A Villain's Will to Survive

Chapter 315: Breakdown and Repair (3)

In the Imperial Palace corridors, I was walking through a place that resembled a spiderweb or a maze, whose connections were entirely unknown.

Thud, thud.

Only my footsteps clearly echoed in the silent darkness as at the far end of that corridor, a person stood visible, as if waiting for me and watching me.

Thud, thud.

He was the last follower, the closest to God, marking the end of this world’s narrative, and I approached him without hesitation.

“Quay.”

Quay swayed like a ghost as he looked at me.

“Let us go to the Altar’s Land of Destruction,” I continued.

At the mention of the Land of Destruction, Quay looked into my eyes without saying a word.

“Let us go to your temple,” I added.

At the mention of the temple, a question clouded Quay’s eyes, but only for a moment.

“It appears you already know my mind,” Quay replied.

I nodded.

At that moment, mana congealed beside Quay, and the mana, gathering like a whirlwind, formed a shape—no—rather, to life—the Courier.

“Let’s go,” Quay said, waving his hand.

Then, the mana of the Couriers wrapped around Quay and me, and I closed my eyes for a moment in the mist before opening them again.

“We are here,” Quay added.

I looked around the area and saw the Land of Destruction, a land where no life could exist, and a cursed expanse where demonic energy undulated, with a lighthouse standing tall within it.

“A lighthouse, is it?” I said.

In the middle of the Land of Destruction, there was a towering structure that seemed to reach the sky.

“Yes, you recognize it at first glance. Creáto called it a tower, you know,” Quay replied with a smile.

I looked upon the lighthouse with my Comprehension and Sharp Eyesight, and all its hidden functions, intentions, meanings, and will were understood in a single glance.

“… There remain insufficient aspects,” I said.

That was the conclusion.

“Was it not, then, by your own hand that it was designed? For I find your capabilities fall short of one who claims to be a God,” I continued, looking back at Quay.

“Deculein, you already know that puppets have a lifespan,” Quay replied, a bitter smile on his lips as he poked my shoulder with his finger and pointed to his own body. “I am incomplete. No, I am not myself. I am merely myself imitating myself—really just a puppet. My true self is at the outer edge of the world.”

Then, Quay turned to me, pouting his lips.

“Because you interfered with me, I don’t have much time left.”

If he aimed to build it for absolute completion, he could have, but the issue was time, and since Quay was still in his puppet state—a false body with clear limitations—he saw no need to pursue complete perfection.

“Deculein, do you now understand why I came to find you?” Quay asked.

“I will cooperate,” I replied, nodding.

Quay’s face flinched, and he tilted his head, looking back at me.

Indeed, it was an unexpectedly immediate reply, I thought.

“You intend to observe comets with this lighthouse and destroy the continent, do you not?”

“It is a reset. Washing away original sin and regenerating purity once more.”

“That is destruction.”

At my words, Quay shook his head but offered no opposition, for we were, after all, parallel lines incapable of persuading each other.

“However, your and my act of building this lighthouse together, even if our purposes differ, can be said to be the same process,” I continued.

Quay was silent for a moment, as if he understood what I was about to say without a word.

“This lighthouse is incomplete.”

This lighthouse was now merely a structure capable of observing the distant universe.

“I know, but it’s enough to reset the continent,” Quay replied.

Quay’s words were, of course, factual, for with the comet’s impending arrival soon, enough power would be unleashed to wipe the continent clean.

“The claim of its incompleteness, I note, finds no refutation from your lips.”

However, if Quay and I had combined our strengths, this lighthouse would have been more than merely an observatory of the universe and could have been advanced into a lighthouse capable of observing anything that existed.

“From the beginning, sufficient and insufficient are hardly distinguishable,” Quay replied, a smile appearing on his lips.

“To complete the lighthouse, you require my strength, and I, too, need your strength to observe God.”

At this moment, I was demanding Quay’s temporary cooperation, a method that might be tantamount to betraying the Empress and the continent, even if it served a purpose for the grander cause.

I wondered whether this went against Deculein’s Principle… but that was not the case.

“Even if God were to descend again, this moment and my will would not change,” Quay said, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Rather, even God would desire the continent’s destruction, for the descendant of the godslayer is corrupting this continent.”

“Quay,” I said, looking at him.

Quay, too, looked up at my face.

For some reason, Quay was deserving of pity and was also laughable.

“God does not dictate the will of His creations.”

Quay remained silent.

“The decision, it ever belonged to you.”

Quay listened to my words in silence.

“It was you indeed who interpreted God’s revelation as godslay. It was you who offered prayers across ten thousand years, and in the end, it was your very self who was isolated from the world.”

Quay was a being whose very existence had shattered after serving God throughout his entire lifetime.

“You, who at this moment consecrate yourself to become a God, and you, who pronounce the continent’s destruction, are both merely aspects of you.”

Then, a smile spread on Quay’s lips, but it was not a comforting sentiment and rather was a cold inferno, a blend of hostility, fury, and profound chaos.

“In the end, the decision rested upon you. Therefore, at this very moment, you are proving God’s revelation.”

“… What revelation are you speaking of?” Quay asked in a chilling voice.

“That God, by His own will, chose death for your freedom. His death was, indeed, suicide,” I replied.

Even Quay, who had lived his entire life only for God, gained his own will once God had died—this was the proof.

“Not that your indulgence led to God’s death, but rather that God died by His own will for your freedom.”

Fwoosh—!

Without warning, a red energy bloomed from Quay’s body, and it was, as expected, a death variable.

“God does not commit such a humanlike act of dying by His own will—”

“No, it is because God can even choose death by His own will that He is God. By dying Himself, God granted us the very essence of purity and primal origin—death.”

“… Then,” Quay replied, gritting his teeth. His death variable, cascading like a waterfall, pricked my neck. “Why did I not die and remain?”

Quay’s voice brimmed with rage, and he, who had maintained his composure until now, was revealing his genuine emotions.

“It has been ten thousand years. Do you think God did not know that a being like me would be born during that time?” Quay asked.

“He would not have known,” I replied, looking into his eyes.

“… You are wrong. You do not know God.”

“Then, he would have known.”

“Are you playing word games with me?” Quay said, his lips tightening.

“Word games, you say? How would a human know God’s will? However, one thing is certain,” I replied, shaking my head.

I turned my eyes once more to the lighthouse and silently watched the dark construction.

“That is why I must have come here.”

Quay remained unresponsive, and I wondered if he was momentarily stunned by my astounding ego and self-perception.

However, my words were neither a petty joke nor a mere mischief.

“Either God Himself was unaware of your existence and hastily prepared me, or He knew and arranged it beforehand. Either interpretation is possible. The heart called faith belongs not to God, but to the follower,” I continued.

“How arrogant. Even if your soul is special, it is not God’s will.”

“You are the arrogant one, Quay, for I am, I assure you, not merely special.”

I vaguely and naturally realized, as I stood in this Land of Destruction looking at that lighthouse and contemplating Him who would be watching me from somewhere high above, that I was merely not of a special standing.

“The I of this world is unique.”

Quay remained silent.

“Moreover, I am of a greatness comparable to the God whom you served.”

At that moment, Quay’s face went blank, but my words were neither false nor an exaggeration, for I—Kim Woo-Jin, residing within Deculein who descended here from outside this world—was no different from the person who created this world.

“This moment, it seems, I comprehend why I came to this place,” I continued.

Quay remained silent.

“Yours is the credit, Quay.”

Quay was silent for a long while, but his death variable subsided soon, and his bewildered eyes soon turned into a look of amusement.

“You mean the reason you came here was me?” Quay asked.

I did not bother to answer Quay.

“I will cooperate,” I replied, offering him my hand.

“… Hmm.”

“You, too, should cooperate with me.”

At the very moment I spoke those words, I felt an ache, as if a dagger had been thrust into some corner of my heart or perhaps my very soul. This was probably because, regardless of its ultimate objective, this particular undertaking was, in essence, indistinguishable from an act of betrayal against Sophien.

“Your Empress, whom you serve, would be disheartened, wouldn’t she?” Quay added, his voice underscoring the point.

“… By all accounts, my remaining days are few. Moreover, this will, at last, be Deculein’s demise.”

The Altar’s agents were multiplying across the continent due to the potion, and the reason I chose not to suppress those caught by the temptation of power was that this was ultimately Quay’s desired outcome—internecine conflict where humans would kill each other, leading the continent to ruin.

“Deculein’s demise—your entire house might be annihilated, you know?” Quay asked. “You, despite being the Empress’s Elite Guard, will become a corrupted traitor, a collaborator of the Altar.”

I cooperated with the Altar and contributed to the lighthouse’s completion—no, I personally designed, reconstructed, and brought the lighthouse to full completion.

“Or a top war criminal who—blinded by power—sought to destroy the continent. You might become an even greater Black Beast than your mentor Rohakan.”

Regardless of whether the Altar was victorious or defeated, the fact that I had cooperated with Quay would be revealed, and it would stain my name and house with disgrace.

“No, it will happen. Unquestionably.”

“I am unconcerned,” I replied, nodding.

However, it mattered not to me, for Deculein was, from the start, neither a sycophant, nor a loyal servant, nor an opportunist, nor a heretic.

Moreover, he was not a petty individual who valued only his own comfort, advancement, and success, nor a fool who would destroy the continent solely for Her Majesty, the Empress, nor a paranoiac obsessed with principles, nor a weak man blinded by mere love.

“I already know my identity.”

I belonged to none of those.

I was merely…

“A villain.”

The villain, the villain named Deculein.

Quay’s eyes, watching me, trembled slightly.

“Indeed, I am nothing but a villain.”

Just as a hero drives out evil through his goodness, a villain preserves goodness through his evil.

“And it is only right that one such as I should fade in concert with evil,” I concluded.

The future that Quay desired, meaning the bloody tragedy of humans slaughtering one another, would not come to pass as long as a great evil representing that tragedy remained.

***

Meanwhile, Yulie was sitting at the table playing poker with Leo, Ria, and Carlos from the Red Garnet Adventure Team.

“But why are we not allowed to go outside, Ria?” Leo asked.

“There’s something called a Courier. I call,” Ria replied, placing chips on the table.

“Courier?”

“Yes, it’s a demonic presence that delivers humans anywhere, and I believe the Altar released it in the Imperial Palace for containment.”

At the mention of Altar, Yulie pricked up her ears, listening closely to their voices.

“Then if we get caught by them, we might be instantly teleported to the Land of Destruction?”

“That is possible, but one might also be moved to other abnormal places, not just the Land of Destruction.”

“I raise.”

At that moment, Carlos, a child who instantly doubled the bet, caused Yulie to flinch and look back at him while Leo and Ria watched Yulie with intrigued eyes.

“Knight Yulie, what will she do?” Ria said, commenting as if in a commentary.

Yulie pressed her lips together as her hand was a two-pair of sevens, but the bet was a staggering ten thousand elne.

Of course, these chips were generously provided by the Imperial Palace, and the game was meant to foster friendships rather than actual gambling. However, for Yulie to step forward at this level was far too insignificant.

“… I fold,” Yulie said, laying down her hand.

“Oh, come on. What’s this? You’re such a scaredy-cat,” Ria said with a chuckle.

“… Yes, that’s correct.”

I will not fall for taunting. Anyway, I just need to win the next round, Yulie thought.

“Then let’s reveal our hands. I have a pair of sixes.”

The hand Ria revealed was a pair of sixes, a rather weak hand.

Yulie chuckled internally, but the cards revealed afterward were all hands that did not form even a single pair…

“… I won.”

Yulie, who had been watching Ria take the pot with envious eyes, pouted her lips and shuffled the cards.

“But are you all aware of the news spreading in the Imperial University lately?” Yulie asked cautiously.

“A news?” Ria replied, her response being the first.

“Yes.”

Ria looked into Yulie’s eyes, and Yulie, in turn, met her eyes, assessing her for a moment.

Is she a righteous one? Yulie thought.

“Is it about a potion?” Ria said.

Yulie flinched, her body trembling.

Has the news really already spread widely?

“Yes.”

“Well… while most ordinary people might not know about that, adventurers like us all do. That potion is famous even among adventurers, you know.”

“Oh, do adventurers also drink things like that potion?”

“Some do, but not as many as knights or mages, because they became adventurers precisely to avoid being tied down. However…” Ria replied, narrowing her eyes slightly with suspicion. “What about you?”

“I do not rely on such potions.”

“Then that’s a relief,” Ria said with a chuckle.

However, the sight of Ria smiling was, for some reason, strange, and Yulie’s eyes instinctively narrowed, as it was a face she felt she had seen somewhere before.

This child is somehow familiar to me. To be familiar to me now… means, in other words, to have been familiar to me ten years ago…

“Oh?”

A certain scene came to Yulie’s mind—more precisely, the image of a woman from a distant memory, unclear as to when or where it had been seen—a woman from Deculein’s academy days with whom he would secretly meet and smile.

“What is it?” Ria said, tilting her head.

“Do you, by any chance, know Yuara?” Yulie asked, her eyes wide.

At that moment…

Pzzzzzzt—!

Without warning, the ceiling lamp was destroyed, and the window shattered.

“Who is it?!” Yulie said, her hand closing around her blade.

Ria, Leo, and Carlos too wrapped their bodies in mana, and in the sudden darkness that enveloped the room, an unnerving demonic presence appeared, radiating a chilling aura.

“… Shh. It’s a Courier. There’s no immediate threat to life, so don’t be too nervous,” Ria said, taking Yulie’s hand.

Yulie flinched in surprise.

“Let’s all hold hands. If we do that, at least one person won’t be separated,” Ria concluded, speaking like an expert.

Yulie nodded at Ria’s inexplicably trustworthy words, gripping her sword in one hand and Ria’s hand tightly in the other.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!