The endless hands reached for him like starving ghosts, stretching from every crack and crevice. No matter how many Daemon slashed down, they just kept crawling back — twitching, writhing, gripping.
The king's voice boomed, ragged and furious, rattling the bones still clinging to his ancient armor.
"You must die, Demon king!"
His sword cleaved the air, wild and desperate.
"I will not allow it! You won't rise as him — as the Demon King! I won't let this world suffer again!"
Daemon ducked the swing, his blade colliding with the king's steel, sparks screeching off the edge. The recoil shook his bones, but his hands tightened on the hilt. His heartbeat was steady. His blood was boiling.
"Funny," Daemon hissed, twisting the sword and forcing the king back a step.
"You don't even know me. You don't know what I'll become. You just want to wear the title 'hero' so badly you're willing to erase anything that threatens it."
The king lunged again, faster this time, fury blinding his technique. His golden aura flared like a sun swallowed in smoke.
"I sacrificed everything to stop the Demon King! I lost my people — my kingdom! I paid the price for the world's peace!"
He raised his hand, summoning another wall of cursed hands to flood toward Daemon.
"And now YOU show up — wearing his face, carrying his sword — I will bury you here, even if it means crumbling this whole damn dungeon around us!"
Daemon sidestepped the collapsing floor, the grasping limbs clawing at his coat and boots. His sword blazed, cutting through the mass — but the hands kept coming, endless and suffocating.
He grit his teeth. The truth weighed heavy in his chest.
"You sacrificed your kingdom to stop me once," Daemon muttered under his breath, dark aura crackling around him.
"But this time, you're not standing in the way of a Demon King."
His crimson eyes gleamed, sharp and cold.
"You're standing in the way of someone worse."
The king charged again, his sword glowing, aura spiraling into its final form.
"Judgment Steel!"
The blade was no longer iron — it was a towering, molten pillar of golden light, the full force of a king's fury behind it.
Daemon raised his own sword, whispering low:
"Let's end this."
The moment the blades clashed, the cave split with a roar. The walls fractured, the hands shrieked like banshees, and the king's aura exploded outward — but so did Daemon's, reinforced by the ancient blade pulsing in his grip.
Their clash sent shockwaves ripping through the stone until, finally, the King's strength began to falter.
One clean, vicious strike.
Daemon's blade drove through the old king's chest, piercing the remains of his hollow, broken core.
The hands froze mid-air. The dungeon fell silent.
The king staggered, falling to one knee. His sword cracked, splintering into dust.
His voice came out low, hoarse — almost human again.
"So... the world... chose you, after all..."
Daemon stood there, calm, watching the light fade from the skeleton's empty sockets.
"No, old man," he whispered.
"I chose myself."
The king's bones scattered, the crown rolling across the stone floor, stopping at Daemon's feet.
Daemon picked it up, turning it over in his hand.
"Hero or villain. You lived both... and still died forgotten."
He glanced at the sword — his sword — now resting against his shoulder.
"Don't worry," he muttered.
"I'll make sure the world never forgets me."
The king's bones finally crumbled into dust. The thousand severed hands — once cursed to guard the Demon King's blade — vanished into the earth, dissolving like mist under morning sun. Even the blood river that had stretched for miles began to dry, fading away as if it had never existed.
The silence was heavy. Daemon stood there, sword slack in his grip, his body trembling from the brutal aftermath.
If not for the blade... he'd be dead.
But this gamble? Worth every wound.
His eyes drifted toward the fallen crown, resting quietly in the dirt where the king had last stood. Embedded in its center was a gleaming gemstone — a spiritual stone, pulsing with raw power.
Daemon's lips curved into a slow, dangerous smile.
"I guess I'll gamble my life one more time," he whispered. "I'm still too damn weak."
Without hesitation, he reached down, plucked the stone from the crown, and tossed it into his mouth — swallowing it whole.
The blade at his side pulsed violently, almost like a heartbeat — as if warning him.
The voice whispered in his mind, cold and sharp:
"Reckless... you could die."
But Daemon only chuckled, his teeth bloodstained.
"You wouldn't understand, buddy. This is the price of power."
The moment the stone hit his core, the surge struck him like a lightning bolt.
His body dropped, muscles seizing. His vision blurred as blood streamed from his eyes, ears, and mouth. His core twisted and convulsed under the weight of the raw energy now flooding through him.
"Shit...!" he gasped, clutching his chest, breath ragged and sharp.
His knees buckled. His heartbeat slowed. His lungs strained.
This is it... I miscalculated. This is how I die?
And just as the world tilted toward darkness — the sword glowed.
A soft light broke through the violent storm inside him, and from the core of that light, a figure appeared. A woman, ethereal and unreal, her long white hair floating like silk in water, her crimson eyes gentle but unyielding.
She hovered toward him, her hands resting against his chest.
"Don't worry... father," she whispered softly, her voice like an old song echoing from the past. "I'll save you."
Daemon's head slumped back, the pain overtaking him — but this time, he didn't resist. He closed his eyes and allowed the energy to flow. His breathing steadied, his mind quieted, and in his inner world, he saw it clearly:
The two energies — human and demonic — twisted and coiled like serpents, colliding until they merged. His Astra Core expanded, twice its former size, now pulsating with dark red and black light.
The impurities of his mortal body burned away, melting into nothing.
A surge of power flooded every nerve, every cell.
His body grew taller, stronger — his frame sharpened, muscles defined, his senses stretching beyond human limits.
When he opened his eyes, the world looked different.
The dull ache of weakness was gone.
He had broken through.
Eclipse Star. 7th Rank — Celestial Core.
A level he had never touched in his past life.
He let out a slow, disbelieving laugh, brushing the blood from his face.
"I can't believe I survived it," he muttered, voice hoarse but alive.
And then he saw her — the same woman from before, the one who had saved him. Standing calmly before him, barefoot on the cold stone.
"You..." he whispered.
"You're the sword, aren't you?"
She tilted her head and smiled softly.
"Yes, father."
Daemon stared at her — at the impossible truth now standing before him — and for the first time, the weight of his path ahead felt sharper than ever.
He wasn't alone.