With the Dramatization buff layered on top of Cheok Jun-gyeong’s incarnation body, the fight gradually became evenly matched. And the fact that this duel was even was, apparently, a tremendous shock to the Outer God.

【O O O O O O O】

For a brief moment, a mere constellation displayed martial power equal to an Outer God. Perhaps that alone was enough to fluster the “Founder of the Absolute Throne,” which had reigned over the void for thousands of years.

[Legend, ‘The Heir to an Eternal Name’ scoffs at the Outer God.]

As if it had sensed something ominous in my legend, it even staggered backward, its massive frame lurching as it retreated.

【Kong ■ po ■ ui ■ wang …… ?】

But in the end, both it and I knew. There was nowhere to retreat in this fight. Whoever ran would die.

The moment it released its final roar, we collided once more. Its sword cut my flesh, and my sword tore its bones.

In the storm of slashes where bone and flesh scattered, I was Cheok Jun-gyeong, the greatest sword of Goryeo.

The next instant was when the Outer God’s movements became strange. An ominous force was gathering across its entire body.

I realized it by instinct as well. The next exchange would decide the end of this duel.

【U O O O O O O O O】

Watching its swirling force, I prepared my own final technique.

[Exclusive skill, ‘Incite Lv.10’ activates!]

The strongest technique that could be unleashed with Cheok Jun-gyeong’s body.

Originally, it wasn’t a technique permitted to the Cheok Jun-gyeong of this moment—but if it was just a little, if it was only imitation, maybe it would be possible.

“I am—”

My right arm swelled as if it were about to burst, filled with monstrous strength.

In my head, the pages of the original story turned.

I recalled the strongest Cheok Jun-gyeong I knew. The way that Cheok Jun-gyeong gripped a sword, the way he looked at the world.

And I brought to mind the worst nemesis that stood at the end of his gaze.

“The one who cut an indescribable, distant vastness—”

An enemy far more terrifying, more powerful, and more horrific than the being before me now.

“Cheok Jun-gyeong!”

In the end, Cheok Jun-gyeong created the technique that could cut it down.

His fourth form.

The Fourth Sword That Cuts the Void.

Maybe my proficiency was catastrophically lacking. Along with a sensation like my grip was being torn apart, an overwhelming limp exhaustion washed over my entire body. It felt like every legend embedded in the incarnation body was being wrung dry.

With a scream, I swung the sword. Space tore open before my eyes, and my vision was dyed white.

[Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint ‘Stage 3’ is forcibly terminated!]

The soul lodged within Cheok Jun-gyeong’s incarnation body couldn’t withstand the shock and was thrown out.

When I returned to my own incarnation body, it felt like someone had smashed my head with a hammer. I was dizzy, and it was hard to breathe. For some reason, my legs wouldn’t move. When I staggered and forced my upper body up, everything below my knees was simply gone.

[Exclusive skill, ‘Fourth Wall’ activates!]

Had I been swept up in the backlash?

It had been that kind of collision. It was a clash between Cheok Jun-gyeong’s strongest secret technique and an Outer God’s force.

Through the dust that had settled in a pale haze, I saw Cheok Jun-gyeong’s incarnation body collapse, its strength spent. It looked like it had taken enormous damage.

What happened to the Outer God?

【Ka ka ka ka ka】

A nasty laugh echoed from somewhere. In the swirling dust storm, I saw the silhouette of the Outer God, staggering as it stood. It seemed the last blow had been lacking.

Even so, it must have suffered a fatal hit as well, because its height had shrunk rapidly. The giant body that had filled the sky was now about the size of an adult man.

【With you r hi sto ry】

As long as Dramatization hadn’t ended, there was still a chance.

But it looked like it knew even that.

【You ca n’t ki ll me】

Maybe that clever Outer God had anticipated this moment. That was why it had wrecked the legs of the incarnation body I would return to in advance.

【Ju st li ke th at ti me】

Ten steps. If I could just take ten steps and drive my sword into its heart, that would be enough—but I had no strength left for that.

[Dramatization ends.]

Even Dramatization, my last hope, vanished.

As I watched it approach step by step, I thought and thought.

It was strange.

Even facing a crisis of life and death, I wasn’t tense—strangely, not at all.

Maybe that was because—

—Youngest.

Because Kim Dokja was inside me.

“Yes.”

Or because I had changed that much, into someone like Kim Dokja.

—Let’s use that.

I nodded and looked around.

「This ‘time stratum’ is a page from ‘Ways of Survival’ that I know.」

The scenery of a ruined Seoul. Collapsed buildings. A place where “civilization” had once existed.

As it happened, I had one “horror” I could use in an environment like this.

[Legend fragment, ‘Remote Signal Controller’ begins its story.]

[Disaster-grade horror, ‘Alien Traffic Light’ is reinterpreted.]

In an instant, the thing that had been coming straight at me across the road hesitated. It must have realized instinctively that something was wrong.

“Caught on?”

When it stood on the four-lane road, looking around in confusion, I grinned and said,

“Don’t jaywalk, you bastard.”

[Disaster-grade horror, ‘Alien Traffic Light’ activates!]

Along with a red traffic light glowing in the distance, something unseen came rushing in and pummeled its entire body.

If it had been in its original state, it wouldn’t have even flinched at an impact like this—but now was different. Its body, after taking the Fourth Sword That Cuts the Void, was already little more than rags.

With a horrifying scream, a series of deafening booms exploded before my eyes. I could see shattered legends leaving long skid marks across the ground.

The Founder of the Absolute Throne, breaking apart in real time in a grotesque way, reached toward me.

【A ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) A A A A A A】

An Outer God’s cause of death being a “traffic accident.”

It was an absurdly hollow ending for an Outer God that had ruled a world.

[You have slain the end-of-the-world-grade horror, ‘Founder of the Absolute Throne’!]

I watched its perished legends scatter into the void.

Old legends were being freed from it. Like snow falling upward, the legends rose into the sky, and I stared up at them blankly.

[All horrors of the apocalypse region are startled by your feat.]

Forgotten legends, legends in the process of being forgotten.

Unread words that had become horrors in the gaps between sentences glimmered in the air as if dancing.

This world is full of legends.

In that moment, for some reason, I felt like I could understand—at least a little—why the second Kim Dokja was staying in this “apocalypse region.”

[Interpretation proposals and reward distribution will take time.]

[The resolution objective of the time stratum has been completed!]

[You have acquired a new ‘legend’!]

As the scenery of the stratum collapsed, my consciousness blurred. It was probably because I’d spilled too many legends.

[The Recorders of Horror show interest in your ‘interpretation’.]

Through my fading consciousness, I heard the recorders’ messages.

[Recorder of Horror, ‘The Fox Who Commands the Sky’, takes interest in your interpretation.]

[Recorder of Horror, ‘Wolf Prince’, takes interest in your interpretation.]

[Recorder of Horror, ‘Demon King of the Theater’, takes interest in your interpretation.]

……

[Recorder of Horror, ‘Designer of the False End’, takes interest in your interpretation.]

*

When I opened my eyes again, a week had passed. How did I know that the moment I opened them?

[Remaining time: 21 days 2 hours.]

The countdown in the air told me.

The instant I saw the number, a flood of emotions crossed my mind.

The thought that only twenty-one days remained until the End. And—

「I killed the Founder of the Absolute Throne.」

When I pulled back the blanket, the two legs that had been cut off were attached again. Was that the power of the “horror ward”? Or had they treated me with some other special horror? I didn’t know. Seeing my legs perfectly fine only made it harder to be certain.

Was it really true that I killed the Founder of the Absolute Throne?

That terrifying “Outer God,” of all things?

[You have acquired a new legend.]

Sure enough, the message blinking in the air proved that what I’d done had truly happened.

Even if I’d borrowed Cheok Jun-gyeong’s incarnation body and used the trick called Dramatization, I had definitely killed an Outer God.

And this was the sweet reward for that courage.

With trembling hands, I reached toward the legend message.

Even if the fame of the legend would be lower since the constellations hadn’t been watching, I still thought I’d obtained an unbelievable legend.

But then.

[Legend, ‘The Heir to an Eternal Name’ devoured the new legend.]

I thought I had to be seeing it wrong, so I checked the message again and again.

[Legend, ‘The Heir to an Eternal Name’ burps lightly.]

[Legend, ‘The Heir to an Eternal Name’ asks what you’re staring at.]

No, are you insane?

[Legend, ‘The Heir to an Eternal Name’ declares it’s sleepy and will take a short nap.]

I was speechless. This damn bastard ate the legend I just got?

“You bastard! Spit it out! Spit it out!”

But Eternal didn’t respond at all.

Thinking about it, I had forgotten to feed it for quite a long time. For a while, I hadn’t obtained any new Kim Dokja fragments, and I hadn’t found any legends worth giving it either.

I thought maybe it had taken the legend as payment, since I’d borrowed a lot of its power this time.

And of course, not getting a new legend didn’t necessarily mean I’d only lost something. In the end, 「The Heir to an Eternal Name」 was my legend too.

In other words, I just didn’t get the new legend—my existing legend had grown stronger.

I could tell the moment I slowly stood and looked into the ward’s mirror.

My force had risen.

Before, I could barely measure up to a “great-person-grade constellation,” but now the force flowing from my entire body was clearly approaching legend-grade.

Only now could I properly use the power of the “Demon King of Salvation.”

Since I still didn’t have a powerful incarnation body, it would be difficult to throw around the power of a legend-grade constellation freely, but even so, the fact that I had reached complete force made me oddly excited.

That was when the hospital room door opened.

[Looks like you had an enlightenment.]

“Master.”

It was Cheok Jun-gyeong and Anna Croft.

*

For a full ten minutes, Anna Croft told me everything that had happened. The summary itself was simple.

The Transcendents of the Transcendent Alliance had been shocked by the fight I’d put on.

Some of the lower-ranked Transcendents were even so inspired by my battle that they jumped back into a time stratum to train.

“That’s not something you can summarize that easily. Do you have any idea how shocked everyone was?”

“Ah, it’s fine. It’s not like I did it alone.”

In the first place, without Cheok Jun-gyeong, it wasn’t a strategy I could even attempt.

I glanced at Cheok Jun-gyeong. He probably had a lot he was curious about.

What the technique called the Fourth Sword That Cuts the Void was. How I could possess his incarnation body.

But he didn’t ask anything. I couldn’t tell if it was simply his nature or consideration, but either way, it was a welcome thing for me.

[Hmph. You two. Did you hear about my disciple’s exploits?]

It was like he was just a shameless disciple-bragger.

For a while, Cheok Jun-gyeong tormented the people in the nearby wards. Only when the Transcendents—sick of hearing him boast about his disciple—started to slip away did he finally turn to me.

[Are you going to meet the recorders?]

So it was finally time.

[The recorders are very interested in the ‘horror’ you interpreted this time. You might get a better reward than expected. Because you’re the first one who’s ever killed that insane bastard.]

“They’re giving rewards?”

[What. Don’t tell me you entered the stratum without knowing anything?]

My purpose had only been to meet the “Recorders of Horror,” not to wring something out of them.

But from what I was hearing, “interpretation” of horrors seemed to be treated as something quite valuable in this apocalypse region.

[Transcendents who obtain unique interpretations can trade with the recorders and enter a ‘hidden time stratum’.]

A hidden time stratum.

[Normal time strata barely let you raise your transcendent type by a single stage, and the training time isn’t short. But the time strata those guys have are different. There are strata that let you skip several stages at once, and strata that rapidly shorten the time needed for a breakthrough. Not only that—depending on which stratum you choose—]

Cheok Jun-gyeong looked at me with a face that seemed to weigh something for a moment, then continued.

[You could become a demon king, or an angel. Or even an Outer God.]

Just by going through a special time stratum, that was possible?

I was startled, but I didn’t show it.

Power gained quickly always has a price. No matter if it was a time stratum of the Recorders of Horror, there was no guarantee it was an exception to that rule.

Soon, we followed Cheok Jun-gyeong toward the recorder’s room.

“Why are you coming too, Ms. Kim Anna?”

“I’m meeting the recorders this time too.”

“Did you kill an end-of-the-world-grade horror too?”

Honestly, I was surprised. I did think highly of Anna Croft’s potential, but she had already interpreted an “end-of-the-world-grade horror”?

Anna Croft answered with a somewhat dejected face.

“I’m not on your level, but I obtained one unusual horror interpretation in my own way.”

From the look of it, in the week I’d been unconscious, Anna Croft had solved quite a few horrors. Among them, even if it wasn’t end-of-the-world-grade, there had apparently been one disaster-grade interpretation that was enough to catch the recorders’ eyes.

“Ms. Kim Anna.”

“Yes?”

“For some reason, I feel like you were really good at office life.”

“What does that mean?”

“You probably spoke Spanish well too. Definitely.”

“Is this another one of those strange jokes from last time?”

As we walked down the ward street, I could feel nearby Transcendents whispering while looking at me. I hadn’t even been in the alliance that long, and already being stared at like this was a burden.

I hid behind Ms. Kim Anna appropriately and followed behind Cheok Jun-gyeong.

A little later, the place we arrived at was a small door located in the room of time strata. On the black-painted door were various pictographic symbols that suggested stars, the moon, the sun, birds, wolves, and more.

“Do we open this door?”

[Yeah. Think of the recorder you want to meet and open the door, and you can enter their dwelling.]

I recalled the messages I’d heard right before I passed out.

Messages sent by the Recorders of Horror who wanted to meet me.

[Currently, a total of 4 ‘Recorders of Horror’ wish to make contact with you.]

Maybe because I looked worried, Cheok Jun-gyeong added a warning.

[Remember this, disciple. You can only trade with one recorder.]

Only one recorder I could meet.

I checked the list of “Recorders of Horror” I could choose from.

My choice was already decided.