I raised the Keepsake Sword high and brought it down in a vertical arc—a lethal strike capable of cleaving even a dragon in two.
"…!"
Faced with the blow, the Demigod’s eyes sharpened. As if repelled by his very gaze, the trajectory of my slash began to veer off course. My aim hadn't failed; rather, the Demigod was warping space itself, distorting the area around him to evade the strike.
But that was a naive defense. I had already anticipated interference of this level.
In a heartbeat, I adjusted my strike. With a sharp flick of my wrist, I corrected the angle and followed through with the slash. Realizing his evasion had failed, the Demigod teleported. Predicting his destination, I immediately transitioned into a rearward thrust.
The tip of my blade appeared to be buried deep in the Demigod’s chest. However, upon closer inspection, it hadn't actually connected. A hollow void had opened up precisely where his chest should have been.
Did he teleport only the point of impact somewhere else?
Impressed by his sheer dexterity, I swept my sword out in a wide horizontal arc. The Demigod teleported once more, retreating far into the distance to create space.
We stood facing each other across the gap. Quite some time had passed since the battle began, and the morning sun was now beginning to crest the horizon. The Demigod was gasping for air, his stamina clearly depleted by the continuous use of high-level magic. While he possessed a vast reservoir of magic power, it wasn't enough to sustain a prolonged battle of this intensity. He was fundamentally at a disadvantage compared to me, as I received a near-bottomless supply of magic power from the Valley of the Dead.
The Demigod wiped a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth.
"I... I can't afford to lose here. My mission to save the world..."
Watching him, I felt a sense of growing incongruity. My attacks shouldn't have dealt a decisive blow yet. Though I had severed parts of his body several times, he had instantly reattached them. Every spell I cast had been neutralized by his space magic. I hadn't inflicted any wounds that should cause such visible distress. Even accounting for his extreme magic consumption, his physical symptoms seemed too severe.
I focused my gaze on him, visually analyzing his condition. Once I realized the truth, I voiced my observation.
"You're shaving away your own life force with every spell you cast. Why be so desperate?"
"Because the death of the Demon King... is the only path to peace for the people."
The Demigod clutched his chest and coughed violently. He spat a mouthful of blood onto the ground, then stomped on it with a look of loathing.
"Until recently, I was a nameless mage. Just a mediocre man with the barest aptitude for space magic."
He began to confess his past. The fact that he was a nobody matched my expectations. Had he been a figure of any renown before becoming a hero, my spies would have uncovered his identity. That they couldn't meant he had left no legacy behind.
The Demigod glanced down at the blood staining the earth. After taking a deep breath, he looked at me.
"Are you familiar with the hero-creating ritual magic? That forbidden art performed in the Holy Staff Kingdom."
"I am. The Steel Knight and the Valkyrie... you underwent the same procedure, didn't you?"
"I did. We were the ones who were compatible with the art. However, I am different from the other two. I was originally just a powerless civilian who volunteered for the ritual."
The Steel Knight and the Valkyrie had likely been scouted through established channels. As renowned warriors, they were approached by the state because they showed potential. Their candidacy was likely decided long before the ritual was even viable.
The Demigod, however, had offered himself up as a test subject. If he was telling the truth, he had been nothing more than an obscure mage. His aptitude for space magic would have been practically useless in a conventional sense. Space magic, which consumes far more magic power than other disciplines and is notoriously difficult to control, hasn't even been properly systematized due to the rarity of its users. To an ordinary person, it was a cumbersome, half-baked talent.
"There were many volunteers, but every single one of them died except for me. I alone survived to become a false hero. The ritual granted me power incomparable to anything I had known before. But even then, I knew it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough to rival the Demon King."
The Demigod glared at me, his eyes sharp and intense. His bloodshot gaze held a bottomless, obsessive tenacity. Though his expression remained mostly stoic, his eyes betrayed his inner fervor.
"I subjected my body to twelve additional forbidden arts. It was a localized hell—a suffering indistinguishable from death—but I endured. All for the sake of the Demon King’s subjugation, and to restore peace to this world."
The magic formulas etched across his skin were likely one of those forbidden arts. His disheveled white hair was almost certainly a side effect. If he had pushed himself that far, it was no wonder that every spell cost him a piece of his life. In truth, it was a miracle he was still standing.
It must be his willpower.
His sheer obsession with obtaining the power to slay the Demon King had seemingly manifested a miracle beyond the reach of logic.
Suddenly, the Demigod clasped his hands together and began to surge his magic power. He closed his eyes and began to mutter a low string of words. It looked like an incantation.
I readjusted my stance, my senses on high alert.
He has been casting without incantations until now... Why start now?
A cold sense of dread washed over me. I unleashed a lightning strike laden with miasma, but the bolt dissipated before it could reach him, sucked into a spatial distortion. He appeared to be full of openings, yet magic still couldn't touch him.
In that time, the Demigod’s spell reached completion. His magic power radiated outward, seizing control of the surrounding space. Fissures tore through the wasteland as it awaited the dawn. The sky and the earth began to peel away indiscriminately, giving way to a void of pure white.
I tried to counter with my own magic, but none of it took hold.
The world was turning inside out. That was the only way to describe the phenomenon.
In an instant, the wasteland vanished, leaving us standing in a featureless void. The Demigod lowered his hands, staggering as if he were about to collapse. He was drenched in a deluge of sweat, and his eyes struggled to focus. His skin was as pale as a corpse's.
Despite his state, his voice remained steady.
"This is a subspace. Our connection to the outside world has been severed. Since you are isolated, you should no longer be able to draw magic power from your source."
"…I see."
He was right. My connection to the Valley of the Dead had been cut. I could no longer benefit from that near-infinite supply. He had pushed himself to the brink of death just to force this moment of vulnerability upon me.
The Demigod coughed violently again, thick blood leaking through the gaps of his fingers. He pulled his hand away, revealing a palm stained crimson, and issued a raspy declaration.
"The Hero of this world is dead. Therefore, I must be the one to crush evil. I will not be defeated."