#110. End

Dominique had been staring endlessly at the Underworld Tree while waiting for her master to return, but her eyes suddenly opened wide and she began to stagger.

“Ah…”

Letting out an agonizing moan, she was barely able to remain on her feet. But just moments later, she staggered again, and her face turned pale as if she were about to faint.

“Again… Once again, Master is…”

An overwhelming influx of malice, greed, and deep, deep hatred that surpassed her ability to empathize began flowing through her mind.

Belatedly realizing what was happening, Angela tried to run toward her and help, but instead of accepting her helping hand, Dominique screamed fearfully, “E-Everyone needs to get out of here!”

As soon as Dominique finished speaking, Quantus shouted, “Fall back, you fools!” The Nagas quickly began to withdraw.

However, there was a problem with the Einherjar. Morrigan cried out as loud as she could, but the Einherjar, who knew nothing beyond fighting, were sluggish and showed little interest in what was happening.

Goaaaaaar.

At that moment, disaster struck.

“Keeeeeeek!”

The Einherjar’s flesh disintegrated and their bones melted. Their physical forms disintegrated quickly, just as when they had been Moai before turning into Einherjar. In the past, they had retained their physical forms no matter how many times they were destroyed. This time, however, their bodies completely melted away and turned into pools of blood.

It was all due to the enormous amount of energy that had suddenly radiated from the Underworld Tree. It was the divinity of the Underworld Tree, and it was powerful enough to destroy even the spirit of a mighty Lord just by looking at them and showing any sign of interest.

But now, that divinity spreading out in all directions, with the Underworld Tree as its epicenter, was much denser and more powerful than ever. It was so powerful that it was difficult to even breathe properly, as if the surrounding air had been replaced completely by divine energy.

That was a terrible disaster in itself. Of the tens of thousands of Einherjar who had survived the terrifying battle previously, most of them melted in the face of the overwhelming divinity. The damage was so immense that only a couple thousand Einherjar survived.

Fortunately, thanks to their swift actions and movements, there had been no damage to the Nagas.

“More! Fall back even more!” Dominique continued to warn the rest of the Nagas, as the catastrophe wasn’t over yet. “Get away! You fools! Forget about formations or anything, just get the hell out of here!”

Even after suffering terrible losses, the Einherjar still continued to move slowly, and eventually, even those who had survived the initial wave of divinity from the Underworld Tree began to be caught up in the divinity as it started to expand outward.

“Ah… This… is a nightmare,” Morrigan muttered to herself in despair, seeing the divinity that seemed to chase them no matter how much they retreated. Even then, she dared not look at the Underworld Tree, which could be said to be the root cause of all this.

In the face of the Underworld Tree’s overwhelming presence that felt as if it could blind her just by looking at it, Morrigan was too afraid to turn her head. She wasn’t the only one, either. Among those who hastily made their retreat, none dared to look back.

They all knew that should they stop and turn to look at the Underworld Tree, they would be overwhelmed by its otherworldly energy and wouldn’t be able to take another step ever again.

Given the situation, stopping was no different from certain death.

“What’s going on…”

Now that almost all the Highlords had been annihilated, even Angela—the only remaining Highlord with the exception of Kim Jin-Woo—was so overwhelmed by the divinity of the Underworld Tree that she was lost for words.

“Master has…” While in Angela’s embrace, Dominique began to speak, seeming as if she were gasping for breath. “...begun his battle with the Underworld Tree.”

“What!?”

Angela couldn’t comprehend what Dominique had said. Wasn’t Master supposed to receive a huge reward for being the rightful King of the Underworld in return for finding the Wish Stone? She simply couldn’t accept that that same Master had begun battling the Underworld Tree.

“Master didn’t want to sit on a throne someone else had prepared for him. He hated everyone who messed with his life, and he didn’t want anyone else to control his life anymore,” Dominique explained.

“No way. Is that why…” Angela began.

“That’s right. Master decided not to be crowned King by the Mysteries of the Underworld, but decided to crown himself King.”

The Tyrant was determined to become a true king, not a puppet king whom the Mysteries of the Underworld could undo whenever they wanted.

“But this isn’t even a fair fight!” Angela screamed after the situation had been clarified.

Master’s existence itself had almost collapsed just from facing the Underworld Tree’s divinity. There was no way he could win in the face of such an overwhelming gap in power.

“Master thought that so long as he had the Wish Stone, he would be able to withstand the divinity of the Underworld Tree,” Dominique said.

“Even so…” Angela looked as if she were about to go looking for her master at any moment.

“Have faith in Master just a little longer.” Despite still looking pale and tired, Dominique was barely able to raise her hand to dissuade Angela. Her gaze was directed toward the summit of the Underworld Tree as she continued, “Truth be told, Master’s thoughts don't seem wrong.”

“Ah…” Angela followed Dominique’s gaze and turned toward where she was looking, before letting out an ambiguous sound that could have been a cheer or a gasp of astonishment. In her sight, she saw a black snake with its head raised sharply at the highest point of the great Underworld Tree.

“And it seems Master has completely made the power of Night his own,” Dominique continued.

The snake’s scales were darker than the black shadows of the Underworld, and its vertically slit pupils were redder and more ominous than those of the most vicious of creatures. The Black Serpent was insidious and terrifying, and was as big as the Underworld Tree itself.

Skrrrrrrt.

Akin to the sound of gnawing at bones and scraping nails, the ungodly noise of the black scales scraping against everything they touched resounded outward. And as that terrible sound spread across the Underworld, the divinity of the Underworld Tree began to fade.

Surprisingly, the Black Serpent was holding its own against the divinity of the Underworld Tree. That was why it was able to protect its existence from disintegrating even in that dense divinity, and in fact was able to further reveal itself.

The Black Serpent wrapped around the huge trunk of the Underworld Tree several times, as if it were constricting its prey.

Craaaaack.

The branches of the Underworld Tree, once thought to be indestructible, began to break, and their leaves that were as wide as the ceiling of the Underworld started to fall.

“Ah.” Angela couldn’t help but gasp in astonishment at the sight. Blue light began to fall across the Underworld like snow. Witnessing that fantastic and dreamy sight, she couldn’t help but momentarily forget about the situation she was in.

“Keeeeeeeeeek!”

But not everyone was admiring the sight the way she was. Unlike the Nagas who had followed Dominique’s warning and retreated to quite a distance, the Einherjar, who were still far behind the Nagas, melted away as soon as they came into contact with the falling leaves.

“Don’t stand there like idiots! You’ll melt away!” Morrigan finally snapped.

The Einherjar belatedly began using their respective abilities to set up a huge barrier above themselves. However, it was all for naught. Whether it was the thick iron shields the Einherjar carried or their barrier created with mystical powers, the blue snow melted them all away and even consumed their respective owners.

Morrigan had persevered and encouraged the Einherjar until the end, but she couldn’t hold on any longer and was forced to withdraw. After their retreat, fewer than a thousand Einherjar remained.

Even as the Einherjar were swept away and suffered colossal damage to the point that their race was driven to near-extinction, the Black Serpent and the Underworld Tree were still fighting.

***

The Black Serpent wrapped its body around the trunk of the Underworld Tree and pruned its branches, while the Underworld Tree continued to unleash waves of divine energy that melted the Serpent’s scales away.

The vast forest surrounding the two had disappeared without a trace, but the fight showed no signs of ending any time soon. While the Black Serpent was several times larger and more powerful than the Jörmungandr of the past, the Underworld Tree was still several times stronger than it was. The Serpent’s malice couldn’t overwhelm the divinity of the Underworld Tree, and even its sharp fangs couldn’t penetrate the bark of the giant ash tree that had endured for eons.

The tree’s divine energy continued to radiate out in all directions across the Underworld as it expanded its domain. The Nagas and the surviving Einherjar began to flee from it again. But the divine energy continued to spread, as if it wanted to swallow up the entire Underworld and turn everything into nothing.

Perhaps the end of the Underworld that the One-Eyed Lord had seen wasn’t that different from what was happening at that moment. It looked as if the Underworld Tree wanted to purify the entire Underworld in its attempt to purify the evil Serpent’s malice, and the Underworld seemed to be on the brink of destruction.

But the Serpent was persistent. New scales grew out immediately from the ugly holes in its hide where its old scales once were, and new fangs grew in place of the old fangs that had broken while it attempted to bite the giant ash tree. The newly-formed scales and fangs were even harder and sharper than before.

As time went on, more and more of the Underworld Tree’s branches broke off. Despite the toughness of its bark, scratches began to appear little by little, and the Serpent tenaciously began to attack those fresh wounds.

Thanks to its constant effort, what had started off as a small scratch on the Underworld Tree’s bark soon became a massive hole. An incomparable amount of divinity flowed out from that hole, and the Black Serpent wasted none of it as it devoured every last drop of the leaking divine energy. But it seemed discontent with the amount that was flowing out, and soon, the Serpent buried its head inside the gaping hole of the Underworld Tree.

The Serpent’s body started to grow bigger and bigger. Previously having been able to only barely wrap itself around the uppermost part of the Underworld Tree’s trunk, the Serpent had now grown big enough to be able to wrap itself around the entire Underworld Tree.

The Serpent continued to grow, and conversely, the Underworld Tree began to shrink. And when the Underworld Tree at last turned into a relatively tiny tree, the Serpent opened its huge mouth and swallowed the Underworld Tree whole.

***

Many explorers who had been assigned to spy on the Underworld witnessed the fight between the Black Serpent and the Underworld Tree that day. All of them fled the Underworld in terrifying fear, and ascended back to the surface to spread the word of the existence of the terrible monster they had witnessed.

“The monster looked like a giant snake at first, but it eventually turned into something completely different.”

“Nothing can stop that terrifying monster with its nine pairs of wings. It’s suicidal to go into the Underworld with something like that lurking inside of it. I’m pulling myself out of this. And I swear I’ll never head back inside that place ever again.”

“If that monster ever comes to the surface, what will follow is certain doom. Maybe we should worry about survival, not war.”

The surface had been preparing for war to conquer the Underworld, but now, it had to reconsider all its plans.

The testimonies of the explorers were enough to bring a sense of crisis to the surface. They now had to prepare for an attack by the Underworld and take up a defensive stance.

However, as time passed, the terrifying monster the explorers talked about didn’t appear.

After more time passed, a certain brave explorer found an Underworld gate. Instead of a long passage that led to the Underworld, all he found was a small, cramped, dark cave that was sealed by solid rock.

Belatedly realizing that fact, explorers from all over the world went searching for another entrance, but none could find the Underworld ever again.

“The Underworld no longer exists in this world.”

When the last of the explorers finally gave up, the surface had no choice but to accept the fact that the world that had existed in the dark depths below the surface of the earth was no longer.

Some were delighted with the disappearance of the dark, gloomy world that threatened the world on the surface, while others were saddened by the disappearance of the Underworld, which held enormous value and potential.

But no matter what they thought, there was no longer a way for them to go from the surface to the Underworld.

At least for them.