Chapter 27. Apostle Beris (1)
Yohan and Gaf spent half a day riding without rest and managed to catch up with the Pilgrimage Group.
The Pilgrimage Group, positioned atop a high ridge, was preparing to set up camp.
Even during the pitch-dark night, the campsite was extremely bright.
The priestly robes they wore and the military tents they had set up were imbued with holiness and shone pure white.
A safe zone surrounded by holiness. Most demons could not even approach the ridge.
It was the same for Yohan. While he would not burn to death thanks to the Ring of Kazan, the moment he touched that holiness, his identity would be exposed.
The instant the Ring of Kazan absorbed the holy energy, the priests would notice the anomaly.
They would all immediately enter a state of vigilance. A demon could never escape their surveillance network.
“This is the limit. Gaf, don’t get any closer.”
From the peak of the mountain facing the ridge, Yohan spoke.
Gaf scoffed.
“You were the one calling holy light a cheap glow, and yet you’re scared of holiness too, huh.”
“If I were scared, I wouldn’t be standing here. Don’t lose your nerve. We’ll be moving soon.”
Gaf looked toward the ridge. Close to a hundred troops were positioned there. Among them would be priests capable of holy magic, and monstrous Holy Knights.
They planned to ambush them with just the two of them? No matter how he thought about it, there was no chance of victory.
Gaf’s expression darkened.
Yohan let out a short laugh.
“Feeling uneasy?”
“What’s making you so relaxed?”
“Because I’m certain.”
Yohan opened his bag and took out a jar covered in talismans stuck all over it.
A relic wrapped in a dark aura. It was horrifying to look at.
Yohan spoke.
“I told you earlier, but there’s really nothing we need to do. We just use this relic to draw their attention, steal the coffin of the Great Saint, and we’re done.”
“What in the world is inside that jar?”
For once, tension appeared on Yohan’s face.
He spoke in a low voice.
“The twelfth apostle of the End. To be precise, it contains a fragment of the Great Demon Beris.”
Gaf frowned.
“You mean the Beris from the Scriptures?”
“That’s right. The demon who was torn apart by the Great Saint Marziel five hundred years ago. As you know, his soul was divided into ten pieces and scattered across the continent.”
“And one of those fragments is in this jar?”
“Exactly.”
“……I can’t believe it.”
“See for yourself.”
At the same time, Yohan pulled on the talismans.
Though the talismans were of a high-level sealing technique, they had long lost their function due to the erosion of time.
For hundreds of years, no one had maintained the technique.
The negligence of the heads of the Miyatro Family had brought about a dreadful result.
The responsibility for abandoning their duty could only be borne by their descendants.
The seal was undone in an instant.
In the original, it was the witch who summoned the Great Demon to this land; now, it was the half-demon.
Even if it was only one-tenth of Beris’s soul, its aftermath was beyond what mere mortals could withstand.
As pitch-black smoke surged from the jar, Gaf collapsed onto the ground. Blood streamed continuously from his nose and eyes.
Yohan’s body trembled like a leaf.
The liberated malice pressed down on the space like gravity.
A terrible scream erupted.
“Keehahaha! A mere five hundred years! For one who has existed for eternity, it is but a fleeting moment! Marziel! Behold! I have broken my chains and returned to manifest upon this land once more! The prophecy of the Apocalypse is being fulfilled again!”
As if the voice itself carried death, the mountain birds fell lifeless from the sky.
The surrounding trees and soil began to decay.
Nature was losing its life.
Yohan and Gaf groaned as they covered their ears. The pressure was so intense they could not even lift their heads.
The manifested demon was truly a being of a different caliber.
Even if it was only a tenth of Beris, before his majesty, mortals were nothing more than insects.
‘……Just as terrifying as expected.’
In the original, even Ilea could not look directly at Beris. Even a witch who commanded demons was crushed by the presence of the prey.
Naturally, Yohan, too, could not resist Beris’s majesty.
It was the most basic of basics. However, an anomaly occurred.
Yohan slowly lifted his head.
It was quite painful, but strangely, it wasn’t to the point of death.
If it were as in the original, he wouldn’t have been able to move a finger, but he was freer than he had expected.
‘Was the description in the original exaggerated?’
If that were the case, Gaf’s appearance was too pitiful.
He was writhing in pain with his head pressed to the ground.
The depiction in the original was not exaggerated at all.
Mortals could not even look upon the Apostle of the End.
‘Then why…….’
As confusion overtook him, the malice swept toward Yohan. A voice like metal scraping against metal pierced his eardrums.
“How strange. What are you?”
Only then was Yohan able to see the true form of Beris.
A grotesque being wearing a gray robe. Beris twitched his large hooked nose, staring at Yohan with two vertically slit eyes.
A mouth far too small compared to the eyes and nose chewed continuously as if munching on something.
It was a deeply eerie impression.
“I asked, an insignificant one. What are you?”
Each syllable carried weight, pressing down on Yohan.
Resisting the pressure, Yohan opened his mouth.
“A lie wouldn’t work on you, would it. I’ll tell you the truth. I don’t know what I am, either. But there is one thing I know for sure. I am the one who freed you.”
The muscles on Beris’s face twitched slightly.
He felt displeasure at Yohan not using honorifics.
His pride was greatly wounded.
A demon who did not respect the Great Demon. A mortal who resisted the presence of an Apostle. Truly, an incomprehensible existence.
Even Yohan himself found the situation difficult to understand.
‘……Was there a setting in Demon’s Hour I didn’t know about?’
Mortals, regardless of their race, were bound to feel fear and reverence toward transcendents.
Yohan was different.
While he suffered from the pressure, fear and reverence did not fill him.
Even if it was a tenth of an Apostle, its presence was something utterly unreachable, yet for some reason, it had little effect on Yohan.
It was hard to know the reason. Even if he thought about it now, it would be difficult to find an answer.
For now, he had to focus on the present.
Beris spoke.
“……You say you freed my seal? Very well. I shall bestow upon you, an insignificant one, the honor of making a deal with me. Speak your desire.”
Beris was the Apostle who governed ‘contracts.’
Before he was sealed, he had left a contract spell in the world.
A spell that granted the one who freed him the right to trade with him. In short, Yohan could make a direct contract with the Apostle.
Whatever was given and received, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a mortal.
He could ask for an ageless body, demand to be taught great magic, or even be satisfied with wealth and glory.
Though the mortal would also have to pay a price in return, in truth, the Apostle would take nothing.
Because what Beris desired was something mortals could never give.
A contract with Beris was called a deal, but for mortals, it was no different from gaining a wish.
Yohan spoke.
“Over there, look over there. Do you see that ridge?”
Beris twitched his nose.
“Marziel’s lackeys. A breed tougher than cockroaches. Even now, five hundred years later, they’re still crawling around.”
“Among that group is a woman with red hair. Her name is Shaferia. Completely erase her from existence. That is my condition for the deal.”
Beris blinked his vertically slit eyes. He spoke in disbelief.
“That’s it?”
“Yes.”
“I cannot understand.”
“I will say it again. Complete erasure. The deadline is midnight today.”
Beris chuckled.
“To think you would waste a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity like this. Truly foolish, but I find you very interesting. Therefore, I shall keep you by my side. In exchange for erasing that woman by midnight, you shall become my vassal. Do you agree?”
Beris demanded Yohan’s subordination as the condition of the contract.
Any demon would wish to become a vassal of an Apostle.
There was no reason to refuse.
In fact, it would not have been strange if Yohan himself had requested to be subordinated to Beris as a condition of the contract.
Yohan nodded.
“Fine. The moment Shaferia is erased, I will become your vassal.”
Gaf, who was lying down, glared at Yohan while groaning.
If Yohan became Beris’s vassal, Ilea would automatically become entangled with the Apostle.
The Apostle’s sole purpose was the extinction of humanity. The daughter would be forced to partake in that horrific evil without any choice.
Gaf trembled violently.
What kind of end awaited him and his daughter now? He could no longer grasp it.
Every moment was filled with regret.
It was his greed to find his daughter that had brought things to this point.
As he was wallowing in self-deprecation, miasma surged from Beris’s body.
The surging smoke seeped into Yohan.
A foreign sensation settled in Yohan’s chest.
The contract was complete.
Gaf looked at that scene with eyes filled with despair.
Beris chuckled and spoke.
“Shall we first fix your way of speaking?”
“I am not your vassal yet. Take care of Shaferia first. If you fail, you will pay the price.”
In some one-in-a-billion world line, there might exist a world where Beris failed.
In that world, Beris would be crushed by a karmic weight beyond imagination.
An Apostle who governed contracts unable to uphold a promise with a mere mortal? It would mean he had lost his reason to exist.
He would have no right to complain even if he was obliterated.
Beris burst into mad laughter.
“Keehahahahaha! Did you say fail?! You are an amusing one! Watch with your own eyes and carve it into yourself! The omnipotence of your master!”
Beris shot up into the sky in an instant. His gray robe fluttered in the air.
Looking down at Yohan, he spoke.
“I shall return to fix that insolence of yours!”
Then he headed straight for the ridge.
The Pilgrimage Group, sensing the anomaly, was already preparing for battle.
As Beris left, the oppressive pressure that had weighed down the space vanished in an instant.
However, Gaf could not get up.
He was lost in despair and helplessness, only wallowing in self-pity.
Yohan spoke.
“Beris is gone. You should get up and shake it off too.”
A mortal who faced an Apostle would suffer a severe shock to the mind.
Gaf’s reaction was perfectly normal.
He spoke in a low voice.
“……I finally understand your true intentions.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You intend to kill all of humanity.”
Yohan frowned.
“Why would I?”
“If not, then why did you become a vassal of the Apostle!”
Gaf’s eyes were filled with hatred.
Because Yohan had dragged Ilea into this.
“I am not Beris’s vassal.”
“Stop playing word games!”
If Shaferia was erased, Yohan would become Beris’s vassal.
There was no chance of Beris failing.
“It’s not wordplay. I have no intention of being subordinated to some Apostle. If you don’t believe me, I’ll even make a contract with you. Using my life as collateral.”
Gaf stared intently at Yohan. The hatred in his eyes was replaced by doubt.
No matter how he thought about it, Shaferia would die, and Yohan would become Beris’s vassal.
There should be no anomaly, yet Yohan was denying it.
Gaf nodded.
“Come to think of it, it is understandable to misunderstand. You know nothing about Shaferia.”
“Then explain.”
Yohan shook his head.
“While Beris is rampaging, we need to steal the coffin of the Great Saint. If we don’t move now, we will miss our timing. Also, it’s annoying to explain everything to you. I’m not obligated to, either.”
Gaf let out a hollow laugh.
“You once called me a partner, but it was all bullshit.”
Partners were supposed to share their opinions.
If everything was kept hidden, it couldn’t be called a partnership.
For the first time in his conversations with Gaf, Yohan felt as if he had taken a hit.
‘He got me there.’
Yohan spoke.
“Fine. Since we’re partners, I’ll share information from now on. But in exchange, you must acknowledge me as your partner as well. It means we should respect each other.”
Gaf stood up, brushing the dirt off his knees. He spoke in a firm tone.
“I will decide after seeing how things unfold.”
Yohan let out a short laugh as he moved behind Gaf.
“Let me make it clear once more. I have not the slightest intention of serving under anyone.”
As he said that, Yohan slipped his arms under Gaf’s armpits.
Before the startled Gaf could say anything, Yohan took off into the air.
Their destination was the ridge, which had already turned into hell.