Book 1 Chapter 949

Countless memories swirled in his mind.

Awakening.

What was to happen in the future and his own end.

Furthermore, even the events that would unfold in the distant future.

He came to know everything.

Arion blinked his golden eyes.

‘Ar. You’ve grown so much.’

How much time had passed since he subjugated Erebus’ fragments in the future?

It didn’t seem like a very long time had passed.

But Ar had grown to a surprising extent.

While Arion found Ar’s growth commendable, his gaze turned to Azonia, a beastwoman with brown hair and golden eyes.

A beastwoman who felt both strangely familiar and yet unfamiliar.

Brown hair and golden eyes.

‘You said your name was Azonia, right?’

He heard she was the successor who followed him before Ar.

A formidable beastwoman called a great warrior among the heroes of creation.

Arion saw at a glance that Azonia was a warrior worthy of that reputation.

‘But she feels a little different from Ar, doesn’t she?’

Arion made a puzzled expression.

Looking at Ar, there was a definite feeling that he had followed in his footsteps.

He had inherited and used his power, and the aura he felt also had aspects similar to his own.

‘Should I say Ar is like Belkia?’

The feeling of a master and disciple.

But if Belkia was the disciple of three people—Kyle, Luna, and Arion—Ar directly inherited only Arion’s essence.

In that sense, he was closer to Arion than even Belkia.

But Azonia was not.

‘She has the feeling of my master.’

Arion glimpsed the shadow of his master, Agon, in Azonia.

He hadn’t seen her fight yet, so he couldn’t be sure, but the warrior’s spirit and momentum he subtly felt reminded him of Agon.

His transcendent senses were telling him so.

Arion silently looked down at his hands.

‘Erebus was summoned in Leysar at this time.’

He couldn’t stop it now.

‘No, it’s uncertain if even we, from the time of the final journey, could stop it.’

Ar, who had been punished by Azonia, barely broke free and approached Arion.

“Lord Arion! Let’s go find Lord Agon now!”

“Oh? Ah… Yes. We should find Master.”

‘These children are trying to save Master for me.’

For Arion, Agon was a father before he was a master.

But Arion hadn’t met Agon since leaving Leysar.

Even if it was a surviving city, there was distance.

The magic stone resources used for warp gates were not plentiful either.

The demons of Tartarus had also made using warp gates more difficult with curses and black magic.

Furthermore, since Arion was always fighting fiercely on the front lines during the Age of Calamity.

He had no time to go to Leysar to meet Agon.

Still, Arion didn’t worry about his master.

Agon was a hero praised as the greatest hero until the great heroes became active during the Age of Calamity.

No matter how difficult communication between cities was, if something happened to Agon, news would surely have reached Guardsron.

Moreover, the Agon Arion knew was a very strong warrior.

So he didn’t worry.

He didn’t know when he left Leysar.

That the day he left his hometown was the last time he would see Agon.

‘Thinking about it. Not meeting Master at that time wasn’t just a simple coincidence.’

Something he learned later, after more time had passed.

‘Perhaps Master was avoiding me at that time.’

He didn’t know why.

But it was strange that he couldn’t meet him even when he was determined to find him.

Erebus was summoned, and after barely evacuating some of Leysar’s people, Leysar was destroyed.

Even then, Arion believed Agon was alive.

Because the Agon Arion remembered was a very strong hero.

He was the person he respected most and the object of his admiration.

But Agon shared Leysar’s fate.

How much had he cried then?

If only he had visited a little earlier.

He regretted his insensitivity again and again.

But time could not be turned back.

Thus, Agon’s matter remained a deep regret until the moment Arion closed his eyes.

And now.

An opportunity to meet his master had come.

It was truly ironic.

His self from that time wouldn’t be able to find his master.

But his current self could find him.

‘That the opportunity to meet came after I died.’

Arion thought of his master.

In a way, it might be good fortune.

He couldn’t change the past, but he might be able to resolve one deep regret embedded in it.

No.

There were things he needed to say to his master.

There were things he wanted to convey.

But.

‘Is it right to put these children in danger just for my own selfish desire?’

Should he force a sacrifice on the living for someone who was already dead?

‘…….’

Arion closed and opened his eyes.

Before he knew it, his eyes were shining with resolve.

“Let’s find Master.”

‘Kyle once explained that I regained my memories in the ‘World of Heroes’ because it was my world.’

Arion recalled the words of his reincarnated friend.

‘And he said there was a clear objective in the World of Heroes, and if I cleared it, the world would close.’

Having thought that far, Arion decided on the path he had to take.

Arion, with his lips pressed tightly together, looked up at the sky.

A terrible sky, incomparably different from the beautiful sky he had seen in the future.

After experiencing a peaceful era, he realized anew.

That such an era should never happen again.

‘First, let’s find out the objective.’

Though it was a trial he had experienced, Arion didn’t know what the conditions for success were.

‘I’ll conquer this world and send these children back to the future.’

***

“What? Complete Erebus?”

Kal walked down the alley, his face a look of shock.

Leo nodded at Kal’s question.

“Then we need to quickly bring Lord Arion from Leysar…”

“I want to save Leysar.”

“What?”

“No, I will save it, Kal.”

“…….”

Seeing Leo’s bitter smile, Kal unconsciously closed his mouth.

Then he scratched his head furiously.

“Ah, seriously. Is it because my friend is a great hero who once saved the world? His scale is usually no joke, but sometimes he’s truly beyond approach. What was I thinking when I said I’d support you in my first year?”

“Do you regret it?”

“Yes. Enough to want to go back in time and grab you by the collar and shake you.”

Leo smiled bitterly at the grumbling Kal.

“Sorry. Am I being a bit selfish?”

“Yes. You are selfish.”

Kal clicked his tongue.

“But you can be a little selfish. No, I wish all the great heroes were a little selfish.”

All the great heroes Kal had seen so far were not selfish.

When they put the world and themselves on a scale.

They all ultimately chose the world.

And they didn’t even show a hint of unfairness.

“Ugh. For me, that’s truly unimaginable.”

As Kal bluffed, Leo said.

“It’s nothing special. You’ll be like this soon too.”

“Hearing that makes me scared because it sounds like it might really happen.”

Kal shivered as if he was creeped out.

Then he said.

“Then there’s something we need to address first. Have you laid out the basic framework of the plan?”

To that question, Leo replied.

“If you listen to people’s conversations as you move around the city, Erebus will probably be summoned in Leysar in ten days.”

“Hmm. Then we’ll have to stop that summoning, won’t we?”

“No. Stopping Erebus’ summoning is impossible.”

“What?”

“Erebus fundamentally cannot leave Mount Erden.”

The mountain at the eastern edge of the world.

And the great heroes’ final destination.

Erebus was bound by a prohibition spell by the gods and could not leave Mount Erden.

But there was a way to subtly bypass that prohibition.

It was to use his own creations, the Tartarus, to summon himself to a burnt land.

“Erebus being summoned in ten days means Leysar has already become a suitable land for the summoning.”

“……If we can’t stop the summoning, is there no other answer than to defeat Erebus?”

Kal gaped.

“Let’s see, our forces… You and your past self. And the great heroes. And two heroes of creation.”

Kal, who mentioned the main forces of their side, mumbled.

“It’s truly a dream team, isn’t it?”

It was a combination that transcended time and space.

Gathered like this, it felt like they could save the world twice over.

Of course, that was only if they were in their future forms.

‘The great heroes haven’t reached their peak abilities yet.’

“Is there a chance?”

“If we’re facing the complete form, there’s no chance.”

Even if Leo expended divine power to draw out the power of the final chapter, it was still unknown.

A battle with Erebus in its complete form was necessarily a long one.

If that happened, the divine power Leo obtained by defeating Erebus’ fragments would be consumed first.

“If you brought it up, there must be a way… Ah. Are you thinking of interfering with the summoning ritual to make him summoned in an incomplete state?”

Leo nodded.

The summoning could not be stopped.

But finding and disrupting the summoning ritual was possible.

‘If that happens, he won’t be summoned in a complete state.’

If the summoning gate were to be cut off midway, Erebus’ main body would only partially cross over, tied to Mount Erden.

Of course, even that alone would be terrifying.

‘We can also pour all our strength into this.’

This world was fake.

Therefore, nothing would change even if Erebus was defeated.

But in other words, precisely because it was fake, they could stake everything.

They could pour all of Guardsron’s forces into the subjugation of Erebus.

It was literally an all-out war.

‘Moreover, there are also the hero candidates and the shadows.’

In the past, if Kyle and Bihar were the only ones who could find and eliminate traitors.

The future was different.

There were countless shadows.

And those shadows would come to this world.

‘The remaining time is ten days.’

It was by no means a lot of time to change history.

But it wasn’t an impossible amount of time either.

“To formulate a plan, there’s one person whose cooperation we need to secure first.”

“Lord Lysinas?”

“No.”

Leo had stopped walking without realizing it.

It was a warehouse-like place on the outskirts of Guardsron.

“This is…”

Kal’s eyes widened.

“Lord Dweno’s workshop?”

Bang, bang, bang—!

Leo pounded on the door roughly without hesitation.

“Hey, you damn perverted old man! Open the door!”

Since he was obviously deep in the workshop’s basement, he clearly wouldn’t come out unless called like this.

“This madman. Breaking into someone else’s workshop in the middle of the night… Huh?”

The door opened with an angry voice.

Seeing the tone and actions, Dweno had confidently opened the door, assuming it was Kyle.

But when an unexpected person stood there, even Dweno, who was known throughout the land, was flustered.

“You’re not Kyle? Who on earth are you?”

Leo summoned a sword from his subspace.

Thud—!

He gripped the sword reversed and plunged it into the floor.

Dweno, who had been frowning at the incomprehensible action, his face suddenly changed.

The ordinary longsword gripped in Leo’s hand.

But the beauty imbued in the blade caught Dweno’s eye.

‘Could a weapon be a work of art?’

Dweno unconsciously exclaimed.

‘But this looks like something I made?’

But Dweno had never made such a sword.

For starters.

‘…If I look at the traces of the sword’s use… Kyle used it.’

Just by looking at how the blade was worn, one could easily guess who the user was.

The speech and actions reminiscent of Kyle.

And the sword he made that he never made, and the user’s traces visible on that sword.

Dweno asked with a stern face.

“What is your true identity?”

To that question, Leo replied.

“Kyle.”