The Foreigner on the Periphery

Sometimes, a person who expresses their anger calmly is more terrifying than someone who screams and rages.

Right now, however, the Princess of Endelion was using both methods simultaneously to vent her fury. That made it even more terrifying. What did an expressionless face matter? The tentacles writhing on her back were threatening enough. Those parts likely moved independently of her will when she felt intense emotions. Like a dog's tail, for instance.

"Son...?"

Ha Eunseong thought quietly. It would have been a disaster if he had spoken his next thought out loud: 'It doesn't even feel like just one or two.'

It was actually a bit ambiguous. The will radiating from the light was definitely searching for a 'son,' but it felt like a single entity and multiple entities at once. Being one and many at the same time was a concept that defied common sense.

Dell asked with a suspicious look.

"Why are you the only one who can hear that? I don't feel anything."

The moment Ha Eunseong tried to explain the 'spiritual wave'—

"Huh?"

He almost lost his balance. The princess used her tentacles to prop up the dragon before he could fall over again.

"What's wrong with you now?"

Dell, lacking spiritual sensitivity, couldn't see it, but just a moment ago, the spectral image of a human with a blade lodged in his neck had overlapped with the dragon's physical body before vanishing.

It was a phenomenon that could never happen when a body and soul were perfectly bound together.

"C-cough, cough!"

Right before the soul could completely detach, the physical body yanked it back in. Having regained control of his body, the dragon coughed a few times. Only then could he answer Dell's question. His tone was bewildered.

"I... I was almost forced out of my body just now!"

"What? Why?!"

"I think it's probably because of that light..."

At that moment, a similar event occurred among the surrounding priests.

Their souls and bodies were forcefully separated. However, the moment of separation was extremely brief. Looking down at their bodies in an astral state, the terrified priests dove straight back in. Just like when they sent their souls to the sanctuary to steal Divine Blood, every single one of them returned to their bodies without fail.

"Why am I fine?"

"Your connection between body and soul is solid, Princess. You haven't frequently detached and reattached it like we have."

In truth, her soul had also been separated before due to her penal labor. But she had undergone the process far fewer times than they had.

"Are you saying Minjun is sucking in souls right now? And people with loose connections like you get easily swept up in it?"

Ha Eunseong spoke exactly as he felt.

"The target of that light isn't us, but we're getting caught in it because we're too close. What the agent is looking for right now is... a son."

He continued, carefully watching Dell's reaction.

"But considering the call is embedded in a spiritual wave, and it's specifically pulling at souls... it doesn't seem like his son is alive."

"...?!"

"Yeah, the agent's son is already... probably dead. He seems to be summoning the spirit here."

A father's evocation ritual to call back his dead son.

It was a sad affair, but since he himself was also dead, Ha Eunseong's reaction was relatively calm.

He did feel a sense of doubt, however. It was beyond common sense for perfectly rational beings like himself—not mindless wraiths—and the priests, who were living spirits that hadn't even died yet, to be affected.

But Dell didn't have the luxury to focus on such contradictions.

'A son... turned into a soul?!'

By natural association, a certain concept flashed through Dell's mind.

Asif-666's creation. The fragments scattered across dimensions in a spiritual state.

The word slipped through her lips.

"Asiph-1!"

   *

About ten minutes before the intense flash of light erupted from the Cathedral of Resurrection.

Minjun stepped through the doors alone. In his hand, he held Asiph-1, which had transformed into a Dagger.

He crossed the corridor leading into the building. Ancient murals decorated the walls on both sides. Most were religious paintings depicting sacred events recorded in the scriptures.

The painting at the entrance, marking the beginning of the path, depicted a man descending from the sky. Minjun spoke to his creation.

"That's you."

=Ah, so it seems. Though I don't remember it clearly yet.=

The founder of the order. Their Prophet, who became the first and last pope.

The painters had to stay true to the description that no one remembered his appearance, but since they couldn't leave his face completely blank, they seemed to have devised a clever workaround. The face in the painting was tightly wrapped in thick cloth to block the desert winds. The Prophet appeared to be preaching to a gathered crowd of wilderness peasants. The flocked three-eyed ones were kneeling with their hands clasped together, wearing deeply moved expressions.

As Minjun moved forward, various paintings came into view. They seemed to follow the chronological order of history. Miracles of the Prophet feeding the pitiful, healing the sick, and resurrecting the dead were depicted, eventually leading to a striking painting of him ascending to the heavens, leaving the mortals behind.

Next followed the history of this planet and the records of the order's glorious victories. When Yumtus explained the planet's process of becoming a theocracy to Ha Eunseong, he had described it as 'peaceful,' but the paintings told a different story. The gruesome reality of blood-soaked slaughter filled the walls for a long stretch. It was hard to tell whether these were religious paintings or war records. The priests of Elahu-Praga used their powerful Divine Power as weapons to crush pagans and nonbelievers. The sight of beheaded victims and mountains of corpses piling up in pits was painted without any omission.

Minjun kept walking. Finally, the wars of conquest ended. The depiction showed a planet that had reclaimed peace. The increased number of priests began mining Divine Blood in earnest. It was a preparation for the future. The sky, which had been painted blue up until then, gradually turned yellow, then ashen gray. Everything that existed in the mortal realm was a tool for the awakening of the gods, for the true world that would arrive in the future. And the believers had been granted the right by their god to use those tools freely. Because they were the chosen people.

The final section expressed scenes of a future yet to be realized. It showed the priests awakening the slumbering gods. The painters, who hadn't drawn the Prophet's features, seemingly judged it blasphemous to cover the faces of the gods with mere scraps of cloth. They filled the void in their knowledge with imagination. The primordial race they painted was deep in slumber with their 'three eyes' gently closed.

And beneath that painting lay a massive altar.

The very reason Minjun had come all the way to this dimension.

=So that's it!=

Asiph-1 spoke with a deeply resonating spiritual wave.

Even though the Talent was sealed securely within the altar, an extraordinary radiant light was seeping out of it.

To the marveling entity, the creator gave an unexpected response.

"Yes. You've worked hard, my son."

=...!=

Minjun spoke to Asiph-1, who was momentarily at a loss for words.

"That altar is practically something you prepared. You created the order. You guided them to gather the Talent all this time. It's all thanks to you."

It was the first time he had ever heard such words of praise.

Hiding his tremors, Asiph-1 asked.

=Will you use that to awaken the other kin?=

"No. Unfortunately, that much isn't enough."

=Ah!=

A sigh of regret.

"You were caught by the Committee too early. If things had gone according to the original plan, you should have created a few more organizations like this order. Even if we couldn't steal the Talent using the same methods as the Repatam Tribe, I intended to operate them in the form of terrorist organizations, pirate fleets, resistance armies, or governments in exile. Armed factions that could steal the Talent the Committee had already mined. In the end, the order is the only one that survived without getting caught, but even this alone is a job well done."

He added.

"And don't worry too much. I'll put this Talent to good use in a different way."

Having made his declaration, Minjun approached the altar. The spacious hall located in the deepest part of the cathedral was desolate, devoid of any decorations other than the altar itself. A soft light emanated from the center of a space that felt almost pointlessly huge and empty.

He stepped onto the metal platform that protruded slightly from the ground. As he took a step, Minjun felt an emotion that was hard to define with a single word.

The greatest amount of his kin's lifeblood he had ever witnessed was right here.

But the Ancient Race had stolen far more than this over the past few centuries. The true thieves weren't the priests; it was the Ancient Race, those beasts. The mere thought of it made an unfathomable rage surge within him. He knew exactly how the Ancient Race squandered the Talent.

Talent was a medium that intervened in the relationship between the spirit and the flesh. It inherently contained the properties of both matter and mind. Having figured that out, those beasts used it for nothing more than switching bodies. Thinking about his kin's lifeblood being wasted like that filled him with a fury so intense it felt like his heart would explode.

Suppressing those emotions, Minjun reached his hand toward the metallic floor. In response to his call, the ground shifted.

Ruumble!

Cracks spread across the ground, rapidly multiplying like streaks of rain. Splintering along the slanted lines, the shards of metal overlapped and began to swirl. The fissures moved dynamically, surpassing mere two-dimensional deformation, and the ground undulated, forming ripples.

A moment later, the swirling ceased. A pillar emitting a piercing light surged upward from the previously flat altar.

Now, the interior of the hall had reached a point where the eyesight of ordinary races wouldn't be able to distinguish objects. The intense radiance blasting from the pillar had filled the entire space.

The moment Minjun reached his hand toward it—

Pwaaash!

Light flooded the room.

Minjun absorbed the overflowing Talent without leaving a single drop. He felt the light with both his physical body and his mind simultaneously. At this moment, there wasn't a single speck of shadow in the cathedral. Every inch of space became a source of light, burning brilliantly.

A torrent of starlight poured into Minjun's mind. And it burned away whatever scarce traces of the Committee still remained inside the prisoner. It was the remnants of hypnotic suggestions meant to control the sinner, and tools used to conceal and hide memories. They had already lost most of their function, but he seized this opportunity to annihilate them perfectly.

Continuing the process, Minjun realized that his inner self had been purified to near perfection.

Save for a very small fragment, a remnant akin to a stain.

"..."

Staring at that final dust-like fragment, he pondered.

It was none other than the ego of the existence known as Asif-666.

The second personality forged while living as a prisoner.

There was no need to obliterate the memories of the past 800 years. But what about the ego?

'This is also a remnant of the Committee. If I leave it be, won't it become my shackle?'

He agonized over it. The ego of the prisoner who was once Ye Minjun, and before that Cain, and even earlier known by various names depending on the dimension.

From the perspective of the primordial race, it was tantamount to an insult. It was a disgrace and evidence of humiliation. It was the remnant of someone who was a person acting and thinking as a non-person.

'Should I burn this away, too?'

The primordial race pondered.

However, his hesitation didn't last long.

'That, too, is mine. The insults I endured, the disgrace, the pain—all of it belongs to me. There is no need to erase it.'

One who had once lost everything remained obsessed with his possessions. He fiercely despised anyone touching what entered his domain. Much less could he tolerate destroying it himself.

Leaving it intact, the primordial race turned his attention away. He then molded the Talent into the shape of an even more colossal pillar of light and radiated it outward. It pierced the hall's ceiling, broke through the roof, and rocketed up to penetrate the night sky. That was exactly when the people outside the cathedral witnessed the pillar of light.

Only then did the primordial race answer his creation's question.

What was he going to do with this Talent?

"I am going to use this Talent for you."

=...?!=

"I will use this to call your other fragments here."

Asiph-1 finally realized that this pillar of light was a kind of lighthouse. A guiding beacon calling out to his soul fragments scattered across the frontier dimensions.

The primordial race carried his spiritual wave on the light.

=It will take a very long time.=

Asiph-1 asked hesitantly.

It was true that there was little resistance when a soul moved quickly and crossed the Dimensional Wall.

However, even if they moved at the speed of light, it seemed like it would take an unfathomable amount of time for them to depart from the corners of the universe and gather here.

"We just have to use a shortcut."

=A shortcut?=

"How did the followers here cross dimensions when they retrieved the Talent?"

=By sending only their souls to the place where the primordial race sleeps... Ah!=

"Right. The place where we sleep is connected to all dimensions. Because that's how we made it in the first place."

The creator intended to gather all the other soul fragments at the 'mining site' and then bring them here all at once.

The primordial race looked up. High above, at the very end of the pillar of light, a black rift was opening.

It was on a scale hundreds, thousands of times larger than the rift Ha Eunseong had seen when Yumtus traveled in and out of Elahu-Praga in his spiritual state. The pillar of light pierced right through it.

=The reason you wish to complete me first...=

Asiph-1 asked cautiously.

=Have you already made your decision?=

The dilemma the creator had revealed on the way here.

His future course of action.

"First, I'm going to clean house."

The primordial race calmly recited his plan.

Just like the murals he had seen today, in chronological order.

"Those meant to die will die, and those meant to be punished will be punished."

The target he was referring to now was the Ancient Race.

"And as for the others..."

Around the time right before and after the primordial race awakened, the Ancient Race would all be dealt with in an appropriate manner.

However, after doing so, Minjun's kin were ultimately destined to fall back asleep.

Moreover, the primordial race and the Ancient Race weren't the only ones living in the universe. What was to be done about the other intelligent lifeforms that would be left behind here in the future?

After a long time passed, there was no guarantee they wouldn't become another Kavite.

"How should we protect ourselves once we fall asleep again? Can we guarantee our safety without turning everyone into livestock? I saw the answer here, in the order."

Many priests served the primordial race and acted for their sake even without being brainwashed. They expressed and carried out 'goodwill' toward Minjun's kin.

Asiph-1 asked.

=...Are you intending to turn all intelligent lifeforms into beings like the believers of Elahu-Praga?=

Which meant.

=Are you trying to become the god of all intelligent lifeforms?=

To teach them what is right and what is wrong. To make them perceive acts of hostility against the primordial race as evil, as a sin. And thus, guide them to distance themselves from sin of their own free will.

To create a discipline called religion.

Minjun considered his own identity to be a dragon herder, a shepherd. It was his job to guide lost dragons onto the right path. He instructed them directly, and sometimes delegated the task to a smart dragon.

What he was about to do was simply expand the scope of the work he had done in the past.

In theory, it seemed perfect. Up until he conducted his experiment just a moment ago.

"But I also saw its limits here."

=...Felix!=

Today, he had seen someone who served a god of his own free will, yet ultimately rejected that worship of his own free will.

"Extreme choices come with side effects."

The primordial race realized his decision was gradually solidifying.

"So, there's no need to obsess over just one method. I think appropriately combining the two approaches will work. That's why I need to resurrect you first."

Brainwashing and religion.

Religion and brainwashing.

It was a declaration that he would utilize both weapons.

"My son, I need your power. To recreate the minds and spirits of those who lack the qualification to exercise freedom."

Pondering for a moment, he added.

"No, that word isn't suitable."

The word creation implied making something entirely new that hadn't existed before.

"What I am about to do is establish a new process, procedure, and system out of existing materials. I am going to redesign the way the mind operates and functions. In that sense..."

Searching for the right thought, he declared.

"Right. 'Invention' is more accurate. From now on, we must re-invent them into a far more efficient and suitable form. Their minds."

At that moment, something began to pour down from the end of the pillar of light.

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