The Hero Becomes the Duke’s Eldest Son

Chapter 142

– “Aden Albireo, my adversary, the Dragon Slayer King. I ask you this.”

Curse smirked as he asked Aden.

– “Are you not ashamed right now?”

‘…Shut your mouth.’

– “Hehe. No matter how intense your emotions are, to say with your own mouth, ‘I am the savior in the prophecy,’ your bold courage is truly…”

‘Holy Potion.’

– ….

Although Aden succeeded in silencing Curse, the air around him was still enveloped in an eerie silence.

That silence was broken only when a new person appeared through the door.

“It’s been a while! Sister Spica!”

It was Priestess Lunia, with a lively and angelic smile.

“…Lunia.”

For the first time, the silence of the usurper saintess, Spica, was shattered.

The two bearers of the Holy Mark, the candidates for sainthood, faced each other.

Then, as if understanding something, they both nodded slightly.

“…I see. Lunia, you are the one who brought in that master?”

“Yes! That’s right, Sister Lunia!”

“I am now the saintess of the New Church, Lunia.”

“That’s right, the saintess aiming to bring down our church!”

“….”

“Therefore, I cannot regard you as a saintess, nor can I acknowledge or overlook you as the warden of the wasteland!”

Her twisted golden eyes reflected the figure of the usurper saintess like a mirror.

“You mean to stop me.”

A slight curve appeared at the edge of her lips beneath the white cloth.

The figure reflected in Lunia’s golden eyes also smiled, a smile filled with deep ridicule and amusement.

“Do you think that is possible?”

The priests of the Slaughter Cult were already drenched in blood, continuing their battle.

The trolls, surrounding these priests, were desperately trying to annihilate them, willing to endure any amount of damage.

She, the only one capable of controlling and commanding a retreat, desired their annihilation.

The dam had already burst.

This was no different from a massive flood.

Once the flow began, it could not be stopped.

Her smile deepened.

It was a self-mocking expression, looking somewhat relieved.

“With this, the New Church ends today, Lunia.”

She was without a shred of doubt, determined that it must be so.

“No one can stop or control this flow.”

“And so.”

And so, Aden decided to shatter that certainty.

“I have brought those who can stop and control it.”

A meaningful, deep smile appeared on his lips.

It was at that moment.

The door behind Aden and Priestess Lunia began to grow rapidly.

Three meters, four meters, five meters….

The door became so large it was more like a wall.

The wall-like door creaked open.

Rumble.

And simultaneously, an enormous presence spread out, changing the atmosphere in an instant.

“…!”

“…!”

Everyone engulfed in the battlefield’s frenzy felt the aura and flinched.

– “My kin.”

The high trolls flinched again at the booming voice.

– “My futile hatred and resolve were broken centuries ago.”

From the door, a giant troll with black skin, bearing marks of chains once embedded in his body, stepped out.

– “You have not forgotten me, nor that era. Even though you exist in this era, you live in the past.”

A voice laden with thick mana spread out.

Though the voice wasn’t loud, it echoed across the wasteland, and the trolls and priests of the Slaughter Cult, who heard it, momentarily ceased their battle.

His mere existence commanded the entire battlefield.

– “My God…”

– “This can’t be…”

The high troll leaders trembled all over.

Their hearts pounded, and their regenerative abilities surged within them.

As soon as they heard the voice, their bodies and instincts recognized it first.

As if imprinted within their blue blood and the very essence of their race.

– “My mistake, my failure has made you this way… My pitiful, pitiful soldiers.”

– “Ah…!”

The high trolls exhaled in a lament-like sigh.

They couldn’t possibly deny it.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The high trolls knelt in unison, pressing their heads against the blood-soaked ground.

From their mouths erupted a thunderous cry.

– “Our kinggggg…!”

* * *

The king of the trolls.

The master and ruler of the Undying Grey Army, the Undying Lord.

That being was an Elder Troll Lord, a calamity-level troll surpassing a king.

‘He was originally imprisoned in the underground labyrinth of the Slaughter Tower.’

The first saintess had built the Slaughter Tower to defeat and imprison the Undying Lord.

No matter how many times his head was destroyed, no matter how many times his body was dismembered or burned, he could not be killed—a true immortal monster.

Even the first saintess couldn’t kill him, so she bound him with holy chains of divinity.

‘But over hundreds of years, the seal weakened, and eventually, in the future, it broke.’

Seven years from now.

In the original timeline, he broke out of the underground labyrinth, causing the Slaughter Tower to collapse, killing countless priests.

After escaping the labyrinth, he led the troll army in a disaster-level monster wave.

‘The unfortunate yet fortunate aspect was that he was not in his right mind.’

The Undying Lord, as a price for his absurd regenerative abilities and strength, was consumed by madness.

While imprisoned in the underground labyrinth for centuries, his mind was eaten away by madness, and by the time the seal was broken in the future, he had lost most of his sanity.

Even while leading the troll army, his mind wavered, and he sometimes massacred his own kind.

‘Sometimes he would regain his sanity.’

Every time the Undying Lord regained his sanity, he begged for someone to kill him.

“No longer do I wish to stain my hands with the blood of my kin! Please, anyone, kill me! Humans, anyone, kill my immortality, and end my undying life!”

At that time, Aden, along with the Iron-Blooded Saintess and her Slaughter Cult priests, reinforcements from the capital, and mercenary groups, fought him and barely managed to subdue him.

‘No, to be precise, we couldn’t truly kill him.’

His head, arms, legs, body, and heart.

They cut him into pieces and sealed them across various parts of the continent.

It was the best they could do, a pyrrhic victory achieved at the cost of thousands of lives.

Because of that, many died, and the continent suffered extensive damage, taking a long time to recover.

‘Fortunately, at this time, he had not yet been completely consumed by madness.’

The Undying Lord, when sane, was a sufficiently rational being, and Aden made a ‘deal’ with him in the underground labyrinth.

He spoke to him, saying,

“Undying Lord, you must be watching now, right? Seeing the Slaughter Cult and your kin trying to annihilate each other. You wouldn’t want such an outcome either, would you? So, make a deal with me.”

The Undying Lord possessed the ‘clairvoyance’ to see distant landscapes.

In other words, it meant he was aware of everything happening outside at that moment.

Aden demanded that the Undying Grey Army be halted in exchange for freeing him.

The Undying Lord accepted this demand, and Aden broke the weakened seal of the labyrinth and used the workshop world to bring the Undying Lord here.

By removing the Dungeon Core, the dungeon ceased to be a dungeon, allowing him to use the workshop key freely.

‘Well, the process of breaking the seal also caused the Slaughter Tower to collapse…’

Anyway, the tower was destined to collapse in the future as well.

Since he had evacuated all the priests inside the tower, no one would be injured, and they should rather thank him and bow to him.

Aden thus rationalized it to himself.

The high troll leaders, encountering the Undying Lord, knelt and banged their heads on the ground.

– “Our only rightful ruler!”

– “U, U, U, U.”

The surrounding trolls stomped their feet and breathed beast-like breaths in response.

– “The god of the clan who sought to scar the world with our hatred!”

– “Uuu! Uuu! Uuu!”

Thousands, tens of thousands of trolls roared and paid homage to their lord.

Their rhythmic chest voices echoed like the sound of waves.

The army of despair that devoured and destroyed everything, the Undying Grey Army.

They bowed and cried out towards their king.

– “Our immortal father! We greet the Undying Lord…!”

– “Uooooooo!”

The grey wave surged and roared.

The lord of the army.

The god of the clan had returned.

The troll army, entranced by that fact, praised their god.

“What… What is going on?”

“Trolls, aren’t you fighting?”

“Haha! Who could that massive black troll be?”

The priests, who had been in a bloody battle with the trolls, were at a loss as to how to respond to the sudden change.

The flow they thought couldn’t be stopped was now halted.

The war had ceased.

“…”

The usurper saintess, Spica, remained silent. Beneath the white cloth covering her face, she was biting her lip.

“…Who are you?”

She turned to Aden.

Her voice trembled as well.

“How, how could…?”

She was now shaken.

However, her turmoil was not just due to her disrupted plan.

Aden calmly replied,

“I just followed the commission of the god, that’s all.”

Saaaak.

The red holy power was seeping out from the body of the usurper saintess.

The blessing of the Slaughter God, which she obtained by killing the former saintess and taking her place, was now slowly dissipating.

It was an impossible situation.

The only time the saintess of the Slaughter Cult lost her power was upon death.

Aden spoke.

“I shall awaken the ancient king buried under the black stake…”

That phrase referred to the Undying Lord imprisoned in the underground labyrinth of the Slaughter Tower.

He had brought out the Undying Lord to pacify the Undying Grey Army.

“Risen among the dead.”

And Aden had mentioned earlier.

That he had brought those who could control and stop the current flow.

Step.

With the sound of footsteps, another person walked out from beyond the door.

“The providence of the gods is very complex for us foolish humans to understand.”

“……!”

It was the voice of a woman.

And it was a voice all too familiar to Spica.

“That’s why it is arrogance and pride for us, who are lacking, to try to understand and comprehend.”

“You are…….”

That’s why, at this moment, it felt like a dream to her. It was unbelievable and terrifying.

It was a voice she should never hear again, one she thought she would never hear again.

“That’s why, as children of God, all we can do is follow His will, believe, and carry it out.”

But the voice resounded so clearly that it was undeniable.

The voice was imbued with holy power and echoed across the entire battlefield.

“That person is……?”

“Am I seeing things……?”

“Ahah… could it be that we are already dead?”

The priests of the Slaughter Cult stood agape, unable to believe their eyes.

Long golden hair.

And a white bandage covering her eyes.

A woman wearing a blood-stained saint’s robe with a hole in the center of her chest.

“That’s why my resurrection is also the will and intent of the God of Slaughter and Death, Saintess Spica.”

The usurped saint trembled slightly and involuntarily took a step back.

“Merida, my lord…….”

“Yes, my disciple Spica.”

The supreme leader of the Slaughter Cult, the proxy of the God of Slaughter, and the strongest woman.

The saint of the blind, Merida Lunius.

She spoke calmly to the priests of the Slaughter Cult, to her second disciple, and to Spica, her successor and the new saint who had killed her.

“I have returned from death. Spica, my beloved disciple.”