In this world, specifically the world of [Esdinas of Heaven], if I were to spoil one serious detail.
No one really knows why the Middle World is called the “Middle” World.
Even the Angels descending from Heaven don’t fully understand it, nor do the Demons living in the Demon World.
Only about 20 beings know the full details.
It’s not recorded in history and only remains in the memories of the immortals.
But as a modern person and an outsider of sorts, I can somewhat grasp the concept.
The Middle World is the surface.
Heaven is the moon orbiting the planet.
And the Demon World is below the surface, even deeper than the mantle, in the outer core of this planet.
‘The so-called Goddess trapped the demons inside the planet.’
The Goddess banished the Demon King, Changyeom, and others to the underground.
After banishing them to a place that should be called the “Underground”, she labeled them “Demons” and made the beings on the surface wary of them.
She created all kinds of barriers with her power, spreading her faith among the surface dwellers to maintain those barriers, using that belief as a source of power.
The source of that power is the faith that “Demons from the Demon World are dangerous beings, and we must live with faith in the Goddess in Heaven”.
Humanity doesn’t know that the Demon World is deep underground beneath the land they live on.
When they see Demons crossing through dimensional gates and using spatial movement, they think, “They must be coming from an entirely different world!”
‘But in reality, they exist within the same planet.’
Sometimes, certain demons appear to emerge from the depths of Hell or Purgatory, and that imagery serves as a kind of foreshadowing.
A hint that the Demon World exists within the planet.
Isn’t that dangerous?
Won’t the planet be destroyed if the demons wreak havoc in the outer core?
‘Well, it’s not the Goddess’ planet anyway.’
The Goddess lives on the moon.
If you look up at the night sky from Esdinas Academy, you’ll see two moons. The Goddess resides on the red moon, not the blue one.
The blue moon serves the true purpose of a “moon”, meaning it brings about the night.
The red moon, on the other hand, is another world in the form of a moon, [Heaven].
‘You could say it’s like a colossal spaceship disguised as a moon.’
You might suddenly think, “What’s this SF!”, but since it actually is, it’s the most fitting analogy.
There’s a reason why Angels call humans “inferior beings of the surface”.
They truly live above, looking down at the surface.
In other words…
Even if the demons wreak havoc beneath the mantle, it’s their home that’s damaged, and the Goddess is entirely unaffected.
Under such circumstances, it was nearly impossible to rise from the outer core to the surface.
As soon as you broke through the core’s barriers, they would activate, and to reach the surface, you’d have to break through countless barriers set by the Goddess as you ascended through the mantle.
The Demon King gave me a special gift to address this issue.
A teleportation device.
Specifically, teleportation magic—the only spatial movement device the Demon King took with him when he was banished from the surface to the outer core.
Since the Demon King and the first Demons were initially exiled to the Demon World, this device had never been used.
‘Even I, who played the original, didn’t know about it, so there’s no way the Goddess would.’
Normally, the Demon King descends to the surface by combining the power of the seven Dukes of Hell.
In other words, he breaks through the mantle and all the barriers through sheer force.
However, the Demon King had a more gentle, simple, magical, yet reliable “one-time-use portal” that allowed him to descend to the surface.
The blue moon.
Not Heaven, but the moon in the truest sense.
The Demon King secretly hid his dimensional gate there, and through that gate, I crossed over to the surface—to space.
Breathing, impossible.
I had to hold my breath in a place with no oxygen, and since I landed on the moon, I had to cross through space to reach the planet.
Anyway, that’s how I made it.
In simple terms, I used a warp gate to teleport from the Earth’s outer core to the moon, and now I had to descend to the surface by crashing through Earth’s atmosphere.
And during that process…
“Tsk.”
As soon as I started descending through the atmosphere, angels pursued me.
They appeared instantly through spatial movement and attacked me, and I had to fend them off while plummeting like a meteor towards the planet.
I won’t go into the details of that process.
At the last moment, the being considered the Archangel delivered a final headbutt towards me, causing my trajectory to spiral.
Kwah──bang!!
In the end…
“Phew.”
I managed to land on the surface.
“So this is what you meant when you said I should practice falling from above.”
Was this the reason Changyeom had me practice falling?
“…”
The surroundings were completely devastated.
A crater, easily over 1 kilometer in diameter, was created, and I was in the center of it.
Though it was a bit different from the anticipated trajectory, it wasn’t a major problem.
Fortunately, this was an uninhabited wasteland.
‘The mana state is good.’
I placed my hand on my chest to check the flow of mana.
Although I felt quite drained from using a lot of mana in the battle with the angels, I just needed to build it up slowly from here.
“Hah, hah.”
I took a deep breath.
With each inhale, I pushed the mana in the air into the core of my heart.
‘Just like when I first accumulated mana as Regif.’
Since I possessed Regif, I could accumulate the mana of the Middle World.
‘It’s like filtering.’
I was absorbing the mana that carried the scent of surface dwellers, not the polluted mana mixed with demonic energy from deep underground.
Step, step.
As I absorbed the mana and activated my body, I soon became able to move.
I restructured my body to fit the Middle World using mana and jumped up the slope of the crater.
Swoosh.
Lightly, I jumped.
Fortunately, I managed to climb out of the crater and came face to face with someone.
“Hi, h-hi—!”
A farmer wearing a straw hat.
He held a weapon that didn’t quite suit a farmer—or rather, a weapon one would expect a hunter to have—
‘A magic rifle.’
The farmer had a magic rifle for beast hunting.
Whirr.
I infused mana into my eyes.
In the green-tinted view, I assessed the total amount of mana the opponent possessed.
To put it in terms of the status screen from the original:
[Level, around 5?]
“Uwaaaa!”
The farmer aimed the magic rifle at me and fired.
Bang!
The magical bullet pierced through my chest.
[How unfortunate. I haven’t yet restructured my body…]
“M-Monster!!”
The farmer screamed and continued to shoot the rifle, while I charged forward and drove my fist into the farmer’s abdomen.
Thud.
The farmer collapsed.
His eyes rolled back as he slammed his head into the ground.
[…]
There was nothing else around.
Just the farmer and the horse he rode.
And in the horse’s saddlebags were some ‘magic stones’.
[How fortunate.]
Was the farmer also a monster hunter?
It was quite lucky to find magic stones as soon as I fell.
Crack.
As soon as I grabbed the magic stones, they melted into flames and flowed into my body.
“Ah, aaah.”
I checked my voice as I reformed my vocal cords.
I needed to move quickly before the angels descended, conserving as much mana as possible.
‘Not sure about the terrain, but nearby—’
In the middle of the wasteland, something familiar came into view.
“Really, I’m lucky.”
A tall barrier stretching across the wasteland.
It looked like someone had built a barrier towards Mexico, but in reality, it was just a high fence intended to prevent monsters or beasts from crossing over and causing damage beyond it.
The Transcontinental Train.
The route of the magic train.
Traces of human civilization, and at the same time, railroad tracks that spread out radially throughout the continent.
At the center of it all is the heart of the continent, Esdinas Academy.
‘Let’s head to the station first.’
To where people are.
If I’m going to Esdinas Academy, ‘farming’ is essential.
“So then…”
Whirr.
[“Transformation.”]
* * *
[Attention, please. The Transcontinental Train KTS 088 has been temporarily suspended due to an unknown accident for the safety of the passengers. Once again, we inform you that currently….]
“Oh, this is driving me crazy. What’s going on!”
People on the train were shouting.
“Calm down, we’re looking into it….”
“Is there a war or something?! Did a Grand Mage go berserk?!”
“Ahhhh!”
It was utter chaos.
Despite no actual apocalypse arriving, the train’s interior was filled with confusion.
“…”
The blonde girl pulled out a pocket watch from her pocket.
Tick-tock.
The time was 2:33.
It wasn’t too late, but if the train continued to be delayed, she would miss the transfer time.
If she missed the next train, she might miss the Academy entrance exam—
“Did a meteor fall or something? What on earth is going on!!”
“…Huh.”
The girl thought.
Yes.
Is the Academy entrance exam really that important right now?
What matters is that the blue comet that fell from the sky, and the fact that it landed near the track this train is supposed to be moving on.
“Could this be the ‘Fire of Apocalypse’ from the prophecy…?”
The Fire of Apocalypse.
The girl thought back to her hometown, to the prophecy her grandmother had left behind.
– Humanity will face numerous apocalypses.
Her grandmother, an astrologer and prophet, had left a warning.
– Go to the center of the continent. There, you will meet a person of great destiny. Only he can overcome the many apocalypses humanity will face.
“A person of great destiny…”
Does the apocalypse inevitably come?
– In some form, the final apocalypse will come. Whether it will appear alongside other apocalypses or stand alone is up to you.
If asked, one can say that ‘one’ will definitely come.
– Yunia.
Her grandmother had said.
– Help that person of great destiny. They might become your ‘destined partner.’
Turn away from the apocalypse and leave it to fate?
Or, try as hard as you can to overcome that apocalypse.
So—
“Ah, excuse me.”
Yunia was startled when a man sat next to her.
The man wore a suit similar to what one might see at the Academy.
is tanned skin showed through his shirt, his hair was blonde, and he wore black sunglasses.
He held a briefcase, and his appearance was almost—
“…”
“Is there something on my face?”
“…Oh.”
Yunia pointed to a magazine in front of her.
“Is this person…?”
“…”
In the magazine.
A man with short blonde hair and tanned skin was holding up his middle finger to the camera.
[Wanted: Duke’s Daughter Kidnapper. [Dead or Alive].]
The resemblance between the man and the person in the magazine was striking.
“Hmm.”
The man gave a faint smile and adjusted his sunglasses.
“Do I look like a rude person who steals other people’s women?”
The man took off his sunglasses.
“I’m not that kind of person.”
The man’s eyes, which smiled at Yunia, were—
“…Huh?”
Just a moment ago, the color of the blue comet that fell from the sky was eerily similar. Was that just Yunia’s imagination?
Or—
– Granddaughter.
Could this be the person her grandmother spoke of?
– Your destined partner has blonde hair and blue eyes. Especially, his eyes are the color of the clear blue sky, what you could call the color of the Azure Heaven. It should be easy to find him like this.
…Yunia hadn’t heard about the skin color.
