CHAPTER 102: Deep Beneath the Earth
The child was a guest who had come to the garden.
I was glad. In this garden, nothing existed that did not originate from me.
Only things I had sown from seed, tilled the land for, and raised myself. They were all beautiful and filled me with pride just by looking at them, but sometimes, I felt a sense of emptiness.
The child's visit happened during one of those times. The first being from the outside I had ever welcomed.
Are you the king of this place?
A king? I had never thought of myself as one.
But if I have a territory and those who follow me, I suppose I could be called a king.
This garden is my territory, and the things I have cultivated follow me, so the word 'king' didn't seem entirely wrong.
I am Rondar, a plunderer from Sarbak. I challenge you.
It seemed the child had come to plunder my kingdom.
For a fearsome plunderer, his speech was polite, and his gaze was not vulgar but held a deep resonance.
His closely cropped silver hair was neat, and though he was short, his body spoke of countless years of training. His skin was like rock, with no soft spots, only rough and hard surfaces.
Above all, the sharpness of the sword in his hand was real. So, I too, faced him with all my sincerity.
To state the conclusion first, the child could not defeat me.
He lost, and lost, and lost again. He lost so many times that the sword he had brought with him eventually wore down to nothing.
Undaunted, the child asked for my understanding and forged a new sword to challenge me again.
Years passed, and that sword too wore away. New iron and a new fire boiled in the forge.
The sword made from that also wore away with time, and he would forge another, and it too would wear away…
Such days continued. I couldn't count how many years had passed.
After spending so much time together, the child and I had become quite close.
You don't even see me as a threat.
The child expressed his dissatisfaction with a pout, but he never refused the wine I offered him. The mouth may be sullen, but the tongue is honest.
—This fruit wine is too magnificent to refuse.
That was a far more satisfying compliment than when I overwhelmed him with a sword. I brewed my wine even more diligently, just to hear those words.
Countless more years flowed by, and at some point, our duels were no longer fought with swords but with suitable tree branches we picked up nearby.
They weren't even edged; we just knocked off the small twigs and called them wooden swords.
Since the outcome was always his defeat, and the victor never killed the loser, there was no reason to insist on real swords.
—...I lost.
Once again, the child suffered a bitter defeat. Compared to me, who had grown numb to victory, his ability to still chew on the bitterness of defeat was remarkable.
Our duels had taken on the nature of sparring rather than a life-or-death struggle, but losing was still vexing for him, it seemed.
When will I ever be able to win?
He sighed in disappointment, but his skills had improved greatly.
He was strong when we first met, but he was even stronger now. He just couldn't reach my level.
To comfort his disappointment, I served him a consoling drink along with delicious fruits and grains of wheat.
How can I defeat you?
I don't know. I've never fought against myself, so I don't know how one could defeat me.
But if you keep getting stronger, perhaps the day will come when you can fell me.
—Is that so…
It was a simple answer, yet the child repeated it as if deeply savoring it.
Somehow, we've ended up fighting only with these branches. What if we tried using swords again?
It made no difference to me either way. I was confident I wouldn't lose, regardless.
The child took great care in reheating the forge. Lighting a fire in a furnace that had been frozen for so many years was no easy task.
I sought a suitable fire to melt the frozen forge. I needed a flame stronger than any other, and as it happened, the core of a star was hot enough to heat the furnace.
Having lit the forge with my help, the child stared into the crimson flames and made a vow.
One day, I will defeat you.
Good wine and food. A life with someone to talk with and cross swords with.
This was from a time when my kingdom was still at peace.

The sword was flung, soaring into the sky. It was an impossible sight. Of the two clashing blades, it was the larger one, not the smaller one, that had been knocked away.
For a brief moment, order descended upon the utterly chaotic battlefield. Friend and foe alike, even those who had lost the ability to distinguish between them, were all struck speechless.
For Kalesian and Rona, who had been watching intently, the shock was enough to make their hearts stop.
"That sword…!"
When Jinwoo had raised his blade to meet the greatsword of the God of the Battlefield, they thought he had lost his mind.
They wanted to stop him, but the clash of swords was faster than any means they had to intervene.
Watching Jinwoo willingly leap into an unstoppable blow, they had imagined a horrific outcome.
But that didn't happen. Instead, it was the God of the Battlefield's sword that was deflected, its momentum broken.
However.
'Still too weak.'
Jinwoo couldn't relax yet. His opponent's sword had only been knocked back slightly; it hadn't been dropped or lost.
Given the sword's immense size, deflecting it even a little was a remarkable feat, but it hadn't diminished his opponent's combat power.
The enemy could bring the sword down again at any moment. What would he do about the second strike?
But contrary to Jinwoo's worries, the enemy did not bring the sword down. He neither swung nor stabbed.
He just… paused.
'What's happening?'
It was an unexpected reaction. Feeling even more suspicious, Jinwoo remained on guard, not letting his focus waver.
Then, his opponent's next action was astonishing. The giant arm inverted the sword, and then, simply let it go.
The sword fell tip-first, plunging straight into the ground. It didn't tear through the earth but vanished softly, as if phasing through it like a ghost, seeping into the planet.
After discarding the sword into the ground, the arm began to disappear back into the rift.
Not only that, but the rift itself began to slowly close. The number of monsters pouring out of it naturally started to decrease.
Flash!
As if this was their chance, lights flared up across the battlefield. The God of Light incited her allied monsters, pushing back hard against the enemy.
"Jinwoo!"
"What just happened!?"
Kalesian and Rona stared at him with incomprehensible eyes.
Rona's gaze was fine, but Kalesian's was burdensome. His scholarly curiosity was observing Jinwoo with fervent intensity.
"First, let's secure the divine artifacts."
He didn't know what he could possibly explain, but all that would have to wait. Right now, they needed to collect the divine artifacts the enemy had left behind.
[…]
The light that had been chattering incessantly by his side was now silent. Not only was it silent, but it wasn't shining either.
At this moment, the only place the light was heading was the path toward the divine artifacts.
'Of course, she's not without greed.'
She might not have a specific goal or reason for descending like the God of the Battlefield. But that didn't mean she wouldn't covet the divine artifacts.
Items that other deities had imbued with a portion of their power to interfere with the lower world. Who wouldn't desire such things?
Before long, the light began to directly obstruct them. It blocked their path, using monsters to bar their way.
"Out of the way, you fiends!"
Kalesian roared in fury and unleashed his breath weapon. His breath, which had been completely ineffective against the red cliffs, was a different story for the monsters.
The beam of light he fired overpowered even the light cast by the God of Light, creating a long runway across the battlefield.
The fleet-footed Rona and Jinwoo ran ahead first, leaping into the rubble of the collapsed red cliff.
Jinwoo first looked for the divine artifact of the Moonlight Forest. The other half of the glass bead inside him.
'There it is!'
He didn't even need to look around; he could feel a pulling force through the glass bead. He set his course toward it, and his body moved naturally.
A small sapling, rooted in the red cliff. After securing that, he swept up every other plausible-looking item nearby and stuffed it into his inventory.
There were many miscellaneous and trivial items, but he had no time to examine them one by one. He would grab everything now and check it later.
[Jinwoo, I helped a lot, so just one…]
Just then, a mote of light flickered in front of Jinwoo. It seemed she wanted at least one divine artifact.
He remembered that the God of the Moonlight Forest had needed two divine artifacts to open the gate to the Spirit Realm. It seemed there was a big difference between having one and having two.
"How about I repay you for your help with gold or money?"
Of course, she had no need for such things. It was just his way of refusing.
Considering she had betrayed them the moment the God of the Battlefield retreated, there was no room for sympathy. It wasn't as if they had a relationship built on deep trust to begin with.
[…]
The mote of light remained silent.
He expected some kind of response, like "You'll regret this," or "I'll be watching you," but there was nothing.
[Huu, I'll back off for today. Let's have a proper talk later. I'm still on the 3rd Floor, after all.]
Surprisingly, she retreated cleanly. Although she promised a "later," this was a very cool-headed withdrawal.
It wasn't a feeling of her being good-natured. Her voice was tinged with a thick mix of wariness and curiosity.
It seemed she had no intention of being completely hostile just yet. But it didn't seem like she considered him an ally either.
The heat of the battle had cooled considerably.
The monsters summoned by the God of the Battlefield were almost all defeated, leaving only the God of Light's monsters. They alone stood on the corpses, roaring in victory toward the heavens.
"Jinwoo! Did you find them?"
"Probably. Let's head back for now."
Rona let out a huge sigh of relief at the news that Jinwoo had secured the artifacts.
The worst-case scenario would have been another god, like the God of Light right here, taking the artifacts. If that happened, there was no telling when they might attempt a descent like the God of the Battlefield and seal off the 3rd Floor.
If Jinwoo had indeed collected them all, they had at least avoided the worst. The two, joined shortly after by Kalesian, quickly left the cliffside.

They were no longer in a cooperative or allied relationship with the God of Light.
Since clashing with her monsters would do them no good, the party avoided them and sought to regroup with the Elves on the outskirts.
Along the way.
Jinwoo was examining the divine artifacts in his inventory one by one.
'Some are ornate, some are simple…'
Most of the items he had swept up were useless decorations. But a few were definitely divine artifacts.
The reason he could tell was simple. Like the Sky God's scabbard, they radiated a thick aura of Erosion.
'What do I do with these?'
Jinwoo frowned. He had collected them, but he wasn't sure if it was safe to possess them. Could there be negative effects?
For now, though, it was fine. Surprisingly, there was no effect on him.
His arms and skin weren't turning black, and his mind wasn't being corrupted. His Blue Flame was still as blue as ever.
'Where is the one from the God of the Battlefield?'
Among the artifacts, Jinwoo searched for the one belonging to the God of the Battlefield. Since he had crossed blades with him, it wasn't difficult to search for his energy.
But he couldn't feel that energy from within his inventory.
'Did I leave it back at the cliff?'
The thought crossed his mind for a moment, but that wasn't it. He hadn't left it behind; he just hadn't found it yet.
Jinwoo briefly placed his hand on the ground. He remembered how the enemy had left his sword behind at the end.
Deep beneath the earth. Far beyond his current reach, he could feel a dark energy.