The Berserker’s Second Playthrough in the Game - Chapter 112



Only Krnovel

Episode 112. Atala’s Judgement (15)

Duncan had no idea what was going on or how this hilarious final match was going to pan out.

““Eww! Ewww!!!””

““AAAAAAAAAAAAH!””

What I remember clearly is that something unidentified broke through the wall and burst in. After that, I was swept away by screams and crowds, and my soul was completely sucked out. Duncan, who was being pushed around like a paper doll, came to his senses just before escaping the stands.

‘… … I’ll be fine! ‘Are you okay?’

He struggled against the tide of people. After being trampled to death several times, he finally returned to his original position.

Tragically, around that time the entire stands began to collapse.

――――― Kwarrrrrrrr – !

“Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!!”

The survival instinct awakened superhuman physical abilities. Duncan rushed forward, forward. He stepped on the collapsing stairs and flagstones, leaving behind falling spectators and gamblers, and threw himself into the stadium alone, surviving alone.

By chance, at that moment, the air cleared and a fragment of the ruins’ landscape appeared.

Blah blah blah… … .

When I finally came to my senses, all I saw was a dark passageway.

“Ugh, ugh, ugh… … .”

Where are we? Am I really dead?

I could feel the weight of the heavy bag and the pounding of my heart, so I knew I wasn’t dead. A faint golden light was twinkling at the end of the passageway in the distance.

There was nowhere else to go. Duncan hesitated and headed toward the light source. And when he came to the opening where the light emanated, he saw a strange little bird.

“[… … The ‘Guardian of the Earth’ will turn you into a speck of dust smaller than dust! If you wish to leave behind even a corpse, you must choose self-destruction now… … .]”

A room overgrown with bushes with golden flower buds. An old woman talking to herself as if possessed by a ghost, and Agon’s angry horn bathing half his body in a glowing pool.

My mind went blank, wondering what the point of this was. At first, I thought about asking the old woman the whole story, but I soon gave up.

“[It’s the same! Anyone who has not passed the ordeal will never be able to set foot in the ruins!]”

Tu – Ugh!

‘That person… … She doesn’t seem like a grandmother whose mind and body are intact… … .’

Duncan changed his target without any hesitation. He said he would secretly go to Agon’s Raging Horn and ask questions. It was for the best for Duncan, who didn’t know that he was in ‘berserk’ mode.

‘… … Surely, you won’t hurt me because of our last fight?’

He gripped the dagger hilt tightly in preparation for an emergency. Anyone else would have been caught by now, but fortunately Duncan was good at hiding his presence. He approached right behind the puddle without anyone noticing him at all.

But by chance, very coincidentally… …

“[…] … The moment you reach destruction!! Until that moment, the ordeal will never end!!!]”

… … As the shaman turned her head while using her evil words, she was eventually discovered.

Dilated, cloudy pupils. The shaman was distraught as if she had seen a ghost.

“[Oh, no? W-what are you! How dare you sneak into the ruins… … .]”

Duncan was also taken aback. He reflexively drew his dagger and thrust it into Goltarran’s neck.

“Huh oh! Go, stay still, grandma! Oh, otherwise something bad and regrettable will happen!”

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Hellfire slowly consumed Goltaran’s beard. While the hostage taker who threatened her had a dumbfounded expression, the threatened old woman contorted her face like a demon and spewed out scathing words.

“[Ruthless!! Get away from him right now!! Otherwise, I will tear you to pieces! Don’t leave a single speck of dust behind! I will bury you forever in that dry wasteland!!]”

“Uh, huh… … .”

The standoff continued without much success. The priestess barely managed to regain her composure. She exhaled sharply and quickly drew a magic circle behind her back.

“[Whew, the old man was so foolish… … . There was a way to drive away the intruder without harming the great warrior… … .]”

Too – Woah!

“… … fishing!”

The banishing spell pushed Duncan’s body away. The small spirit disappeared from the ruins in an instant.

Ting, ting, hururuk –

But even after its master disappeared, the Hellfire Dagger remained, falling into the bushes and igniting a fire.

“[hmm……?]”

Whoosh whoosh whoosh –

A hellish horror that spreads in an instant.

Flowers and bushes burned well due to lack of moisture. The raw materials for the elixir, which had been cultivated with great effort, were burned into firewood in the blink of an eye.

“[… … Ah, no!! Nooooooooooooo!!]”

The priestess’s scream echoed fiercely. Nevertheless, the teeth of flame mercilessly chewed the firewood and vomited out sharp sulfuric smoke that filled the space. The priestess’s eyes, who was coughing, caught sight of something much more important than a simple elixir.

“[Kuhuluk! Kuhuluk, Keluk, Kek, Kek! Come on, warrior! Come on, warrior!]”

Goltarran still hadn’t come to his senses. The priestess finally got up from her seat after hundreds of years.

Tsk tsk, tsk tsk –

The severed roots dangled from under her emaciated thighs. With the ‘Roots of the Wilderness’ destroyed, the spell would cease and she would lose much of her supernatural power, but now was not the time to worry about such things.

The priestess stumbled as she walked, lost her balance, and fell down violently. Still, she desperately crawled through the flames and headed toward the pool. Grabbing Goltarran’s forearm, she quickly drew a line in the air.

As soon as he put his hand on the magic circle, the outlines of the two people scattered like dust.

“[Kuhuluk, kuhuluk, keuluk, keuk… … .]”

Due to the unexpected visit of an intruder, the priestess is finally forced to leave the ruins for the last time.

*

A space where the two landscapes of the arena and the ruins still strangely overlap.

The Great Warrior of Atala finally came face to face with the priestess of the wilderness who had humiliated him and created a fake warrior.

Passsssssssssssssssssssssssssssss… … .

“[Coolook, coolook, koolook, hoooooo… …].”

“… … .”

Under the shadow of the stopped rock giants, the shaman was scattering like dust. Although some of the ruins have been covered over, the essence of this space is ultimately external. It was inevitable that the shaman would not last long.

Among the Daejeon Temple and the shaman, the Daejeon Temple was the first to speak.

“Why did you suddenly crawl out? Sniffing like a rat… … “She was just stuck in her damn closet.”

“[Kuhuluk, kuluk… … The one who is truly a rat is the one who is stuck next to you… … . How dare he sneak into the sacred relics and burn it down… … .]”

The priestess glared at Duncan as if she was going to chew him to death. Duncan flinched, shivered, and hid behind Kadim. Kadim nodded, deciding to ask about the details later.

“Good job, Duncan. Now run as far away from here as possible.”

“Yes? Well, but… wouldn’t it be safer to stay by your side?”

“No, I’m the one in the most danger right now.”

The empty gaze turned to Duncan. The bloodshot eyes were shaking wildly as if they would burst at any moment. Duncan trembled in fear, then shouted and ran away in a panic.

“Mom, take care of yourself, Your Majesty! You must come back safely without getting hurt!”

“… … .”

Without answering, Kadim waved his left hand, which had all his fingers broken.

Suppressing the madness is approaching its limit. The shaman, scattering like dust in the red-stained world, looked like a mist of blood in the shape of a person. He gritted his teeth against hers, suppressed the maddening impulse, and finally opened his dry lips.

“pizza… … I don’t think I can last long. Before I lose my mind… … Just one thing… … “Let me ask.”

“[…] … .]”

“For some reason… … I couldn’t summon my strength. I know the reason. That guy used it well… … “Did you, by any chance, place a ban on ‘Judgment of Atala’?”

The priestess slowly turned around, with a dry regret on her lips.

“[No. The reason is, you… … abandoned your mission to fight and ran away.]”

At first, Kadim thought he was talking nonsense and tried to throw the axe, but when he heard what followed, he had no choice but to stop himself.

“[…] … Why, why did you abandon us?]”

“… … !”

“[Where did you go and now you’re back? What mood swings made you turn away from this world? Fulfilling my mission to defeat the Great Evil… … ? I’m sick of the days of struggle… … ? But, but, it’s still here… … Weren’t we, the blind-eyed shaman who trusted and relied only on you, left? … ?]”

“… … .”

“[I hope you come back… … She waited. I turned my back on the sweet fruits of life, and for too long I chewed on the roots of loneliness, which were bitterer than death… … . But hundreds of days, thousands of days, tens of thousands of days… … Even if I cry out your name alone, wail, sob, vomit blood, and hit my head on the floor until my forehead bursts! You didn’t come back… … . If you hadn’t left! No, I would rather have died! Well, I wouldn’t have had to go through that kind of pain… … . I wouldn’t have made a fake great warrior with my own hands… … .]”

A worn-out, shattered soil full of resentment.

However, as soon as the shaman finished speaking, she erased the thick layer of grief. Instead, she painted her magic circle with her eyes shining brightly.

“[You guy… … It is not ‘The Great Warrior of Atala’. No, you… … It should not be the ‘Great Warrior of Atala’. That is a title not granted to a fugitive who has turned away from the struggle. Now, I will hold you by your ankles and send you into hell, where there is only defeat and submission, and give birth to a new great warrior who will carry on the mission… … .]”

The moment when the rock giants that had fallen under the control of sorcery rise again.

Kugugugugugugu, kukugugugugugugu –

Kadim suddenly lost consciousness.

And the pale demonic land filled the field of vision.

There were piles of corpses around him, and he was holding a shovel in his hand. His body moved on its own, regardless of his own will. He stuck the shovel blade into the ground soaked with magic, stomped on it with his foot, dug deep, and dug a hole.

Are you going to dig a pit to bury the body? I didn’t know why this vision appeared out of nowhere. But I realized one thing clearly.

The reason why he couldn’t summon the ‘Spirit of Atala’.

Because he was not a warrior of Atala.

Because he wasn’t Khadim.

The man separated his modern self from his warrior self. He denied what Kadeem had done, saying it was not his doing. It was a shallow defense mechanism to prevent his heart from collapsing and to endure the blood-stained reality.

However, it became an obstacle that denied the identity of Daejeon Temple.

It was okay the first time. I didn’t have time to look back on reality when I got ‘Atala’s Judgment’. But the problem was right after I defeated the Great Demon.

[…] … You have to accept reality. Because these are people I can never meet again.]

The life of a warrior and the life of a modern man. At a critical crossroads, he abandoned everything and chose the latter. Starting the second episode, he hastily buried his modern self again, but the hole that had already been dug once had revealed his true intentions to the bottom.

A divine blessing is the spirit that God bestows upon his followers. A fugitive who runs away and abandons everything will never be able to obtain that blessing… … .

‘Because of something so trivial… … you can’t use your divine power… …?’

On the one hand, boiling anger was building up.

Anyway, remaining in this world was an impossible option due to my madness. After going through endless hardships to defeat the great evil, you arbitrarily start the second round and take away what little blessings you had? I was filled with such intense anger that it wouldn’t be easy even if I chopped the culprit into pieces with an ax until every single bone or piece of flesh was left behind.

But on the other hand, there was also solemn repentance.

It wasn’t just his comrades and the priestesses of the wilderness that he had abandoned. It was the world itself that presented him with an endless struggle that encompassed everything. He couldn’t help but feel that his attitude of turning his back on the world without hesitation and then returning and proudly calling himself a great warrior was contradictory, even to himself.

chin – !

Suddenly something touched the tip of the shovel.

Anxiety overtook me. Could it be that this unknown red outline appears again?

Fortunately, that wasn’t the case. The thing that reached the end of the shovel was another shovel. As I looked down the hole, I saw a man shoveling in the world across from me.

The man continued to dig as if he had something to show. As time passed, the hole widened and his world was completely revealed.

There were living people there, not piles of corpses.

All the people of the continent who were saved by the demise of the Great Demon. Far more numerous than the corpses he had personally piled up, people as numerous as the stars in the night sky who would never have seen the light of day if he had not fought… … .

I thought I knew what he was going to say. The man and Kadim burst into laughter at the same time.

That’s right. Everything is like two sides of a coin, and they couldn’t be separated from the beginning. Where there are men, there are khadim, where there are sins, there are achievements, and where there are those who are judged, there are also those who are saved.

So the man finally acknowledged Kadeem.

There was no more denial. There was no more escapism. He decided to fully accept the sins, the deeds, the mission that Khadim had carried. He decided to humbly acknowledge that it was all his own doing and his own choice.

With the two selves merged, there was only one way to go. A path that I believed would ultimately save myself and everyone. A path of struggle, where I had no doubt that my will was the will to devote myself.

Kadim knelt down and recited a prayer resolutely.

“[Atala, god of struggle and wilderness… … .]”

I will no longer turn my back.

“[Look down on your great warriors, lift the torch and lead them to the battlefield… … .]”

No longer will I abandon anything and run away.

“[Give me the strength to stand against the wicked enemies, give me a heart that will not be broken even when the storm blows… … .]”

No longer will I deny the footsteps I have walked.

“[Even if my spirit and body are covered in blood and return to the dust of the wilderness… … .]”

If it is my mission to walk through the endless wilderness covered in that blood, I will gladly accept it.

“[… … I swear that I will never surrender and will fight forever.]”

I am an outsider, exiled from reality.

Khadim.

And he is the great warrior of Atala.

Tsk tsk tsk tsk tsk… … .

The illusion of the Demon Realm was lifted like a curtain. Beyond the red-tinted vision, majestic outlines were revealed. It seemed that he was currently in a state of madness, fighting against the rock giants.

―――― Quagwagwa, quagwagwagwagwang-!!

“Ugh, keaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!”

“[…] … You’ve finally revealed your true colors! As expected, you are the source of disaster that will lead to destruction of the whole world… … .]”

But it didn’t last long.

Kadim stopped the runaway body. And then he grabbed the sack tightly. A yellowish energy leaked out from the jet-black axe, and before we knew it, it formed a large gust of wind, which eventually expanded like a sandstorm and enveloped the entire ruined arena.

WH …

The shrine maiden, who had already lost half of her body, opened her eyes wide.

“[Ah, no, how can I get the ‘Magnificence of Atala’…? … .]”

A yellow afterglow lingered and soothed the body consumed by madness. Kadim breathed out her breath as if spitting out polluted waste.

“… … Phew.”

Atala’s Divine. Its effect is to amplify all combat-related stats and grant immunity to all debuffs.

The worst debuff, ‘mania’, was no exception.

Khoooooooooooo – !!!

No amount of madness could stop the will of the great warrior. The vortex of the wilderness enveloped the sun’s eyes. The sky was dyed in a swirling gold, scattering a dazzling afterglow.

“[Well, you can’t do that! That can’t be possible! You, you, have turned your back on the struggle… … They abandoned us… … Why, why… … .]”

The torrent of divine power surged forward with increasing intensity. The broken-hearted priestess was swept away by the storm and collapsed. The heavens and earth shook like a roaring beast, and even the great rock giants staggered without being able to find their footing.

– Coo coo coo… … .

– Kookookookookook… … .

Only Kadim.

“Now, here, the hall of corruption that insults the struggle… … .”

Only the great warrior of Atala.

“… … In front of a fake Daejeonsa who pretends to be the savior and a shaman in the wilderness who mocked the Daejeonsa… … .”

Only those who have sworn to walk the path of struggle forever.

“… … The solemn ‘Judgment of Atala’ has arrived.”

He stood firm, without moving an inch.