CHAPTER 0: PROLOGUE

The Ashtion Kingdom never truly understood the steep price tag attached to a word like "victory."

That night, the sky above Avernus Fortress burned a vivid crimson, scorched by a rain of fire and the explosive fury of thousands of mana cannons. Blasts of magical light sliced through the darkness, shattering the black stone pillars that had stood firm for centuries. The allied human forces had finally breached the final line of defense. One by one, the Demon King’s finest commanders fell, leaving behind the metallic stench of blood and the shattered, scattered fragments of an empire reduced to rubble.

At the very front line, a girl clad in silver armor rode atop a snow-white pegasus.

Her name was Shion. Strapped to her chest was armor forged from celestial iron, while her gauntleted fingers tightly gripped the hilt of a holy sword. Her silver hair whipped wildly against the plumes of battlefield smoke. Every step forward into the dying remnants of the demon stronghold dragged up the dark memories of a night over a decade ago to haunt her mind.

The night her village was razed to the ground. The night ravenous monsters tore her parents apart right before her eyes.

That hatred had never flickered out. It was that very vengeance that fueled her to spur her pegasus forward, smashing through the colossal stone doors of the Throne Room until they shattered into oblivion.

Inside the vast, dimly lit hall, a man sat calmly atop a throne carved from black stone.

Sabath—the Supreme Demon King.

A pair of pitch-black horns curved majestically atop his head. His glowing red eyes stared passively at the freshly demolished entrance. Not a single trace of fear crossed his face, as if the cataclysmic forces crumbling his empire around him were nothing more than a passing breeze.

"So... you're the one they call the Hero?" Sabath’s voice echoed heavily, pressing down on the air with a weight of mana that squeezed the lungs.

Shion leapt down from her pegasus. She didn't waste a second replying to his greeting. Gritting her teeth until they ground together, she raised her holy sword in a two-handed grip and dropped into a combat stance.

"How utterly tragic..." Sabath chuckled softly, resting his chin on one hand. "Carrying the hopes of so many on your shoulders for your entire life... Don't you ever tire of it, Hero?"

"Carrying everyone's hopes is heavy!" Shion yelled, her voice trembling under a surge of overwhelming emotion. "But this is proof that the people you slaughtered put their trust in me! I'm not standing here just for myself!"

A brilliant white-gold aura of holy magic erupted from Shion, incinerating the chill lingering in the hall. Without warning, she shot forward, slicing through the air in the blink of an eye.

Sabath moved to block with claws of raw mana, but the holy sword’s strike—infused with celestial energy—was far too sharp. Her follow-up slash struck the side of Sabath’s head with brutal accuracy.

CRACK!

A loud snap shattered the silence. One of Sabath's proud, magnificent horns snapped off, flying into the air before clattering violently onto the stone floor.

Black blood dripped from the corner of the Demon King's lips. Yet, instead of roaring in rage or wincing in pain, Sabath burst into a booming laugh. A cold, mocking laughter that vibrated through the very foundation of the castle.

"You should really ask yourself, Hero..." Sabath wiped the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. "What will you do once all this vengeance is settled? When there's no enemy left for you to hate... in the end, you'll realize just how empty a soul filled with nothing but anger truly is."

"SHUT UP!"

Shion roared. She channeled every last drop of her soul and holy mana into the tip of her blade. A massive magical crest formed in midair, radiating a blinding radiance that consumed the entire throne room in a tide of ultimate energy.

Facing an attack capable of leveling a mountain, Sabath made no effort to dodge. Instead, he threw his arms wide open.

"Then finish it, Hero. Unleash every drop of your malice... and mark my words."

A violent shockwave collapsed the dome of Avernus Fortress. Sabath’s second horn broke free, floating for a brief second before turning into dust.

As the thick smoke slowly lifted and the magical light faded away, Shion collapsed to her knees on the fractured ground. She panted heavily, her chest heaving for air. Her eyes stared blankly at the spot where the Demon King had stood. All that remained were blackened ruins and a lingering wave of heat.

The crushing weight of vengeance she had carried for over a decade felt lifted in an instant, yet at the exact same moment, a strange emptiness crept into her chest. There was no pure satisfaction—only a soul-draining exhaustion gnawing at her spirit.

The Demon King was dead. The entire world would celebrate her name by morning.

However, not a single soul in the world of Ashtion knew the actual truth.

In the dark, hollow void between dimensions, Sabath drifted in a state of unconsciousness. Before the Hero’s final slash could touch his body, he had sacrificed his entire core mana supply and his pair of grand horns to activate a forbidden spell: Dimensity Shift. He had intentionally faked his death to escape absolute annihilation.

Dragged by the gravitational pull of another dimension, his helpless body hurtled through Earth’s atmosphere like a falling meteor.

A harsh crash echoed as his body ripped through dense foliage, slamming hard into the dirt within the bushes of a city park in Japan.

The night was dead silent. The damp smell of earth following a fresh rain crept into his fading senses.

A middle-aged park security guard on his night rounds suddenly froze in his tracks. The beam of his flashlight caught the motionless body of a young man with messy black hair sprawled out among the bushes. His luxurious attire was completely shredded, leaving a handsome youth dressed in rags.

"Hey! Are you okay?!" The guard yelled in panic, rushing over. He frantically grabbed Sabath by the shoulders and shook him. "Gosh, kid! Don't go dying on me here! They'll dock my pay if there's a corpse on my patrol route!"

Sabath, barely conscious, could only roll his eyes in complete resignation before his mind finally plunged into darkness.

The old man had no idea. The young man he was currently piggybacking while muttering out