Stray

Because Nemo Light’s overpowering intervention, the destruction array was activated in advance. Although the possible time difference was calculated, Aurorae had activated the teleportation prop as soon as possible, but he didn’t think that Light wouldn’t leave any way back for himself.

A demon who was willing to face destruction for the sake of humans.

Before Aurorae had time to escape, the powerful destructive aura instantly pushed on the shield he had erected and blasted him directly to the bottom of the Abyss.

The Demon Slayer, who was had overdrawn the power of his flesh had abandoned the unfinished teleportation spell and concentrated all his power on defense. The rapid fall and landing only caused him to lose his mind for a few seconds.

But he wasn’t safe.

Immediately what followed was the devastating effect of overdrawing his power. There was little that was left of the demon flesh that Telaranea supplied him. The blood surging in his veins seemed to turn into fine needles causing intense pain. His own power was collapsing at a terrible speed, exacerbated by the dense dead air at the bottom of the Abyss.

Telaranea was waiting for him near the entrance of the Abyss but he was destined to break his promise. Only here, they couldn’t make contact, and he had completely lost the power to escape.

Aurorae didn’t feel resentment or anger.

He threw the teleportation prop in his hand that had already been deformed and was useless into the cold sand. His tattered armor was cracked into several pieces, and most of the blood-stained waiter’s uniform was exposed.

Aurorae took a deep breath, picked up the remnants of the great sword, and stood up shakily.

He was going to die here. This fact was now unmistakable.

No, rather, it should be said that he was going to die here again.

Hundreds of years ago, he decided that he would never let his consciousness return to his body and a few years ago, the unconscious body had finally stopped breathing. From that moment on, he had actually “died”, and it could even be called dead.

Telaranea had been extending his life with its own flesh, allowing him to barely retain his last consciousness. He didn’t know whether the other party did it out of years of friendship, or simply wanted to observe him as a case, but nevertheless Aurorae was still grateful.

“Aurorae”, who had been guarding the surface for thousands of years, was now just a little spark in the ashes.

His power continued to deplete, and the sense of weakness was getting stronger. Aurorae wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and smiled bitterly at the darkness in front of him.

It’s over, father.

But he seemed destined to be unable to get his peace. Not far away, a familiar aura was surging.

Nemo Light didn’t erect any defense spells, but for some reason he wasn’t swallowed up by the destruction array. The aura of that foolish demon wasn’t far away, together with his father who had lost his sentience.

Although Light was also a creature from the Demon King, it seemed that he had not undertaken any mission. The Demon King who was left with only instinct raised one of its forelimbs and looked like he was about to completely destroy Light—

Aurorae didn’t hesitate for long.

He gathered his last strength in his lower limbs, and before the Demon King could react, he abruptly took Light out of the Demon King’s attack range. He dragged the unconscious Nemo Light in the direction of his body.

The Demon King chased after them, without anger, vigilance, or any other emotions, but only pure intent to kill. There was no vitality in its action. It was more like a puppet dominated by the simplest desires.

His father was still not awake.

Would the Demon King keep hunting them down like this regardless? Aurorae subconsciously rushed towards his own body. Blood gushed out from his wounds, and his muscle seemed to crack into pieces, but he ran with the last of his strength.

He was about to die, but since Light could leave the Abyss, maybe he could still return to the surface. Even if the hatred between them couldn’t be resolved, Nemo Light loved that human so deeply and befriended human authority that he should be able to spread the message.

To tell them with personal experience that this time the Demon King was very dangerous. Tell them not to go on another expedition for hundreds of years. Tell them… Even if Light kills him to vent his anger, it wouldn’t matter. At least from Light’s ability and previous performance, he wasn’t as stupid as that group of humans to irritate the Demon King.

Aurorae weakly laughed.

Hopefully, Light’s great power and sacrificial deed would increase the persuasiveness, arouse the vigilance of those greedy people, and make the surface treat the changes at the bottom of the Abyss more carefully.

…So as to buy his father more time to recuperate.

Aurorae didn’t know when the Demon King would be able to regain his memory, but one more second would give him one more point of hope.

On the one hand, he didn’t know whether the Demon King, who had lost its sanity after being kill, could possibly return to normal again. On the other hand, the current Demon King was too dangerous for both the surface and the Abyss, so he must try to make the other side suffer less useless stimulation.

In this way, at least before death, he could still provide a trace of possibility that was better than nothing, and he could atone for a little bit of his sin.

The premise though was that right now they could escape.

With the rapid loss of strength, the demon slayer could hardly move on. The unconscious Nemo Light’s body became heavier, and Aurorae finally fell to his knees in the cold, fine sand, gasping for breath.

Despite the darkness in front of him, he could still hear blood dripping on the sand.

His body was just ahead.

This is the end, Aurorae thought to himself. He let Light lie on his back in the sand while he crawled two steps to lean on the corpse of a demon behind him. Struggling to move his body, he faced the direction that the Demon King was chasing him, and his heart became sour.

This was a gamble with very low odds. A game. Even if the Demon King was conscious, he didn’t show much care about him, not to mention the state it was in now…

The rhythm of the limbs rubbing against the sand was slowing down.

The speed of the Demon King’s advance became slower, and it finally stopped a hundred meters away.

The unconscious monster stood quietly for a moment besides the body of Aurorae, and then slowly left. Aurorae, who was sitting with is back to the corpse, raised his head slightly as tears streamed across the blood on his face.

He made the right bet, but it made him even more painful.

…Even at this point, did his father still remember his “existence”?

“Nemo Light,” Aurorae squeezed a sentence from between his teeth. He let go of the sword he was holding in his left hand and held down his bleeding wound. His long gray hair scattered on his shoulders. “You’d better wake up quickly…”

He stretched out his blood-stained right hand, pressed Nemo’s brow and struggle to input what strength he had left.

Nemo didn’t take it well.

His consciousness seemed to be cut into several pieces, washed and dissolved by countless important or unimportant information. The state of his mind was closer to half-asleep, half-awake, but the “self” was becoming more blurred.

Those memories were too cold and long.

Boring and complicated, mixed with pain, near-death feelings, and the tears from others. It was like he was sinking in a swamp and was slowly and irreversibly fading away. Those terrible memories couldn’t stop hitting his consciousness, and Nemo frantically shielded the memories that belonged only to him, trying to separate the memories with sunlight from the infinite darkness.

But he didn’t know how to resist, and the swarming consciousness made him wonder where to start. He repeated Oliver’s name repeatedly in his mind, but while one second his lover’s name could bring him sweet brilliance, the next second he felt a numbness that gave him chills.

In the end, there was only a piece of suffocating despair.

Consciousness was gradually piecing together in front of Nemo— He was like an idiot who wanted to hinder the tsunami with his flesh. In the end, he was still too optimistic, thinking that he could preserve his consciousness. Even if he turned into a monster, there was still a chance to turn things around.

The Demon King didn’t need useless information.

Regardless of the details of the merciless plan, he once even considered the current situation. The consciousness that was separated from the surface and lost its memory could easily be disturbed by other races, bringing unnecessary feelings and positions.

Hatred and love, affection and friendship built on falsehood.

The Demon King never needed those things. He just wanted a curious glimpse so as to deduce the full state of the surface. The sun, the smell of the air, the level of development of many civilizations… Even the fact that he wanted to be a librarian before may not be entirely out of his own will.

“Nemo Light” was just a spy on the surface of the darkness. The last intelligence collection before the destruction.

According to the Demon King’s plan, Nemo Light shouldn’t even awaken. He should have spent his life as an ordinary human being, or died from war, disease, or at the hands of his fellow humans. After his uneventful death, the flesh would be destroyed, and the consciousness will return to the body.

Then bring a real calamity to the surface.

Not to mention that the consciousness and feelings of mortals were completely unworthy to be mentioned under the impact of such huge memories, now Nemo was clear about the characteristics of his own body. Once the consciousness really returned to the body, he would instinctively sift through these “worthless” small feelings. It was like using a strainer to sift out the impurities of the muddy water.

It was unstoppable, like the instinct of a heartbeat.

In a more unexpected situation, if he encountered such a thing, he would restore some of the characteristics of a demon. In order to prevent himself from harming his body without his knowledge, he even made a backup plan—

The Demon King separated another piece of flesh, based on all the information collected so far, designed the strongest combat form that life that this world could achieve.

A fully evolved second “Ulysses”.

To avoid attracting unnecessary attention, this fighting machine without self-awareness at first only slept in the corner of the Abyss. If Nemo Light on the surface unfortunately awakened but chance to recover some power, the “strongest life form” at the bottom of the Abyss would be activated at the same time and start moving again.

And without reservation kill all living things in front of it.

After all, “Nemo Light” was born to blend into the surface and was very different from “Ulysses” who was born to fight from the beginning. So even in the worst case, “Nemo Light” regained a lot of power and was influence or manipulated by the surface and tried to attack the Abyss, Ulysses, who had prepared things in advance would also destroy him and forced his consciousness back into his body.

Then the surface would still be destroyed.

In other words, even if he could withstand the impact of these huge memories at this moment, he could barely preserve what was “him”. What awaited would also be the fate of being unable to escape from the bottom of the Abyss, as well as the cruel battle against Ulysses with a zero chance of winning.

Nemo knew this very well, not to mention that Ollie’s strength hadn’t yet developed, and Jesse Dylan couldn’t interfere with the fate he faced. Whether staying, giving up, or moving forward, there was nothing but despair waiting for him.

He protected his last reason blankly, but his heart was barren. Nemo couldn’t even be surprised by the appearance of his own body, and the pain completely tore him apart. If there were feelings, even if he once had little “meaningless” feelings, perhaps…

At this moment, a familiar force poured in from his forehead. The relevant memories were like schools of fish looking for bait, gradually gathered in one place.

He remembered the scene when he first saw this aura.

The lantern blind bugs were one of the superior demons that lived at the bottom of the Abyss and liked to move in groups, slowly wandering around the bottom. The Demon King had never been interested in that kind of stupid plant-like life.

But on that day thousands of years ago, they left behind a newborn of the pack.

At that time, he leaned forward simply because he happened to be nearby and casually checked the condition— A cub born with incomplete legs and feet and unable to move. It curled up in place, motionless.

But unlike its species, it was exuding helplessness and fear.

At the time he thought it was quite interesting. A cub who paid a physical price and was mutated into something with extraordinary wisdom. It was natural that the lantern blind bugs would be wary of this kind of thing and abandoned it as they couldn’t understand it. They didn’t equate it with their own kind.

Without vision, unable to move, left with only hearing and touch, it hadn’t even learned how to eat. Abandoned by its own kind in this way, it would soon die in panic and confusion.

At that time, he hesitated briefly, and Nemo remembered it very clearly. He considered for a while whether to use it as food or continue to observe this special case. In the end, out of some vague emotion, he chose the latter.

He just stayed next to it, letting the lantern blind bug cub scream instinctively in horror. It couldn’t end its own life— When it was so scared that it didn’t have the strength to be afraid, Nemo casually dragged the corpse of a superior demon over, decomposed it into miasma, and watched the cub eat jerkily.

Surface creatures occasionally engage in the act of raising other species. He thought to himself that he might be able to try it to see if this behavior could bring beneficial value.

After feeding regularly for a period of time, when the cub finally got used to fear, his thoughts were no longer chaotic, and Nemo began to exchange ideas with the lantern blind bug.

After all, he just took in a floating cocoon whose world was entirely wrapped. The boundary between the Abyss and the surface had already been designated. Besides, he had infinite time. In order to prepare for the future, he needed to first study the method of sending his consciousness to the surface without destroying the boundary of the surface and the Abyss.

In the darkness, he had an object who could communicate, which really made things a little more efficient.

But that little thing wasn’t the same as himself.

It began to think about a lot of inexplicable things in silence, and Nemo couldn’t understand its thoughts. According to various manifestations, perhaps it also had “feelings” common to those small lives.

[Most feelings are harmful or unhelpful.]

Nemo once explained to it like this.

[You have seen those expeditionary forces. No matter what race they are, they will grieve when their companions die. And that grief made the ensuing attack chaotic… Obviously they came here to plunder, and was prepared to die beforehand, so why would they grieve?]

[Maybe people don’t like being left behind.] It answered like this.

Nemo at the time couldn’t understand.

[I want a name.]

After another expedition, Nemo took his reconstituted body and dragged food to the lantern blind bug he was casually raising. The immovable creature made a request for the first time.

Nemo was a little surprised. It was only the two of them that was communicating underground so this request made no sense, but it didn’t cost much, and he had no firm reason to refuse.

He stared at the white star-like eyes of the lantern blind bug without the slightest vision.

[If you care about the expedition,] he thought for a moment, [The sword that killed me before looks good in color. I don’t know how to express it accurately, but I hope to see it again.]

[The surface race calls it “The Holy Sword, Breaking Dawn” and its name comes from the brilliance of the sunrise. I haven’t seen the sunrise before. If it looks like that, then it doesn’t hurt to take a look. You gave me a question that I can’t understand. Maybe I can give you a name that you won’t understand.]

[“Dawn”, Aurorae. Speaking of which, Aurorae, do you want to go to the surface to take a look?]

That was the beginning of everything.

The author has something to say:

Nemo: Pick up a small animal and raise it.

Nemo: This is my little animal!

Aurorae: Father—!

Nemo: …