The Hero Returns

* * *

The night before, when the four of them were drinking together...

"What Big Brother was like in the past, you ask?"

That was the question Su-hyeun threw out to his brothers during that occasion.

Just what was the Bull Demon King's personality like way back in the past?

Although it was rude to ask that in front of the person in question, Su-hyeun was far too curious to let it slide. After all, he had already heard some bits and pieces about the Bull Demon King's old personality from Sun Wukong in passing.

"Well, it was no joke, I can tell you that."

"Back then, we couldn't even freely talk about it like this."

Sun Wukong and the Roc Demon King replied in turn, then smirked to themselves.

When Su-hyeun sneaked a glance to the side, he noticed the Bull Demon King faintly smiling as well. He would've at the very least pretended to smack his younger brothers in the head if they said nonsense about him, yet he was not doing any of the sorts.

"Wow, it must be true, then," Su-hyeun thought.

Although they were smiling, the two Yogoe brothers were definitely telling the truth here.

And the fact that the Bull Demon King was also smiling? It probably meant that he was also conscious of what he was like in the past.

"Can't you just tell me what he was like back then?" Su-hyeun, his curiosity now greatly piqued, pestered the others for more answers.

When he did, Sun Wukong pondered something for a bit, then replied contemplatively, "Okay. Hmm…he was utterly terrifying."

That was a somewhat vague, roundabout answer.

However, it wasn't that Sun Wukong didn't want to answer properly, but this was most likely the limit of his ability to describe something in detail.

However, that vague answer was still enough to let Su-hyeun know that Sun Wukong was genuinely scared of the Bull Demon King back then. The one and only Sun Wukong, who possessed the power of immortality that even surpassed the grip of death and fear itself, was actually scared of someone.

Now that it made sense why Sun Wukong was utterly helpless against the Bull Demon King's orders.

The Roc Demon King chimed in, "Let me tell you something. Our Big Brother was even more violent than this kid, Sun Wukong, back then."

"More violent...?" Su-hyeun sneaked a glance at the Bull Demon King.

The Bull Demon King silently nodded. His expression said he agreed with the usage of the term "violent." Despite the revelation of him being even more violent than Sun Wukong, he didn't try to deny it.

"Just how bad must he been for him to..." Su-hyeun's thoughts trailed off.

There was no doubting that Sun Wukong was a good brother to Su-hyeun, but that didn't automatically turn him into a kind brother. A good person was only a single word difference from a kind one.

But to think that the Bull Demon King was even more violent than Sun Wukong. It was almost impossible to even imagine how bad he must've been like back then.

"Wow, that's practically at the level of a gang boss..."

Su-hyeun ended up muttering something without realizing it, causing the whole room to suddenly fall into this eerie silence.

Then, a short while later...

"Fuut, fuu-hahahahaha!"

"Ahahah! Hahat, ahahahat!"

Sun Wukong and the Roc Demon King burst into peals of laughter. They were so close to one another that it was hard to tell who started laughing first.

Even the Bull Demon King was chuckling. It seemed that he also found Su-hyeun's opinion of "gang boss" too amusing to hold back.

"Aaargh, my tummy. Kek. Kekeke," Sun Wukong held his aching belly and rolled around on the small room's floor while laughing, then wiped away some tears that had trickled from of his eyes.

The boisterous laughter continued for a while, and Su-hyeun eventually joined them with a sheepish grin of his own. He was beginning to feel apologetic to the Bull Demon King for some reason.

Sun Wukong barely managed to stop laughing to his mouth to say, "Right, back in the past, he used a weapon called the Mixed Iron Rod. He originally used that instead of the Palm Leaf Fan, and when I first met him, he often beat the living snot out of me with that thing."

"Mixed Iron Rod?"

"Yeah, it's this pitch-black rod for dishing out beatings. It hurts like hell if you get hit by it. Big Brother took it out less and less as his Sage Arts got better, though. Even I haven't seen it in ages."

The Bull Demon King had another weapon beside the Palm Leaf?

Although Su-hyeun's curiosity was piqued again, he couldn't ask for the rod to be displayed during this occasion. The Bull Demon King not bringing that rod out could only mean that he no longer wanted to use it.

"Will I get to see it in the future, I wonder?" Just as Su-hyeun's curiosity regarding this Mixed Iron Rod was about to reach its fiery peak...

"Wait a minute, are you implying that only gangsters are more violent than me?!" Sun Wukong, who abruptly regained his wits, spun his head to stare at Su-hyeun.

And his sudden outburst caused the room to explode into another fit of laughter.

"Fuu-hahahahat! Now you finally figured it out!" the Roc Demon King laughed loudly.

Meanwhile, the Bull Demon King said, "Now that you understand, perhaps you should behave yourself better in your daily life, Wukong."

And so, they spent the night in that manner—merrily and boisterously.

* * *

The discussion regarding the Mixed Iron Rod was nothing more than a brief interlude during the night and nothing more.

Even so, it was made abundantly clear that the Bull Demon King hadn't brought that weapon out in a truly long time.

"Which means he's thinking of getting serious now," Su-hyeun inwardly concluded.

The Bull Demon King, who had been using his bare fists or his fan until now to fight, finally pulled out his Mixed Iron Rod—a "club" around one meter in length and somewhat thick in width, too.

Whoosh—

The Bull Demon King grasped the Mixed Iron Rod with both his hands, then assumed the stance of taking a big swing.

Whoosh—!

Craaaack—!

Riiiip, ka-booooom—!

He then smashed a nearby tree, shattering it into million pieces, with those pieces flying toward Su-hyeun like bullets. But the flames that rose in front of Su-hyeun burned all those tree shrapnel to ashes.

Whoosh—

Right after that, the Bull Demon King held the Mixed Iron Rod up high.

Su-hyeun looked up at the rod that was already above his head, then powerfully swung the Thunder Sword diagonally upward.

[Heavenly Demon's Blade - Dragon Ascending to Heaven, Annihilation]

Smaaaaash—

Fwhooooosh—!

The Thunder Sword clashed and blocked the Bull Demon King's descending Mixed Iron Rod. Powerful ripples of electricity spread out, with the spot where the two of them collided as the epicenter. The ground where Su-hyeun stood on deeply caved in.

"So heavy!" Su-hyeun inwardly complained.

"Kuk..."

Su-hyeun's hand gripping the sword shook with the pressure. Without driving a ton of magical energy into the blade, he guessed that the blade would snap in an instant.

"What on earth is up with this stupid level of strength?" he thought.

Sure, the Bull Demon King's height wasn't exactly on the short side, but even so, how could someone with that physical size bring out this much strength?

Su-hyeun wielding the Thunder Sword was the one being pushed back in the contest of strength. Despite his stats rising by two points after killing Fafnir, all he could do right now was to hold on for his dear life with everything he had.

Whoosh—

Smack, bang, pooow—!

The Mixed Iron Rod moved around seamlessly.

Su-hyeun barely responded by raising the sword to defend on time, yet his wrist was rapidly getting numb. He staggered back and stared at the Bull Demon King, who was lightly wielding the Mixed Iron Rod with his usual expression.

"It's like he's a completely different person."

The usual Bull Demon King had a serene personality, like a gentle stream of water.

There were times when he would reveal a dangerous, oppressive side similar to today. Still, even then, he only did it for very brief moments.

But his current fighting style was like that of a fighter even more crazed than Sun Wukong—vicious and terrifying. That black rod was certainly hard, yes, but even so, each clash sent shockwaves powerful enough to rock the terrain.

Most likely, that was the hidden ability of the Mixed Iron Rod, the Bull Demon King's other weapon besides his favorite, the Palm Leaf Fan.

Griiit—

Just as Su-hyeun clenched his teeth...

Claaang—!

Pazzzzik—!

The Mixed Iron Rod was deflected upward, and at the same time, arcs of powerful electricity exploded everywhere.

[Thunder Dragon Sword - Miru]

Bzzzik, vzzzzik—

The Thunder Dragon coiled around Su-hyeun's sword.

Whooooosh—!

[Shattering the Sky, Absolute Destruction - Thunder Dragon Miru]

The electric dragon, seemingly made of crimson energy, stretched forward. The Bull Demon King grasped the Mixed Iron Rod tightly with both hands, then took an almighty downward swing.

Mooooo—!

The massive white ox screeched loudly.

The light burning in the Bull Demon King's eyes became white in color. Then, the moment his Mixed Iron Rod and the crimson dragon extending from Su-hyeun's sword collided...

FLASH—!

All sounds instantly died as a pillar of light that emitted crimson and white aura shot up straight into the sky.

Piiiiiii—

Su-hyeun's ears rang. The light was so intense that not even his Insight could see through it, and he ended up shielding his eyes with his hand.

The collision of the two powers was like water and oil, never meant to be mixed together. It was almost impossible to sense anything within this maelstrom.

Su-hyeun rigidly waited, feeling deeply tense. He waited for the light to subside and for his vision to be restored just a little.

Quake, shudder...

The ground below began bucking ominously. Right after that, his vision was restored.

"Crazy son of a—!"

His barely restored vision saw countless clumps of rocks. The ground below broke apart, and rocks rose to surround Su-hyeun from all directions. Not only was the ground below his feet quaking, but even the skies above him were filled with rocks of varying sizes.

He finally recognized the situation he was in and urgently tried to escape, but then...

"Crush him."

Fwhooooosh—!

Crunch! Wudududuk—

All those clumps of rocks closed in on Su-hyeun's position in the center and began crushing down on him.

* * *

Crunch, wuduk...

A small "planet" began floating up into the sky.

The soil rose from various parts of the forest to stick to this floating lump of earth. Initially, it looked big enough to have the appearance of an asteroid, but the huge "boulder" gradually grew smaller and more compact in size.

Squeeze, crunch...

The Bull Demon King's hand was extended toward this lump of rocks, and he was continuously squeezing even tighter by relying on his grip strength.

It was the same principle as compacting a large boulder into the size of a small stone. A boulder might be fragile enough to easily break apart in the beginning, but that would no longer be true if one continued to compact it.

Most importantly, though, it was none other than the Bull Demon King compacting that boulder right now.

"As I thought, it is difficult," he furrowed his brow deeply after sensing the powerful resistance coming from deep within the boulder.

However, that didn't mean he was thinking of stopping his hand from squeezing. This battle had turned into a situation where Su-hyeun was inside the boulder, fiercely resisting the Dao energy driven by the Bull Demon King. Meanwhile, from the outside, the Bull Demon King compacted said boulder even further.

The boulder that was the size of a small planet gradually shrunk. It decreased by one-one hundredth, then down to one-ten thousandth, of its initial size. Eventually, it became so small that it was only around two meters in diameter.

Drip, drip...

Sweat began trickling down from the Bull Demon King's forehead.

"And so, with this..."

The Bull Demon King's other hand was also extended forward. But then, his hand faltered ever so slightly as a dilemma reared its head in his mind.

What would happen if he clenched this hand, too?

And during that brief window of indecision...

Crack—

A faint little crack ran down on the surface of the boulder that had shrunk down to barely over two meters in diameter. And then...

Fwhoooooosh—

The energy circulating within the boulder experienced a sudden upheaval. The Bull Demon King's control over the boulder, which had been acting according to his will to crush it even further a second ago, suddenly got weaker.

Shwa-aaaaah—

The energy flow was no longer from the outside to the inside but from the inside to even deeper inside.

It was as if energy was being sucked in.

* * *

Su-hyeun couldn't move a muscle due to the sheer pressure crushing him. Even moving a single finger proved to be incredibly hard right now.

"At this rate, I might die."

Even though he wasn't convinced that the Bull Demon King would actually kill him, a battle couldn't be fought while having such a relaxed mind.

Besides, he didn't start this thing with such a mindset, anyway.

This battle was the "final fight" before the Bull Demon King could ascend to full godhood. He was most likely fighting this battle with a mindset that Su-hyeun probably couldn't even imagine.

"What should I do here?" Su-hyeun contemplated, his eyes deeply closed.

What were avenues available to him?

An idea popped up in his head, so he immediately put that into practice.

[The "Hero - Immortality" trait is activating.]

[Lifeforce and stamina will rapidly recover.]

[All physical abilities will be significantly enhanced.]

It was his "Immortality" trait.

Consequently, his magical energy and prana reserves that had fallen below the halfway mark from this fairly lengthy battle were being rapidly filled up. Even though this effect only lasted during the duration of the Immortality trait, under his current situation, it still proved to be a great help nonetheless.

The same applied to the rapid enhancement of his physical abilities.

Wiggle—

He could now move his fingers, but that was all he could do.

"It's still not enough."

The Immortality trait alone wasn't enough to break through this predicament.

He could sense it through his entire body. He could sense just how much Dao energy the Bull Demon King was pouring into the boulder to create this level of crushing pressure.

If it was this level of Dao energy, then it would surely be possible to cause an explosion vicious enough to tear his whole body apart into bloody pieces.

"Wait a minute."

Su-hyeun used the tip of his fingers that could barely move now to accept some of the Dao energy that was flooding in from outside the boulder.

He could vividly sense a flow of energy reminiscent of a water stream.

He wondered about why his senses had become so attuned to his surroundings, and he got to his answer rather quickly. It was all thanks to a new skill that got "imprinted" on him recently.

Shu-aaaahk—

Through the tip of his hand, the Dao energy circulating within the boulder seeped into him.

This energy, not meant to be absorbed in the first place, entered his body and caused a negative reaction, an adverse rejection akin to oil getting mixed up in his bloodstream.

However, he still felt confident of successfully controlling this new energy.

"Now, normally, something like this would've been impossible, but..."

[Predation]

Crunch—!

Su-hyeun extended his hand forward within this compacted boulder.

"But if it's the current me....!"