-Bang!
A clear, crisp sound echoes through the darkness.
-Bang!
It was the sound of hammering.
There are no workshops here.
There are no state-of-the-art facilities utilizing futuristic technology, no railroads blessed by the gods and fueled by the energy of the stars.
All that's here is a crumbling blacksmith and a crude hammer that barely kept its shape.
-Bang!
But why?
Why does a broken blacksmith's crude hammer.
-Bang!
How can it make such a beautiful sound?
-Questioning computational logic. Warning of inefficient energy waste.
-Last probability calculation success rate of 0.03% or less.
Pessimistic, but the numbers don't lie. The blacksmith knew the warning was correct.
-Computational logic off. Auxiliary systems off.
But he rejected the computation.
For the blacksmith, a machine, the most rational choice is always to choose the highest probability.
Even if he takes an action with a 0.06% chance of success with a tiny amount of energy left, it's better than what he's doing now.
The odds are better than the pointless hammering he's doing now.
Understand it in numbers. The machine, the Yakt Spinner, understands it.
But
[Yappy, you're a city hero.]
The last robot to defend the city at the end of the world.
[Yappy, I'm done here. This is my last command.]
The last order of a commander who worries about the future until the very end.
[Protect the seal, don't let anyone get close.]
A blacksmith has endured a millennium of meaningless orders in a world that is already doomed.
He repaired deteriorating parts, produced cornerstones and manufactured gunpowder to fill the lack of armaments.
A millennium of defending the city must have been a pointless endeavor.
Until the man showed up.
[A knight of loyalty, to whose service all living things are indebted beyond measure.]
The man proclaimed himself greater than him.
He told the blacksmith again and again that he admired him, valued him, and thought he's wonderful.
But he knows.
He knows that the blacksmith who has defended the city for a thousand years has never given up, even in the most hopeless of circumstances.
The Lord of Wisdom, Caracael, and his ten million evil servants. How futile is the act of resistance in the face of an endless army of evil.
But the man said,
["I command you to fight to the last, honorable knights!"]
I will not give in, I will fight.
In that hopeless battle, knowing they would be defeated, Lionheart's knights and soldiers shouted.
[King Lionheart! King Lionheart!]
Even if he had to fight his way to victory alone, when there was no one left.
The Lionheart's victory was clearly not based on probability, but on doing what had to be done.
He did it because he had to.
And the blacksmith realized that probability doesn't matter.
So you do it.
Even if it's 0.03%, you do it because you have to.
The probability was unexpectedly unimportant.
-Kirk.
If you think about it, that's what he's always been.
To protect the city, to keep the evil seal from leaking out into the world.
[Iron your convictions. Imagine the future you will forge with your hammer. The sword you forge will cut down the enemies of the realm, and the armor you forge will protect your comrades-in-arms.]
Imagination.
This mechanical blacksmith knows little of it.
He's used to calculating results, not imagining and creating something vague so he simply uses the subjunctive to derive the result.
-Bang!
The infallible Lionheart wins in the end.
* * * * *
Leon looked down at Yappy in his arms.
"------"
Yappy, which had poured all of its power into hammering, had already stopped functioning when Leon opened his eyes.
Leon found it as calm as a sleeping child.
"You made your king proud, indeed."
As King of the Knights, Leon was proud to have captured this noble knight.
Because of this knight, who completed the great quest, there is the Great Hall of the Gods.
[Leon, my knight.]
And now there is resurrection.
"Arianna."
[I lost contact with my knight, and we were all worried. Are you all right?]
"Thanks to Lord Spinner."
Leon doesn't know what process led to this phenomenon. He can only guess, for when he opens his eyes, Yappy was out of commission, and his armor is a different shape than before.
"Heto, do you know what happened?"
[My blacksmith has finished the unfinished armor, blowing fire with a mechanical arm and polishing it with a hasty hammer.]
"But that doesn't explain the reconnection with the divine that was cut off."
[I have modified the properties of the armor to resist this dark miasma, and this child has provided you with an armor that will give you victory.]
In other words, the finished armor itself is a protective suit against the Mists of Darkness.
"I am indeed. Blessed are the people."
[What shall we do now?]
The goddess asked, and Leon answered as if it were obvious.
"I will fight and I will win."
Leon decided to do what he had to do.
[You--- how------.]
Leon faced the beast.
Evil lords are far too large for their fire-man-sized selves.
When many saw them, they despaired. They were afraid and sensed defeat but not Leon, who always raised his sword against the evils that shadowed the world.
"Glory be to Sir Yakt Spinner."
And in the end, victory was his destiny.
[Lionheart, though I don't know how they reconnected the divinity------]
Rakshar's tentacled feet shook the ground, bringing down the buildings of the city and sending earthquakes through the land.
Rakshar's claws clatter menacingly, powerful enough to cut through the sky.
[Your knights have all fallen to me, and I have a new toy to play with.]
"Do you understand the weight of life that this king carries?"
Leon's holy sword glows brightly. In the fog of darkness that blocked out the divine, the blade shone brightly.
"The burden is on me, Leon Dragonia Lionheart. I am the end of evil."
Leon leapt in but Rakshar was quick to respond.
Hundreds of legs whipped around sharply as if there were no buildings in their way.
-Thump!
With a dizzying sound, a leg slammed into the diving Leon and his body bounces off the ground, gnawing at it.
[Leon--!]
The demons of the Chaos family are unusually large and Rakshar is the pinnacle of them all. He was already powerful as a Demon Archduke, but when he became a Lord, he became a great evil that could devour the world by himself.
His power is too great for a single man.
"Come."
Divine Punishment
The sun is the most offensive of the Holy Law's powers. The power of the sun to illuminate a planet is the purest form of destruction.
[A force merely magnified!]
Rakshar catches the striking sun. with his bare body.
The heat of the sun should have melted his body, but Rakshar pushed it back in a hand-to-hand combat.
The Chaos Lord's immense power is so fierce that it can repel even the heat of the sun, which possesses the element of judgment.
[You cannot defeat me on your own.]
He held the sun in his claws, reminiscent of a mythical planetary giant. The difference between him and Rakshar is that Rakshar has no obligation to support a planet.
The sun, which is quickly set, spells doom for the city of Pyongyang. It incinerates every uninhabited building and structure it touches, burrowing deeper and deeper into the earth.
Next comes the bombardment of Rakshar's massive magical power. The power of the sun was turned into magic, and the magnitude was too much for a single entity.
Each one was an arch magic and there were hundreds of them.
The bombardment of mana, as natural as breathing, rained down on Leon.
[Here is a sacrifice of three million, hear me! Hear me!]
After the Emperor of the Empire sacrificed his people to summon the Lord of Chaos, Leon was forced to watch as the people of his kingdom perished to his unending malice.
A holy warrior who was content to stay in his kingdom was enraged even by his own kind. Regret that he should have torn the old emperor apart long ago.
"Iron power."
The bombardment of magic is blocked by a mass of iron from deep within the earth. The shield of pure iron is pierced, and the Lionheart King is nowhere to be seen.
[------!?]
Looking for the missing Leon, Rakshar suddenly saw a white feather fluttering in the air.
"Let's go, Stallion!"
-Khaaa!
The roar is that of a ferocious beast but the god of light spreads his wings, scattering his radiant beauty.
* * * * *
Koo Dae-sung watched the fight between Leon and Rakshar while hanging from the World Tree.
"It's amazing------"
He had awakened as a Holy Knight, but Leon's fight was far different.
This is the man who encompasses the power of all the gods, a giant of the ages who stood at the pinnacle of humanity, The Lionheart King, Guardian of the Holy Grail.
"But--- he's falling behind."
He could tell because he was now an old saint who had reached the level of a superhuman.
The Lord of Chaos and the Lionheart King faced off. They're fighting tooth and nail, but Leon's power hasn't fully returned.
The new armor is clearly reconnecting the blocked divinity, but he can see the power diminishing as Leon's holy power manifests.
The Sacrifice of the five Archdemons and one Demon Archduke is weakening the Holy Power as soon as it touches Leon.
[Child, you must help.]
"Yes--- but how------?"
Unlike Leon, Koo Dae-sung can't avoid being cut off from the divine as soon as he touches the Mist of Darkness.
[You'll have to ask her how.]
Demera's words caused Koo Dae-sung to glance up, and something slithered out of the shell of the World Tree he was hanging from.
'A spirit?'
Koo Dae-sung thought, based on his meager knowledge of fantasy.
A winged spirit with a beautiful appearance, the one Demera called, walked towards Koo Dae-sung and said.
[Knight of Life, who brought me into being, I need your help.]
"Whatever you wish."
The woman smiled at Koo Dae-sung obedience.
[I am Irmin of the forests and trees. Creator of the fairies and twin goddess of Demera. The goddess who carried the seed of the species and sealed it within herself.]
It is the ark plan for the destruction of the world, like the Holy Grail.
The goddess of the multiplication of all the world's species in preparation for the future victory of the Lionheart King and his army.
[Give me your life force, and I will show you the miracle of birth.]
Koo Dae-sung sensed that he had arrived at a moment of greatness beyond his wildest dreams.
'The resurrection of the Lionheart. '
He shuddered, knowing that the miracle that would bring back that era of glory was in his hands.
"As you wish---!"
At Koo Dae-sung agreement, Irmin smirked and manipulated the World Tree.
A layer of dark mist descended. Its roots moved, pulling something up and bringing it to where Koo Dae-sung was.
Koo Dae-sung's eyes widened when he saw the woman being carried up by the roots.
"Grand Duke Karina!"
Koo Dae-sung, who had been handed her in the root, was at a loss for words.
"Yes------"
"Great, Great Duke, are you all right?"
"Are you---?"
Karina was puzzled by the stranger who had taken her in his arms after being beaten to a pulp by Rakshar.
"I'm Knight Koo Dae-sung."
"I don't think you're just a knight."
Karina marveled at the boundless vitality she sensed in Koo Dae-sung. In this age, there was someone on Earth who could become a Holy Knight.
[Karina. Daughter of Leon Dragonia. Granddaughter of Wolfric.]
"Irmin?"
[I need what you have.]
Karina recognized the meaning of Irmin's words at once.
"I see. So it is."
Karina stared straight at Koo Dae-Sung, who swallowed hard and lowered his gaze as he met her strong, domineering gaze.
It was the behavior of a beta in the wild, instinctively deferring to the alpha of a pack, but apparently it was perceived differently by Karina.
"The newcomer is shy."
"That's not what I meant------"
"We're in a hurry, so quickly bring your face.."
"What? What?!"
Karina grabbed Koo Dae-sung's panicked chin and forced him to look at her directly. Then she slowly brought his face closer.
"Seo, no!"
Koo Dae-sung squeezed his eyes shut. But the unthinkable didn't happen, and he felt their foreheads touch.
"Huh?"
Koo Dae-sung made a complicated expression, not the one he was expecting, and Karina smiled brightly at him.
"What, did you expect that?"
"That's not what I expected!"
Karina flicked her finger across the bridge of his nose, thinking that his blushing expression was cute.
"A man who meets a beauty should be like you, but this is an important moment. Concentrate."
"Ah, yeah, yeah------"
Something--some self-consciousness--made him look like her, Koo Dae-sung thought, and he touched his forehead to Karina's as she instructed.
"Feel the factor of this work, infusing it with the life force of the Lord and sprouting it through the World Tree."
Koo Dae-sung felt something transmitted through the touch of their foreheads, and instinctively began to energize it.
[It's done. It contains enough life force.]
Irmin accepted it. The World Tree soon sprouted a seed with Karina's factor and the life force of the Old World, and──
[It's time to fulfill the contract! I'll give you all the power I've gathered to give birth to my first offspring.]
The golden god Dragonia unleashed all the power he had been saving to ensure that his first offspring on Earth will be more magnificent and noble than any other creature.
The seed soon sprouted, the first life born from the World Tree and its vast roar resounded.
-Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
The first offspring of the Dragon God Dragonia, the great black dragon spread its wings.