I finally feel, before my mana perception ability, all of his power invade what was still left of my body lying on the cold ground.
My body shudders and a gut-wrenching pain fills my head.
The unbearable pain is too much for me.
I can see it, as clear as day, in front of the yellow torches scattered on the pillars that support the entire dungeon.
A humanoid physique, mixed in a red and gray tone, representing the worst of the depths of Tartarus.
He wields a gigantic crystalline sword in his hands, displaying the object with delicacy and pride before the blade imbued by the souls of sinners.
I can swear I hear the trapped ghosts calling for help, as if I weren't the next victim to join them all.
"Human…"
Says the enormous demon, three and a half meters tall, waving his weapon like a banner on the battlefield.
"You're the last of them, aren't you? How interesting. We are the last of our races."
He says, smiling creepily in my direction.
I watch as his wings emerge from his sculpted back, reaching above his shoulders and collapsing over his heel protected by a large shell of keratin. This same shell covered much of his shoulders, chest and, finally, his forearms.
A natural armor made from his own body that, moments before, had been completely destroyed along with him.
"Ekridin's sacrifice…"
I thought bitterly.
The names of my friends fill the whimpers in my mind like an explosion of feelings buried in sadness.
Siobhan. Korin. Diora. Yaeger. And…
"Alyla."
I say her name in a hushed manner. I'm not worthy of even thinking about that person.
About thinking of my… Wife.
Mana flows in my body and my blood vessels dilate so that the passage of ancient power circulates like a storm to my heart and brain.
"No…"
I say putting my fist on the ground.
"I, I can't die. Not yet. Not like this, not now. I…"
Suddenly I find myself standing, hunched over, trying to support the weight of my own brittle body.
My shaking legs try at all costs to keep the bag of meat that I have become upright.
"I, I won't lose! I'll avenge them all! Is my friends' sacrifice a joke to you Baahl?!"
The Demon King hears the desperate screams of the frail young man standing in front of him.
He notices the blond hair, the thick eyebrows and the blue eyes. Covered in blood stains from his feet to his head.
But that look…
The look in Qoran Lark's eyes was not the look of a dying animal abandoned in the desert.
Much less the look of someone who had accepted death.
It was full of life and determination.
Qoran Lark, the last human who had accepted death minutes before, refused to die with the last demon still standing.
"No, he had already accepted that he was about to die. So what changed, why did he…! The mark of ancestral power in his eyes…!"
The demon king was deeply distracted in his subconscious.
Qoran Lark's gaze had changed.
From death to life. The ancestral power of the fallen gods shone in his pupils.
"He is absorbing the mana of the dead…!"
The demon king smiles, revealing the shark teeth that fill the demonic creature's entire mouth cavity.
"What an interesting human! Absorbing more mana than the body can handle… That's basically signing a death warrant. So you do want to die! Ha!"
From life to death. More than ever, the cross that reflects in his eyes is engulfed in a sparkling blue fire.
"Very good human! Let's go with everything this time! Just the two of us, the last of our race!"
I'm lost in my thoughts. The world around me slowly passes by as my companions' mana begins to invade my cells.
I don't notice that the Demon King also starts to absorb the mana of the deceased demons and humans in the hall.
He even proceeds to absorb the souls trapped in his throne and sword in a twisted attempt to battle to the death one last time.
One last attempt by that man obsessed with battles and destruction to finally conquer the human world.
"Huu…"
At the same time as the mana is quickly recovering my body for an upcoming fight, I slowly feel my body disintegrating, the forced absorption of mana beyond what I can handle is causing my body to slowly collapse.
"GRRR…"
It's no surprise, I wasn't the first option of those who carried the ancestral mark to inherit the power of the fallen gods. The near human extinction, however, and the death of the chosen one, made me a viable option at that moment.
It was time to prove 'them' right.
"Hah…"
My eyes lit up like celestial primordial fire.
"The ascension of a human to a God… for a few seconds at least."
[Battle Technique: Fallen Gods: Ancestral Mark]
[Battle Technique: Martial Arts King]
[Battle Technique: Ultimate Sniper]
[Battle Technique: Poison Queen Diora]
[Battle Technique: Prince of Dragons]
[Battle Technique: Eagle Eyes]
[Battle Technique: Man of Steel]
"H… Hah."
It was time to kill the Demon King once and for all.