Copy Skills with Affinity!
Chapter 209: Resolution (4)
Bab ini belum diterjemahkan ke Bahasa Indonesia
Naskah di bawah ini ditampilkan sementara dari versi English asli.
There would probably need to be a very long discussion about how on earth someone could come up with the idea of letting themselves get eaten by a god even once, but in any case, everyone would agree that it was something that only ‘Aiden’ would do.
And with that trust—mixed with everyone’s concern—placed entirely on him, Aiden, now inside Wornil’s body…
…was going through a truly surreal experience.
First of all, the very first thing I felt was an intense pain, as if sparks were exploding inside my brain.
I had just shoved my entire body into the heart of a god that was trying to devour me, so it would have been stranger if it didn’t hurt.
Even so, I moved.
Even through the pain that felt like my entire body was being torn apart, I kept moving.
A searing pain, as if my whole body were being burned alive, crashed over me. It felt like even my internal organs were on fire.
Still, one step.
It felt like I had stopped in the middle of exhaling and my lungs were being wrung dry. I opened my mouth, but my breathing was hollow. I couldn’t inhale any air.
Still, one step.
A terrifying pressure weighed down on my chest. The muscles in my limbs refused to obey me.
Still, one step.
Pushing past the pain that felt like my consciousness was being severed again and again,
As I kept forcing my body forward, the pitch-black abyss that surrounded me began to change, and a new scene formed.
“……”
It was that orphanage from back then.
Burned down, collapsed, filled with the stench of blood, with corpses scattered everywhere.
‘…Is this the kind of thing where you see your life flash before your eyes before dying?’
I took a deep breath and walked through the middle of it.
Getting eaten by a god was already a ridiculous experience, but directly reliving a scene from the past like this was something else entirely.
Was it because this was the deepest trauma I had buried in the back of my memory?
And what I felt as I sat in the middle of that scene was—
“……”
It still hurt.
The experience of losing something was truly painful.
“Aiden.”
And then, an image that seemed to condense all of that pain into one form appeared before me.
She was a girl I had treated like my younger sister. She had also been my fiancée.
Though it had become a promise that could never be fulfilled.
“Did you become a wonderful adult?”
“…I did become an adult.”
“Did you make a new family?”
“I think I will.”
“Do you think you can protect them?”
“……”
I let out a bitter smile.
Who knows.
I didn’t know whether this was an illusion Wornil had created to torture me, or if I was really seeing my life flash before my eyes.
But it was certainly a question that was hard to answer when asked so directly.
Still, in this moment, I had a clear answer.
“I’ll protect them, even if it costs me my life.”
The moment I said that, the surrounding scene shattered all at once.
What filled my vision now was Wornil’s energy, tightening around me from all directions.
It was trying to rot my body, tear me apart, and devour me whole.
‘…There they are.’
I narrowed my eyes and focused.
I could faintly sense the presence of Elisha and Bailey, who had been swallowed earlier.
They were buried inside, gnawing away at Wornil’s energy like parasites that had infiltrated its body.
What I had to do was closer to strengthening them.
If they were currently like leeches merely sucking a bit of blood, then my goal was to raise them to the level of a cancerous virus.
By doing that, the aim was to weaken Wornil enough for the humans outside to finish off its heart.
“……”
I closed my eyes and focused on that.
Well.
I wasn’t someone who really knew how I had managed to do these kinds of things until now.
I had always just… adjusted on the fly.
I did what needed to be done, somehow managing through sheer instinct.
But what I was about to do now was something that was nearly impossible, even by my own standards.
If you asked me how, I had no method that came to mind.
Just—
‘…Even if it costs my life.’
I said I would protect the people who would become my family.
So.
It was time to prove it.
▣
“…Will you be okay?”
Katya called out to Noel, who stood at the very front.
She had just thrown Aiden in, but the state she was showing now was clearly not normal.
Her pale face, the cold sweat running down her forehead to the point her bangs clung to it, her hands clenched tightly to suppress the trembling.
In fact,
This was a woman who had never shown such a reaction even when her own life was in danger, yet now, because of Aiden, she looked almost terrified.
Even so,
“…I will do it.”
Noel said that and steadied her breathing.
The flames kindled by Katya settled into her body. She could also feel the amplification granted by the priestess sisters.
The plan was simple: Aiden would weaken it, and at the decisive moment, she only needed to deliver the final blow.
And that final strike ultimately depended on Noel.
“I said I would do it, so I will.”
No matter how anxious she was,
At the foundation of it all was a trust so absolute it might as well have been called certainty.
They had journeyed together until now, and he had never betrayed that trust, so she believed he wouldn’t this time either.
Aiden would definitely succeed. She would wait for that moment.
Repeating that resolve to herself once more, Noel steadied her stance.
This was the moment when the swordsmanship she had honed over her entire life shone at its sharpest. And what resided within her body now was a power so grotesque it could be called the most hideous in human history, a fusion of three divine forces.
There was absolutely no lack of firepower. All that remained was to wait for Aiden to prove it.
“…Looks like that lunatic is really pulling it off.”
Rania’s muttered voice, tinged with dizziness, served as the signal.
He had actually carried out that insane act—entering the god’s heart himself, strengthening Elisha and Bailey, who were inside weakening it, and dragging Wornil down to a level where it could be killed.
And he had done it in less than five minutes!
“-!”
Then, the rest depended on Noel.
Pure white qi surged explosively from her body.
It wasn’t just white qi rising—divinity that seemed capable of melting everything, along with radiant mana, all blended together and erupted at once.
And Noel’s body, about to swing that power, shot forward at a speed that seemed to break the sound barrier.
The most grotesque power ever gathered within a single human body unfolded in the hands of the most skilled swordsman on the entire continent.
But—
-!
With a sharp clang, Noel’s eyes widened as she saw her sword bounce back.
‘…It’s not enough?!’
Even after weakening it this much, and strengthening herself to this extent, it still wasn’t enough.
She couldn’t even begin to grasp how durable it was.
Grinding her teeth in impatience, Noel tensed.
She had to cut it down as quickly as possible. Otherwise, Aiden inside would be in danger…!
“…Hey, try strengthening it one more time from there!”
It seemed she wasn’t the only one who felt it, as Katya’s urgent voice rang out from afar.
Strengthen it further? How was she supposed to do that?
“Didn’t they say divine power changes depending on our emotional state?! So think of something intense!”
The advice sounded oddly light for the situation, but it clearly struck at the core.
‘…Emotion.’
The output of her power changed depending on what she felt toward Aiden.
Closing her eyes, she reflected on her feelings toward him.
Good memories. The moments they had built together, all of them—
“-No, I don’t know what you’re thinking of right now, but not that! It’s not getting stronger at all!”
“…Then what exactly am I supposed to think about?!”
“Anything, just something intense! Something that makes your chest surge every time you see him!”
“……”
Hmm.
What would that be?
‘…Ah.’
There was one.
She took a deep breath.
Noel didn’t really know how she did such things.
All she ever did was swing her sword as her accumulated battle experience guided her.
But what now dominated her entire being was—
“…Stop fooling arou—”
“What?”
“Stop chasing after other women, you damned womanizing bastard!!!”
…A fury, almost majestic in its intensity, directed at Aiden, who casually flirted with other women.
“……”
“……”
As everyone watching fell into silence,
Noel’s sword, filled with the full force of a wife’s fury toward her unfaithful husband, split the God of Devouring—capable of plunging the entire continent into darkness—in half.
“……”
“……”
“…You know.”
Katya, who had been watching quietly, spoke in a daze.
“If someone dies to a sword filled with a wife nagging her husband, are we supposed to laugh or feel sorry?”
“…We won, so it doesn’t matter.”
Hmm.
Hearing Rania’s words, Katya slowly nodded.
It was, in its own way, a convincing point.
▣
-My vision cleared brightly.
As the black heart burst apart in a single strike,
“…How did you manage that?”
“…Somehow.”
Looking at Noel, who had shattered the god’s heart in one blow, I asked the same question.
“…And how did you do that?”
“Ah, I have a slightly more definite answer than you, Sir Aiden.”
“…Excuse me?”
“I couldn’t very well become a widow before even getting married, could I?”
“……”
“Since we’re on the topic.”
Noel rummaged through her clothes and took something out.
As I blankly watched, wondering what she was doing, she pulled out a small box and took out a gem-studded ring from inside it.
“I originally prepared this for a proposal.”
“…Why are you bringing that out now?”
Leaving my flustered question unanswered, Noel firmly slipped the ring onto my finger.
“If you try to increase the number of your wives any further, that’s when you’ll really die.”
“……”
“And this is to serve as a token of that promise.”
“……”
“Understood?”
At Noel’s faint smile, I silently nodded.
If I answered wrong here, it genuinely felt like my head would be crushed on the spot.
“In that sense.”
Noel slightly turned her head and continued, looking at Elisha and Bailey, who had flowed out together when Wornil’s heart burst.
“What do you plan to do about those two?”
“……”
“You did say something earlier about marrying them, didn’t you?”
“……”
…Ah, right.
The hardest part was still left.
With the feeling that something even more hellish than killing a god awaited me, I began to sweat coldly.
