The Hero Returns

* * *

Ku-rung, rumble—

Bzz, vzzzz—

The lightning energy from the Somersault cloud was still gathering in Su-hyeun's hand.

Honestly, there wasn't a real need to reach up with his hand to grasp the electrical energy. From the get-go, all the lightning energy infusing the Somersault cloud was the power he commanded, anyway. As such, all the electricity gathered in his hand rather naturally as well.

However, the ability to hold onto electrical energy that didn't have any physical form or shape and giving it a tangible form came from the glove Su-hyeun wore over his left hand.

"For sure, its compatibility is really outstanding," he thought.

The ability of the god of Olympus, Zeus, was wielding lightning bolts. Su-hyeun had never met Zeus before, but even then, he still knew that the power symbolizing the god in the myths was the heavenly punishment that struck down from the skies—the thunderbolts.

The Thunder Glove was an item that allowed the wearer to grasp lightning and amplify its destructive power. This item alone granted the authority to freely command thunder and lightning, which was basically the same as acquiring yet another qualification of godhood.

And Su-hyeun already possessed the power called the Somersault cloud that could command lightning.

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"Did they choose this reward in consideration of my Somersault cloud?"

He had no choice but to think that way. After using it, he now knew for sure. He understood how well this item combined with the Somersault cloud.

Shu-wuwuwu—

One of Tyrant's numerous hands reached right before Su-hyeun's eyes. Each of these hands featured sharp fangs, and they were pouncing on him with incredible gripping power, too.

Nonetheless, to Su-hyeun, they were all moving very slowly. No, wait—it wasn't as simple as "moving slowly" but something more than that.

He was vividly seeing the future that would happen in a short while.

[Clairvoyance]

* The user can confirm the future about to happen shortly.

* The future confirmed in this manner can be altered by the user.

* The scope of the future that can be confirmed will depend on the user's proficiency.

* Proficiency: 0.08%

Clairvoyance was another skill that he acquired through Divine Art. This skill could only be activated through prana and not the usual magical energy. It was also completely on another realm compared to how one could foresee the possible future after raising one's Reflex stat extremely high.

Su-hyeun had to confirm the difference between sensing the future like seeing it and then actually seeing it vividly.

Crunch—!

It looked as though Tyrant's hand had swallowed up Su-hyeun's body. However, Su-hyeun had already moved out of the way to the side by then.

Fwhooooosh—!

Chomp, choooomp—

Chomp, chomp, chomp, choooomp—

Hundreds of hands busily darted about to capture Su-hyeun, but he simply flitted left, right, up, and down to dodge, all the while activating his Clairvoyance.

He could clearly see everything—specifically, where he should move and which action would be the most optimal course to take for him.

"One, two..."

And as he dodged the hundreds of hands, Su-hyeun's back began arching back like a bow. In his left hand still wearing Zeus's Thunder Glove was the famed Thunderbolt ready to be thrown at the target.

And so, right after he counted inwardly to two...

"Three!"

When he had counted the last number, he threw the pure-white Thunderbolt crackling with electricity that had been completed in his hand.

Right in that moment...

FLASH—!

The entire world was instantly dyed in a searing white light.

KWA-RUUUMBLE—!

* * *

The whole world became pure white. The light was too intense that not even "Insight" could see through it. It was bright enough to even blind the eyes.

Even the one who threw the lightning bolt, Su-hyeun, had to furrow his brow really deeply. He wasn't affected by the electrical discharge, but he couldn't even guess the quantity of electricity currently blanketing the world.

Without a doubt, the Thunderbolt was shaped like a slick and slender spear in his hand, which was only around two meters in length, yet it had this effect. It must have contained one heck of an electrical charge than Su-hyeun had imagined.

Time passed by, and gradually, color returned to the whitened world.

The first thing he saw was one of Tyrant's arms reaching out toward him. Su-hyeun extended his hand at the burnt-black arm.

Crumble...

The moment their hands touched, the Predator's arm turned into powder and crumbled to the ground before scattering away.

Su-hyeun shifted his gaze over to Tyrant's torso connected to the crumbling arm. The Predator, with its entire figure scorched black, was not regenerating anymore.

However, that wasn't all that surprising since Tyrant's body had become fine powder that crumbled to the ground. It wasn't just his arm but his entire being had turned into blackened powder.

Crumble, scatter—

Soon after that, Su-hyeun's eyes finally caught the surrounding scenery.

"Well, this is definitely more than I imagined."

The single lightning bolt that Su-hyeun fired at Tyrant and no one else ended up affecting everything his eyes could see. The destructive power on display was one thing, but the attack range was also well beyond Su-hyeun's initial estimation.

His divine Flame could also influence an area as large as this, yes, but the case with the Thunderbolt was definitely not the same at all.

"It would've been really bad if someone was nearby."

The divine Flame burned all those that Su-hyeun wanted to burn. The flip side of that meant that those he didn't want to burn would never be affected.

On the other hand, Su-hyeun was not in complete control of the Thunderbolt. Therefore, if its attack range turned out to be well beyond his estimation, then the skill would become difficult to use if there were allies nearby.

Crackle, buzzzz—

Su-hyeun created one more Thunderbolt in his grip, but then he noticed something within his reserve.

Maybe using the powers of both Somersault cloud and the Thunder Glove at once was to blame here, but he sensed that his prana and magical energy reserve were draining out at an alarming rate.

Nonetheless, he proceeded to throw the bolt at a tall mountain visible in a far-off distance.

Fwhoooooosh—

Crackle, bzzzzz, crackleeee—!

KA-BOOOOM—!

A blinding light flashed from the mountain targeted by the spear, and a plume of electricity exploded upward. The mountain itself shattered into pieces, and even before its debris could scatter, it got pulverized out of existence.

"Crazy son of a..."

No wonder.

He activated this power while adjusting the destructive power to be as low as possible, yet he had still spent a lot more magical energy and prana than he expected just now.

He wondered why that was, but the truth turned out to be that the attack still contained far greater destructive power than he bargained for.

This wasn't something to be fully happy about because a power that couldn't be either restricted or controlled properly was not much different from handing a treasured sword to a little child.

Su-hyeun had never imagined that one day he would be handed a stupendous power that he couldn't even control properly.

"And Zeus can fire something like this as many times as he wants, right?"

The Thunder Glove originally belonged to Zeus, and the power activated through this item originally was also Zeus's.

Su-hyeun was still not skilled enough in handling this power. On the other hand, Zeus would be more than proficient enough with it since it was his own power in the first place.

The difference in how they handled this power would only be starkly noticeable, but when he thought about it in another way, it might mean something significant about him.

"If I can control this power properly, does that mean I've almost reached Zeus's level?"

He thought about Insight, Clairvoyance, Thunderbolt, and the others, as well as his proficiency in Divine Art that included all of the above. If he continued to dig deeper into this Divine Art, then it was inevitable that his own status as a god would grow higher. Since that was the case, it might be possible that one day, his own abilities could rival that of Zeus, one of the highest-tier gods out there.

"What are you doing?" Su-hyeun asked as he raised his head to look up. The sky had nothing in it, yet he spoke in that particular direction anyway, "It's over now, right?"

Right after that...

[You have cleared the 199th floor's trial.]

[You have acquired 80,000,000 achievement points.]

[Death Aura has increased by one point.]

[Your soul has taken a step beyond the boundaries of man.]

[You have acquired the qualification of godhood.]

[Skills related to the "Trait – Necromancer" have been partially altered.]

[Will you transfer to the next floor?]

Messages appeared one after another.

The Administrators who had been discussing the rewards until now had to decide quickly on Su-hyeun's new reward after he egged them on.

Eighty million achievement points? That was a lot more points than he anticipated.

With this much, it would be possible to purchase another God's Tear. He was planning to save up the points to improve his Death Aura, but now...

"Well, another one has increased, then."

His Death Aura stat had reached 100 points as well.

This transformation also brought along quite a few changes to the related skills, but there was no real need to confirm them right here.

[You will be transferred to the next floor.]

Su-hyeun's body grew blurry.

Floor number 200—this would be his second hundred-floor hurdle.

* * *

"I had no idea that Tyrant would be killed that easily."

"One strike…was it?"

The Administrators were all looking down on the floor.

The floor they were standing on was projecting an image, and it contained a pulverized mountain, a destroyed city, and finally, a scorched-black corpse that was turning into powder.

That place was where Su-hyeun had vanished from only a second ago.

"I'm beginning to wonder if we've given him something a bit too over the top here."

"No, it's already the 200th floor. It's certainly not over the top considering that."

"You still think that way after clapping your eyes on this end result? A so-called unkillable immortal died in one hit. A bastard that we all thought couldn't be killed no matter what died in that man's hands!"

"The whole idea of that thing being unkillable was nothing more than some rumor circulating among those bottom-feeder gods. Let's be honest here, you think those gods in the Five Godly Sages tier will feel that way?"

One question from this Administrator managed to utterly silence his surroundings, but that wasn't because providing an answer would've been too troublesome or difficult. Rather, it was all because of one term that came out of this Administrator—the Five Godly Sages.

"Wait a minute, fella. Did you really compare that man to the gods in the Five Godly Sages tier?"

"Why, am I not allowed to do that?"

"Compare him to someone comparable, fella. How could you even bring those noble beings into this...?"

Their voices grew louder, which made some sense since the term "Five Godly Sages" carried that much weight.

Even when searching through all the dimensions and realms, you still wouldn't find all that many existences that could rival them.

But now...

"Didn't you see it for yourselves? Besides, that man is a human who hasn't even lived for 100 years yet. As far as I know, there has never been any precedence like him."

"..."

What he said shut the other Administrators up once more. Without a doubt, Su-hyeun's growth speed was extraordinary.

It had only been a few years since he began climbing the Tower, and that was precisely the length of time he required to break through the boundaries separating man and god to reach this realm.

Even if gods and men were not the same, his current growth speed couldn't simply be explained with such a line of thinking.

"The Great Sage who Pacifies Heaven is being considered as another being who can rival the noble beings, yet that man is displaying the growth rate exceeding even him. It's already extraordinary that he can use Insight as soon as becoming a god, too..."

"Just what is it that you are trying to say, fella?"

"It's about what the reward for him will be after he clears the 200th floor." The Administrator, who had been leading the discussion, seemed to ponder on something for a bit before asking a question to his fellow Administrators, "How about we do this?"

* * *

There was nothing to be found on the 200th floor.

This place was pitch-black. Since it was so dark here with not even a trace of faint light, to Su-hyeun, it felt like he had fallen into outer space without any stars to guide him.

He found himself standing all alone in such a space. Despite there being no light, he could still take a look around through Insight and could also sense what was around him.

Even then...

"There really is nothing here."

There were no ground, mountains, and rivers, but what shocked him the most was the fact that there was no sky above as well.

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Even if a world was destroyed, a blackened sky that had lost all of its colors should still exist above, but in this place, the boundary separating the sky and the ground was gone, making it appear as if he was floating in empty space.

"The ground where life form can grow, the air one needs to breathe, and the sky that should emit at least some light..."

None of those existed here, but that didn't mean this place began as a complete nothingness, either.

The tainted but faint dregs of magical energy that he could still detect told him that there used to be something existing in this space.

Su-hyeun slowly scanned the world where even its land had been devoured, which made it impossible for anything else to exist. "Just…what kind of monster appeared in this place?"