Chapter 200

A shadow is the expression of existence.

Proof of existence—and existence itself.

The moment Park Chan-woo accepted Chronos, Chronos was able to grasp Park Chan-woo’s condition more precisely than anyone else.

The existence of the Outer God Charpam, the Sealed Demon God’s Grail, the absolute seal of death, and even the Transcendent Dragon’s heart.

There was nothing that wasn’t shocking.

Possessing even one of those would be enough to be called an ‘anomalous being.’

Yet there was one thing Chronos couldn’t understand.

‘Don’t tell me he stole Transcendent Dragon Sephiro’s heart?’

The thought was absurd even to him.

Such a thing was impossible.

It might be different if it were a clone, but secretly approaching the main body of a Transcendent Dragon and carving out its most important organ—the heart—was beyond imagination.

A being that had slain the great Ten Monarch, the ‘Master of the Void.’

Even the one called the strongest monarch had been annihilated the moment a Transcendent Dragon appeared.

And it wasn’t just the ‘Master of the Void.’

When a Transcendent Dragon appeared, the entire Abyss held its breath.

Its influence was so overwhelming that the masters of the other Twelve Species yielded.

Even the Outer Gods within the ‘Great Rift’ avoided the Transcendent Dragons.

Their strength alone was reason enough, but—

‘The Absolute Magic surrounding the Transcendent Dragons. As their name implies, spells of terror that can never be broken—spells that prevent even approaching…’

The Transcendent Dragons were protected by countless spells.

Even Chronos had long since given up on ever drawing near.

Though he had remained undetected for eons, he knew it instinctively.

The moment he approached a Transcendent Dragon, he would be discovered.

And so it was a mystery.

How had a human come to possess a Transcendent Dragon’s heart?

And to have it sealed—thoroughly hidden so no one knew it existed?

If not for his Authority as a Shadow Reaper, Chronos would never have realized.

‘An honorable one acknowledged by a Transcender… yet one connected to countless massacres.’

That, too, was a contradiction.

There were too many things that didn’t add up.

Of course, to enter the Hall of Fame, one needed that much power—and a profession of even greater slaughter.

The problem was Karma.

Unnecessary killing was bound to reduce one’s Karma.

Yet from what Chronos could see, this human’s Karma was enormous.

Enormous—and yet, at the same time, the shadow imprints of countless souls clung to him.

‘Billions… no, more than that.’

Chronos averted his gaze.

Then he saw the shadows of the dead.

From the outside, he had thought it was on the scale of hundreds of millions to billions.

But from within, he realized he had been wrong.

There were many.

Far, far too many.

‘Insane…!’

They were countless.

Chronos was a reaper.

Born from the shadows of countless reapers.

Reapers upheld the rules of the Abyss, but more than anything, they were close to ‘death.’

That was why Chronos could see it—the death his opponent carried, the shadows of the souls his opponent had killed.

He had met plenty of ‘slaughterers.’

A thousand?

Ten thousand?

Laughable.

The Abyss was overflowing with beings who had annihilated worlds—killing in the billions.

But among them all, this human was, without a doubt, number one.

‘Just how many deaths is he connected to?’

Perhaps even if you added up every other slaughterer, it wouldn’t compare to this one human.

It was as if he had killed the entire Abyss once over. Shadows in numbers that couldn’t even be counted surrounded Chronos.

He was a being that could never be honorable.

‘…A lump of anomalies.’

An anomaly of the Abyss.

The appearance of something contradictory caused a Great Rift to open.

The more powerful the anomaly, the greater the Great Rift.

Chronos had seen the Great Rift open several times.

Each time, he had identified what kind of anomaly had caused it.

For example—the Azure Demon who opened the 3rd Great Rift.

The Azure Demon wielded the ‘Primordial Fire,’ something that could not exist in the present world.

And so a Great Rift had appeared.

The fourth was caused by ‘possession.’

A witch with a powerful possession ability had possessed a person from a world the Abyss had not yet reached, causing a Great Rift to open.

The fifth Great Rift was also caused by a witch.

A witch with Future Sight—the ability to see the future.

By recklessly twisting what she saw, she opened a Great Rift of considerable scale.

Like this, an anomaly was what caused an ‘impossible event.’

And yet—

‘There are too many anomalies.’

From what Chronos could see, the anomalies within this human were on a level incomparable to any before.

He was a being that simply should not exist.

If such a being could exist—

There was only one possibility.

‘A regressor…!’

Someone who had returned from the past.

But even that didn’t explain everything.

People said time was relative, but it could not be reversed.

It was possible to slow its flow, but impossible to go against time that had already passed.

‘I heard a rumor that Sephiro was researching magic related to time…’

Chronos shook his head inwardly.

He was certain.

Such research could never succeed.

Even if magic reached the realm of the gods, it could not break the most fundamental law governing the universe.

And if an anomaly of that magnitude truly occurred—

‘The Abyss could be finished.’

An unprecedented Great Rift would open.

If he was truly a regressor, he had to be killed.

It was a reaper’s destiny to eliminate any anomaly found.

And as Chronos was also a reaper, he could not allow a human carrying such a great anomaly to live.

However—

Swoooooosh!

The ‘seal’ on the heart constricted Chronos’s soul.

Then—

‘What, what are you doing? Stop!’

Chronos’s shadow began to be sucked into the heart’s seal.

—

Chronos’s “test” of Park Chan-woo’s capabilities didn’t take as long as expected.

At most, about five minutes.

Afterward, Chronos slipped out of the shadow and spoke lightly.

Clap, clap, clap, clap!

“You pass. Very excellent.”

His voice was genuinely pleased.

“What did you check?”

He had felt something like a full-body scan as Chronos seeped into his shadow, but he had no way of knowing what criteria Chronos had used.

At his question, Chronos shrugged.

“I witnessed the shining talent of an excellent human. You have more than enough capacity to accept me.”

A thoroughly vague answer.

Park Chan-woo didn’t press further.

Then Chronos spoke in a voice full of gravitas.

“My name is Chronos. I am a spirit who governs shadows, and a reaper. From now on, I will reside in your shadow, so tell me your name.”

“Park Chan-woo.”

“Park Chan-woo. A normal Spirit Contract depends on the summoner’s ability, but the contract I will make is executed solely by my own ability. That is why it can exert greater power, but in return, I cannot reveal my form often.”

Though it was a higher-level contract, it had its pros and cons.

Normally, a spirit could not exert power beyond the spirit user’s ability.

Outside the Spirit Realm, a spirit was sustained solely by the contractor’s Mana.

But Chronos meant he would remain in the world using only his own Mana.

That meant the consumption was enormous, and he couldn’t reveal himself often.

“Sounds like there’s a limit to the number of times.”

Clap, clap, clap, clap!

“Correct. The number of times I can properly exert my power is only three. If you do not want this, we can switch to a Spirit Contract, but I will not be able to exert my main body’s power.”

“Are you telling me to choose?”

“I will respect your will. Excellent human, Park Chan-woo!”

Park Chan-woo stroked his chin.

If he switched to a Spirit Contract, he could summon Chronos until he died.

The problem was that Chronos’s power would be greatly weakened.

He looked at Lil.

“Didn’t you say I need a spirit to learn ‘magic’?”

Saying he needed a spirit meant he needed to maintain a contract.

A one-off contract was meaningless.

—…Shadow spirit. If you recover the Mana you’ve used, does the number of uses increase as well?

Lil asked Chronos.

“That is true, but my Mana does not recover through ordinary means. If you forcefully try to recover it with the contractor’s Mana, you will twist and die from Mana depletion.”

—Then it shouldn’t be a problem.

Lil nodded, then spoke to Park Chan-woo.

—The reason a Spirit Contract is necessary is because you need to perform ‘Mana filtration’ through the spirit. In that process, the spirit’s own Mana is also recovered.

…I see.

Now he understood clearly why a spirit was needed to learn magic.

“Then wouldn’t it be fine to make an additional contract with another spirit?”

—Of course, contracting with other spirits is an option, but the process of Mana filtration will not be as easy as with the first contracted spirit.

The first contract.

The purest contract. Naturally, there would be a difference.

The choice was Park Chan-woo’s alone.

Soon, he made his decision.

“Let’s go with the original plan.”

Clap, clap, clap, clap!

“As expected of a bold and excellent human.”

Chronos spoke with laughter in his voice.

Still, a faint doubt lingered.

‘My thoughts feel scattered.’

He had entered the shadow to test the human’s capabilities.

He had confirmed his talent, and even identified the existence of an Outer God.

Even after accepting him, Park Chan-woo had been fine.

That alone proved his capacity.

Yet although it felt as though he had spent an incredibly long time inside, only about five minutes had passed.

It felt as if he were missing something.

…What could it be?

After pondering for a moment, Chronos shook his head.

There was no way something that could confuse him existed inside Park Chan-woo.

He was a shadow spirit and a reaper.

If he had found an anomaly, he would have recognized it.

“Then let us proceed with the Shadow Contract right away.”

Chronos began the contract with Park Chan-woo.

—

Two days later.

The world faced a great cataclysm once again.

T-ring!

[‘Transcendent Abyss’ dungeons are appearing all over the Earth.]

[The ‘Tower of God’ is appearing from the ‘Transcendent Abyss’.]

[Do your best to climb the ‘Tower of God’.]

[Numerous ‘Traces’ exist in the ‘Tower of God’.]

[They consist of ‘Ancient Traces’, ‘Traces of a Transcender’, ‘Traces of a God’, and more. Through these ‘Traces’, you can complete an ‘Epic’. When you complete an ‘Epic’, you will be given a ‘Stigmata’.]

[Also, the higher the floor you reach, the more powerful ‘Abilities’, high-grade ‘Treasures’, or ‘Special Blessings’ you can obtain.]

[It is said that one can even become a ‘God’ upon reaching the top floor.]