Haru stood silently, hands tucked inside his robe as his gaze settled on Linda.
His voice was calm, but carried weight.
Haru: "What happened two years ago… in the Zerath Empire?"
The air inside the room shifted — even the candlelight seemed to flicker differently.
Linda hesitated before answering, her expression darkening.
Linda: "A lot of people already know the surface of what happened… but few dare to speak it aloud."
She took a slow breath.
"The great city in the south—Varelion City—was completely obliterated. The dead walked again, an endless tide of undead pouring from nowhere. Within three days, hundreds of thousands were slaughtered. Even the adventurer guilds… the otherworlders… they didn't survive."
Haru didn't flinch, but his eyes turned sharp — a faint glint of memory flickered deep inside.
Linda continued, lowering her tone.
"The Empire thought the Nine Seat of Paradox was behind it. But when the dust cleared, they discovered something worse. The Third Seat, Rebecca the Crimson Queen—the Vampire Monarch—was seen in the ruins. Three Saint-Level warriors were dispatched to confront her."
Her jaw tightened. "Not one of them returned unscathed. Even the Patriarch of the Valcrest Family, Darius Valcrest, went personally to defend the borders."
She paused, her eyes meeting Haru's.
"He's still alive… but barely. The curse from that battle nearly destroyed his mana heart. Since then, Lady Sera has been running the family in his place, hiding the truth from the other noble houses."
Haru's gaze lingered, expression unreadable. His voice came out low, almost a whisper.
Haru: "So even the saints couldn't stop her…"
Linda nodded grimly. "The Paradox Seats aren't living things anymore, Elder. They're calamities that wear human faces."
For a long moment, Haru said nothing. The silence was heavy enough to make even Linda shift uncomfortably.
Then, with quiet finality, he said,
Haru: "I see… Thank you."
He turned to leave, his robe sweeping softly against the floor — but Linda felt it again, that same crushing weight that made her heart race.
Even saints—those who stood at Level 80—couldn't defeat a single Seat of Paradox.
To Haru, that truth only confirmed one thing:
"They're beyond comprehension."
Without another word, Haru walked out of the city gates. The guards could only bow, their knees trembling under the weight of his aura as he vanished into the sky — floating higher and higher until his figure became nothing more than a flicker against the clouds.
Within a minutes, he was gone — already 150 kilometers away from the Valterion Empire, standing atop a jagged mountain range where even air refused to move freely. The ground below was scorched black; countless monster dens stretched as far as the eye could see.
Haru cracked his neck, stretching his arms lazily.
Haru: "Good… I need to warm up."
The wind exploded as he disappeared from sight.
A moment later—
BOOM!
A massive ogre, towering thirty meters tall, had its head crushed before it could even roar. Haru reappeared behind it, his hand still dripping with blackened blood.
Another growl echoed behind him — a pack of dire wolves lunged, their mana fangs glimmering blue. Haru didn't move.
Instead, he whispered.
The ground shattered. A burst of compressed mana erupted outward like an expanding ring — everything within a hundred meters was erased from existence, not burned or torn, just gone,
From above, the clouds turned red as hundreds of wyverns screamed, drawn by the blood and mana surge. Their shadows blanketed the land.
Haru: "Let's make this quick."
Haru raised his sword and cut the sky,
The sky cracked open.
A beam of light the size of a mountain pillar fell from above, vaporizing everything within sight. The shockwave reached the nearby forest, and even the earth groaned under the force.
When silence returned, only ashes remained. The once lush wilderness was now a hollow crater.
The system voice echoed again—
Haru floated above the destruction, expression calm as ever.
Haru: "Not bad… but still far from what I need."
He looked toward the distant horizon — where the Zerath Empire's ruins shimmered faintly in the red dusk.
With a faint hum, his body dissolved into thin light — vanishing from the mountain like he was never there.
After a full month of relentless hunting in the mountains, Haru finally decided to return.
He'd leveled countless times, slain beasts that ruled valleys, and left behind scars across entire ranges.
But as he descended—
he sensed something.
200 kilometers away from the Valtherion mainland, on a desolate mountain ridge, a humanoid figure stood quietly against the wind.
Haru stopped midair.
The figure had two large wings folded behind his back—one white, one black. Half his body seemed alive, pulsing with faint nerves and light, while the other half looked decayed, as if the flesh had long died.
Long white hair danced in the cold breeze, and on his forehead—a single black horn twisted upward.
> ZEX
Half-Demon, Half-Angel
Age: 490 years
Level: ??
He sat upon a boulder, eyes half closed, as though meditating. But even from the distance, Haru could tell—this was no ordinary being.
When Zex opened his eyes, the air around him froze. His gaze alone was sharp enough to cut stone, cold enough to make even Haru's body tense for a second.
Haru's instincts screamed, but his mind stayed calm.
He tried to analyze him—his mana, his intent, anything.
But there was nothing.
No killing intent.
No trace of blood.
No smell of fear.
Just… emptiness.
Like staring into the void.
Haru (thinking): "He's not human… but not a demon either. What the hell is he?"
Meanwhile—
from Zex's point of view, he could feel a presence descending from the sky.
A man drenched in the smell of blood, his aura spilling across the entire valley. The mountains themselves seemed to tremble in his presence.
Even the monsters hiding in the shadows backed away.
Zex narrowed his eyes.
Zex (thinking): "That energy… it's alive. No human should have that much mana overflowing…"
Curious, he activated his own System—a gift once granted to him by an unknown god centuries ago.
> [Scanning Target…]
N??e: H??u
Le?el: ??
??b: ??
Title: RANKER (1)
The border of his system screen began to distort, its color shifting into deep scarlet, spreading like a virus across his interface.
> [Warning!]
[System Error: Target exceeds scan parameters.]
Zex's face went pale.
The system window shattered into static before disappearing entirely.
Zex: "Shit…"
The wind howled.
For the first time in decades, Zex felt fear.
Not because Haru had attacked—
but because something inside him whispered that the man floating above wasn't supposed to exist.
Haru slowly descended, his cold gaze never leaving Zex.
Two existences outside the world's logic, standing face to face for the first time.