It wasn’t a matter of power or rank—but of its sheer size and the manner in which it existed.
Between the dark crimson runes, grotesque and ominous movements began to seep out.
In the darkness that even starlight and moonlight could not penetrate, amidst the dark crimson glow of the runes that seemed to burn the very light, a chilling green shimmer and a sickening squirming appeared, revealing themselves here and there as if to defile the heavens.
That green was far removed from the freshness of trees.
It bore not even the slightest resemblance to the beauty of emeralds.
It was a vile green, as if everything was rotting.
A bizarre hue, like something decomposing.
Like a swarm of green worms writhing together, that disturbing sight spread across the entire sky above my head, and even I wanted to stop the summoning out of sheer revulsion.
Moreover, as the summoned being grew more corporeal, the overwhelming unreality I felt through the soul link surged like it was about to devour my soul.
I heard the blades of the assassins striking my barrier.
I didn’t take my eyes off the sky, but I could sense their urgency and desperation in the faint sounds and the blurred movements at the edges of my vision.
They must have realized it too.
That this summoning must never be completed—not because of the outcome of the battle or their own deaths, but because, as living beings, it was something they should never face.
With a sharp sound, the fifth barrier vanished.
It wasn’t destroyed by force—it had simply reached the end of its duration.
In that brief moment of relief and faint joy, I sensed them moving their blades.
I don’t know if it was a delusion born of my unstable mind during the soul-linked summoning, or if their emotions were truly that strong—but at least to me, it felt real.
Then, reacting to my danger, the fourth barrier activated, and with one final despairing impact, the sound of strikes against the barrier came to a complete stop.
Belatedly, I sensed a slight disruption in the mana flow around me.
Likely, the Grendels had been wiped out—or perhaps even they had been so disturbed by the ominous presence covering the sky that they ceased moving, allowing some mages to refocus on me.
But it no longer mattered.
It had no effect.
The summoning was complete.
A being of that size—no simple disruption to the surrounding mana would affect the connection.
The runes disappeared, and from among the ominous, grotesque writhing forms, something immense began to reveal itself.
It was a vast and horrifying green eye.
As if tearing the veil of the night sky to peer down at the world below, countless massive green eyes filled the heavens.
This being I summoned now—or rather, something that can hardly be called a being at all—was named Neaphis Naka Honus.
Meaning “the eye that gazes from the abyss,” it belonged to neither the Demon Realm, Celestial Realm, Spirit Realm, nor even the earthly realm we now inhabit.
It does not belong to any of the eight material worlds.
Instead, it comes from Minocas, a different dimension completely detached from the flow of time, where the emotions and sensations of all creatures from the eight worlds are drawn and accumulated.
Originally, it had no self, no body, no life—it was simply a fragment of the emotional vortex that fills Minocas.
But a thousand years ago, a brilliant summoner first called it into the material world, gave it form and name, thus bringing it into existence as a summonable entity.
That said, Neaphis Naka Honus does not exist as a lifeform even within Minocas.
Until it is summoned and named again, it remains nothing more than part of that swirling storm of emotion—this is why, due to its utterly alien form of existence and unique nature, it can only take on such an immense form in the physical world.
Driven by instinctive fear and revulsion, even the Grendels fled, leaving behind the feast before them.
I saw it.
Not only them—ordinary soldiers and mages also turned away and fled to escape its gaze.
But Neaphis Naka Honus paid them no mind.
Its gaze turned only to the mages wielding staves.
“Die.”
With that brief declaration, the mages screamed in agony and collapsed on the spot, never to rise again.
This was the power of Neaphis Naka Honus.
A being closer to a mass of emotions than a true lifeform, it temporarily strengthens the link between its target and Minocas, pouring the entire lifetime of their emotions and sensations directly into their mind.
Ordinary creatures cannot retain their sense of self—or their lives—within that emotional storm.
Some mages managed to survive by cutting the link through barriers, but most were not so fortunate.
And the moment I confirmed their deaths, I immediately severed the mana flow that was sustaining Neaphis Naka Honus’s manifestation.
Spawning and manifesting it had taken tremendous time and nearly all of my mana, so from a cost-efficiency standpoint, it was a terrible decision—but I had no choice.
Even though its form and powers had been fixed by its first summoner, it was still difficult to control such a being from Minocas while protecting my own ego.
Maintaining its presence required a mana cost that exceeded even the restoration rate of the High Priest’s Ring, one of the highest-ranking artifacts.
If I’d had another method to simultaneously and accurately eliminate such a number of targets—and if I weren’t relying on the Pope’s Ring to rapidly replenish my mana—I would never have summoned it.
It was far too inefficient.
It was regrettable that I missed a few mages from the original plan, but at that number, they could no longer cast high-level spells capable of breaking through all my remaining barriers or launch another mana disruption spell like before.
If I waited for my mana to recover, I could summon other entities and handle not just the remaining troops, but also the Grendels I had summoned earlier.
Only when Neaphis Naka Honus began to rapidly lose its form and vanish did the soldiers and assassins seem to regain their senses.
They swiftly finished off the nearby, still-panicked Grendels, broke formation, and rushed toward me all at once.
They must have believed I wouldn’t be given time to recover my mana and that the barrier wouldn’t last long—but even now, four layers of the barrier still remained.
Of course, given the nature of my equipped barrier, which synergizes with the existing ones, the inner layers do tend to weaken slightly.
Still, it’s not so fragile that it can be easily destroyed by mere spears and blades without even concentrated cannon fire.
And right in that moment when I let my guard down, I realized the most critical fact I had momentarily forgotten—and the fatal flaw in this strategy.
“No wonder Orcan said what he did!”
Even if the barrier holds long enough for my mana to recover, there’s no guarantee the enemy will just stay there, dealing meaningless blows and waiting patiently.
That’s why the first target of Neaphis Naka Honus’s ability shouldn’t have been the mages alone.
Why did I come on this journey, into this trap, in the first place?
What was my real objective?
I may not know exactly what that red-haired man’s goal is, but this operation, at least on his end, was carried out in a dramatic and needlessly flashy way, all for the sake of revenge for Hailer’s younger sister.
Thanks to that, even if I didn’t know the exact scale or timing, I was able to prepare accordingly and survive.
But if they’d instead gone for a covert assassination attempt, completely flipping the method, the weight of it would have been different.
Not only would it have been harder to keep it a secret from Lowell or Aegina, but there would’ve been a much higher chance of unnecessary collateral damage.
And though unlikely, if they’d brought in a much larger force than this, it would’ve been truly dangerous.
That’s why, no matter what, I should have taken out that red-haired man.
Even if the operation failed, Hailer would never have run from me.
But instead, wanting to guarantee my own safety first, I simply targeted the mages.
—
“…!”
As I frantically scanned my surroundings, I spotted something different from the soldiers charging at me—farther and farther away, the red-haired man and the assassins were retreating, taking Hailer with them.
“…Clever, I’ll give him that.”
He had sensed that the operation had failed.
With most of the mages wiped out, he realized that the remaining forces wouldn’t be enough to take me down.
And yet, instead of giving the retreat order, he only extracted Hailer, intending to use the other troops to buy time.
“It’s like looking in a mirror.”
And that was an incredibly unpleasant experience.
I needed to summon a familiar immediately to block or pursue their escape route, but even with the High Priest’s Ring, my mana recovery wasn’t fast enough for that.
The best I could summon with my current mana would only be able to handle nearby foot soldiers.
“Damn it!”
I couldn’t stop the curse from escaping my mouth.
In the end, with no allies around, this was the extent of my combat ability.
I could protect myself—but I was far from capable of achieving my true objective.
At my gesture, glyphs once again floated in the air.
I couldn’t pursue them anymore, nor did I have another method—but at the very least, I could take out my anger on what they left behind.
Small creatures the size of children, with rocky, sturdy exteriors.
Long legs, razor-sharp jaws split to either side, and small pincers constantly twitching beside them.
Thanathors Apollydon.
My personal swarm of demon bugs, loyal only to my will, emerged crawling along the shadows of the night that had descended around us.