Chapter 1184: 171. The Crying

"The truth is crueler than a lie. This world really is... as goddamn rotten as ever."

Muen scratched his head and suddenly cursed.

Miss Andri was right. Most of the time, this world was not beautiful. It only made people feel despair and helplessness... especially those who were already pitiful to begin with.

"I never thought that one day, even a blond villain like me would realize that I wasn't the one being persecuted most cruelly by fate."

Muen gave a self-mocking smile. This sudden "victory" could not make anyone happy no matter how he looked at it.

There was no point thinking about something he could not change for the time being. Muen shifted his thoughts, steadied his mind, and slowly drew back the black flames circulating outside his body and provoking the mist's rejection.

The black flames continued to sway and burn like a small animal under stress. If the collision between these mutually repelling forces went even slightly wrong, it could lead to extremely terrifying consequences, especially when both sides possessed an exceedingly high "status."

Becoming enemies with the "world" or something like that... Muen felt he had long since passed the age of adolescent delusions and would not entertain such showy thoughts.

Fortunately, both his mental power and self-control far surpassed those of ordinary people. The black flames were soon drawn back into his body, and the Black Sun within his mental space also ceased its agitation.

The surging mist flowed around Muen for quite a while. Seemingly unable to find its target, it gradually returned to calm.

Just like that, the crisis was resolved.

"That was rather fast."

A rare trace of surprise actually appeared in Hamreign's voice.

"I originally thought you would struggle for much longer."

"Miss Dragon, you should know that in this world, 'fast' is the one word that must never be used to describe a man."

Muen put on a stern face and instructed her seriously:

"It seems your understanding of humans is still severely lacking."

"Is that so?"

Hamreign thought for a moment.

"It ended all at once. Human, I have to admit that you truly are different from other humans in certain respects."

"..." Wasn't that the exact same meaning?

Muen covered his face.

Forget it...

During this period, he had come to understand that trying to reason with Miss Dragon was probably one of the most difficult things in the world.

"The reason I could finish so fast... No, the reason I could resolve it so easily was probably because a certain someone taught me well."

Muen returned to the previous subject.

"A certain someone?"

"Although I don't want to admit it, whenever that guy—who deserves a beating in every possible respect—is being serious, everything he says makes a great deal of sense."

Muen looked at his own hands.

"For example, I should control power rather than be controlled by it... Controlling myself, whether it is my power, my emotions, or anything else, is something I have always paid close attention to."

He possessed power far beyond what his own level should have allowed.

His mental power was constantly being exhausted or even overdrawn.

Every time, he had to face enemies whose realms far exceeded his own.

Put all those settings together, and if he had been the protagonist of some old-school righteous-action work from his previous life, he would have gone berserk at least once every three episodes.

But Muen never had.

He would rather risk his life...

He would rather endure the agony of even his soul being devoured than allow himself to be consumed by something he could not control...

Otherwise, something even more terrifying than death would surely happen.

Whether it was Teacher Mela's teachings or his own instincts, both told him the same thing.

He could become the Black Sun. ℯℯ𝑙.

But the Black Sun could never become him.

"Control yourself... Interesting."

The enormous, ferocious dragon head turned back slightly. A trace of mockery appeared in those golden eyes.

"But for the person who loves taking unconventional risks and walking the most dangerous path to say such a thing is truly laughable."

"Laughable? Perhaps it seems that way to Miss Dragon, but I think it is quite meaningful. Especially when it comes to controlling oneself. I think Miss Dragon should learn more about that as well."

Muen offered the suggestion with complete seriousness.

"Are you saying I have a bad temper?"

The dragon head drew closer, and the golden eyes became majestic and blazing.

"No, no, no!"

Muen hurriedly shook his head.

"Controlling oneself is only a method of cultivating one's mind and character. How could Miss Dragon possibly have a bad temper? I have always thought you were very gentle!"

"Where am I gentle?"

"Whe—"

Muen almost twisted his tongue.

He had lived half his life and had never imagined such words would come from the mouth of a dragon.

Wasn't that the sort of question a lovestruck girl asked while acting spoiled?

Miss Dragon, you need to stay in character!

"Naturally... you're gentle in every way."

Muen racked his brains and gave an ingratiating smile.

"For example, even though you could clearly kill me with a single blow, you have still allowed me to fool around until now and have barely beaten me at all from beginning to end. If that mercy isn't a form of gentleness, then what is?"

"For some reason... I feel like you're mocking me."

"No! Absolutely not! Every word I said came from the bottom of my heart. I swear!"

"Heh."

Hamreign did not continue along that subject.

The dragon head returned to face forward, and she casually tossed out a sentence:

"Since you say I am gentle, then I will gently remind you of something. This is not yet the time for you to relax. Your strength has not reached the point where you are qualified to know every secret, but you are not weak either. Being weak enough would be fine, and being strong enough would also be fine. But being neither high nor low, stuck right at that boundary, is the most dangerous state to be in within this mist."

"Huh? What do you mean, neither high nor low is the most dangerous?"

Muen looked utterly confused, but instinctively sensed that something was wrong.

However, before he had time to become vigilant...

"Uuu..."

Suddenly, he heard a strange sound.

It was a vague, prolonged, indescribable sound. Although it could be called "hearing," Muen did not feel the slightest vibration in his eardrums...

It seemed to appear directly inside his mind.

It was neither high nor low, neither long nor short. It had no special frequency, nor did it possess any unique tone.

It was merely a sound.

And then, it simply existed there.

Yet Muen felt the pain within it.

Unimaginable pain.

It was like someone terminally ill, struggling with difficulty upon a sickbed.

At the same time, he also felt a trace of familiarity.

Because he had heard this sound before, and he remembered it deeply.

This was...

"The world's crying"!

Muen's mind instantly tensed.

He remembered that when he had traded verbal blows with Gaius in Saint Blancfazesiya, the other party had shown him this very sound.

The wailing, crying...

And sorrow of the world.

But this time was clearly different from that one.

The "crying" back then had only been something Gaius displayed to him.

It had been an illusion.

A false image.

But now, he was truly standing inside the world's most terrible wound, listening to the crying of the world itself!

"Damn it!"

Muen gritted his teeth and immediately guarded his mind.

He knew that he absolutely could not listen to something like this for too long. Just look at that old bastard Gaius, who had become a lunatic. Who knew what would happen if Muen listened for even a little longer?

But no matter how hard he tried, no matter how much he attempted to seal the crying outside, the defenses formed inside his mind were instantly torn apart...

Before an existence known as the "world," the mental power he took such pride in appeared so fragile and insignificant.

"Uuu..."

The sound gradually took on a concrete form, gradually becoming genuine crying.

That sobbing was like a curse, completely filling Muen's entire mind and mental space.

His heart suddenly hurt as though it had been torn apart, but that pain did not come from an injury to flesh and blood.

It came from sorrow that chilled him to the bone.

Muen wiped his face and discovered that large tears were already sliding from the corners of his eyes.

His confrontations with Evil Gods and battles to the death against all kinds of powerful beings had never made him waver in the slightest, yet at this moment, he was crying like a child who had lost his favorite toy.

"No... This can't continue..."

Muen clenched his hand tightly, his fingernails digging into his flesh. At the same time, he bit his tongue, forcibly dragging his consciousness slightly free from that endless crying and sorrow.

It was too terrifying.

If this continued, his entire mental space would be occupied by the "world's crying."

At that point, even if he did not go insane, he would be tortured into suicide by this unimaginable sorrow!

He had to break free from the crying's control!

"So that's why you gave me those jade beads for no reason. You were waiting for me here!"

The crying of the world intensified the fluctuations in his emotions.

Muen was now so grief-stricken and furious that he wanted nothing more than to rush over and fight Miss Dragon, letting that evil dragon know that although he was only a weak little blond villain, he was not so easy to bully!

...Fortunately, the last trace of reason stopped him from doing something that amounted to delivering himself as food.

Muen hurriedly took out a jade bead and placed it in his mouth.

A cooling sensation filled his mind.

Muen's mental power, which had already thrown down its weapons and fled, trembled and actually gathered a little strength to resist once again.

The crying continued, clinging to him like maggots attached to the bone.

Even this newly restored mental power was being rapidly eroded.

Clearly, even with the boost from an item, the situation could not improve by much at all.

But...

"That place is my home field!"

Muen suddenly let out a ferocious growl.

Dong!

High above his mental space, the majestic Black Sun with its holy outer flames began to turn, and an ancient, profound bell rang out with chilling force!

The power of time abruptly descended.

Within the entire mental space, everything that was not permitted was immediately brought to a standstill.

Naturally, that included those strange sounds from outside.

Then the black flames surged forward, burning and devouring every last one of those formless things!

Who cared whether they possessed physical form?

Burn every last damn one of them!

Even Miss Dragon had to use an entire hand here if she wanted to beat him. What the hell did these things think they were?

Intense sorrow always gave birth to even stronger rage.

Muen's eyes had nearly turned red by now.

He did not care what the world was crying about or why it was crying...

Burn!

Burn!

Burn every damn thing!!

The black flames rapidly swept through his mental space, finally allowing Muen to pull free from those abnormal emotions and catch his breath for a moment.

"It seems I will not need to knock you unconscious again this time."

The flying dragon turned her head back slightly.

"Knock me unconscious?"

Muen froze again.

But before he could figure out when the first time implied by that "again" had happened, a violent sense of weightlessness suddenly rushed over him.

Miss Dragon's claw tightened around him once more.

Her enormous dragon body twisted, then descended toward a certain direction at an unimaginable speed!

No.

At that speed, it could no longer be called descending.

It was a crash!

A violent crash like a meteor falling from the sky!

"Fuck!"

Muen cursed aloud.

At that moment, the sense of weightlessness was not the only thing he had to resist.

The crying of the world was not something that could disappear after being casually burned once by the black flames.

It was like the sea beneath his feet.

Endless.

Muen burned away one portion, and another immediately surged into the depths of his mind.

As a result, this became an extremely agonizing contest of endurance...

The crying invaded and was burned away.

The crying invaded again and was burned away again.

The cycle repeated endlessly.

However, throughout this cycle, Muen's mental power was being consumed at tremendous speed, as though a massive hole had opened in its container.

It quickly approached complete exhaustion.

Muen felt as though his brain had become a flushing toilet.

His mental power...

Together with something else, was rapidly being drawn away in a swirling vortex.

The stabbing pain in his head became increasingly clear, while his consciousness grew increasingly blurred...

The Black Sun turning high above his mental space seemed to have been infected by the rage born from that ultimate sorrow and began growing restless...

Everything was racing toward the edge of a cliff.

Muen felt that the slightest mistake would send him falling into that bottomless abyss.

Until...

"We've arrived."

Miss Dragon's voice remained cold.

Yet it sounded like heavenly music.