The Last Place Hero’s Return - Chapter 243

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 243. Divine Descent (3)
A year had passed since I returned against the flow of time.
In that span, I came to experience countless joys I could never have dared dream of in my previous life.
Yet still, I remember.
It surfaces unbidden.
Like a thorn driven deep into flesh.
The endless Snowy Wasteland, the relentless blizzard, the cold that crushed my lungs.
That distant.
That endless existence.
Of course, upon returning to the past, the Forest God’s blessing was no longer a curse, but a benediction capable of reshaping my future.
Yet that is merely hindsight speaking.
A favorable outcome does not justify the suffering endured to achieve it.
And so I wish to ask.
Why me?
Among countless souls, why was I alone bound to an existence without end, forced to struggle against it?
If there was a reason, I wanted to hear it.
No—even if there was no reason, I wanted to demand an answer.
Why did you bestow upon me a life so mercilessly cruel?
“Dale…”
Did she read my heart?
Iris gazed at me with trembling eyes.
“…I understand.”
Iris nodded softly, her head bowed.
She clutched Grace’s holy relic hanging from her neck as she nodded.
“I’ll summon the Forest God through divine descent.”
“…Please do.”
[Hmm… I’m not entirely sure what’s happening, but you want to invoke the Forest God through divine descent, yes?]
“Yes, that’s right.”
[Understood.]
Grace nodded.
[First, draw the power of the Seven Eyes to its maximum.]
“Yes.”
A seven-colored aura bloomed from Iris’s body.
It resembled the moment when Camelia had invoked the Blessing of the Seven Stars.
The difference, perhaps, was that Iris’s presence radiated not an overwhelming force, but a sanctity as though miracles were unfolding before one’s very eyes.
[Now then, I’ll begin. Follow my guidance and move the power of the Seven Eyes slowly.]
Grace placed her hand upon Iris’s head.
Iridescent radiance enveloped both their bodies.
“…Ah.”
With a soft gasp, Iris’s eyes opened wide.
Her eyes, which had shimmered with rainbow light, transformed into the same deep green as mine.
I swallowed hard, watching Iris enveloped in a verdant aura.
‘This is different from Camelia’s blessing.’
If Camelia had borrowed the Deity’s physical form to manifest it within her own body,
then Iris was borrowing the Deity’s consciousness to possess her own—a divine descent rather than mere embodiment.
Unlike Camelia, who had simply borrowed the Deity’s power, Iris created the illusion that she herself had become a god.
“Ah, uh… ah.”
Iris’s body trembled violently, convulsing.
As I rushed toward her, Grace raised her hand to stop me.
[Focus. Don’t resist the divine power—accept it into your body as it flows.]
“…Ah, yes… m-mother.”
Iris answered with difficulty and drew a deep breath.
“Hah.”
The turbulent green aura gradually began to stabilize.
[…Heh.]
Grace let out a soft, incredulous laugh as she observed the scene.
[She’s my daughter, but this is remarkable. Is this truly your first time using divine descent?]
I wasn’t entirely certain, but judging from Grace’s reaction, the divine descent had apparently succeeded without incident.
“….”
Iris hung her head like a puppet with severed strings, her eyes closed.
And then.
Iris slowly lifted her head.
No—the being before me was no longer “Iris.”
“It has been a long time, Grace.”
Iris—no, the Forest God gazed at Grace with a faint smile.
[I greet the Forest God.]
Grace traced a sacred sign in the air and bowed her head.
The Forest God regarded the translucent, spectral form of Grace with sorrowful eyes.
“You too… could not escape the passage of time.”
[I am human, after all.]
Compared to the lives of gods, a human life was but a fleeting moment.
“Heh. Do not speak such things. Being a god does not mean one lives in ‘eternity.'”
The Forest God continued, a faint smile lingering at the corners of her lips.
“…You do not live in eternity?”
In that instant.
Iris’s green eyes returned to their original light.
“Interesting. You maintained consciousness while your mind was connected to mine….”
Her eyes shifted back to green.
“This is indeed your first time using divine descent, correct?”
[Yes, that is correct.]
“…That’s surprising. Grace also lost consciousness immediately at first, severing the connection.”
[Hehe. My daughter is exceptional, after all.]
Grace puffed out her chest with a proud expression.
“So, to answer Iris’s question from earlier… Yes, that’s right. Even gods cannot live eternally.”
A truth that contradicted what was written in the Seven Star Church’s scriptures.
Even Yurina, Elisha, and Lanez—who, though not as devout as Iris, had believed without question in the eternity of the Seven Gods—felt their pupils narrow.
In a way, it was a natural reaction.
After all, it was common knowledge that ‘gods’ were eternal and immortal by their very existence alone.
“After the Tree of Creation burned and disappeared, the gods gained something called a lifespan. Of course, it’s incomparably longer than that of humans. But still… there is nothing ‘eternal’ left in this world anymore.”
The Forest God spoke those words with a bitter smile lingering at the corners of her lips.
“…Wait.”
I, who had been quietly listening to her story, slowly approached the Forest God.
“That’s complete nonsense.”
[S-son-in-law! What kind of manner is that before a god!]
Grace cried out in alarm, but her words didn’t reach my ears.
“Nothing eternal remains in this world anymore?”
Then.
What was the life I lived?
That relentless nightmare, that unending despair—what was it?
“What was it, then…!”
A torrent of emotions surging up.
Feelings I had buried, memories I had suppressed, pain I had crushed down.
All erupting like a violent eruption.
“Why… why only me…! Why did I have to live forever without dying!”
“…Pardon?”
The Forest God stared at me with a bewildered expression.
I glared at the Forest God, grinding my teeth.
“Are you going to pretend you don’t know?”
Rip!
I tore open the shirt I was wearing and revealed the stigma carved into my left chest.
The clearly marked stigma of the ‘Forest God’.
“You… you gave it to me! You made me eternal!”
“….”
“And now you’re saying nothing eternal exists? What kind of nonsense is that!!!”
Then what was my life?
What was that relentless eternity?
“…I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”
The Forest God shook her head with a confused expression.
“There seems to be some misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding? A misunderstanding?”
“Yes.”
The Forest God nodded slowly.
“I have never given you anything.”
“…What?”
What was she talking about?
“Look, look! Here is your stigma…!”
“That is not my stigma.”
“What do you mean…?”
“No, what is inscribed on your chest from the beginning is not even a ‘stigma’. The form is similar, but it is something entirely different.”
“…”
What was it?
What on earth was she saying?
The mark on my chest was not a stigma?
Then why could I manipulate mana?
And why did I have the blessing of resurrection?
“Then… what is this?”
“…I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
A god who doesn’t know.
Then who possibly could?
“It is hidden… as if shrouded in ashen smoke.”
“…”
It was the same thing Elisha had said when she examined my body with the blessing of insight before.
“But this much is certain.”
The Forest God continued, gazing into my eyes.
“Within you sleeps something far greater than even ‘divinity’.”
Something greater than divinity?
That meant the power dwelling within me was of a higher order than the power possessed by gods, didn’t it?
‘That’s impossible…’
Suddenly.
The enormous form I had witnessed in the Mental Realm came to mind.
A deep ashen something that lightly suppressed the flames burning as if to devour the world.
“-Ah.”
A faint exclamation escaped between my lips.
The scattered puzzle pieces clicked into place.
-I had never been able to accumulate mana through breathing techniques like other heroes.
Of course not.
What was inscribed on my chest was not a stigma.
There was no way mana could accumulate through the same method as others.
-The only way I could accumulate mana was to burn my body with primordial flame and create mana from it.
Death, repeated daily to increase my magical power.
It was to stimulate the primordial flame through my own death.
Through the roaring inferno.
I cast my body as kindling into the blaze.
And.
-‘Magical power’ is a byproduct created when the primordial flame burns the tree of creation.
“Ha.”
I clutched my head, letting out a hollow laugh.
The clues had been scattered everywhere from the beginning.
The answer was written on the exam paper.
The fact that I only realized it now made the answer seem almost absurd in its simplicity.
“Ha, haha.”
Memories.
Blazed like fire, filling my mind completely.
-Why wasn’t my stigma burned?
The primordial flame that burns stigmas.
Even the Demon God’s devouring flames of divinity couldn’t burn my stigma.
-It’s not one, but ‘two’.
-There are two powers dwelling within Dale’s body.
That’s right.
Before I embraced the primordial flame, one power already dwelled within me.
-You possess the power to extinguish fire.
There couldn’t be only one power capable of extinguishing the Demon God’s flames.
-In any case… there is no longer anything ‘eternal’ left in this world.
In a world where eternity has vanished.
The reason I alone could remain eternal was.
“Yes… that’s how it was.”
I placed my hand over my left chest.
Closing my eyes gently, I sank into the Mental Realm.
Whoooosh!
Flames blazing before my eyes.
Beyond the raging inferno, a colossal form shrouded in ashen mist became visible.
As I slowly extended my hand, the ashen mist gradually dispersed.
‘It wasn’t the Seven Gods who granted me eternal life… it was you.’
Where the ashen mist had vanished.
Immense beyond all measure.
A single tree loomed down upon me.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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