The Lord Who Levels Up by Devouring - Chapter 345

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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 345. The First Mage (1)
In the distant past.
There existed a great sage who discovered the method of converting primordial energy—Mana—into usable force known as Mana Force.
Arcanis Rilsein.
Through this power called Mana Force, she became the first to manifest the phenomenon of magic.
Thus was born a new system of knowledge: the Arcane Arts.
Under the framework of the Arcane Arts, all natural laws were codified, and nature ceased to be an object of reverence.
Lightning became not divine wrath, but electrical discharge.
Flame became not the breath of spirits, but a combustion reaction.
Earthquakes became not the cries of earth deities, but tectonic collisions.
Humanity understood nature, ceased to worship it, and began to dominate it.
Demons naturally declined as well.
The fear of the unknown had become hollow.
Knowledge and power departed from palaces and moved into scholarship, and the world was built upon the Arcane Arts.
The first mage.
Arcanis Rilsein.
She was the being who transformed the paradigm of the Continent and human civilization.
Yet such was Arcanis—she had died.
Thousands of years ago, no less.
She had been human, and humans could never escape death.
…That was why I could not believe it.
The text now floating before my eyes.
It shimmered with translucent luminescence.
Yet it spoke with absolute clarity.
==【Character Information】==
Name: Arcanis Rilsein
Classification: Transcendent Concept-Defying Immortal Entity of Void Origin
Gender: Female
Age: None
Distinctive Trait: Omnilock[T]
The first mage, Arcanis Rilsein.
The text declared with certainty that she was the Immortal Lord.
Thud, thud-thud!
Veins sprouted and wove densely across the torn neck.
Sutured tissues reformed into the shape of a face.
Skin pale as frost.
Eyes of crimson depth beyond measure.
A visage of noble and exquisite beauty, like a flower blooming upon blood.
…It was unmistakable.
The Immortal Lord.
It was no different from my memories of my past life.
If anything, the Immortal Lord was even more vivid than those memories.
‘How is this possible…’
My thoughts tangled into chaos.
I couldn’t comprehend it.
Yet ironically, it all made sense.
Why the Immortal Lord was in Langritd Magic Tower.
And how he could be in the Archive of Truth.
If the Immortal Lord was Arcanis Rilsein, it all clicked into place instantly.
The reverse was equally true.
Why Arcanis, who died thousands of years ago, was still alive now.
Why he could stand before my eyes transcending every era.
If Arcanis Rilsein was the Immortal Lord, this too made perfect sense.
The possibility of it being false was… slim.
Even if Mungu wasn’t in his right mind, he would never give me false information.
…And yet I still couldn’t believe it.
But I stopped denying it.
The first Mage, Arcanis Rilsein.
One of the six Lords who serve the Emperor, the Immortal Lord.
These two were the same being.
The Immortal Lord is Arcanis Rilsein.
I calmed my emotions and steadied myself.
Then I spoke.
“Where is Iliana?”
“…Iliana?”
The Immortal Lord.
In other words, Arcanis tilted his head.
That gesture.
It was so natural and graceful that one would never guess his neck had just been torn open.
“The child with blue hair who asked many questions.”
He knew, as I suspected.
Then Arcanis asked in return.
“…You. How do you know that child?”
His demeanor was different from what he’d shown until now.
How to describe it.
It was as if he too was searching for Iliana.
From that expression, I could discern several facts.
First, Iliana had come to the Archive of Truth.
And second.
“All this trouble because I couldn’t eliminate one insignificant variable.”
Iliana’s disappearance was connected to Arcanis.
The moment I confirmed it, I pushed off the ground with force and bolted forward.
* * *
Gwendolyn couldn’t comprehend what was happening at all.
Something crashed—bang! Boom crash crash!
A tremendous commotion erupted, and she found herself buried under a pile of books.
Barely regaining her senses, she looked up to see—
An unknown woman and Kim Fujiwara.
No, Adrian was locked in combat with them.
‘A woman…?’
Gwendolyn narrowed her eyes, studying the woman.
Pale, flawless skin.
A bewitching yet elegant beauty.
And an overwhelming presence.
‘What is that woman… Is she even human?’
It was like gazing upon a being from the Other Dimension.
Like beholding the Queen herself, seated upon the throne of that realm.
In that instant, her instincts screamed a warning.
Do not approach.
This is not a being humanity can contend with.
Gwendolyn unconsciously took a step back.
Right then.
Crash!!!!
The Archive of Truth shook violently.
And Adrian vanished.
Gwendolyn couldn’t fathom what had just occurred.
Boom!
A deafening roar tore through the air.
Turning her head, she saw Adrian and the Queen locked in direct collision.
Adrian clenched his fist. Tremendous energy compressed in an instant, and the space around them trembled.
‘That… what is that…!!’
Gwendolyn’s breath caught in her throat.
It felt as though that single blow could obliterate the entire Archive.
Yet the Queen did not retreat.
The Queen spread both hands wide.
Crimson mana surged from all directions.
Blood-red light stained the void, and intricate magical circles inscribed themselves around the Queen.
Adrian’s fist collided with the Queen’s magical circles.
The world shattered.
The magical circles shattered to pieces.
Adrian’s fist, having shattered the magical circle, crashed down upon the Queen’s body.
The Queen disintegrated without a trace.
Not a shred of flesh, not a single bone remained—everything scattered into the void.
And yet.
‘She didn’t die…?’
The Queen’s body reconstituted itself.
The crimson particles scattered into the void drew back together as if rewinding.
And once again began to shape themselves into the form of a body.
* * *
“EEEEEEEEEK!!?!!”
A bizarre scream erupted from behind.
I turned to look, and there was Gwendolyn.
“No, what is that…! That’s not a person, is it?! AAAAAAAHHHHH!!”
Her eyes wide open, she was losing consciousness in real time.
All that magician composure had been thrown to the winds as she flailed this way and that!
“She was dead! Completely obliterated!! But why… why is she assembling again!! Even now her eyeballs are clicking into place… KYAAAAAAHHH!!!”
…She was practically half out of her mind.
Well, it wasn’t an unreasonable reaction.
I turned my gaze back.
There, just as Gwendolyn had said, Arcanis’s eyeballs were clicking into place as she reconstituted herself.
Soon her deep crimson eyes fixed upon me as if nothing had happened.
Her entire body had clearly suffered a fatal wound, utterly torn apart.
And yet Arcanis remained perfectly alive.
It was only natural.
Arcanis is the Immortal Lord.
And the Immortal Lord does not die.
But she is not undead.
The undead merely move while in a state of death.
They are beings that have experienced death.
That is why the undead can be reduced back into death.
But the power of immortality is different.
◆Omnilock[T]
: The user exists or can exist outside of all things—space, time, non-space, non-time, duality, possibility, impossibility, non-existence, and more. They are unaffected by temporal paradoxes or reality manipulation of any kind, and acquire an exceptionality that transcends all things, including absolute irreversibility.
Absolute externality.
A power that renders all laws meaningless by existing outside the world.
Thus transcending death itself.
The very concept of death cannot reach her.
Therefore, she is not human.
Not a living being of this world, nor an existence within it.
A singularity that has completely escaped the realm of life.
The Vampire Queen.
She was the one.
The Immortal Lord whose body had been instantaneously reconstituted.
Arcanis Rilsein.
Arcanis lifted her head.
Her pristine white neck, unmarred by a single vein, lay bare, and her crimson eyes flashed toward me.
“…Who are you?”
Her serpentine gaze slid across my face like a blade.
And then, for a moment.
Arcanis’s brow furrowed.
“You… are wearing a mask.”
It was the first time.
The first being to see through the fact that my face was not real.
Even Marzen’s magic eye had failed to detect it, but Arcanis was different.
…The level was different.
An entirely different dimension.
Arcanis’s crimson eyes pierced toward me once more with lethal sharpness.
And soon her brow deepened.
“It’s not disguise. Not magic either… a seal?”
Arcanis muttered the words as if thinking aloud.
Yet there was no certainty in her voice.
She had grasped that my appearance was false, but could not penetrate it.
It was only natural.
My current form was neither disguise, nor magic, nor seal.
Physical restructuring.
Moreover, I emit no mana whatsoever.
And I am not even human.
A Perfect Lifeform.
An existence that had never manifested even once across billions of years.
A structure that could not be reached even if one repeated the accidents of life billions of times—even Arcanis could not penetrate it.
“…I cannot comprehend this. Why?”
For Arcanis, this was far too unfamiliar and unacceptable.
Arcanis’s eyes wavered.
She was bewildered.
But I was different.
Because I knew.
An existence I had already encountered in my past life.
The Immortal Lord.
I knew what she was and what powers she wielded.
Though in the past, I had not known her true identity.
But now I understood.
Moreover, by devouring the knowledge T-Rex had accumulated, I could also grasp the principles of immortal power and its mechanisms.
In other words, I had already seized the informational advantage in all aspects.
Therefore, at this very moment.
The initiative in every strategic calculation was already in my hands.
* * *
Arcanis could not comprehend what was happening or how.
…For some reason, he could not see it.
Who the man before him was.
What abilities he wielded, and what their principles were.
The information was sufficient.
Yet interpretation was impossible.
‘How is this…?’
Knowledge accumulated over countless eons.
Perfect understanding.
For Arcanis, who had pierced through all things in the world, ignorance was akin to terror itself.
That was the moment.
Whoosh—!
The man’s form distorted.
No, Arcanis’s vision distorted.
He drew forth blood mana.
In an instant, the man burrowed toward him.
It was a movement as if space itself had been transcended.
A blink?
No.
Not a trace of mana fluctuation could be felt.
Then what was it?
It was a movement Arcanis could neither comprehend nor perceive.
Arcanis gritted his teeth.
He swung his hand, channeling blood mana with tremendous force.
Wooooooom!!
Space trembled as if it would shatter.
Crimson mana erupting from his fingertips devoured everything.
And then.
…it vanished.
The blood mana he had gathered with all his strength disappeared in an instant.
‘Dispel?’
Arcanis shook his head.
Dispel is a spell that unravels magic by reverse-calculating its formula.
And the magic was power that Arcanis himself had created.
That’s why I understood it better than anyone else.
‘That won’t work.’
Dispel requires analyzing the structure of a single spell and performing reverse calculations—a process demanding at least several seconds of analysis and precise mana adjustment.
From the start, the blood mana that Arcanis had drawn forth was not of this world.
There was no way to analyze its structure or anything of the sort.
Therefore, it was not Dispel.
More than that, it was not magic.
The phenomenon it produced resembled magic, but its power and structure were entirely different.
No incantations, no spells, no chants.
‘A dragon’s word…?’
But that made even less sense.
How could a mere human possibly wield a dragon’s word?
If that were possible, Arcanis would never have created mana as an energy source.
‘Then how…?’
Boom!!
In an instant, a crushing pressure pierced through my skin.
My thoughts shattered.
“…?!”
Before a scream could even escape, all my senses were suppressed.
“Ugh…!”
The flow of mana ceased abruptly.
The mana I had drawn forth began to backflow.
This too was the power of a dragon’s word.
But it was different.
A dragon’s word manipulates mana itself.
It reproduces phenomena exactly as they are.
That’s why it is more primordial and direct than magic that uses mana.
But the man’s dragon’s word did not reproduce phenomena.
It ‘negated’ phenomena exactly as they were.
‘Could it be….’
I could understand now.
The man’s dragon’s word did not use mana as its energy source.
It used anti-mana—negating/reversing/denying mana.
‘Anti-mana!’
He was using anti-mana as his energy source.
Therefore, he did not reproduce phenomena.
He made the existent non-existent.
And reversed laws already set in motion.
Without realizing it, I stumbled backward.
The man’s footsteps drew closer.
One step. Another step.
Closer still.
“The Immortal Lord.”
The Man spoke.
A whisper, yet one laden with undisguised hatred.
He enunciated each word with deliberate precision.
“I may have failed to kill you.”
But I have never abandoned the attempt.

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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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