The Mage Who Devours Disasters - Chapter 2

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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 2.
From my earliest days.
-You’re truly relentless, Kim Jung-seok.
I possessed an obsessive nature.
Once I began digging into something, I would burrow to the very depths.
Because of this, I often heard I was narrow-minded and inflexible.
-You intend to inscribe magical circles across the entire world?
-What exactly is the Sage’s Stone?
-Do you truly believe this warrants mobilizing such vast resources?
All opposition.
None would join my cause.
Understandable. I comprehended their hesitation.
The world was collapsing.
Everyone was too consumed with their own survival.
Yet through desperate persuasion.
Over more than a decade, I managed to inscribe a single magical circle across the world.
The personnel mobilized: 27,384 souls.
Each one was extraordinary.
Masters who had reached the pinnacle of their respective disciplines.
-Stop this now, Jung-seok.
-Our nation is perishing!
-How long will you cling to this meaningless endeavor? Tell me!
Calamities that never ceased.
Monsters that overflowed without end.
Days stained with screams and despair.
Amid everyone’s condemnation, I steadfastly inscribed the magical circle.
My purpose was singular.
To obliterate the Tower.
Those who had reduced us to this state deserved to experience the same devastation.
Even if I could only sever their hands and feet, it would be a victory.
I would make them understand with absolute clarity: if we perish, you shall not escape unscathed.
In other words.
‘Let us all die together.’
I detonated the completed Sage’s Stone.
The Tower vanished along with Earth.
The calamity itself ceased to exist.
Everything returned to nothingness.
Ding!
A message materialized before my eyes.
I couldn’t help but laugh.
What good are titles and awakenings when everything is dead and finished?
Yet something felt wrong.
Another window had suddenly materialized before me.
[Will you create a character?]
Create a character…?
I couldn’t fathom the meaning.
Reality wasn’t a game, so what on earth was this?
Still, I needed to understand this phenomenon.
This message had appeared after the Absolute Deity annihilated the Inevitability and obliterated Earth itself.
‘I’ll create one.’
As I nodded, another window appeared.
[‘The Greatest Calamity’ has entered.]
[Soul Points (SP) Possessed: 100,000,000]
[You can raise ‘talents’ using SP.]
[The talents you can raise are as follows.]
【Light】【Darkness】
【Fire】【Water】【Earth】【Wind】【Air】
【Sorcery】【Taoism】【Witchcraft】【Illusion】【Spirit Magic】
【Alchemy】【Divination】【Necromancy】
【Spirit Command】【Summoning】【Creation】
【Void】【Nothingness】【Emptiness】【Nullity】
….
What is this?
Text that descended endlessly.
The talents I could raise seemed to have no limit.
I understood instinctively.
‘Talents bestowed upon a character when starting a game.’
It was like some kind of RPG.
I could determine the character’s talents.
I simply needed to allocate points based on the direction I wanted to develop.
But.
‘One hundred million points were given to me. That means I could allocate talents one hundred million times.’
Why?
Why was I given one hundred million points?
It was certainly no small number.
‘Could it be because I annihilated the Inevitability?’
The Inevitability.
That which cannot be resisted.
Was this the price for obliterating an entity that could never be killed?
‘…I don’t know what’s what, but one thing is certain.’
I couldn’t afford to overlook this phenomenon.
My senses as a mage and as a seeker of truth were screaming.
A turning point.
Perhaps I would finally face the truth I had never reached in my lifetime.
I used SP to raise my talents.
[You consume 1 SP to raise the talent 【Light】.]
[You consume 1 SP to raise the talent 【Light】.]
….
[You cannot raise it further.]
[The maximum for the talent 【Light】 is 10,000.]
And I understood.
‘The maximum value for a single talent is 10,000. In other words….’
It meant I could raise 10,000 talents to their maximum.
The problem was.
‘I don’t have 10,000 talents.’
At most, around 1,000.
Even if I maxed them all out, that’s only 10,000,000.
90 million SP remains.
I rubbed my chin for a moment.
These categories.
They felt familiar somehow.
‘…The subcategories of all attributes, Technique Arts, and magic.’
The ones I had tried to learn but abandoned.
All those classifications I couldn’t even touch because they were too vast—they were all here.
There were even things I had never known about.
Yet even if I mastered all of them, it’s only 10 million.
I moved my fingers rapidly.
How much time had passed?
[Remarkable! Extraordinary!]
[All talents are at maximum!]
[You achieve the hidden piece ‘Unprecedented’.]
[Remaining Soul Points are assigned randomly.]
[This includes ‘unraisable’ abilities such as racial value, innate limits, luck, charm, and charisma.]
…Wasn’t SP only usable for raising talents?
Apparently there were hidden talents or additional talents that couldn’t be raised through normal means.
But my thoughts couldn’t linger long.
[Character creation is complete.]
[You log in to Asgard, Land of the Gods.]
[You can log out once you raise your level.]
My vision flickered.
* * *
…Where am I?
“C-Calamity!”
“The Deity of Calamity has grown wrathful!”
“Everyone, flee!”
Chaos erupted around me.
Figures clad in golden armor scrambled desperately in every direction, abandoning all pretense of order.
And I….
‘Chains?’
I was bound.
Imprisoned, moreover.
It appeared I was being transported somewhere.
Around me were numerous others in similar circumstances.
The problem was that our escorts had abandoned us in their haste to escape.
Most troubling of all.
“P-Please, save us!”
“That’s the Annihilation Typhoon!”
“We’re all going to die!”
The imprisoned wailed in desperation.
They convulsed and wept uncontrollably.
Rumble! Roooooaaaaaarrrrr!
A typhoon of incomprehensible magnitude bore down upon us.
True to its name—the Annihilation Typhoon.
It consumed everything in its path.
I examined my own body.
‘Similar, yet different.’
It was my body, and yet it was not.
Though I could move it as I wished, this flesh was decidedly not that of Kim Jung-seok.
It was far larger and more robust.
A frame easily exceeding two meters in height.
Corded muscle rippled beneath the skin.
Even my hair gleamed with radiant gold.
Had a mirror been present, I would have examined myself more thoroughly.
Yet even from these fragmentary glimpses, I could not reconcile this body with Kim Jung-seok.
I knew neither where I was nor what circumstances had brought me here.
But one thing remained certain.
‘Why am I so composed?’
Unnaturally calm, I realized.
Not a trace of panic stirred within me.
Unlike those around me, I felt no grip of terror.
Yet I accepted the situation faster than anyone else.
So this place is―
‘Asgard.’
The land of the gods, Asgard, it must be.
I clearly saw the message that my character had been created and logged in there.
In other words, this body is a ‘character’ I created.
Then is this inside a game?
‘Too vivid to be a game.’
Reality saturated every sensation.
All my senses were speaking to me.
That this wasn’t a game.
That this was reality.
‘The Deity of Calamity. The Annihilation Typhoon.’
Those fleeing in screams spoke in unison.
The Deity of Calamity had grown wrathful, they said.
Even naming that typhoon as they spoke.
No, wait.
I know that typhoon.
From before. From the distant past.
I’ve definitely seen a typhoon like that before.
One of the supreme divine powers wielded by one of the mightiest deities who ruled the Tower.
But it’s strange.
The Tower was destroyed, and the insurmountable was annihilated.
Could it be that the Deities of Calamity are still alive?
‘We always wondered where those who built the Tower on Earth came from.’
Soon I faced a single truth.
‘So this Asgard is their homeland.’
Asgard. Land of the Gods!
As the name suggested, this was the ‘homeland’ where they lived.
The moment I understood, I nodded.
I rose from my seat.
And then.
Crack!
I exerted force and shattered the chains.
Screech!
I folded the iron bars with both hands.
Power surged through me. I felt capable of anything.
If this is the character I created.
If it’s truly that character with every talent maxed to its limit.
And if all the messages I saw were real―
‘Status window.’
Ding!
【Attributes】
Level: 1
Class: Calamity Devourer
Strength: 50 Vitality: 50 Agility: 50
Intelligence: 50 Mana: 50
Titles: Slayer of the Absolute Deity, Greatest Calamity, Omnipotent One
As expected.
No—it was beyond what I anticipated.
Truly monstrous.
‘A monster.’
The maximum stat for a level 1 human is at most 10.
Even then, it’s impossible to distribute all stats equally at 10.
Yet this one.
Every stat starts at 50.
Considering the typical maximum level cap is 10, these numbers are absurd.
And furthermore.
‘I’m currently logged in.’
In an avatar I created.
Not my real body.
‘They said I can only log out by leveling up. If I log out, do I return to reality?’
Log out and return to reality.
And if reality means for me.
‘…Can I return to Earth?’
Only Earth.
To return to my body—Kim Jung-seok’s flesh.
I opened my right palm.
‘Golden runes.’
My right hand had been itching since earlier.
Precisely since that typhoon appeared.
It seemed these ‘golden runes’ were the cause.
Glimmering characters pulsed in response to the typhoon.
‘Calamity Devourer.’
I understood this instinctively as well.
I am a mage.
One who pursues truth and approaches the principles of existence.
To see one thing is to know its essence.
By conventional wisdom, fleeing would be the wisest course.
‘Let’s try.’
A body that has already died once, after all.
I am the mad mage who sought to obliterate both Earth and the Tower in a single stroke.
“Is… is that lunatic insane?”
“He’s walking straight toward the Annihilation Typhoon!”
Those trapped within cried out.
True to their words, I walked into the tempest.
The moment the typhoon consumed me.
Whoooooosh!
The golden rune in my palm responds.
And then.
Shuuuuuuuu!
It is drawn inward.
Devoured entirely.
Before long.
“…The… the typhoon vanished?”
“Impossible!”
The world fell silent.
[You have consumed the Annihilation Typhoon.]
[You can now use the Annihilation Typhoon.]
A message of utmost simplicity.
Yet this was far from the end.
Craaaaaaack!
The sky suddenly darkened to black.
Boom!
Simultaneously, a black lightning bolt descended before me.
“…An intriguing one, I see.”
A man appeared.
I knew at once.
This being.
The Deity of Calamity.
The god who unleashed the Annihilation Typhoon.
Moreover.
I cannot win.
I must flee.
My instincts screamed with desperate urgency.
Yet I cannot escape.
If I turn my back, I will be devoured.
Then the man spoke.
“Are you a ‘Child of the Deity’?”
Child of the Deity?
I paused to consider my response.
He was waiting for an answer.
Clearly, he questioned the miracle I had performed.
Should I come on strong, or play the part of someone submissive?
‘Clumsy acting won’t fool him.’
My opponent was a god.
The Deity of Calamity, no less.
It would be better to show him exactly who I was.
“I completed my mandatory service.”
“…?”
Ah. That wasn’t what he meant.
“…Just joking. What does ‘son of a god’ even mean?”
The man answered as if exasperated.
“You’re a funny one. To crack jokes right in front of me.”
It was undeniable.
Ever since this creature appeared, the world had fallen silent.
I couldn’t even hear the breathing of the people behind me.
Fear had rendered them all mute.
It was only natural that standing alone against him seemed remarkable.
The man shook his head once, then spoke.
“Go to the Tower. If you truly are a ‘son of a god,’ then you must enter the process of becoming a god within the Tower.”
“…?”
“You don’t know? The Tower of Gods. A tower where beings like us can become true ‘gods.'”
The man shrugged his shoulders.
“Judging by the fact that you extinguished my typhoon, you have considerable talent. If you climb the Tower, come find me.”
“And how am I supposed to find you if I don’t even know your name?”
“…Your insolence has been piercing the heavens since earlier. Do you have a death wish?”
Swooooosh!
Wind surged around us once more.
But I did not avert my gaze from the man.
Strangely, I felt no trembling.
My heartbeat was calm. Steady.
This body held no fear of the Deity of Calamity.
Not even a speck of it.
Especially not for someone who had already witnessed the end.
My experience and resolve from having seen the abyss remained intact.
“…You.”
After I refused to look away for a long moment, the man’s eyes gleamed with intrigue.
“I like you.”
The man let out a soft chuckle and continued speaking.
“I am the Deity of the Typhoon, the ruler of all things. I am Heimdall.”
“….”
…Wait.
The Deity of the Typhoon, Heimdall?
I know this name.
The Deities of Calamity that existed in the Tower.
One of the supreme beings among them, no less.
Only I knew their names.
‘The ancient tome that contained the method for crafting the Sage’s Stone also listed the names of the Deities of Calamity.’
Were the other Deities of Calamity truly unharmed?
They suffered no damage whatsoever?
I asked with desperate urgency.
“What happened to Earth? Has it been destroyed?”
“Hmm? It’s still intact. It’s likely still in the ‘protection period.'”
Still intact?
…And even a protection period?
The Deities who invaded Earth.
They did not immediately destroy it.
Especially during the first year, which they called the ‘protection period,’ they even gradually awakened humanity to a certain degree.
In other words.
‘Could it be….’
A single possibility suddenly occurred to me.
‘Regression?’
Had I traveled back through time?
Yet doubt still lingered.
If I had regressed, why didn’t I return to Kim Jung-seok’s body?
Why did I create a new character and start in Asgard, Land of the Gods?
‘I suppose I’ll need to log out to clarify everything.’
I drew in a breath.
And posed one final question.
“Then is there also an ‘Irresistible Force’ in the Tower of Gods?”
The moment I spoke that name.
Heimdall’s expression darkened.
He who had maintained an arrogant demeanor with ease.
Spoke in a grave tone I had never heard before.
“…How do you know the name of ‘that one’?”

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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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