Demon King

[All movements have become lighter and quieter!]

[You have become more attuned to blood. The efficiency of all blood-related skills and artifacts increases. When exposed to a large amount of blood during combat, power, and resilience increases! When not exposed to blood, you are weakened.]

[Advanced Martial Arts has become Lv6!]

[Intermediate Lunatic Trickster has become Lv8!]

[Intermediate Flame Magic has risen to Lv10 and evolves into Advanced Flame Magic! By using enough magic power, you will be able to ignite a massive flame!]

[Lesser Shadow Step has risen to Lv10 and evolves into Intermediate Shadow Step! All actions become stealthier and quieter!]

[Intermediate Black Rose … …]

I brushed all the notifications off my face with the hand and turned my attention to Lee Chan-yu, who was still wary of me. The hellhounds beside him were growling right at me.

“You’re fat.”

“Is this some kind of joke?”

“It’s me. Fate.”

I showed him Blood Shadow. The Baptism of Blood and the Lesser Reaper’s cloak were shrinking to fit my body. So why couldn’t he recognize me?

Lee Chan-yu seemed like he was thinking hard.

“Boss?”

“Yeah.”

He found it hard to believe me. He could have been thinking that I stole the artifacts I was wearing from myself. So I showed him skills that only I possessed. Lee Chan-yu had no choice but to believe me even though he was still a bit skeptical.

“You really changed a lot.”

“I evolved into something other than a monster for once. No, this is the first time that it has happened.”

I realized something after speaking. Special evolution was a little different from a normal evolution. It seemed like I was starting anew based on what I’ve done so far.

I was expecting that I might have become an advanced level monster, but life doesn’t always give you what you want. Although I have grown in many ways, my strength has decreased considerably.

Am I an advanced monster? Just judging by my abilities, I couldn’t hunt advanced monsters, but by pure physical abilities? I’d be dead in a flash.

I wasn’t even a total monster. As the inhabitants of Hater in the previous districts called it, I am… Sub-racial.

“Long, pointy ears, an annoyingly beautiful face, Boss…. I think you’re an elf.”

“Figures.”

The ugly word elf

was preceded by the ugly prefix crimson. Lee Chan-yu was still unconvinced I evolved.

“This is a change, not evolution. Something like… rebirth! The time when the Demon King has become a warrior!”

“I still prefer just Demon King.” I responded to Lee Chan-yu and looked at my reflection on a clear puddle of blood. For a moment, I was speechless.

It was a face that was similar to humans. Would I still be targeted if I went and gone into human society?

Compared to the scary face of my bugbear days, this one looked so innocent and fragile.

There was another reason I was surprised, though.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m…”

I remembered when I met L. The time when my face was too close to her, the time when I saw my soul in her beautiful eyes. The appearance of a person who looked so similar to when I was human.

The figure in front of me, with black hair that reaches the shoulders, and red and gloomy eyes, was me. The only difference was that my skin was redder, instead of being darker,

“Boss, were you this handsome before?”

“No way. I was below the Korean average.”

“Oh, same. And now that I’m born a werewolf, I still looked the same.”

We both laughed.

There was joy inside me. I had thoughts of returning to human society if only my long ears and reddish skin were conspicuous. It was unfortunate that I lost the bugbear’s large and sturdy body, but now I’m probably about 190cm tall at best. Clearly closer to human-like.

Moreover, I was slimmer than most humans and a pretty handsome face. It was worthy of the word beautiful that we usually wish to see.

But then, the joy was soon stamped out sooner than I realized.

It was because I had no intention of returning to human society until I cleared this dungeon.

Moreover, there was no guarantee that I would become something similar looking to humans if I continued to evolve. And even the thought that I could have been anything else, I was just surprised that I became an elf out of all races.

Crimson Elf, there must be something I don’t know about the unusual race name, but it didn’t matter. This wasn’t the stopping point for me.

I wasn’t a monster, but I never thought it would limit my evolution. It was still too early for me to stop. Time to go further…

“You’re looking like that again.”

“What do I look like? My face is completely different from when I was a bugbear. Even when I was a bugbear, it was a bit difficult to recognize. But now that my face looks human-like, my expressions are more pronounced.”

“What expression are you making now?” asked Lee Chan-yu, furrowing his brows.

“An expression that says I’m carrying the world alone.”

“Really?” Lee Chan-yu took a deep sigh before speaking again, “If there’s something you want, you take it seriously. How much can your mind relax? Whenever you’re happy, be happy—kind of happy. We’re delving in dungeons right now, and we’ll be deeper in the future. But that shouldn’t stop you from being happy.”

“But there’s a lot of dungeons left, and I’m still weak.”

“If you keep pulling yourself down, you won’t get any stronger faster than that.”

I didn’t refute him and just kept my mouth shut.

Does he really know my circumstance? He died and became a werewolf. He somehow managed to live within human society. But then his home was destroyed, and he lost his colleagues.

His self-loathing and anger towards the world was worse than my circumstance. It would have been painful to experience it myself, but while I didn’t, he did.

Despite it all, he never lost his sense of humor. Does that mean that the burden in his heart became lighter? He tried his utmost to get stronger.

Yeah, he’s right. Just because life is gloomy doesn’t mean I have to. Why did I forget such a simple thing?

“Boss.”

Lee Chan-yu tapped my shoulder. I forgot that I was shorter than him now and looked up.

“Congratulations on your evolution! Let’s clear this dungeon and get stronger!”

“Okay. And thanks.” I replied with a smile.

It felt like tears would come out of my eyes. I was really fortunate to have Lee Chan-yu with me.

[Kang Si-Ha (Fate)]

[Crimson Elf Lv90]

[Strength: 609 | Stamina: 718 | Magic: 828 | Luck-???]

[Skill: Ebon Heart, Predation Lv5, Advanced Martial Arts Lv6, Intermediate Lunatic Trickster Lv8, Intermediate Armor Defense Lv8, Advanced Regeneration Lv5, Advanced Flame Magic Lv1, Intermediate Power Attack Lv7, Intermediate Speed ​​Attack Lv7, Advanced Detection Lv7, Advanced Surprise Lv9, Advanced Fairy Tale Lv4, Intermediate Shadow Step Lv1, Beginner Ubiquitous Lv7, Advanced Leadership Lv4, Advanced Immunity Lv4, Beginner CONTINUOUS Lv8, Beginner Madness Noise Lv5, Lesser Stone Skin Lv2, Medium Blackmine Lv5, Intermediate Fire Magic Lv1, Lesser Healing Magic Lv2, Lesser Water Magic Lv2, Lesser Ice Magic Lv1]

The change in my status was extreme. My strength had decreased by a whopping 140, and my stamina increased a little. On the other hand, my magic increased by more than 300.

Of course, a strength of 600 wasn’t enough to beat the monsters on the 4th floor, and it’s a problem to reinforce the skills with increased magic instead of reduced strength. I had to adapt to this new change for the time being.

It’s not because Crimson elves are a race that’s weak physically, but because a bugbear’s body was one that focuses on strength. In particular, a bugbear is fast as well as strong.

Actually, when I moved my body, the strength I could exert was less. But I was faster, probably due to this lighter body. And it’s probably thanks to the muscles developed with an emphasis on speed that’s faster than a bugbear’s.

The changes in my skills were incredible. Almost all of them grew little by little. It was the ones needing magic that had a lot of changes.

In particular, I was happy that most of the magic in the beginner level quickly rose up to the next tier. The best part was that Flame Magic had become at the advanced level.

A question appeared as expected, but the conditions were absurd.

[Quest Assigned!]

[You started to walk a different path than anyone else. Your footprints are still faint, but the results will vary depending on your karma.]

[Predation of Black Palace 4F District 7 monsters 0/50,000]

[Predation of Curd Wight 0/50]

[Clearr the 3rd floor of Jinma’s Tower 0/1]

[Win the second game in the Garden of Nak 0/1]

The monsters appearing on the 4th floor of the Black Palace are undead. Great!

Of course, some monsters weren’t undead, and there weren’t any undead at the beginning. I didn’t notice at first, but it was a tactic to trick those entering the dungeon. The deeper you are in the dungeon, the stronger the undead becomes.

I clenched my jaw while remembering the undead back on the second floor of Jinma’s Tower. It felt very nice. Not because A hates me, no. I hate myself. But apart from that, the trial was essential. It was good that I learned how to eat undead before I went down to the fourth floor.

It felt like the Black Palace is associated with A, Rain, and L.

“So…”

After explaining the results of the reconnaissance, Lee Chan-yu was annoyed. He, who doesn’t usually use any weapon, was now wearing a silver claw in one hand. It was a weapon designed to kill the undead, but one had to be at a certain level to put one in their inventory. I would have done the same if I knew about the challenge at Jinma’s Tower beforehand. But maybe A would have stopped me from using it.

“I think I have to regularly return to the entrance to the fourth floor for food. So, it would be nice if you could get food from that store you always go to.”

“I could do that… But I don’t need to.”

“Why?”

“This.”

I picked up bloody fangs and threw them using Throwing, Power Attack, and Blackmine. A bloody fang shot faster than a bullet and pierced the head of a ghoul that appeared at the end of the corridor.

I used Black Rose to latch onto the fang and pulled it, along with the ghoul, to me.

It didn’t take long for me to retrieve the blood fangs. I looked at the ghoul and realized that it showed no signs of resurrection yet. Lee Chan-yu was disturbed and lifted his silver claw, but I stopped him.

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Are you going to…?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, thank God.”

“What?”

“I didn’t say anything.”

I ate the ghoul on the spot. Since I became an elf, my mouth became smaller, so it took a little longer. But it wasn’t that difficult. After changing death energy into life energy, I was given some money and experience. There were more normal monsters on the third floor, but it had less high-leveled ones.

Judging from the ghoul, it seemed that the third and fourth floors did not seem to show much difference in difficulty.

[Predation of Black Palace 4F District 7 monsters 1/50,000]

I licked my mouth and looked at the ghoul. There was nothing left of it.

“Delicious.”

Only

“Are you proud of that? Please think of my position as I watched an elf eating a ghoul!”

The exploration of the fourth floor was smooth. My body felt really light, and monsters could no longer grab me. I could eat undead to my heart’s content now, so there was no need to worry about food or become undead. Lee Chan-yu was the one who suffered from not being able to eat them.

And time passed.

From the time of entering the fourth floor, the pocket watch’s hour hand went around fifty times. About 25 days had passed.

[You’ve leveled up!]

I finally reached level 100. It was hard to raise levels from 1 to 99, so I thought this was the limit. But gear level had risen, and there was still a little more left until the next evolution. I felt a little bit of pleasure that it doesn’t stop at just 100.

[You can now enter the Rookie’s Battlefield!]

Destiny just keeps making up ways to hit me on the head.