Chapter 160: Pain Beyond Death
That Upper-Ranked Werewolf had said this Temple Warrior was special—he could be wound even with wood.
Ymir did not mind. As a Priest, he had come into contact with many forms of Mystery, and naturally knew that Mysteries specifically targeting Werewolves like them did exist.
However, the opponent was strong. The heart likely had a pleasant flavor.
So Ymir wanted to dig out his heart for a taste.
Yet when his claws tore open the skin, ripped through the flesh, and reached the heart, the instant he touched it, he felt as though his claws had sunk into fire, searing his fingers. Then that scorching heat spread, charring the fur on his arm black.
It was only at this moment that Ymir realized something was wrong.
He was now the Wolf King—the Wolf King wearing the Wolf God’s Crown—yet even so, he could still be injured.
He fell silent.
Then, he killed the Upper-Ranked Werewolf who had offered up this human.
He was meant to become the Wolf God. A god could be savage, but a god must not be wounded.
He used the Earth Vein to construct a Ritual, attempting to communicate with the existence behind this Temple Warrior.
Yet not only did he fail to establish that connection, he nearly died himself.
If the Wolf God’s Crown had not activated, piercing his skull and injecting him with some divine power, he would have been assimilated by that Will.
Ymir now understood what the Wolf God meant before being slain by him.
They had already drawn the attention of some existence—one above even the Wolf God, one that even the Wolf God feared.
Once Ymir understood this, he immediately resolved to kill the Temple Warrior.
However, while he could tear apart the man's flesh, dig out his eyes and tongue, cut off his ears and nose, even flay his skin and gut his internal organs, tormenting his body—
When it came to digging out his heart or severing his head—true fatal blows—he always felt as though a pair of eyes were watching him.
The moment he acted to kill, at the instant of the opponent’s death, he too would be erased.
He could clearly sense that Will.
Especially in recent times, that sensation had grown even stronger.
He had never intended to let this Temple Warrior go.
That power clearly targeting Werewolves told him the opponent’s goal was them from the start.
Even if he spared this human, he would not earn the favor of that existence. Besides, this was just a slightly stronger human.
He never considered fleeing. With the nature of that power, as long as he stayed, he could still struggle by relying on the Earth Vein and the Nation of Werewolves. But if he fled, it would only result in slow extinction.
So he bound the Temple Warrior, right across from himself, to watch how the man survived.
Yet until now, after a long time had passed, and the army that marched through his territory had come and gone, this Temple Warrior still had not died.
He had neither eaten nor breathed. The blood beneath him had pooled like a small pond, his body was covered in blood scabs, and the ropes binding him seemed to have grown into his flesh. He no longer resembled a human—more like a Humanoid Creature.
And yet, even so, his exposed heart continued to beat.
Though very slowly—only pulsing after a long interval—each beat seemed to supply his entire body with energy, sustaining his basic survival.
Ymir had watched him the entire time—from initial suspicion, to later fear, to indifference, and finally to the present fury.
“You’re still watching, aren’t you?” Ymir said aloud.
“This is just an ordinary human, yet you sustain his life. You would rather he suffer unending pain than let the concept of ‘being alive’ leave his body.”
“Are you truly the existence he believes in, or are you merely torturing him with pain?”
As a Priest, Ymir could clearly see—this was the work of that existence intervening, maintaining this Temple Warrior in a state of ‘being alive’.
It wasn’t difficult. Ymir himself could do it.
But this kind of ‘being alive’ was different from truly being alive.
Any living thing, once wounded and its vitality drained, ought to die.
There were three kinds of death. One was physical death, such as a human’s heart being crushed, or his head cut off.
One was death of the will. Of course, as a Priest, Ymir preferred to call it the death of the soul—when one, after enduring endless pain or losing the will to live, chose death in their own consciousness.
The third was conceptual death. Ymir had only heard of this—when one died conceptually, everything about them would be erased from the world, and no one would remember them.
Now, the warrior before him should have died physically, and with the body gone, his will would have had no vessel and thus perished too.
But because that existence had locked the concept of being alive within him, the man continued to exist in this world under the notion of still being alive.
This allowed him to live, but also made him suffer pain beyond death.
Just think—without the protective mechanism of fainting from pain, with one’s consciousness and perception fully exposed to the outside world—even the crawling of tiny insects on the body would feel like sharp spikes piercing into the flesh.
That was why Ymir felt that existence was so cruel, and compared to them, he himself was merciful.
When someone ought to die, he always struck cleanly, never letting them suffer unnecessary pain.
“If you want to watch him suffer, then naturally, I shall help you.” As he said this, Ymir sat upon his throne and waved his claws. Several blade-like gusts of wind sliced through the air, cutting a few more wounds into the Temple Warrior’s body.
A few drops of fresh blood fell. The blood inside the Temple Warrior had long dried up—only the heartbeat allowed a bit more blood to pump out from the wounds.
Ymir watched those wounds scab over, his gaze still locked upon the man, then snorted coldly.
He ignored that gaze and closed his eyes again, searching for the Earth Vein.
…
Corleon had not deliberately locked the concept of Hod being alive. It was Hod himself, driven by intense hatred and the will to survive, who had condensed the Commandment · Toward Life, and it was that Commandment and his strong desire to live that prevented his death.
Of course, the threat of fatal wounds like beheading or heart extraction was Corleon’s doing.
Otherwise, without a head or heart, no matter how strong the will, Hod would still die.
After all, the concept of being alive had not truly been locked.
Just like the Necromancers who toyed with life and death whom Corleon loathed—Corleon would never interfere with the death of someone who had fulfilled their mission, because both life and death were blessings from the Lord.
Except for George.
He was the first Believer, and even now remained the most steadfast. He deserved grace.
Corleon had already reviewed Hod’s past.
He was the second son of a border Marquis from the Northern Kingdom, but during an attack by Dark Creatures at Blackrock Point, his family was killed.
Suddenly losing his guardian and most blood relatives in the castle, the Marquis family fell into turmoil over inheritance rights.
In that attack, Hod, the only survivor in the castle, became the loser. He was branded with the mark of a slave and sold to Greenwood City.
Hod did not resent his brother who returned to claim the title—this was Northern tradition, and his brother even spared his life.
Hod hated those Dark Creatures. They had ambushed and killed his father, throwing his family into chaos and destroying his home.
Moreover, he had personally witnessed a Werewolf hiding in the shadows, waiting until his father had slain two powerful Dark Creature leaders and the battle had ended—then launching a sneak attack.
From behind, the Werewolf dug out his father’s heart.
Though the Werewolf’s head was crushed by his father, from that moment on, Hod—the sole survivor of that night in the castle—harbored a deep hatred for Dark Creatures, especially the Werewolves.
They had destroyed his home.
This was a Commandment ignited by the flames of hatred. Corleon simply observed it—a Faith forged from such flames.
As for those Werewolves, their time to face final judgment had not yet come.