"I, Elune's power is justice. However, justice is very hard to come by, contrary to what others think about it. Just like true perfection could not exist in this imperfect world, justice could not exist. So, it is like an ideal we have to just look to."
Elune knew that her own justice was not true justice. It would rather rightly be called an indomitable conviction.
"My strength is like a will that never bends. It's like the courage to take a step toward the light even in the dark where you can't look ahead at all."
The starlight faded now. The dim moonlight was eclipsed by the darkness.
Elune asked in the darkness, "If you want to back down, now is the time. But that's not an option."
It was a pointless question. Yong-ho wouldn't have come here if he hadn't intended to challenge the test in the first place.
Elune didn't delay any further. "Okay, let's get started."
Silence was added to the darkness. He couldn't see and hear anything anymore.
He breathed. He couldn't feel it. It wasn't just the darkness that eclipsed the surroundings.
What was Elune's test? Surely, was it to endure isolation created by darkness?
It was not. He noticed that the test began.
The sword of light poured down. After cutting through the darkness, it cut his chest.
He instinctively backed down, but he couldn't avoid it. The terrible pain in his heart spread to his whole body.
He was still in the dark. He couldn't feel his surroundings. Moreover, it was difficult for him to even concentrate. He felt regret now. The memories that he wanted to forget, the memories and feelings that had been dulled by time, began to come flooding back to him.
It was a shock that surpassed the pain of the flesh. It was brief but sharp enough for him to forget the pain. Elune did not stop.
The sword of light poured out again. He couldn't escape it again. His shoulders were split, with blood gushing out from it. Even his blood was eclipsed by the darkness.
He could not come to his senses. Mental and physical pain alternately raged in his body. He stumbled without hearing his own scream. Elune's ordeal, which came so suddenly, was so tough.
[Concentrate!]
[You must set yourself right in the dark. You must end the confusion with a strong will!]
Aamon shouted, but it didn't reach him. The darkness blocked Aamon's voice.
Yong-ho gasped for breath. The funeral came to his mind. The pain that had been buried in his heart tormented him. The little Yong-ho was crying sadly.
The sword of light kept pouring down. He was hacked. He desperately moved his body, but he couldn't even tell the right side from the left. All he could do was to avoid her fatal attack.
The darkness took away his sense of balance. Pain and confusion endlessly disturbed his concentration, which made him drift in the flood of emotions. It was almost impossible for him to erect five horns and release mana.
Aamon did not stop shouting. Aamon shouted to him to stand tall in the dark with strong winds and greed.
However, he could not produce the power of greed. It seemed that he couldn't even think about it. He was just being hacked in the darkness created by Elune.
Aamon felt nervous. Aamon knew Elune. Elune was different from Scathach. Elune was much more resolute and cold-hearted. He could die at the end of this ordeal.
[Little master!]
It was almost a desperate scream. Aamon felt that his voice finally reached him.
Aamon was convinced that he was focusing in the dark. But it was too late.
The sword of light cut his chest again. As he couldn't stand it, he sank to the floor.
Aamon called him again. He didn't answer his call.
He raised his head. It was so dark that he could see the sword of bright light.
He instinctively knew it would be his last moment.
He didn't even know how much time passed. The time he wandered in the terrible darkness where Elune invited him was short, but he felt it was long.
The sword of light poured out from overhead. Aamon screamed.
Yong-ho also clenched his fist. He called only one name even at this moment when his memories and feelings were being hacked.
"Catalina!"
At that very moment, the darkness broke. It shattered and collapsed. The sword of light did not reach him.
Yong-ho gasped for breath. He lifted his head, sweating.
Elune, grasping the sword of light, was standing in the bright moonlight.
Catalina was standing behind her back. She was aiming at Elune's neck with the sword of black mana.
Moreover, it wasn't just Catalina. Skull was standing before him.
"Kuhuuuuuh."
Yong-ho laughed beyond the wreckage of the shattered darkness. All the wounds inflicted by the sword of light were fake, but the mental shock was real. Because of that, he felt the pain as if he had been cut by a real sword, but he still smiled.
"Uh… How could you...?" Elune asked in confusion.
She asked Yong-ho, not Catalina who was aiming at her neck.
The purpose of this ordeal was to strengthen the will of the successor of the House of Mammon. Overcoming extreme confusion and darkness with strong conviction was the model answer.
But Yong-ho didn't do it like that. The reason Elune stopped her sword was not because he overcame her ordeal. It was because Catalina, who was supposed to not know what was happening to him, aimed her sword at Elune.
The darkness eclipsed not only Yong-ho but also his dungeon spirits. Of course, there were differences. Unlike the darkness that eclipsed Yong-ho, it only blocked their movement.
The dungeon spirits should not have known what was happening to Yong-ho. In fact, except for Catalina and Skull, the other spirits were only looking at Yong-ho and Elune alternately as if they didn't know what had happened.
"How could you…?" Elune asked again.
Wiping his cold sweat, he replied, "Scathach told me I should fight you with dungeon spirits."
Of course, Scathach didn't say it to him, with Elune's test in mind. In fact, he didn't recall Scathach's kind reminder from the beginning. Even now, he could reply like that because the fight was over.
When he was in the dark, he lost himself. As Elune intended, he drifted in confusion and fear.
But at the same time, he could feel it when he was thrown to the floor and in terrible isolation by the darkness. At that moment, he felt he was not alone. He knew that even in this darkness, there were his dungeon spirits, who got connected with himself.
What came next was totally his own world. He couldn't hear Aamon's voice, but he focused.
In the midst of being swept away by the drift of emotions, he never let go of his touch with the dungeon spirits, who were connected with him like a lifeline.
And he finally moved.
He conveyed a simple but strong will to Catalina and Skull. It was Catalina who responded first. The escort knight became a sword to protect her master. She broke the dark veil that Elune had unfolded. And Skull became a shield for its master.
Elune opened her lips. Yong-ho couldn't specifically explain what he had done, but Elune already understood it. That was why she didn't withdraw her sword right away.
The Elune standing here was her ghost. In other words, she was a replica that the real Elune had left behind just before she left the Labyrinth of Greed.
Because of that, her emotions and memories were the same as hers back then, which synced with Yong-ho and made Elune silent.
Some time passed after that.
When he began to feel nervous, Elune withdrew the sword. She felt a bit dispirited, but she smiled kindly.
"It wasn't the model answer to my test, but you have overcome it anyway."
The moonlight pouring from the ceiling became stronger. Yong-ho instinctively lifted the magic field on his left arm. It was giving off a golden gleam, next to blue and purple.
Catalina and Skull naturally stepped back.
Elune politely showed due manners to Yong-ho.
She ended the ritual by transferring her power to him.
***
"Power of anguish again! Last time Gusion and Kaiwan said that the source of the master's power is an incredibly powerful desire for lust."
"Ah, no, that's not true!"
"Oh, it looks like a weak denial, not a strong one. Then, is it really true?" Ophelia said, hurriedly covering her chest with both hands. Why the hell did she cover her chest while talking about it?
Yong-ho looked around as if asking for help, but there was no one who could help him.
Eligos gently cleared his throat, and Catalina didn't turn to Yong-ho at all. As always, Skull just laughed.
"Skull Skull!"
Yong-ho and his dungeon spirits left Elune's room. They headed back to the upper floor with Salami and Skull's unit on standby.
After saying goodbye to Yong-ho's party, Elune watched them leaving quietly.
Since she transferred her power to him, she couldn't sustain herself anymore.
Along with the dimming moonlight, her body turned more and more gray.
[Elune.]
The flames of the red lotus arose near Elune, who was now almost translucent.
Aamon also overworked itself. But Aamon couldn't help but see her last moment.
Although it was nothing but her ghost, it was still Elune.
Elune did not ask about what happened after she died because she already knew the answer after learning about the current status of the Labyrinth of Greed and Scathach's request to Yong-ho.
Aamon didn't say much. It was just content with staying with Elune. When her last moment came, it was Elune who opened his mouth first.
"I think that person, too, must have thought of us until the end."
[You bet.]
Aamon knew it, too. Although Aamon didn't see Mammon's last moment, it remembered the moment when it got disconnected from its master.
Mammon did not die in regret, anger, or fear. What he thought about until his last moment was his concern about the 12 Spirits and Sitri.
"Well, I have to say goodbye to you once and for all."
Aamon could hardly see Elune's figure now. Elune turned to Aamon. She smiled like Mammon did and said, "I hope the new King of Greed is in your great hands, let alone the escort knight who resembles me."
Instead of answering, Aamon nodded. Elune slowly closed her eyes and disappeared.
The only thing left in the darkness of the night where even the starlight disappeared was the flame of the red lotus.
[My master, the great one who saved the demon world!]
With that faint call, Aamon also closed its eyes. The flames of the red lotus were flaring up fiercely and faded with the wind.