For a moment, Ugar was frozen with shock, but then a blazing flame of rage bloomed within his chest and his eyes went red with unbridled rage.
“DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU ARE SAYING?!”
It was as if something had overridden his mind. He burst out with anger and started thrashing against his bindings again. Leon had a bad feeling and lunged forward, stabbing his swords into Ugar’s heart without hesitation.
The lizardman continued to struggle even with Leon’s swords stabbed through his heart. It took some time, but his movements eventually began to slow. He looked weakly up as Leon as the blind rage that overwhelmed him in the last few moments faded away.
“Thank you.” He whispered, and for a moment, Leon could have sworn that he saw something else within the Lizardman’s eyes.
‘Indeed, he can remember who he is.’ Leon thought to himself.
[Level 100 Despair Lizardman killed. You have leveled up!]
[You have leveled up!]
[You have leveled up!]
…
[Congratulations! You have defeated the Final Boss of the Despair Dungeon, Despair Lizardman!]
[You have gained access to the Dungeon Rewards!]
Leon hummed and waved away the notifications. He looked around, still not seeing any signs of a portal opening like how it did in the Dark Abyss Dungeon.
“What? Did I not do well enough for the dungeon to acknowledge me?” Leon came to a realization with a grim tone. After all that work, was he going to go home empty handed?
A few moments passed before Leon looked up to the dark sky above him.
“Michael! If you can hear me, then do something!” He yelled out loud. A few seconds passed, but nothing happened, much to his dismay. Just as he was about to yell out again, the medallion that he had kept in his spatial ring began to release waves of Michael’s Divinity. Leon felt it and hurriedly pulled it out of the ring. Moments later, the Divinity flowing around him seemed to interact with the surrounding space.
Whoosh!
In front of Leon, a door of light materialized, and a grin spread over his bony face. He waltzed through it without a second thought, allowing him to feel the familiar sensation of passing through a portal.
A moment later, he arrived in a well lit room. It was all white, just like it was for the Dark Abyss Dungeon. There was no armor set or whatever waiting for him within the Core Room of the dungeon, but he calmly waited as the core emerged from within the ground, held up on a pedestal.
“Alright, I’ll take this and go.” Leon took a step forward.
“WAIT!” A loud, deep voice cut through the air as a dark green shadow materialized between Leon and the pedestal.
“Oh, another dungeon butler?” Leon tilted his head in thought.𝞸𝑽𝗅xt.𝚘𝔪
“How did you get in here?! I did not give you the permission to access the Core Room!” The dark green shadow had finished taking form by now, and imitated a lizardman’s shape.
“Yeah, I invited myself in. Now, out of the way.” Leon chuckled and waltzed forward.
“DO NOT MOCK ME!” The dungeon consciousness roared and raised his arm.
Whoosh!
He slammed his arm down in a slashing motion, intending to slice Leon into two, but his arm came to a stop when Leon pulled out the medallion Michael had given him.
“A-a… Forgive me!” The dungeon consciousness reared back in fright as he saw the medallion. He had unwittingly tried to attack the envoy of a God!
What Michael had not told Leon was that the medallion that was in his possession was something that Gods only gave to their most favored and capable envoys. For him to give it to Leon meant that Leon was acting on behalf, and that Leon’s words and actions were also his words and actions. The medallion was also something different from what Kai had.
“You are forgiven,” Leon went along smoothly, “But you will have to follow me from now on.” He said.
“I…I am not sure if I can do that…” The dungeon consciousness hesitated. “I have been given the duty to maintain this dungeon.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. The dungeon will be coming with me, so you will also be coming along.” Leon laughed as he picked up the core that swirled with murky green smoke.
“…” The dungeon consciousness was speechless. Of course, the dungeon will belong to Leon if he took its core. But there was nothing that he could do to stop Leon.
“Very well, my lord.” In the end, only subservience was the way forward. The dungeon consciousness bowed its head and walked behind Leon as Leon walked back out of the Core Room.
“By the way, what is your name?” Leon paused when he reached the portal.
“…My name is Ugar…”
“…Wait, so you were the boss?!” Leon was confused and shocked.
“No, I only sat back to watch the fight while subtly manipulating his mentality. He was a rather strange one. Very adamant about rejecting the name he was given. Insisting that he bore a different name.” Ugar explained.
“What name was that?” Leon was curious.
“Darwin, my lord. He kept calling himself Darwin for decades. He eventually ran mad after being killed multiple times by the intruders that ran through the dungeon.”
“I see…” Leon muttered, but his head was swirling.
Michael had not told him the real name of the person that he had been coming to save, but it turned out that this person was actually Darwin, the man who Dibella had been in love with before she had been turned into the Spider Queen!
‘These Gods are too savage! Turning him into a lizardman and forcing him to be killed over and over again. At least, Dibella used to be a boss in Divinity’s Bout, so she had a lot more rest in between.’ Leon thought to himself, exasperated. He recalled that it was Dardan who Dibella had seen after Michael had been taken away in the battle that marked the end of the Era of Gods.
‘I will have to watch out for him.’