Return of the Sword God-Rank Civil Servant-Chapter 412

It was real.

It was Su-ho for certain—none other.

Of course, people didn’t recognize Su-ho.

Setting aside the chaos, his face and fame hadn’t spread as far as Mexico.

Naturally, that wasn’t the only reason they failed to recognize him.

At present, Su-ho was using a transformation skill, having borrowed the appearance of a dime-a-dozen Mexican man.

“Who the hell are you?”

“What the hell are you doing!!”

Boos and curses poured down.

No wonder.

What Su-ho had just killed was one of New New Mexico’s heroes.

But without so much as a blink, Su-ho kept his eyes on the Sawblade Cardinal, split in half and dead.

“Who is that guy?”

“Is he one of ours?”

“First time I’ve seen him?”

The Calavera Family was confused, too.

Who is that bastard?

He looks Mexican, but he doesn’t seem like one of our gang.

But he killed the Sawblade Cardinal, didn’t he?

Then is he on our side?

Among those whose thoughts reached that point, some Calavera Family punk approached Su-ho and acted familiar.

“Good job, brother. What you just did was a huge help to our family—”

But his words never reached the end.

Snik—SPLAAASH!

A slicing sound, and a geyser of blood.

Su-ho swung his sword and beheaded the Calavera gang member who tried to act chummy.

His gaze still remained on the Sawblade Cardinal, dead and halved.

Perhaps because of that—

Now even the Calavera Family began to fall into confusion.

Just who is this bastard?

He’s neither New New nor Calavera?

Yet contrary to all speculation, not a single person dared to approach Su-ho.

Right then—

Squirm— squirm—

Something that made everyone doubt their eyes occurred.

The corpse of the Sawblade Cardinal, which they were certain had died split in two, began to wriggle like a live fish.

“H-huh?”

“W-what is that?”

“W-why is that thing doing that?”

The way they referred to him shifted from Fernando or Sawblade Cardinal to “that thing.”

That was how hard the sight before their eyes was to accept.

But Su-ho smiled.

‘Came to the right place.’

Thinking so, he kept his eyes on Fernando, and after a while, Fernando’s corpse, which had been wriggling like a live fish, underwent the bizarre phenomenon of fusing back into one.

It was a grotesque sight.

The bisected body adhered into one as if magnetized; then, as if that weren’t enough, it stood up on its own two legs.

Next, the sliced parts of the body knit back together as they were, restoring perfectly with not even a seam left, and when ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ the last-joined face fused back into one, even the stunned eyes returned to their sockets.

Resurrection.

What other word could there be?

The resurrected Fernando parted his lips and let out a faint groan.

Then he rolled his neck muscles, making crack— crack— kinds of joint-popping sounds, and perhaps because they had seen the resurrection process, even that action looked incredibly uncanny.

At length, Fernando, fully back to himself, turned his gaze to Su-ho.

“Who are you?”

“Ask your partner who I am.”

“......I see.”

Your partner.

With that one phrase, Fernando accepted it at once and shifted his gaze elsewhere.

Then one of the New New members mustered up courage and approached Fernando.

“Y-Your Eminence, are you alright?”

“Yes, I’m fine. However.”

“However?”

“I think I need some nutrients.”

“Huh?”

In that instant—

Crunch!!

Fernando’s hand pierced straight through the body of the nameless New New member.

“K— khak...... Y-Your Eminence......!”

The impaled man barely managed to speak.

But Fernando, as if completely uninterested, pursed his lips in a gesture to be quiet. And then—

Vrrrrrrrrr!!

KRRRRRRRRRUNCH!!

“Aaaaaarghhh!!”

Sharp bladed tendrils burst from his arm and, like that chainsaw, spun madly, shredding the New New member to pieces.

“Alonso!!”

“Your Eminence!! What are you doing!!”

People were steeped in shock at Fernando’s actions.

But regardless of their shock, Fernando brought a portion of skewered, ground Alonso to his own mouth and crunched down on some flesh stuck to the sawteeth.

An act that was nothing if not grotesque.

Yet the man himself, Fernando, wore an expression of utter ecstasy.

“Ahh, this is it......”

Disgusting.

But thanks to it, certainty was gained.

Su-ho used skills.

[ Heatstorm is activating. ]

Fwooooooosh!!

The skill used was Heatstorm.

However, he imbued only a very faint amount of mana, blasting a hair-dryer level temperature while keeping the airflow itself strong to forcibly push people back.

And then he used Mini Fear.

“Everyone, get lost.”

Tzzzt—tzzzt!

Is there any skill that can hammer a message straight into the ear as surely as Mini Fear?

At Su-ho’s warning, mafia or vigilante, it didn’t matter—only then did everyone come to their senses and start to flee.

Thanks to that, only Su-ho and Fernando remained in the vicinity.

Of course, the fight between Calavera and New New was still ongoing.

Boom! K-BOOOM KAGAGAGANG!

The surrounding detonations were proof enough.

But the two paid those things no mind whatsoever and watched each other.

Fernando slicked back hair matted with Alonso’s blood and grinned.

“I didn’t expect to meet one of my kind like this.”

His manner of speaking had changed.

At the same time, a strange madness, unseen until moments ago, flickered across Fernando’s smiling face.

And his eyes had turned red.

That was a signature trait peculiar to Great Demon Players, and proof that he was the full Successor of Lust of Lechery.

Seeing his eyes, Su-ho thought,

‘Fast progress.’

He had already qualified as a Successor.

No—perhaps that was only natural.

In a way, Great Demons are similar to Transcendents.

Su-ho said,

“One of your kind? You and I may look similar, but we’re definitely different.”

“What’s different?”

“You’re a contractor. I’m just a business partner, at best.”

“I see. In that sense, shall we exchange names? I am Fernando Villalobos. I have contracted with Lust of Lechery.”

“Oh, really?”

This bastard.

He just let my words slide, didn’t he?

It must have been because of the phrase business partner.

‘He doesn’t believe it.’

Well, it doesn’t matter.

In any case, I told the truth.

As expected, Fernando had indeed made a Successor contract with Lust of Lechery.

Su-ho answered,

“My partner is a secret.”

“What?”

“If you’re curious, find out yourself.”

“Interesting.”

As he said so, Fernando’s lips pulled up until they were about to split.

Looking at that smile, it was unmistakably a demon’s.

Su-ho asked Grid,

“Grid?”

— I’m watching.

“How about it, this much?”

— Heh heh, asking what’s obvious. Very...... very, very satisfying.

Grid always answers when his partner calls.

In that sense, Grid was currently floating lazily near Su-ho’s field of view in a semi-transparent form.

There was deep satisfaction on Grid’s face.

No wonder.

At present, Grid’s highest need was to slay other Great Demons and become the Demon King, and at a time he hadn’t expected at all, Su-ho had come to meet Lust of Lechery.

‘If you want to keep a good relationship, dragging it out too long is a problem.’

If you pull the leash and act stubborn for no reason, you only end up ruining trust.

A truly good relationship is one where both give and take what the other wants at the right place and time.

In that sense, now was the right moment to meet Lust of Lechery.

He thought he had spent quite a long time in Takamagahara, but the time discrepancy wasn’t as large as expected.

‘You have to seize them when everyone’s frantic from the Second Effect.’

That was why he had come to Mexico now, when even Grid hadn’t expected it.

Su-ho asked the rest,

“Then tell me what you want.”

— For now, I’d like you to kill the contractor first.

“For now?”

— Yes, for now. But will you be fine? As you saw earlier, that guy has already contracted with Lust and is using demonic power.

By demonic power, Grid meant that so-called resurrection.

Of course, it wasn’t true resurrection.

Resurrection was a far greater and more difficult kind of power than people thought.

Su-ho grinned and said,

“It’s fine. Demons are still only demons, you know.”

— A demon listening to that doesn’t feel so good, you know?

“I’d have said the same even if it were an angel.”

— Very well, then I’ll trust only you.

“Yeah, just trust me.”

In fact, there was no need to ask what he wanted done.

He already knew how to deal with a Great Demon Player and exactly what to take from him.

He was merely asking out of courtesy.

Su-ho lifted his Blood Sword again.

He did not cast his self-buffs.

The opponent before his eyes was someone he could handle well enough even without buffs.

‘Even if you’re a Great Demon’s contractor, if your level is low and your stats are lacking, it’s all the same.’

This was the eternal, unchanging truth the system had made.

When Su-ho cocked his sword to taunt, Fernando’s mouth corners shot up as if they might split again.

“Yeah, you need at least that much spine!”

At the same time, bladed tendrils sprouted once more from both his arms and began to spin like chainsaw teeth.

GRWAAAAAAANG!!

The sawblade noise coming from his body sounded like a real chainsaw.

The opponent, battle-ready, finally lunged as if flying toward Su-ho, and both his arms came pouring down on him.

Clang! KAGAGAGAGAGAK!!

The moment both arms collided with the Blood Sword, the sawteeth spun furiously.

Sparks flew right before his nose, and it seemed like the sawteeth might tear Su-ho apart any second, but Su-ho wasn’t fazed in the slightest.

“Die!!”

GRWAAAAANG!

KAGAGAGAGAGAGAK!!

Face filled with rapture, Fernando cranked the output of the sawblade’s rotation even higher.

It truly looked like he would shred Su-ho at any moment.

But Su-ho remained serene.

That was about when Fernando felt something off.

Su-ho’s eyes curved like a crescent moon.

“Done?”

“What?”

“Looks like we’re done.”

KRKKKKK!

In that moment, an unbelievable sight unfolded before Fernando’s eyes.

Su-ho gave his sword a single swing, and both of Fernando’s arms were severed.

There wasn’t even a moment to defend or respond or anything.

What the other had swung was a sword, yet his arms, quite literally torn off, went tumbling and rolled far away.

Whirr— whirr—

The severed arms, under the influence of residual mana, spun their saw-tendrils for a short while, then soon lost strength like fish out of water.

Fernando, both arms cut off, collapsed to the ground.

And he stared blankly up at Su-ho.

An overwhelming gap in power.

It had been a single clash, yet he felt it to his very bones.

“What is this.......”

The first time his body was cut, he thought it was because he’d let his guard down.

So he hadn’t taken it seriously.

He possessed a powerful regenerative power, after all.

But this time, it was hard to accept even after seeing it with his own eyes.

While Fernando sat there blank and dumbfounded, Su-ho let out a faint laugh and raised the Blood Sword again.

“Why are you making that face like it’s news to you?”

“You......”

“Shh.”

Su-ho pursed his lips and swung his sword.

Snik!

Fernando’s head soared into the air once again.

Snik!

Su-ho swung his sword one more time.

Fernando’s head, which had shot up into the air, split once more; as the quartered head fell, Su-ho spoke to it.

“Stop watching and come on out already, Lust.”