Mercadius

It was something of a mixture of blood, Mana, and divine power.

I cant I cant die this wa2y!

He tore the open wound on the forehead even wider and released a mental wave closer to a scream.

I was the one he was after.

Leaving behind the fallen host that turned into a cold corpse, the entity charged toward my face only a few dozen centimeters away.

Its trying to take my body!

It failed to assume control by planting the seed in my body.

It also failed to shake down my head by using the power borne as a fragment of a god.

The last option left was for it to dig into my body itself.

That was its only way to make me the new host.

Boosh!

Thousands of red threads touched my skin and seeped inside.

Driiip!

Immediately after, the blood from the back of my hand began to pour more violently.

The tensile was rejecting it.

Furthermore, fresh blood flowed from my eyes, nose, and mouth at the same time.

Damn it!

My body trembled.

The divine power of a different god was causing chaos inside me.

However, by only this much-!

Although it was a pain that I had never experienced before, my soul, described by the magic god Igras-Sho as unprecedentedly hard and tough, overcame it.

I didnt give in.

I held out with [The Successors Eyes]

It struggled in an attempt to take control of the body, drive out the energy of other deities, and overtake my mind, but it was futile.

Whoooong!

Mercadius, who was crawling under my skin, soon delivered a baffling mental wave.

W-what the hell is this?!

So far, by fighting with me, he witnessed divine power pour out as they were converted into four elements: magic, life, sword, and luck.

At that moment, however, in my body which Mercadius had penetrated, was a presence that it couldnt even have imagined.

It was something that I had stored in advance before committing to the battle.

A deep sea-like non-elemental divine power.

When it encountered the power, the entity shouted as if it were in a fit.

This doesnt make sense!

I moved the divine power and induced it to swarm the intruder.

I then drove Mercadius to the corner, denying its retreat.

Like crushing a bug with a rock, or as if to break a glass with water pressure, I gathered hefty sacred forces from all around and pressured it.

Mercadiuss intentions were broken and collapsed.

It had become busy being chased around in my body.

It couldnt even attempt to brainwash me according to its primary objective.

Somethings wrong with this! How can a human!

Abandoning the host and infiltrating into my body would have been quite a superb move for it.

However, Mercadius didnt expect that my body was a more dangerous prison and trap than the surrounding environment for its spirit.

The intellectual being composed of Mana and divine power screamed devastatingly.

It tried to run back out of my body, but I grabbed it and didnt let it go.

The non-elemental divine power had gnawed and crushed the divine power of the mind.

As it struggled disgracefully, the feeling of something foreign having entered my body began to decrease gradually.

As a result-

A cry of a different level compared to the previous ones resonated.

Screeeeech!

It was a horrific scream that was much larger and deeper than the scream of the seeds that I had heard countless times.

It belonged to the one who lost the glory of a god as it was divided into pieces and forced to wander the worlds for eons.

With the last scream of death ringing, all kinds of mental waves finally came to an end.

Quietly observing my inner being, I was certain.

Its done!

I couldnt believe it.

After having reborn as Seo Jin-Wook and at the end of the year-long journey, finally

I killed it!

I didnt know how to define the death of the mind, but that much was certain.

Mercadius had perished.

It only left behind a ragged mess.

Its over.

Even amid the thrill of joy, I slightly felt disappointed.

It was indeed too much to capture.

In fact, the Union had come up with an obviously improbable plan.

However, it couldnt be regarded as a complete failure.

The divine power that enabled it to exist as an incarnate had completely perished, but the red Mana that had been mixed with it still remained.

The frame that acted as the body of the intellectual being had been left behind like a corpse.

!

Ideas lit up with a strange sense of deja vu.

Is there a need to leave it as it is, allowing it to decompose and dissipate in the air??

My determination solidified.

Yeah, just like what I did to Angelica back then

The red Mana was slowly fading.

Before that happened, I decided to make it completely mine.

[Mana Drain]!

The unique skill that had gone through the first evolution unfolded.

The attraction created at that time didnt start from my fingers.

A powerful vortex revolved around my Mana Core.

And it swirled like a typhoon and absorbed the remaining red Mana of Mercadius all over my body.

Then, a similar phenomenon to when I ate up other seeds occurred.

I witnessed a memory string bound with malicious intentions.

*

You could call it them or him.

The intellectual entity that shared memories with each other limitedly had a common goal.

They expressed their terrible hatred and evil that they bore toward the world in action.

All in order to bring their horrific imagination to life.

At some point, they started to be called Mercadius.

In the forgotten language, the name meant the following:

Remains of Apocalypse.

Even they didnt know why they hated the world so much.

Malice only grew bigger as he emerged from the void and began to wander around the material world.

The long duration honed their feelings to become even denser and more horrible.

Finally, they arrived at a decision.

A body is needed to affect the material world!

It was easy to control and manipulate the mortals when bearing the fragments of a god.

However, they knew that they had to dominate more beings to sow destruction more efficiently.

In other words, breeding was necessary.

Lets make one as an experimenta similar being like us.

Through the memory of Mercadius, I realized for sure that Angelica was their creation as well.

But the creation was a defective product.

It didnt have as much blind hatred toward the world as they did, and above all, it didnt have a reproductive ability.

With that ability, it could only hop between different creatures, brainwash them, and squander.

Lets leave that trifle as it is for now until a necessity arises.

It served as a momentum that the parasitic entity, acting under Angelicas identity on Earth, wandered through dimensions on its own and harassed numerous species fate.

It does not work by creating a similar being. Thats not enough. We must multiply ourselves.

After a long trial and effort, they finally found a way to reproduce as an intellectual entity.

It was the birth of a skill called [Mercadiuss Seed].

It began with a curse cast upon a mortal in the form of a seed.

After that, the seed absorbed the hosts emotions and grew by consuming the feed-type seeds that the parents had placed around the host.

Ultimately, the mind of the host was completely consumed and became the new Mercadius.

According to the individuals memory that fought me, the Mercadius that attempted it for the first time leeched on the Awakened and then evolved the unique skill through the system.

Looking into the knowledge, I couldnt help but be appalled.

This means Its like the system had helped the reproduction of Mercadius!

Just as [The Successors Eyes] continued through rebirth and repetition, [Mercadiuss Seed] continued through reproduction and brainwashing.

And as they increased their numbers, they consistently did their best to contribute for the worlds to fall just as the Red Gates monsters desired.

After observing for a long time to determine to touch, who to kill, and what kind of choices to make to most efficiently lead the specific dimension to its apocalypse, they planted the seed and brainwashed them.

In the case of Earth, the target was Seo Jin-Wook of my past life.

Mercadius sought the effect of killing two birds with one stone.

They induced the world to fall through the one that showed the potential of being the most powerful Awakened in order to enable the newly born Mercadius to take over that body.

As I observed the memories, I was able to conclude.

As expected, all this would have been impossible without the cooperation of the system from beginning to end.

The member dimensions of the Union were unconditionally supportive of the system.

They didnt doubt that all races would be more prosperous if they did as the system told them to do so and followed as it guided them.

They didnt realize it because of such a stereotype!

According to the memory that I just saw, I couldnt blame them.

What would be the point in helping those trying to destroy the worlds and leaving them be like that?

The Main Quest to fight and eliminate the monsters at Red Gate corresponded to the goal of helping the mortals survive.

Monsters were explicit and direct threats.

However, why wasnt there a quest to find and exterminate the species hiding in the shadows while leading mortals to destruction?

Mercadius could be more dangerous than the monsters of the void if they were left alone to increase their numbers.

Is it that theyre turning blind to it in the end? Theyre covering something up.

The system couldnt not have known the species named Mercadius.

The name was clearly written on the race information.

In addition to all those reasoning, and even considering the information I had, I knew

The system is polluted.

That was the reason why I couldnt reveal to the Ministry Spirit that I was the successor.

I didnt know where it went wrong, but it was evident that it was related to Mercadius.

For now, the Mercadius on Earth has been caught. Ive also found out some of their secrets, but Its not the end yet.

Why was the System standing behind Mercadius and technically helping them?

If that part werent discovered, it would be the same even if I repeatedly reincarnated several times in the future.

The system would only remain as the provisional enemy of the successor.

And it should be considered impossible to eradicate Mercadius, as there were no ideas how many of them existed.

Looking at the memory of the individual I had absorbed, I ended up with one conclusion.

The system needed to be rectified.

*

The place where Mercadius sent me to was a third dimension, not Earth.

I could have been isolated, but I simply opened the [Door to Hope] and returned to Earth.

The Union and the Earths government, which were panicking because they thought they had completely lost the traces of the two of us, burst into cheers when I came back alive and in good condition.

And they were shocked to see what I had handed to them.

The host that Mercadius indwelled.

When I told them that I had finished it completely, they went wild.

B-By yourself?

Oh, my days. I cant believe it.

A few days later, when I visited the Union Headquarters again, I confessed everything I had seen in front of them.

The god of mind?

Capturing it alive, as we aimed in the beginning, had failed, but I succeeded in uncovering some of their secrets.

As my story progressed, the seven supreme commissioners reacted differently according to their species.

Some turned their skin color purple, bounced their fins frantically, or released bizarre ultrasounds.

Bachurka spoke with admiration.

Oh, my days. Indeed, they were the ones that bore malice, leading whole worlds to eventual extinction. Whats even scarier is that they had the power to materialize it!

One of the commissioners replied as if to support those words.

So, there was a reason why we couldnt find a record of Mercadius coming forward and destroying the world itself in the history we know. When it brainwashed and controlled the seed host, the system wouldnt have identified it as Mercadius. They would have thought that the fall was just due to an internal problem.

It wouldnt have been until the world collapsed after that that the seeds would bloom, and the host would have become the main body and disappeared into another world in a leisurely manner.

While everyones jaws were dropped, someone spoke up.

I dont understand why the system isnt coming forward to eradicate Mercadius.

There must be a reason. But its too big a threat to take time guessing why. If the system doesnt come forward, the Union must come forward. That must be the action in line with the systems intentions.

Thats right. We have to order Mercadius labeled as wanted by all member dimensions right now. The one that hid on Earth is dead, but other individuals are still spread throughout the dimensions and are probably planning for an apocalypse.

We need to increase the resources we put in right away. We need to promote it as an agenda as urgent as handling the Red Gates monstrosities

The discussion went on like a rough current.

But at that moment

Wait a minute. Lets all calm down for a moment.

As expected, only one being raised an objection at that time.

He was the commissioner of the Adgon race.

I gave a bitter smile.

At this point, hes letting everyone in the neighborhood know.

He spoke.

Since Mercadius hadnt been captured alive, we cannot rely solely on the testimony of that Awakened to make such a grave political decision.

I inwardly muttered when I saw that face.

To dig the background behind how the system got twisted I should get rid of that bastard first.