"Let's go back."

"No, there's one thing I need to do before that.”

"Hmm? What is it?"

When asked by the Frost Queen, Seo Jun-Ho fumbled through his memory.

- You're trying to stop this attack? Do you have anything to do with them... No, there's no reason to be hostile to me...

It was because what the Ice Witch had muttered during the battle made him wary.

"You probably didn't hear because you were worried about the battle, but the Ice Witch said something weird."

He sat on one knee in the snowfields and rested his hand on the lich's skull.

"Confession of the Dead."

The memory projection started playing. He was not interested in the process or the results of her hundreds of years of research. There was only one thing he was interested in and it was who she was referring to as 'them.’

"…Found it."

He found it. Five years ago, a man visited her with a few subordinates. Seo Jun-Ho's eyes glittered alone in the dark snow as he watched the projection.

***

An uninvited guest came to the lich, the Ice Witch's Dungeon. Wearing a purple suit and pointed shoes, he introduced himself with an elegant greeting.

"Nice to meet you, Ice Witch. My name is Isaac. Isaac Dvor."

- I didn't ask. Get… lost!

The lich expressed great hostility toward the man, similar to what she had done with Seo Jun-Ho. It was because the person was an invader who had intruded into her sacred laboratory without permission. Isaac stroked his chin while the Ice Witch was gathering her magic.

"Hmm, this is difficult. I was only going to have a simple conversation...”

"You don't have to come forward. We will beat her up to make her obedient."

"That's right. Isaac-nim’s too good for him to act personally."

To his politely bowing men, Isaac shook his head. "Hmm, no. It's also a good idea to humble someone with such high self-esteem.”

Pop!

In an empty space where there was nothing, a purple rose magically popped out. Isaac clasped it gently and shook it.

- Are you looking down on me, right now…?!

The angry Ice Witch let down a shower of hail and spears.

"You are also absorbed in the beauty of roses,” Isaac spoke.

However, roses always hid sharp thorns. One petal, two petals, the petals of the rose began to tear off and fly forward.

- …!

The world was tinged with rose petals. The desolate Dungeon seemed to have been filled with the smell of flowers. But the Ice Witch, who had no senses, couldn't smell it. The ice spears and hail, which seemed as if they wanted to tear him apart, disappeared, unable to fight off the petals.

"Let me introduce myself again." Isaac, who had turned the lich's Dungeon into a flower garden, spoke, "My name is Isaac Dvor, a magician from the Fiend Association, and I look for monsters like you."

His mouth and eyes were elegantly bent in a crescent shape, but his pupils weren’t smiling.

"I am the fifth of the Nine Heavens."

***

"Ni-nine Heavens!" the Frost Queen screamed in surprise.

Seo Jun-Ho didn’t expect that he would be able to see the face of one of the Nine Heavens, Isaac Dvor. There had been rumors about Isaac, but his information had always been the same as Seo Jun-Ho's, wrapped in secrecy.

"Fiends classified as one of the Nine Heavens don’t have detailed personal information released to the public, in contrast to the Players among the Nine Heavens."

"Huh? Wait a minute. Then, why would they choose someone whose face they had no idea of to be a member of the Nine Heavens?

"Hmm... That would take long to explain," Seo Jun-Ho muttered.

"I have a lot of time. Tell me." The Frost Queen insisted.

Since it seemed like it would take a while, Seo Jun-Ho made an igloo. He went inside with the Frost Queen and started talking. "In fact, it hasn't been that long since the term ‘Nine Heavens' was created.”

"Oh? That is my first time hearing that."

"That’s because I never really explained it to you…" Seo Jun-Ho scratched his head.

Most people in the modern era knew about the Nine Heavens. However, the story that Seo Jun-Ho was about to tell was a secret that only the relevant people knew.

"The first time the word Heaven was used... was 11 years ago, by a fiend."

When he had thrown his hat into the ring, that fiend had referred to himself with a glorious word—Heaven.

"Everyone must have looked at him weirdly..."

"Everyone thought he was crazy. Whenever a Player met with him, they would snort."

"What happened to them?"

"They’re dead."

The Frost Queen was dumbfounded.

"It was a shocking debut. Although they weren’t a part of the Big 6, they were still members of the four big Guilds below the Big 6, yet he single-handedly killed more than a hundred of them.”

The report even described the event as a shocking incident comparable to the ones that Specter had stirred. Then, that fiend had said one thing calmly, while standing in a field of blood and corpses.

"He said that he was the president of the Fiend Association of the time, succeeding his predecessor."

That was the appearance of the First Heaven, the Demon King.

"…I can predict how things turned out after that. I’m sure the Players didn’t just accept their defeat, no?”

"Yup, the shocking news made people nervous.”

Since olden times, the reckless actions of strong fiends had always made people anxious. But it also had a great impact on the Player talent pool that expanded day by day.

"As it became an era where the fiends acted as they pleased, parents started to oppose their children becoming Players, and most of all, the children themselves were afraid. It became that kind of society."

After the Demon King’s call, fiends had began to flourish all over the 1st and 2nd floors.

It was the beginning of the fiends’ era.

"That's why the Players believed they also needed a new symbol."

They needed a symbol, a means to confront the Demon King. In the end, the numerous Guilds and associations came up with the ‘Second Heaven’ by putting their heads together.

"Nweje."

He became the ‘Second Heaven.’ He was actually the best Player of his time and he also had the strength to match his title. It was said that even the present-day Shin Sung-Hyun and Kim Woo-Joong were a notch below him.

"If there was one problem…”

It was that Nweje didn’t wear the noble mask of a hero like Specter. The most important thing to him was himself, not others, and he greatly enjoyed art. He was like the wind that liked to wander around.

"In short, he was someone who wasn’t interested in the fight between Players and fiends."

Anyway, it was still a fact that the Players had put up a new symbol against the Demon King. After that, new heavens began to be added one by one. Of course, none of them were small fries. They were all the best Players and fiends of their time.

"In the process, superstars like Shin Sung-Hyun and Kim Woo-Joong appeared and they managed to build the Players’ prestige from the ground up."

These two people had become the Sixth and Seventh Heaven, respectively. Without them, even more of the Nine Heaven seats would have been occupied by fiends.

"But there are still a lot of people who doubt it."

Nweje was strong. On his own, he had gone through numerous Dungeons, hunted field boss monsters, and even often beat the fiends he met to death.

"But he never gave off as much greatness as the Demon King."

This was why people doubted him, and because of that, they remained nervous even during the times when the Demon King was incognito.

"From now on, everything I say is off the record."

"Y-yeah. All right. I won't go telling anyone."

At Seo Jun-Ho's sincere voice, the Frost Queen nodded.

"People had always been always curious. Why did the overwhelming Demon King go silent?"

"I am curious about that, too.”

"Five years ago, the Demon King secretly came near the capital of the Ruben Empire along with just a single fiend.”

“…!”

Back then, the capital of the Ruben Empire was a sacred place for large Guilds, including the Big 6. Not only that, but there were imperial guards, a huge number of soldiers, and even archmages from the magic tower.

"The Big 6 elites noticed his approach and stopped him as tensions heightened."

They had even thought of bringing in all the Players nearby through the community forums. The encirclement was completed, and even the rogue Nweje participated.

"H-he is a bold one. Just what in the world did he come for then? To die?" The Frost Queen asked, sticking her head forward, like a child listening to an old story.

"For a duel and proof."

In front of hundreds of Players, the Demon King made a proposition.

"To sum it up, he wanted to fight Players before he fully took over his position.”

"Are you sure he isn’t just a madman?"

"He left 'the rest of it' to the fiend Valencia Citrin, who he brought along with him, and offered a proposition to the Players of the Nine Heavens."

He proposed a duel.

"S-so? So what happened? Who won?” asked the Frost Queen in a fretful voice.

"Nweje, Wei Chun-Hak, Shin Sung-Hyun, and Kim Woo-Joong. The Demon King went up against these four together."

When the results came out…

"The Demon King lost. It was the Players’ victory.”

"Oh, I'm not surprised...”

"It was by a very tiny margin, though," Seo Jun-Ho interrupted her. "The report said that if the Demon King had been one level higher, the Heavens on the Players side would have collapsed that day."

"...Gulp."

Gulping a mouthful of saliva, the Frost Queen noticed something strange and asked, "But... you said they won. Why did they not kill the Demon King?"

"Of course, they tried to kill him since it was their right as the victor, but they failed.”

It was all because he hadn't been alone; he had been with another fiend.

"I told you earlier, didn't I? The reason why the Demon King visited was for a duel and proof."

"You certainly said that..."

"That day, the Demon King successfully finished both tasks and left."

He had had a duel with the Nine Heaven Players, and his subordinate, Valencia Citrin, had become the Eighth Heaven.

"The exhausted Nine Heavens couldn't stop Valencia from disappearing with the Demon King."

"...Wait, then why didn't she kill the exhausted Nine Heaven Players?"

"Because the Demon King told her not to..."

Through this secret history, Seo Jun-Ho realized one thing. The Demon King was a crazily arrogant madman with someone capable of supporting him behind the scenes.

“He laughed even while he was bleeding and said one thing…”

He had said that he would give them 6 years. Within those 6 years, they had to become strong enough to stop him.

"Then, the reason why the Demon King is currently inactive is...”

"The superficial reason is to let his wounds heal from that time, but..."

Most people already knew. Wounds? His injuries could have immediately been treated.

"He’s going up."

The last stairs on which he could reign as the pinnacle of this world. As soon as the Demon King climbed the stairs, no one would be able to stop him.

"But no one actually knows, right? The Nine Heavens wouldn’t be just playing around,” argued the Frost Queen.

"Yeah, no one knows that."

It was unknown whose time was more valuable, who sweated and bled more, and finally, whose talent was greater.

"There's nothing much I can do right now...”

This was the reason why Seo Jun-Ho was trying so hard to get stronger. It was to liberate his comrades as soon as possible and topple the Fiend Association.

"If it's any later, then we’ll really get destroyed without being able to do anything.”

This time, not at the hands of a Gate or a monster, but at the hands of a single individual.