That admission was no small thing. Argan had lived long enough to witness the creation and destruction of universes. He had slain creatures born before time. But these symbols… they were alien even to him.
He pressed his hand to the door.
One by one, the symbols pulsed , glowing in sequence.
And when the final symbol lit up ,a ninth rune unlike anything he'd encountered made the door opened.
It revealed a portal, swirling with dark mist and faint cosmic ripples, suspended in silence.
A portal that connected the place where Argan stood to an unknown location.
The portal showed no image of what lay beyond , only a shimmer of unstable energy. No time to analyze. No trace of fear in his heart.
Without a hint of hesitation, Argan stepped into the portal. When he inside that portal space, he felt something trying to absorb him and a force trying to bind him to the laws of another world.
"Trying to bind me with your world's laws? Don't even dream of it."
Argan clenched his fist and shattered the space with a punch that nearly caused the entire realm to collapse, though it quickly restored itself.
After that, Argan no longer felt the presence of the entity that had tried to bind him.
Seeing that there were no more disturbances, Argan continued walking through the space, searching for a way out.
After some time, Argan found a hole that seemed like an exit.
Not wasting time , he moved towards the hole and entered it.
The moment he steped out from that portal, a strong gust of wind greet him.
He found himself inside a cave filled with the corpses of monsters' that still looked fresh. The monsters' blood was splattered everywhere.
Argan looked around once more and could tell that five people had fought here earlier, just by observing the different battle marks burns, slash marks, arrows, and the condition of the monster corpses, which looked like they had been crushed by something. Most obvious of all were the punch marks on the bodies.
Argan narrowed his eyes. "So, that portal just now, connect to the Demon God's domain hmm?" he murmured. Well, it's not like he never encounter something like this before .
Suddenly a whistling noise. Three arrows coming to his head.
With quick reaction , he raised his hand. In one effortless movement, he caught all three arrow at mid-air. A moment later, he flicked them back. Not just with speed but with intent.
One collided mid-air with another arrow, detonating in a brief flash of sparks.
"What?! How is the monster react that fast?!" a voice growled from behind a shattered pillar.
"Oii!! Why are you making so much noise?!What if that monster hear is!" snaped a sharp eye elven women hide behind a rock.
"The monster already knows where we are," said a calm voice. A woman in armor stepped out, her sword and shield ready.
"Let me fire a flame orb at that monster," muttered a cocky mage, already gathering mana. With all his spell , he confident can burn the monster in instant .
"Wait!Where is the monster?!" Vicon, the strategist, shouted. He scanned around, heart thumping. "It's had vanished from our sight!"
"Everyone, ready in battle positions!" command Jullia as she drew her sword. Her eyes sharpened.
Manuk raised his massive shield. Laila nocked a glowing arrow. Raun finished chanting. Vicon clenched his fists and dropped into a martial stance.
They formed a tight defensive circle.
Minutes passed.
Nothing.
"How long are we going to wait? Still no sign of it," Manuk grumbled.
"Just wait. You're the one who gave our position away, idiot," Laila hissed.
"Wanna fight?!"
"Enough, both of you!" Jullia snapped, rubbing her temple.
"I bet it ran away. There was only one monster," Raun muttered arrogantly.
"Monsters like that usually can't be seen often but sometimes deadliest. They're smart. Calculated," Vicon added, his gaze serious. He had hear this from other hunter that ever encounter monster like that .
When they had wait enough ,Jullia sighed. "Then we leave. There no point wasting time at here."
"Yo,why you all want leave quickly?"
The voice coming from behind them froze their blood.
They spun around. A tall, shadowed figure stood inches from them. They couldn't see his face because his aura distorted the air.
"How the mosnter get behind us?! And it's speaking our language?!" Manuk trembled.
The pressure coming from Argan made his body feel incredibly heavy .
"Why you suddenly call me a monster?" Argan asked calmly not knowing his aura made them misunderstood him as a monster.
"Everyone, attack! Formation Gamma!" Jullia ordered. There no Times form them too talk .
The battle began.
Manuk rushed forward, shield first. "I'll pin it down!"
Clang! Argan parried it with a single finger. Manuk skidded back.
' What the!! ' Manuk doesn't believe that Argan just use his finger to block his shield .
Raun launched a fire orb. "Burn!"
Argan caught the orb mid-air. It fizzled out in his palm like a candle flame.
" Imposible!! " Raun sure that fire just now was the strongest spell he ever had .
Laila fired arrow after arrow. They curved mid-air with buffs. Argan dodged them effortlessly, barely shifting his stance.
' So that not coincidence when the monster dodge my arrow '
Laila had been practice this skill many time but the monster easyly dodge it .
Vicon struck from the side with lightning-fast punches. Argan raised his arm, blocking them with his forearm.
"Tch… it's not even trying," Vicon grunted.
Jullia leapt from behind, her blade aimed for Argan's neck.
But her sword halted inches from him. She was frozen in place by sheer pressure.
Argan simply stared. His presence alone made them tremble.
Their strikes continued. Formations. Techniques. Spells. Flares of teamwork. But no matter how they attacked, they could not touch him. Not truly.
Within minutes, they collapsed one by one. Not wounded. Not bleeding. Just… out of strength.
Just before Jullia lost consciousness, her mind flickered back to the moment it all began , the reason why they attacked him without a second thought.
They had just finished extracting monster cores from the fallen beasts when it happened.
Suddenly a portal, silent and ominous, opened beneath their feet , swirling with unstable energy.
Instinct took over. Without hesitation, the five of them quickly hid behind the nearest big rock's. They were ready to strike at any moment and also held their breath to avoid revealing their position.
They believed a high-tier monster was about to emerge.
They never expected... him.
It was then that she gave Laila the order . "Shoot it."
Laila obeyed without hesitation. The first arrow flew.
But from that moment onward, it was clear that they couldn't even touch him.
No matter how well-trained their formation was… no matter how precise their attacks… nothing landed.
Her strikes missed. Their coordination broke. The pressure… the overwhelming weight of his presence…
One by one, the others collapsed ,not from wounds, but from sheer exhaustion and suffocation under that suffocating aura.
And now, as her vision dimmed, Jullia finally fell , her blade slipping from her hand.
Collapsed, panting. Unconscious.
Argan looked at them silently.
Then he realized it.
"...My aura."
He gently lowered his aura . The atmosphere seemed to breathe again.
"I see. My aura alone made them hard to breath. Even they had hard time to move."
He moved to them and knealt beside them.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scared you all."
His voice wasn't soft. Nor guilty. Just honest.
He placed five glowing crystals beside their bodies. "Take these. They're Barti. Treasures from a world beyond comprehension."
He rose up again.
The dungeon sprawled ahead. Twisting tunnels, echoes of monsters.
But Argan didn't destroy the walls. He didn't break through.
He walked. Fought. Wandered.
Gulan beasts and goblins leapt at him. They fell with single glances or flicks of the wrist.
He saw the style of the walls. The carvings. The monsters.
"Why does this place feel… familiar?"
He couldn't recalled it.
Until he found it.
Another portal.
Without hesitation, he stepped through.
---------------------------
As Argan stepped through the swirling portal, his boots touched cold, cracked concrete.
The place not too dark, lit only faintly by a sunlight piercing through the broken roof above. Damaged steel beams were scattered across the floor. It seemed like he was inside a building that had long been abandoned.
Argan's eyes sharpened and see movement .
At the end of corridor, not far from where he stood, two uniform men were positioned at the exit. They appeared to be security guard's stationed at the building entrance. They were gossiping and completely unaware that someone was watching them.
' Should I talk to them?'Argan wondered, wanting to ask the guards where he was. But after thinking it over, he decided to ignore the thought.
" Ehh!! Why does it feel like someone's watching me??" said one of the guards , shivering.
" I feel the same things too. Let's just hope they had finished their job insiden there," replied his patner, pretending to stay calm though his body was sweating in fear.
As the two security guard talk, Argan walk calmly toward the exit, erasing his presence so the guard wouldn't notice him.
He moved without making a single sound even holding back his own heartbeat.
Argan passed between the two of them like a shadow. Neither of the security guards sense that someone had just walked past them
And then…
The moment he exited the rusted double doors of the old construction site, the night sky opened before him vast, familiar, impossibly blue with scattered stars. City lights shimmered in the distance. Neon signs flickered. The distant hum of traffic echoed through the wind.
Argan stopped.
The silence inside him was replaced by a slow, powerful thrum in his chest.
"…Earth."
His voice was low, almost like a whisper. Old memories began to resurface after a millions of years he forgot about earth.
Not confusion.
Not awe.
But something far deeper.
Nostalgia.
Recognition.
A return.
After what felt like an eternity wandering worlds beyond stars… he had come home.
And yet , the earth he returned to no longer felt the same. Or perhaps… he was no longer the same from before .
He stepped forward slowly, eyes scanning the city skyline ahead.
"...So , I finally returned to earth ."
And without another word, Argan began to walk fading into the shadows of his once-forgotten world.