Bright gray hair and brown eyes that shone like polished bronze—aside from those, his face was almost identical to Zeke's.
Zeke stared fixedly at the Holy King's face.
"Excluding the hair color, he's basically a mirror image of me." He was startled at first, but Zeke quickly accepted the reality.
"I'm carrying the blood of both the Agamemnon Family and the Draker Family, so it's not strange that our appearances would be similar."
Rather than just similar, their features were nearly identical, but Zeke dismissed it as a mere coincidence.
The Holy King noticed Zeke's surprised gaze and spoke up.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" Zeke shook his head in response.
"It's nothing, Your Majesty."
This time, the Holy King stared at Zeke for a moment before murmuring.
"Your presence... it reminds me greatly of Terakan Draker."
Zeke was caught off guard by the Holy King's unexpected words.
"Me, you say?"
"Yes."
The Holy King's voice sharpened noticeably when he mentioned Terakan.
From the Holy King's reaction, Zeke realized one thing.
"It seems he suspected that Terakan was his biological father. But since Terakan never revealed it, the Holy King never acknowledged it either."
Zeke pondered why Terakan had never told his son, Gio Rubern, the truth.
"Was it because he didn't want to reveal that Claudia was the one who slew Bahamut?"
The relationship between Terakan Draker and the Holy King seemed more complicated than he had imagined.
At that moment, the Holy King looked at Zeke and asked.
"Successor, what is your name?"
Zeke hesitated briefly before using the alias he had prepared earlier.
"Kai Rubern."
It was the same name he had given Laura when he had traveled back in time.
The Holy King's eyes wavered at Zeke's words.
"Rubern... So you are my descendant."
"Yes."
Zeke pulled out Agamemnon's Mask—one of the sacred relics—from his inventory and showed it to the Holy King.
"It's a sacred relic passed down through our family. It was nearly destroyed once before, but it was fully restored thanks to the Blessing of the Fairy King."
The Holy King was even more astonished upon seeing Agamemnon's Mask in Zeke's hand.
"The Mask of the Great Sage! So it has been preserved all this time! I was worried that after me, no one worthy could wield it properly. What a relief."
The Holy King smiled with evident relief for a moment, then furrowed his brow as if pondering something before asking Zeke.
"I have one question."
"Please speak, Your Majesty."
"If you are my descendant, you should be able to wield the power of light with a healer class, just like me. However..."
The Holy King glanced at the spear inside the glass tube and continued.
"The Holy Spear Longominant cannot draw forth its godslaying power with the power of light alone. For that, a different power is required..."
"I believe I know what you mean. The power of immortality is needed, correct?" The Holy King's eyes widened at Zeke's words.
"How do you know this?"
"In truth, before coming here, I met the Divine Dragon Poseidon and pulled out the spear that had sealed his body."
Zeke retrieved the crude spear he had drawn from Poseidon's body from his inventory and showed it to the Holy King.
The Holy King was visibly shocked upon seeing the spear.
"I've heard of this spear before. Did you truly pull it out?"
"Yes, I did."
At Zeke's confirmation, the Holy King closed his eyes briefly, clasped his hands, and offered a prayer.
"O God of Light, today I have finally met the true successor who will save the world, allowing me to pass on this spear."
Zeke watched the Holy King pray with solemn reverence and felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity from him.
"Is it because our faces are so similar?" Zeke thought of his other siblings.
Perhaps because they all had different mothers, his siblings varied greatly in appearance and personality.
He maintained good relations with Kali and Helen, but it was more as comrades or allies than as close siblings.
One brother, Abel, had even died by Zeke's own hand, and another, Bacchus, had nearly met the same fate after being captured by him.
In the history of the Draker Family, fratricide among siblings was all too common.
Zeke felt a subtle emotion stirring within him at the greater closeness he felt toward the Holy King—a man he had just met that day, and in spirit form no less—compared to his own blood brothers.
"This is strange. I've never felt anything like this before."
Just then, the Holy King finished his prayer and rose from his seat, approaching Zeke.
"Kai Rubern, today I can finally break free from these heavy chains of restraint. In my stead, use this holy spear to eternally annihilate the Demon King who will revive." "Your Majesty, I have one question."
"Speak."
"I have heard prophecies about the Demon King's revival, but I don't know exactly how it happens."
"Prophecies are dangerous in themselves, so prophets often hide the truth in riddles and verses. What do you know about the revival?"
"I only know that the dark mages of Narak are using the Book of the Lion to revive a being called the King in Yellow."
The Holy King's expression darkened at the mention of Narak.
"Those accursed wretches are still crawling about. Despite how diligently I hunted them down wherever I found them."
Surprisingly, Narak had existed even in the Holy King's time.
Zeke said to the Holy King.
"It is now about 800 years after the era of the Holy Empire that Your Majesty established. The Demon King is treated as nothing more than a character from children's tales in our world. If anyone mentions his revival, people just scoff and think it's a bad joke."
The Holy King frowned at those words.
"That's the Narak wretches' scheme. Those vile creatures hide their identities, infiltrate every corner of society, and slowly twist people's perceptions, history, and information bit by bit. Sometimes, such conspiracies are more effective than leading an army to assault a castle."
Zeke nodded in agreement with the Holy King.
Even in Zeke's time, people continued to mistakenly believe the War of Liberation had been caused by Bahamut.
False information and history warped people's understanding, leaving them oblivious to the dangers they faced.
The Holy King continued.
"For Narak to revive the Demon King, two things are needed. One is the Book of the
Lion, where the Demon King's soul is sealed. The other is a vessel to contain that soul." "I think I know what the Book of the Lion is, but what do you mean by vessel?" "The flesh into which the Demon King's soul will descend. It must be prepared." Zeke had one doubt about the Holy King's words.
"I've heard that only a dragon's body can withstand the Demon King's immense power. That's why the soul entered Bahamut before, isn't it?" The Holy King nodded.
"You are correct. But after the War of Liberation, the dragon population dwindled to near extinction. So the Narak fiends sought another way."
"Another way? What is it?"
"Dragonkin."
Zeke was stunned by the Holy King's words.
"Dragonkin? You mean they plan to create dragonkin and descend the Demon King's soul into one?"
"Exactly. A being with a dragon's power but a human heart—ideal for descending the
Demon King. But conditions are required for that as well."
"What conditions?"
"Originally, dragonkin are created when a contract dragon willingly gives a portion of its heart to its contractor and implants it, forcibly enhancing the human body. Human flesh is infinitely weaker than a dragon's, so it's a kind of trick dragons devised out of a desire to stay with their contractors longer." Zeke recalled what Hoshgar had once said.
"Hoshgar mentioned that dragonkin are a loophole created by deceiving karma." But this method still ultimately required a dragon's assistance.
As Zeke grew more puzzled, the Holy King spoke.
"The dark mages of Narak discovered a way to create dragonkin without a dragon's help."
"What? Is that possible?"
"Yes. Though dragons are gone, the dragon hearts they left behind still exist. The dark mages conducted experiments implanting dragon hearts forcibly into humans to create dragonkin."
Hearing this, Zeke suddenly thought of something.
"Abel. He definitely used dragon power."
As the Holy King said, the dark mages of Narak must have implanted a dragon heart into Abel to make him a vessel.
"Crazy bastards. To think of implanting a dragon heart into a human body."
Thanks to that, Abel had risen swiftly to the level of a black knight, but he gradually became unstable and was ultimately consumed by the power, transforming into a monstrous form.
If Zeke had tried to absorb the cursed light dragon's heart without the system's aid, he would have ended up no different from Abel.
The Holy King continued.
"But implanting a dragon heart into a human isn't easy. Most of the Narak fiends' attempts failed."
Zeke nodded at the Holy King's words.
The source of a dragon's immense power was precisely the dragon heart.
The power of a complete dragon heart was something no human could endure.
Zeke said to the Holy King.
"So that's why Narak couldn't create a vessel for so long and couldn't break the Demon
King's seal."
"It's not just the vessel; retrieving the Book of the Lion would have been nearly impossible for them too, so it wouldn't have been easy." Zeke looked puzzled at the Holy King's words.
"I thought the Book of the Lion was already in Narak's possession. I understood they had gathered to interpret it and gain its power." The Holy King shook his head.
"Strictly speaking, the Narak wretches are closer to the followers of the Demon King formed after the War of Liberation to reclaim the Book of the Lion where his soul is sealed. After their defeat in the war, they scattered and hid everywhere, forcing me to traverse the continent to eradicate them."
Only then did Zeke understand why the Holy King's chronicles were filled with battles against dark mages and liches. They were traces of his fights against Narak's dark mages.
The Holy King grimaced as he recalled Narak's dark mages.
"Those tenacious scum are still alive even after 800 years. I should have wiped them out more thoroughly back then..." Zeke shook his head.
"Such vermin cower when danger looms and resurface when the time is right, like poisonous mushrooms. Your Majesty did your utmost." The Holy King smiled warmly at Zeke.
"Thank you."
As Zeke watched the Holy King's gentle smile, he posed another question.
"If what Your Majesty says is true, they didn't have the Book of the Lion back then, but they might have it again now."
The Holy King shook his head.
"I doubt it."
"What? How can you be so certain?"
The Holy King looked straight into Zeke's eyes and said.
"Because the Book of the Lion is hidden in a place unreachable not only by those fiends but by anyone else. Even Narak won't dare search for it lightly." Zeke asked with a puzzled expression.
"What place is so inaccessible that even Narak can't find it?"
The Holy King hesitated for a moment before slowly opening his mouth.
"Yes, I should tell you, the successor."
Even as he said that, he seemed reluctant, pausing briefly before continuing.
"The last dragons sacrificed their own bodies to create a tower in order to seal the Book of the Lion. They placed the book in its deepest chamber."
"Are you saying the Book of the Lion is sealed in a tower built by dragons?"
"Yes. Thanks to the noble sacrifice of the Great Sage and the dragons, the Demon
King's soul is effectively sealed forever." Zeke asked the Holy King.
"Where is that tower?"
The Holy King hesitated again before slowly answering.
"Beyond the Dark Sea. In the Abandoned Continent, where no one can go. The Last
Tower is there."