It was right after I had abdicated the throne of Sword Emperor to my son that I first visited the Land in Between.
In the war against the Demon race, I had always been at the front lines, yet I could never find meaning in the fighting.
Why did the Human race and the Demon race have to keep fighting?
There was no answer to that question.
Rather than waste time pondering a question with no answer, I swung my sword to kill the enemy.
But one of my disciples became the Hero and crossed alone into Demon race territory, and after that, the Demon race stopped their advances.
He, too, was a man who had lost his meaning in fighting, just like me.
And somehow—though I never learned how—he managed to end the war, even if only temporarily.
Only a minuscule number of people, myself included, knew that he had gone to Demon race territory.
Because of this, there were many who viewed the suddenly docile Demon race with suspicion.
There was no shortage of voices calling for an offensive while we had the chance.
But I wanted to place my bet on him.
That he would put a full stop to the long history of conflict between the Human race and the Demon race.
But I would not live to see the outcome.
I had confidence in my skill with the sword, but when it came to politics, I was weak.
With fighting gone, the status of civil officials began to rise above that of military ones, and men like me—who could do nothing but swing a sword—were becoming unnecessary.
Fortunately, my son's skill with the blade was still immature, but his mind was reasonably sharp.
It seemed better to entrust the future of the empire to my son than to have an old relic like me clinging to the throne forever.
Once I made that decision, it felt as though a weight had been lifted from my shoulders.
Without my even realizing it, the burden of the title Sword Emperor had been crushing me.
After ceding the throne to my son and retiring, a question I had never had the leisure to consider grew larger and larger within me.
Did the Human race and the Demon race truly have to remain in conflict?
I did not think so.
In truth, while radicals still existed within the empire, the overall mood was one of war-weariness.
The long war had dealt no small blow to the empire, casting a dark shadow over the entire nation.
The Demon race must surely have been in a similar state.
That was why they had withdrawn.
In that, I could sense thinking shared with the Human race.
If we held similar thoughts, then there was nothing we could not share between us.
That was my conclusion.
And then, I was found by that person and invited to this Land in Between.
There, exactly as I had envisioned, a sight spread before me.
The Human race and the Demon race living together without division—shedding no blood, brandishing no weapons.
I was moved to tears, and resolved to spend the rest of my life here.
It would have been nice to simply live out my remaining years in peace, but it seemed that was not to be.
I draw my beloved sword.
In this peaceful land, I had never once let go of my blade.
On the contrary, I never missed a day of training and kept it meticulously maintained.
It was not that I had foreseen this outcome.
I simply could not bring myself to cast away the sword—the other half of my being.
Wishing for peace while wielding a weapon.
That was the contradiction I had carried with me all along.
How ironic that it would prove useful.
I walk in the direction opposite to the fleeing people.
I can already see the figure of my opponent.
A colossal body, towering far beyond the height of a man.
An Ogre—and an evolved one, at that.
Judging by its size, it was probably a High Ogre.
Yet the aura of pressure it exuded surpassed that of the Ogre King I had once fought.
Its presence was something beyond human reach—akin to that of dragon-kind.
Even so, I step forward toward the Ogre.
Though I had retired, I was once the Sword Emperor.
And the Sword God.
One who had reached the pinnacle of the sword.
Even if my Status was inferior, that alone did not decide the fight.
I would teach that to this maddened Ogre with its very body.
************************* The first stratum of the Demon Mountains.
There, the Ice Dragon reunited with its master.
Having barely escaped the Ogre with its life, the Ice Dragon had been relaying information to its master.
Upon receiving the report, the master teleported to the Ice Dragon's location at once.
After hearing the full account from the Ice Dragon, the master offered words of praise and healing, then said he would go ahead and vanished in a flash of teleportation.
Unable to use teleportation, the Ice Dragon flew back.
And upon returning, it was met with confusion—the master who should have gone ahead was nowhere to be found.
************************* The Ice Dragon's master, Kuro, realized that his teleportation had ended in failure.
What should have been an instantaneous journey through the interstitial space showed no sign of releasing him, no matter how long he waited.
A darkness like that of Naraku enveloped Kuro's entire body.
Kuro considered.
His teleportation had been intercepted by interference in the spatial fabric, trapping him within this void.
That was his assessment of the situation.
But Kuro was among the strongest existences in this world.
There should have been no being capable of interfering with Kuro's teleportation.
And yet here he was, sealed away.
The possibility of an outside god having infiltrated seemed unlikely.
The system was specifically configured to be sensitive to such things.
Aside from D's system, there were only a handful of the highest-ranking gods who could slip into this world undetected.
And a god of that caliber would more easily have simply annihilated Kuro rather than confined him.
Kuro considered two possibilities.
The first was interference from D.
The second was interference from a newcomer who had only recently ascended to godhood.
Neither could be ruled out entirely, nor could either be confirmed.
D's actions were unreadable to Kuro.
Even if D had maintained non-interference until now, it was entirely possible for the god to interfere on a whim.
A newcomer would lack the advanced skill necessary to obstruct Kuro's teleportation.
The techniques of godhood were not something mastered overnight.
But that particular newcomer had ascended to godhood in an astonishingly short time.
Given that rate of growth, it was perhaps not so unthinkable.
Either way, the situation remained troublesome.
Kuro attempted to escape the void.
In that instant, as if to stop him, the darkness was dyed white.
So it seemed—a flood of white spiders filled his vision, swallowing Kuro whole.
At that point, the identity of his opponent was clear.
"What are you playing at, Shiroori!"
Kuro parted the tidal wave of white spiders with his hands and roared.
There was no voice in answer.