The Emperor Has Returned

Chapter 134 – Opening the Door (3)

Flames started soaring above Juan’s head. Haild immediately pulled Elkiehl out and stepped back upon seeing the flames. Just like what had happened a few days ago, the flames fluttered in columns and took the form of an enormous horn. Halid widened the distance between himself and Juan as soon as he could, but the back of his hand still ended up becoming red due to the burning heat.

“Your Majesty!” Haild cried out impatiently.

But Juan stood still without answering Haild. Only then did Haild realize that Juan’s arms were twitching as if he was convulsing.

Juan gritted his teeth in pain; it felt like his brain was melting due to the heat. It wasn’t long before his teeth cracked with a terrible sound and blood flowed down his cheeks. After that, even the blood running down his cheek started burning with red smoke. Juan felt as if someone had thrusted red hot iron inside his head.

The pain he was feeling was beyond anything anyone could ever imagine. What he felt couldn’t simply be described as pain—the flames were burning fiercely, as if it was to burn Juan’s soul and nerves to make him lose his mind.

Juan groaned and clenched his teeth even harder as he attempted to bear the pain. He thought that it was rather fortunate that his teeth cracked and broke earlier, since that meant that he wouldn’t have to worry about biting his tongue.

The muscles throughout Juan’s entire body began to swell and rip apart. It was clear that his body would break down and turn into a powder even before he was burned to death at this rate.

Haild, who was watching the sight, could not believe his eyes.

‘Is he actually controlling the crown?’

Haild was doubtful about what was going on, and Nienna stood beside him with her mouth wide open.

“Haild. Is he really okay? No matter how I look at him… I don’t think he’s in a good condition.”

“The fact that he is not freaking out or turning everything around him into ashes means that he’s okay. Besides, he is restraining himself. If that’s the case, his condition may actually be…”

At that moment, Haild closed his mouth as Juan screamed and shook his body. At the same time as Juan let out a scream, his right arm shattered and scattered everywhere.

Nienna’s face turned pale upon seeing such a sight.

Juan shivered with his back bent over. His consciousness was only narrowly maintained, as if he had tied a huge ship with only one extremely taut thread. Juan had almost lost consciousness several times, but his desire to find out about Gerard’s intentions paradoxically allowed him to remain sane.

‘Was it because of this crown that Gerard decided to stab me in the back? And did Gerard really think that I could handle this?’

Juan concentrated on the crown. The crown was still burning as furiously as ever above his head. Then Juan wondered if the pain would be less if he were to transfer the heat concentrated on his head elsewhere. He couldn’t be sure if it would work or not, but figured that it should be no different from controlling his mana.

Crack!

Nienna and Haild, who were observing Juan in silence, inadvertently found something strange—the flames which had been soaring above Juan’s head in the form of a horn began to spread from Juan’s forehead, almost as if they were taking root. The flame first invaded Juan’s eyes, quickly burning his eyeballs. The ashes then scattered with a terrible sound and flames burst out of Juan’s eyes.

“Shit!”

Nienna tried to run toward Juan, but Haild quickly stopped her.

“Aunt, please stay still!”

“Does that look normal to you? Dad’s body never burns in fire! That means that his body is not functioning properly!”

“I don’t know what process the crown uses to calm down. I’m not too sure whether everything is properly progressing right now, but His Majesty will recover once he loses consciousness. On the other hand, you won’t be able to stay safe if you approached him so recklessly right now!”

Haild was right, but it was hard to Nienna to stay still and look at Juan suffer. Nienna nervously chewed on her nails as she looked at Juan.

“I will hold you responsible if anything happens to dad,” Nienna warned.

“What if His Majesty gets completely taken over by the crown?”

The flames from the crown began to intertwine with Juan’s body like roots. Juan’s skin burned down at every spot where the flames passed by. Juan’s face looked no different from a fireball. Almost his entire face including his eyes, nose, and mouth was emitting flames, to the point that his face looked like charcoal due to bright flames.

Juan’s body, which had been twitching, almost as if he was suffering from convulsions, was no longer showing any movements now. The flames of the crown engulfed Juan, almost as if it was trying to encroach upon him.

Nienna realized that the flames were flowing along Juan’s blood vessels. The moment the flames reached his amputated right arm, they spread themselves as if there were blood vessels in the place of his non-existent arm.

It continued getting hotter and hotter as the crown slowly encroached upon Juan. Nienna stepped back; she could no longer withstand the heat despite being quite far away from Juan. The same was true of Haild.

Juan was now burning almost like a piece of wood and his blackened skin split in half, flashing the heat inside.

“How does it look?”

Nienna asked. But Haild couldn’t answer her; even he had no idea what was going on. Everything happening right now was out of his expectations.

At that moment, Juan’s left arm, which had still been intact, exploded and turned into ashes with a loud bang. Black ashes flew away in the heat, scattering all over the white sand.

After that, a series of thunderous bangs rang out one after the other, and Juan lost balance and fell flat onto the white sand.

Juan’s body slowly turned into ashes and helplessly scattered away. The sound of his body crumbling down and scattering was quite gruesome.

“Dad!”

.

Nienna grit her teeth and quickly sent her ice spears toward Juan. Hundreds of ice spears were vaporized in just an instant, releasing huge amounts of steam. Even the steam that was being emitted was so hot that it could easily scald Nienna and Haild. While Nienna’s view wasn’t clear due to the steam, she didn’t stop.

Haild had no choice but to admit that the current situation was completely unexpected.

“Aunt, stay back!”

Haild picked up Elkiehl and stabbed it into the steam. At that moment, the steam was scattering in a round shape, slowly allowing Nienna and Haild to regain their vision. The intense heat had also cooled down a little, thanks to Nienna’s ice spears. But it was still quite hot.

Haild felt his hands starting to deform due to heat, but he continued to put strength into his hand which was stabbing Elkiehl in the steam. Then he witnessed something unbelievable inside the steam—Juan’s body had turned into ashes and scattered away, but the crown was still at the spot where Juan had been standing, burning furiously.

***

Juan had no eyes, but he could still ‘see’. He had no brain, but he could still ‘think’.

Juan recalled the time when an unknown power was poured into him back in Hiveden. This was quite similar to that time—but unlike that time, Juan could still feel his body. The blazing flames themselves were Juan. He thought that he had experienced the same condition, even long before Hiveden.

When he had just been revived as a scrawny boy, this was exactly how he had looked like. The only difference compared to back then was that he was conscious now. Juan realized that the crown was certainly related to his resurrection.

The power fluctuating in the crown was enormous.

Juan felt that he could easily burn down the entire empire in his current state. He could feel the amount of power that lay inside the crown. Upon feeling the amount of power inside the crown, he realized just how reckless he had been and how lucky he was to be able to survive from the last time he summoned the crown.

Juan carefully moved his body that was made up of flames. His body felt very comfortable and light, without the slightest pain; one could only feel pain if they had a physical form. Most of his human needs had also disappeared. Being able to sense the surrounding environment was a system that consisted of rewards and punishments, and it was designed for the sake of survival. But Juan was now free from such matters and had no reason to feel such unnecessary things.

However, Juan felt quite displeased for a moment.

‘This is no different from being a god.’

Juan preferred having a physical form. He liked to touch, feel, eat, sleep, laugh out loud and even feel pain. He hadn’t felt any particular pleasure from any of it until now, but now he desperately wanted them more than ever.

Then he got his body back.

***

Juan slowly looked up. It seemed that his eye level was slightly higher than before. Juan looked at his own hands and examined his own condition. His skin was slightly pale, but it was clean and soft, almost as if he was a newborn baby. He had also gotten a little more muscular. His hair had also grown longer, reaching down to his shoulders.

All in all, he looked to be around twenty years of age; Juan seemed to have grown a little older compared to before the crown was summoned.

‘I didn’t expect to grow older.’

At that moment, Juan stepped over something as he slightly moved—they were ashes. Juan realized that the ashes were from his old body. This was the first time that his original body remained after his new body had been reconstructed. This hinted at the fact that the scale of body reconstruction this time around was quite different compared to previous times.

‘Rebirth’ would be a better word than ‘reconstruction of the body.’ More mana than ever was flowing inside his body.

“Your Majesty!”

Juan could see Haild and Nienna hastily running toward him. Nienna hesitated for a moment upon seeing the growth of Juan’s body, but she immediately took off her furry cloak and wrapped it around Juan.

“What happened? Are you able to control the crown now?” Haild asked.

“I don’t exactly know what happened. It seems like I am able to handle the crown better now, since my body was reconstructed right before my old body and soul turned into ashes. It’s hard to explain in detail, but… Hm. I can feel that my body is filled with the clean and pure power of fire,” Juan said.

“As much as before you died?” Nienna asked with delight.

“Not to that extent. But… I can put this power to good use.”

Haild made a disappointed expression.

Juan inadvertently thought that his definition and Haild’s definition of ‘good use’ might be slightly different from each other, but he didn’t bother to point it out.

“Do you think you’d be able to summon the crown again?”

Juan nodded upon hearing Haild’s question.

“Maybe. However, I don’t want to go through that again.”

Juan realized that Haild’s use of the metaphor was correct. If the crown was a huge amount of water stored in the dam, Juan himself was the dam gate. The act of inserting Elkiehl inside Juan was like making a hole in the dam.

“I’m sorry, but I’d like to check some things a few more times in the future. While I do think that what aunt Nienna and I saw is enough to make some assumptions about the crown, it would be hard to confront the Crack until you can take full control of the crown,” Haild said.

“I guess I have no choice but to do it if I have to. I’m sure it will be easier the third time.”

“I don’t know how to explain this situation other than saying that… it’s a miracle. I can’t believe that you learned how to control the crown even the slightest bit in just two attempts. It’s a completely different result compared to the information I had collected about the crown before. I thought it would take at least another year,” Haild said.

“That’s His Majesty. He’s a genius at anything he does,” Nienna proudly said.

Haild nodded at Nienna’s reply.

“Genius… surely it would be impossible otherwise. I feel like he was created to be perfect at everything he does rather than simply being a genius…”

“Haild, don’t say such cheeky things,” Nienna shot back upon hearing Haild’s mutterings, almost as if she was warning him.

Haild quickly bowed his head.

“My apologies. I didn’t think much before I spoke just now. I got a little too excited because everything went against my expectations.”

“It’s okay. Thanks to you, my plan has been expedited,” Juan said as he clenched his hands.

‘Gerard. If you’re alive, I want to give you a taste of this sea of fire.’

Juan promised himself that he would make such happen. His lovely son had to be punished.