Demon Lord Gallery

“Wasn’t magic unable to intervene in my dimension?”
“I told you, didn’t I? It’s magic close to a concept. As much as she has the nickname of goddess, she’s reached an incredible level when it comes to magic. Most magic-type Demon Lords you see in the Demon Lord Gallery wouldn’t even be a match, right? If we’re talking about hierarchy, she’d be around the 10th rank.”
“What…”
Questions piled upon questions.
The doubt about magic close to a concept was big, but above all, what filled my head now was the intervention of Heroes.
Intervention of Heroes? It was something I had expected.
Since I gained the qualification of a Demon Lord, I had received help or intervention from other Demon Lords several times, so it was impossible that the Hero side wouldn’t provide such help and intervention.
Just looking at the cases of Astraea, Eirene, and Eunomia, it was certain that there had been some kind of help and intervention.
But what I had expected was about interventions carried out after I became a Demon Lord.
Before becoming a Demon Lord. The fact that beings from other dimensions had been intervening in the world I lived in from far before 20 years ago was something I simply couldn’t believe, and I couldn’t help but have doubts and suspicions.
“Evidence, I think I need evidence to believe─”

“If you’re talking about related materials, I’ll give them to you now.”
Along with the words that she would provide the materials, dizziness suddenly attacked me.
It was a somewhat familiar experience.
To be precise, it was the same as when Leon had delivered swordsmanship through Grandpa Noah.
And just like then, I could examine one by one the information and knowledge directly injected into my head, and.
“…”
“There are quite a lot of testimony materials based on oaths, but I think this much should be quite reliable, right?”
I could hear testimonies and explanations from various Demon Lords such as Solomon, Mephistopheles, Amon, Ella, and others.
It was natural that reliability was guaranteed as quite a few Demon Lords were speaking using oaths.
So I started asking her about other doubts.
“Why─”
Why were gates opened in a peaceful dimension?
Why did Heroes drive the world to destruction instead of saving it?
Why did we have to suffer?
I spilled out all the resentment and doubts that had accumulated for 20 years, or even longer.
“First, in the case of extra-dimensional rifts opened by Outer Gods, we don’t know the reason. Outer Gods are beings like that. They are beings that exist outside the word dimension and are incomprehensible by our common sense.”
“Then aren’t they no different from risk factors? Why haven’t the Hero Gallery or Demon Lord Gallery eliminated the Outer Gods?”
“Because they are outside the bounds of good and evil. Besides that, there’s also the reason that their influence on dimensions is really like dust compared to other hostile factors─”
The explanation about Outer Gods was brief.
Soon, Anastasia turned the topic of conversation from Outer Gods to Heroes.
“The reason Heroes breathed madness into your dimension is what’s commonly called a ‘trial’ on that side. It’s used in a slightly different sense from Lord Lucifer’s trial.”
“Trial?”
“Yes. Here’s one thing I want to ask. When do you think Heroes are born?”
At this sudden question about the birth of Heroes, I swallowed the words I was about to say and fell into thought for a moment.
The Heroes I knew were beings who defeated evil and acted on behalf of good, and who defeated beings called Demon Lords in common novels.
In other words, they were beings representing good and saviors.
And the word savior required one premise, and.
“…They appear when humanity or a specific race is on the brink of extinction?”
“Correct.”
The premise was a world so bleak and hopeless that there were beings who needed salvation everywhere.
“The Hero Gallery is divided into three factions, they say. Moderate, radical, centrist. It’s exactly the same as our Demon Lord Gallery. Risa I mentioned earlier belongs to the radical faction among these.”
“If it’s the radical faction…”
“It’s the side that thinks even small sacrifices can be considered to increase the power of Heroes. It’s the side that doesn’t mind small sacrifices if it’s for Heroes to win and bring complete good to all dimensions.”
Hearing the explanation up to this point, anyone who wasn’t a fool could figure out the whole story of this incident.
One of the conditions for the appearance of Heroes was a world on the brink of destruction.
In other words, the way to forcibly make Heroes appear was to drive a world to destruction.
“…Then was my world sacrificed?”
“…That’s right. Probably, they tried to create a world on the brink of destruction through war and gate waves, then partially impose causality to birth a being called a Hero. But because you took on all the sins and ended the war, a Hero couldn’t appear.”
The moment I realized the truth about everything.
I let out a hollow laugh.
I couldn’t help but let out a hollow laugh at the harsh truth.
“Haha…”
Tens of billions of lives sacrificed for a great cause, and humanity including myself manipulated like puppets.
It was a reality truly merciless beyond compare.
*
Slash─!
The sound of a sword cutting through flesh was heard.
No, it was a bit ambiguous to call it a living being.
No matter how much I thought about it, the monsters that popped out from inside the gates had too many strange points to be called living beings.
Anyway, according to these corrected words, I was walking while cutting down all these beings imitating monsters.
What was held in my hand was only a black straight sword, and what I was wearing was a worn-out hoodie and wrinkled jeans.
Moreover, those clothes were covered in dust and dirt as if they had been rolling around somewhere, but I didn’t bother to shake them off and just moved forward.
Mindlessly cutting down the rushing monsters with my sword, forward, forward.
After walking for a while, the air changed along with a strange sensation of my body being slightly compressed.
Deep layer.
It didn’t even take two hours to reach deep inside the gate.
It was almost twice as fast as usual.
Is it because I’m angry? Or is it because of the swordsmanship I acquired after the battle with Eunomia?
Although I couldn’t clearly define the cause of the time reduction, the cause of me mindlessly slaughtering monsters as they came was undoubtedly anger.
The conversation I had in Anastasia’s dream dimension, Somnium, a few hours ago kept swirling in my head.
“Ha.”
No matter how many times I thought about it, I couldn’t understand.
They cause a war just to birth one Hero?
They sacrifice hundreds of millions, billions for the sake of just one, a single life?
Moreover, thinking that they would rationalize such actions as unavoidable sacrifices for a greater good and great cause made me even more incomprehensible and angry.
Isn’t this no different from treating humans like lab mice?
Because the beings called Heroes I had thought of were not like this.
Because I thought they would be different from me, who had to choose the option of killing people and dirtied my hands, the anger was even greater.
Splat─
Perhaps I was too caught up in my emotions, a small sound of flesh tearing and blood spraying was heard.
Touching my cheek at the sticky feeling, quite a deep wound was carved there.
Although it was recovering in seconds thanks to the rapidly increased healing ability since that day, the fact that I was wounded by a mere monster meant nothing less than that I was being careless.
“Whew.”
I slowly took a deep breath and suppressed my emotions.
Right, nothing has been clearly revealed yet.
Although Anastasia brought materials, those were just materials from this ‘Demon Lord’ side, and there was no neutral and definitive evidence.
It was natural to go through the process of cross-verification through conversations with the Hero side or asking them.
It wasn’t good to be swayed simply by hearing the opinions and information from one side.
I needed to calm down.
“…”
After repeating deep breaths and short meditations for a long time, I was able to regain some semblance of composure.
In that somewhat saner state of mind and body, I continued to go deeper into the gate, and soon I was able to reach the end of the gate.
A huge cavity with a diameter of over several hundred meters and a sphere floating in its center came into view.
The sphere, a little larger than a person, was covered with something black that rippled.
This was the core of the Main Gate.
An immortal core that no ability, no weapon of humanity could affect.
Because of this cursed condition, the first subjugation team that reached here 22 years ago only transmitted information about the sphere before being annihilated in vain.
After that, several subjugation teams reached here, and tried and researched all possible means of destruction, but the only thing they could find out was one thing.
At that time, the only way to eliminate that was on the day when that black something covering the sphere disappeared, that is, the moment when the Main Gate wave opened.
I too had reached here dozens, hundreds of times while cleaning gates for 20 years.
But not once had I succeeded in breaking this core, and I hadn’t even been able to reach here at the moment when the Main Gate wave opened.
But now it was different.
I felt like I could eliminate it.
It wasn’t just a feeling.
‘I’ll give you more data related to gates. It seems similar cases have occurred in other dimensions.’
In the materials Anastasia had given me, which were now imprinted in my head, there were quite a few cases very similar to this gate.
Especially regarding the treatment of the core, various alternatives and methods were listed, and one of them stated that it could be destroyed through means that could interfere with dimensions.
And I had one means that could interfere with dimensions.
Swordsmanship.
The origin was Moses’ swordsmanship that cut dimensions, and what refined it was another Sword Master and my teacher, friend, Leon.
If I could somehow draw this out, it was fully possible to cut that sphere.
According to the conversation I had with Leon before, even the first time I split the sky was also a kind of dimensional technique, so it was all the more so.
I closed my eyes, gripped the sword with both hands, and slowly raised it.
Although it was a posture I had tried hundreds of times, I thought the posture was correctly ‘set’ only twice.
Would I be able to succeed this time too?
A little doubt and worry came into my mind for a moment, but I soon shook them off.
What was needed was only faith and earnestness.
It had been a while since I was holding the sword.
In an instant. I realized the posture was set and immediately swung the sword down.
The moment the sword swung down, I could be certain it had cut and.
Crack──!
Along with a sound more crisp than I thought, the sight of the core splitting exactly in half entered my eyes.
The black something that had never been penetrated no matter what was done was cleanly split in half.
“…Is it a success?”
40 years and 9 months.
Today was exactly 14,877 days since the appearance of Brazil’s Main Gate, and.
From today, it would be recorded as the date when the Main Gate was first subjugated.
“4 left.”