The Regressor Can Make Them All
Chapter 365

Chapter 365

“...State who you are.”

After a long period of silence, the old man—Wurgen of the past—had finally spoken, now gazing at Se-Hoon with even sharper eyes with an expression that suggested he’d attack immediately if he sensed anything suspicious.

What am I supposed to do here... Se-Hoon thought with a frustrated frown, feeling the immense scrutiny.

Although he knew the man before him was the Wurgen of the past, Se-Hoon was unsure about where he even was, much less the situation he was in. For all he knew, opening his mouth recklessly could be dangerous. Just like Wurgen’s gaze suggested, if Wurgen even remotely suspected that he was related to the Demon Force, Wurgen would attack immediately.

Fighting him right now isn’t ideal... no, maybe I could manage since he hasn’t become a Perfect One yet?

While Wurgen wasn't weak during his S-rank days, he had a clear weakness Se-Hoon could target, potentially allowing him to subdue Wurgen. Rapidly calculating the odds of success, Se-Hoon finally regained his composure.

“I’m someone who could be called your future disciple.”

“...What?”

“I said I’m someone who could be called your future disciple.”

Wurgen’s expression turned peculiar, his face displaying confusion and suspicion over the incomprehensible words he just heard. There was a hint of deliberation as well, as if he were weighing the plausibility.

“Just to clarify any misconceptions, I don’t even know why I ended up here,” Se-Hoon added before Wurgen could come to any conclusion, having sensed his confusion.

“You don’t?”

“That’s right. I entered the Tower of Heroes, and the next thing I knew, I was here with you. I have no clue where this is or what’s going on.”

“Hmm...”

At the additional explanation, Wurgen fell into deeper thought. Then, after some contemplation, he spoke once more. “A future disciple... no, you said someone who could be calledmy future disciple?”

“Well, you did teach me a few of your skills in the future, but you never called me your disciple.”

“That makes sense. If you had said you were my future disciple, I’d have attacked you immediately.”

“...Why would you do that?”

Did Wurgen have some sort of twisted belief about master-disciple relationships?

“Because disciples are nothing but thieves aiming for their master’s skills and wealth. I’d have to be insane to accept one of those willingly.”

“...I see.”

The words “Aren’t you just overly projecting?” almost slipped from his lips, but Se-Hoon managed to hold them back. It wasn’t worth saying, especially since Wurgen wasn’t the kind of person who’d change his mind because of a few words. Besides, under someone like Wurgen, it was entirely possible for a disciple to end up behaving that way.

What should I even say... Wurgen is just Wurgen, as usual.

Although the atmosphere was slightly different, the essence of the man was unmistakably the same—a fact Se-Hoon realized through just that brief conversation.

Thinking it was interesting, Se-Hoon stared at Wurgen with slight curiosity, making Wurgen frown.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“...Sorry?”

“Oh, it’s just your filthy eyes. Stop looking in my direction. Your eyes are making me feel unpleasant.”

“...”

Past or present, Wurgen was still Wurgen. Maybe he should just knock him out and figure things out afterward? As Se-Hoon seriously considered it, the ground suddenly shook violently.

RUMBLE!

The entire forest quaked as if it might split apart.

“Tsk. It’s already regenerating. Kid, how’s your physical strength?”

“Barely S-rank, I suppose.”

“That’s not too bad. Carry me. I don’t want to waste mana on such trivial nonsense.”

Without hesitation, Wurgen demanded to be carried as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Annoyed, Se-Hoon was about to protest when he ultimately just offered his back obediently. He had experience carrying a rabid hellhound a few times, and following Wurgen’s orders also just seemed the safest option in the unfamiliar situation.

“That way!”

Boom!

Following Wurgen’s directions, Se-Hoon bolted forward. And as he ran, he started noticing shadowy, mist-like shapes spread throughout the forest.

“Aaaahhhh...!”

The black mist, which turned out to be undead, let out ghastly wails in pursuit.

Seeing them as well, Wurgen reached out his gaunt left hand with an annoyed expression.

Woong-

Runes etched densely across his withered hand glowed black, generating a powerful force that sucked in the undead.

“Aaaaaagh...!”

Still screaming, the undead were all absorbed into Wurgen’s hand. At the sight, it dawned on Se-Hoon that Wurgen was using necromancy to force the undead into servitude.

Such a realization fascinated him.

So, before ascending the tower, he was just a regular necromancer.

The current Wurgen, whom all undead would bow to without hesitation, was a stark contrast to the version on his back. It seemed in the past, necromancy required direct effort—chasing, subduing, and binding the undead to his will.

“What are you staring idly at? Run faster!”

“Yes, yes, I’m on it.”

Spurred by Wurgen’s impatience, Se-Hoon started running faster and faster until they finally broke free from the dense forest and entered an open clearing. There, Se-Hoon narrowed his eyes at the now revealed bleak mountain range under a sky covered in stormy clouds.

Right, this isn’t reality.

In the past, the war against the Demon Force had altered several terrains. The environment here felt fundamentally different from the ones he remembered.

“You said you arrived here after entering the Tower of Heroes, right?” As if having read Se-Hoon’s thoughts, Wurgen, still perched on his back, spoke up again.

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“The same thing happened to me.”

Startled, Se-Hoon rapidly spun his head to confirm his thoughts. Immediately, his gaze landed on a bright white tower visible in the distance, which, even under the dim sky, its radiance was unmistakable—a clear indication of being inside the Tower of Heroes.

However, that wasn’t the most shocking part.

Thud-

Beyond the forest and mountains, a massive black figure also loomed, slowly approaching their location.It emitted an incomprehensible scream as its mist-like body spread and moved. And with every step, undead similar to the ones Wurgen had just bound were endlessly falling out.

Its overwhelming presence left Se-Hoon petrified, even forgetting he was mid-stride, as he stared at it in a daze.

What... is that?

The creature, looking as though it embodied the very concept of death, inspired not fear, but awe.

Captivated, Se-Hoon found himself unable to look away—

“Eyes forward!”

His head was suddenly grabbed and forcibly turned by Wurgen.

Crack!

“Ugh!”

Feeling as though his neck bone had been shattered, Se-Hoon let out a pained groan.

“What the hell was that for?!” Se-Hoon yelled, shooting Wurgen a glare.

“Your soul would’ve been sucked out if you’d kept staring at that. You should be thanking me for saving your life.”

It was an explanation that left Se-Hoon dumbfounded.

What on earth is that thing...?

As if prompted by his thoughts, Wurgen followed up. “That’s the source of power for us necromancers. In simple terms, it’s death itself. My guess is that this trial is about subduing or defeating it to reach the tower.”

“You mean...”

“Yeah.”

With a nod, Wurgen calmly delivered the staggering truth.

“You’ve landed in my final trial: the 444th floor.”

***

In the President’s office at the UD Group headquarters, silence reigned where numerous screens once displayed global news.

The only one in the room was a lone skull resting atop the cushion on the desk. Its eye sockets were pitch black, as if it were sleeping.

In that quiet place, a wrinkled hand slowly reached toward the lone skull.

Slash!

A black blade suddenly severed the hand at the wrist.

“Argh...!”

Caught off guard, the elderly woman who the hand belonged to—Laura Kruger—stumbled back, clutching her wrist.

“I remember I told you I’m never fully asleep. How many times must I tell this to you fools?” Blue flames flared to life within the skull’s sockets as Wurgen’s voice filled the room.

His gaze then turned toward his eldest daughter, who had sneaked into the office.

“Now, what business do you have with me?”

“I have something to tell you, Father—”

“Drop the pathetic act. I don’t want to waste any more of my time.”

At the calm interruption, Laura’s body stiffened. But while fear flickered in her eyes, her strong resolve remained.

Then, slowly, her gaze sharpened, her eyes curving into a crescent-moon smile.

“What’s this? You knew who I was all along? Turns out you have more of a soft spot for family than I thought.”

“How could I not when your soul is all saturated with filth?”

Letting out a weary sigh, Wurgen looked at Laura—or rather Tuner—and spoke again. “So? Since when have you two been working together?”

“Hmm... The deal itself was made eight years ago. Your daughter seemed increasingly worried about her wrinkles as they started piling up. All I did was offer her a few procedures here and there.”

“Tsk... All because of that obsession with immortality.”

Thanks to the explanation, Wurgen quickly pieced together how his eldest daughter had ended up with her body taken over.

As she got older, her fear of death had grown, driving her to desperation. Her obsession with extending her lifespan had thus led her to reach out to Tuner, sealing her fate.

“Since she was so desperate to become immortal, she should’ve just turned into an undead herself.... Tsk, truly a foolish creature.”

“Haha! That’s not a bad choice, I suppose. At least she wouldn’t have ended up without her body like this.”

Letting out a hearty laughter, Tuner picked up the severed left hand and reattached it with a casual shrug.

“But can you blame her? Imagine how much she must’ve hated living under your shadow to resort to this.”

“To be fine losing her body for that?”

“Hmm, well, she didn’t like it, but hey, thanks to her, I got this chance to deliver a blow to you. That alone is worth celebrating, isn’t it?”

At Tuner’s playful words, Wurgen narrowed his eyes.

“Tell me. What kind of mischief are you planning this time?”

“Oh, nothing too big. Things haven’t exactly been going well for us lately, so...”—grinning at Wurgen, Tuner snapped his fingers—“I figured I’d kill you to restore some balance.”

BOOM!

Laura’s body, tweaked into a living bomb by the Tuner, exploded. The blast was so powerful that it obliterated the office and reduced half of the UD Group’s headquarters to dust.

WEEE-WOO!

Immediately, alarms blared across the city as screams echoed everywhere.

And high above in the sky, Tuner, in his bird-like mask, was overlooking it all while stroking his chin.

“Hmm... was that not enough? I put quite a bit of effort into that.”

The bomb, a bioweapon designed to be effective against those that share the same blood, was a weapon that could only be created by abducting the target’s family.

But unfortunately, there was no satisfying result.

“What now?” asked Puppeteer, controlling a small doll perched on Tuner’s shoulder.

“We continue with the assault, of course. Who knows when we’ll get another chance like this?”

Tuner had heard the rumors about the anomaly detected in the Tower of Heroes as well, and he had come up with his own theory that was not publicly disclosed but plausible.

It’s likely a fusion of reality and the Tower’s interior, allowing anyone to ascend without risking their lives. Quite ingenious.

Even the Emperor of Ascension wouldn’t be able to leave Babel after setting up such a complex evaluation exam. But what was more important was that Se-Hoon was also trapped inside too—making now the perfect chance.

The next step is...

As Tuner plotted his next move, a black darkness gushed over the ruined UD headquarters like a cascading waterfall, devouring everything in its path. Then, from within the darkness, a pure white skull emerged while absorbing the darkness into itself like a cloak.

“Going all out already, huh? Scary.”

Wurgen Kruger, the Eternal Nocturne, was someone who once single-handedly turned the tide of the war against the Demon Force by subjugating all undead to his will. And even without his legion, his near-infinite mana reserve alone was overwhelming, fitting for someone who had conquered a Tower of Heroes.

Rumble-

From the depths of the shadows, undead soldiers began appearing one by one. The legion—former allies of Wurgen, enslaved simply because they had died, and also former enemies, subjugated in vengeance—had only become stronger with time.

“As expected, a direct confrontation seems impossible,” Tuner muttered, observing the massive army.

Even if he deployed every experimental subject and tuned soldier of Exuviation, they still couldn’t defeat Wurgen. The gap between them wasn’t just a matter of tactics—it was an absolute difference in strength.

Knowing that fact better than anyone, Tuner spoke to Puppeteer. “Let’s move to the next phase.”

At the signal, Puppeteer simultaneously sent commands to all autonomous dolls hidden in Danger Zones controlled by the UD Group, causing assaults to erupt worldwide.

“It’s an ambush from the Demon Force! Shoot them down!”

Stationed in the zones, the undead didn’t falter against the sudden attacks and fought back immediately. In regular combat, the autonomous dolls had the upper hand due to their immunity to pain. Against the undead, however, that was no longer the case.

Boom!

Like them, the undead also felt no pain and could even regenerate indefinitely with the mana of the Netherworld. That was why, despite the ambush, they dominated the battlefield.

However, Puppeteer had never intended to suppress them in the first place.

THUD!

The autonomous dolls plunged cylindrical devices into the undead’s bodies, creating strange changes as the devices synchronized with their souls.

Clink-

All across the world, the undead began losing their sanity, endlessly absorbing mana from the Netherworld.

“This...”

Detecting what was occurring, Wurgen narrowed his eyes even further.

Not only was his mana being drained, but his consciousness was splintering into countless fragments. He felt like his very being was splitting into thousands.

“Is this your doing?” Wurgen looked up, shooting Tuner a deathly glare.

“How could I resist using such an interesting toy?”

The device, designed to strengthen the souls of the undead, had been slightly tampered with when Tuner found a way to turn it into a weapon customized for hunting down Wurgen.

“I just had a thought. While it’s impossible to fuse the undeads’ souls because they were too distinct, what if they were altered to become similar?”

By tweaking Soul Frame’s functions, Tuner tuned the souls of the undead, making them all mimic Wurgen’s. And the result? The undead, believing themselves to be Wurgen, mindlessly consumed massive amounts of mana.

“Urgh...”

The black cloak of darkness surrounding Wurgen wavered, and his Einherjars were dragged deeper into the Netherworld. With thousands of entities with souls similar to Wurgen’s issuing conflicting orders, chaos broke loose among his forces.

“Once even one of you dies, the rest will collapse like dominoes. And just like that, the legendary Eternal Nocturne, Wurgen Kruger, will end here. Don’t you find this fascinating?”

Before the staggering Wurgen, Tuner descended confidently under his glare.

“You...”

“It is a rather anticlimactic ending, but it’s much easier than facing you outright. Okay then, goodbye now.”

Pulling a violet-glowing dagger from his coat, Tuner raised it high.

“So that’s it.”

The wavering darkness around Wurgen calmed abruptly.

“What?!”

Before Tuner could react, the darkness morphed into sharp spikes that immediately pierced through his entire body.

Splurt!

Impaled all over, blood sprayed. Tuner hung in the air, his black blood dripping onto the ground.

Now utterly calm, Wurgen gestured with his hand. Like normal, a skeleton appeared from the shadows and picked up the fallen violet dagger that it then respectfully presented to Wurgen.

“A dagger infused with the power of the Dream Demon... truly dangerous.”

If struck in his current unstable state, even he might have succumbed to eternal slumber.

“So you... knew all along...” Tuner gasped, now a mangled mess.

“Of course. I knew you’d come for me today and even how you’d try to kill me.”

If that was true, then Wurgen could have ended it all before it even began. But he hadn’t. Why?

Though unable to understand at first, Tuner figured it out almost immediately.

“Ha... You used me... to break free of the leash Lee Se-Hoon placed on you.... You... completely outplayed me...”

Though he had guessed correctly, Wurgen didn’t respond. He found further conversation unnecessary because he had achieved his goal already.

Now for the next step.

Before others—be it other Perfect Ones or Se-Hoon—could interfere, Wurgen would take advantage of his splintering to ascend to the next stage.

“But...”

Just as he was about to, however, Tuner smirked.

“Do you really think this will clear your doubts?”

“...What are you talking about?”

Wurgen, who was about to activate his power of Boundaries, shot a sharp glare at Tuner.

Tuner continued to grin slyly. “It’s pretty obvious what you’re trying to do. You’re planning to merge the entire world with the Netherworld, turning all of humanity into beings like you. Right?”

“...”

“And you’re doing it now because Ludwig and Se-Hoon are conveniently out of the picture.”

To merge the entire world with the Netherworld and trap humanity in the boundary between life and death—framed positively, it could be seen as elevating all humans into immortal beings. But in truth, it was nothing less than mass genocide, a forcible conversion of everyone into undead.

“There’s no malice in it, of course... that’s just the path dictated by the law that governs you, Wurgen Kruger. It’s the essence of what you Perfect Ones are, isn’t it?”

“Is that all you have to say?”

Crunch-

The spikes piercing Tuner’s body drove deeper, tearing Tuner’s body as black blood spilled out. A normal living being would have died long ago, but Tuner continued to speak, unfazed. “Listen... even the very act of questioning yourself is part of that law. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“Silence.”

“Whether you turn all of humanity into undead... or shroud the world in the Netherworld and annihilate all life... your question will never be answered, you fool...!”

CRACK!

Before Tuner could finish, the darkness of the Netherworld swallowed him entirely, tearing apart the remains of his body.

“...”

Even the very act of questioning himself was a part of Wurgen Kruger’s law—Wurgen understood what those words meant, yet he felt no need to stop. He was well aware his doubts would never be answered, but for him, that only reaffirmed the path he had to walk.

Was this truly what I was seeking?

The question had haunted him daily since conquering the Tower of Heroes. He had revisited the memories of his past more times than he could count, yet he still found no answer.

That was why all he could do was continue forward. There was no other choice.

Suppressing unnecessary thoughts, Wurgen focused again on preparations to use the power of Boundaries.

But just as he was about to activate it...

“Father!”

Startled, Wurgen turned to see Julia rushing toward him, her face full of alarm. He immediately scanned her soul.

...She’s clean.

Confirming it was indeed his daughter and not Tuner, Wurgen halted his attack.

“Go back. This is no place for—”

Before he could finish, Julia pulled out a massive coffin from her void pocket. Naturally, Wurgen’s gaze fell on the figure inside.

“...!”

An old man, his hands folded over his chest, was sleeping peacefully inside. Furthermore... he looked identical to Wurgen’s younger self—a memory long buried in the past.

Thunk!

The violet dagger plunged into Wurgen’s chest.

“What...?”

His left hand, seemingly acting on its own, had betrayed him. His eyes wide, Wurgen soon heard a familiar voice.

“Thanks for all the hard work pretending.”

Having successfully exploited the distraction, Tuner smiled as he manipulated Wurgen’s left hand once more to cover his eyes.

“It’s time to wake up.”

At the call, the coffin creaked open and the old man resembling the past Wurgen slowly opened his eyes.