Chapter 144

For me, who wanted to reduce the sentence of the Seven Heroes still being held in hell, Enma’s proposed conditions once stood in my way. With the power of the Ancient Celestial Dragon and the God-created Magic Beasts, Enma persuaded the Great Sorcerer Bastrell, who opposed it, and this caused him to wish for reincarnation.

Enma wouldn’t tell me what any of the Seven Heroes were being held for, as it was classified information belonging to hell, but I still want to make it easier for them, who I consider as my friends, so I did not raise any objections.

But to think Bastrell’s name would come up here, that was truly unexpected.

If you ask Enma, Bastrell is a dead man like no other.

There have been plenty of dead humans, dead magic beasts, dead demons, and dead gods up until now, but Bastrell was the first to contain both the factors of an Ancient Celestial Dragon and an evil Sacred Beast.

The Ancient Celestial Dragon factor, whether he continued to stay condemned in hell or get reincarnated, would continue to be a tremendous restraint on him. If I am the only one who can do something about that, and I am one of the reasons why he was reborn in this world, then I can’t stand by and do nothing about it.

As for Lenia, she either knew about Enma’s request or ignored it, but in my case, it’s harder to say.

I left the room together with Enma and proceeded into the courthouse’s corridor, where we occasionally passed by many gods of judgement and punishment and their followers or guards, and they all bowed their heads to us.

When Enma leaves her post, everyone else becomes busier, but if Enma continues to work without solving the problem with Bastrell, then her work efficiency would probably go down as a result, so everyone knew this was a situation that couldn’t be helped.

With scarlet and violet corridors and numerous buildings, and with the voices of the dead reaching our ears, we continued onward without rest, until we arrived at a corner which led into hell, and was heavily protected by the prison guards.

There was a male demon with green skin and a magnificent horn growing from his head, and a beautiful female demon of large build with two horns and straight black hair. There was also a half-beast, half-human person with the head of a dog with pitch-black fur. They all belonged to the god Anubis.

Anubis is to Enma what Thanatos and Hypnos are to Hades; he is her closest aide among all her subordinates.

Originally a completely different kind of god compared to Enma, a Buddhist god, Anubis held divinity and authority fitting of a Greater God, surpassing even Enma in form, but standing as her equal in essence.

As far as I knew, there haven’t been any criminals who ever escaped after falling into hell, but the guards continued to protect the gate without slacking in the slightest. It was good that they are faithful to their professional duties.

The guards at the gate lowered their heads to us without a single movement out of place, and the gates of hell made of black stone slowly opened up to the other side.

The ones in hell are the dead who have committed sins, and the ones bestowing blame and punishment on them are the prison guards. The hell is in the shape of a funnel, and the further down you went, the heavier the sins of the prisoners, until you reach the ones who will never be forgiven of their crimes for all eternity.

The ones at the top most layer are given a relatively lesser sentence, while Bastrell has probably fallen close to the bottom most floor.

I could see many burning lamps glowing in regular intervals through the darkness. The path underfoot was bare dirt, but the area around the gate contained the residences of the guards, which served as a fortress to prevent the escape of the criminals.

In front of the open gates to hell, Enma spoke to me.

「Shall I lead you to where Bastrell is?」

「I’m grateful for your consideration, but I know where Bastrell is from here. Because of our relationship, we can both easily tell where the other is」

「You sure don’t look too happy about that. I’ve talked with the guards here in hell. There isn’t anyone here who doesn’t know who you are.

But if Bastrell says anything to you, don’t use your power too recklessly, okay? It would be terrible if you end up destroying hell and all the prisoners escape into the Underworld」

「I’ll do my best. But, Bastrell, huh? I still hear it in my head, the last words he said to me. Truthfully, my current state of mind is a bit complicated」

It was the words he said when he realized that he’d been dancing in the palm of my hand all along, the words he powerlessly whispered when he was trapped in despair.

I didn’t pay it much attention at the time, but now that I look back on it, several thoughts about it pop up.

If we had met differently, if we had met sooner, or if Bastrell just had a different nature as a person; all these different possibilities crossed my mind.

But now, all of them were impossible. I know thinking about it is useless. But, still…

「Dragon, please look through this on your way there. It’s a record of everything that was in Bastrell’s heart and everything that happened to him while he was alive」

Telling me that, the thing that Enma handed over to me was a small hand-mirror.

It was a sacred treasure similar to the mirror Enma owns, which is used to show all the good and bad deeds of a person during their time of judgement. I could tell with just a single glance what it was.

Her mirror is a tool made to ascertain the good and evil of the dead, but this was a similar object of lower quality.

「Now I don’t know if it would have been better or not if I never knew, but it seems you had to make a hard decision」

As I looked at the silver-lined hand mirror, I couldn’t stop a bitter smile from forming at my mouth.

「Hades once directly read the thoughts of that guy’s soul, but maybe it would’ve gone better if he’d pretended to be Lenia, your daughter. I wanted to tell you that, at least」

「Fumu, due to their circumstances, it’s true that Lenia and Bastrell are close. Lenia was blessed with many things, but aside from their own personalities, things might have been different for Bastrell too, had he been blessed as well.

No, there’s no point in thinking about that. Well, I will go now. I don’t think it will take too long, but…」

「I told you to convince him so he wishes for reincarnation, but feel free to talk to him as you wish. No matter the result, I’m sure it’ll turn out for the best.

If you talk to Bastrell, my business with him will be over. After you’re done, pay a visit to Mugen. She’s busy too, but I’m sure she’ll make time if it’s to meet with you」

「I plan to do that. You and Hades haven’t changed at all. So she probably hasn’t either. See you later」

Since I was meeting face to face with Bastrell, I thought it would be better to show myself in my Ancient Celestial Dragon form, rather than my human form. Deciding on that, I layered my dragon form over my human body.

As I heard sounds of admiration from the guards who saw me in my dragon form, I spread my six wings and flew into hell.

In one hell, the guards would endlessly cut into the prisoners’ bodies with rusted and broken swords until there was nowhere on their bodies left to cut, and then they would heal them, only to carve into their bodies once again.

In another hell, the criminals would be forced to lie on burning iron, and then on that same iron, they would be bound by rope and beaten with iron whips, then further cut with iron axes and saws.

And while they still had the same sense of pain they had when they were still alive, they were dropped into pots filled with boiling water or oil or molten iron, boiling, frying and cooking them for all eternity.

There were numerous types of punishments being dealt out in these various hells, but including the punishments specific to the prisoners in the deepest part of hell, all of these, in earth year terms, can go on for trillions to quadrillions of years.

But even this torture will someday end for most of these existences. But there are some whose sins run so deep, they will never be forgiven. They will never know reincarnation or destruction or forgiveness, and they will continue to be punished forever, so long as the Underworld itself doesn’t disappear.

The various hells appeared one by one along the exposed ground in the pitch black darkness, but I simply continued flying toward where Bastrell is.

From time to time, the prison guards would notice me and look up at me in surprise, but I had no time to deal with them.

Aside from the surprised faces of the guards, there were also countless new screams rising up, enough to make it seem like hell itself was shaking… Fumu, although their souls weren’t destroyed, their lives were killed by me, sending their souls down to hell.

By seeing me, their killer, they forgot even the torture of hell and couldn’t help but scream in fear and despair.

I was not reluctant to treat them a little gentler, but for now, I had no time left to spare for them. I’ll leave dealing with them to the people of the Underworld.

Bastrell had not fallen to a floor near the bottom most layer. He was on the actual bottom layer. It contained a hell that made all the hells above it look like a sweet dream, but considering what Bastrell had done, it was only natural that he was here.

At the bottom of the bottom of the bottom of the infinite darkness, my rainbow eyes could see the shape of the vague existence of the gate, which appeared to be both there and not there at the same time.

Compared to the main gates of hell, which were compact, the gate to the bottom most floor of hell was partly engraved into the ground, and each of the two doors had the faces of demons at its four corners.

No, the two doors of the gate themselves were actual demons. They were a living gate.

The mouths of the demons were open wide and dyed red, as if covered in blood, while the fangs they bared were pure white, without a single dark speck anywhere to be seen.

The demons at the gate had red faces, which were sprinkled with black spots here and there, and their wide open blue eyes acknowledged my presence with immense awe as they spoke to me. Their voice surprisingly gave off an impression of intelligence.

「We received news from Enma-sama. Ancient Celestial Dragon」

The exact same voice spun out those words, which came out of both of the two mouths at the same time, but all I could do was respond with an apology.

「Sorry to trouble you. You usually don’t open these gates unless to let criminals into hell, or for the prison guards to enter and exit」

「Your visit is of far more importance than any of those things. Moreover, if it is for Enma-sama or Mugen-sama, then we would never consider it troublesome. Now then, Dragon-sama, please enter」

After the two demons spoke in chorus, the two doors of the gate opened, and on the other side was a hell filled with screams and cries of pain that was on a completely different level from any of the previous levels of hell, and I flew right in.

NEXT CHAPTER

01d 17:36:20

Become a VIP
Question icon
Become a VIP and enjoy the benefits of being able to read chapters in advance of the current release schedule.

  • Read +1 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $5 / month
  • Read +2 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $10 / month
  • Read +4 extra chapters (inc. Ad-FREE experience)
    $20 / month

RELEASE RATE

Goodbye Dragon Life, Hello Human Life

Speed up schedule by 10 hours

125 / 55000

Current schedule: Every 70 hours

SPEED UP SCHEDULE
Question icon
Use Krystals to speed up the schedule of this novel. When the bar is completely filled, the schedule will be updated manually by an admin and the chapters will release at a rate 10 hours faster. E.g. 70 Publish Hours will be reduced to 60 Published Hours. Any excess Krystals donated will be credited to the next speed-up schedule if available or refunded to your account

Novel Schedule

Goodbye Dragon Life, Hello Human Life

Schedule will be reduced when the goal is reached

Balance: 0

Comment (0)

Get More Krystals