He's Controlling Demons?

The moment the hole in the ceiling realigned into concentric circles, the moonlight pouring down fell vertically onto the Magic Array on the ground.

It was precisely midnight.

At that moment, Brunhilde's entire body tensed, and her eyes widened round.

Her pupils contracted, and utter disbelief flashed across her face.

It was as if the Magic Array had absorbed and gathered all the moonlight in the palace, dimming the surrounding light while the array itself gave off a silvery radiance.

Glowing patterns also emerged across King Solomon's body as he stood within the Magic Array. They spread over his entire body, mysterious patterns that gave off an unfathomable feeling.

Those patterns seemed to be forcibly pressing themselves into his skin. She could see King Solomon's body trembling slightly, cold sweat continuously beading on his face.

This scene was remarkably similar to the process of ascending to godhood.

There was one difference, however: the ritual to ascend to godhood took place during the day, when the midday sun hung high overhead.

"Sister Brunhilde, th-this...!"

By now, Goll had naturally noticed something. Her voice trembled with disbelief.

"Is he trying to become a god?"

Th-this was absurd. It was simply impossible.

"No, probably not."

The energy required for godhood, once focused into the Magic Array, would easily reduce a human to ashes.

That was why King Solomon had borrowed the power of moonlight.

Moonlight looked like light shining from the moon onto the earth, but those rays did not actually originate from the moon. They were sunlight.

After sunlight struck the moon and scattered and reflected off it, the resulting moonlight was far weaker than direct sunlight.

The ritual before them also seemed to be nearing its end. The light of the Magic Array gradually faded, and the patterns on King Solomon's body also seemed to disappear.

No, the patterns on King Solomon's body had not disappeared. They had seeped into his body, which was why they could no longer be seen.

Judging by his condition, he no longer seemed to be in pain. In fact, he looked somewhat pleased. Had the experiment succeeded?

The next second, he raised one hand before his eyes, as if he were holding something.

What was he looking at in his hand? It was empty. There was nothing there.

No, something appeared. Light gradually gathered in his hand, and specks of light began to emerge.

From several specks, they continuously multiplied into hundreds, turning crimson as though a mass of sparks had gathered together. Finally, with a whoosh, a ball of flame appeared in his palm.

The next moment, the flame gradually vanished and became specks of light again. The white specks merged together, shifting toward transparency, becoming a writhing sphere of water.

Just as before, the water sphere turned back into specks of light. Then the specks formed a vortex—a flowing current of air. Wind!

"Sister Brunhilde, is th-this Magic?"

Goll's eyes were wide, her expression stiff.

In truth, she understood that this was not Magic. It was simply too unbelievable for her to face reality.

"Yes, it's Magic."

Huh? Even her sister said so? Was she unable to face it too?

"Magic that can affect reality. Magic that can kill."

That additional explanation made Goll's mouth fall open.

"Th-then isn't that sorcery?"

Yes, it was sorcery. She needed to accept reality.

A mere human had mastered sorcery. With a mortal body, he had touched the Divine Realm.

This was even more bizarre and outrageous than the deeds of a certain god widely known throughout the Heavenly Realm.

That god was also the one Goll admired and revered most. In human fan terms, he was her idol.

Terrifying monsters such as the Nemean Lion and Hell's gatekeeper Cerberus—he had tamed them all with his bare hands.

He had completed twelve grueling, supposedly impossible trials of purgatory, creating legends. From a demigod, he had gone on to become a god truly recognized by the gods, one of their own.

He was a god who did not exude the arrogance of gods, and he cherished her as though she were his younger sister.

He was the mighty god of Greek Mythology—Hercules.

In fact, Hercules had been delayed by other matters and failed to make it to this Valhalla Conference. Otherwise, he would certainly have voted against it, because like Sister Brunhilde, he was close to humanity.

Yet now, the person before Goll had accomplished something even more outrageous than Hercules.

With a mortal body, he stood shoulder to shoulder with gods!

Wait—!

Goll thought of a possibility.

"Th-this might have been bestowed by that god, perhaps?"

Brunhilde did not answer Goll's words. In truth, she had suspected the same thing, because it was simply too absurd.

So Brunhilde rewound the historical footage.

As the footage rewound, they saw King Solomon repeatedly attempting this array and conducting quite a few human experiments—all on criminal offenders.

"Ugh...!"

Goll covered her mouth to keep herself from crying out, because she had seen a horrifying sight that made her scalp tingle.

What kind of horrifying sight was it? It was the sight of the test subjects failing. Most of them met their end with their bodies exploding like balloons.

With that, Goll's possibility could probably be ruled out.

In that case, King Solomon had clearly figured it out himself through wisdom.

Of course, Brunhilde did not believe King Solomon had figured out every part of it alone. Perhaps he had seen the array for ascending to godhood through some means, then researched it himself and developed an array suitable for humans.

Though it had not been created from nothing and had been developed by drawing on an existing model, it was still outrageously absurd.

The gods had always believed humans could never come into contact with the truth of the universe. Even the gods had failed to create an array that would allow humans to touch the truth of the Universal Substrate.

Normally, for someone to become a god, either a god and human had to unite and give birth to a demigod with divine blood, or one had to consume God's Blood in order to touch the supernatural.

There had never been a method that allowed humans to directly touch those things with their physical bodies. It was not that no one had tried—the result was always sudden death.

So didn't that mean King Solomon's wisdom surpassed that of the gods?

PS: The simulations won't all be completed before the opening. After King Solomon, the story will begin with one more.

He Was Controlling Demons? ### This was too interesting. Far too interesting!

She had encountered another monster.

Simply by having touched such a thing, he was qualified to become one of the thirteen people who would decide humanity's fate and survival.

Of course, Brunhilde still needed to observe him carefully.

She needed to determine exactly what the Supreme Four Pillars were up to and what conspiracy they had planned.

Time returned to the point where King Solomon had successfully touched the Divine Realm.

Although King Solomon had now touched the Universal Substrate and seemed capable of using so-called sorcery, he was still some distance away from casting genuine sorcery.

At present, he had only touched the basics. He still needed to confidently explore how to transform and release sorcery in different ways, rather than merely forming a ball of fire in his hand. He needed to learn how to use it, how to shape flames into all kinds of attacks.

How to launch them, how to compress them, how to make them explode—he needed to research and create all of it himself.

Come to think of it, demigods like them had not entered the gods' Magic Array to ascend into true gods, so did that mean they could not use sorcery? Of course not.

Demigods like them could naturally use sorcery, but there was still a gap between their sorcery and that used by true gods.

True gods could use the Universal Substrate—the power of the Root—to unleash sorcery with power on an entirely different level.

King Solomon now appeared to have touched the Substrate as well, but that did not mean he could unleash power on the same level as the gods.

That limitation existed because he was human while gods were gods. The difference in the strength of their bodies was enormous, so how much power sorcery could exert depended greatly on how much force the body could withstand.

As they continued watching, King Solomon seemed to have grown tired of the changes in his hand. Was he just going back to sleep?

Then, after intermittent observation lasting half a month, King Solomon had successfully created sorcery in the true sense of the word.

Although this sorcery seemed basic to Brunhilde, that was because they could directly learn from existing magical knowledge. King Solomon was different—he had researched it alone.

"Ah-ha~!"

That was Goll yawning. Though they had not watched continuously for every second over the past half month, the total viewing time had still exceeded a hundred hours.

They skipped directly ahead by half a year to see whether anything major had changed.

It was daytime now. King Solomon was, as always, busy handling all sorts of affairs. Once night came, he would probably be creating sorcery again.

They arrived at the great hall where King Solomon discussed matters with his ministers. Deputy officials from the twelve administrative districts were also reporting their respective districts' recent situations to King Solomon.

"That is the Sixth Administrative District's current situation, Your Majesty."

After delivering his report, the Sixth Administrative District's deputy governor wore a grief-stricken expression.

According to his report, the Sixth Administrative District had once again been attacked by nomadic tribes along the border, suffering heavy losses. They needed the Royal Capital to provide sufficient materials and funds to build defenses and prevent those hateful nomads from crossing the border for surprise attacks.

After hearing the report, King Solomon was neither saddened nor angered. He merely sighed.

"Is that so? Then how much do you think is needed?"

After King Solomon said that, the deputy governor of the Sixth Administrative District named an amount that made the other deputy officials frown slightly.

Seeing this, Brunhilde intended to skip ahead.

At the same time, she was about to withdraw her disgusted gaze from the Sixth Administrative District's deputy governor.

This man might fool others, but he could not fool her eyes. The deputy governor was lying.

That amount had likely been deliberately inflated. He intended to embezzle a considerable portion of it.

However, just as her gaze was about to shift away and she was about to fast-forward, something rather strange suddenly occurred.

"Ahhh...!"

Accompanied by a piercing scream, the deputy governor's right ear fell to the floor.

It was extremely strange. How could an ear fall off for no reason?

It looked as though an invisible blade had suddenly cut it off.

Had King Solomon used a wind blade to sever the deputy governor's ear?

But Brunhilde had not seen the king make any motion to cast sorcery. He merely sat naturally upon his throne.

"Yakos, lying is not good, understand?"

Faced with this scene, King Solomon narrowed his eyes and spoke in a faintly amused tone.

That meant the loss of the deputy governor Yakos's ear was undoubtedly connected to King Solomon.

But how had he done it?

"Your Majesty, what? I-I don't understand what you mean, can—ahhh!"

He screamed again. This time, the fingers of his right hand were crushed into pulp by something invisible without any warning.

"So, can you explain exactly what the Sixth Administrative District is doing, Yakos?"

"Your Majesty, I don't understand—ahhhhhhh!"

It was a heart-rending scream, so agonizing that no one in the entire hall could bear to watch.

This time, one of his eyeballs burst out, while half his face was torn away by an unseen force.

At that moment, no matter how foolish the others were, they could understand that the deputy governor's strange fate was connected to their king.

At that moment, their king became extraordinarily mysterious.

"Next time, your heart will be torn out, Yakos."

King Solomon narrowed his eyes and wore a faint smile. That made the screaming Yakos instantly drop to his knees.

"I'll talk, I'll talk..."