The Max Level Hero Has Returned!-Chapter 1156

The Max Level Hero Has Returned!-Chapter 1156

Chapter 1156
“He’s similar to him, in a lot of ways.”
Thinking of Park Seung-Hyun’s dazed, empty expression as he walked away, Reina let out a faint, sorrowful smile.
Having left work for her break earlier than usual, the cityscape looked different to her. It made sense, especially since there was no way customers would come out to a street where a giant bug had suddenly emerged and wreaked havoc.
In the end, the boss decided to close early and sent everyone home, citing the uneasy atmosphere and potential danger.
Bizarrely, there weren’t any traces of the bug’s appearance aside from the initial tremors. Ignoring the chaos caused by the panicked people, the area looked perfectly clean—almost suspiciously so. It was as if the whole thing had been an illusion.
Super Ribbon had already left earlier to prepare for her entrance exams for Korea University. Reina, since alone, silently stared down at the busy city’s scenery.
Park Seung-Hyun was a polite young man with a good personality. That wasn’t why Reina had treated him so kindly, however.
‘Commander... I’ll come back alive, so please believe in me.’
The voice of a young black-haired man, two to three years younger than her, echoed in her mind.
“
Ah. Aah...
” Reina clutched her head, both hands pressed over her ears as she sat on the rooftop’s edge. She’d thought she was over it, but her chest would still constrict and ache from time to time.
Davey had once helped her erase the memories of her past. Alas, there were some memories that slowly came back to her through dreams.
From what she could tell, the young man in her dream had been one of the more cheerful members of the resistance army. He was the kind of person who tried to lighten even the most oppressive of atmospheres. He was also someone who never doubted that the world would become a better place after the war with the demons was over.
In fact, his voice had changed the resistance army’s attitude and morale over the years. Where despair had once consumed everyone, a faint spark of hope had begun to glow. People found the strength to rise again.
However, his end was anything but hopeful.
The bombardment unit, led by the terrifying first-generation Lich Nyx, had ambushed the unit he was in, surrounding them in an instant. The resistance mounted a rescue operation once they realized what was happening, but by the time reinforcements arrived, they were already too late.
There were no survivors, only corpses shredded by the relentless bombardment.
The young man who had been the hope of the resistance had died there. The regret of failing to protect him still haunted Reina in her dreams.
She thought about how nice it would be to be able to bury that dream under something else.
Letting out a deep sigh, Reina tried to shake off the negative thoughts.
Park Seung-Hyun, also known as Moderation, may have had a different name, background, experiences, and age, but his aura reminded her so much of that young man. That was why she, who rarely let anyone get close, had been unusually playful around him.
“You look troubled,” someone whispered into her ear.
Startled, Reina turned her head to see Davey sitting at the edge of the rooftop with a fishing rod in hand, Perserque lounging perched on his shoulder.
“W-What are you doing here?” She couldn’t make sense of the scene. Not only was he suddenly there, but he was fishing from a rooftop. It wasn’t like there was water anywhere nearby!
She then noticed a strange red orb hooked onto the end of the fishing line, swaying gently in the air.
As Davey approached, Perserque waved sweetly at her from his shoulder. There was no real reason for her to take such a tiny form, but she often traveled around with Davey in her suitably travel-sized form.
“What are you doing up here?”
He simply responded, “Fishing.”
Reina squinted in disbelief at his ridiculous answer. “Fishing? There’s no water up here! Are you trying to catch people or something?”
“Nope.” Davey flicked the fishing rod with a faint chuckle, and Perserque lightly smacked the back of his head.
“I told you, that's a bad habit,” she scolded.
Grumbling, she fluttered off his shoulder and instead landed gently on Reina’s. “Would you like to see?”
“See what?”
“Dreams.”
Just as she finished her sentence, the red orb at the tip of his rod began to vibrate, emitting a strange high-pitched hum. At the same time, the scenery around them was gradually warped. Her vision blurred, as though she were underwater.
Just as the dizziness threatened to overtake her, Perserque touched her cheek and activated a spell, snapping her mind back into clarity.
“Awakening magic?”
“You gotta stay sharp. Fall asleep here, and you'll get pulled straight into the Dream World.”
“T-Thanks... Wait, Dream World?”
“This is a kind of reverse realm,” Davey explained calmly. “You saw that cockroach earlier, right?”
Her eyes widened. “Yes! What even was that thing?”
“What else? Just some brat playing around.”
* * *
The reverse realm that housed the Dream World. It wasn't quite a parallel world, instead more like a world inside of a mirror. To be exact, it was a space inside the dream of Goddess Freyja.
The surroundings looked hazy, like they were submerged in water. Once she got used to it, Reina let out a breath of awe, “
Whoooooa.
”
They were still on the rooftop of the building, yet everything else from the buildings to the cars, flying birds, and people looked like illusions.
“This feels like an illusion.”
“Exactly. It’s an illusion. The reverse world is inside Goddess Freyja’s dream, so it can’t affect Middle Earth. It also can’t be seen, under normal circumstances.”
Slash, slash!!
“
Eek?!
” Startled, Reina stepped back after giant cockroaches suddenly appeared around them.
There were seven in total. Each one was identical to the one Reina had sliced through when she was with Park Seung-Hyun.
She knew they were illusions and that they shouldn’t be able to affect her in any way.
Crack!!
One of them cracked the ground with its steps as it moved, and Reina’s face went cold.
She knew simple illusions couldn’t shatter concrete. She reached for her weapon in alarm, but Davey stopped her.
“It’s fine. Just wait.”
“What? They’re coming closer!”
Listening to her protest, Davey pulled out a card and flicked it into the air. “I’ve got guys who specialize in pest control.”
The card shimmered with light and summoned three figures wielding swords and axes. Their bodies were emaciated with pale gray skin, pretty much resembling mummies. However, rather than being terrifying, they instead just looked bizarre.
One of them turned to Davey and smirked. Then it approached Reina and Perserque and started dancing. It wasn’t just any dance—it was a crude and obscene one.
“Good grief... Seeing it in person is something else.”
Perserque sighed while Reina blushed and turned her head away in embarrassment.
Smack!!
Davey effectively silenced the dancer.
“Exterminate every single one of those cockroaches. Leave none alive.”
The summoned beings grumbled in protest at first, then Davey plucked out a few strands of hair and blew on them. Clones of himself abruptly sprang into being and immediately ganged up on the original summoned warrior, beating them down.
“I told you not to cross the line. Would you rather get whooped first and then move, or just move when I tell you?”
Cackling madly in what was either pain or joy, the summoned beings finally began to obey.
“Fuck ‘em up!”
“Let’s goooo!”
Laughing like lunatics, they charged at the cockroaches.
Reina felt her mind slipping. “What are those things?!”
“Fragments of my soul.”
“What?” She looked at him, clearly demanding an explanation.
They didn’t resemble Davey in the slightest! They were crude, violent, and ridiculously inappropriate. They were also all shirtless with only pants on, waving weapons around like maniacs.
Nothing about them was like Davey.
“There was a time when... I kinda lost it. Too much time passed, so I lost my mind a bit,” he spoke as if reminiscing, shaking his head. “Those are twisted parts of my personality that came from that time. I put them into fragments of my soul to give them form.”
Despite their ridiculous behavior, they were strong.
In the Dream World, where it was difficult to summon other subordinates like Killer Rabbit or the spirits, those beings served as his right hands in their stead. If there were anyone else he could summon, it’d likely be limited to those directly linked to him, like Rinne or Super Ribbon, but he hadn’t bothered to call them.
Even so, the ones he had chosen were far from reassuring. One of them had just gotten in Reina’s face moments before, swinging its hips with that disturbing dance.
Reina let out a long sigh.
Boom! Boom!!
“The cockroaches you saw on Earth were created here,” Davey explained. “It makes no sense for a creature from the reverse world to show up in reality.”
As the Dream World expanded, the being Nightmare emerged. Due to someone’s prank, they manifested as illusions in the real world. Of course, in the reverse realm, Earth itself was an illusion and everything else was real. That meant the giant bugs retained their true forms.
“Right now, they’re just illusions. Still, once they’re given enough time, a few real ones are bound to eventually break through.”
Expression blank, Reina lifted her head and looked to the sky. There were countless droplet-like orbs floating, some tens and others hundreds of meters wide.
Each one reflected a different world, fakes created by Goddess Freyja’s dream.
They weren’t dangerous per se, but waking up one night to find a meter-long cockroach rustling beside you in bed wasn’t something a sane person could handle.
“So you came to hunt this Nightmare thing?”
“I need the power that Nightmare holds. From the looks of it, so do you.” Davey spoke like he already knew everything. “That thing creates dreams. It can even envelop human dreams completely.”
Her expression grew more conflicted at his explanation.
Snap!!
Something had finally taken the bait on his line. The moment it tugged, his eyes lit up and he yanked the rod with glee. The space tore open before someone was revealed. At a glance, the figure resembled Goddess Freyja. Yet rather than a divine being, it was a small boy, no older than seven.
If Goddess Freyja were to become a childlike boy, it might’ve been what she would look like. Nonetheless, the boy’s mischievous expression clearly set them apart.
Pulled from the other side of space, the boy looked around nervously before bolting and trying to escape. Alas, Davey swiftly caught it by the scruff of the neck.
“So it was you who was pulling these pranks. Might be a good idea to stop now, while I’m still being nice.”
Reina wondered if the boy could even understand him.
The boy turned to Davey, mouth opening and closing soundlessly. It then suddenly thrust a hand toward him. Soap bubbles abruptly burst out and filled the air around them.
Startled, Reina quickly brushed the foam away, but the boy had already put some distance between them.
“
Hahahahahaha!
”
Floating in midair and clutching its stomach with laughter, the boy was the very image of a playful troublemaker.
What shocked Reina more, however, was the fact that Davey was holding the massive warhammer Corona Destroyer.
“Seems like it won’t be listening.”
“Davey, calm down.” Perserque tried to intervene, but his smile only grew darker.
The boy was playful but had no harmful intentions—not that it mattered to Davey.
The boy twirled through the air, sticking out its tongue and clearly having fun.
Boom! Boom!!
Down below, Davey’s soul fragments and the three musketeers were still tearing through the cockroaches. The boy, presumably Nightmare, darted around with bright, gleaming eyes.
Goddess Freyja’s words from some time before played again in Davey’s mind.
-
That child just wants to play. It needs someone to play with. So go ahead and entertain it first.
Davey paused, sighed, then tossed the hammer back into his Pocket Plane.
“
Hah...
Alright, kiddo. Wanna play?”
The boy's eyes widened, and it nodded eagerly.
“Have you ever heard of flash tag?” Davey pulled a small orb from his pocket. “This here’s a divine flash bomb some tech-pervert made. If it goes off, it’ll knock your ears and eyes out of commission for a few seconds.”
The boy curiously tilted its head, peering at the orb.
That’s when Perserque turned to Reina. “Reina, cover your ears and close your eyes.”
Reina was briefly stunned, but quickly obeyed.
Beep!!!
In the high-pitched ringing silence that followed afterward, Reina slowly opened her eyes and saw Nightmare flailing on the ground, rubbing its eyes and writhing in pain.
The moment it managed to open its eyes again, Davey grinned and pulled out another orb.
Nightmare paled in response.
-
I’ll give you what you need to control Nightmare. Tame it properly, and you’ll gain the power you need.
Aside from the fishing rod Goddess Freyja had given him to access the reverse world, she had provided Davey with several other tools.
Grinning, Davey said, “The rules are simple. If you can last five minutes without getting caught, you win. If you succeed, I’ll play with you all you want.”
Nightmare hesitated, eyeing him suspiciously. Just moments before, it had been thrilled to play, but it clearly sensed something else going on.
It took a few cautious steps back to distance itself.
“The chase starts in ten seconds.”
At those words, the boy didn’t look back. It just shot off into the sky.
“Ten...” Davey counted down slowly, unfazed by the speed it was getting away at. “Aaaand one. Ready or not, here I come.”
Boom!!!
With a shockwave that bent the surroundings, Davey tore through the air and seized Nightmare by the scruff.
“Gotcha. That resets the clock. Five minutes, starting from now. Perserque, keep time.”
She sighed and pulled out a stopwatch, then tapped the Transcendence’s Demise, spreading a dark barrier across the space.
Peering through the hazy barrier, Reina saw Davey thrust another flash orb directly in front of the boy. Nightmare turned ghostly pale as it violently shook its head. Davey gave a dark and terrifying grin while holding the orb close.
Goddess Freyja had told him that the flash orbs worked especially well on Nightmare.
Boom!! Beep!!
Once again, Nightmare clutched its eyes and writhed around in midair. After flailing for a while, its vision had returned and it looked around in panic.
It flashed away to escape, only to find Davey waiting for it with a wide smile and palms wide open. He had bright red flash orbs in between each of his fingers.
Panicking, Nightmare changed its form. It was no longer a boy, instead becoming a girl. It resembled a child version of Goddess Freyja.
“N-No!!” Nightmare screamed.
A series of explosions detonated in quick succession.
“What are you doing? Run! You just need to last five minutes.”
Davey's chilling grin accompanied the echoing blasts, while Nightmare howled and flailed through the air, tumbling endlessly in agony.
Reina had been worried that the appearance of the bugs might’ve caused some serious trouble. However, watching Davey relentlessly torment Nightmare made her start to pity the poor thing.

Chapter 1156