Chapter 140
The Bait
Though it was only a country manor, it had once belonged to a noble family.
That meant it wasn't a building that could be brought down by ordinary magic or explosions.
An explosion of that magnitude...
There was no way either Regent Ferda or the demon could have survived.
Even so, the company commander sprinted toward the ruined estate.
Ferda couldn't die.
Not until they understood exactly what his death would mean.
As dust and rubble filled the air, a single figure remained standing in the middle of the destruction.
The demon?
The commander drew his sword, aura flaring around its blade.
To his astonishment...
The figure belonged to the man he knew.
Ferda Valdrova.
The Regent stood proudly amid the ruins.
"Regent! Are you unharmed?"
The knight captain rushed toward him.
Without a word, Ferda threw a sphere of mana.
It exploded precisely at the captain's feet.
Boom!
"Gah!"
"What are you doing?!"
"Don't come any closer."
Ferda's warning was firm.
His eyes never left a single point among the rubble.
"He's still alive."
Still alive?
A moment later...
Just as Ferda had said...
Something stirred beneath the debris.
It emerged exactly along the path the captain had been taking.
"I was hoping to take a few more of you with me..."
The demon sighed.
"But you saw right through it."
"Even on the verge of death, you still won't drop that ridiculous way of talking."
"Haha..."
"I never thought you were weak..."
"But you turned out to be much stronger than I expected."
The demon tried to stand on his mangled legs.
Again...
And again...
They refused to support him.
The legendary regenerative abilities of demonkind were no longer working.
"That strange lightning..."
"It's so powerful that even my regeneration won't heal the wounds."
"If this keeps up..."
"I really am going to die."
He smiled unpleasantly, extending his claws.
"So..."
"How about taking me with you as your companion?"
"I already have one."
"How enviable."
"The beautiful tyrant, wasn't it?"
"If only I'd been born a woman..."
The demon's life was rapidly fading.
With the last of his strength, he spoke again.
"Would you tell me..."
"What exactly you did to me?"
"Think of it as a farewell gift before I return to the Void."
"Do I look like an idiot?"
"Hehe..."
"You're difficult to the very end."
At last...
The demon dropped to one knee.
"Then..."
"Let me tell you a secret instead."
"I don't need one."
"My objective..."
He smiled.
"...was simply to lure you here."
Ferda allowed him to continue.
At the same time, he quietly began another spell, preparing to finish him off.
Blue mana gathered into brilliant blue lightning.
"But in the end..."
The demon laughed.
"You were never the true target."
Ferda stopped chanting.
"What do you mean?"
The demon answered with a grin.
"I'm after someone else."
"Someone much smaller..."
"Much weaker..."
"And terribly adorable."
A small... fragile... adorable creature.
Only one person came to Ferda's mind.
Only one person fit that description.
Luri.
Luri Silverwind.
A descendant of Silverwind.
The fastest warrior alive.
The one known as the Nightmare of the Frost Giants.
To her...
Beast-type monsters were little more than children's toys.
Unlike the knights, Luri didn't wait for the monsters to arrive.
She intercepted them halfway along their route.
Twenty beast-type monsters.
Thirty Melteds.
Time required to eliminate them all—
One minute.
I've gotten rusty.
She judged herself honestly.
Back when she had commanded the Silverwing Special Mobile Brigade...
A force this size wouldn't even have lasted thirty seconds.
Has peace made me dull?
They said peace was a poison that rusted one's blade.
Back then...
She had slept with her axe within arm's reach.
Now...
Serving Valdrova meant she rarely had any reason to fight.
No matter how faithfully one trained...
Without real battles, dullness was inevitable.
Even if I can't return to my absolute peak...
I need to sharpen myself again.
There was simply more to protect now.
Having renewed her resolve, she turned toward the village the monsters had been marching toward.
Since she had intercepted them...
It should now be safe.
Still...
I'd better make sure.
She spread her wings and flew toward the village.
The moment she arrived...
Her concern became reality.
Something was wrong.
It's too quiet.
Her hearing was sharp enough to distinguish insects chirping in the grass.
Yet...
Not a single human heartbeat.
Not a single breath.
The village had already died before she arrived.
At that instant—
Her senses caught a sudden presence.
Her body reacted before her mind could.
Luri hurled her axe.
The massive weapon carved a great arc through the sky.
But her opponent reacted just as quickly.
The spinning axe disappeared into a grotesquely torn rift in space.
It was swallowed whole.
Within the crack that distorted reality...
A man stood waiting.
"We've met before."
He wore a gray robe beneath the blazing midday sun.
Even under the bright daylight...
Deep shadows clung unnaturally to him.
Yet those shadows couldn't conceal his unnaturally pale face.
"I'll return your axe."
He casually flicked a finger.
A chill ran down the back of Luri's neck.
Her own axe—
The one she had thrown—
Had suddenly appeared behind her, hurtling toward the back of her head.
Luri exploded from the ground.
She performed a massive aerial somersault.
Grabbing the spinning axe handle midair...
She forced it to a halt through sheer strength before landing smoothly.
Then she spoke the name of the man before her.
"...You're Gokma."
The mastermind behind the sudden monster outbreak in Hestia Village.
"I suspected as much."
"So it was you who suddenly unleashed the colossal monsters as well?"
"Of course."
He smiled pleasantly.
"Summoning twelve of them at once was a little exhausting..."
"But still..."
"It was manageable."
Gokma smiled.
It might have taxed him then...
But a month had already passed.
His strength would have fully recovered by now.
Underestimating him would be fatal.
How strong is he...?
Luri quietly evaluated him.
She already knew he was a mage who manipulated space.
Even Tower Master Erika struggled against him.
Although Dragon Spawn naturally tended to look down on the spawn of other dragons...
Luri wasn't foolish enough to underestimate him.
He possessed the advantage even against powerful mages.
And space magic...
Was an especially troublesome matchup for a close-range warrior like herself.
Even so...
She was a descendant of Silverwind.
If ordinary strength isn't enough...
Silverwind represented steel and wind.
Then I'll overwhelm him with even greater strength.
She simply had to strike faster than he could react.
Her silver eyes narrowed sharply.
"Tormenta."
The moment she summoned the High Wind Spirit—
Pure white winds coiled around her feet.
Then...
She vanished with the wind.
"Oh?"
Gokma couldn't help but admire it.
She had disappeared as though she had cast teleportation.
But it wasn't teleportation.
It was nothing more...
And nothing less...
Than overwhelming speed.
"If that's the kind of speed you're offering..."
Gokma smiled.
"Then I'll respond with speed worthy of it."
Gokma moved a finger.
The space around him split open, cutting off Luri’s path. At the same time, the surrounding space twisted, triggering a series of deadly explosions.
Bang! B-b-b-bang!
The distortions rippling through the air revealed the outline of her previously invisible figure, tracing the path of her movement.
She wasn’t merely fast.
Her body changed direction freely, as though the concept of inertia had been erased from it entirely. With dazzling footwork, she slipped through the spatial distortions and relentlessly aimed for Gokma’s blind spots.
“As expected of someone Silverwind favored so greatly.”
Gokma sounded genuinely impressed, but his words grated on Luri.
He’s predicting everything.
Even when he appeared to leave an opening, he constantly covered his blind spots and turned them into traps.
Despite her absolute superiority in speed, Gokma still held the advantage.
One hit.
She felt as though everything would change if she could land just one blow.
But that single blow never came.
“Let us end this pointless foreplay here.”
All the spaces Gokma had torn open collapsed at once.
Luri’s axe swept toward his body, but the spatial rift swallowed him before the blade could reach him.
Had he disappeared?
No.
He had merely widened the distance between them.
She could still sense his presence nearby.
Luri turned toward it.
A tightly sealed village warehouse stood there.
She hurled her axe.
Rather than aiming at the center of Gokma’s presence, she targeted the warehouse’s supporting pillars.
Craaaash!
The tremendous force of the axe shattered the pillars inside.
Naturally, an attack like that could not inflict any meaningful damage on Gokma.
However, it destroyed the enclosed space that had restricted her movement and vision, reducing the area to something no different from an open plain.
The collapsing wooden boards never touched Gokma’s head. They slid away from him as though deflected by a rounded barrier.
Now.
Like the seasoned warrior she was, Luri immediately sought another chance to take his life.
Gokma neither fled nor tore open space.
Instead, he placed something in front of himself.
Had it been an ordinary hostage, Luri would have cut through them both.
During her time as a warrior of Silverwind, she had learned that clumsy mercy only invited greater disaster.
Luri raised her axe high.
Gokma calmly asked her,
“What does this look like to you?”
Whoosh!
The pressure from the axe burst outward.
Yet Luri’s blade stopped in front of Gokma.
She had reached him.
She had a perfect chance to cut him down.
And still, she couldn’t move.
It had begun the moment she saw what he had placed before himself.
“Ah...”
A faint gasp escaped Luri.
She couldn’t believe her eyes.
Standing there was a brown-haired boy who looked about seven years old.
“No...”
Luri denied what she saw.
Then the boy opened his mouth and cried out in a desperate voice.
“B-Big Sister...”
The words pierced Luri’s ears.
The axe of the girl once known as the Nightmare of the Frost Giants began to tremble.
She took a step backward.
Tears filled the boy’s eyes as he choked out,
“Save me...”
“No. You’re...”
Already dead.
You died a very long time ago.
The memory was so distant that she could no longer even remember his name.
There was no possibility that he could be standing here now.
“Please... don’t let me go... Not this time... please...”
Her mind knew it was fake.
Yet she couldn’t reject it.
“Ah...”
Luri dropped her axe.
The boy reached toward her, and she moved to embrace him.
As though she would never let that form disappear again.
She stepped closer to wrap her arms around him.
Shhk!
But the figure shattered.
A spear thrown from behind Luri pierced the boy’s head like a skewer and continued flying forward.
The weapon was a throwing spear forged from silver and steel.
Luri knew what it was.
Only one person wielded such a spear.
Before she could even recall his name, a massive figure descended toward the weapon.
Wings more than five times larger than his body carried him down from the sky. He grabbed the spear and dragged it across the ground.
KRAKAKAKABOOM!
The image of the boy Luri remembered was instantly pulverized into particles and disappeared completely.
A cloud of dust obscured Gokma.
The silver spear tore through it and continued toward him.
But by the time it reached the place where Gokma should have been, the rift in space was already closing.
The battle ended there.
Luri stood frozen in place.
The enormous silver wings folded inward and disappeared.
Goz Silverwind.
The man closest to Silverwind, now seeking to inherit its essence and become the next dragon.
He had arrived.
“What were you doing?”
He addressed Luri in a cold, mocking tone.
“You dropped your weapon with the enemy in front of you. Were you trying to kill yourself?”
“I...”
Luri couldn’t answer.
Instead, she stared down at the remains of the boy Goz had ruthlessly destroyed.
Human blood and Dragon Spawn blood were both red.
But this was green.
It had never been human in the first place.
Everything Luri had felt had been an illusion.
Even so, the shock left her unable to move.
“Why did you hesitate?”
“...”
“Don’t make me ask twice. I don’t know what I might do if I have to keep looking at that pathetic face of yours.”
Luri finally forced herself to speak.
“This is Imperial territory.”
Rather than answering his question, she pointed that out.
He had no right to stand there after intruding upon another’s domain.
Goz snorted.
“I know. Do you think I would set foot on this land without a reason?”
“Then...”
“The Emperor formally requested our assistance. In exchange, he agreed to settle a portion of the debt attached to Silverwind’s name.”
He had a legitimate justification for entering Imperial territory.
Disgust toward the Empire surged within Luri, but that wasn’t what mattered now.
She was standing alone before Goz.
The man she had once feared so deeply...
Now stood before her with the authority of Silverwind itself behind him.
“You still haven’t answered my question.”
“...”
When she remained silent again, Goz sighed.
“Forget it. Why should I care what you’re thinking?”
He glanced back at her over his shoulder.
“I expect nothing from someone who has grown so weak that she can no longer even be called a warrior.”
His contemptuous gaze seemed to pierce Luri’s heart.
It hurt.
It was unbearable.
“Even an honorable death would be wasted on one who has abandoned the heart of a warrior.”
He pulled his spear free and began walking away.
“You no longer need to fear me. I will not come looking for you again.”
“Return to that castle and live your life.”
“Even if you change your mind and come back, the North will no longer be your home.”
Leaving those words behind, Goz disappeared.
Luri lowered her head.
Her clenched fists trembled with suppressed anguish.
She stood alone in the empty village.
Just as she had on that day.