Chapter 217
Chapter: 217
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>Translator: penny
>Chapter: 217
>Chapter Title: Flower Garden (3)
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Before the battle began, Sung-jin had anticipated a considerable struggle.
This was considering the Lycanslope Lord he had once fought in a labyrinth boss room. Back then, he and Orden had struggled quite a bit against it.
The fake Lord before his eyes now didn't measure up to that one, but it still possessed a tremendously strong body and aura.
Even if its reason was clouded, had it charged at them alongside the others without hesitation, they wouldn't have been able to clean up the situation this quickly.
Yet now, the leader of those beasts was staring at them while shedding tears.
It was a sight neither Sung-jin nor Louise could have imagined.
‘The reason it just stood there dumbly until now……!’
Its bloodshot eyes and hazy focus weren't those of someone whose reason had fully returned.
But the expression on its dazed face, as if lost in a daydream, was a twisted mix of suppressed regret and sorrow that almost looked like ecstasy.
It was unmistakably the face of an intelligent being, plain for anyone to see.
Sung-jin flinched for a moment but gripped his Nutcracker and adjusted his stance. The two remaining Lycanslopes were charging at him simultaneously.
Grrrrrr!
Yap yap yap!
Ta-at. Instead of swinging his Nutcracker, Sung-jin swiftly retreated into a defensive posture. To figure out why that one was acting this way, he needed to fully resolve the situation first.
‘Two of them should be easy enough…….’
But now that he knew another possibility about these beasts, he had no choice but to proceed more cautiously with his attacks from here on.
Unlike before, taking a bit more time, Sung-jin methodically dealt with the remaining two Lycanslopes.
"Your Grace……."
Even as he did so, Louise stood rooted to the spot, staring blankly up at the fake Lord.
Her two hands clutching the bastard sword hung limply at her sides. She had completely lost the will to fight.
"Louise."
As Sung-jin approached and called her name, her black eyes—swirling with complex emotions—turned toward him.
Shock, hope, guilt, pity.
It was a rare whirlpool of raw emotions from the girl who usually maintained a maturity beyond her years.
"Your Grace. These ones……."
She had kept telling herself that they were no longer her kin, that they were mere mindless beasts, as she swung her sword.
But had she perhaps blinded herself to her own safety from the start, abandoning any search for a path that could save her kin?
Had she already committed an irredeemable mistake?
"I might have……done something to my kin……."
Her thin, trembling voice trailed off.
At that moment, as if hearing Louise's words, the fake Lord shuddered.
"…Kin."
Grrrrr.
The beast's pointed maw let out a low-frequency growl along with syllables carrying clear meaning.
Shockingly, it was the language of the Empire!
"…My kin."
At the same time, a change came over the fake Lord's state. Though it had been staring at Sung-jin and Louise, the hazy focus in its eyes now showed the first clear sign of recognition directed at them.
"…Lycanslopes speaking the Empire's common tongue?"
Louise muttered in astonishment, her eyes wide—
Sniff.
The fake Lord snorted loudly, drawing back tears, and spoke in an even clearer voice.
"Yes. Kin. This familiar feeling is surely the blood of Nebraska……."
Then the fake Lord looked back and forth between the two of them and posed a question.
In a voice filled with reminiscence, carrying an incomparably deep resonance.
"Are you here to destroy that demon's [Flower Garden]? To be the last hope for these pitiful kin lost in delusion!"
* * *
Lycanslope, Bazra.
He was the last pureblood Lycanslope, far removed but carrying the blood of the legendary Lycanslope Lord, Nebraska.
On that day when the [Cataclysm] overflowed and engulfed all of Ionia.
Lycanslope Lord Murat, who had evacuated the clan to a temporary shelter, commanded him.
-Protect the remaining kin with all your strength, Bazra. No matter what happens to me, do not be deceived by the empty words of the 'Council of Six'—lead them by your own judgment. You alone are the one I can trust now.
With those words, Lord Murat departed solemnly and never returned.
Soon after, a representative of the 'Council of Six' came to them and coldly demanded a cruel choice in a ruthless voice.
-Will you take your own lives? Or die by my hand like this?
It didn't seem like an empty threat to slaughter them all; he had already drawn a gray sword in one hand and was staring down Bazra. Eyes of gleaming silver, devoid of any emotion.
At that moment, Berseus, the warden of the Demonic Realm standing beside him, urgently proposed.
-How about this? Let's flee to Delcross instead. Saving everyone might be impossible, but at least some of the kin could survive. I'll open the path to the Demonic Realm as wide as possible.
Bazra hesitated. The [Demonic Realm] managed by Berseus was no good land for a pureblood Lycanslope to set foot in.
It was a wretched prison where kin who had lost their connection to [essence] and fully lost their reason wandered as grotesque beasts until they died.
But to the agonizing Bazra, Berseus drove in one final wedge.
-If we stay like this, the kin will all die by that man's hand without fail. Why hesitate? Didn't Lord Murat entrust the kin's future to you?
The decision was swift, and there was no real interference.
The representative of the 'Council of Six,' who had watched their actions silently, sheathed his sword and declared in a calm voice.
-This is your choice as well, not subject to the karma permitted to me. However, you will forever regret not taking their lives yourself right now.
A faint trace of pity flickered in his eyes.
Suddenly, an ominous premonition flooded Bazra's mind, but the gate to the Demonic Realm was already open, and the kin were desperately rushing toward it one after another.
In the end, fewer than half of those at the temporary shelter survived.
The red [Cataclysm] that struck without mercy swept away the rear of the kin and poured down right in front of them in an instant.
-Close the Demonic Realm! Berseus!
In front of the kin wailing in terror and despair, he had no choice but to heartlessly seal the dimensional gate.
-Ahh!
Deeply despairing, Bazra stood before the closed gate, mourning his vanished comrades for a moment.
It was then.
-Puhahaha! Hahaha!
Beside him rang out unbridled mad laughter.
Turning his head in confusion, Bazra faced the Demonic Realm's warden, who bared his fangs, unable to hide his glee.
-Berseus?
-Hahaha! These stupid beasts! Strutting around all high and mighty, proud and noble, but when push comes to shove, they leap to become prisoners themselves!
-…What?
Still not grasping the situation, dazed, Bazra saw Berseus's eyes curve into sly arcs as he gazed at him.
-Still don't get it? You lot are all my prisoners now!
At the same time, a sweet floral scent wafted to his nose.
That was the last memory Bazra clearly perceived.
* * *
"The moment we entered the Demonic Realm, I was aware that the kin's minds would cloud over. Still, I thought we'd have some time to reorganize them……."
"…What was that floral scent?"
Louise asked with a grave expression. She seemed to have something nagging at her.
"Blue flowers that emit a fragrance paralyzing reason. They've grown wild in the depths of the Demonic Realm since ancient times. That's why this place has been used as a prison for the kin from long ago—to keep the mindless ones from causing pointless trouble, or from needless suffering."
"Prison……."
"But when we arrived, for some reason, those blue flowers blanketed the entire forest. The whole heart of the Demonic Realm had become a [Flower Garden] filled with narcotics!"
So saying, Bazra looked at Sung-jin and Louise and shed tears once more.
"That man's warning was right. I can no longer bear to regret that day's decision any deeper."
The Lycanslopes wandered the Demonic Realm for years, devoid of reason.
Occasionally following orders that descended into their minds, without meaning or purpose.
Go south.
Attack the humans.
Return to the depths of the Demonic Realm.
The Lycanslopes fought in beast turf wars as the orders led them, unaware even of their own deaths, and devoured their own kin when hunger struck.
It was the utterly wretched life of beasts.
After how many years of wandering? Bazra, who rarely regained his senses, gradually stopped thinking altogether.
Clink clink.
The glorious golden ornament proving his Nebraska bloodline had become nothing but annoying noise-making junk.
"And recently, a new order came down."
The order was simple.
Gather the kin in the snowy plains where the ice wall is visible.
And find something in the canyon.
"Find something? What?"
At Sung-jin's question, Bazra shook his head.
"I don't know the details either. Just that I was told to use this."
In his outstretched palm was a small chunk of ice emitting a faint pulsing glow. An eerie ice that didn't melt even after days gripped in his hand.
[Huh, Yi Sung-jin!]
Suddenly, the Demon King gasped and shouted.
[That's from the Upper Realm!]
Well, he had figured as much.
Ice that doesn't melt—doesn't it completely defy this world's natural laws?
‘We've seen Upper Realm stuff once or twice before, so why the fuss?’
At Sung-jin's rebuke, the Demon King stamped his feet in frustration.
[The rules governing that thing are insanely powerful! You might not get it, but Upper Realm items have grades too! And that's definitely a rare, top-grade one!]
‘Yeah?’
[Yeah! I wanna take a closer look at it! Think you could ask for it?]
Just like that?
Even as Sung-jin conversed with the Demon King, Bazra's explanation continued. He said he had received the following order along with this ice shard.
-Find the place in the canyon where the ice's pulsing grows stronger. Then confirm the vibrations from the glacier.
Naturally, one thought rose in Sung-jin's group's minds.
‘…Something's inside the canyon glacier?’
And so began several days of canyon exploration.
It was a brute-force search without maps or relays, but Bazra didn't mind. The canyons they had already searched were drenched in Lycanslope blood anyway.
That brutal search ended when few Lycanslopes left to climb the ice walls remained. Suddenly, small humans armed with swords appeared before them.
But why was this?
Even as they mercilessly slaughtered his kin, the moment he saw them, Bazra's heart began to pound fiercely for some reason.
‘…Kin!’
Yes. This was undoubtedly the aura of kin.
Buried deep in his subconscious, no longer properly remembered, yet it stimulated his instincts with its familiar, powerful pull.
And so, he had been pulled from a hellish world of delusion back to reality.
"Please help us! Heirs of Nebraska's blood."
As he spoke those words, hot tears streamed from Bazra's eyes.
Time was running out now.
Before his mind clouded over with fog again. Before the merciless [Lord] harboring grudge against his kin noticed the anomaly.
"Destroy the [Flower Garden] of those flowers deep in the Demonic Realm. Otherwise, the kin's future……."
Sung-jin and Louise, who had just brutally slaughtered Bazra's kin.
Yet solely because they carried the faint trace of ancient blood kin, Bazra had no choice but to place his full trust in them. That desperate plea.
The heat from his wretched emotions transmitted palpably to the two, even in the canyon's frigid air.
"Tell us the location of that [Flower Garden]."
Louise opened her mouth in a stiff voice.
"…You'll help us?"
"I don't know if it will ultimately benefit you or not. As long as you continue invading Sigismund Territory like this, your fate is sealed anyway. But……."
As she said this, her eyes sank into an oddly dark abyss.
"At the very least, I want to stop you from making the worst choice, ensnared by the [flower fragrance] of the Demonic Realm. That much is my honest feeling."
"Aah! Thank you! Truly, thank you!"
Hm.
At Louise's words, Sung-jin tilted his head.
Sure, it was natural to want to help weakened kin.
‘But why?’
Something about leaving it like this didn't sit right.
After pondering briefly, Sung-jin looked up at Bazra and asked.
"Hey. If you don't even know what it's for anyway, how about handing that over to me?"
Meeting Sung-jin's gaze at those words, Bazra suddenly felt an odd sense of déjà vu.
Strange eyes that sometimes gleamed silver-gray in the morning sunlight. Hadn't he once seen those eyes forcing a choice upon him?
As if entranced, Bazra extended the ice shard toward Sung-jin. For some reason, he felt like obeying this time.
It was right then.
[Hoo.]
In Bazra's mind rang a low, unsettling chuckle.
[…Finally found it!]