Chapter 18
Chapter 18
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 18
Chapter Title: Chapter 4: Dragon Slaying Ritual (3)
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‘Atein is coming back to life...’
The archenemy that Azel had staked his life to defeat.
The very idea that he could return filled him with confusion. It wasn’t just the fact that a dead man might come back. As strange as it sounded, a corpse rising again through black magic wasn’t all that shocking.
‘Undying bodies aren’t exactly rare.’
During the Dragon Emperor War, it had been commonplace. After a grueling battle to slay a dragonkin foe, they’d show up not long after as half-rotted corpses, shouting things like,
‘Until I’ve killed you all, I can’t crawl back into my grave!’
...and Azel had lost count—more than he could tally on two hands—of the times he’d had to put down such grudge-fueled enemies again. So when someone he’d already killed returned as an undying monster, Azel just shrugged it off with a ‘That figures.’
But this was different. For a being who had been completely eradicated to revive after such an incredibly long span of time...
‘Could my awakening in this era be connected to it somehow?’
It was a baseless hunch. Kallos’s thought projection had said even he didn’t know if it would happen.
Yet the thought he’d come up with on his own made his heart race. Perhaps he and Atein were fated to clash once more in this age. If so, then Azel being torn from everyone he’d lived and fought with, cast alone into this era, would hold some greater meaning.
‘But first things first—I need to learn about this era and adapt to it.’
Azel took a deep breath to shake off the notion. He focused on the reality before him.
Arietta was staring at him with an expression that said she’d never seen anything so bizarre. The sight of a young girl looking at him that way made him chuckle despite himself.
‘Come to think of it, she’s a type I never encountered even during the Dragon Emperor War.’
Boys and girls fighting on the battlefield had been common enough back then. Anyone with even a scrap of strength had to fight.
But there had been no one like Arietta. A living testament that humans and dragon demons could coexist—the Dragon Princess. He couldn’t help but wonder what fate she bore.
‘At the very least, it can’t be easy.’
He’d once hoped that after the Dragon Emperor War ended, a peaceful era would dawn where everyone could smile. Kallos had foreseen another age of chaos ahead, claiming there was no one less trustworthy than humans... but Azel had gone to sleep expecting at least a temporary peace until the wounds left by the dragon demons healed.
Yet looking at Arietta, it seemed the world hadn’t improved much in 220 years. For a girl this young to be thrust onto the battlefield because of her birth, risking her life—and to take deep suspicion of others as a given...
Suddenly, Arietta spoke.
“Why are you staring like that?”
“Hm. What do you mean by that?”
“You’re looking at me like I’m some exotic animal.”
“...Was I?”
If it had been a pitying gaze, he might have understood, but this didn’t sit right.
Arietta continued.
“Either way, it was an odd look. Good thing it wasn’t lecherous. I would’ve slugged you if it was.”
“You’re still too young for me to look at you that way, Princess.”
“A man of uncertain status speaking to royalty like that—you’d be punished for lese-majeste in the palace.”
“Fortunately, this isn’t the palace.”
“True enough.”
“And it’s so pitch-black in here—how could anyone even see to ogle someone?”
“I doubt this level of darkness blinds you.”
She was right. The gloom was so thick an ordinary person couldn’t even see their own feet, but Azel and Arietta had no trouble making each other out.
“But calling me young... It’s been a while since I’ve heard that.”
Arietta muttered awkwardly, looking every bit the girl her age, just like when she slept.
‘Does she usually put on an air of dignity on purpose?’
It probably worked because of her strikingly beautiful and unique appearance. Her snow-white hair, porcelain-doll skin, sunset-hued eyes, and the turquoise feather-like horn protruding above her left ear combined to create an otherworldly allure.
Suddenly, Arietta asked.
“Azel.”
“Yes.”
“How old are you?”
“This year... well. I haven’t turned thirty yet. Probably twenty-six or twenty-seven?”
Excluding the 220 years he’d spent asleep, Azel was twenty-six.
“...So you’re not that much older than me?”
“Hey, even taking the low end at twenty-six, that’s nine years older. When I was nine, you hadn’t even been born yet.”
“Hmm. That was then. Now I’m no kid you should treat like a child.”
“Did that bother you?”
“No, I was just intrigued. And to me, you don’t look that young.”
“Really? How old do I seem?”
“Around forty?”
“...”
“I mean it.”
Azel felt depressed. He’d thought of himself as a fresh-faced young man, but with his scruffy beard and habit of avoiding the chore of cleaning and polishing his gear, he was getting pegged for forty!
‘Damn it.’
He didn’t care what the guys said, but hearing it from a pretty girl stung. He resolved to shave the moment he had some downtime.
Arietta said,
“I started learning the sword at seven. After my coming-of-age at fifteen, I had to become a full warrior.”
From then on, she’d been sent to battlefields. Wherever the royals deemed her needed, she went and earned the people’s praise.
‘The royals send the Dragon Princess to fight for us. The child of a human king and dragon demon fights for us—it’s proof we can live alongside them.’
That was the very purpose of the Dragon Demon Prince and Princess.
“After that, no one’s ever called me young. That’s why your words caught me off guard.”
“How do you feel... about that kind of life?”
Azel asked carefully. Arietta stared blankly into the void as she replied.
“Honestly, I don’t know. Everyone’s told me since I was little that it’s my duty. That I was born for it, that I must live for it...”
“Weren’t you scared?”
“I was terrified my first time in real combat.”
At fifteen, after her coming-of-age rite, when she first stepped onto the battlefield... Arietta would never forget that day.
“It wasn’t a big deal. I didn’t even get a scratch.”
But others had died instead. While she hesitated, failing to grasp the situation, powerless soldiers fell.
She would carry that memory forever. Even now, the faces of those dead soldiers sometimes haunted her.
Suddenly, Arietta asked.
“What about you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your first real battle.”
“Hm. Let’s see.”
“You don’t remember?”
“Not precisely. But I think it was around ten.”
“Ten?”
Arietta was stunned. The minimum conscription age in the Lurein Kingdom was fifteen. Only those who’d undergone the coming-of-age rite could enlist. That was why even she, the Dragon Princess, had enjoyed a peaceful life until her fifteenth birthday.
Azel gave a wry smile.
“I don’t remember it well. But... it was a time when everyone was starving.”
The Dragon Emperor War had broken out when Azel was seven. It raged for seventeen years, leaving massive scars across the continent before finally ending.
“In times of famine, plenty of people turn to banditry.”
Humanity had united beyond nations, gender, or class to face the colossal threat of the dragon demons.
But not every human was noble. In the chaos, countless turned on their fellow man, committing acts worse than beasts.
Azel glossed over the details.
“Bandits like that raided my village. Fighting and killing them—that was my first real battle.”
Azel had no memory of his parents. He’d only learned his surname was Zestringer from a memento they left. He was one of the countless war orphans, wandering with survivors until settling in a remote mountain village, where he lived until ten.
Facing the bandits who attacked that place was his first battle—and his first kill.
Arietta marveled.
“Things like that happen in the world...”
“When you’re powerless or young... sometimes you have no choice but to fight.”
“I shouldn’t have pried. Sorry.”
“No need to apologize. I heard about your past now too—we’re even.”
“I suppose.”
Arietta gazed at Azel with fresh curiosity.
What an odd man. Endlessly suspicious in every way, yet somehow she found herself trusting and relying on him. He was so disarming that she’d spilled a story she’d kept buried without realizing it.
An awkward silence fell. Arietta hesitated, then dredged up a new topic.
“Who taught you the sword?”
“No single teacher. My first lessons came from an old vigilante in the village.”
Azel had no master who’d guided him from start to finish. He’d picked up swordsmanship and Spirit Order bit by bit from those he’d crossed paths with.
It was common on the battlefield. Unless born to a martial house, one didn’t grow up with systematic training in martial arts or Spirit Order. The wealthy could hire tutors, but how many were born into such fortune?
Thriving in barren conditions like a desert was no easy feat. But those who did survived and were hailed as the strong.
“Still, if I had to name mentors, there’d be about five.”
People who’d helped him overcome the walls he faced as he grew. Without their selfless guidance, he wouldn’t be the Azel he was today.
Arietta said,
“I’ve never seen anyone fight like you.”
“Really?”
“Especially how you don’t cling to your sword—it’s astonishing.”
“Weapons are consumables.”
“My sword masters told me to treat it like my life.”
“They were knights.”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s one way to see it. But I think differently. Better to live by discarding your sword than die gripping it.”
That’s how Azel had fought from his first battle. With nothing to his name, he’d lured armed bandits into traps, seized their weapons, and killed them.
Arietta smiled.
“You really are a fascinating one.”
“Better than ‘weird,’ at least.”
Azel smiled back at her.