Chapter 160
Chapter 160
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 160
Chapter Title: Nevermore
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One of the five mages at the pinnacle of the Empire, the Master of the Black Magic Tower.
Yet his opponent was one who stood at the apex of the 'Shadow Magic Tower,' a figure hidden in even greater darkness and shadow.
The Deathless Duke, Frederick.
His calling Dale a ‘usurper’ was, in a sense, not entirely wrong.
As he claimed, it was the Deathless Duke himself who had sacrificed his daughter to write *The Book of the Black Goat*, and it was through this act that the Mother Goddess of Darkness had finally descended upon this world.
In truth, Dale had only been able to obtain the title of Shadow Lord because he had acquired *The Book of the Black Goat* with Sachsen blood.
From the Deathless Duke’s perspective, at least, there was a valid reason to call Dale’s actions a ‘usurpation.’
As another Sachsen, and another Shadow Lord.
*‘In your current state, you probably can’t even imagine it. The existence of the lords who rule the nation known as the Empire.’*
The words of Kiara, the Empire’s Fifth Princess and a sorceress of the Blue Magic Tower, came to mind unbidden.
Officially, after the Empire unified the continent, there existed only one emperor and one nation on this land.
But the silent ‘lords,’ hidden behind the Empire’s plausible grand cause, did not see it that way.
The Lords of Blood and Fire, the Lords of Light and Heaven—even the ‘Lord of Darkness and Death’ who ruled here in the Sachsen Duchy was no exception.
Unnamed kings who ruled their own territories amidst the conflict between gold and shadow. Among them were those who declared themselves their standard-bearers, and others who concealed their ambition to ascend the throne themselves.
That was the reality of this world, and it was no different here.
The very fact that two empires, two lords of gold and shadow, were in opposition… ultimately proved that ‘a single throne’ lay between them.
The Throne of Black Gold.
Thus, what was unfolding there was undoubtedly a battle of kings.
Lord Black, the Lord of Darkness and Death, did not hide his hostility toward the other Shadow Lord to whom he should have sworn loyalty.
Though his actions were by no means for his own ambition or desire, it changed nothing.
Six wings unfurled, like those of a seraph, yet they were as black and ominous as a crow’s feathers.
*Flap!*
A few crows took flight from behind Lord Black.
At the same time, tentacles erupted from beneath the Deathless Duke’s feet, surging toward Lord Black.
*Swisssh!*
It was a bundle of tentacles dozens of times larger than the one that had unilaterally sealed and overwhelmed Dale’s sword and Blood-Iron Armor.
Amidst that overwhelming force that seemed to swallow its surroundings, the greatest black mage on the continent opened his mouth.
“Nevermore.”
A jet-black vortex swirled out from under his feet, and the Deathless Duke’s tentacles vanished all at once.
At the same moment, a flock of crows that had already filled the sky was swooping down on the Deathless Duke, like something out of Alfred Hitchcock’s *The Birds*.
It was a swarm of jackdaws filling the twilight gloom.
“Birds that bring death.”
The Deathless Duke, Frederick, smiled as he watched the flock of crows descending upon him.
Simultaneously, an innumerable swarm of crows descended upon his body and began to peck away at his flesh.
They tore at his flesh, ripped out his entrails, and pecked their beaks into his empty eye sockets, cawing as they feasted.
Afterward, the crows took flight in unison, leaving behind the skeletal corpse of a young boy.
At that moment, the shadow cast by the corpse slithered like a snake, racing toward Lord Black.
The rushing shadow swallowed Lord Black from head to toe, and as it consumed his body, it shed the ‘shadow’ like a snake sloughing its skin.
The shadow shed its skin, and standing there was not Lord Black, but the Deathless Duke, Frederick.
No longer a mere boy, but a dignified man possessing the same youth as Lord Black.
At the same time, the crows began to gather again around the boy’s skeletal remains.
In their beaks, they carried the flesh, blood, and bones of Frederick they had just devoured.
Like creatures storing food for winter, they spat the pieces onto the boy’s corpse, and the flesh, blood, and bones began to writhe and fuse together.
The boy rose.
It was not the Deathless Duke, Frederick.
It was a young boy who bore a striking resemblance to Dale’s father, Duke Sachsen.
Simultaneously, the body of the Deathless Duke, Frederick, which had stolen Duke Sachsen’s age, began to age rapidly, as if time were fast-forwarded a thousandfold. Wrinkles formed, vitality drained away, and his body shriveled like a mummy’s.
Likewise, the ‘age’ of Dale’s father, Duke Sachsen, who now inhabited the Deathless Duke’s former body, began to reverse. From twelve to five, and from five to the body of a suckling infant only a few months old.
As if turning back a clock.
A scene of their years being haphazardly accelerated and reversed intersected.
Lord Black had regressed from a toddler who should be crawling… to a babe unable to even turn over on his own, and he burst into tears.
The Deathless Duke’s body, too, was withered like an Egyptian mummy preserved across the ages.
“A fetus’s immature brain is not a suitable vessel for thought.”
The withered, mummy-like Deathless Duke, Frederick, finally smiled.
He looked upon Dale’s father, who possessed a body meant for immortal years, yet had been reduced to a literal, crying baby.
“Was this all there was to the apex of the Black Magic Tower, the self-proclaimed head of House Sachsen?”
“Father…!”
Dale gasped in bewilderment. At the same time, a shadow began to swirl at the feet of the mummified Deathless Duke.
As if killing a single infant would be no trouble at all.
But faster still, a single crow dove from the sky and snatched the ‘infant Lord Black’ in its talons.
As the crow flew, evading the Deathless Duke’s shadow, the infant Lord Black was regressing into something even lesser.
From a toddler to an infant, from an infant to a fetus.
Lord Black, devolving into a being that could no longer even be called life, was swallowed whole by the crow.
It swallowed him, and at the same time, the crow laid an egg.
The egg cracked open, and inside was Lord Black, once again in an infant state.
But this time, his body did not regress; instead, it began to age rapidly, as if time were sped up hundreds of times.
Reclaiming the body of a young boy, just as the Deathless Duke had been, Lord Black raised his head.
Likewise, the aging Deathless Duke had also returned to the youth he possessed when he had first stolen Lord Black’s body.
Beings who stole each other’s bodies, freely turning the hands of life and death.
A battle of House Sachsen, seekers of the truth beyond death.
There was no fierce clash or overwhelming destructive power, as one would see in a battle between so-called ‘extraordinary powerhouses.’
If they so chose, it would not be difficult for them to raise an army large enough to cover the entire continent.
As the greatest necromancers on the continent, and furthermore, as shadowmancers.
But they did not.
They merely clashed with their philosophies, using the truths of life and death as their weapons.
In the way of Sachsen, ever pursuing the truth beyond death.
“As expected. It seems that even a charade cannot fool the blood of Sachsen.”
The Deathless Duke, the very progenitor of House Sachsen, smiled in satisfaction, as if his earlier madness and agitation had been a lie.
Now a man of befitting dignity, having stolen Lord Black’s body and overlaid his own existence upon it.
In contrast, Lord Black, now reborn as a boy, looked almost like Dale’s younger brother, his usual intimidating presence gone.
Just like that, the man—the Deathless Duke, Frederick—turned his head toward Dale.
“This child is also your descendant, one who carries the blood of Sachsen.”
Lord Black, in the body of a young boy, stepped in front of Dale and spoke. His voice was that of a child, not yet touched by puberty.
“And at the same time, a usurper who stole my blood and philosophy.”
“It was ultimately ‘Her’ will that chose Dale.”
Lord Black said, referring to ‘Her’ from *The Book of the Black Goat*.
The Deathless Duke’s composure wavered once more.
“That young usurper stole our ancient Mother of Darkness and my daughter.”
“No, that’s not true.”
Just then, Dale, who had been silent until now, finally spoke.
“When the Mother Goddess of Darkness and young Shub were trapped in the hell of the White Magic Tower, I was the one who reached out to her.”
“…”
“While you chose eons of stagnation in the northern darkness, I willingly walked into the hell of the White Magic Tower to carry on the legacy of Sachsen.”
“Child, what do you know of ‘our’ decisions that you dare speak of them?”
“It is the way of this world for the old to fade and the new to take its place.”
Dale replied.
“The throne of shadows is no exception, O former King of Shadows.”
Killing intent once again filled the Deathless Duke’s expression. And in the form of that man, who possessed not a child’s body but Duke Sachsen’s, there was an incomparable sense of pressure.
It was then.
Breaking her silence at last, ‘Shub,’ who stood beside Dale, revealed herself to the Deathless Duke. She appeared as the little girl he remembered.
“Ah, ahh…! Lije!”
The Deathless Duke’s expression softened with the same tenderness Duke Sachsen showed his own daughter, ‘Lije.’
But this was the same Frederick who had sacrificed his daughter Lije with his own hands to write the grimoire, *The Book of the Black Goat*. The fatherly image he now projected only filled Dale with disgust.
*Why won’t you step aside?*
Shub spoke, and the Deathless Duke gasped once more.
*I like him. His world and his solitude are unbearably lovely. So I want to stay by his side. I can’t bear not seeing more of the humans he shows me.*
Shub, no… with the ego of Lije, his daughter, the sacrifice the Deathless Duke had once offered to her.
*I don’t want to return to your side.*
Lije said.
*Because I am not your property.*
“Ah, ahh…”
At Lije’s words, the Deathless Duke, Frederick, laughed weakly. It started small, but grew louder, until it erupted into a mad, sobbing laugh.
*Is the fight about to start again?* Dale held his breath, watching him intently.
But just then, the dark landscape covering the area faded away. Likewise, the twilight gloom Lord Black had manifested also vanished.
The scene of the two forces, the Church and Sachsen, clashing at the edge of the Demon Lord’s territory, was revealed.
Dale drew a sharp breath, but the Deathless Duke, Frederick, was nowhere to be seen.
Only Dale’s father, Duke Sachsen, was there.
“Ah, Father.”
In the body of a twelve-year-old boy, one who could pass for the fifteen-year-old Dale's younger brother.
“That body…”
“Don’t worry. It won’t be difficult to change it back.”
said Duke Sachsen, his father, now shorter than Dale.
“It will just take a little time.”
He swallowed a bitter laugh at the unexpected turn of events.
It was a laugh that truly did not suit his age.