Chapter 37
Chapter 37
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 37
Chapter Title: The Knight's Vow
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‘I can win. I can win!’
A heavenly aria resounded, filling Nikolai's heart with a hymn of victory and hope.
The 'Angels of Battle,' with their six wings and flaming swords, surged forward. It was a strike from the Church's knights, enhanced by the anthem magic the White Magic Tower prided itself on. At the sudden assault, like a descent from the heavens to the earth, Dale urgently stretched out his arm.
“Shadow Bullet.”
From his fluttering shadow cloak, a hail of bullets forged from darkness rained down. But the angels effortlessly dodged the attack in midair and flew toward Dale once more. They were fast.
‘They are my angels, after all!’
No matter if the eldest son of House Sachsen was the greatest genius in the empire, he was ultimately nothing more than a 3rd-circle expert, a mere novice.
Furthermore, even if *The Book of the Black Goat* was the most terrible grimoire in the world, there was no way a mere 3rd-circle novice could draw out 100% of its potential.
“Praise…!”
The heavenly aria, resonating deep in his chest, enveloped the hellscape in light.
“Praise be (Alleluia)!”
“...isy.”
And as if in response to Cardinal Nikolai's aria.
“So noisy….”
The silent darkness finally opened its mouth.
“So noisy, so noisy, so noisy!”
In Dale's eyes, the girl with the black goat's horns was shouting.
“■■■■—!”
But to Nikolai and his angels, it must have looked like a loathsome being letting out a monstrous scream.
An otherworldly abomination, a hive-mind of countless tentacles.
*Swoosh!*
From beneath the girl's skirt, bundles of innumerable tentacles shot out. Toward the Angels of Battle, who had lightly dodged even Dale's Shadow Bullets.
“...!”
The flaming swords in the angels' hands swung, unleashing a storm of sacred flames. The holy fire that incinerated the enemies of the goddess.
Just as he thought the tentacles were being cut down helplessly, black blood gushed from the severed ends.
Right in front of the angels.
Blood as black as jet, dark and murky. No, it wasn't even blood. A black, viscous liquid, like coal tar, splattered onto the angels' bodies.
“...?!”
*Thud.*
The angels' wingbeats ceased. They did not fall.
After a moment of silence, the angels turned in midair. Toward Cardinal Nikolai, the one they were supposed to protect.
“P-Praise….”
“P-P-P-Praise... be….”
With a mumble clearly twisted by madness. The moment he saw it, Nikolai's blood ran cold.
The standard-bearers of the goddess, who were supposed to be reborn as invincible warriors through the heavenly aria….
The angels' wings were grotesquely swollen, as if hundreds of earthworms were writhing within them. They were a horrifying sight, pouring black, coal-tar-like blood from their eyes, noses, and mouths, as if weeping black tears.
“Ah, ahh….”
Cardinal Nikolai's hope crumbled into nothing. They were no longer angels serving the heavenly goddess.
Angels of darkness stood there instead.
Weeping streams of dark, black tears of blood, their bodies grotesquely swollen with veins that looked like bursting earthworms. Their wings were twisted into something so hideous they could no longer be called 'wings'.
*Swoosh!*
Toward those very angels, the tentacles descended once more.
*Crunch!*
Breaking limbs, entwining and tearing wings, shattering armor, crushing skulls, the tentacles burrowed into their brains and took root. As if a malevolent god were toying with its own creations… Nikolai's angels, the proud knights of the Sistina faith, were being mercilessly violated.
Before this sight, all a mere 6th-circle white mage could do was tremble in fear.
“Regarding what happens in hell.”
With the angels being mercilessly violated by tentacles behind him, the silent 'Black Prince' opened his mouth.
“The parties to the contract bear no responsibility.”
The distance between Dale and Nikolai began to shrink.
“Ah, ahhh….”
Forgetting that he was just an eleven-year-old child, Cardinal Nikolai trembled in a terror so profound he felt he might faint.
The prodigy of the ducal house, the son of Lord Black. The greatest genius in the empire.
No.
Such trivial epithets were not fit to describe the 'Black Prince'.
He was the devil's child.
‘The enemy of the goddess….’
The seed of evil conceived by the shadow of the sister goddess.
“Do you want to live?”
Dale asked, with the horrifying mass of tentacles, the girl with the goat's horns, by his side.
“P-Please….”
Cardinal Nikolai desperately begged for his life.
“It's not impossible to let you live.”
Dale continued.
“What can you offer me in return?”
“W-What….”
Nikolai asked back in terror. Then, he began to blurt out everything he could think of. His rank, his wealth, the power of the church he commanded, and everything he possessed as a 6th-circle white mage and a cardinal of bishop-rank. He desperately spat it all out.
“I like it.”
“W-What did you like?”
Nikolai asked, terrified.
“Everything you have.”
Dale replied.
“N-No way…!”
Realizing the meaning behind those words, Nikolai's expression froze. Despair washed over him, a feeling like his heart had dropped into his stomach. For Dale's words could only mean one thing.
“It seems we'll have to rewrite the contract.”
Absolute obedience through a Geas.
At this point, there was no turning back for Nikolai. Not even if it meant selling his soul to the devil.
***
“Playing with you was so much fun!”
The girl laughed cheerfully, her expression tinged with the same regret one might feel after a pleasant outing.
“I really like your world.”
Her countless tentacles writhed beneath her dress. In Dale's world, a vacant horizon filled with cold and darkness.
“So I'll be waiting here.”
Dale smiled quietly, pushing aside the pain in his heart, which felt as if it might wither and die from mana exhaustion.
A grimoire is, quite literally, a vessel containing an ideology; it is not a book in itself. That was why *The Book of the Black Goat* was now fused with Dale's world, having taken root in his heart in the form of tentacles.
“Aren't you scared of me?”
On the frigid plains, the girl asked Dale.
“I'm not scared.”
“Oh, I see.”
At his words, the girl smiled as if relieved.
“We'll be able to play like this again, right?”
After smiling, she asked again, this time with a hint of worry.
“We'll see each other again.”
Dale nodded, and the girl laughed innocently.
“Okay, I'm glad!”
Witnessing her overwhelm the 6th-circle white mage, Cardinal Nikolai, he knew instinctively. Her existence was too dangerous to be brought out carelessly. And in the strictest sense, Dale still couldn't control *The Book of the Black Goat*.
A vessel containing the deep-rooted darkness of House Sachsen and the ideology of 'Duke Frederick the Undying'.
A forbidden realm that even the son of Lord Black, the empire's greatest genius, could not handle.
‘Besides, this isn't a power I can show off recklessly.’
Not a power to be wielded blindly, but a hidden ace to be kept as a final card.
In a way, this was like confining her to an ideological abyss. The girl surely knew this as well.
“I promise.”
But this was by no means the end for them.
“Soon, you'll be able to play with me to your heart's content again.”
“Okay, I'll look forward to it!”
The girl smiled, and Dale nodded, leaving her alone in the vacant world filled with chilling cold and solitude.
***
After the commotion in hell was over… the eldest son of House Sachsen received a grand 'absolution' in Cardinal Nikolai's name.
Furthermore, as a bridge symbolizing the friendship between House Sachsen and the Church, he was treated with protocol from the Church that was nothing short of extraordinary.
On the road back to the duchy, Dale and his knights were no longer pilgrims in disguise.
For that reason, no one dared to stand in the way of the 'Black Prince' and the swords of House Sachsen that he commanded.
***
A few months later.
A jet-black light enveloped the blade. Upon the heavy body of the greatsword, based on the mental cultivation techniques passed down by the northern Night Raven Knights.
Drawing out the aura processed within one's body and enveloping the sword with it in the form of a blade of energy. An 'Aura Knight' was a knight who had reached such a stage.
A jet-black aura blade. Readjusting her grip on the black sword, a symbol of House Sachsen, the 'Sword Maiden' Charlotte raised her head.
“It's done.”
At her confident appearance, Charlotte's master, Lord Helmut Blackbear, was so stunned he was at a loss for words. The knights of House Sachsen watching with him were no exception.
Dale was not the only 'possessor of extraordinary talent' in this world who grew stronger by the day.
‘An aura blade of such a perfected state at her age!’
And.
“Charlotte of Orharhart.”
Among them, the only one who remained composed, the eldest son of House Sachsen, Dale, spoke.
“Dale of Sachsen asks of you.”
Toward Charlotte, who knelt and planted the black sword of House Sachsen before her.
“For the honor of your lord and house, for your own honor, and for all that you must protect…”
He lightly tapped Charlotte's shoulders with the knight's sword in his hand.
“Will you wield your sword in observance of the knight's oath?”
“I swear.”
Charlotte bowed her head.
“Will you wield your sword not for selfish desire, but to protect the weak and punish the wicked?”
“I swear.”
“...May the true nobility of a knight be with your sword.”
Dale said.
“In the name of Sachsen, I hereby dub thee 'Lady Charlotte,' my knight.”
Charlotte's knighting ceremony.
Though it was a modest ceremony attended by only a few Night Raven Knights, considering Charlotte's position, it was no exaggeration to say that Dale and the Ducal House of Sachsen had given her the highest honor.
And so, Charlotte smiled quietly.
With the overwhelming emotion of having finally become a sword capable of protecting 'her lord'.
***
After the ceremony, in the central courtyard of Castle Sachsen.
“Are you sure about this?”
At Dale's question, his knight, Charlotte, nodded.
“I like the swords of House Sachsen.”
The doctrine pursued by the swords of the northern knights. Dale had hesitated, considering the compatibility, but Charlotte's will was firm.
“Because it's the sword that made me who I am today.”
That was why she had accepted the sword of the Night Raven Knights of her own volition and began to wield the 'greatsword' of House Sachsen instead of a rapier. As the top disciple of Lord Helmut Blackbear, the Mad Sword, one of the Seven Swords of the Continent.
Completing the black sword of House Sachsen, the jet-black aura blade, at an unbelievable speed was an added bonus.
“I never imagined I could become a knight like this.”
Charlotte smiled as if the thought was new to her.
“Thank you, Dale.”
The girl's shy smile.
“It's all thanks to you.”
Seeing her, he thought that it was he who had underestimated Charlotte's talent.
“...There's intelligence that a large-scale orc warlord is gathering forces beyond the Demon Lord's territory.”
Having made his decision, Dale spoke.
“I hear an 'Orc Warboss' is leading the army himself.”
“...!”
“My father will personally summon the duchy's forces and the northern lords, and I will also be participating in that battle.”
Dale continued.
“In that battle, I want you to guard my side.”
“....”
“As my knight.”
Charlotte gasped at the utterly unexpected words. Even though she was a knight who had reached the level of an 'Aura Knight,' she was still only an eleven-year-old girl.
“Yes, I understand.”
But Charlotte nodded without a hint of panic.
A knight's sword is wielded for her lord, and her lord was asking for her sword.