Chapter 96
Chapter 96
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Vine
Chapter: 96
Chapter Title: The Winner's Game
-----------------------------------------------------------------
* * *
—The people of the Shadow Court will protect the Guild Master.
With those words, Dale vanished.
Left alone, the Guild Master of Calimala trembled before the impending storm of blood.
The Guild City. An empire of gold, comprised of the seven great guilds and the Shadow Court.
And a conflict between the powerful, unfolding over the City Master's ledgers—the very heart of the Guild City.
Before the overwhelming power they displayed, the master of the Calimala Guild realized for the first time the futility of gold.
* * *
Meanwhile, Dale was at a hideout of the Shadow Court.
The Grand Shadow Court. In a place reminiscent of an underground chapel, he stood before the continent's greatest assassin.
“Khh, damn. This beer is fucking amazing.”
The Killing Sword, Master Baro, was chugging beer. He paid no mind to the decorum or etiquette of the Shadow Court, his feet propped up on the table.
“...You don't seem to have much faith in the Shadow Church.”
Dale, too, dropped the formalities and spoke casually.
“Haha, you think?”
Master Baro chuckled and nodded.
“There aren't many places that would take in a bastard like me, who stabbed his own lord in the back and ran.”
“Why did you stab him in the back?”
Betraying one's lord is the ultimate taboo for a knight, an unforgivable act.
“Well, he just lost his damn mind.”
Master Baro answered as if it were someone else's story.
“My lord started raising hell, claiming his young daughter was possessed by a demon.”
“...”
“And then he ordered me to cut off her head.”
Casually.
“So while I was hesitating—”
After finishing his mug of beer, Master Baro spoke.
“That mad lord of mine gouged out his own daughter's eyes with his bare hands.”
“Don't tell me...”
“That's exactly right.”
Dale held his breath.
“That daughter is the very same saint who's so flustered in front of you.”
“...”
“I took the child and fled to the Guild City, and the religious fanatics of the Shadow Court went absolutely crazy, proclaiming ‘a saint has appeared.’”
“At the very least, there's no doubt she received a ‘divine revelation’ in some form.”
“Yeah, sister goddesses or whatever.”
Master Baro scoffed coldly at Dale's words.
“Let's say there are some, huh? Fucking amazing beings looking down on us from above the clouds.”
“...”
“Do you think those fucking amazing beings have even a shred of love for us?”
“They don't.”
“Oh?”
Master Baro seemed surprised.
“So, you chose to become a sword of the Shadow Court, without any faith, for that child's sake?”
“Leaving her among these fanatic bastards didn't sit right with me.”
“That child has already become an irreversible puppet of the gods.”
“It'd be weirder if a kid who lost her eyes at her own father's hands *didn't* seek out a god.”
Master Baro muttered, feigning indifference.
“I have no intention of judging her faith.”
Dale unconsciously recalled the image of the Shadow Saint, looking at him and Shub.
“I'm content just to stay by her side and protect her.”
Becoming a sword of the Shadow Court to protect the saint, with neither faith nor anything else. Dale smiled bitterly at the predicament.
“Looks like we can see eye to eye.”
“Haha, this young friend has quite the silver tongue.”
Master Baro finished his beer with an amused expression.
“So, why did you decide to become a god to these religious bastards?”
“Because I needed the sword of the Shadow Court.”
Dale answered without a hint of hesitation.
“An assassin with the title of Killing Sword, one of the Seven Swords of the Continent.”
The significance of such a being was beyond words.
“Was that all?”
“That was all.”
At Dale's reply, Master Baro burst out laughing as if he couldn't hold it in any longer.
“At least there's no doubt you'll become the messiah for these moronic bastards.”
* * *
Before the Black Market opened, the Fight Club's ‘Winner's Game’ was drawing near.
A stage for a power struggle, where representatives of the continent's greatest nobles began to gather, each hiding their own greed and ambition.
The ‘Black Prince’ of House Sachsen was no exception.
* * *
The Fight Club.
Dale was there, in that very underground arena, with the Death Knight he had acquired here standing behind him. From his appearance, people could only surmise one identity.
“The ‘Black Prince’ of House Sachsen has appeared!”
“A bigger name than we could have ever imagined for the first match!”
A lawless arena where one could use their full strength to defeat an opponent, excluding Worlds of Thought and Avatars. And the ones Dale would face from now on would be anything but easy.
Powerful individuals on a different level from the small fry he had faced so far. Representatives participating in the Black Market on behalf of the Empire's most prominent great nobles.
As a stage for a power struggle to establish a pecking order among them, Dale's opponent revealed himself.
It was a knight clad in pure white armor. And it wasn't difficult to guess the armor's origin.
“Look at that armor!”
“Pure white armor forged from mithril... It must be that of a Knight of Saint Magdalena!”
The existence of the ‘Mithril Mine’ in Count Brandenburg's domain was, without exaggeration, what had made the count's family what it was today.
By now, the pure white armor forged from mithril was synonymous with the ‘Knights of Saint Magdalena.’
The representative of the Holy Sword Master.
“Does the great Count Brandenburg have business in such a shady, heretical market?”
It was truly a fated encounter with a rival.
“You...”
At Dale's sneer, a pure white aura enveloped the tip of the Saint Magdalena Knight's sword. This was a knight skilled enough to act as the Holy Sword Master's direct representative. He was surely a powerhouse beyond comparison to the Aura Knights who had participated in the Black-and-White Revolution.
An Aura Master at the very least, or perhaps even stronger.
However, by the rules of the Fight Club, Avatars were forbidden. Just as Dale was bound by the restriction of not being able to deploy his World of Thought.
After all, if powerhouses using Avatars or Worlds of Thought were to clash with their full strength, the resulting bloodshed would not be something easily managed.
“I remember the souls of the knights who died at your hands in the Black-and-White Revolution.”
The Saint Magdalena Knight spoke, his voice filled with an unforgettable hatred.
“Ah, you should get your facts straight.”
“What?”
Dale muttered in response, as if it had nothing to do with him.
“It would be more accurate to say that Lord Phillip killed them, not me.”
The black sheep of the count's family.
“It takes a special kind of talent to get that many knights killed.”
It was no exaggeration to call his track record a work of genius—a genius of defeat.
“Though even that is just a drop in the bucket compared to the fifty percent of the Imperial army he got wiped out on the Isle of Britannia.”
“How dare you...!”
Provoked by Dale, the Saint Magdalena Knight's sword became imbued with killing intent. The Death Knight accompanying Dale also tightened its grip on the black sword of House Sachsen.
‘Which one should I project the Peacemaker onto?’
Amidst the standoff, Dale thought calmly.
Focusing all its power on the Death Knight wasn't a bad idea. But his opponent would likely be trying to kill him for real, and he couldn't leave everything to his escort.
This was different from when Master Baro had merely been testing him.
With a soft hiss, Dale drew the knight's sword from his hip.
“You lost in the Black-and-White Revolution, you lost on the Isle of Britannia...”
Dale said, projecting the Peacemaker's concept onto the blade.
“And you're going to lose here, too.”
The conversation ended there.
“It seems your house has a talent for getting smashed to bits.”
*Taaat!*
Even without using his Avatar, as a knight who had reached the level of Aura Master, the Saint Magdalena Knight charged forward with all his might.
He was fast. The Dale of his Third Circle days would not have been able to counter that movement; it wouldn't have been strange for his head to fly off in a single strike.
But the Dale of today was different.
Not just a mere mage, but a knight wielding the Peacemaker, imbued with a fragment of the Hero, and a Fourth Circle mage hailed as the Empire's greatest talent.
Having fused these two aspects and reached a state of rapid, daily improvement, the Death Knight guarding Dale's back surged forward.
The black sword of Sachsen met the knight's strike, and Dale did not stand idly by.
He tightened his grip on the Peacemaker and charged, his shadow cloak fluttering.
The sword sought by the Hero.
In a way, it was not so different from that of the ‘Killing Sword,’ Master Baro. The sword of an assassin, so ruthless it was despicable, designed solely to take human life.
The path to slaughter.
The Saint Magdalena Knight and the Death Knight's black sword clashed. As the black and white lights met, Dale darted into the knight's guard and thrust the Peacemaker forward.
*Clang!*
Without panicking, the knight deflected the Death Knight's sword while simultaneously parrying Dale's swinging blade.
“...!”
An immediate counterattack followed.
He was strong. But a sword was not all Dale possessed. As the Saint Magdalena Knight deflected his sword and charged, Dale's shadow cloak billowed. From beneath his feet, shadow bullets, projected with the formula for 「Gatling Style」, were fired.
A baptism of bullets made of darkness rained down, and the Saint Magdalena Knight swung his sword against them.
With a single swing, the aura surging from within his body formed the shape of a ‘shield.’
Aura Armor.
A type of aura shield, similar to a mage's, and that very shield was deflecting Dale's Shadow Bullets.
‘The intensity of his aura is no joke.’
If one were to compare an Aura Master knight to a mage's level, they would be equivalent to at least a Sixth Circle practitioner.
An elder of the Tower.
However, being of the same Circle doesn't mean their combat prowess is equal. A knight is no scholar.
They are not ones who coop themselves up in the Tower, reading books and focusing on training, but those who make a living by risking their lives to cut down enemies on the battlefield and survive.
And the pinnacle of the sword, the stage of the Avatar, is attained precisely in that way—by building one's level through repeated slaughter.
That was why, even without using his Avatar, the knight before him was an opponent against whom even the current Dale could not guarantee a 100% chance of victory.
And for that very reason, his heart pounded all the more.
The next stage he would obtain by hunting countless powerful foes. With every strong opponent he hunted, the memories of his past life embedded in the Peacemaker would steadily awaken.
After the clash, they created distance. Once separated, Dale muttered.
“This is my domain.”
Following the shades of his fluttering shadow cloak, the area was submerged into a lake of darkness... and the predators lurking within the shadows began to move.
《Shadow Lurker》.
「Kieeeeek!」
Thorned tentacles shot out from the shadows. At the same time, several fully grown 《Shadow Lurkers》 revealed themselves.
Serpentine bodies several meters long, with eight limbs made of scythes. Thorned tentacles writhing along their backs.
Those very beasts blocked Dale's path, acting as his shield.
Dozens to one.
Power born from overwhelming numbers. This was the strength of a necromancer, a black mage of the Black Magic Tower.
“...!”
Facing those monsters, the Saint Magdalena Knight's decision was singular. He ignored all attacks and kicked off the ground.
A single-point breakthrough. The most reliable, orthodox strategy for a knight facing a mage.
Because there was no need to even mention the fate of a mage who let a knight close the distance.
Leaving Dale's creations behind, the Saint Magdalena Knight charged. The distance closed. But Dale was no ‘mere mage.’
A mage who would lose simply because they allowed a knight to get close could never survive against the powerhouses of this world.
*Clang!*
Sword met sword.
Dale's sword was blocking the Saint Magdalena Knight's. A mere iron sword, without even an aura.
A single strike.
But the Saint Magdalena Knight did not give up.
It was all too famous that the eldest son of House Sachsen possessed a prodigious talent for the sword, so blocking a single strike was within his expectations.
*Clang! Clang!*
But when the mere iron sword deflected his strikes, imbued with a pure white aura, several times.
“How...!”
The Saint Magdalena Knight could finally no longer contain his astonishment.
At the same time, the ‘Shadow Lurkers’ he had painstakingly ignored and turned his back on plunged their thorned tentacles toward him in unison.
*Crack!*
He managed to avoid instant death by belatedly raising his aura shield, but an aura shield was by no means invincible.
*Clang!*
The shield shattered, and the Shadow Lurkers' tentacles struck. Dale, too, kicked off the ground without hesitation.
The real reason the nobles' representatives scrambled to participate in the Fight Club. A match in the Fight Club didn't necessarily have to end in death.
Simply shouting one's surrender was enough.
However, the representatives did not participate in the Fight Club merely to hear their opponent's ‘surrender.’
It was to eliminate a competitor in the Black Market in the most certain and legitimate way: by killing them.
That was the true meaning of this Fight Club's ‘Winner's Game,’ and Dale brought his sword down to fulfill that very purpose.
No, he was about to bring it down.
*Kwaang!*
At that moment, an unknown explosion erupted. From the Saint Magdalena Knight's body.
‘An explosion? No, that's not it.’
It wasn't an ordinary explosion. It was a shockwave caused by an absurd amount of swirling aura.
And that act could only mean one thing.
“...!”
There stood a pure white knight. Not a trace of a human form could be seen; it was, quite literally, a knight of pure white.
‘An Avatar!’
The ultimate combat form sought by the Knights of Saint Magdalena.
Considering the repercussions a knight who had reached the stage of the Avatar would bring, the damage to the entire arena would be unimaginable.
The Fight Club was aware of this fact, and it was not without countermeasures.
And so, to punish the one who broke the Fight Club's rules, the ‘high-ranking assassins of the Shadow Court,’ led by Master Baro, were about to move...
But before they could, a black-blue mana swirled from beneath Dale's feet, enveloping the entire arena.
*Fwoosh!*
Dale and the Saint Magdalena Knight—both of them vanished without a trace.
The world of a mage.
That day, into another world—a world of a white and dark winter night.