Chapter 147
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 147
Chapter Title: 14th Floor - Lv. 2200 Dark Spirit King (4)
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One of the two who properly understood what was happening, excluding the man himself.
The little one clinging to his back had her eyes wide open.
It had been a while since she'd snapped back to reality.
She had taken the darkness into her body and sunk deep into it, but in the end, the element of darkness only wore a person down.
Unless she'd dreamed sweet, happy dreams, her life had been nothing but a mountain of bitter memories.
In the end, she had to return to reality.
The happiest time in the little one's life was still right now, all things considered.
But that's exactly why announcing that she was awake terrified her.
The little one hadn't fulfilled her purpose.
A clan member who couldn't carry out the clan master's orders was useless.
If you weren't needed, they showed mercy by simply putting you out of your misery.
Her very existence was a burden.
That was the most basic principle of being in a vampire clan.
At least, that's how it was in the Barbaroi Clan.
In their harsh lives, the endless existence ground away at everyone's humanity.
In the little one's mind, she was a defective product who had failed to perform the role assigned to her.
She knew no other way of life.
So she would be punished.
And if she wasn't... that was even scarier.
Quiet, chilling gazes fixed on her.
She had given up on being loved, given up on happiness, but even so, those eyes were unbearable.
She didn't even know why, but they were.
In that wretched state of mind, the little one stealthily opened her eyes.
The cold rationality granted to her as a mage's talent suppressed her urge to escape.
Either way, punishment came with an afterward.
Turning away from it solved nothing.
She wanted to stay passive, but that would only lead to death.
She was still too young to think death might be easier.
Should she beg for forgiveness? Or just listen silently?
As she fretted over such worries and opened her eyes blankly, as her consciousness pulled free from the darkness...
The little one beheld a new world.
Back on the 12th floor, in the grandly opulent transport ship, Barbaroi had called the little one aside. He apologized first.
It was ancient history to him now.
But it was something that had weighed on his heart for all those long years.
This small vampire had been an obvious burden in the clan, and after her parents—who had turned her—died, no one looked after her. She was abandoned.
Barbaroi had turned a blind eye.
In a situation where everyone was about to die, he had no way to afford any greater sacrifice.
In the midst of it all, he had seen the light fade completely from her eyes, watched the spark unique to children flicker out.
Of course, that sort of thing was common.
No need to even mention war orphans—plenty of human children lost their parents to illness.
But she was a vampire. A member of the Barbaroi Clan.
The fact that he had ignored a child who had come under his responsibility like that lingered in his heart.
Vampires normally didn't turn children carelessly.
Bodies that no longer grew were a massive hindrance in life, in the struggle for survival.
Child vampires born from a moment's pity became headaches for both themselves and the clan forever.
And the little one was the only clan member who hadn't chosen to become a vampire, and the only child.
Honestly, Barbaroi had been relieved when the new clan master said he'd take her.
The little one hesitated a bit before replying.
"No. It's okay."
Her eyes, answering the apology like that, still held no light. Five hundred years had passed unilaterally for him, but for her, it had been less than a month.
Far too soon for any change.
Barbaroi sighed, then pulled her into a warm embrace and whispered.
"Don't worry about clans or clan masters. Exiles are beings who transcend such things."
The little one stared up at Barbaroi with eyes full of doubt.
As if she had no idea what he meant.
Those clouded eyes stirred the guilt of a clan master who had failed in his duty.
"I know you can't understand yet. You wouldn't know how to live. You've lived in a way that never let you decide that."
If any of his federation colleagues heard that gentle voice, they'd first wonder if he was dreaming and pinch his cheek.
And if he didn't wake up, they'd definitely start doubting his mental state.
If it happened on a broadcast, psychiatrists would be booked solid for a while.
The ruthless iron-blooded Director Barbaroi, being gentle? A celestial physicist troll was more believable gossip.
"You're no longer one of our clan."
The little one's eyes shook violently.
She must have thought she was being abandoned.
"No, you haven't been for a while now. Your clan master is someone else. Don't you like him?"
The little one shook her head.
"Do you like him?"
Her small mouth parted slightly. A feeble voice leaked out.
"I... don't know."
Having almost never received kindness, she didn't even know what it was.
Since Barbaroi had a rough idea, he simply held her small body close again.
"Then make yourself like it. You can decide that for yourself now. Good or bad, you choose. Right, you said you wanted to learn magic. Do you like that?"
The little one couldn't move her head this time either. A voice thin as a thread.
"That... I don't know either."
Barbaroi just smiled.
"I hope you come to like it."
Of course, Barbaroi knew. It was the future for her, but the past for him—he'd seen her that way before.
This child who loved magic more than anyone, who was obsessed with it, and who had learned what joy and happiness were.
All he could do now was give her back a little push toward that future.
The little one's vision took in everything. The massive wave of darkness crashing down, and the breakwater standing against that colossal power.
She could even see how the torrent of force was being controlled.
The terrifying power that would shatter at a mere touch was bending softly to her new dad's will, wrapping around them, no longer frightening.
The incoming forces kept surging, rearranging into beautiful forms.
It softened the tsunami's might, diverted it around them, gathered some of it, and forged it into new power.
The little one, who could see all that power with her eyes, watched entranced.
She couldn't tear her gaze away. Couldn't close her mouth.
In her life, if a typhoon hit, she had to run.
The beastmen's oppression and tyranny had driven the human little one from peace and comfort.
Even after becoming a vampire to survive, she could only flee.
The entire clan had eventually fled.
From the eastern lands to the distant west, infiltrating human nations and existing vampire societies.
Even that hadn't worked. Pursued, fleeing, routed.
She had never stood against them.
Now, something different unfolded before her eyes.
Facing the colossal darkness deemed unstoppable, without retreating an inch, and overcoming it.
That resolute will.
That beautiful technique.
The magical feat that resulted.
All of it dazzled the little one.
The moment she thought that, the world's colors changed.
This darkness, which she'd thought a bit less murky and dark, now sparkled.
The flow of mana she'd seen with her eyes since birth suddenly looked entirely different.
No longer mere background flow—it filled her vision.
How could she wield these shining powers?
Could she recreate the feat unfolding before her?
A longing to try bloomed within her.
Her heart, which hadn't beat since death, twitched and ached.
She felt a flame kindling deep inside.
She didn't know what it was, but it felt warm.
The back she clung to was so very warm.
Her old dad's words came to mind: find something you like.
The little one wanted to learn magic.
I gradually expanded the system's size as it gathered the dark torrent.
The mana control's operational rate, which I'd imaged myself, dropped steadily.
Already under 10%.
If this torrent held steady, it would soon run on its own.
And amid it all, the two cores I'd induced to form behind me finally reached criticality.
Dark cores made purely from the element of darkness.
On top of the newly supplied power, even forces that hadn't existed before leaked out around them.
The lumpy darkness, unable to contain its massive energy, began spewing it as light.
Light was the most basic form of mana.
"Dark light" might be a rhetorical contradiction, but magically, it was possible.
I could probably summon sylphs with that mana, but they'd hate it.
I didn't want to see pitch-black sylphs either.
But if I did, my options for using that mana would be extremely limited.
Without enough stats and passive stacks, I couldn't wield mana on that scale directly.
I'd self-destruct, nothing more or less.
And if I only used those cores as infinite mana reserves, I wouldn't output enough to hurt the original owner, the monster.
So I made two.
One to temporarily replenish my mana...
And the other to shove straight into that bastard's gut.
The baptism of darkness, which had seemed eternal, finally ended.
Excluding the darkness that vanished into some distant space behind it, the surrounding mana density was extremely high.
The monster seemed greatly puzzled that I still existed.
The dark spirit roared.
It wasn't a sound you could call one.
A shockwave of darkness, more intense and powerful than any mana detection, spread in all directions.
Now I had overflowing mana too.
The rising darkness easily blocked the impact.
I loaded one of the two furiously spinning cores.
Its pointed tip, shaped to pierce the dark torrent, could also function as a barrel.
Magic was truly conceptual.
By my will, its form shifted into an accelerator barrel.
One core, already too hot to control its spin, was chambered.
The monster still didn't know what I was up to. It raised its arm in rage.
Resorting to physical attack means.
The giant body approached. It moved forward steadily.
Good. This core had no physical substance and was extremely unstable.
Hard to send far.
If I fired it as is, the monster would just absorb it wholesale...
But there was something even an ignorant spirit king who learned nothing from anyone could never know.
Converging the core's spin inward was also a spell.
Releasing it in a single instant was also a spell.
A precisely crafted time bomb seeped into the core.
Accelerated by energy from the other core.
The projectile, primed in place, began accelerating.
Separately from the spin, force built up to propel it forward.
Ah, this might be dangerous.
Not for me, but maybe for our little one.
I slipped out of the system I'd made to shield from the launch backlash.
Detonate outside.
The ultra-condensed mana wildly spun the core—the mana vortex—and ejected it at insane speeds.
Passing through the barrel accelerated it further. It even used its own power as thrust to shoot forward.
The excessive mana exertion warped time's flow for a moment.
The projectile's trajectory stretched like a rubber band, scoring across the void.
The massive darkness vanished into the monster's giant body as if sucked in, arm outstretched.
The thick shroud around the dark spirit king's flesh parted as if it didn't exist.
And for a moment, time felt frozen.
Another side effect of excessive output warping time?
The instant that felt eternally long passed.
From the monster's body, from that distant far-off point.
An explosion erupted.
A colossal blast, like the birth of a star.