Chapter 45
Chapter 45
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 44
Chapter Title: Flames of the Departed
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Perhaps she had known from the very beginning.
Suddenly, that person vanished.
And never appeared again.
Though she didn't want to, Eanna thought that what was bound to come had finally arrived.
This was Lost City, after all.
A city where the shadows of colossal buildings devoured people's souls. A kaleidoscope where life and death twisted together like a labyrinth.
Walter was a mercenary, no less. In a life where dying at any moment wouldn't raise eyebrows, he had more than a few days teetering on the edge of death or grievously wounded.
Eanna couldn't stop him.
It was the path chosen by a man who hadn't been chosen himself.
So she rehearsed it.
Opening her eyes tomorrow morning to find him gone. The hollow ache of his absence. The sorrow from that ache. Even that sorrow fading into a distant future. She pictured it all alone in her mind.
Her face must have been grim.
That's why they asked if something was wrong.
What had she said in response?
Did she smile? Or did she embarrass the worried person by bursting into tears?
She couldn't quite remember.
It was an old tale.
One that surfaced in her dreams now and then.
Walter lay with his eyes closed, as if merely asleep inside the glass tube.
Maybe it was because it had been so long since she'd seen him sleeping so peacefully.
Even knowing the thing before her eyes was nothing but an empty husk, Eanna couldn't tear her gaze away for the longest time.
Their reunion after two years ended just like that—so quietly, in gazes that could never meet.
At some point, fury came crashing in.
The one emotion she had never rehearsed.
When she snapped back to her senses, the master of the black flame stood before her.
Styx's specter.
The wielder of the cursed flames that devoured kin.
She had heard the tales.
A heretical lineage passed down through the generations as a sole inheritance.
The strongest among them, or so they said.
Eanna steeled herself for death.
Not because she sensed she couldn't survive.
And certainly not out of some lofty sense of duty.
She simply wanted to spew out the whirlwind of rage until her heart lay utterly empty.
She knew the outcome better than anyone—precisely because of that.
That's why she had told them to run.
Why? Why go that far?
Eanna's eyes wavered.
It was because of the two figures suddenly fighting at her side.
The woman linker had assigned them for emergencies, she'd said.
Honestly, Eanna hadn't been thrilled.
She couldn't fathom how these two, weaker than her, could possibly help.
But she was wrong.
She was alive in this moment solely because of them.
They had relentlessly shouldered the burden, allowing her to keep facing the heretic's inferno.
And that only bewildered her more.
These two, whom she'd thought would bolt at any second—staking their lives like this?
Because they were Solos?
Just to protect their client?
No, it couldn't be that simple.
They were just... special, somehow.
...Special?
A sudden curiosity struck her—sharp and insistent.
Had Walter been like that too?
Somehow, she thought he had.
He was a man brimming with a sense of responsibility.
Yes—that was one of the things she'd loved about him.
At some point,
Eanna even forgot her rage.
She simply summoned white flame after white flame.
Her body had long hit its limit, but it didn't matter.
Kwachik!
The helmeted Solo fell first.
His acrobatic movements crumbled in a single blow. The moment he collapsed into the flames, a destructive crimson glow erupted.
The man cloaked in rotation.
He filled his comrade's void.
No—that didn't do it justice.
Not only did he hold the balance alone, but in an instant, he seized the battle's momentum for their side.
But only for a moment.
Now, Jahad's bloodline—struck repeatedly by compressed black flames—had slammed his head into the wall and floor before collapsing.
Eanna alone remained.
"Took longer than expected."
After several clashes, Kilgit thudded his massive steps toward her, sprawled on the ground.
A frame that overwhelmed even the average beastman.
From her upward gaze, he was a giant in every sense.
Coughing up blood, Eanna rasped,
"...You provided the black flame... to the black mages?"
Kilgit nodded as if it were nothing.
"I did. Though it was just a tiny spark."
"...Why... though?"
Eanna echoed in disbelief.
A sole inheritance came with its own secrets.
Unclean power or not, there was no disputing it was a legacy honed across ages.
And this man had so casually admitted handing even fragments to outsiders—
"Why? Too narrow-minded for your family's dusty traditions? It's just business."
Kilgit bared a savage grin.
At the same time, the black flames coiling around him blazed fiercer, shrouding the space in inky haze.
A sight that induced vertigo just by looking.
Yet Eanna held her gaze steady and said,
"...Just business? Is that how you... treat that power?"
"What's the issue?"
Kilgit took a heavy step forward.
His presence alone strangled the air.
"I am the black flame."
Another step.
"No one surpasses me with this power."
Blood trickled from Eanna's nose.
"No one!"
Just as the pressure threatened to suffocate her—
"······?"
Suddenly, Kilgit's head snapped sideways.
His eyebrows slowly arched.
Eanna, hacking up blood-flecked coughs, painfully turned her gaze in the same direction.
And she saw it.
Flames burning transparently.
Beyond them, a warm gaze.
What the hell is this?
Jin panicked.
Really panicked.
He had activated mana rampage, for crying out loud.
In a situation where he had no clue how long he could stay sane, standing around like an idiot was beyond stupid—he knew that.
...He knew!
But how could he just walk past that?
Walter was walking.
The guy he'd pulverized, blasted away with a final kick—he was shuffling forward, slow but steady, one step at a time.
His face was smashed beyond recognition. Barely two holes for eyes, and one of those completely pulped, oozing milky fluid.
Yet the relatively intact right eyeball throbbed.
Sure, the scarlet orb still blurred pupil from sclera just like before, but the emotion pulsing from within was no longer violent.
The moment Jin, debating a finishing blow, finally relaxed his fist—
Flames erupted around Walter's body.
White flame.
The same noble blaze as Eanna's.
Solad's secret art.
But that wasn't the end.
The pristine white flames silently merged with the black flames blanketing their host. Mocking Jin's expectation of mutual annihilation, they fused in an instant—burning transparently as one.
A mystical boundary.
It felt like a faint outline, or perhaps a ripple of clear waves.
As that scene seeped quietly into Jin's mind—
"···!"
Kilgit whipped his head around from afar. Spotting the shambling Walter, his eyes bulged—
Walter widened his stride toward the shouting man.
One step, two, three. Soon he broke into a run, an inarticulate bellow ripping from his throat.
"Arrrrrrrgh!!!"
Jin clenched his teeth.
He framed it perfectly: Walter brushing past him, Kilgit cackling as he cocked his fist.
His body moved before his mind could catch up.
He kicked off the ground, overtook Walter, and charged straight at Kilgit's front.
Instinct demanded it.
And Jin trusted his instincts.
That was why he'd met a punch he'd normally dodge head-on—
Jin committed. His brain lightning resonated.
Kwarung!
Lightning struck.
Not from the heavens, but the earth.
Not crashing down, but lancing straight ahead.
The next instant—
Two fists collided in midair.
The eardrum-shattering boom followed a beat later.
──!!
A shockwave burst between the clashing knuckles.
Force that should have dissipated into the air surged back wholly into Jin and Kilgit's arms.
Pung! Pung! Pung! Pung!
From hands to elbows to shoulders—muscles and bones exploding and shattering in unison.
Jin's right arm whipped back over his head—
His body, unable to withstand the impact, launched backward in a massive tumble.
But this time was different.
In his airborne vision: Kilgit staggering.
Walter lunging to wrap him in a fierce embrace.
Immediately after, a colossal blaze roared up.
"Arrrrrrr!!"
A mindless, monstrous roar. Yet the flames surging from Walter were utterly radiant—soul-scorching fire that devoured the black flames, crushing Kilgit's body with inexplicable mass and slamming him into the floor.
Meanwhile, Jin propped himself up with his left hand.
"Hahk! Hahk!"
Breath jammed in his throat, vision whirling, right arm a mangled wreck like it'd been through a blender—but he drew Gravis 707 and squeezed the trigger at Kilgit's skull anyway.
He knew it wouldn't work.
But he was too pissed to leave it at that.
"This is revenge for Rum Pump Pump!"
Only after seeing the skull twitch did he turn and approach the fallen Eanna.
He crouched, exposing his back.
"Climb on. Hurry."
Eanna didn't ask dumb questions.
She threw her arms around his neck right away.
Her gaze stayed locked elsewhere.
"...Walter?"
Her murmur grazed his ear as Jin stood, then headed for Eric, limp amid the flames.
His vision blurred—couldn't tell if the guy was dead or alive.
But he couldn't leave a corpse behind, so he hoisted him up.
"...Kuhp!"
Agony lanced from his ruined right arm. Jin bit down hard, swallowing the pain.
"Arrrrrrr!!!"
The roar pierced his ears.
Transparent flames still blazed fiercely.
Kilgit, buried within, flailed massive arms to shake them off.
But Jin wasn't optimistic.
Walter's body—still clutching Kilgit—was crumbling and scattering even now.
That was when—
The barely recognizable head turned their way.
And the cry echoed.
"Gaaaaaa!!!!"
Jin leaped toward the ceiling hole belching black smoke.
Vision gone, skin melting from the heat—but he barely cleared the ledge. Leaving Eanna's wail for Walter behind, he sprinted for his life.
Teng!
He kicked open the emergency door, clinging to his fraying consciousness as he bounded up the stairs.
The path he'd descended in seconds now stretched endlessly.
And to top it off, the heat-warped, swelling building began tilting from the basement up.
What the actual fuck! Seriously!
Jin spewed curses inwardly as he ran and ran.
Torn mana circuits meant no flash step or mana—he relied purely on his body to reach the rooftop and hurl himself into the waiting transport ship.
With Eanna clinging unconscious to his neck and Eric in tow, he collapsed and rasped his final reserves:
"...To a safe... place... depart······"
(Complete!) Success!
Congratulations!
But by then, Jin's consciousness had already snapped. He never saw it.