Chapter 234
Chapter 234
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 234
Chapter Title: Those Who Try to Protect the Future, Those Who Try to Live in the Present
-----------------------------------------------------------------
In the midst of a feeling like she was being carried somewhere.
Meyri faintly regained consciousness.
And when she opened her eyes.
She came face-to-face with dark blue hair.
The moment she saw that hair color, Meyri gasped in shock and swallowed hard.
It was the color of Valheim, the man who had knocked her out twice, after all. It was only natural.
Meyri hurriedly looked at the person running while carrying her on his back.
And she immediately realized who he was.
Krash Valheim.
The man who had spouted nonsense she couldn't comprehend.
Meyri realized he hadn't noticed she was awake yet.
And just as she was slyly moving her hand toward her waist.
"Let me say this first: I have detection abilities too."
Meyri's body stiffened abruptly.
He had noticed her trying to ambush him from behind.
Meyri quietly removed her hand from her waist.
She knew the moment her futile attempt was exposed, she had no chance against Krash.
At the same time, Meyri noticed that the bracelet on her wrist had already been taken by Krash.
She quickly gave up on trying to reclaim that too.
"...What do you plan to do with me?"
"You're the head of the White Yang Corps. I'll stash you somewhere else until the White Yang Corps is dealt with."
Krash said this as he raced down the corridor.
But Krash's expression was far from pleased.
Meyri could quickly tell why.
The surroundings were entirely embroiled in battle.
The White Yang Corps had joined forces with the Vast Sea Corps and the Man-Horse Corps.
In the Vast Sea Corps' case, only Pelai had come to support them, but the Man-Horse Corps had brought most of their forces.
They too needed to crush the Lion Corps alongside the White Yang Corps, so they were going all out.
As a result, the Lion Corps was struggling quite a bit.
The White Yang Corps already had superior numbers, and now the Man-Horse Corps had joined them.
They were being overwhelmed numerically, that was the reality.
So the Lion Corps members each had to handle at least three opponents.
On top of that, there was another reason Krash was frowning.
Krash was looking out the window.
"Tch, they've brought a lot."
Numerous people were swarming in from outside.
Their identities were none other than the other corps.
This could be a chance to take out the White Yang Corps, Lion Corps, and Man-Horse Corps all at once.
So the moment they noticed the battle between those two corps, they stopped fighting among themselves and came attacking this way first.
Meyri belatedly sensed it through her detection.
At the same time, she looked at Krash with eyes wide in shock.
Her detection range was wide enough to be called the best in Raheln Academy.
In truth, among those with detection abilities worldwide, few could match her.
But the Krash right in front of her was sensing presences just as far away as her own detection allowed.
He couldn't discern the fine details like Meyri could, but his detection range was ridiculously vast too.
As proof, the other corps were still quite a distance away.
"W-What... what are you, exactly?"
As Meyri muttered dazedly, Krash glanced at her.
"Krash Valheim."
Ironically, just saying that name explained everything.
He was a Valheim, after all.
Krash ignored the stunned Meyri and turned his gaze from the window.
A figure was approaching from down the corridor.
The moment Krash saw him, he slightly furrowed his brow.
A man walking with his spear dangling loosely, golden energy scattering around him.
It was none other than Glen Diana, Mary Diana's cousin.
There was a shallow wound on his arm.
Krash immediately realized who had inflicted it.
'Karandis.'
She had stepped up to tie down Glen in his place.
It seemed like her handiwork.
"Glen, what did you do with Karandis?"
With Karandis's personality, unless her body was completely immobilized, she would have stubbornly blocked Glen.
Yet here he was with just a shallow arm wound.
What that implied came from Glen's own mouth.
"I broke her limbs. When she still tried to get up, I pinned her to the wall with my sword."
Glen relayed the fact with remarkable indifference.
However, Krash noticed he had deliberately mentioned something he didn't need to.
It was a provocation.
A provocation to make Krash fight him.
Cheap provocations didn't work on Krash.
Provoking was his specialty; being provoked wasn't a hobby of his.
But Krash casually released the hand holding Meyri.
"Kyaa!"
Not expecting Krash to let go, Meyri instinctively screamed as she tumbled to the floor.
Krash left her there and drew Thunderclap.
"Meyri, if you run, I'll chase you to hell itself and drag you back by force."
His voice echoed chillingly through the corridor, laced with utter sincerity.
Meyri sensed Krash would gladly do it and flinched, quietly leaning against the wall.
"...I don't even have the energy to run."
From the moment Charlotte wrecked her detection once, to getting beaten by Krash—Meyri had been through it all.
As she said, she truly lacked the stamina to flee.
So she decided to just watch.
She judged that without someone coming to save her, escaping Krash was impossible anyway.
"Glen, I was in the middle of asking you something earlier."
Black Flame rose from Krash's sword.
Amid that Black Flame, Krash quietly regarded Glen.
"Why did you end up like this?"
The Glen that Krash knew was someone who stood against injustice.
In fact, he had confronted a member of the imperial faction when Krash was wronged.
Yet the Glen now looked utterly tormented.
As if he had betrayed his own beliefs.
"It's for the family."
Hearing "family," Krash began to slowly furrow his brow.
His family was Diana, the renowned house of spearmanship.
They had consistently produced exceptional spear wielders, and in the past, Mary from their house had even been called the Divine Spear.
However, the situation before and after his regression was vastly different.
Mary had been imprisoned for attempting to assassinate the Fourth Princess, Sizzly Epania, and now bore the imperial family's stigma.
Naturally, the Diana family, which had produced an imperial assassin, had been pushed out of the political sphere.
The prestige of the Diana house as a spearmanship powerhouse had plummeted in an instant.
That fallen prestige showed no sign of recovery, and the Diana family began to rot away bit by bit.
At least while Mary was by Sigrin's side, things were somewhat okay.
Sigrin had provided some support to the Diana family.
But after Sigrin completely abandoned Mary.
Sigrin no longer offered protection to the Diana family.
It was retaliation against Mary, but also part of her own calculations.
Mary might be unnecessary now, but the Diana spear wielders were still useful.
With that judgment, Sigrin abruptly cut ties with Diana.
She knew that if the Diana family collapsed like this, they would cling to her first—the one who had extended a hand until now.
The moment Sigrin's sole patronage vanished.
Diana began hurtling down the path to ruin at an uncontrollable speed.
Nobles and merchant guilds began successively severing deals and contracts with the Diana family.
And the territory's residents, deprived of supplies and merchants, started fleeing Diana lands.
The Diana family was located in rugged northern terrain, even at the empire's heart.
An territory unable to be self-sufficient crumbled in an instant without supplies and merchants.
Naturally, the Diana family went into emergency mode.
And as Sigrin intended, the first they clung to was her.
After Mary's assassination attempt, all the merchant guilds and nobles who had dealt with them were now under Sigrin's control.
Thus, the person the Diana family attached to create even a sliver of connection with Sigrin.
That was Glen Diana, still attending Raheln Academy.
Glen had to become Sigrin's dog.
"You're wielding your spear for the Diana family, so you must understand. To revive the Diana family, you need to surpass Mary."
Glen couldn't deny those words.
Even now, Mary's status as one born with the Heavenly Martial Physique was immense.
The sight of her overwhelmingly defeating an imperial knight order alone at a young age was firmly etched in Glen's mind.
Though undervalued now, Glen still knew he couldn't beat Mary.
"If I said there's one way to make you strong, would you follow it?"
His family's mother and father knelt and begged before Glen.
For the first time, he saw his once-proud parents so pathetically pleading with him.
He couldn't abandon his lifelong family's downfall.
So he trampled his own beliefs.
He would become strong enough to meet Sigrin's expectations, no matter what it took.
And he would restore the family.
"Yes, gladly."
Thus, he became Sigrin's dog.
Golden light surged even more fiercely from Glen's spear.
The walls touched by the rippling energy cracked with a sharp sound.
Cracks formed in the glass windows, shattering with a crash.
The energy emanating from Glen was overwhelmingly powerful.
"Krash."
Glen's spear aimed straight at Krash.
"I must defeat you."
Sigrin had told Glen.
To return victorious over Krash in this inter-corps battle.
Sigrin knew Krash's strength well.
She knew unfinished Glen couldn't beat him.
Yet she sent him anyway.
Thinking he could at least grab Krash's ankle.
Realizing this, Krash scowled fiercely.
'Sigrin, that bitch.'
She had turned Glen, who would belong to the Generation of the Sky in the future, into a mere disposable pawn.
All for her own greed.
'I knew she was rotten from the start, but...'
This woman truly seemed to have no intention of preventing destruction.
Krash wanted to ask Sigrin.
What was the point of destroying everything just to cling to her position?
No matter how desperately she held onto it, wouldn't she witness this world's end with her own eyes?
Didn't she once wield her sword beside Arthur to save the world?
Krash forcibly swallowed the words welling from deep within.
'In the end, Sigrin, the path you're walking isn't the same direction as mine.'
Sigrin Epania.
She truly had no intention of stopping the destruction.
Even knowing the future's annihilation, she only wrecked everything around her, grasped petty power, and sought to preserve her seat.
He found it laughable that he once thought she'd advance in the same direction as Arthur's chosen one.
Arthur had at least tried to avert destruction, that much was true.
'Well, I knew that long ago.'
Sigrin lacked leadership.
Precisely, she didn't know how to set goals and march toward them.
Not knowing how, she had blindly followed Arthur as he boldly advanced toward his goals.
He must have dazzled in her eyes.
And inwardly, she felt satisfaction and elation.
Just being by Arthur's side earned her praise, with people calling her a apostle of justice.
When in reality, she wasn't of that caliber.
"Is that so."
Krash abandoned all expectations of Sigrin and looked at Glen.
Glen, who had poured everything into this— even his future.
There was only one thing Krash could do for him now.
"Then beat me."
Match his full power with his own.