Chapter 98
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 98
Chapter Title: Aura Blade
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An incomprehensible thought.
No matter how much of a genius Christian was, he was, at best, a lower-tier 4-Star.
In contrast, the Dark Demon Squad had five 4-Star Majin. Including Maisac, that made six.
With over ten 3-Star Majin besides, their forces were unbeatable.
But the squad leader's intuition sounded an instinctual alarm.
*'I can't let my guard down.'*
"Form the Dark Demon Formation. Full power."
The squad leader's sword was stained with darkness.
It was the Black Sword Transformation, Black Fog.
A destructive mist of Magi that spread like fog, pulverizing anything it touched.
The other 4-Star members also unleashed their Black Sword Transformations.
They too summoned Black Fog.
The Black Fog conjured by the five 4-Star Majin merged into one, its nature transforming once more.
The fog became wind.
Like a vortex.
It was a combination formation using the Black Sword Transformation.
That wasn't all.
The 3-Star Majin standing behind them cast their own specialized black magic.
Curses, destruction, illusions.
The dark wind absorbed the black magic, exuding an even more menacing aura.
In short, the Dark Demon Formation was a powerful anti-personnel combination attack—a vortex of Magi formed from Black Swords, imbued with curses, destruction, and illusions.
But Christian's reaction was strange.
He simply stood there, motionless.
The squad leader wore a puzzled expression.
*'What's this? Has he given up?'*
But that couldn't be right.
An eerie sense of foreboding washed over him.
It was the intuition of a Majin who had crossed the line between life and death countless times.
The squad leader shouted forcefully.
"Inject the maximum amount of Magi. We kill him in one blow!"
"W-Wait?! Didn't I tell you to capture him alive?"
"Shut up and stay put!"
The other members of the Dark Demon Squad felt the same unease.
"Haaah!"
The vortex of darkness, like a raging storm, engulfed Christian.
*'Got him! He's trapped.'*
The squad leader let out a sigh of relief.
Though it wasn't perfectly executed without their 5-Star commander, a 4-Star Majin could never escape that vortex alive.
He would be instantly killed by the barrage of black magic and the gale of Black Swords assaulting him from all sides.
*'Not even a corpse will remain…'*
But in that moment.
The unbelievable happened.
*Fwwaaash!!!*
A pure white light erupted from within the vortex of darkness.
It was a brilliant radiance that seemed to drive out the wicked darkness.
The vortex of darkness began to shatter.
"Keuk?!"
The members who had cast the Dark Demon Formation coughed up blood.
"What?!"
The squad leader's face was a mask of disbelief.
Breaking the Dark Demon Formation was shocking enough, but something else was even more astounding.
*'This, this feeling…? What? It can't be...?'*
And then.
After the remnants of darkness had completely faded.
Everyone gasped at the sight of Christian.
"Th-that's?"
A pillar of light radiating brilliantly from Christian's hand.
The realm of a 5-Star of the Alliance.
The symbol of the 'Elder Knights' class.
An 'Aura Blade' rippled from Chris's sword.
"..."
Silence fell.
It was as if time itself had stopped.
Everyone stood frozen, staring at that blade of light with eyes full of disbelief.
Then.
"D-Don't be fooled! It must be an illusion!"
one of the Dark Demon Squad members yelled.
"I'll check it myself!"
"Wait!"
*Fwaash!*
The pillar of light flashed.
And that was it.
The Majin who had charged forward was simply destroyed.
The word 'cut' didn't seem fitting.
The sword he held.
His Black Sword.
And the entire path it swept through had been utterly erased.
A terrifying power that belied its brilliant, almost beautiful, radiance.
It was a real Aura Blade.
A silence akin to despair descended.
"H-how?"
Chris shrugged.
"Ah. I'm a genius, so it just sort of happened. I got bored of only using Magi, so I trained with Starlight on the side, and what do you know, I hit 5-Star."
"Wh-what nonsense..."
"In any case, that's not what's important, is it?"
Chris said softly.
"You're all going to die here."
"!!"
"Now that you've seen this, I can't let a single one of you live. Sorry."
The Dark Demon Squad flinched and stepped back.
But it was too late.
*Fwaaash!*
A fountain of blood erupted.
* * *
The Dark Demon Squad resisted, but it was futile.
A 5-Star Elder Class wields power incomparable to the realms below.
Not a single one survived.
"Uh, uh... uhh..."
Maisac stared up at Chris with a dazed look.
Maisac had been pathetic to the very end.
He had left the Dark Demon Squad to fend for themselves and tried to flee.
And yet, he hadn't even gotten far.
Paralyzed by fear, he had tripped, stumbled, and been caught while flailing on the ground.
"P-please spare me...!"
He trembled while sitting on the ground, then bowed his head low, begging for forgiveness.
"Sp-spare me! W-we're still brothers! I-I... I'll never appear before you again! Please, let me live!! No, please spare me!"
But Christian's expression remained as cold as ever.
Just as despair was about to consume him.
Christian said something unexpected.
"You want to live? Then tell me something useful."
"!!"
"Give me information worth as much as your life, and I'll consider letting you live."
Even a wretch like him was of the direct bloodline.
He might know some unexpectedly important information.
"Th-that...!!"
"Nothing? Then you can just die."
"N-no! Uh... Father is plotting a rebellion!"
He was talking about Marquis Langham.
Chris stared blankly at Maisac.
"Father wants to kill the Lord! I've seen him secretly communicating with the Four Kings Castle! So... so...!"
It was surprising information, but nothing new to Chris.
*'I already know all of this.'*
Instead, Chris asked about something else.
"What about Lady Yurian?"
"H-huh?"
"Do you know anything about Lady Yurian?"
She was the rival he needed to be most wary of in the succession contest.
Maisac's eyes darted around frantically.
"L-Lady Yurian... older sister..."
"It seems you don't know much."
"No! Wait...!! Forget Lady Yurian, I'll tell you about older brother Eshid!"
Maisac shrieked.
"Brother Eshid is plotting something terrible to kill you!!"
"Hmm?"
Now this was interesting.
"That bastard should be recuperating from what I did to him."
By his calculations, the internal injuries would take at least a year to heal. There was still a long way to go.
"His internal injuries are already almost healed."
"That's impossible."
"...He used the secret art of human sacrifice."
"!!"
Chris frowned.
"The Dark Magic House forbids human sacrifice, doesn't it? No, beyond that, isn't human sacrifice forbidden by His Majesty the Demon Emperor?"
The Demon Emperor.
The greatest Demon King, ranked number one, who has lived since the dawn of the Magitech Empire.
But the Demon Emperor's way of ruling the Magitech Empire was one of strict non-intervention.
He never revealed himself, even when the Magitech Empire was shaken to its core.
*'At most, he conveys his will through the third-ranked Demon King, the 'Magic Chancellor'.'*
Because the Demon Emperor adhered so strictly to this policy of non-intervention, terrible things often happened in the shadows.
"The Riberi family helped him. The County of Riberi is completely on Brother Eshid's side."
They were a vassal family of the Dark Magic House.
A family of the most loyal retainers who had sworn fealty for generations, they were considered the core of the Dark Magic House's vassals.
They were also the family of Eshid's mother.
*'So, Eshid will be returning sooner than I expected.'*
The Eshid who returned would undoubtedly possess even greater power than before.
Because he had performed a human sacrifice.
*'That damn bastard.'*
Chris clenched his fist, his knuckles cracking.
He utterly detested human sacrifice.
He had witnessed it ad nauseam during the Age of Ruin.
*'I won't let them get away with this. Not him, and not the Riberi family.'*
To defeat Eshid, he would naturally have to face the vassals behind him.
It wouldn't be easy, but that was fine.
He had a plan.
"I-I gave you information, so please spare me..."
*Puk.*
A cold blade pierced Maisac's throat.
He had only asked in case he might get some useful information; he'd never had any intention of letting Maisac live.
"Hoo."
Chris let out a sigh.
The Dark Demon Squad hadn't been an easy opponent, and fatigue washed over him.
*'Time to clean up.'*
A cleanup to avoid suspicion.
Chris manipulated the scene according to his plan.
*'I wonder if that Evan fellow got away safely. Since I'm done here, I should get going too.'*
*Fwaash!*
But after Chris had disappeared from the forest.
A single drop of blood fell, and at the same time, a figure appeared.
"Hmm. Well, well."
Brilliant silver hair.
Eyes as red as blood.
An eerie madness that didn't match his handsome face.
It was the First Prince, Sherard.
He had been secretly watching Chris's fight!
"This is starting to get interesting. What should I do?"
Sherard gazed in the direction Chris had disappeared.
A bright smile spread across his lips.
"I feel like killing him."
* * *
The death of Maisac!
The Dark Magic House was in an uproar.
"What happened?"
Marquis Langham summoned Chris for questioning.
"My apologies. The incident occurred while I was separated from my slave."
"What do you mean?"
"The Dark Demon Squad and Young Lord Maisac attacked my slave first, and my slave retaliated, killing them all."
Chris blamed the entire incident on Evan.
*'This is why I deliberately used the swordsmanship of a renowned sword family.'*
"Judging by the traces of an Aura Blade, it seems the slave was hiding his true strength. By the time I arrived at the scene, they had mutually destroyed each other, and both sides were dead. I apologize for not being able to stop it."
He had already manipulated the scene to match his testimony, so there was no worry of being caught.
*'Evan will have to live in hiding for a while to avoid the eyes of the sword families, so there's no way they'll find out he's alive.'*
By the time Evan's survival is revealed, this incident will have become completely insignificant.
"...I see. Understood."
Marquis Langham frowned but couldn't say anything more.
Since Maisac and the Dark Demon Squad had attacked first, it wasn't Chris's fault.
Above all, regardless of the circumstances, the one who lost the fight and died was the one at fault.
This was the way of the Majin.
But there was one person who couldn't think that way.
"Aaaaaaaah!!!!"
It was Marchioness Fresia.
"No! This can't be happening!! Aah...!!"
Her grief soon turned to rage.
"I'll kill you! Christian! Right now...!! I'll chop you up, starting with your fingers, one by one...!!"
But then.
"Enough."
"!!"
A cold voice cut in.
She whipped her head around to see a woman with a cold expression glaring at her.
It was Merian.
She was wearing the uniform of the Black Shadow Knights, the family's inspection unit.
"Get out of my way!"
However.
*Chaaang!*
Merian's sword was pointed at Fresia.
Fresia's face hardened.
"Did you really think that we, the Black Shadow Knights, have been ignorant of your wrongdoings all this time, Fresia?"