Chapter 263
Chapter 263
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 263
Chapter Title: 74. When the Night is Long, the Dreams are Deep (2)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Sigrun raised her hand, her body trembling uncontrollably.
Her skin, once as fair and smooth as if glazed with honey, now bloomed with dark purplish blotches across the back of her hand.
Soon, the entire back of her hand was engulfed in those inky stains.
It wasn't just her hand.
Through the parted collar of her robe, the exposed skin revealed the same affliction. She drew the treasured sword of the Mistletoe Clan.
Even amid the fierce clash of battle, the blade remained utterly pristine, not a speck of dust upon it, reflecting its master's form without the slightest distortion.
Her skin had turned a deep purplish hue, and the whites of her eyes had blackened.
This was no longer the ethereal beauty that people coveted in a fairy.
It was simply something grotesque and repulsive.
But the truly horrifying part wasn't her hideous transformation.
Sigrun clawed at the empty air.
Nothing was there, yet in Sigrun's eyes, it was all too clear.
The millennium of merit she had built, crumbling like a sandcastle; the fragments of her karma and techniques scattering like grains of sand.
Despair washed over her.
An unprecedented sense of loss and deprivation flooded her hollowed body.
As she shuddered in that horrific sensation, she soon realized the truth.
From this day forward, she would never dance the sword dance again.
And she intuited something deeper.
Her clan had no future left.
Sigrun laughed.
At first a giggle, then convulsing with full-body cackles, and finally choking gasps as if her breath might fail her—she laughed like a madwoman.
Only after a long while did she rein in her laughter.
"That day, and today as well... Your Highness never fails to astonish me."
It wasn't feigned admiration or mockery.
She was genuinely shocked.
She could never have imagined that the young prince of the Leonberger royal house—who had even forgotten his own family's legacy—would not only awaken the true power of the Dragon Slayer Sword but unearth an even older force unknown to her, cornering her like this.
Sigrun narrowed her blackened eyes, gazing at the man before her.
"Thanks to Your Highness, I've lost the greatest power I possessed. My merit is shattered, my sword dance is unusable, and even my innate abilities have diminished significantly. At least three-tenths? And as time passes, I'll lose even more."
Her voice was dry as desert sand.
"But the same goes for Your Highness. That power isn't meant for you—it must come at a steep price. And the only thing Your Highness can pay with right now is your life. Even if you borrow strength by sacrificing your lifespan, how long can it last? Even at this moment, the time granted to you is ticking away."
He offered no reply. He simply stared at her silently from within his helm.
If she could, Sigrun wanted nothing more than to rip that helmet off him right then.
Drawing power at the cost of one's life brought agony as the soul frayed apart—and being unable to see his face twisted in torment was maddeningly frustrating.
But she suppressed that twisted urge and continued speaking.
"Perhaps there's not much time left already. You once drew on the sword's power by wagering your lifespan before. No matter how this battle ends, Your Highness will..."
She stared at him intently.
"...inevitably meet death."
He maintained his silence.
Perhaps the pain of his soul unraveling was overwhelming enough, or maybe he didn't want to shorten his life further by speaking.
Either way, Sigrun had no interest in caring.
What mattered to her was...
"I'm delighted. To go that far, just for me."
The fact that the man before her had staked his life and soul on this fight with her.
It filled her with unbearable ecstasy.
"I can't help but return the favor."
Escaping this place would be child's play if she wished.
But she had no intention of letting his life flicker out so meaninglessly.
"Before the life left in Your Highness fully gutters out..."
A violet aura began to overflow along her blade.
"...I'll snuff it out with my own hands. That will be my reciprocation."
And so the battle commenced.
**
With a single sword stroke, the earth split and the heavens tore.
A clash beyond anything a human could fathom.
Even the distant shockwaves and auras made the fortress tremble as if it might collapse.
Before such a horrific battle, ordinary humans had few options.
Cower flat on the ground clutching their heads, or deny reality itself.
But there were those who belonged to neither category.
"Get a grip!"
"On your feet, now!"
Men bellowing roughly as they dragged terrified soldiers upright by force.
"You weak-ass southern pansies!"
"You wanna hole up in the fortress and die?!"
They were Winter Castle's rangers.
With bodies battered and unhealed, they raced through the fortress, hauling panicked soldiers out to safety.
"The fortress is about to crumble!"
The knights, too, poured mana into their shouts, evacuating soldiers huddled deep within the stronghold.
"Prioritize the wounded!"
At the center was Winter Castle's lord, Vincent Ballerhard.
"Handling the dead and supplies comes last!"
He stood firm atop the quaking battlements, as if they might collapse any second, directing the evacuation.
"My lord! We must fall back!"
"Too many haven't evacuated yet! These are the men His Highness risked everything to protect—we can't let them die in vain!"
"But...!"
"I won't say it twice! Get those soldiers out!"
Vincent berated his knights more harshly than ever before.
"Move!"
"Yes, my lord!"
As they vanished into the fortress's depths, Vincent turned to gaze beyond the plains.
Boom! Boom!
Golden and violet flashes bloomed and faded countless times.
And whenever the light dimmed, shattered luminous fragments invariably rained down on the fortress.
Rumble.
A atop the shuddering walls, Vincent's eyes held an unprecedented gloom as he stared at the plains.
"Damn it all, it's exactly like that day."
The day Winter Castle fell, the day his father never returned—the scene overlaid perfectly.
The surging dark-green waves, the burning castle, the desperately fleeing soldiers—it all mirrored atop the fortress.
The only difference was that instead of dark-green waves crashing down, it was golden and violet flashes.
He was just as powerless as that day, reduced to watching helplessly.
The image of the crown prince plunging a blade into his own chest burned vividly in his mind.
He shuddered.
The sound of steel slicing flesh still echoed sharply in his ears.
It had to be the ritual to draw forth the Leonberger royal sword, the Dragon Slayer's power.
The family's legacy was no mere fanciful legend.
That golden plate armor he'd never seen before must be part of it.
Yet even witnessing the legend unfold before his eyes, even knowing his beloved crown prince had revived it, brought him no thrill.
Anxiety gnawed at him.
His heart refused to calm, unnaturally so.
Vincent shook his head, trying to dispel the ominous premonition.
He repeated to himself endlessly.
It's different this time. His Highness is several times the knight my father was. He'll definitely return.
Muttering the same words countless times, he staved off his impatience.
How much time passed like that?
"My lord! Evacuation complete!"
The knights who'd gone to aid the retreat returned.
"Any stragglers?!"
"We got most... No! Anyone left can't be saved now! If we dawdle, our own men die!"
At that exact moment, one side of the fortress collapsed with a thunderous groan.
"My lord!"
A knight screamed and yanked him back.
Vincent could no longer stubbornly hold out.
Among those the crown prince had protected was himself, and staying in the crumbling fortress to share its fate wasn't what His Highness wanted.
"Damn it!"
Cursing, he bounded down the wall steps like they were stairs.
Roooar.
The moment he passed through the gates, the walls caved in with a deafening roar.
Dust billowed thickly.
Even amid it, the explosions continued unabated.
"Pull the men back as far as possible! If you can, retreat beyond sight of the flashes!"
Vincent coughed out commands to his subordinates.
"My lord! Where are you going?!"
"I leave the rear to you!"
Snapping at them, he circled the collapsed wall and dashed toward the plains.
Stumbling over rocks countless times, he finally halted somewhere near the raging battle.
It was where the Silver Lions and a handful of men had gathered.
"Well done."
York Willoden, Count of the Iron Lion Knight Order and the kingdom's Silver Lion, offered Vincent a quiet word of thanks.
But Vincent stared past him, toward the flashing plains beyond.
"It's like a scene from myth."
York spoke as if seeking agreement. Vincent didn't respond.
"To think the royal sword was such an extraordinary artifact."
This time, it was another old knight who replied.
"No matter how divine the relic, it's wielded by a man in the end. That, too, is His Highness's prowess."
York Willoden and the old knight marveled ceaselessly at the earth-shaking battle.
But not one of the crown prince's knights, Vincent included, voiced agreement.
Perhaps thinking themselves overly dramatic, the old knights quietly fell silent.
They mused inwardly.
A battle so ferocious it toppled a fortress with mere aftershocks alone—not strange that the crown prince's knights, infamous for their fierce loyalty to their lord, stood there anxiously mute.
But even so, their current demeanor seemed excessive.
They never once averted their eyes from the fight. Lips pale and clenched, fists gripped until blood welled—their faces were masks of despair.
Among them, Adelia Bayern was in the worst state.
She'd tried to charge the battlefield multiple times.
If Arwen Kirguyen hadn't stepped in, scolding her that she'd only get in the way, she'd have been reduced to ash amid those flashes long ago.
Now, Adelia Bayern lay cradled in Arwen Kirguyen's arms, her vacant eyes—drained of soul—staring endlessly at the plains where the crown prince fought.
Gleams of madness and tears alternated in her gaze.
Her crazed appearance was both pitiful and eerie.
The others weren't much better, though the degree varied.
Bernard Ilai's aura flickered unstably as he fidgeted with his sword incessantly—left unchecked, his mana core might shatter.
Arwen Kirguyen was the same.
She appeared the most composed among the crown prince's knights on the surface, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Her sword told the tale.
The blade she gripped tightly flickered with swordlight, gathering and fading repeatedly, yet she seemed oblivious, just glaring at the distant plains.
Even Kals Yulihi, renowned for his steadfastness, thrummed with tension, as if poised to hurl himself into the fray at any moment.
Unable to bear the young Silver Lions and knights' excessive loss of composure, York Willoden turned.
He opened his mouth to offer some small comfort—
Whoosh!
An immense aura erupted behind him.
York Willoden froze solid.
He couldn't even dream of turning. It felt like he'd face something horrific if he did.
But he shuddered and forced himself to look back.
And he beheld it.
Something colossal slowly raising its head beyond the plains.
It was something supreme York Willoden had never imagined could exist in this world—something so ferocious, one feared even meeting its gaze.
Grrrrowl.
Finally lifting its head fully, the entity slowly rose.
York Willoden cried out like a scream.
"A dragon!"
The instant the words left him, he realized.
What he'd taken for a dragon was merely an illusion forged of swordlight.
Lost in this unprecedented miracle, he stood transfixed.
And at that very moment.
ROOOAR!
The dragon's form abruptly spread illusory wings and soared aloft.
Toward the heart of the ominous storm swirling with violet flashes.