Chapter 183
Chapter 183
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 183
Chapter Title: Imperial Resonance
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There were two staircases in Research Building 12.
Of the two passages connecting to the lower floor, one had now become the absolute critical defensive line that must not fall at this moment.
The west staircase was guarded by Batter Goodspring and the members of the special task force.
The east staircase was held by Lingdo along with some cadets capable of combat.
And Hector, who was effectively commanding the east staircase, was now feeling his limits.
“These bastards, when the hell are they gonna stop coming?!”
“Were there this many puppets in the academy?”
“The dean’s a puppeteer, you idiot!”
“What? Are you accusing Dean Alderson of collecting trash like this?”
“Trash puppets? Are you insulting stuffed dolls right nowwww?!”
“Die! Die! Fuck, I’m sick of puppets!”
No. He had been feeling his limits for a while now.
Amid the vulgar curses, not only the cadets but even the Lingdo were losing their minds, spouting nonsense now and then.
Normally, Hector would have frowned immediately upon hearing such profanity...
“Hector! What’s the situation like now?”
What do you think? It’s fucked. Anyone can see that.
...but he forcibly held back the retort.
Hector, who took immense pride in the noble Bednicker bloodline, never acted in a way that would tarnish the family’s honor, no matter the situation.
“To be honest, it’s not good! But if we hold out just a little longer, we’ll make it! The enemy’s assault has weakened considerably!”
It was a lie.
The enemy’s onslaught hadn’t let up for even a moment from the start until now.
If he graphed their attack momentum, it would form a nearly flat line, smooth as a calm sea.
Hector even felt a chill at that fact. It was a uniformity possible only with an army of puppets.
“Got it! You hear that, you fuckers?! Put your backs into it! Squeeze out every last drop of strength from your nursing days!”
A knight cadet with an especially foul mouth bellowed in a ragged voice. He was strong enough not to aspire to heroism, with exceptional mental fortitude as well.
Hector had definitely heard his name before, but couldn’t recall it.
‘But this cadet’s at his limit too.’
In fact, it wasn’t just him.
Hector himself was starting to feel his body growing numb.
It was only natural.
Hector was at the forefront of the defensive line, facing the most puppets.
His usual murderous training volume was what kept him going now.
He knew from experience.
The human body was surprisingly resilient.
Even after the moment you think you can’t move anymore, you can keep going for a while longer.
Of course, exceeding the limit meant brutal muscle pain the next day...
But that was better than dying, wasn’t it?
‘Just hold on. That’s all we need to do.’
He didn’t know how long, though.
Hector was certain the assault team would succeed. Even against the Demon King.
It was a level of trust that surprised even him.
And he felt no resentment at not being included in the assault team.
It was strange, really.
When had this much trust sprouted for his much younger little brother, who had only one Blessing?
“......”
It didn’t matter.
Tracing back the origins of that trust step by step felt pointless anyway.
There was only one important thing.
Hector trusted Ruan.
Kieeeeeek—!
The puppets screeching grotesquely no longer felt unfamiliar. Had he adapted already?
Hector swung his sword mechanically as he thought.
The staircase was about five meters wide.
A standard width—not too narrow, not too wide—but right now, it felt endlessly vast.
‘Still manageable, though.’
This staircase width.
With solid tactics and timely rotations, a dozen men could hold off hundreds in a siege.
And they were doing just that.
Just four of them defending a five-meter space, repelling dozens of puppets.
If they maintained this, they could hold for another hour or two.
Of course, there was no guarantee Ruan would defeat the Demon King by then—.
“Moooooommmmyyyy—!”
At that moment, a scream-like wail erupted from behind.
It was so loud that Hector couldn’t help diverting his attention backward, even though he knew he shouldn’t.
In the end, it turned out to be the right choice.
An academy cadet without resistance to the instrument’s effects—especially a particularly burly one—was charging forward, tears flying.
“Mommy! Mommy! Wait! Take me with you! Moooommm!”
Hector genuinely wanted to see that cadet’s mother.
“You’re leaving again? Leaving me all alone? Mommy, why’d you have to die...!”
...Never mind.
“What the hell are you doing...? Stop him—!”
Nabi Goodspring, standing beside him, shouted in a tearing voice.
As Hector agreed with her command—thinking how thin her voice was, like a woman’s—the cadet was in the academy’s highest year and seemed to have neglected no physical training.
A sturdy body contrasting his fragile mind.
Even with Zeroth and Caris—two Lingdo—desperately trying to block him, they couldn’t stop the cadet’s rampage.
He was even charging while dragging them along.
“This guy...! He’s a beastkin!”
Caris blurted out in panic.
Beastkin.
That explained the explosive strength. Hector bit his lip and judged quickly.
“Nabi Goodspring!”
“Yeah!”
“You can stop him, right?”
Nabi flinched.
“I can stop him, but... if I leave, this spot—”
“I’ll cover it!”
“What?”
“Go quick! If he crashes through here, the whole defensive line collapses!”
“......”
After a brief hesitation, Nabi gritted her teeth and followed the order.
Hector Bednicker was the commander of this east staircase.
She hadn’t accepted it at first, but as the battle worsened, she had no choice.
Hector was born to be a general.
He grasped the ever-changing battlefield without delay and issued precise orders.
In such a situation, he even possessed the coolness to weigh his own life equally.
Considering his age, it had to be innate talent as a commander.
“Uwaaaaaah...!”
Nabi took the beastkin cadet’s body-slam head-on.
But he was still just a cadet.
Compared to Nabi—an elite Lingdo, Blessing holder, and genius of the Goodspring Family—he was a greenhorn.
‘Damn it...!’
...That was when her body was in perfect condition.
Nabi had been fighting for nearly five hours. Her physical fatigue had long passed the limit, and her concentration was waning.
Meanwhile, this cadet’s body was intact, aside from his emotional instability.
“Stop! I said stop, you wild boar bastard...!”
Now she understood why mercenaries had such foul mouths.
Living on life-or-death battlefields every day, no one could avoid a thick tongue.
Nabi dug in her toes until they nearly broke. Face flushed red, she barely halted the beastkin cadet’s charge.
Thwack!
“Guh...”
Then a strike to the solar plexus.
The emotionally charged punch sent the cadet crumpling. No time to check if he was out cold.
Nabi hurriedly turned back.
“......!”
Hector was still holding. But he’d taken two major wounds in the interim. His left ear was mangled, and his right knee was bent unnaturally.
His trembling body looked ready to collapse any second.
Nabi tried to rush back to the defensive line as fast as possible.
“Uwaaaaaah—!”
“Let me go home! Send me home! I wanna go home!”
She couldn’t.
The cadets started rampaging all at once. Like a chain of explosions.
So, was that beastkin the trigger?
No one matched his size and strength, but their numbers were overwhelming.
Most people here were cadets to begin with. Lingdo were only a portion.
“Damn...!”
Nabi had no choice but to block the cadets instead of rejoining the line.
‘Block them, then what?’
Block the cadets, and the puppets breach the line.
Block the puppets, and the cadets rampage and shatter the front.
A devil’s choice either way—pure ruin.
‘...What do we do?’
Hector thought amid the pain.
Should they grab whoever’s still sane and evacuate to the fourth floor? That was tough too. They could have handled one or two mad cadets, but now dozens were rioting, and the number was growing by the second.
‘I misjudged.’
He’d kept the cadets close to prevent mischief and monitor them.
That was wrong.
He should have evacuated all cadets looking unstable to the fourth floor beforehand and locked them in rooms.
It felt a bit inhumane, sure.
That was wrong.
That damned pity, that compassion, had ruined everything.
‘...Is this it?’
The thought he least wanted to entertain crossed his mind.
“Goooo—hoooo—meee—nowww—!”
A thunderous voice exploded.
It pierced through the bloated Research Building 12, the vast corridor entirely.
It echoed so loudly through the east staircase that it must have reached the west one too.
‘Whose voice?’
He thought it was unfamiliar.
It wasn’t, but it was natural for Hector to think so.
Even Marco on the west staircase, who knew the owner best, took a moment to realize.
‘His Imperial Highness?’
No way.
The one who never raised his voice, even in fierce anger.
But this was nearly a roar, evoking a lion.
There’s no way that frail prince could—
“Rouse your spirits—!”
“......”
No.
It wasn’t.
Anyone else, maybe, but Marco couldn’t mistake this voice.
Marco turned his head.
And he saw.
Flaming red hair and blazing eyes—the imperial prince revealing his noble blood without restraint.
“To all cadets still alive, this prince declares! Even if you can’t help, you must not become a hindrance!”
No wind blew, yet the prince’s red hair danced wildly. His eyes blazed like they held twilight.
His whole body seemed cloaked in crimson flames.
“I know it’s a harsh demand! Resisting the Demon King’s madness requires deeper endurance than enduring torture!”
“But this prince believes in you! Not as individuals, but as alumni who shared the same space and teachings—I am certain!”
“Cadets of Cartel Academy!”
“Recall! Was the education we received so futile? Do the teachings of our respected instructors amount to this little? Can the vile whispers and madness of those evil demons invade the dignity we’ve honed as humans? Are you mere beasts...?”
A tremor crept into his voice.
His throat, unaccustomed to speaking loudly for so long, was straining.
Coughing a few times, the prince shouted again.
“No! Uphold your dignity! Awaken your intellect! Don’t yield to madness! If going mad is easy and staying sane is hard, we must choose the latter! That’s the biggest fuck-you we can give those deceiving demons—!”
“......”
The voice cut off there.
Glenn Scarlett collapsed to the spot, overwhelmed by exhaustion.
His whipping red hair and blazing eyes dimmed.
It was just a short speech, but Glenn felt as drained as if he’d sprinted at full speed.
“......”
“......”
Silence briefly blanketed the corridor.
The puppet demons’ screeches continued unabated, as did the clash of combat blocking them.
Yet all the survivors felt it.
Silence.
And somewhere, the stirrings of furious heat.
Then, something astonishing happened.
“Huh...?”
“...What the hell.”
The eyes of those consumed by madness began to regain a faint light.
That wasn’t all.
“Uwaaaaaah—!”
“Power, my power’s surging!”
“You weak cotton-ball bastards!”
Even the Lingdo, who had reached their limits long ago, felt new vitality surging through their bodies.
Hector and Batter.
Only the scions of the empire’s most prestigious noble houses realized why and shuddered.
‘This is the blood of emperors...’
‘The famed imperial [Resonance]?’
The noblest bloodline among the Great Families.
The world’s only power to amplify Blessings emanated from the young prince’s voice at this moment.
“Yeah...! We have to help!”
“Damn. What nonsense was I spouting?”
“Mom’s... Mom’s gone now...!”
“Help the Lingdo! Don’t let those demon bastards advance any further!”
That voice erased the demons’ whispers and expelled the madness.
It allowed even ordinary people to share his innate [Anti-Demonic Aptitude].
This was the unique power of the imperial bloodline.
“......”
Marco was shedding tears before he knew it.
He had always believed this day would come.
The boy who hated the imperial family, doubted the empire’s existence, and couldn’t blend with peers—his gaze always turned to the weak.
He frequented the slums like his own home, unhesitant to grasp grubby hands.
He ignored the advances of beautiful noble ladies but met the eyes of plague-ridden elders without flinching.
The boy who naturally became king of the slums would one day be the empire’s emperor.
Marco had always believed it.
“Let’s fight—!”
“Uwaaaaaah—!”
Revived Lingdo.
Cadets freed from frenzy.
The defensive line, pushed back relentlessly until now, advanced a step for the first time.
Shockingly, the puppets surging up the stairs were forced back.
‘We can hold...!’
Like this, it’s enough!
Hector and Batter’s thoughts turned positive too.
That’s what they thought.
Until one cadet looked out the window.
“Huh...”
Thud. The thick book he’d meant to swing like a weapon dropped.
“Hey, what? What’s wrong?”
“T-That...”
His trembling fingertip pointed at the window, and all the cadets saw it.
Hundreds of armored knights.
Modeled after the legendary White Knight Order.
They hovered above the building not as saviors, but as harbingers of death.
[......]
One armored knight assumed a stance.
“Huh...?”
The sharp-eyed realized it was a spear-throw position.
As the red cape rippled like heat haze.
Kurrrung...!
The windows and walls shattered.