The Full Moon (1)
Squelch. Squelch.
[Kyii… kyiii…….]
“Whoa—shit, hold on. What is it! What do you want!”
The Changgwi was crouched down, rubbing its face furiously against one of Rudy's cheeks.
It was a grotesque sight.
Thick bodily fluid drooled in a steady stream from the Changgwi's half-torn mouth.
Thanks to that, Rudy's armor had become a sticky, viscous slime-coated mess, and Rudy rolled his eyes in every direction, utterly bewildered.
…What in the hell is even happening right now?
He felt a faint relief that it had stopped attacking him, but the situation was still bizarre beyond comprehension.
[Kyiii—!]
The Changgwi stopped nuzzling his cheek and stretched out a hand toward him.
And that was when it happened.
“…Huh?”
Fwoooosh!
Rudy's body—bruised, lacerated, beaten to a wreck—began to slowly heal itself.
His mana and stamina seemed to return a little as well.
His aura was still completely spent, but his body was now barely in a state where he could move.
Rudy rose slowly, thinking.
…Did this thing heal me? If so, why?
He recalled the status window that had flashed before his eyes in that moment of crisis.
To ensure the holder's safety, the System will activate automatically.
Converting a portion of your Lust stat into Charm.
It definitely said it would convert my Lust stat into Charm… don't tell me it's exactly the situation I think it is?
The Changgwi was clinging to him from every angle, acting cute and affectionate.
It was exactly as Rudy had understood.
In an instant, Rudy's face had flashed with light, and the female-form monster—the Changgwi—had laid eyes on his unhelmeted face.
And it had fallen head over heels, just like that.
Even a semi-genderless monster still divided into male and female bodies.
Which meant it naturally had its own preferences for the opposite sex—and right now, the Changgwi was utterly smitten with Rudy's Charm stat.
[Kyiii! (Oppa, you're so handsome!)]
“…….”
Rudy had never imagined he would learn the power of the Seventh Deadly Sin, Lust—the very ability he'd been dying to understand—in quite this fashion.
Well, whatever. A win was a win.
He'd survived. That was all that mattered.
“Uh, um… then I'll be going now.”
[Kyiii! Kyiii—!]
“Huh? You're following me? W-well… okay then….”
“Purrrr purrrr, purrrr purrrr.”
[KYAAAAAAAK!!]
“Purrrr purrrr!!”
KRA-BOOM! BAM!
Thunderous detonations rang out all around as piles of bones went flying through the air.
It was the aftershock of the Changgwi unleashing its ice magic.
Rudy had been pushing forward, ignoring the Changgwi trailing behind him, when he ran headlong into a horde of skeletons.
No matter how much the Changgwi's magic had healed him, he still had only enough strength to drag his body around, so he'd been tense—braced for the worst.
It turned out to be a needless worry.
“Go get 'em! Changgwi-mon!”
[KYAAAAAAAK!]
The Changgwi proceeded to flash-freeze every last one of the skeleton soldiers that had come charging at Rudy in a mad frenzy, reducing them all to freeze-dried bone piles.
KRA-KOOM!
Razor-sharp icicles rained down on the skeletons in a relentless barrage.
“Good job. Just keep doing exactly that.”
[Kihik… kyiii….]
Rudy stroked the Changgwi's head as it finished sweeping every monster out of the underground caverns.
By the time several hours had passed, the nearby monsters had been driven to outright extinction—not so much as a nose hair of one remained in sight.
“Oh! Finally, a place with something in it?!”
After wandering through an endless stretch of darkness, he had at last arrived at the final chamber.
A colossal iron door, easily five times Rudy's height, blocked his way.
“How the hell do I open this thing? Wha—”
The moment he laid a hand on the door, his mana began draining out of him at a frightening rate.
The door was designed to open when infused with mana.
It responded only to the mana of a pureblooded Fafnir.
Knowing none of this, Rudy simply stood there in flustered confusion, hand pressed against the iron.
…A short while later.
-WHUUUUMBLE! GRRRRND!
The massive iron door that had stood so stubbornly in his path finally ground open.
In the small space beyond, gold coins lay scattered in glittering heaps, and dozens upon dozens of ancient tomes lined the shelves along the wall.
“Holy shit! It really WAS a treasure room!”
[KYAAAAAAAAAAAK!]
“Eh?”
The moment he stepped into the opened chamber, the Changgwi that had followed him in let out a scream of pure agony.
CRACKLE-CRISP!
A enormous high-voltage current roasted the Changgwi alive.
The secret chamber was sealed behind a barrier that barred the entry of any and all monsters.
Unaware of this, Rudy could only watch dumbfounded as the Changgwi lay dying, and by the time he finally opened his mouth, the creature had already collapsed, its screams fallen silent.
“Uh, um… I shall never forget your faithful service?”
[…….]
The departed Changgwi was in no condition to answer.
Anyway! How about that!
“Trivial things should be forgotten quickly, right?”
Right now was the time for the long-awaited, long-dreamed-of exploration of the secret chamber.
“Whoa, holy shit! This sword…!”
Amid the scattered gold coins, a single blade stood driven into the stone floor.
It was a weapon in a completely different league from the cheap iron sword Rudy had brought with him.
“Incredible. Not only its strength but its sharpness is maximized… one graze and you'd die of tetanus!”
The peerless blade Drakan.
The very sword wielded by the ancestors who founded the Fafnir household.
Rudy tossed his cheap iron sword carelessly onto the floor and sheathed Drakan at his hip.
Rudy ended up spending about a month in the secret chamber.
At the 3-Star realm, Rudy could survive a full month without eating or drinking anything, absorbing mana from the air alone.
“A secret clan manual on the sword arts passed down to the tip of the blade… so this is that power—the swordsmanship only the protagonist can use?”
Dozens of swordsmanship texts.
Every last one of them contained the contents of the very same sword art: the Heavenly Moon Sword.
They were books recording a martial art powerful enough to threaten the world itself.
However, the texts noted that it was a sword art which could not be mastered unless one was chosen.
“No wonder the family kept this locked away so tight. It'll be useful, so I'll memorize every last bit of it.”
The sword that cleaves the moon. The Heavenly Moon Sword.
A sword art that consumed neither mana nor aura, but rather Lunar Qi—an energy usable only by those chosen by the moon.
“But what in the world is this 'Lunar Qi' of the moon supposed to be…?”
The game he'd transmigrated into was a fairly recent release, so walkthroughs were scarce and the information eluded him.
It was clearly described as a supreme sword art on the road to the ultimate pinnacle of the blade.
But not a single page explained how one actually came to grasp the moon's Lunar Qi.
The texts said only this: meditate in the Forest of Dead Mist, where the full moon could be seen with perfect clarity, and seek your own hint.
“Well, I'll shelve the Lunar Qi problem for now. I've copied everything down and committed it to memory anyway.”
Rudy condensed aura at his fingertips.
“Time to burn it all. Better safe than sorry—there's no telling whether I'm truly the only one who can use it.”
He swept up every last gold coin, then escaped back out through the escape magic circle connected to the secret chamber, emerging once more into the mansion.
“A memorable adventure. Really, a person can't just sit around like an idiot doing nothing.”
The gold coins he'd hauled out were enough to pay off two-thirds of his current debt.
Had the father who'd run off in the night—the head of the family—not known about this chamber?
Thanks to that, he was off the hook for interest payments for the next few months.
He was off the hook….
“…….”
On his way back from surrendering every last gold coin to the authorities, he found a formal complaint waiting for him.
As the defendant in a violation of the Empire's monogamy statutes.
He was to appear before an Imperial tribunal six months hence.
The complainants were the heiresses of the Four Great Families.
“Have you ever seen such lunatic bitches in your life?”
They were thoroughly, completely insane.
All the while paying off a debt he'd never rightfully owed, Rudy had been diligently sending letters of apology to the heiresses of the Four Great Families—known in the community as the Four Princesses—without fail.
Crammed wall to wall with writing, like a schoolboy's scribbled punishment sheets from childhood.
“Goddammit….”
And what he got back was a lawsuit.
Just when he'd thought he'd clear his debts and finally get his life on track.
No reply. Just this.
“These lunatics—are they even heroines? The sheer nerve… no, wait, now's not the time. Think rationally.”
At minimum, the sentence could come down to a fine.
Just in case, he needed to earn more money to cover it.
Something that could bring in serious money on a short timeline.
Taking on S-Rank adventurer quests was the first thing that came to mind.
Having withdrawn from the Academy, with my realm still lukewarm at best, there's no way I could take on quests that dangerous right now….
But the Heavenly Moon Sword—the sword art he'd obtained from the underground secret chamber.
If he mastered it, the equation might change.
Learn this Lunar Qi thing. Fast.
The hint: to grasp Lunar Qi, meditate where the full moon shines clearest—
the Forest of Dead Mist, located in the Lien Spirit Kingdom.
There was no time to waste.
“I eat, then head straight for the Lien Spirit Kingdom. Goddammit, what kind of shit-show grind is this! Those women aren't the Four Princesses anymore—they're the Four Psyc-hoes….”
“…So. An anomaly in the Forest of Dead Mist—what does that have to do with me?”
At the manor of Rose Eswell, Grand Spirit Mage of Lien.
Rose was less than thrilled by Count Ivan's unannounced, out-of-the-blue visit.
She drummed one leg insolently against the floor, chin propped in her hand, regarding Ivan as though he were a nuisance.
“You think I'd empty out Judith County over something trivial?”
“Knowing your personality, it's entirely possible. Just get to the point.”
“Still as impatient as ever, I see.”
Ivan calmly raised his teacup and drained the tea in one slow sip, then set the emptied cup down on the table.
“You're slow to the point of making me want to strangle you.”
“You're the impatient one. I've watched you since we were children, and you still haven't understood the first thing about the beauty of composure. …Hah. Fine, I'll get to the point, as you insist. You've heard the rumors, haven't you—that a corrupted tree spirit has appeared in the Forest of Dead Mist?”
“I have.”
“Good. And I've come to tell you this: the fact that it hasn't yet gone public, and the Spirit Kingdom's government hasn't stirred—thatis your opportunity.”
“…Opportunity? Speak so I can understand you.”
“The Eclipse Cult.”
And that was the moment.
The Eclipse Cult.
The instant that name left Ivan's lips—
BANG!
Rose slammed both fists down on the table, her whole body trembling.
Ivan stared at her, utterly composed, as though he had predicted her reaction all along.
…The air between them had changed in a heartbeat.
A torrent of killing intent poured out of Rose's body, which had flinched for just an instant, and hatred writhed in both her eyes.
Trembling. Trembling.
Rose's usual attitude—that everything was a bother—had vanished without a trace.
Unable to bear the rage welling up from the depths of her chest, her body kept shaking uncontrollably.
“…You're telling me the Eclipse Cult is the reason a corrupted tree spirit came into being.”
“I am.”
It went without saying.
Turning back the clock—before Rose became the Grand Spirit Mage.
Back when Lien had not yet been unified as the Spirit Kingdom, but was a divided nation at war, Rose lost both her parents as a child.
It had not been the toll of war itself.
…It was the Eclipse Cult—a cabal of madmen who had exploited the chaos of wartime to research the dark arts.
It was them, and them alone.
While countless uninvolved civilians perished in the war, the Eclipse Cult, which had infiltrated Lien in an organized campaign, carried out dark-magic research using corpses.
Namely: the dark art of raising the dead as ghouls.
In the mountains, in ruined villages—
The cult raised the corpses of soldiers and civilians strewn across those places into mindless ghouls.
And the moment their research succeeded, they simply abandoned the risen ghouls and walked away.
Because of that, countless more people were sacrificed needlessly—devoured by the ghouls.
War, and on top of it a horrific calamity, had come down upon Lien together.
Rose's parents were among the victims.
“Those monstrous bastards—barely fit to be called human, slaughtering people for nothing but their own sick appetites. That's what this is, isn't it…?”
“…….”
“I'm leaving for the Forest of Dead Mist. Now.”
“…Isn't that rather hasty? Even if it hasn't become public knowledge yet, the Spirit Kingdom's government will be quietly selecting knights to deploy to the forest. If you act rashly and provoke an incident, on a national level—”
“Not my problem.”
Rose snatched up her staff set with spirit stones.
Closing her eyes, extending her hand, she began to chant—reciting something in a low murmur.
She was summoning Phoenix, the most gifted flyer among all the spirits she possessed.
[SCREEEEEECH!]
In an instant, a crimson magic circle etched with geometric patterns bloomed into being, and out of it burst the King of Phoenixes, revealing his blazing form.
An ordinary spirit mage would have burned through a lifetime's accumulated spirit power just to summon him.
But for Rose—a genius among spirit mages from the moment she was born—it was as easy as flipping her palm.
In the wake of Phoenix's summoning, the entire manor turned as hot as high summer in the span of a breath.
“Fine. Who's going to stop you, anyway.”
“Hmph.”
The flames wreathing Phoenix's entire body held no power to harm his summoner.
Rose swung herself swiftly onto Phoenix's back and spoke to Ivan.
“Thanks for the tip.”
“Oh, don't thank me—it was my scout corps who reported it.”
“Then I take it back.”
“…Your personality is truly something else.”
SCREEEECH!
As Phoenix shot into high-speed flight—
Rose shrank beyond the window into a single dot in the sky, disappearing ever farther away.