Chapter 200
Chapter 200
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 200
Chapter Title: Fallen
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“Shut…… your mouth.”
It seemed her pride wouldn’t allow her to utter such a blatant lie, so Cecilia merely unleashed a quiet pressure, commanding silence. Floretta continued with a smile.
“My offer will remain eternally unchanged. So please, take your time to consider it. As you’ve just realized, our esteemed guest has the capacity to embrace us all.”
I wanted to believe it meant something else, but coming from Floretta, it could only sound suggestive. The events in the Holy Kingdom must have been etched too deeply into her mind.
Cecilia remained silent for a while before grinding her teeth.
……Solar Pontiff.
“Speak.”
“Why…… did you spare that thing?”
Perhaps realizing she couldn’t win Floretta in a battle of words right now, her golden pupils turned toward the golden armor that still writhed as if alive.
Floretta showed no intention of demanding an answer and seemed ready to let it slide.
“I would have killed it with my own hands under normal circumstances. But since it’s merely a possessed vessel, it’s not as dangerous as a direct demonic descent. Moreover, as it was once a vassal of His Imperial Majesty, I left it breathing in case there might be something to interrogate it about—like clues on when and where it made a pact with the demon.”
“Interrogate it? Ha, what a pointless act. As if that wretch has anything worth asking. There’s no need to know where it bargained with the demon. It simply means its mind had rotted to that extent.”
At those words, the possessed body’s writhing intensified.
Even so, it was just a bit more visible, but that alone seemed enough to irk her. Cecilia’s face twisted in a scowl.
“How dare you deny my words, you worthless scum. I have nothing to ask a maggot who abandoned his loyalty to a woman out of petty jealousy and joined hands with a demon. So die quietly and be gone.”
“Th…… at…….”
Some mutter escaped its mouth, but it was incomprehensible. Wondering if it was some kind of incantation, I glanced at Floretta, but she seemed equally baffled.
“Ebony Holy Night Knight Captain.”
Cecilia ignored the mutter completely and called to me. By now, at least in appearance, she had fully reverted to the perfect Emperor of the Empire.
Though her body was still in that state.
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“That thing’s knight order is now under your command. Do not disappoint me.”
“I shall repay Your Majesty’s trust with my utmost efforts.”
I knew this was coming.
While I was suddenly stuck absorbing the entire Golden Twilight Knights and pondering future troubles, the former Golden Twilight Knight Captain kept muttering endlessly.
“Ma, gi…….”
“How noisy. If you’re going to die, die cleanly. Why beg for your worthless life until the end?”
Irritated, Cecilia drew her holy sword but paused mid-motion and glanced at me.
“I command you. Dispose of it.”
“As you wish.”
I had been planning to request to kill it myself for the boss kill experience anyway. I promptly agreed and drew Wingless Nightmare.
The holy-attuned Wingless Nightmare gleamed radiantly. Floretta watched from the opposite side with a pleased smile.
“Il, lu…….”
I brushed off its mutter with one ear and swung Wingless Nightmare down, only to halt midway.
It was because I spotted an inverted pentagram drawn beneath the thing’s body. My sudden pause made Floretta tilt her head.
“What’s wrong, esteemed guest?”
“Pontifex, do you see the inverted pentagram under its body?”
“Inverted pentagram…… Ah, you mean that. Yes, I see it.”
“Do you know why it’s appearing now?”
An inverted pentagram is the symbol demon worshippers draw to summon demons. Since the Golden Twilight Knight Captain was already fully possessed, it shouldn’t have been visible.
Floretta pondered my question briefly before raising her holy relic. A golden hemispherical barrier enveloped the former Golden Twilight Knight Captain.
“My apologies, esteemed guest. I don’t know why it appeared either. But it’s not a bad idea to prepare in advance.”
I nodded. We didn’t even know what it was. Better to take precautions. Worst case, a demon could actually be summoned from it.
“Your Imperial Majesty, might I handle its disposal? Just in case.”
“Do as you please.”
Cecilia also seemed uneasy about something and permitted it without hesitation.
As Floretta, permission granted, channeled holy power into the small sun at her staff’s tip, the inverted pentagram began emitting a crimson glow filled with an ominous aura.
“So that’s how it is.”
Floretta’s voice turned as cold as Cecilia’s. Her benevolent smile vanished. She knew what a glowing inverted pentagram meant.
I knew what it signified too, but for different reasons than Cecilia, Floretta, or Minerva, my mind was in turmoil.
There was no such event in the game. Meaning everything from now on was outside my knowledge. Facing something new, my head naturally spun.
……For now, let’s watch.
With Cecilia standing firm beside me, holy sword in hand, and the Solar Pontiff closest to the inverted pentagram, it was a combination no ordinary demon could withstand.
My mind calmed. Right, leave demons or whatever to those two. I probably wouldn’t even get a chance to step in. My job was just to observe.
The crimson light grew stronger. In response, the golden light bursting from the small sun gained even more vigor.
…….
How much time passed? The crimson light swirling within the hemispherical holy barrier faded. It couldn’t withstand Floretta’s holy power any longer.
A smile returned to Floretta’s face.
“It seems to be over.”
I inwardly sighed in relief. Being unfamiliar with the situation, I’d been on edge too.
Thank goodness Floretta was nearby. Otherwise, we’d have had to fight whatever emerged after it spawned.
“Now, to purify the interior with holy power……?”
Floretta trailed off there. As I wondered about it, the crimson light erupted far more fiercely than before.
Floretta scowled fiercely and raised her holy relic again. Solar light poured down dazzlingly, as if to blanket the world.
Crack.
“What……!”
But this time, it was futile. Cracks spiderwebbed across the hemispherical holy barrier, mirroring the fracture on Floretta’s face. She urgently poured in more holy power and shouted toward us—actually, behind us.
“Eternal Mage! I require your aid! Mana is flowing from within!”
‘Mana?’
“What do you mean, Solar Pontiff! Did you say mana?!”
Cecilia echoed my own shock with an urgent cry, but her voice was drowned by the surging mana. Minerva had immediately begun casting.
A blue sphere wrapped around the holy barrier on the verge of shattering. The crimson light that had dyed everything red was momentarily obscured by the blue mana, then overlaid by golden holy power.
And then.
“Get back—!”
The protective barrier of mana and holy power shattered in an instant, and the unleashed crimson light blanketed the world in red.
…….
Floretta withdrew the holy barrier with a stiff expression. From the small sun at the tip of her holy relic, radiant golden light rose, beginning to purify every corner of the palace.
What had just happened was a sight even she had never witnessed.
Not only had an inverted pentagram appeared beneath a possession body on the brink of death, but it had pierced both the Solar Pontiff’s full-powered holy barrier and the Eternal Mage’s full-powered mana shield.
No such record existed in the Holy Kingdom’s histories.
“Esteemed guest, are you unharmed?”
Floretta sought me out first. She had deployed a holy barrier at the last moment, but its range had been slightly off.
It had definitely blocked the red light from spreading beyond the palace corridor, but other areas were uncertain.
“Esteemed guest? Why no reply?”
No answer came, so Floretta called again. Still nothing.
……Esteemed guest?
The third call yielded the same.
Rustle. Suddenly, a sound of sifting debris came from down the corridor. Floretta whipped around toward it.
“Phew, what in the world just happened.”
There stood Minerva, encased in a mana barrier, sighing as she pulverized the building rubble.
Minerva, approaching Floretta, started to ask if she was okay but fell silent upon seeing her expression—anything but fine.
And when she heard the reason for that look, she joined in tearing up the entire corridor searching for Delta.
But Delta was nowhere.
Cecilia was the same.
…….
I kicked the ground with my toe. The bone-dry soil, utterly devoid of moisture, kicked up puffs of dust.
Why here of all places? I let out a hollow chuckle inwardly and looked up. Cecilia gripped her holy sword, vigilantly scanning our surroundings.
“What is this place? Utterly revolting.”
Cecilia muttered with a deeply furrowed brow. It was understandable. At a glance, it was a horrifically nightmarish place.
Nearby flowed a river of crimson blood, with several hills of bones visible. The ground was cracked and parched, and here and there stood stakes topped with impaled human corpses.
‘Swept up in red light, and of all places, here…… No, better than dying?’
I approached Cecilia. As I drew near, she sheathed her holy sword.
“Your Imperial Majesty.”
“Speak.”
“I know where we are.”
“I suspect I do as well. Likely matching your thoughts, but tell me anyway.”
Of course, with it looking like this, how could she not? I gave a wry smile and opened my mouth.
“It seems we’ve fallen into Hell.”
The third DLC of Brenark 4, ‘Sanctuary of Demons’.