Chapter 41
Chapter 41
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 41
Chapter Title: A Different Level
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In the Prelude Forest, they had picked up a tail.
An outsider asking around about Reinhardt. Carlos Grand Duke must have been targeting him too, planting his lackeys all over the place.
They were ambushed on the pilgrimage route.
That was why 1st Prince Raunel was now locked in the underground dungeon.
"Don't worry! I'll stake my life to get you out of here."
"There will definitely be an opportunity!"
The knights spun hopeful tales.
Deliberately.
Intentionally speaking loudly to gauge the lich's movements.
There was no reaction.
But they couldn't be sure.
Raunel wrote on the floor with his finger.
『He can control anyone who meets his eyes.』
They couldn't afford to space out.
The knights nodded upon confirming it.
Sure enough, one knight who had made eye contact snapped his own neck.
The lich's eyes were clearly imbued with black magic that scrambled the mind.
The knights proceeded to write what they knew on the floor.
『127 paces to the exit.』
『Mana recovery complete.』
『No sign of the lich.』
『Shall we escape now?』
They all avoided eye contact.
In that instant.
Whoosh!
Flames erupted over their entire bodies.
It was the descent state, usable only by elite members of the Phoenix Knight Order.
The intense blaze burned through the restraints and dispelled the curses.
Grabbing the iron bars while sizzling, they melted them away.
The four knights and Raunel swiftly escaped the dungeon and climbed the stairs.
They retraced the path they had taken.
But soon, they had no choice but to furrow their brows.
"This is..."
"The sky?"
They had definitely headed for the exit, but what lay before them was no door.
Outside, the sky was visible.
This place, embroidered with clouds, was far from the northern lands where they had been captured.
'A tower.'
A massive tower.
The pinnacle of a tower piercing the heavens.
But he had never seen architecture like this.
It was the first time in his life seeing a structure this tall.
It didn't feel like part of this world.
His mind floated in a daze.
"This is my 'Life Castle'."
The corpse with a broken neck approached.
It was the knight whose neck had snapped after first making eye contact with the lich.
Grotesque.
An insult to the dead.
Under the lich's control, his body kept speaking.
"You will never escape this place..."
Whoosh!
Raunel conjured a blade of flame and severed the lich's neck.
"...ever."
Then the voice came from right beside them.
Despite the prior warning, one of the knights must have met its eyes.
He hadn't expected it to manifest through the dead knight's body.
"Everyone, close your eyes!"
"You intend to face me in the dark?"
Even flames that lit the darkness couldn't exert their power in pitch blackness.
They couldn't reach it.
It felt like sinking into a swamp of despair.
Raunel bit his lip hard.
*
'Despair more. Fall deeper into frustration.'
Daemon relentlessly tested Raunel.
The power of frustration and despair was the driving force behind becoming a death knight.
It was hard to obtain the corpse of a sword master who had tasted ultimate despair.
Their minds were as steadfast as their prowess, so they often accepted death quietly when it came.
But endless trials inevitably wore down the spirit.
Before Daemon stood the underground dungeon.
"S-save me..."
"Forgive me, please!"
All were asleep, trapped in nightmares.
Daemon had been born with the ability to subtly manipulate the boundary between dreams and reality.
The eerie realism of the situations drove them into even greater despair—and would kill them.
'Prime material.'
Daemon eyed Raunel with greedy eyes.
Better than expected. He possessed a steel will that didn't bend easily.
Moreover, his body was tempered by a unique mana cultivation method. A physique quenched in fire and that spirit were perfect for becoming a death knight.
Death knights were strong enough to toy with sword masters.
The pinnacle of black magic was the lich, and a lich's level was determined by whether they could create death knights.
'Full of potential too. He could become the strongest death knight I've ever made.'
Daemon had created death knights several times before.
Excluding the 'dragon' corpse he had saved in the deeper underground, this one was the best.
Ziiing.
A sudden ringing in his ears.
Daemon's expression hardened.
'What is this? Who's invading my domain?'
The barrier spells he had set outside were being dismantled at an alarming speed.
Abnormal.
Only Carlos Grand Duke and a few under him knew of this place to begin with.
They wouldn't bother dismantling the barriers to enter.
Which meant an external intruder.
'The closer they get, the more knight-grade undead swarm. They can't possibly break through...'
Ziiing.
Ziiiiing!
The ringing continued nonstop.
They were breaking through.
In an instant. Without a moment to react.
'The Holy Land.'
The only place besides Carlos capable of such a fierce assault was the Holy Land.
They had discovered the location and were swarming in.
Recognizing the gravity of the situation, Daemon flicked his hand.
A skull-patterned staff rose from thin air.
Gripping it, Daemon chanted.
"Rise, sword masters."
The sword masters under Carlos Grand Duke, slain on the northern battlefield, awoke.
"Rise, paragons."
Mighty paragons rose in grotesque forms.
"Rise, kings of death."
And he unleashed his treasured aces.
Kings of death—four death knights.
An invincible legion was complete.
A lineup that could never lose.
This force alone could raze a kingdom.
'I'll make them regret invading.'
Kill them, and raise their corpses as my own.
Daemon's eyes darkened.
*
I saw something amusing.
At first, I thought I'd seen wrong.
'Raunel.'
Why are you there?
A guy who should be living luxuriously in the palace had come to the north.
For what?
'The emperor must have sent him to scout the changes in the north.'
Croft, the shadow overseer, was here.
They couldn't dispatch knight orders en masse, so they sent Raunel.
Raunel, always brimming with zeal, must have jumped at the chance.
While investigating my movements, he got caught by Carlos Grand Duke.
'Too predictable.'
It was laughably obvious.
But the one thing that didn't make sense was Carlos Grand Duke.
The usual him would never hand Raunel over to Daemon.
He hadn't handed him over to use—he meant to kill him.
'He's shaken.'
Carlos Grand Duke.
He wasn't making rational judgments.
Perhaps Thebeus's death and the derailed plans had made him impatient.
Even the iron-blooded, iron-walled Carlos Grand Duke was human after all.
This should be good news since he was wavering.
It definitely should be.
'But it feels off.'
In the past, I killed all my brothers.
Executed them along with the empresses.
Even if I'd returned, that fact wouldn't change.
Something I'd already been through once.
No reason to feel bad.
Yet it did feel rotten.
Them dying by someone else's hand, when they had to die anyway.
For the sake of gain, I should let it be.
Keep monitoring Daemon and use Carlos Grand Duke as the rock that sinks him.
Raunel's death?
No brotherly bond despite shared blood.
But if I let this death slide, I'd end up just like in the past.
I kill those who must die.
I save those who must live.
Handing the power of life and death to others makes no sense.
"You've crawled in here alone to die, Holy Lord."
Lich Daemon said sinisterly.
The outside was already a battlefield.
I had entered his domain alone.
Skeletal soldiers crawled out from Daemon's shadow.
"Foolish fool. Even the Holy Emperor trembles before me."
"Strange. Normally, you'd wonder 'why' or 'how' I entered alone, right?"
Not even Croft, Y ung, or Edis could enter.
No matter how many or strong the undead outside, their goal was to protect me.
They couldn't enter the barrier meant to guard the one they must protect, so it was only natural to question how or why I alone had slipped inside.
Had his brain rotted along with becoming a lich? He just grinned.
"Heh heh. Say what you will—it changes nothing. This time, I'll dominate you."
Soul domination directly with his main body, without intermediaries, was absolute.
Even against a sword master, they couldn't shake it off right before his eyes.
And our eyes had met.
This time was different.
But there was no sensation.
'It didn't work?'
It didn't work at all.
As if he'd become immune.
No, not quite. It wasn't that it failed to take hold.
The soul domination hadn't activated at all.
'My right eye?'
Only then did he realize.
His right eye was moving independently of his will.
He was the one being dominated.
Daemon panicked.
"Wh-when did this start?"
"From the beginning."
I shrugged as I answered.
Only then did Daemon understand.
All his schemes to mass-produce undead had been thwarted, and even this ultra-secret location had been exposed—all because of his right eye.
As expected, he possessed an epic domination skill.
Crunch!
Daemon gouged out his own right eye.
With the dominated eye gone, he should be fine now.
"Fine, I'll dissect you for sure. Hm?!"
His vision went black.
The world drowned in darkness.
Now his left eye was dominated.
'So it was domination of one eye.'
Not a specific eye, but domination of a single eye.
Now that he knew the condition, it was fine.
Just as he needed eye contact to dominate, this guy had domination over specific body parts.
'I'm superior.'
If he hadn't known, maybe. But now that he did, he wouldn't fall for it.
Something he had that the enemy lacked.
Even among domination powers, Daemon could switch bodies.
For living targets, he needed eye contact, but for corpses he'd turned into undead, he could hop freely as long as they were in sight.
The enemy's would only persist in the dominated body at best.
It was clear. His authority was the superior version.
Daemon switched bodies without hesitation.
Into one of the skeletal soldiers.
Now the enemy couldn't touch him.
Splatter!
The moment he believed that, the skeletal soldier's head exploded.
It had precisely detected and burst the body he'd switched into.
With silent magic, no less.
'Coincidence.'
Yes, definitely a coincidence.
Daemon switched bodies again.
Splatter!
Its head exploded in an instant.
One by one, the heads of his prepared skeletal soldiers burst.
Only one remained.
Terror filled Daemon's eyes.
Now he understood why the enemy had come alone.
Fewer bodies to hop between was better.
And those eyes—weren't they like those of a vengeful spirit?
He wasn't human.
"They call liches immortals in the Demon Church, don't they?"
I was genuinely curious.
Immortal. Because they supposedly never die.
"Let's see if you're truly an eternal being."
[A Different Level] End