Chapter 215
Chapter 215
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 215
Chapter Title: Traces Left by the Catastrophe (2)
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I stepped over the rubble of the collapsed wall and moved beyond it. Even though half of it had crumbled away, the wall was enormous, and it took quite some time to scale it.
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Drip. Drop.
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Standing at the edge of the ruined wall, I looked down below. Cardi had said that beyond the wall lay the capital of Arcadia.
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"...Hey, Cardi."
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I called out to him.
Cardi, who had climbed up a beat later than me, brushed the dust off his robe and replied.
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"What."
"Is this the capital?"
"Yeah. The heart of Arcadia. It was once home to the royal castle and properly called the capital."
"...This?"
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I pointed beyond the wall.
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"This is the capital?"
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What met my eyes was devastation.
The ground was cracked open wide, and fragments of buildings and towers floated in the air. The floating debris didn't even twitch.
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'Like they've been perfectly preserved in place.'
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And there were hundreds, thousands of them.
I swallowed hard and directed my gaze even lower. Beneath the fragments, in the crevices of the split earth. Something was seeping out from there.
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Fog.
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Gray fog resembling storm clouds.
The thick fog leaking from the cracks crawled along the ground, and flashes of light periodically sparked within it.
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Boom!
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A flash burst forth, followed shortly by a deafening roar. The thunderclap rattled my eardrums. I flinched at the sudden thunder.
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"...Lightning?"
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Lightning struck from the ground toward the sky.
Not blue, not white—a pitch-black bolt. The afterimage of that single streak of dark light lingered long in the air toward the heavens.
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It defied all common sense.
A place where the natural order didn't hold.
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I extended my hand, reading the flow of mana beyond the wall.
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'Demonic energy.'
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Thick demonic energy vibrated in all directions.
The mana flows swallowed by it were razor-sharp, and it was clear they'd shred anything caught in the instant their arrangement faltered.
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'Cardi might be fine since he has no mana...'
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But for me, it was a pretty tricky environment.
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"Ha... ."
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Demonic realm.
> Chewing on the word that first came to mind, I swallowed dryly. The thick demonic energy permeating this so-called capital of Arcadia dredged up horrific memories for me.
Memories that made my skin crawl just to recall.
Memories that sent phantom pains throbbing through my heart just to think about.
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'The black field.'
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The endlessly sprawling plain where I'd faced the Demon King.
That place had given off the same atmosphere as what I saw now. The way simply taking a step made death feel tangible.
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'The difference is...'
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I slowly looked up at the sky.
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'...there's no Demon King here.'
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Gazing at the sky, I recalled the day I'd faced the Demon King. There had been no sky there.
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Black sludge that had devoured the sky.
Something unknown blotting out the light.
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From the moment we'd set foot on that field, rain had fallen from the sky, and the endlessly pouring black raindrops began pooling in the furrows etched into the plain.
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Masses formed as the sludge pooled and congealed.
A shape formed from what poured from the heavens.
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『■■, ■. ■■■■■■.』
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That sludge mass emitting unknowable noise—thankfully, it wasn't here.
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The surroundings were dark, but that was because starlight didn't reach this place, not because something had devoured the sky.
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"Why, is it worse than you imagined?"
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As I swallowed dryly, Cardi tossed out a joke. I gave a bitter smile and looked at him.
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"Yeah. The capital's landscape is awfully avant-garde. Guess the architect had a unique way of thinking?"
"Who doesn't."
"What?"
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Cardi let out a chuckle.
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"Then let's go."
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We leaped from the wall and landed on the nearest floating fragment. With the repeated booms of thunder as our backdrop, we leaped again and again.
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Thud.
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Cardi offered no explanation, but I instinctively knew our destination. My eyes turned toward the massive castle shrouded in fog.
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'The ancient palace.'
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The royal castle at the heart of the ancient kingdom, now turned demonic realm. It resembled the White Night Palace I'd seen in the north, but several times larger.
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That fog-enshrouded place was surely our goal.
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'And...'
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If we arrived there.
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'I'll learn something.'
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What Cardi wanted to tell me.
What I needed to see and understand with my own eyes.
It was undoubtedly in that palace.
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2.
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The moment they exited Delorhim's main church and tried to leave the ashen land behind, Kyle halted as if entranced and looked back.
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"......"
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Traces of a kingdom's fall.
Beyond those traces stood a massive wall. Far away, but Kyle felt an unease from 'something' beyond that wall.
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A sensation like something crawling up his spine.
A throat burning dry.
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It was a familiar sensation from long ago. Kyle recalled when he'd felt it. An unforgettable memory.
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'...The Demon King.'
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The feeling from his encounter with that monster. Kyle absently gripped his holy sword's hilt.
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"Kyle, what're you doing?"
"...Nothing."
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Remia, leading the way, turned back.
Kyle shook his head. Whatever the sensation, it had nothing to do with him. He had no intention of going beyond that wall anyway.
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"...Kyle."
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As he started walking again, Remia hurried to his side and whispered softly into his ear.
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"Sara looks really upset."
"...Does she."
"You should do something. If you ignore her like last time, she'll sulk for weeks."
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Kyle looked ahead.
Sara's back came into view, stomping forward and smashing through building debris in her frustration.
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"...I'll try."
"Sara's simple, so just buy her something. Grab one for me while you're at it."
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With that, Remia quickened her pace and pulled away. She soon reached Sara, who was far ahead, slung an arm around her neck, and whispered into her ear.
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The distance was great, her voice small... but Kyle's heightened hearing caught every word.
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「I set it up for you. Just hint at what you want, and Kyle'll probably buy it. So, this time...」
「...Really?」
「Yeah. Got anything in mind?」
「Oh, come to think of it... there's this really pretty design from the Black Mage Tower this time...」
「That one with no functions, just good design and fabric?」
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...There goes this subjugation reward money too.
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"Sigh... ."
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Kyle sighed and fiddled with his sword hilt.
Closing his eyes brought the image of the girl he'd just faced—glaring fiercely as she broke his ribs and shattered his shin.
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A girl who resembled Raniel.
Yet the star insisted she wasn't Raniel.
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Her identity nagged at Kyle. But his instincts told him getting further involved would do neither any good.
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'Ashen hair, blue eyes.'
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Distinctive, yet unlike that one.
Everything but her looks resembled him.
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『She's different.』
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No matter how many times he asked, the star gave that answer. Kyle sighed, shoving the hand that had been on his sword hilt into his pocket.
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「Training a Hero Party to replace you.」
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The girl's parting words echoed in Kyle's ears—the plan Raniel was supposedly pursuing. Hearing it, Kyle amusingly recalled the sentiment he'd felt these past five years.
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Still the same.
Truly unchanged.
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Even now, she intended to take down the Demon King. After pouring half her lifespan into it, fleeing was all she'd achieved... yet she was serious about subjugating it.
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Not a pipe dream.
Not a delusion.
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What everyone called impossible, she'd accomplished. She'd crushed an ancient lich with spells after centuries of life and created a class overcoming mages' weaknesses.
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'Always, just like that.'
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Everyone praised his name, but Kyle knew better than anyone. His feats weren't from his own power alone.
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The ashen mage, Raniel van Trias.
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Despite no star's choice, no special blessing, no racial advantages, he'd reached the pinnacle—and that's what made Kyle's achievements possible.
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She doesn't break.
Never broke.
Even before death, she was the same as always.
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'Unlike me, different from me.'
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That tormented Kyle.
He looked at his raised palm. Smooth now, but once callused thick.
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Days of training until scars formed on the Hero's unscarred flesh.
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Recalling those distant days, Kyle let out a wry smile. Dozens of lines would just boil down to a stunningly simple tale.
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'I changed.'
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She hadn't.
Hasn't, even now.
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Kyle found that fact loathsome yet gratifying.
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"That's right."
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That's how you have to be.
That's the you I've seen.
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"You have to be, that's all."
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Kyle muttered.
His mutter hung in the air before crumbling. Only the star heard it.
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3.
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"Weren't you leaping around all spirited earlier?"
"I was."
"I thought you could hop through a demonic realm like this too. Wow, even without mana, your physical prowess remains? As expected of the great sage. I was impressed, thinking that."
"Sadly, I thought the same."
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Raniel gave Cardi a cold look. Right now, he dangled helplessly from the chain she held—no dignity of a great sage in sight.
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To sum up the situation:
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Cardi, leaping boldly, had tripped just short of the palace and tumbled. Raniel had caught his sliding form with a chain, leaving him dangling...
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"Hey, Cardi... ."
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Looking down at him, Raniel spoke in a voice full of pity.
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"You look really pathetic right now... ."
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True enough; he couldn't argue.
Cardi sighed and opened his mouth.
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"It's not a matter of my physical ability. Elves have innate physical prowess, and through training, I've reached a level close to superhuman, if not quite. I don't make stupid mistakes like tripping."
"Then why now?"
"...The contract's effect."
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That again?
Under Raniel's pitiful gaze, Cardi felt a twinge of patheticness as he answered.
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"A contract penalty. Whenever I try to intervene in anything Demon King-related, I become powerless."
"...You're not just embarrassed and making excuses? You just tripped?"
"No."
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His voice was deadly serious, so Raniel asked no more. Silently, she yanked the chain, reeling him up like a fish.
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"Looks like something's up."
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Feeling like a hooked fish, Cardi eyed the palace. The moment he'd tried to enter—more precisely, interfere with the barrier around it—his strength had drained away.
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'Something's inside.'
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Something that hadn't existed even a few hundred years ago, on his last visit here... wriggling within the palace.
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"It's unsettling."
"Yeah, really unsettling. Don't tell me I have to carry you?"
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The two felt unease for different reasons.