Chapter 151
Chapter 151
The day after the second battle concluded.
The battle that immediately resumed was enough to drain the color from every MacLaine soldier's face from the very beginning.
Because the strongest warriors of each faction—the Transcendents—had all appeared simultaneously on the front lines.
The sight of the allied forces surging forward under their command was enough to instill terror in the hearts of all who witnessed it.
"Damn it! Why all of a sudden—?!"
"They must have reached an agreement. It was only a matter of time."
"But our current situation is far from ideal for such a confrontation."
"No. At least today won't be the worst. There are still moves we can make."
"What?"
Patrick was puzzled, but Logan had no time for lengthy explanations.
He had anticipated this scenario, but he hadn't expected to deploy his contingency plan so soon.
'And even if it works, we can't let our guard down. If it fails... No, don't even think about that.'
With veins bulging in his neck, Logan shouted:
"Master Clayton, handle Luther Kyle! I'll take Wicken! And knights—focus Liberatio fire on the other Transcendents! Understood?!"
"First Company, abandon the bombs! Follow me and focus on the knights scaling the walls!"
"Yes, sir!"
Patrick and Logan, father and son, moved swiftly along the walls, rallying their troops. The sight of their lord and heir steeled the knights' resolve as they braced for a desperate fight.
The atmosphere was palpably different from the previous two days—tense to the point where even the soldiers struggled to steady their trembling hands.
Before long, the enemy forces entered crossbow range, and a storm of quarrels rained down upon them. The deafening explosions of Liberatio amplified the chaos on the front lines.
'Now!'
Three Liberatio bombs Logan had thrown detonated midair, one after another.
And moments later—
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!
A localized explosion erupted in the Second Prince's main camp, followed by a blizzard that completely shifted the tide of battle.
"Juan, you bastard!!"
Duke Jordan's furious roar echoed as the two Transcendents, who had been charging toward Aegis' walls, abruptly turned back toward their own camp.
Half of the Second Prince's knights, who had been storming the fortress, continued their assault, while the other half followed their commanders in retreat—a ludicrous sight.
The same chaos unfolded among the First Prince's forces advancing from the west and south.
Startled by the sudden movement of the Second Prince's Transcendents, Wicken and Juan Douglas hastily withdrew, creating confusion as some soldiers advanced while others retreated.
"Fire! Keep firing!"
"Pour it on!"
For MacLaine, this was an unparalleled opportunity.
'It worked!'
The Transcendents—their most formidable opponents—had abruptly abandoned the front lines.
"Focus fire on the retreating knights!"
Logan, the only one who had foreseen this, barked orders before leaping off the wall without hesitation.
"Grand Prince?!"
"Don't follow me—keep firing!"
With that shout, Logan landed at the base of the wall.
Without the Transcendents present, he could move freely.
As he surveyed the chaotic enemy forces—some fleeing, some charging recklessly—a cold smile curled his lips.
"Haaah!"
With Logan's battle cry, a massive golden greatsword erupted from Lux.
SHIIING!
Twelve enemy knights charging at him were simultaneously cleaved in half.
"Gah—!"
"M-Monster!!"
The screams came not from the dead but from those who witnessed the carnage.
Most knights and soldiers scrambled backward in terror, but even in the chaos, some still rushed at Logan.
"MacLaine's bastard! Die!!"
Oliver Ortega, captain of the Chernov County Knights—a top-tier knight known as the "Flash Knight"—led his elite subordinates in a charge toward Logan.
Unfortunately, he had not witnessed Logan's duel with Wicken the previous day.
He had heard rumors but dismissed them as exaggerations.
'Fought an Aura User on equal footing? What nonsense! It must've been that mage's doing!'
He had heard about the mage's presence.
Having seen the half-giant Luther Kyle retreat in defeat, he couldn't deny that much.
But right now, there was no mage—no MacLaine knight—anywhere near Logan to assist him.
Still, Oliver remained cautious.
The dozens-of-meters-long Force Blade (?) Logan had just unleashed was something even he couldn't recklessly block.
Even if Logan was exhausted from such an attack, it was better to be safe than sorry...
"Surround him! I'll finish him!"
"Yes, sir!"
At his command, the high knights—Tenan, Clang, and Plebon—advanced simultaneously from three directions.
Oliver, following closely behind, gathered his strength and prepared his secret technique.
His Force Blade flickered at the tip of his sword, growing and shrinking intermittently.
He planned to pierce Logan's opening the moment his subordinates forced him to evade or block.
But then—
Flash.
Slice.
A golden streak moved like a serpent, and the heads of his charging subordinates floated into the air.
"What the—?!"
The exclamation escaped his lips before he could stop it.
Yet, years of training kicked in—his body reacted instinctively.
He activated his signature technique—Instant Acceleration—and unleashed his condensed Force Blade like lightning toward his target.
But—
Swish.
Slice.
His attack, which should have been impossible to block, was ensnared by the golden serpent and sent skyward.
Simultaneously, a flash of light streaked toward him—
A searing pain erupted in his forehead, and his body went numb.
'Am I... dying so easily?'
The reality was unbelievable.
But he couldn't even finish the thought.
As the top-tier knight fell in an instant, the other knights who had been about to charge froze in horror.
"T-That's impossible!"
"Run!"
But without proper command, the army's limitations became glaringly obvious.
"Let's die today!"
Gritting his teeth, Logan squeezed out every ounce of his Force Core, unleashing his full power from the start.
Flash.
Slice.
He wasn't targeting the entire gathered force.
With transcendent senses, he pinpointed only high knights and above, moving like a specter as he reaped lives.
The result?
In the short time since he had leaped off the wall alone, Logan had slaughtered over thirty high knights—including the top-tier Oliver Ortega—in an unbelievable feat.
But perhaps his selective targeting was too conspicuous.
"Kill that bastard first!"
"It's MacLaine's dog!"
The remaining top-tier knights, commanding their troops from various positions, finally noticed Logan and began charging toward him.
'That's enough for today.'
Already pale from exhausting his energy, Logan retreated like the wind the moment he sensed the shift in enemy movements.
"Grand Prince...!"
"As expected..."
"Why are you staring?! Before they get farther, take down as many as you can!"
As Logan returned, the MacLaine forces gazed at him with renewed awe.
Meanwhile, the top-tier knights who had chased him at their best speed could only stare blankly at his retreating figure.
From then on, the battle unfolded like a farce—at least from MacLaine's perspective.
Of course, if a bloodbath filled with screams and corpses could be called a farce.
For the allied forces, it was nothing short of an absurd tragedy.
BOOM!
"You bastard!! Are you out of your mind?! You brainless worm! Do you even realize what you've done?!"
[I swear it wasn't me! Didn't we agree yesterday?! Why would I—?!]
"You expect me to believe that?! A blizzard spell was cast from your ranks, you bastard! Infighting is one thing, but this is outright idiocy! Should we just kill each other now, you worthless—?!"
[Get a grip, Jordan! If I had planned this, would I have been so sloppy?!]
It sounded like a desperate excuse, but it was a fair point.
The words brought a sliver of reason back to Jordan Waltermein.
Huuuu...
"...After this war, I'll collect what you promised yesterday. And if—"
Grit.
"—even a hint of hesitation or retreat appears in the First Prince's forces during this battle, I'll settle the score right here."
[...Keep that in mind. And I'll find the traitor who screwed this up and deliver his head to you.]
"Hmph. As if."
A crashing sound came from inside the communication device, but—
[...I'll let it slide this time.]
Juan's face twisted, but for once, he yielded—a rare sight that allowed Jordan to suppress his boiling rage.
"How did you pull it off?"
"I exploited the distrust festering between them."
"I get that. But how?"
"A man I bribed while in the capital. He had quite the gambling debt. And a family to feed."
Logan shrugged.
"The explosion?"
"A scroll. They sell plenty at the Tower of Glaciers."
"...What if he had been captured alive?"
"Doesn't matter. He thought the client was from the First Prince's side."
"..."
Logan's voice was calm, but Patrick's expression darkened as he fell silent.
"Originally, I planned to use it when the central front stalled. But using it now isn't bad either. They barely reached an agreement, and now their trust is shattered again. They'll never fully trust each other."
"...That's fortunate."
"Yes. We got lucky."
"Right. Very lucky. Your plans rarely turn out better than intended."
"Ugh! Father, that's—"
Patrick sighed at his son's flustered response.
"But we can't use this trick again, can we?"
"...No. They're not complete fools."
After the dramatic turn of events, two days of silence followed.
When the war resumed, it mirrored the second battle—but with key differences.
The Second Prince's forces still had Luther Kyle guarding their main camp while Jordan Waltermein took the front lines.
The First Prince's forces had Wicken Calria leading the charge, but Juan Douglas—who had stood beside him before—was nowhere to be seen.
The two days of silence had been spent reaching a superficial conclusion:
- The attack on the Second Prince's camp was MacLaine's doing.
Yet, despite this agreement, the full-scale cooperation seen before was absent.
The mutual suspicion was palpable.
MacLaine saw hope in this division—
"Full advance! Today, we end MacLaine!"
—but the renewed battle took a different turn.
Regardless of the reasons, the commanders of both factions had made up their minds.
- If we drag this out any longer, who knows what variables will emerge? Whether it's MacLaine's doing or the other faction's.
No one voiced it aloud, but both factions silently acknowledged one fact:
- This might be where the final battle between us happens.
And before that—
- MacLaine must be crushed.
That much was an unshakable consensus.
The battle began much like the second day.
However, unlike before, Jordan sent his knights charging first, waiting for an opening from behind. But Clayton's Gravity Control proved indiscriminate—it seized its target regardless of who stood in the way. Forced to endure concentrated fire while focusing solely on defense, Jordan found himself in the same predicament as before.
Wicken, too, was forced to grit his teeth as he confirmed once again that Logan—clearly his inferior—could fight him on equal footing.
The only difference was that the First Prince's forces no longer feigned retreats as they had before.
As corpses piled beneath the walls, more enemy knights managed to scale them.
That small difference created a fatal gap for MacLaine.
To Patrick, it seemed like an inevitable consequence of the intensifying battle.
But the real problem began when Second Prince knights infiltrated the ranks of the militia (Groups 1-5) bombarding Duke Jordan.
Who could calmly fire a crossbow at the enemy outside when knights were scaling the walls to kill them?
Naturally, the concentrated fire on Jordan weakened momentarily.
And in that brief lapse, the Transcendent moved—the second problem.
The biggest issue? His movement wasn't toward the walls but toward the eastern side, where Logan and Wicken were locked in fierce combat.
Amid the chaotic and desperate battlefield—
Patrick, who had been fixated on Jordan, thought he saw the duke's lips curl into a sneer as their eyes met across the distance.
Was it his imagination?
That twisted smile seemed to say:
'Watch your son die.'
And Patrick would never allow that.
Forgotten were orders—he leaped down without hesitation.
Only one thought filled his mind:
Stop him. Save my son.
But—
Even as he descended from above, pouring every ounce of his strength into his strike, it dissipated like foam the moment it clashed with Jordan's overwhelming flame aura.
An excruciating, peculiar pain—as if his very Force was being ripped from his roots.
He had felt it once before, weeks ago, and it had tormented him ever since.
'Right. Fighting an Aura User head-on is madness.'
The realization came too late.
His son was the anomaly—this was normal.
But by then, it didn't matter.
The numbness from his drained Force left him unable to move a single finger.
Yet, strangely, the duke's killing strike hesitated for a fraction of a second.
The suffocating killing intent halved abruptly, and the aura blade wavered—redirecting from his neck to his limbs.
That momentary hesitation gave someone else time to intervene.
"My lord!!"
A familiar voice. A shove.
The face of his lifelong subordinate—no, friend—flashed before him as Patrick was pushed out of the duke's range.
"Protect the lord!"
"Attack that monster!"
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM—CRASH!
"Damn it...!"
A rough voice was drowned out by explosions.
As his Force gradually returned, strength flowed back into Patrick's body—but he couldn't smile.
"Hah... Thank goodness. My lord."
Heinkel, his right arm severed along with his sword, collapsed with a bloody smile.
The sight of his friend's missing limb burned into Patrick's eyes.