Chapter 226: War (3)
Chapter 226: War (3)
“What exactly is the difference?”
I threw the question back at him.
“Because if it were my father, he never would have turned his back.”
“…….”
“Even when everything was crumbling because of his own karma, he didn't return. He was too busy swinging that damn sword. He never showed up, no matter how desperately he was called, only returning once everything had already burned to ash. That man would never have made a choice like yours.”
My father.
Liam Caravan.
The Liam that Leon Caravan spoke of seemed like a completely different person from the Master I knew. While Master occasionally showed a strange side, he was also someone with a lighthearted demeanor and a deeply human touch. But the Liam that Leon Caravan described as a father was different.
“Arhan Caravan, remember one thing.”
“…….”
“Flame does not break.”
Flame does not break. With those final words, my consciousness began to drift away. Leon Caravan kept his gaze fixed on me as he asked one last question.
“I’ll ask you one last time: why did you decide to meddle?”
“……Because it’s the right thing to do. And.”
“And?”
“Because the blood of Steel… grows stronger with every strike.”
I meant it.
The only reason I was able to reach the Golden Treasury was thanks to the help of the dwarves. Without them, I wouldn't have made it this far. Therefore, helping the dwarves who had devoted themselves to me—ensuring they weren't wiped out—was a matter of principle. Above all, if I were to turn a blind eye to them, I wouldn't be able to live with myself. I cannot choose a path I cannot justify. Never.
Furthermore, the blood of Steel grows stronger with every strike. I had only experienced it briefly, but the 「Match」 was a sword far too powerful and arrogant for my current self to digest. To fully assimilate it, I needed to grow further. And Liam had said it: a Caravan always grows through ordeals. Like steel, they become harder the more they are hammered.
I decided to follow that teaching.
Hearing my answer, Leon Caravan snorted.
“The blood of Steel grows stronger with every strike, eh? That’s the phrase I hate most in this world.”
My consciousness grew faint. The last thing I heard was Leon Caravan’s voice—a voice filled with cynicism and mockery.
“Humans aren't steel. If you hammer them, they break.”
“…….”
“If you manage to survive, never pass that garbage teaching down to your descendants. This is the first and last lesson I give you as an ancestor….”
His voice was tinged with bitterness.
And with that, I was returned to the entrance of the Golden Treasury.
The first thing I heard upon my return was a scream. A scream of pure agony.
* * *
Dwarf General Dwight.
He was a general who had devoted his entire life to protecting the Dwarf Kingdom. He was a hero who had reached the unprecedented height of 「Sword Expert」. Even after becoming the Great General, Dwight did not live idly. He never liked the fact that the proud dwarves and their kingdom always had to live in fear of the ‘Dragons.’
So, he had prepared thoroughly.
Even after becoming a Sword Expert, he never neglected his training. He taught his soldiers various tactics, studied dragons, and researched every possible way to face them. Dwight had resolved that if the dragons ever came, he would stand tall and face them without fear.
The dragons had attacked not long ago. Their raid had been terrifying, but even without the Caravan, the dwarves would have found a way to stop them. Of course, the dwarf royalty would have been slaughtered in the grueling process and the proud palace would have crumbled, but they wouldn't have let those bastards leave alive. Dwight was certain of that.
However.
“Aaaaagh—!”
“Save me, please save me! Please—!”
How on earth was one supposed to fight that?
“U-Uwaaa, uwaaaa!”
“Please, please! It’s too hot—!”
How could such a ‘creature’ even exist?
“Ah.”
Dwight looked at the dragon soaring in the sky. The moment he saw it, he instinctively knew its identity. It was a dragon recorded in the royal annals—those born with a ‘Great Bloodline’ among dragons, possessing unique colors of the soul. They were beings treated as ‘Special Dragons’ even among their own kind.
“Aah.”
Those with special soul colors were born with unique authorities according to their respective colors. Dwight knew the moment he saw it. A Red Dragon. The dragon favored by ‘Flame’ above all other elements.
“General, General!”
An adjutant came running from afar in a frantic rush.
“Run, you must run!”
“I cannot do that.”
“Please!”
Clang—!
The adjutant swung a fist clad in a gauntlet. However, the blow merely bounced off Dwight’s black iron armor. It wouldn't have mattered even if he were bare-bodied; a dwarf’s fist could never pierce the armor of a 「Sword Expert」. Nevertheless, the adjutant swung his fist again and again, speaking through sobs.
“Please, please flee.”
“…….”
“You… you are the future of us dwarves. Take His Majesty and flee far away. Leave this hateful country, this nation built beneath the Sky Mountain Range, and somehow open a future for our people. Ensure our lineage isn't severed; carry our era forward, please….”
Dwight felt a pathetic touch as the gauntlet scraped against his armor. Amidst the unpleasant screech of metal, sobbing cries and screams blurred together. Dwight felt as if his mind was being bleached white.
Far off, the soldiers Dwight had raised let out a roar. Whatever they were shouting, they fired the cannons positioned on the outer walls—cannons Dwight had pushed to develop, insisting they must be able to shoot down dragons. A thunderous Boom! echoed as they fired.
But they didn't inflict a single bit of damage on the Red Dragon. The moment the flames and thunder collided with the beast, they were simply absorbed, only serving to make its body grow larger.
From high in the sky, laughter rang out.
“Are you playing a joke on me, you runts?!”
Whoosh.
A wave of fire swept across the outer wall, and the corpses of dwarves were scorched onto the blackened stone. Behind the fallen, even more soldiers came rushing forward. There was no light of victory in their eyes. They were simply fighting. Because they had been trained their whole lives to protect, they threw away their lives as if it were the most natural thing in the world. They willingly went to their deaths, ignoring their instinctive terror. Like moths to a flame.
“How can there be such insignificant creatures? It’s tragic, truly tragic! Why do you keep throwing your lives away? Instead of charging, why don't you try fleeing while sobbing in fear? Wouldn't that be more entertaining? Watching bugs swarm like this… it isn't very fun at all!”
To the dragon, this war was nothing more than a game. It didn't even react when the dwarf soldiers stabbed at it with spears through their tears. It didn't care whether they fired cannons, arrows, or ballistae. Ignoring the soldiers’ desperate struggles, the Red Dragon snatched up fleeing dwarves and crunched them down one by one. It ground up helpless women, the elderly, and children.
“Please! Please, just kill me instead—!”
“Look! Over here! You lizard— son of a—!”
Having targeted and devoured the weak, the Red Dragon soon spat out different voices from its maw. Not an overbearing, grand voice, but the voices of the women and children who had been screaming as they fled.
“Mommy, save me! Son, come this way!”
Dragons can see through all worlds. The Red Dragon crushed the physical bodies of the fleeing dwarves and predated their souls—which should have returned to the spiritual world—into its stomach. The voices of the dwarves swallowed into the dragon’s gut echoed piteously. The soldiers could no longer bear the tragic sight of those denied eternal rest even after death.
But whether they could bear it or not changed nothing. No weapon could wound the Red Dragon. In this desperate situation, the beast continued to laugh.
“Ah, I was full of complaints when that keeper female told me to go to the Dwarf Kingdom instead of the Forest of Fairies… but this isn't so bad. I quite like the looks on your faces, you bugs.”
The Red Dragon wrenched its maw wide open. Inside its mouth, dwarves were teeming, burning alive but unable to die. They looked like shrimp inside a whale’s mouth. Wrapping its tongue around one of the struggling, screaming dwarves, the Red Dragon spoke.
“This runt… she’s the wife of one of your soldiers. Where is he? This runt’s husband! I shall personally show you mercy. If you dance before me and gouge out your comrade’s eyes and swallow them, I will return your wife to you. I shall count to three. If you do not come out, I will burn your wife to ash and make her wander my stomach forever.”
The Red Dragon burst into loud, mad laughter. Then, it began to sing again in the voices of dwarf children—a traditional nursery rhyme passed down among dwarves. Hearing the upbeat, joyful lyrics made the soldiers’ bodies tremble with helplessness, despair, and rage.
And Dwight? He could not stand it.
“General!”
By the time he snapped to his senses, Dwight was already running with a massive war hammer in hand. The adjutant who tried to stop him was swept away and burned to death by flames pouring from the sky. The smell of burning flesh wafted from everywhere.
Soaring into the air, Dwight roared and swung his hammer. With a Clang!, the hammer collided with the Red Dragon’s body. The armor of a Sword Expert was a small world in itself; it could strike even the body of a dragon made of elements. The Red Dragon’s body swayed heavily, and in the next moment, its eyes snapped toward Dwight.
“Oh, so there was a runt like this?”
The hammer Dwight swung suddenly exploded. There was no time for panic. Dwight drew the sword from his waist, intending to unleash his swordsmanship immediately. But when he pulled it out, the blade had already melted into a limp mess. Fire applied through mere sight. The flame that melted everything had erased the blade.
Even so, it was fine. If he had no sword, he would fight with his bare hands. If that failed, he would tear at it with his teeth. Somehow—
“In the end, you’re just a creature that cannot fly.”
Intense heat surged through Dwight’s body. In the next moment, he was enveloped in flames, and a sizzling sound came from his eyeballs. Dwight felt his armor being consumed in an instant. His eyes were growing hotter and hotter.
The authority of flame. The mighty power this dragon had possessed since birth was snapping the sword Dwight had built up over a lifetime in a single breath. It was as if the world itself were speaking to him.
“Do not struggle. It is quite unsightly.”
Do not deny your innate limitations.
Do not try to change what was decided from the beginning.
You cannot do it.
A dwarf cannot do it.
“Oh.”
Just then, a pillar of water shot up behind the Red Dragon. From within the pillar, a dragon with a blue body appeared. Next, the earth surged, and a dragon with a golden body emerged.
“You’ve finally arrived, friends.”
It wasn't just one Red Dragon. All the chromatic dragons had appeared. At that sight, several dwarf soldiers dropped their weapons. Slumping down, they cried out the names of their gods, begging for salvation. Dwight could not reproach them. As the flames constricted his body, Dwight too felt like offering a prayer to the heavens.
Why have the heavens forsaken us?
Were all our efforts and time in vain?
We built ourselves up for a lifetime.
We worked so hard to stand against them.
Could it all really crumble so completely in a single moment?
‘If this was to be the end, why did you create us?’
Resentment. Rage. Helplessness. Despair. Sorrow. All sorts of emotions boiled within him.
‘If this was the end, why…….’
Dwight grit his teeth and sobbed. Inside his black iron helmet, the Great General of the dwarves could not hold back his tears. As his body grew hotter and death approached, the sound of steady footsteps echoed through the chaos. The footsteps drew closer and closer.
“Dwight.”
His vision blurred. Beyond the haze, he saw the owner of the footsteps.
“I apologize for being late.”
Dwight knew his name.
“Please wait just a moment longer.”
Arhan.
“I will prove what I said before once again.”
The Master of Steel.
“That no matter how many winged lizards there are, they are no match for me. And.”
To the Dwarf Kingdom, he was the protagonist of the legend who would restore their lost glory.
“That the time has come for the dragons to pay the price for forgetting Steel.”
The last descendant of 「Caravan」.
* * *
I saw the gruesome landscape. I saw the miserable deaths. There was nothing more to deliberate.
“A human in the Dwarf Kingdom? What an amusing sight.”
I slowly closed my eyes.
“What tricks do you have? Are you perhaps that ‘Caravan’? The human the old dragons feared? Hmph, for someone like that, you look far too insignificant. What on earth were those pathetic ancient dragons afraid of? This proves it—what those old things feared was nothing but an illusion!”
Leon Caravan’s sword, the 「Match」, is far too massive. I haven't fully digested it yet.
“Have you closed your eyes in fear? How laughable, truly laughable. You stupid—”
However, I haven't failed to digest all of it.
“You color-coded dragons.”
A handful of the 「Match」 resides within me. I haven't yet earned the right to draw it out, but I possess a Mystery that allows me to ‘temporarily’ qualify.
The Lantern. The power that allows one to burn oneself to transcend limits.
“Are you prepared to pay the price?”
I opened my eyes again. When I did, darkness momentarily blanketed the world. A chill that seemed to freeze not just my skin but my very soul arrived. Within that chill, I saw the dragons glowing in their various colors.
At the same time, I delivered the ultimatum I had always thrown at ‘uninvited guests’ once again.
“You winged lizards. Today, in this very place, every single one of you dies.”