Chapter 81
Chapter 81
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 81
Chapter Title: Underground Confrontation
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It was quite perplexing.
I had entered the viscount's estate intending to track down the magical beasts under Violle's management.
I didn't even need to draw my sword.
Showing the count's insignia opened doors without a hitch.
No need to force my way through.
But as I passed through the viscount's estate, I unexpectedly spotted Vivi.
The child who should have been with Orkal—why was she here? I moved to approach, but she vanished in an instant.
An artifact in the basement of the viscount's estate had activated.
Count Altemion wasn't a fool, it seemed, and it left me wandering lost.
I lost my sense of direction, the layout of the paths shifting in a flash. After debating several options, I simply smashed through everything and advanced.
That's how I ended up here.
"So that's where she went..."
She had been trapped here.
Those fools were all the same.
If you're going to kidnap someone for leverage, grab a kid like Vivi.
What use was snatching some worthless nobody and calling them a hostage?
"Still just a child, after all."
They knew nothing of the world.
Who would bend to your will over a mere servant?
"I trusted you, my lord! I know you're just embarrassed—that's all! Your inability to be honest is just your adorable charm!"
"Shut your mouth, Brans. One more word, and I'll rip it off."
As I pondered deeply whether this fool was even worth saving...
"Waaah! Watch out, my lord!!"
Boom!
A massive magical beast's forepaw slammed into the ground. By the time the dust settled, my hand rested on the hilt at my waist as I stared it down.
"Kallias! That wastrel scum found his way here, did he?"
A smug man.
Violle de Altemion.
"There were variables, but that doesn't change the fact that you've come to your death!"
"I've never wronged you enough to deserve death. Are you insane? Or did your father order it?"
"You... I suspected, but you truly don't even remember me..."
He ground his teeth as if trembling with rage.
"Ten years ago! When you first joined the church and became an acolyte! Don't you remember that time!!"
No idea.
No reason I would.
I'd only become Kallias three years ago.
"What did I do?"
"You damned bastard!! Back then, you'd been chased out of the north and sought refuge in the church, freshly made an acolyte. That's when we met! Do you know what your first words to me were?"
"What were they?"
"That I was scum born of scum."
"..."
Scum born of scum.
Ten years ago, Count Altemion wasn't a count yet—he was an ambitious climber scraping between barons and viscounts.
Amid poor governance and a string of incidents resolved by luck, he was granted a count's title.
Kallias had dismissed all ranks below count as scum, insulting Altemion—who had clawed his way up through hellish trials to become a count—and his son Violle as such.
Violle naturally made an issue of the insult, reporting it to the church for punishment.
But what came back was his backing.
The Four Great Nobles.
Blood of the founding myth.
Direct lineage of the Four Great Nobles.
That's why Violle had to swallow the humiliation, leading him to leave the church.
"I see."
"What's there to 'see,' you trash?"
"If you'd been insulted, you could have challenged me to a duel. Is this petty scheming what a noble stoops to?"
"I never dreamed those words would come from your mouth."
Fair enough, I had no retort to that.
"...It changes nothing either way."
An apology wouldn't alter a thing, nor did I particularly want to offer one.
Regardless, he'd committed a crime, kidnapping Brans in this pathetic ploy.
If it had been Brans locked up, I felt little; but if it were Vivi or Emily?
Even Kallias, who rarely showed emotion, would have been furious.
In rage, his latent traits would erupt, rampaging without restraint.
Traits like noble duty, count family wastrel, and Kallias's own temperament would surface.
That would be a headache.
I'd truly become Kallias then.
"So the man nursed a grudge from ten years ago like a petty child."
"A man whose life's greatest feat was being born well has much to say."
A flicker of anger stirred.
Raising this wretched body to this point took no ordinary effort. For a hopeless dullard stacking grudges everywhere, becoming a pilgrim meant no smooth path.
No! Absolutely not.
Who could fathom my resolve to bear his karma calmly? No one would understand.
"I'd planned to beat you moderately and drag you off, but I've changed my mind."
I drew the sword from my waist.
Of the two blades, the one with flames etched on its red edge.
I unsheathed the Tyrant Sword.
"I'll take an arm for it."
"Try if you can! Go! Tear him to shreds!!"
-Roaaarrr!!
Clank! Clank! Clank!!
The doors of large and small iron cages in the vast underground cavern swung open.
Artifact-forged cages released massive magical beasts and lesser ones alike, their eyes gleaming.
Their eyes were red and unfocused, drooling mouths the only common trait; otherwise, they resembled ordinary beasts.
Crack!!
He cracked the whip and shouted.
"Go!!"
The beasts charged me like they were hypnotized.
Dozens rushed from all sides—at a glance, about forty.
He really had a lot, true to rumors of his beast trade.
But beasts nonetheless.
Moreover.
"Compared to northern beasts, they're frail."
Slash, chop—whoosh!
Two per swing. Up to five at most.
I cut them down.
"What! What are you doing, idiots! Don't come one by one—swarm and devour him!!"
Snap!!
He lashed the whip in fury. But the beasts, momentum broken, only hesitated.
"You useless things!!"
"No use."
"Shut up! Kill! Kill him! Kill that bastard now!!"
Whoosh.
Another beast's throat severed, collapsing. He had no idea.
How many beasts I'd slain with these hands in the north.
I'd fought enough ordinary ones to kill blindfolded.
Wheel of Patalite.
Over seven hundred beasts felled there.
Precisely 784.
Nearly eight hundred by my hand—could these forty-odd touch me?
"Unlike beasts forged in the north's brutal wilds and brutal turf wars, these are mere greenhouse flowers."
Brute bodies, but clueless brutes who'd never truly hunted.
They couldn't scratch me.
"Damn it!! Kill him now! Kill!!"
Snap!!
-Rraaagh!!
The beasts' eyes changed.
Fearful glances lost reason, filled only with primal hostility.
Not one— all of them.
Suddenly, every beast overwhelmed by my presence lunged at once.
"Futile."
Melee was familiar.
In northern warzones, green waves churned endlessly; chaotic brawls where friend and foe blurred erupted constantly.
I'd carved through such fields, felling over two thousand orcs.
No need for holy power.
Just parry what comes.
Slash what can be slashed.
Whoosh!
I flowed with the blade like water.
Eyes closed, their malice prickled my skin clearly.
Trajectories clear as if foretold.
A true sword dance.
When I opened my eyes again.
Dismembered beast corpses littered the surroundings.
"All your prepared beasts, then?"
* * *
"Damn it!"
Violle tore at his hair.
Was that scum truly the sword dunce?
The kingdom's top wastrel?
His sword held no excess, flowed cleanly like water, graceful as a dance.
Oddly, not a drop of beast blood stained it.
The gap in strength.
In power was too vast.
Violle unwittingly stepped back. Kallias's breath after butchering the beasts was unchanged.
Calm as pre-warmup, expression serene.
"All your prepared beasts, then?"
His calm query, gaze chilling.
No—eerie.
Hands trembled.
"If you're set on killing, I'll show you death's risk."
An arm first.
"Shut up!!"
"Here it comes."
Whoosh.
"Gaaahhh!! My arm!! My arm—aaargh! Aaaahhh!!"
He thrashed, clutching the severed arm.
Kallias eyed the writhing Violle like an insect, frowning.
"As expected."
The whip he'd wielded.
An artifact.
No—more like.
'A carcass sword.'
Half-mixed, but certain.
A carcass sword forged from human flesh via divine power.
Belonging to whip god worshippers.
"Damn it! Hey!! That's enough! How long you gonna hide, damn it!! I wouldn't have schemed this far without your promise to help! Get out here and kill him!!"
"Always blaming others to the end, then shoving it off on them too. Truly a great man among men, eh?"
Swish.
Thud.
A hooded figure dropped from the ceiling. Curved form.
Voice distorted, but feminine.
She landed swiftly, whipping the lash that coiled round Violle's neck like a demonic serpent.
The whip.
She'd likely given Violle the carcass whip.
"Guh! Gaaack!"
Crack!
Neck bones snapped.
Dead before he could react.
"I don't want to fight you. Too cramped here for clashing with the north's hero... and I don't have my full forces."
Boom!
The whip god follower tossed a smoke bomb and vanished.
[See you next time if chance allows.]
Kallias glanced at Violle's broken-necked corpse, then stored his sword in subspace.
He could have pursued.
But Kallias did not.
Whip god faithful had another gift.
Beast taming.
Originally beast trainers and breeders, they'd shifted to magical beasts.
Repeated war defeats drove them there.
But the defeated found scant place. Barely clinging to existence.
No gain in letting her live.
Yet Kallias left her be.
Moments later, he smashed the cage holding weeping Brans and roamed the labyrinthine basement.
Reaching the deepest chamber.
There.
"You're here."
A seductive woman with flowing dark purple hair cradled Vivi.
Beatrice greeted him.
Holding Vivi, who followed no one but him, at ease.