Chapter 402: The Banquet at the Sword Emperor Castle (7)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 402: The Banquet at the Sword Emperor Castle (7)
A monster unlike anything they had ever seen burst through the floor of the sparring ground.
What the hell? Is that a monster?! Where did this thing suddenly come from…!
The creature’s sheer size defied belief.
Jin and Rata were flung into the air as they collided with its snout. In that brief opening, Ron lunged forward and delivered a strike.
Rashid, the sword that only the Patriarch of Hairan could wield, was bathed in a brilliant light.
Swaaaak—!
Space rippled along the sword's path as if a wave had crashed.
While the strike had not reached Cyron’s realm of absolute annihilation, it was a blow from a knight who stood infinitely close to the pinnacle of strength.
The monster's mountain-like body, which had just appeared, was cleaved in two as if it were nothing but an illusion.
Black blood poured out like a flood. Before it could even stain the floor, a follow-up flurry of strikes hacked the monster into hundreds of pieces.
"Knights of Hairan, prioritize the protection of our guests! Assemble all knights currently on standby within the castle. Execute Level 1 Terror Response!"
As Dante issued the command, the knights deployed their sword formations with perfect discipline.
Frantic screams erupted from the ordinary guests in every direction.
The pleasant tension of Jin and Rata’s duel vanished, swept away by a wave of genuine danger. Naturally, the majority of the guests had never experienced a terrorist attack like this before.
The same was true even for the warriors present.
Who could have imagined that such an attack would occur at the Sword Emperor Castle—during a banquet hosted by Ron Hairan for the first time in twenty-two years?
Kujijeok, kkijik—!
It wasn't just one.
Giant monsters continued to burst from the ground at various points across the vast sparring area.
The earth shook as they emerged, and the ceiling trembled as if it might collapse at any moment. Pillars that stood like ancient trees snapped, their collapse adding to the chaos alongside the terrified shrieks of the guests.
Fortunately, however, more than thirty percent of the audience were warriors who had come to the Sword Emperor Castle as honored guests.
"We'll help too!"
"We will clear a path! Knights of Hairan, focus on evacuating the guests!"
"Black King Corps, protect the guests! We’ll settle the payment later!" the warriors shouted as they drew their weapons.
Under normal circumstances, Hairan would have refused their help. Their pride would never allow them to rely on outside forces within their own ancestral home.
But with so many guests at risk of a meaningless death, and the mere fact that a terrorist attack was already in progress being a disgrace in itself, this was no time for pride.
If the attendees of the banquet were to return home as corpses, the reputation of Hairan, the greatest sword clan, would suffer an irreparable wound.
"Damn it, what is this…!"
Landing back on the ground, Rata looked up at the monsters. Ron had already torn one apart until it was unrecognizable, but there were at least a dozen more in sight.
And that wasn't the end of it.
Intense vibrations continued to pulse from beneath the floor. Monsters of that scale were swarming Hairan one after another.
"Dante!"
Ron called out for his grandson while tearing through a second monster.
"Yes, Grandfather!"
"The knights cannot all assemble here. They are already crawling all over the outside as well."
"Outside too…!"
"As the knight who will become the master of the Sword Emperor Castle, take responsibility and evacuate the guests."
Within the sparring ground, only Ron had perceived that the monsters were also spreading outside the castle. Just as Jin and Rata seemed to exist in a different world from others, Ron was an existence on a completely different level from every other warrior present.
Dante nodded heavily.
The outside is under attack too?
The moment Ron mentioned the outside, a single word surfaced in the minds of all the warriors.
War.
Someone had declared war on Hairan—or perhaps on the Viment Empire—in the form of a surprise raid. The scale was far beyond what anyone could consider a simple terrorist attack.
As for a faction capable of commanding such a large number of monsters…
There was none.
As far as anyone present knew, no faction currently utilized monsters. In the first place, humans weren't supposed to be able to control them.
If there was any possibility, it was Zipple. However, even they had never waged war using monsters, nor did they have a reason to suddenly strike Hairan.
"I thought I felt something like a Demon Dragon… Is it the Demons?" Quicantel asked as she cast a protection wall.
The dragons present in the sparring ground, including her and Murakan, were all thinking of the Demons. Unlike the warriors, the dragons all remembered seeing Demons command monsters at least once in their long past.
"Quicantel. Don't those monsters look a bit crude to be the work of Demons?"
"They possess an energy that even most high-ranking monsters couldn't match, and you call them crude?"
"It’s not about strength; their energy flow is just unnatural. It’s as if someone forced them into existence. They’re monsters I’ve never seen before, too."
"They do have that feel to them. For once, you’ve made a plausible deduction, Murakan. Regardless, this is no ordinary situation. Get over there and help. Protect your contractor."
Jin was already wielding the Pluto Sword to deal with the monsters. While he couldn't turn the giant creatures into piles of meat in an instant like Ron, the damage to the audience was being minimized thanks to him and Rata holding the center.
[I intend to.]
Murakan transformed into his true form and soared into the sky.
By then, the ceiling had shattered completely, and boulders the size of houses were raining down everywhere.
"Murakan! Help Dante! The monsters keep swarming in!"
[I am Murakan, the guardian dragon of Jin Runcandel. I shall protect you according to my contractor’s will, so do not be afraid.]
Murakan’s deep, dark voice resonated as the sky turned black. The Veil of Spirit Energy spread from his wings, blanketing the heavens.
Since this was a banquet held in Viment, many of the Empire’s contracted mages were also in attendance. Their guardian dragons followed Murakan’s lead and ascended into the sky.
Murakan naturally became the center of the dragons. The other contractors' dragons were so intimidated by this Black Dragon, who had awakened after a thousand years, that they seemed to forget their own dignity, let alone the monstrous threat before them.
[Gwoooooh—!]
The giant monsters thrust their maws toward the dragons.
Mana began to gather in their mouths. It looked much like a mana cannon, and the spheres forming in their maws possessed the same effect. The problem was the sheer power they contained, on a completely different level from a typical mana cannon.
While it couldn't be compared to the cannons of the Kozec, it possessed enough firepower to be called a disaster.
Twelve giant monsters were gathering mana in that manner.
When they fired their cannons simultaneously, the flash of pure white light was blinding. It seemed powerful enough to turn a small citadel into dust.
[These insignificant things don't know their place.]
Murakan blocked their mana cannons without much difficulty. The Veil of Spirit Energy he had deployed formed a vortex that swallowed the blasts whole.
However, those fired from within the sparring ground were not the only ones.
Monsters outside were firing mana cannons at the outer walls of the Sword Emperor Castle. The shock of the walls collapsing vibrated through the castle, and from that point on, the situation spiraled out of control.
Unless one was an omnipotent being, casualties became inevitable. There were far more monsters outside firing cannons than there were inside the sparring ground.
Even if Cyron, rather than Ron, had been here, it would have been impossible to prevent all damage.
But the raid was only just beginning.
Suddenly, the fragments of the giant monsters that Ron and the warriors had torn apart began to undergo a bizarre mutation.
Like clumps of clay, nearby pieces of flesh began to merge, forming new shapes.
It was impossible to tell what they were.
Jin continuously called down lightning and swung Sigmund to cut them down before the transformation could finish, but it was impossible to eliminate tens of thousands of pieces of flesh entirely.
Humans…?!
The writhing flesh gradually took on humanoid forms.
Bio-Golems made from monsters.
That was exactly what the masses of flesh filling the warriors' vision were.
At that sight, even veterans who had traversed all sorts of battlefields momentarily wore stunned expressions. It felt as if the gates of hell had opened within the Sword Emperor Castle.
Dante, Rata, the other warriors, and the mages all gritted their teeth as they struck down the surging Bio-Golems.
Regardless of their martial prowess, everyone was horrified by the alien and gruesome situation.
Among the warriors, Jin's eyes were the calmest. He had encountered these damned Bio-Golems before. The sight was all too familiar.
Kinzelo, Zipple, or Viment. These giant monsters are golems created by one of those three.
He had personally confirmed that all three factions were developing Bio-Golems. He couldn't immediately tell which one was responsible or why they had struck Hairan at this specific moment.
One thing was certain.
No matter which of the three it was, Hairan would suffer no small amount of damage.
For Jin, it was a bolt from the blue as well. For this disaster to strike in the middle of his duel with Rata, of all times…
The central sparring ground of Hairan, which had once looked like a beautiful white desert, was no longer recognizable. It was simply a hellscape filled with swarming Bio-Golems and giant monsters.
Kwaduk, kurururu…!
Eventually, the wall on the far side collapsed entirely, revealing the scene outside.
A scene of chaos even worse than that in the sparring ground unfolded there.
Knights and dragons were holding the line, but human corpses could be seen everywhere. They were the bodies of servants and ordinary soldiers.
Casualties were also mounting within the sparring ground.
Reflexively turning his head, Jin checked Veradin’s location.
He couldn't see Veradin's magic yet.
That was what made him uneasy. A sudden doubt crossed his mind: could his brainwashed friend be the one leading this raid? If it were the Veradin Jin knew, he would have been working harder than anyone to save people in a time like this.
The situation was not leisurely enough for him to confirm Veradin’s presence. The number of Bio-Golems continued to grow, and Jin had been continuously breaking through their encirclement for some time.
Every time Sigmund unleashed lightning, Bio-Golems were swept away in heaps. Jin, who had been cutting, cutting, and cutting through them, suddenly came to a halt.
It was when a familiar robe entered his vision, far off amidst the remains of Bio-Golems and monsters.
A group of humans wearing gray robes without any insignia.
The moment he saw them, Jin felt his hair stand on end.
Those gray robes belonged to the Wraith Squad.