Chapter 219
Chapter 219
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 219
Chapter Title: Annoying Swarm of Mosquitoes (4)
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“Benefactor… There’s no one. No one at all.”
Kirhas whispered lowly as she scanned their surroundings. Her hearing surpassed that of the Religiosa Demonica in certain areas. Fernandez walked between the silver-white sparks dotting the darkness and the blazing torches flickering from all sides.
She was right. Once again, there was no one. This campsite had been completely abandoned. Just like the other settlements. Traces of people were scattered everywhere. A pot still boiling over the campfire and books flapping in the wind while left open were visible.
Half-empty bottles of liquor rolled across the ground. Fernandez coldly surveyed the area. There was one thing, just one, that set this campsite apart from the others.
“There’s a smell.”
The battle priests of Beitasser. Especially the instinctive sense of smell of the Inquisitors was detecting the stench of black magic and demons. Thick enough to make his nose feel like it might fall off.
“Come out. Manderson.”
Fernandez growled. Veins writhed on the back of his hand gripping the sword hilt. Rage increasingly gnawed at his heart.
‘It’s not Alber.’
Unless Count Alber had gone mad, he wouldn’t have sacrificed his own forces as guinea pigs for black magic experiments just to set a trap. It would be a choice consisting solely of blunders, far beyond the point where losses outweighed gains.
No matter what irreconcilable grudge he held against the duke, he wouldn’t offer up his entire household and vassals to a black mage and act solely for the duke’s political downfall. The political instincts of a frontier noble weren’t that emotional.
Therefore, all these deeds were not a scheme by Alber and Manderson. Now the incident seemed to plunge back into a labyrinth.
That sensation was disgustingly abhorrent. Fernandez stood before the enormous tent entrance with eyes blazing in fury. What set Fernandez apart from other black mages, heretics, or demons was his monopoly on information about the future.
And the more choices diverged from the future, the more the advantages from that informational edge faded. The aftermath of the 50 Years’ War was a prime example. The root of this incident lay in the Necropolis affair in the Kingdom of Dane.
The Walker incident in Merlinport, and during the investigation, the Infermer incident that erupted. The Dane royal family’s recovery of maritime rights and checks against the Kingdom of Fairn.
He had intervened in the Dane royal family for the stability of the Eastern Alliance’s situation, only to get caught in the Necropolis conspiracy. Then he destroyed Mumto’s scheme, the 50 Years’ War ended, the Great Wilderness turned into plains, and the specter lords from the Asit Empire era arrived.
What was the result? Fernandez had decidedly not predicted that Erik the pitch-black would expand his forces so quickly. In the process of changing the future, uncontrollable variables were proliferating.
Meticulously organizing every incident according to plan and securing the flow through numbers battles. That was everything to Fernandez. At this very moment, Fernandez was unleashing his rage at the recurring variables.
‘Annoying.’
Fernandez furrowed his brow and shouted once more.
“Manderson, Manderson of the Tower of Corpses! Come out. There’s nowhere left to run!”
“Arrogant.”
The tent flap opened by itself. Inside was a massive wooden chair. A man leaned obliquely against it from the shadows of the tent, gazing at him.
“Who are you? Who are you to know me?”
“Count Alber… No. Not that. It’s what’s possessing that body.”
Fernandez drew his sword hilt upward as he approached him. It was the face he had met in the conference hall. Count Alber. But beneath that pale face and those pale blue eyes, residues of mana could be felt.
“That’s right. The beastman chieftess and her lover. Quite the warrior. I didn’t know you had knowledge of magic, and even less that you knew me.”
“Necromancer!! I won’t let you spill any more innocent blood!!”
Kirhas bared her fangs and screamed before charging toward the tent. Before Fernandez could grab her, she was already up close to Count Alber, swinging her sword.
-Clang!
“Guh!”
A knight in full plate armor emerged from the shadows inside the tent, deflecting Kirhas’s sword. Kirhas clicked her tongue and retreated, readying her stance. Alber remained seated in the same posture, sneering at her.
“I never thought I’d live to see the leader of beast rabble spouting such pathetic drivel. Are you serious? Were you seriously talking about innocent blood?”
Clang! Clang! The sound of blades clashing and being repelled rang out in succession. Kirhas swung her sword wildly while retreating, panting as she took position beside Fernandez.
“Benefactor, these guys… They’re not ordinary.”
“Death Knights. Don’t charge alone.”
“Yes, Benefactor.”
Like the Death Knights they had faced in Altbert, these were undead entities that retained their premortem skills and mindset, making them extremely threatening.
Knights who could devote all their prowess purely to offense, ignoring threats of death or survival defenses. Since swordsmanship fundamentally consists of over 70% defense. Those who used 100% on attack became existences at least two or three times stronger than ordinary skilled knights.
Fernandez spun his sword and assumed a stance while looking around. There were many. At least seven. No, ten knights were approaching them.
Since they weren’t living, it was natural not to sense their presence. He hadn’t noticed amid the thick residues of black magic everywhere. Knights rising from the tent’s corners, exuding ferocious auras, drew ever closer.
“Uh, Benefactor.”
“Pathetic.”
Fernandez narrowed his eyes and glared at Alber. Alber shrugged.
“I’ll see if you keep that bravado even in death. I’ll make sure to preserve your final expression as a specimen.”
“I have many questions, Manderson. Just who’s behind you to make you act so boldly. I’m very, very curious.”
-Shing.
Fernandez gripped his greatsword with one hand and spun his other hand to draw a second blade. With the King of Dayin’s sword in one hand and the key sword in the other, he coldly glared at Alber.
Operating on border tenant farmers and some pioneer villages was within acceptable recklessness. But directly targeting a noble required a different kind of madness.
Black mages never lightly touch nobles. Nobles had their own social networks, and any black mage who touched one became a definite pursuit target.
If even one noble requested an investigation from the Inquisition, things got very complicated. Heretica dispatched for heresy investigations were real experts, unlike village chiefs’ hired mercenaries.
Therefore, there had to be a backer behind Manderson at least bigger than Count Alber. Fernandez was curious about that figure. It meant there was a noble, at least a great noble, trying to check him this hard.
“So watch closely. From that spot, praying quietly.”
-Kwachik!
One knight close enough swung its sword. In the brief exchange, a dazzling flash accompanied Fernandez’s blade crushing under the knight’s helmet and passing through. Even as he did, he kept his eyes on Count Alber. No, the black mage possessing that body.
* * *
The greatsword cleaved the sky. One-handed greatsword techniques moved through mechanisms entirely different from standard two-handed ones. Greatswords were originally meant to whip around using both hands as levers for rotational force.
But if one could substitute arm strength for that rotational force and the weight-centered power of blade and pommel. The result was the same.
-Kruk!
The knight’s pauldron soared into the air. Wherever the greatsword struck and passed, the trajectory turned straight into destruction. Fernandez’s silver hair shook with the motion.
-Kang!
Someone blocked the sword. An astonishing feat in itself. Techniques were originally for overcoming power disadvantages. Being able to block the strength and speed of a Religiosa Demonica meant that person was a knight who had reached the pinnacle through training.
However—
-Kwaduduk!
The blade twisted and crushed. Iron scales bloomed like flowers, and a jet-black greatsword sliced through them. Not so much a slash as a smash. A shock as if space itself crumpled enveloped the knight.
-Kang! Kwang!
Toward a knight too close, closer than sword-swinging range, hurling its body with blade tip straight, Fernandez smashed his fist. Like pounding with a mace, the knight collapsed to its knees in that pose.
-Sgeung.
Kirhas charged into the spot, swinging her sword. A clean semicircle slash utterly different from Fernandez’s. It precisely slipped into the armor’s gap and tore upward. The cleanly severed helmet floated briefly in the air before rolling on the ground.
The knights’ movements were dry and lethal. Attacks, attacks, attacks with no regard for losing life or bodily harm!
-Clang!
Swords crossed. Kirhas’s longsword slipped through the gap, felling one knight. Death Knights were undoubtedly stronger than two or three knights of the same caliber.
However, Demonica could contend with knights who reached the pinnacle solely through physical prowess—
-Kwang!!
Fernandez and Kirhas stood at the ‘pinnacle’ as swordsmen called it. With at least one foot in that realm beyond faint boundaries!
All the Death Knights in the area crumbled. Even if Darian came, or even if Zephys himself came, it wasn’t a trap they could overcome unscathed. But it wasn’t a trap they couldn’t win either.
It simply exceeded specs. Like a bear stepping on a rat trap. Fernandez briefly watched a knight collapsing while coughing up blackened dead blood. Focusing his hearing, he caught the hissing of escaping air.
[Thank you.]
Like most undead, these knights had merely been used and slain. Their tragedy was compounded by their exceptional premortem abilities.
While the body mattered for forging powerful undead, the talents and power tied to soul and spirit played an even greater role. Thus, mighty undead inevitably retained premortem memories and skills.
The knights’ souls, freed from bondage by their bodies’ destruction, let out death rattles. Unlike skeleton soldiers, ghouls, or Walkers, these had souls. And corrupted souls could never enter the embrace of the Holy Pantheon. Even if it wasn’t by their choice.
Fernandez bowed his head briefly and closed his eyes. Prayers or blessings for them held no meaning. Their souls would be sucked not to the Pantheon’s halls, but into hell’s deep abyss.
The cause of that. Stood before his eyes.
-Shing.
He raised the sword that had been planted in the ground. Despite the fierce swordfight, the blade was flawlessly smooth without a single nick. Fernandez slowly lifted his head to stare straight ahead. He could see panic staining the fiend’s expression.
“You, you bastard. That sword. Not something a beastman can wield. The key sword…!! I thought it only existed in legends! Apostle of Beitasser…? Heretic, Inquisitor!!”
The fiend shrieked while trembling. Fernandez wordlessly took one step toward him. His steel boot thudded heavily on the ground.
“So that’s it. That’s how it was! That’s why that Inquisitor delayed the trial! And, and… the Pope…!! The Pope influencing Rubye…? Why…? Khek!!!”
-Kwachik!
Fernandez’s gauntlet seized the fiend’s throat and hoisted him up. The fiend flailed, making choking noises. Beneath the steel gauntlet, he felt the fiend’s carotid artery pulsing under the larynx.
‘This one’s alive.’
Not a soul overlaid on a corpse for manipulation, but some special type of servitude curse affixed to the count’s flesh. Fernandez clicked his tongue and pulled the fiend close to his eyes.
“If you’ve realized I’m an Inquisitor, you know what you should do. Black mage.”
“Khuk…!! Wh-what…!”
“Pray. To any god, say anything. Earnestly. I’ll come find you.”
“You, you’re too late! The b-beastman chieftess… we tried to whisk her away… but unexpected interference!! Still, the result is the same… You’re too late!!”
-Kwaaaaaang!!!!
At that instant, a violent earthquake shook the tent. Fernandez steadied himself on both feet while glaring down at the choking black mage. The fiend panted while bursting into mad laughter.
“The ritual has already begun!! How will you reverse this situation, Inquisitor!!”
“That’s not for you to worry about.”
-Kwachik!
Fernandez simply clenched his grip. Soon, the sound of bones crunching rang out, and the count’s body went limp.
With the vessel dying mid-servitude curse, the soul would take some damage. Fernandez set down the dangling count’s corpse and exited the tent.
-Kwaaaang!!!
“Uh, Benefactor. That direction…”
“Yeah. Toward Rubye.”
A pillar of fire was rising in the direction of Rubye.