Chapter 342
Chapter 342
Iron Emperor — Chapter 342
A net of lightning enveloped the area around the corps commander. Blinding white light swallowed the world once more.
In that moment, a harrowing cry erupted.
"Great Generaaal!"
* * *
The voice that had refused to come finally burst out along with blood.
Even through the gaps between the boulders, I could see it clearly. A bolt of lightning, as if fallen from the sky, had consumed the Great General.
The net of pure white light surged into the Great General's body, every last thread sucked in until it vanished. Before him, the one who had cast the spell was also reduced to a charred lump.
"Ghk. G-General."
I resented myself for being able to do nothing but watch.
I could only stare as he slowly sank to his knees, his great axe raised high toward the heavens.
Those two thick legs, like pillars supporting the sky, were slowly bending.
His great axe, which had seemed capable of splitting anything in the world, dropped feebly to the ground.
His hero.
The Great General.
Crumbling slowly to the earth.
And the jackals rushed at him.
"Aaaaaah!"
* * *
A feeling that the world itself was humming.
THUNK!
Something had pierced him.
Thwack!
Again, he felt something drive into him.
Something?
Thwack!
Another impact came. Then his ears tingled as someone's wailing rang out.
'Uwaaaaaah!'
A familiar sound.
Avilrun. That Gandengi bastard.
Only then did his eyes begin to see, the world take shape, and the jackals' excited eyes before him come into focus.
Slash!
With one sweep of his hand, three of them went sprawling. Only then did the time that had stopped begin to move again.
"That hurts."
One in the ribs, one in the thigh, one in the belly.
Two spears and a sword.
"I..."
He forced his knees, which had touched the ground, upright again.
"ain’t..."
He straightened his trembling knees and squared his chest.
"...dead yet."
"Generaaal!"
Avilrun was calling him again.
"Noisy bastard."
It's pathetic.
"Far too pathetic to give my life to scum like this. If I died to such wretches, that brat Uru would mock me for eternity."
Looking around, he saw nothing but cowards.
The weapons in their hands were held like mere ornaments, and the feet they should have used to charge only knew how to stumble backward.
"You block of ice. Even to you, don’t I look pathetic?"
"It's pathetic."
The man with the gaze as cold as ice nodded before him.
"Heh heh."
So you do understand.
"I am Marquis Bello von Luchia, Supreme Commander of the Great Holy Empire's Gauri Expeditionary Force."
A man who still knew his courtesies. Then I'll return the proper treatment.
"I am Eulji Buru, Taedaesaja of Great Gauri."
"I remember."
A humorless man.
And he says it with that face of his, cold as a block of ice.
No romance in him at all.
"Any last words?"
Is he treating me like a condemned prisoner before execution?
Me, Eulji Buru?
Is that how it is?
"You."
There’s one thing I want to say more than anything right now.
"You holding a sword in that mouth of yours?"
"What?"
"I'm saying a fight ain't waged with your mouth."
"..."
* * *
Boom-boom-boom-boom-boom!
The wagon wheels rattled as if about to burst at any moment.
NEEEIGH!
The horses blasted out fierce snorts, as though they might collapse then and there.
Gazing at the flames and smoke rising in the distance, shrouded in darkness, Dae Mu-deok murmured.
"Just a little farther."
Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump!
His heart pounded as if ready to explode.
Looking at the sky above Gaemun Mountain Fortress, which was slowly drawing nearer, he repeated those words hundreds, thousands of times.
Never before had the flow of time felt so swift and merciless. His heart was already on the battlefield.
* * *
Boom! Ka-boom! Bang!
Rough, direct, and honest attacks. Put simply, they appeared simple. Yet they were attacks that could never be evaded. These were the attacks of the man who had called himself Eulji Buru.
"Hyaap!"
His own swordsmanship was what he had been most confident of in all the world. Never had he failed to cut something down, never had he failed to overcome a foe.
"You must've eaten nothing but slop! Put some strength into it!"
"Kuaaah!"
CLANG-CLANG!
That very same sword had now betrayed him.
An icy-blue chill wafted from Marquis Luchia's blade as it flew at Eulji Buru's limbs. Sword-images, creating the illusion of having multiplied into dozens, covered the sky and tore up the earth as they flew. And then they scattered into the void like fireflies flitting above a thicket.
"Sometimes you gotta focus on one spot!"
"Shut your mouth."
If there was one thing he wanted to block at any cost, it was that prattling mouth, like a master lecturing a disciple. Yet Marquis Luchia's sword could never stop that mouth.
Eulji Buru fought without rest. He had been struck by magic, pierced by spears and blades.
"Hyaap!"
CLANG!
Once again, Marquis Luchia's sword was knocked aside.
And the disbelief in Marquis Luchia's eyes. From where did such strength come?
Staggering back a couple of steps to bleed off the impact, Marquis Luchia caught his ragged breath and was forced once more to accept the unbelievable situation before him.
"Beyond Master."
GRRIND.
He hated to admit it, but he had no choice.
Eulji Buru. The magnitude of his strength.
"Do not intervene!"
The knights who had been gripping their weapons, watching for an opening, caught Marquis Luchia's eye. At his shout, the knights who had been about to step in flinched back and withdrew. Never in his life had he experienced such a humiliating battle. Watching him, Buru chuckled.
"Heh, don’t be shy. All of ya, come at me."
"Shut up."
Marquis Luchia's composure shattered and a ferocious roar burst out. Yet Buru did not stop talking.
"No matter how strong a wolf gets, it's still just a wolf. To a tiger, it's nothing but prey."
"I told you to shut up."
"That's why wolves run in packs. Just like now!"
"I said shut up!"
The ice shattered. In that moment, the normally cool-headed Marquis Luchia was like an erupting volcano. Drawing on all his strength, his sword formed another blade like blue flame and brought it down through the darkness.
In that instant, Marquis Luchia saw it.
The enormous axe flying back at him.
He saw the moment it split...
the Aura Blade that could cut anything in the world.
CLANG!
"This..."
The moment his beloved sword was severed with a short scream, the man called Geom Muhyul, whom he had killed earlier, flashed through his mind.
Because the place where it had been cut was precisely where the flaw Geom Muhyul had created had been.
SLASH!
Thud.
"M-Marquis!"
"Protect His Excellency!"
His beloved sword was cut off and the armor over his chest was split, blood spurting. Thrown by the force, Marquis Luchia spun once in the air before tumbling to the ground, crying out in desperation.
"Cough! Pelloman! I told you not to interfere!"
While Marquis Luchia spat blood and shouted, Earl Pelloman's sword was piercing through Buru's lower back and protruding from his stomach. Even in that state, Buru burst out laughing and managed to spit out one last remark.
"Cough. Heh heh. See? I... I told ya, didn't I? Wolves run in packs."
Earl Pelloman's single stroke, timed to the instant Marquis Luchia and Eulji Buru collided, achieved its purpose. Had he not intervened, it might not have been merely the front of Luchia's chest that was cut, but his heart.
"Khurk!"
But Earl Pelloman could not follow through with any further action. In the brief moment he drove in that single blow, Buru's elbow had slammed into his solar plexus.
Staggering backward, his breastplate was caved in as if struck by a mace. Judging from the indentation, every rib on one side must have been shattered.
"Quickly! Get His Excellency the Marquis to safety!"
Ignoring the blood gushing forth, he shouted to the soldiers and knights. Then he picked up a spear that was rolling on the ground.
Whoosh!
The moment Earl Pelloman grabbed the spear, an overpowering killing intent seized his entire body, and he could not move.
A terrifying bloodlust that would not even let him breathe.
"I-It can't be."
It was not the Eulji Buru before him. The killing intent came from directly behind.
"It can't be!"
His face contorting, he forced his head to turn.
RRRRUMBLE.
The earth groaned.
The air trembled.
Staring blankly back, Earl Pelloman felt the strength leave the hand that held the spear shaft.
An enormous dust cloud, clearly visible even through the darkness.
Shaking his dazed eardrums...
a roar of fury.
"Woaaaaah!"
The reinforcements of Gauri had arrived.
Earl Pelloman saw it. At the very front, two points of light blazing with a blue glow — the wild glare of a beast.
The scent of death was pouring out from that spot.
Kroooooooar!
A roar that shook the battlefield.
A cry that could not possibly have come from a human throat.
The old general, called the strongest warrior of Gauri...
was enraged.
Heat radiated from his horse, exhausted from galloping across that great distance. The master's battle instinct had passed into the steed. The horse was feeling its master's rage.
He soared over the massive stone mound in a single bound.
With eyes flickering with blue ghostfire, Dae Mu-deok's Hwandudaedo flew toward the one who had aimed at Buru's back.
This was a battlefield, after all.
Raising weapons to kill each other and aiming for an opponent's back was the natural course of things. But he could not forgive it.
He could not forgive...
that Eulji Buru should die at the fangs of mere jackals. Gleaming silver armor, a splendid cloak. This man was clearly a commander. And such a man had planted a sword in Buru's back, and was now trying to drive in a spear as well.
Upon him, he delivered merciless judgment.
SPURT!
ROOOAR!
The Hwandudaedo howled, dyeing the moonlight crimson.
The blood-red moonlight howled as well.
This brutal battlefield itself howled.
"Eulji Buru!"
Dae Mu-deok howled.
At his cry, Buru answered with a smile.
"I held it."
As Buru's consciousness began to haze, battle cries thundered through his ears.
The battle cries that he had so long awaited...
The battle cries that the soldiers of Gaemun Mountain Fortress, now all dead, had so long awaited...
Waaaaaah!
A torrent of furious battle cries.
Surge.
A torrent of blood pouring out.
And then...
tears streaming down.
General Dae Mu-deok had raced up before me, his mouth moving as he tried to speak.