Chapter 115
Chapter 115
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 115
Chapter Title: The Kings' Duel
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"Long time no see. Long time no..."
The Sea King drew one of the scimitars from his waist, using the flat of the blade to scratch the back of his head as he repeated Golden Eye's words.
Thud, thud!
Then, swaggering forward like some neighborhood thug, he advanced to the front.
"Shit-brown eyes. Aren't we past the point of chatting like old pals? After stirring up this dogshit mess, you've got some nerve spitting out words like that. I'm starting to wonder if your face is just that thick... or if you're missing a few screws up top."
Golden Eye shrugged at the Sea King Jacura's razor-sharp words.
"Sea lizard, watch your mouth. You're the ones who kicked off this dogshit first, not us. Elder Turka, Elder Jorg... Precious Golden Heaven elders, so many of our elite Mangryang warriors, called to the warriors' land because of you damned lizards. That sin deserves ten thousand deaths."
"Pfft! Warriors' land can kiss my ass... Fine, whatever."
Jacura scoffed at Golden Eye's words as if they were utterly ridiculous.
"Like you said, at this point... no matter who started it. What's the point in nitpicking now?"
He was right.
Of Takryu's boasted eight tributary lords, the Four Dragon Specters—three had crumbled.
And Golden Heaven's great elders, the pride of the orcs, the Mangryang great warriors—fully seventy percent had breathed their last.
Both factions would need long years ahead just to claw back to their former strength.
None of it would've happened if the war hadn't started in the first place... but hypotheticals didn't matter.
This was the Great Catastrophe land.
A place where only the strong survived.
A realm where underestimating anyone made the consequences brutally clear.
Shing!
"Come to think of it... shit-brown eyes. You or me—we've never had a proper showdown yet."
As Jacura drew his remaining scimitar, his fighting spirit began to seep across the field.
"Might as well be perfect. Let's settle it now. Who’s the true master of this vast Great Catastrophe land? Who’s fit to rule it as king?"
In response to the Sea King's icy aura, cold as a frozen lake, Golden Eye summoned his own, blazing like molten lava.
"Just what I wanted."
That scorching aura, hot enough to incinerate flames, reheated the field frozen solid by the Sea King's energy.
"I've always dreamed of it myself. Seize that massive river, and I could build the orc kingdom. Today, that long-held dream finally comes true."
Golden Eye and the Sea King locked eyes, their auras shoving against each other.
"……."
"……."
Even with countless monsters—orcs and lizardmen at the core—filling the field and riverbanks.
The Beast Field held no sound but the reeds clashing in the wind.
How long did that brief silence last?
...Plop!
A fruit dangling from a tree couldn't withstand the breeze and fell limply to the ground.
As if on cue.
The two absolutes of the Great Catastrophe moved at once.
Boom!
Golden Eye struck first.
Leaping sky-high, he gripped with both hands a massive axe no human could dream of lifting and smashed down toward the ground.
Kwaaaaa!
A golden aura like his axe enlarged dozens of times over hurtled toward Sea King Jacura, immense heat ripping through the air as if to shred him apart.
Orcs roared in cheers at the overwhelming sight; lizardmen froze solid.
...Chiiiing!
Jacura, twirling his scimitars playfully like it was none of his business, swung both without hesitation at Golden Eye's incoming aura.
Icy blades, frozen cold as permafrost, swirled toward the axe.
Zwaaaaa!
Jacura's blades clashed with Golden Eye's axe in midair, unleashing a colossal shockwave.
The air warped in the Beast Field's center like a massive explosion had detonated.
Just before Golden Eye, still airborne, touched down.
Spotting the opening, Jacura thrust a scimitar straight at his torso.
Movement swift as lightning.
But.
Golden Eye precisely caught the thin, razor-sharp tip on his axe blade.
Kaaang!
Jacura's scimitar flew back from the savage axe swing.
But that was no accident—it was deliberate.
No stupider choice than a contest of raw strength against that musclebound brute.
Lick!
Jacura lightly licked the scimitar blade and flashed a chilling grin.
"You didn't conquer the Great Catastrophe's southern mountains and forests for nothing, Golden Eye."
A faint vibration hummed through his grip on the hilt.
Squarely hit by that axe... he'd be cleaved in two in an instant.
Swipe!
"Ditto, Sea King."
Golden Eye replied, dragging a finger across his own cheek.
Red blood smeared the fingertip.
In that split-second gap, it had targeted his nape.
A single lapse in guard, and he'd be carved to pieces.
Was that gripping clash between the two monsters the spark?
"Chwiik! Slaughter every last one of those foolish lizards defying the Golden Heaven boss!!"
Silver, Donga, and Iron Face rallied the tribes that had lost their chiefs.
"Kerruk! Show those clueless pigs exactly who owns this river!!"
The Four Dragon Specters—no, now reduced to the Three Dragon Ghosts—Takryu's strongest breathed fire into the lizardmen.
With battle cries from both sides, lizardmen and orcs charged each other.
The peaceful field was drenched in blood in the blink of an eye amid the colossal factions' collision.
This war was the final one.
An all-out brawl that made prior losses look like a joke.
Which meant... they absolutely could not lose.
The two forces' desperate bid for mutual annihilation raged on even as sun set and moon rose into night.
A fight already nonstop for days, killing without cease day and night.
Nightfall brought a momentary lull.
But Golden Eye and the Sea King showed no sign of caring, their battle fervor undimmed.
Kwaaang!
Golden Eye's twin axes swept top to bottom, targeting Sea King's shoulders and thighs.
A stance like a colossal beast lunging with jaws agape.
The Sea King didn't meet the savage motion head-on. Instead, he smacked the axe hafts, exquisitely deflecting their path.
Undeterred, he countered at Golden Eye's shoulder.
Slower to start than the axes, yet his blade arrived first—an artistry unto itself.
"Hmph!"
Golden Eye snorted and poured power into his axe-gripping arms.
Bulge!
His already massive shoulders swelled to at least double the girth.
Pop!
The pauldrons burst unable to contain the expanding muscle, but Golden Eye paid it no mind.
The armor he'd worn was merely for show—prestige and dignity.
His honed physique suffered no drop in defense without it.
If anything, armor only hampered his movement.
Thus.
Thud!
Freer now, Golden Eye easily parried the Sea King's scimitar.
...Clack!
Not stopping there, he wedged it between his axe blades, sealing its motion.
'Got him!'
Golden Eye grinned in triumph, inwardly cheering.
Perfect vulnerability.
Meanwhile, his other axe—path altered but momentum unbroken.
Now, cleave the Sea King's skull with it... and claim lordship over the Great Catastrophe.
True ruler of nearly all its lands, save the northern deserts.
Right then.
...Whirrr!
As Golden Eye swung in ecstatic glee, a sinister killing intent from the left forced him to raise his axe in desperate self-defense.
Baaaam!
Even shielding his torso with the axe flat, the unspent shock hurled his massive frame bouncing into the field.
"...Boss!!"
Silver spotted the peril and rushed toward Golden Eye, but Iron Face blocked her.
"What the hell, Iron Face! Get out of the way!"
Silver glared and shouted, but Iron Face calmly soothed her.
"Easy, Silver. You know our boss isn't the type to drop from a single hit like that."
Iron Face chin-nodded toward where Golden Eye had fallen—and sure enough, just as he said, Golden Eye was rising, brushing off the clinging dirt.
"Urgh...! That tail's a real pain."
The ambush's source: none other than the Sea King's tail.
Near torso-thick and long, its shockwave resembled a sonic-boom whip lash.
Even front-blocked by axe, his left flank throbbed fiercely.
'...Broken?'
Truly the Sea King.
His renown no empty legend.
"Tch... Meant to send you packing to that fine warriors' land with this strike. But you blocked it again."
Regret in his voice, the Sea King twirled his tail mockingly—but he was far from unscathed.
A long diagonal gash wept blood along the sturdy appendage.
Undeniably a surprise whip-strike.
Any ordinary warrior—no, even Golden Heaven's vaunted Mangryang elite—hit dead-on would've burst skull-first, no resistance.
'Not only blocked it, but counter-slashed my tail...'
Right.
The monster who'd seized the southern Great Mountain—Sky Mountain itself.
Accomplished at young age what generations of great warriors couldn't.
Even with tail twitching in spasms, Jacura felt no intimidation.
A formidable foe, sure—but hardly insurmountable.
'Bet you're thinking the same, shit-brown eyes.'
He knew without asking.
Both had once quailed before a truly unbeatable foe.
Paon Lichtenauer.
Compared to that loathsome human—not even worth devouring—this was merely a rival to overcome.
Golden Eye and the Sea King alike.
Monsters who'd never failed to scale a climbable wall.
They believed utterly in their victory.
"Huuuuu..."
Swoosh!
Regulating his breath, the Sea King crossed his twin scimitars, tilting them slantwise back to his waist.
"Wasn't prepped just for you... but whatever. Can't let my boys spill more pointless blood."
Kuuu!
Behind the Sea King, tangible fighting spirit billowed like heat haze.
The reason Jacura bore the title Sea King, subjugator even of ocean greatbeasts.
Golden Eye sensed that ill omen too, perhaps.
"Speak of the devil."
Whirr!
Golden Eye spun his twin axes into reverse grip; golden aura condensed ferociously around him.
Its majesty in no way inferior to the Sea King's murderous presence.
"Perfect timing. I was thinking the same."
Grrrrr!
The aura rising behind Golden Eye growled like a living wolf's howl.
"……."
"……."
Under the two absolutes' crushing auras, the lulled factions fell into synchronized silence.
...Gulp!
One orc swallowing became the unwitting signal; without a word on who first, the two monsters clashed with full power.
This strike to claim the foe's life for certain.
Flash!
Midnight with no sun, yet the collision's blaze blinded eyes for a moment.
No sound amid the superhuman energies, but the full-body quake confirmed their all-out clash.
"……."
Not a short span passed before eyes and ears recovered enough to grasp the scene.
All on the field anxiously fixed gazes on the clash's outcome.
For it would plainly decide both factions' fates.
"...What? Who won?"
Donga voiced the collective thought, peering into the dust cloud.
How much time passed?
Moments later, as dust settled... an unforeseen tableau lay beyond.
Not just the two monsters—but a third figure entangled with them.
"Both of you, that's far enough."