Chapter 215
Chapter 215
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 215
Chapter Title: The Burning Bridge
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Rem and Bart, who had hurriedly returned to the Ranoa Grand Bridge, involuntarily swallowed hard.
"Bart, this is..."
"Yeah, the smell of burning people."
They couldn't get a clear view of the situation since the Red Witches had blocked passage across the bridge, but the stench of roasting human flesh and the black smoke rising from it were unmistakable.
"Did Rain do this?"
"No way that guy would burn this many people. The real question is what the hell this plague is..."
A sharp ring echoed once from the White Creation Bow Serwebon on Rem's back.
The direction its light pointed was southeast—toward the Kingdom of Solond.
Rem pointed in that direction with his finger, as if confirming.
"Rain's already headed that way?"
Hum.
It felt like Serwebon was nodding its head.
"You're kidding? How'd he get there that fast?"
Humhumhumhumhumhuuuuuuum.
Serwebon started flashing so brightly it hurt the eyes, as if throwing a tantrum!
"Sorry! Cut it out! I was joking! Joking!"
Causing a commotion at a site where everyone was already on edge wasn't exactly fun, so Rem quickly grabbed a few merchants and asked.
"Hey, which way do I go to get to Solond?"
After four tries, he found a merchant fluent in the common tongue, but the answer was the same as the previous three.
"Solond? Why would you wanna go there? It ain't a kingdom no more."
"It ain't a kingdom?"
"You don't know? Most of the land's turned into plague zones. The Southern Republic Witch Association's completely sealed off passage. They say anyone coming out gets burned alive, no matter who they are."
Plague.
Yeah, what the hell kind of plague is this?
The mood sank into an eerie chill, and Rem and Bart could only exchange strange glances.
'The Republic's got healing witches deployed on the front lines.'
'They've always had more advanced medicine than the Empire...'
'And yet those witches are deciding to incinerate every civilian? How dangerous is this shit?'
Bart shrugged the Dragonbone Spear on his back and loosened up his joints.
"We gotta hurry and link up. He might've already clashed with the enemy once."
* * *
"A daughter? You have a daughter too?"
Valensidis asked in surprise, having learned a bit about Aki's background.
「Her name is Elamas. You must know of her as well.」
Elamas?
A silence of disbelief hung over the mysterious underground chamber for a moment.
Miria pressed a hand to her brow to collect her thoughts.
'Elamas—the name of the Black Church's second pillar, right?'
A being who lorded even over the Dragon Slayer—that monster. How much stronger could she be?
And she was Dragonkin? Well, that actually made some sense.
Reading the emotions in their eyes, Shalesarum corrected their assumptions.
「Not a daughter of the flesh, but one born of the heart.」
"Not blood kin?"
「Not all True Dragons succeed in creating avatars. The child of my sister here is truly the crystallization of a great miracle.」
Was it the profound loneliness that defied description which birthed this longing? Or did even the gods pity their sister and grant this gift?
"That the True Dragon was Elamas's spiritual pillar... I just can't believe it. Do you know where Elamas is now?"
While this exchange went on, Rain and Pipi were unusually silent, unlike their normal selves.
Though their wounds were deep enough to limit them to shallow breaths, the silence weighing on their lips stemmed not from physical pain, but from the spirit.
One wailed in resonance with a fragment of Alakishi's soul in those flames, and the other...
'Rista?'
That name, that face, that smile from three hundred years ago kept resurfacing, dominating his mind.
'With Bell Quirius, there were no hallucinations or illusions. It was real.'
Yeah, of course I wouldn't recognize her with a different face.
But she didn't recognize Pipi either.
No, she did for a split second. Like her memories were being controlled, she clutched her head in agony.
'That means it was really her.'
But how is that possible?
Karenden said my comrades all ascended to the heavens, unbound by the earth.
Does that mean Rista alone—the noblest, most beautiful soul among the Hero Party—remained on this land?
How?
Why did this happen?
If he could, he'd scream until every ounce of strength left his body; his chest felt that choked.
「This is all Shalesarum's failing. When I left that child, I failed to heed her heart.」
"What does that mean?"
「Sadly, there's no time to unravel my story and hers in your tongue. Not for this remnant of Shalesarum, nor for the descendant of Rigwind.」
In the rush of events, they'd forgotten. Valensidis flinched and checked on Ovin's condition.
His body burned like a fireball.
She'd definitely cast a spell on him, and the ritual chant had died, the song cut off—why wouldn't he wake?
「The dark arts used by Elamas and her subordinates are those of Neigalas... They devour the frail parts of humanity to claim the soul, corrupting the flesh into the abyss.」
Miria furrowed her brow.
"Neigalas?"
Valensidis shot back reproachfully at once.
"The true name of the Lizard Lord. Don't utter it lightly with human lips. The abyss stirs."
"Then we gotta fix it quick. Claiming the soul—doesn't that mean death?"
And this was probably the dark art turning Solond into a plagued land right now.
The moment it activated on a massive scale, the whole nation—no, the entire continent—would be done for.
From the fragmented intel they'd gotten during interrogation earlier, it seemed the prep was nearly complete...
「Had this body been whole, I would have stripped the dark art away in an instant. But now, I am mere afterglow.」
"Then what do we do?"
「Thus, to pull that child from her dream, another must enter it. She cannot emerge from those happy memories, so someone must awaken her to truth.」
Enter another's dream?
An idea only a transcendent True Dragon could conceive.
As Valensidis and Miria hesitated, glancing at each other, Rain—who'd been silent till now—spoke up.
"You go in, Valensidis."
"...?"
"When I was trapped in that dream, my master said it: 'Is this really the place you should return to?'"
That one phrase pulled him right out of the dream.
Even in life, even in death, his master's words guided him on the right path—leading him into the future.
And the same situation was here now.
"You're her master. Taking care of your disciple is the master's job, right...?"
Valensidis bit her lip.
Master...
Could I really be a master? Do I even qualify? With these hands that killed my own master to survive...
"You had a master too, didn't you?"
Back then, on the day of the magic volleyball match.
When I relayed the chancellor's mindset to him, he'd felt a strange sense of déjà vu and asked her name.
He probably had a master who passed the same feelings to him. Tureina, or someone else.
"Raising a disciple is an extension of your studies. It'll grow not just your knowledge, but your heart too."
"Grow your heart? How's that possible?"
"You'll come to understand a master's heart."
Suddenly, out of nowhere, once more—like light illuminating the soul—the warm smile of Chancellor Atlante surfaced, drawing a pained smile from him even in agony.
—Lin, try some of this.
Because of that smile.
Or maybe those words.
For the first time in ages, the laughter of the master he'd 'killed' echoed in Valensidis's mind.
"......"
Valensidis gave no reply, but instead sat by Ovin's head.
'Yeah...'
Watching the scene, Shalesarum gained one certainty.
'Sister, now I see exactly why you chose that human as protector of your bloodkin.'
Whatever tragic circumstances kept Alakishi away, sending only her bloodkin with the protector... she couldn't know.
「It's decided, then. I'll insert you into the descendant of Rigwind's dream, then guide my sister's bloodkin.」
"Aki...?"
「Shalesarum's memories, power, abilities... and even how to fight as a dragon.」
If things were as they should be—or perhaps if it were the young Aki of old—she might have asked Rain's will right then.
But Aki clenched her fist of her own volition, eyes alight.
Was it because she'd felt her own inadequacy as a child at the Ranoa Grand Bridge?
「It won't take long in human time. I'll burn this final soul fragment to create an eternal space. Now, let us begin.」
* * *
"Holy Maiden, please, I beg you. Please, just save this child..."
In the Kingdom of Solond's borderlands, the Palsas region.
In the heart of a plague zone even the kingdom's soldiers shunned, Elamas entered without hesitation.
In the crumbling kingdom, she was a hero—and the agent of the gods.
"Fear not. The gods will tend to your pains."
Many brought plague victims before her.
People whose hands or feet had twisted into primal shapes, children already turned primitive by soul-loss disease and bound in chains...
Elamas raised her arms in a blessing prayer, and the plagues vanished in an instant. The people wept and bowed their heads.
"Thank you, thank you, thank you."
With every miracle she wrought, Elamas's stature soared higher, while the royal family's position steadily worsened.
Foolish humans could never know it wasn't a miracle—just her reclaiming the dark arts she'd spread.
If Elamas were a mere fairy priestess, some might suspect... but she was a Dragon Priestess.
"Um..."
The child, restored from primal state to human form, tugged at her hem to express gratitude.
But an overwhelming killing intent hit him, and he wet himself in terror, stumbling back.
Why? Why? The priestess was just smiling gently at him.
"Yes, be sure to obey your parents from now on."
The truth lay in Elamas failing to hide a split-second killing intent born of primal disgust.
'This filthy human brat dares touch my body?'
And in response to her rage, the surreal, mountain-sized being looming behind her snarled savagely, shaking the earth.
"And give your thanks to her, not me."
The transcendent being that accompanied Elamas everywhere—the reason she was called Dragon Priestess.
Scales gleaming like sculpted flame, a colossal body radiating supreme dignity, wings beautiful as wildfires.
Its true nature: one of the five flames granted life by the Great Flame, Bell'Dakidun...
The second flame, which had cared for the younger siblings after the eldest Alakishi vanished—and forgotten by humans five hundred years ago.
Once, humanity had praised that dragon as the 'Great Shalesarum.'