Chapter 213
Chapter 213
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 213
Chapter Title: Even If I Lose the Light 8
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Azadin was in pursuit.
“You bastard!”
Hatir swung his sword to parry the pursuing Azadin, but with every clash, it was Hatir who couldn’t withstand the force and was pushed back.
Once his stance shifted backward even slightly, he had to keep retreating just to avoid falling, and Azadin timed his attacks perfectly, driving Hatir along like a ball being kicked across the field.
“Kahk!”
Hatir let out a hideous roar.
Fresh flesh sprouted across the face torn open by Azadin’s fist, his arm that had been sliced down to the bone began to heal, and a translucent brown carapace covered his body.
An insect’s exoskeleton wrapped around Hatir’s form like armor, and sharp scythe-like insect limbs sprouted from his elbows and shoulders.
The insect legs stabbed into the ground, barely regaining the balance he had lost while being shoved back. They shot out with terrifying momentum toward Azadin.
Though the insect limbs bristled with sharp barbs that seemed they could pierce straight to the spine on impact, they were sliced clean off as Azadin swung the Azure Executioner.
“To think the one who calls himself the son of a god would rely on Nether sorcery in the end.”
Azadin sneered.
“Shut your mouth, you wretch! A son of that traitor Aclare?!”
Hatir tried to counter Azadin’s halberd with his Black Steel Sword.
The Black Steel Sword he wielded was a treasure of the Aragasa, called “Arael’s Judgment.” A blade forged from the scales shed by the serpent dragon Azadin during his battle with the angel of justice, Arael.
There was nothing this sword couldn’t cleave. Even a famed sword made of azure steel was inferior to black steel—that was the common wisdom of the Aragasa.
‘If I can just shatter that halberd of his, I can turn this humiliation around!’
Relying on the superiority of his weapon, Hatir sought to break Azadin.
“Pathetic.”
Azadin spun the Azure Executioner, meeting Hatir’s Black Steel Sword with the shaft itself. He knew his opponent was banking on his weapon’s superiority and met him on those terms.
—Sching!
The Black Steel Sword sliced through the shaft of Azadin’s halberd.
And then…
—Crack!
Azadin spun around for a back kick that smashed into Hatir’s arm.
But that was not all. The kick shattered Hatir’s arm and still had enough force left to bury itself into his torso. His arm bones snapped, the broken shards piercing his ribs and crumpling his chest.
The insect carapace and limbs that had sprouted across Hatir’s body broke away and fell off.
“Keuk!”
Blood sprayed from Hatir’s gaping mouth.
Azadin gripped the now-shaftless halberd like a tonfa, spun his body, and closed in on Hatir.
“Y-You! The Divine King’s Scripture… the power of the Divine King’s Scripture!”
Hatir realized the source of Azadin’s monstrous strength and cried out in shock.
“It’d take too long to explain… but if you think you’re dying to the Divine King’s Scripture, maybe it’ll put your mind at ease? Go on and die believing that.”
Azadin swung the Azure Executioner at Hatir. Considering Azadin’s physical prowess, it was an attack that could bisect him vertically in a single blow.
Hatir, supreme being of the Herald Clan, son of the Sage God.
Azadin, the Herald Clan’s lowest outcast, son of the traitor Aclare.
Would their duel truly end like this?
*********
Something heavy struck the blade of Azadin’s halberd as it hurtled toward Hatir with cleaving force.
—Klang!
A Black Steel Arrow had flown in and struck true.
While the Herald Clan regarded black steel as the pinnacle for weapons and azure steel as inferior, Azadin’s Azure Executioner took the Black Steel Arrow without so much as a nick.
Yet the impact transmitted fully to Azadin.
His mask flew off, and blood spurted from his mouth and nose.
“Guh?!”
His head spun as if struck by a powerful fist, his mouth filling with the taste of blood.
“That’s far enough!”
Kazas leaped down between Azadin and Hatir to block the way.
“Kazas!”
“Flee, Hatir.”
So saying, Kazas positioned himself in front of Azadin.
“Master….”
Azadin couldn’t hide his conflicted feelings as he gazed at Kazas barring his path.
To think he would intervene in an Aragasa duel to protect Hatir. The taste of blood filled his mouth.
“You dare interfere in a duel?!”
As Arael raged and drew his bow, Sion Etar and the elders began to move.
“Protect the Second Herald!”
The Four of Flower-Bird-Wind-Moon and their subordinates clashed with the Elder Council faction.
But many of the elders loosed arrows at Azadin. A volley rained down on him in unison.
‘Damn….’
Azadin eyed the elders’ arrow storm and sensed his own death.
A barrage laced with Black Steel Arrows. Even if he deflected those aimed at his head and torso, he’d lose limbs again like before—and this time, he wouldn’t escape fatal blood loss.
Yet…
—Thud thud thud thunk!
Dull sounds of flesh tearing and bones breaking rang out.
The noise of arrows ripping through flesh and shattering bone—any Herald could tell the depth of such wounds just from the sound.
These were piercing injuries, grievous wounds at minimum that led to death.
And yet Azadin felt no pain at all.
Not a single arrow had struck his body.
Of course, the arrows loosed by the Aragasa elders hadn’t flown harmlessly into empty air.
“Urk.”
They were embedded in Kazas.
Kazas, who had shattered the sanctity of the duel to save Second Herald Hatir, had stepped forward and blocked the arrows with magic, martial skill, and his own body.
“M-Master!?”
“K-Kazas Elder?!”
Even those from the Elder Council faction who had attacked Azadin were stunned by the unexpected turn.
“Krk….”
“What are you fools standing around for? Fire!”
Sion Etar drew his bow again. The second volley flew.
Azadin hurriedly tried to swat them away in shock, but Kazas deployed a mana barrier once more and personally deflected the arrows to shield him.
“Splendid, Azadin. To think you’d defeat Hatir.”
“W-What are you doing?!”
As Azadin panicked, at a loss, Kazas silently raised a bloodied hand to his face.
Kazas’s blood-smeared hand brushed Azadin’s cheek. His eyes had already lost their light, blind.
Azadin instinctively seized Kazas’s hand.
“You’re so reckless! You shouldn’t have protected Hatir from the start! That guy is….”
Azadin trailed off.
Kazas’s wounds were far too deep for any hope of survival, yet he was smiling.
“You’re right. Hahaha….”
So saying, Kazas began casting a spell.
A wind of mana stirred in the forecourt before the royal castle. Blue lightning flashed within the gale, devouring the incoming arrows.
It was a wind spirit specialized in nullifying arrow barrages, swallowing the overwhelming numerical superiority of the Elder Council’s volley.
Long ago, when the Aragasa were his enemies, Kazas had boasted of using this very magic to harass them.
Now he cast it once more to protect Azadin.
“Azadin… you, find your star. As for me, my star is already….”
Kazas drew his last breath.
Azadin gazed at his corpse, still standing upright pierced by countless arrows, unable even to fall under their weight, and felt an indescribable grief.
“Kuuk!”
Azadin understood bone-deep why Kazas had made this choice.
Kazas had ultimately been unable to abandon either Hatir or Azadin.
He had claimed to prioritize Hatir, but he couldn’t discard Azadin either. When Azadin didn’t just dominate the duel but moved to kill him, Kazas broke the sacred code of combat himself.
Yet he couldn’t allow Azadin to die under the elders’ arrow storm either.
If he truly wanted to save Azadin, he shouldn’t have intervened at all. Faced with the need to choose between Hatir and Azadin, he had chosen neither.
‘You fool…. What was Harkonia to you?! Why!’
Azadin embraced Kazas and gently laid him on the ground.
He was the person Azadin had spent the longest time with in his entire life.
The master who taught him the strength to fight and the strength to preserve his dignity—a family, whose preciousness words could not express.
Yet it was Azadin’s own jealousy that had cornered Kazas into a position where he had no choice but to die.
Unable to abandon either, Kazas had been forced to choose one—and this was the result.
*********
“Azadin!”
Midiam tried to leap in to aid him. But at that moment, Ismail slipped behind her.
—Thump!
Ismail’s body vanished for an instant before reappearing atop Midiam’s.
The Flower-Bird-Wind-Moon teleportation magic that shifted onto the enemy’s body: mistletoe.
At the same time, Ismail struck Midiam’s carotid artery, knocking her unconscious.
“Euk?!”
“…Forgive me. Midiam.”
Ismail supported the collapsing Midiam.
As expected, the Elder Council’s attacks bypassed Midiam and Ismail, pouring onto Arael’s group.
Midiam had publicly smeared Sion Etar’s face, but they wouldn’t want to kill her here—one of the legitimate heirs to the Etar bloodline.
“Well done, Ismail. I can’t forgo punishment entirely… but you’re quick on the uptake.”
Sion Etar praised Ismail for neutralizing Midiam at the perfect moment.
“Yes. Far too quick.”
Ismail hugged the unconscious Midiam, murmuring bitterly to himself.
“Quick enough to disgust even myself.”
*********
“Azadin! Get a grip! We don’t have time for this!”
Arael’s shout snapped Azadin back to reality.
Even after Kazas’s sacrifice, Azadin and Arael remained in dire peril.
With the duel shattered and Kazas dead, the Elder Council elders could attack Azadin’s group without restraint, and their overwhelming numbers quickly began overpowering the Four of Flower-Bird-Wind-Moon.
It was only the arrow-nullifying spirits summoned by Kazas that neutralized the barrage—otherwise, the Four and Arael wouldn’t have survived this long.
Even so, the enchanted arrows remained a grave threat.
“You filthy scum!”
Arael drew his sword in fury. The azure steel blade and Azadin’s former Wendigo Dagger danced in his hands, spraying blood.
“Krahk!”
“As expected of Arael!”
He felled numerous Aragasa in an instant, and the Herald Clan hesitated to approach out of fear. Yet even as he fought, their numerical superiority told, and Arael’s group bled onto the ground.
And time pressed them for more than that alone.
—Kroooaaaar!
The Nether entities still beyond the mortal plane—the naga attempting to summon a colossal shadow into this world, the King of Storms—let out a roar.
The Nether mana surging from Btuma Royal Castle grew ever stronger.
—Rumble!
The earth quaked, and the ground before Btuma Royal Castle erupted.