Chapter 157
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 157
Once his discussion with Solif concluded, Turan summoned Berit to inform her of the outcome.
Her reaction was far more dramatic than he had anticipated.
It was quite a sight to see Solif’s eyes bulge when Berit suddenly pulled Turan into an embrace and kissed him.
Naturally, Turan did not trust Berit enough yet to reveal the full secrets of the Jade Mirror, so she was blindfolded before they crossed over to the Baraha estate. Once there, Turan composed a formal letter to the Zahar family.
[To the Ruler of Zahar, from Turan Parsha—Master of Parsha, Representative of the Gray Zone, Protector of Kalamaf, and, on a personal note, your grand-nephew.]
[I am writing to inform you that Berit Zahar, your granddaughter who was dispatched to the Parsha family, has been reassigned to the Baraha family due to personal circumstances...]
The letter was less a request for understanding and more a formal notification.
If the Head of the Zahar family looked down on him as an inferior, he would likely be enraged by such a message. However, Turan was certain the man would show no outward reaction to this measure—at least not until they met in person three months from now.
Having finished the paperwork, Turan spent the next three days as he usually did: attending to his public duties as the Family Head and focusing on his personal training.
At dawn on the third day, Turan crossed over to Baraha through the Jade Mirror.
A servant walking down the hallway spotted him and gasped, eyes nearly popping out of his head.
“M-Master of Parsha...”
“Where is Solif?”
“He is upstairs, My Lord!”
The frozen expression on the servant’s face told Turan everything he needed to know about his reputation here.
Solif had started his relationship with Turan as a guest of Parsha, so even after becoming the Head of Baraha, he remained a welcome guest in Kalamaf. Turan, however, was the opposite.
During the recent battle in southern Helio, a significant number of Baraha nobles had perished at Turan’s hands. In this land, the Head of the Parsha family was considered a monster equal to, or perhaps even greater than, the Head of Zahar, who was infamous as the Lord of Assassination. After all, more than a few had fallen to Turan’s invisible blade.
Passing several people who stood as still as statues, Turan reached the Baraha Head’s quarters, where he soon met Solif and Berit.
Seeing the pair getting along quite well—much like he and Meisa once had—he offered a standard greeting.
“You two seem to be doing well. You look better.”
“...Do I?” Berit muttered, her expression souring.
In truth, her face looked haggard and exhausted, contrary to his words. For the past three days, she had been operating in stealth to scout the Ruban army advancing from the north, identifying their movement routes, numbers, and identities.
Thanks to Turan lending her Bije, she had been able to scout enemies from a great distance and return early, but the detailed investigation had still required her to be on the ground.
“The data?”
“Here.”
Turan took the parchment she thrust at him and nodded as he read. Being from the Zahar family, she was clearly skilled in such matters; the maps were accurate, and the intelligence was concise. Berit had even managed to collect several strands of hair from high-ranking individuals who, while not the Family Head, were among the most powerful in the enemy camp.
He wondered what method she had used against people who usually stayed holed up inside their tents. A honey trap, perhaps?
“But will this really be enough? I still think it would be better if I went with you,” Solif said.
“I’m more comfortable moving alone. The new weapon I acquired is suited for that.”
Turan had already told Solif about his new skill, the Railgun, but its power was something that would be hard to grasp without seeing it firsthand.
Folding the documents, Turan nodded.
“Good. I’ll head out now. If I attack too much, I’ll get exhausted, so I’ll just handle the morning raid and come back.”
*
At dawn, as the darkness receded and the first light rose, a flash of light erupted beside the Ruban family’s camp in the northern Land of the Five Lakes.
In that moment, no one immediately understood what had happened. The mind rarely functions smoothly the second one wakes up.
Only after several seconds passed did they realize that Baraha—the enemies they were currently invading—had launched a counterattack. Light and heat; were those not the powers the Sun bloodline wielded best?
“Enemy attack!”
“What were the sentries doing?! Baraha is here!”
Despite their attempts to blame the patrols, the assailant was nowhere to be seen. Instead, all that remained were the remnants of the flash and the screams of survivors caught at the edge of the strike.
“It’s hot, it’s too hot...!”
“My arm! My arm is gone!”
“I can’t see anything—!”
While healers rushed through the desperate cries, nobles who had been sleeping elsewhere hurried over to inspect the aftermath.
A long, deep furrow had been gouged into the earth, stretching from far outside the camp all the way to the center. Judging by how the ground along that path had been pulverized, it wasn't hard to guess the terrifying power of the projectile.
Even the camp’s barrier, which should have been able to withstand the simultaneous attacks of dozens of ordinary mages, had been shredded. Had it not been for that barrier, the attack would have likely pierced through the entire camp.
“What on earth... what kind of attack was that?”
“Lord Godrin was supposed to be staying here.”
The final destination of the mysterious attack was the tent of the commander. Godrin Ruban, a high-ranking noble responsible for one of the five Ruban legions currently invading.
Naturally, his tent had been carbonized, vanishing under the immense heat and pressure along with everything else in the path. Godrin himself had barely managed to keep his body intact. Had he not been a high-ranking noble possessing both the Strength-bearer and Guardian bloodlines, even that would have been impossible.
“Even if he was sleeping and hadn't activated his defensive artifacts... to snipe and kill a noble of a Legion Commander's caliber from that distance?”
“This is undoubtedly the work of someone at the level of a Family Head.”
They could easily think of candidates capable of such an attack: Solif of the Sun bloodline, or Turan of the Zahar bloodline.
Of course, Turan was the Head of the great Parsha family far to the west, but rumors had spread that he possessed some means of moving rapidly between the two families.
“It must be the Head of Parsha. He’s always been known for his expertise in projectiles, and at that range, our scouts should have detected him, yet no one saw anyone infiltrate.”
At one noble’s words, everyone nodded in agreement. But knowing who it was didn't solve the problem of what to do next.
Should they strengthen the perimeter? It wouldn't matter; knights or lower nobles wandering outside the main camp would be nothing more than insects to a Family Head-level powerhouse.
On the other hand, the Head of Ruban couldn't exactly spend his time personally patrolling the camp's surroundings. A powerful Zahar noble wasn't someone who could be found just by looking, and if the Family Head were to suffer physical and mental exhaustion, he might not be able to use his full strength when it truly mattered.
Above all, anyone who dared to make such an impious suggestion risked falling out of favor with their superiors.
“For now, we must report this to the Family Head and receive instructions. You all, first, secure the—”
Just as the eldest noble among them was about to issue an order, another flash of light erupted in the distance.
Unlike before, they were awake this time and could finally see the enemy’s attack clearly.
A single steel ball, appearing as a streak of light as it tore through the air. It ripped through the hole in the already-shredded barrier and swept through the nobles who had gathered for the analysis.
*
I knew it would be powerful, but this is even more absurd than I thought...
After launching two Railgun strikes, Turan clicked his tongue as he looked down at the chaotic Ruban camp before flying south again.
Since he wasn't yet fully proficient in using the Railgun, those two attacks had consumed a significant amount of mana. He could have fired five or six more times if he really wanted to, but it would be troublesome if he ran low on mana and got caught by the Head of Ruban.
Besides, retreating like this had the advantage of leaving the Ruban mages with no way to stop him. A Zahar noble sniping from over a kilometer away and then fleeing while invisible—the Ruban family, who specialized solely in physical combat, had no hope of catching such a target.
Flying south, Turan arrived back in Helio City in about an hour. There was a distance of nearly eight hundred kilometers between him and the advancing army, but for Bije, that was a distance that could be covered in an hour of flying at a moderate pace.
Returning leisurely to the Sun Temple, Turan passed through the fearful gazes of the onlookers and went to the Head’s quarters, where he began calmly organizing documents over a cup of tea.
Before long, Solif, having heard of his arrival, returned.
“You’re back already?”
“Yeah. I probably killed about ten nobles. One top-tier one, too.”
Solif clicked his tongue at Turan’s nonchalant report. His attitude was so casual one might think he had just returned from clearing out a den of local bandits.
“You treat a battle like a morning stroll...”
“I don’t know if I’d call it a battle, but I’ve crossed out the faces of the ones I killed. Check them with Berit later.”
Turan had used a quill to cross out several of the faces of the Ruban nobles Berit had previously documented. This was to help them more accurately gauge the enemy’s remaining strength.
“W-Wait a moment. Did I hear that correctly? You’ve already finished fighting?”
Berit, who had been listening to their conversation from behind, wore an expression of utter disbelief.
It was understandable. They were currently straining to scrape together a hundred nobles to prepare for a war between Great Families, yet he had gone out and killed ten nobles as if he were going for a morning walk.
Of course, Berit could easily kill ten low-ranking nobles found on the street. She was a powerful high-ranking noble herself, specialized in assassination through her Zahar bloodline.
However, killing ten nobles who were protected within a camp fortified with all sorts of barriers and detection magic, or within an army advancing with scouts deployed everywhere, was a completely different story.
No matter how powerful a Family Head was, the Head of Ruban was also there. It made no sense for him to handle it so casually and return. Even on Bije, the round trip would take a couple of hours, meaning he had basically killed them and turned back the moment he arrived.
To her shock, Solif replied casually.
“It’s Turan.”
“What does that...”
“A long time ago, I decided to just accept that whatever this guy does is possible. I wouldn't even be surprised if the Head of Ruban was found dead tomorrow.”
“It’s not that extreme,” Turan said, shaking his head at Solif’s excessive praise.
After talking with them a bit longer, he crossed the Jade Mirror back to Kalamaf.
Naturally, the nobles of Parsha welcomed their Head back without having the slightest inkling of what he had just done. If the Family Head wasn't seen in the morning, they simply assumed he had woken up a bit late; who would imagine he had crossed over to the far east to fight a war?
“It is time for the morning meeting, My Lord.”
“The agenda?”
“A noble calling himself the representative of the Western Forest requested a meeting recently...”
*
That night, Turan crossed over to Baraha again and launched a second raid on the Ruban army.
The surprise attack, launched just as they were beginning to settle into their camp for the night, was slightly less effective than the first. The Ruban army had already changed the layout of their tents to ensure a linear attack wouldn't cause as much damage.
I guess they have someone with a brain over there.
Even so, they seemed somewhat lacking in terms of overall strength. Had they thought that simply pushing an army of this size forward would scare the enemy into negotiating?
Regardless, Turan fired the Railgun a couple more times, killing five or six nobles and about fifty knights before fleeing. This time, flying magical beasts swarmed from all directions in an attempt to catch him, but none of them could detect the invisible Turan and Bije. It seemed they lacked high-level detection artifacts capable of seeing through a Zahar’s stealth.
And so it went for three days.
After a total of seven raids, the Ruban army finally reversed their direction. They had accepted the fact that by the time they reached Helio, their army would be cut in half, and they would be unable to face the combined forces of the Baraha main army and the Parsha reinforcements.
“What? The Ruban army is retreating?”
“Why on earth?”
The most bewildered by this development were, naturally, the Baraha nobles. Some of them, who hated Solif for usurping the position with outside help, had hoped he would be taught a lesson by Ruban. Others had hoped he would successfully defend the territory, even if it meant relying on the strength of Parsha and Lavitas.
Neither group had expected the invading Ruban army to simply pack up and leave.
Naturally, Turan didn't just let the retreating Ruban army go in peace. Just because the one who threw the first punch decided to pull back didn't mean he had to do the same.
After four more raids, Turan ended his assault by raining down ice spears like a storm upon the Ruban army as they finally crossed the border between the two families.
He calculated that it would be unwise to push further now that they were entering enemy territory, but more importantly, a new problem had arisen back at the Parsha estate.
Presumably, Ruban had initiated this campaign believing that Turan and the Parsha family wouldn't be able to intervene actively in Baraha because of this very issue. Their plan had only failed because of the Jade Mirror, which allowed free travel between the two locations, and the overwhelming projectile power of the Railgun.
*
Not long after the fierce clash between the two Great Families ended in a strangely hollow fashion, the real reason for the retreat spread throughout the Land of the Five Lakes.
The retreating Ruban army had stayed in villages and cities along the way, and the stories the lower-ranking knights told among themselves had leaked out through the locals who served them.
“The Head of Parsha came to Baraha?”
“I’m telling you. I heard it from the retreating Ruban knights. They said he despicably hid himself and raided the army, slaughtering the weak.”
“I heard that three of Ruban’s prized Legion Commanders lost their lives to the Head of Parsha.”
“Well, he couldn't exactly have a one-on-one duel with the Head of Ruban. They were an army, and he was alone. There’s no need to speak ill of someone who fought for our region...”
And so, the story of how the Head of Parsha single-handedly repelled the army of a Great Family began to spread far and wide across the Land of the Five Lakes.
Of course, the commoners knew nothing of teleportation artifacts, but they didn't care about the trivial details of how a Family Head from the far west had arrived there. They simply assumed the high and mighty had their own ways of doing things.
It was quite amusing that such a simple assumption hit the nail right on the head.
Thus, a terrifying legend was born in the East.
The story that the one protecting the shining sun of Baraha was the shadow from the West—the Head of Parsha, a man darker and more terrifying than even the Zahar of Assassination.