Chapter 60
Chapter 60
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 60
Chapter Title: Feast of Provocations
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“Eat your fill and drink your fill.”
Alman said loudly.
“The hospitality of Rashiel is generous.”
As Alman said, the lavishly decorated dining hall was filled with food.
Precious delicacies that were hard to obtain even in the lower districts, one by one.
There were even fish dishes that had now become truly hard to find.
Gulp.
Swallowing sounds came from here and there.
“Didn’t they say Dante was poor? Why are they acting like that?”
Rashiel’s candidates whispered among themselves.
“Not poor, more like ascetic. I heard they only eat combat rations.”
“Whoa. They’re crazy.”
The majesty they displayed in the garden had vanished completely, and now the eyes of Dante’s candidates were filled only with food.
“Ahem.”
But at Rohan’s deliberate cough, everyone straightened up again.
“Then, please eat comfortably.”
As soon as Alman’s words fell, everyone began to eat.
“Funny.”
Watching the scene, Sein put a piece of meat in his mouth and said.
“Guys who’ll be killing and dying soon, eating together like good buddies.”
It was a remark devoid of any emotion.
“…….”
In an instant, the atmosphere in the dining hall turned icy.
“What a jinx.”
A voice from Dante’s side.
“No need to get too worked up.”
The one who instantly dispelled the tense mood was Damos.
“Guys who are about to die enjoying their last supper—do we really need to get mad about it?”
Heh heh. Laughter came from Dante’s side.
This time, Rashiel’s side fell silent.
There was no way they wouldn’t know that Damos’s words implied Rashiel’s defeat.
“True enough.”
At that moment, Sein’s voice cut in.
“Guys who’ve lived on nothing but combat rations, about to become corpses—must feel pretty hard done by.”
“Heh heh….”
“Eat up, build up your strength. That way….”
He smirked.
“We can have some fun too.”
Crack.
The sound of tableware breaking came from Dante’s side.
“Whoops, that’s something our master cherishes. We can sell their belongings to pay for it after they die. Wonder if it’ll even cover the cost?”
Dante’s candidates trembled with rage, glaring at Sein, who spoke with his hair slicked back.
It was kids’ squabbling, and he had no intention of getting involved.
“Right?”
But nothing was more entertaining than kids’ squabbles.
“Exactly.”
“Tch, looking at them, they won’t even cover today’s meal.”
That wasn’t the only reason, either.
“You lot.”
The majesty of Dante they had seen in Rashiel’s garden.
“If you flinch from those bastards even once more.”
Rashiel’s candidates had been overwhelmed by that majesty, if only for a moment.
It wasn’t something that could be overcome with battle experience or trials of death.
It was an admiration that any human couldn’t help but feel.
Dante had the power to stir that.
“I’ll split your skulls open.”
But there was one who surpassed all that: Sein.
“……W-what are you talking about? Who flinched?”
“They’re all dead meat anyway, you fuckers.”
With that one line, even the faint unease Rashiel’s candidates felt vanished.
Twitch.
Damos twitched as if his anger hadn’t subsided.
“Eat your food.”
Rohan reined in Dante’s candidates like that.
Sein had hoped they’d start a real brawl, but he soon lost interest.
‘It’s not just now, anyway.’
The exchange match with Dante had only just begun.
*
*
*
As expected, Sein’s prediction came true.
After the meal, during the free time given.
“You little worms were flapping your mouths pretty good earlier.”
Vigorous young men full of hot blood.
Moreover, men who had to fight as enemies, after having even a bit of alcohol?
“Say it again.”
A fight was bound to break out.
“Wow, these guys are insane.”
Rashiel’s candidates retorted.
“You unfilial bastard?”
“……?”
“Our dads and your dads are the same.”
“……!”
“Calling the great head of Demorus a worm—you’re rebels, huh?”
The days they had spent with Sein.
Having stuck with him for a month without separation, enduring all sorts of humiliations and abuses from him.
And naturally.
“I’ll report this to the masters and have these rebel scum executed.”
The candidates had learned not just combat, but Sein’s sharp tongue and rhetoric as well.
At Rashiel’s candidates’ words, Dante’s candidates’ faces flushed red.
Denying it now would be like spitting in their own faces.
But apologizing or defending themselves would be like hocking a loogie on their own faces too.
“Hee hee.”
Rashiel’s candidates, having overwhelmed them verbally, snickered.
“You fucking dogs!”
In the end, Dante chose force.
Rashiel’s candidates were the weakest among Demorus’s candidates.
As befitting underworld folk, they knew force was the most effective in times like these.
Whoooosh.
The lukewarm atmosphere overheated in an instant.
The heat of mana emanating from Dante’s candidates heated up the training ground.
Boom boom boom!
It began to weigh heavily on Rashiel’s candidates.
Smirk.
Dante’s candidates, sensing victory, smiled.
“You bastards only learn when you’re….”
The moment they spoke with full confidence.
Dante’s candidates realized something was wrong.
“What are you idiots doing?”
Rashiel’s candidates, taking the mana head-on, stood there with utterly nonchalant expressions.
Not a drop of sweat, not even a tremor in their bodies.
Whoooosh!
Even pouring out more mana changed nothing.
At that moment.
Smirk.
With a smile reminiscent of someone.
Kwaaaaa!
Rashiel’s candidates unleashed their mana.
They clashed mana against Dante’s for a moment.
Boom!
Rashiel’s mana repelled Dante’s and pressed down on them.
“Urk.”
Some of Dante’s candidates groaned as their mana backlashed from the unexpected counter.
They tried to draw up even more mana in defiance.
‘Mana?’
Dante’s candidates felt it.
Their mana wasn’t budging an inch.
Only then did they see Rashiel’s candidates again.
They looked.
“What are you doing, I said?”
Enormously large.
‘How?’
Rashiel’s candidates were supposedly the weakest among Demorus’s candidates.
Even more so according to the intel they had gathered.
Just a few months ago, greenhorns who might not have even known they were Demorus.
A few months—barely enough time for a couple of missions.
“What…the fuck…are…you…do-ing?”
How could this be?
The approaching Rashiel candidates.
Dante’s candidates unwittingly swallowed.
Fsssh.
Then, an intruding aura scattered the auras emanating from both Rashiel’s and Dante’s candidates.
“What are you doing here?”
“Damos….”
The one who approached was Dante’s Damos.
“Tch.”
He clicked his tongue as if grasping the situation.
“The master calls. Stop the pointless nonsense and follow me.”
Damos’s appearance sorted the situation in an instant.
The retreating figures of the defeated.
Yet Rashiel’s candidates couldn’t follow them.
“That guy’s a real monster.”
Overwhelmed by Damos alone.
But they didn’t lose their composure.
“How do you think we’d stack up against him and that other guy?”
A question from among the candidates.
“Talk sense.”
Tremble.
Some candidates were even shaking.
“That fucker’s gonna die for real if he goes against them. For real.”
*
*
*
Slap!
The sound of a cheek being struck rang out.
“You idiots.”
Damos muttered, unable to hold back his anger.
“No place else to make a fool of yourselves, so you get done in by those nobodies?”
“…Damos, it’s not that.”
“If you start something, see it through.”
Dante’s candidates shut their mouths at Damos’s mad gaze.
“Taking that kind of humiliation from mere nobodies!”
Kwaaaaa!
Damos’s aura poured out.
Thud, thud.
Under Damos’s aura, candidates collapsed as if fainting.
Still unsatisfied, Damos trampled the fallen candidates.
“Doesn’t seem like those guys’ fault.”
One shadow by the window spoke toward Damos.
“Rashiel’s candidates aren’t like the rumors.”
Another shadow revealed itself.
“Not rookies who can’t even handle mana properly.”
They had been observing Rashiel’s candidates since the moment they entered Rashiel.
“Especially that Sein guy….”
“Enough.”
Damos said.
“Just trash that should’ve been discarded turning into worms.”
Damos was firm.
“So you’re saying you’re not confident?”
“As if.”
“They’re still just candidate level.”
Light came in, revealing their faces.
All around the same age.
But these were.
“You don’t think we’re just candidate level, do you?”
They were Dante’s pride.
Born of the main family.
From a young age, they had handled mana, forced to wield it like their own bodies.
Raised holding daggers rather than toys.
“By the way, that bastard seems to have gone completely under that Sein guy.”
“Spineless fuck. Main family stock going under someone else.”
Only then.
Heh.
A smile spread across Damos’s lips.
“Yeah, worms.”
He was the one who felt it most keenly, though he hid it.
A sliver of unease.
A primal instinct he’d felt since entering Rashiel.
But he couldn’t admit it.
‘Me.’
Main family born.
Dante’s most promising heir candidate.
He, who had Rohan’s acknowledgment, couldn’t possibly be scared.
“Yeah…. Just worms.”
Damos calmed and stood by the window.
“Worms that’ll be crushed and burst anyway.”
Just a passing thought.
With the candidate competition ending soon, it was nothing.
‘I am strong.’
Dante’s strongest.
‘I….’
His eyes gleamed.
“Will become Demorus’s heir and the family head.”
That was the reason for his existence.
“Yeah, you’ll be the family head.”
“We’ll help you and devour the three great organizations.”
That was it.
“Rashiel’s candidates. All that’s left is for them to be buried.”
The format of the exchange match was to be decided by Dante.
And Damos….
“In the labyrinth.”