Chapter 17
Chapter 17
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 17
Chapter Title: Frost Castle Lord's Fall
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The final 49th floor of the 4th hierarchy.
There was a man sprinting through the perpetual ice fields.
His name was Pria.
He was the vice-captain of the Meteor Knights' Third Division.
With his striking reddish-brown hair, he was running at full speed right now.
He had left his knights behind, so he was alone.
Even so, no matter how hard he pushed his speed to the limit...
He couldn't catch even a glimpse of Havel.
The distance between them simply refused to close.
"Just how far did he go... Hoo."
Pria let out a ragged breath and clenched his fists tight.
The 4th hierarchy was nearing its end soon.
The lord of the 4th hierarchy should be the Frost Commander.
The Frost Commander was named as such for commanding frost knights.
In truth, it was a golem made entirely of ice.
A calamity beast that swords couldn't even scratch.
A monster so intensely cold that even approaching it was nearly impossible.
Flame mages without specific secret arts couldn't conquer it either.
Yet the swordsman Havel charged ahead without a shred of doubt.
What gave him such confidence?
It was then.
Pria sensed multiple presences ahead.
When he turned his gaze forward, a castle gate came into view.
The fortress made of ice was breathtakingly beautiful even from afar.
The Tower occasionally revealed such stunning architecture.
But like a rose with thorns...
This castle was undoubtedly filled to the brim with calamity beasts.
Right before that gate, on the ice bridge...
Knights began to appear.
Knight clad in armor of ice, swords in hand.
They had to be the Frost Commander's knights.
Pria immediately drew his sword.
The knights are still here, so does that mean Havel hasn't reached this point?
Did he maybe take a wrong turn somewhere?
Harboring various doubts, Pria swung his sword without hesitation.
Clang!
The clash of ice blades and Pria's sword rang out with a sharp whoosh.
But he wasn't vice-captain for nothing.
Pria slid his blade along the knight's like it was nothing.
That bizarre sword technique instead cleaved down toward the frost knight's head.
His sword, infused with aura, neatly bisected the knight's icy skull.
The aura bursting from his blade was overwhelmingly powerful.
Pria's level was Aura Guardian.
The realm right after Aura Expert.
I'll break through straight to the Frost Commander like this.
Pria accelerated even further.
Cleaving frost knights as he leaped over the bridge and stormed into the castle.
Then, frost knights began emerging from everywhere inside the fortress.
"Hup!"
Pria let out a shout as he dashed through the castle interior.
Every swing of his sword shattered a frost knight.
But gradually, Pria started sensing something off.
There were far, far too many frost knights inside.
This shouldn't be the normal numbers.
The frost knight order numbered at most around fifty.
Yet the ones visible now easily surpassed a hundred.
Pria panicked.
He could handle frost knights with ease.
But when their numbers swelled like this, it was a different story.
Moreover, the more frost knights he killed, the stronger the chill he felt.
The frost knights' cold was accumulating in his body.
Sweat beaded on Pria's back.
A bad premonition began to creep in.
Whoosh!
In that instant, a frost knight's ice sword grazed past his head by a hair's breadth.
A few strands of his severed hair fluttered away.
Not good.
His stamina was at its limit.
Every frost knight he killed was freezing his body bit by bit.
They left behind their chill even in death.
No more fighting back was feasible.
Pria kicked the knight away.
Then he twisted toward cover, shaking off the frost knights.
"Haa, haa."
Having escaped safely, Pria pressed against the wall, gasping for breath.
Clack—clack—clack—.
The knights' footsteps echoed from beyond the wall.
The castle's inner corridors had plenty of branching paths.
Fortunately, he hadn't been spotted right away.
He wrapped his arms around his freezing body.
This won't do.
Pria lifted his head, barely catching his breath.
The frost knights were inexplicably too numerous.
He had to take down the commander quickly.
So he began spreading his aura like a spider's web around him.
Pria's swordsmanship was impressive, but his main strength was detection.
He boasted the finest detection ability even among the Meteor Knights.
He could easily locate the commander, who should have the strongest presence.
I figured running would be faster since detection takes time, but...
Havel didn't seem to have entered the ice castle.
So Pria fully unleashed his ability.
The aura web slowly spread, filling the castle densely.
It was then.
Crackle-crackle-crack!
Suddenly, the aura web began tearing apart at one specific point.
"Guh?!"
He let out an involuntary scream and coughed.
Drip—.
Blood trickled from his nose at the same time.
It was the backlash from his aura being forcibly severed.
Pria hurriedly wiped his nose.
Having his detection cut off like this was a first in his life.
Boom!
In that moment, the entire castle shook.
Pria's eyes trembled.
The sound had come from where his detection had snapped.
This wasn't the commander.
Something worse than the commander lurked in this castle.
Thud!
Another massive boom echoed through.
Pria gripped his sword tightly.
He was from the Meteor Knights.
He had to complete his mission.
At the very least, he needed to grasp what was happening here.
That way, he could respond with the knights who would arrive later.
Don't get scared. If I panic, the knights coming behind might get wiped out too.
Pria hurriedly started moving.
The source of the noise was above.
Clack—clack—.
Meanwhile, frost knights tried to block him.
But Pria had no intention of getting tangled with them.
He cleaved them down one by one with his sword.
After climbing for a long while, he finally reached the topmost floor of the ice castle.
A massive door entered Pria's view.
He approached it silently, holding his breath.
Bang!
In that instant, one side of the door flew off explosively.
Pria swallowed hard.
A little closer, and he'd have been blasted away with it.
What on earth could make a door fly like that?
In his panic, Pria peered urgently inside.
There stood an ice knight with a crown in place of a head.
Exquisitely crafted armor.
A translucent, beautiful cloak woven like threads of ice.
And two greatswords.
Its appearance was clearly distinct from other ice knights.
But what stood out most was the aura.
"A-Aura Blade?!"
Pria cried out in shock.
An Aura Blade had formed on the knight's greatswords.
Not the hazy, smoky form of a Guardian, but one properly shaped, close to sword-like.
Beyond Aura Guardian—an Aura Master-level Blade.
And only then did he realize.
Those weren't greatswords.
They were normal swords.
The Aura Blade was so solidly formed it just looked massive.
"In-insane."
A curse slipped out instinctively.
It was an Aura Blade he'd only barely seen from the Grand Captain or the 1st Division Captain.
The lord of the 4th hierarchy.
Frost Castle Lord.
That was its name.
A calamity beast wielding an Aura Blade was absurd enough.
A Master-level one, no less.
It was mind-numbing.
But there was an even bigger problem.
The one that had blasted the door away...
Was none other than the Frost Castle Lord.
"You're late."
In that moment, a familiar voice rang out.
Pria whipped his head around in surprise.
There, white hair peeked into view.
It was none other than Havel.
Pria blinked in disbelief.
He definitely hadn't seen him inside the castle.
Yet he was calling him late?
How the hell had he gotten in?
As Pria wondered...
He felt a gust of wind brush past his face.
The wall at the top of the ice castle...
It was punched clean through.
It didn't look like it had always been that way.
Debris from the collapse littered the area around it.
Pria's gaze shifted outside the wall.
A spot far from the castle.
Far enough it strained his eyes to see.
All the ice there was shattered.
"Gulp."
Pria swallowed reflexively.
No way... Did he leap all the way from there?
To this exact spot, where the 4th hierarchy's lord resided?
Pria's mind went blank for a moment.
A calamity beast wielding an Aura Blade at Master level.
Yet Havel shattered even that common sense.
Now he understood.
It wasn't that he sensed nothing from Havel.
He simply couldn't sense anything from him.
Just as you can't see the entire ocean even staring at it...
Staring at him yielded no sight of Havel.
Crunch, cruuunch!
In that moment, the Frost Castle Lord rose.
It had clearly taken a beating from Havel.
Its condition was far from normal.
"Wanna give it a shot?"
Havel asked Pria.
Meaning, since he'd come this far, did he want to try fighting it?
"......I'll pass."
He knew his own limits well.
Against that thing, three minutes was his max.
And even then, defeat was certain.
"Why does someone like you bother with these friendly spars?"
No matter how he looked at it, such matches seemed pointless for Havel.
The man had the power to take whatever he wanted.
"For Banpellyon."
As he answered, Havel raised his sword.
Pure white light began gathering on his blade.
"Glassis did something to Banpellyon in the past."
Havel stepped forward steadily amid the light.
The Frost Castle Lord raised its two swords, cold air swirling around it.
"I'm just repaying that debt. Things flowed this way partly because of me."
The Frost Castle Lord's swords brimmed with the strongest aura yet.
Rumble!
In an instant, so much aura gathered it warped the air itself.
Then, aura exploded from his sword.
The amplified Aura Blade grew dozens of times larger.
Havel watched it all with bored indifference.
Only Pria hurriedly lowered his stance.
Rumble-roar-crash!
The Frost Castle Lord's sword swung.
Splitting walls and ceiling, it bore down on Havel like it could cleave mountains.
As Pria gaped at the sight...
Havel brought his sword down amid the gathered dawn light.
Banpellyon Style Dawn Swordsmanship
Dawn Sky
The moment his sword descended, the dawn light devoured all space.
Crack, boom.
To Pria's ears, swallowed by the light, came the sound of something collapsing.
Pria slowly raised his head.
There lay the Frost Castle Lord in shattered pieces, and a caved-in ceiling.
Dawn light poured down from the sky above.
Staring blankly at it, Pria slowly parted his lips.
"......Glasis has the Sword Saint."
The strongest person Pria knew.
He couldn't even imagine the Sword Saint losing.
"If you seek to settle debts with Glasis, you'll face the Sword Saint someday."
Pria clenched his fists tight.
The Meteor Knights couldn't stop him.
Not even the Grand Captain could guarantee victory.
But the Sword Saint was different.
He was the world's greatest swordsman.
"Glasis won't lose."
They couldn't win this friendly spar.
But Glasis wouldn't fall.
Seeing that unshakeable conviction, Havel sheathed his sword.
"Sword Saint, huh."
The nickname oddly made him want to chuckle.
To think they'd even stolen his title.
"Sorry, but I don't trust others' words."
Arrogant yet resolute.
The old-generation Sword Saint said no more.