Chapter 249: The Tin Knight and the Strange Resort (8)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 249: The Tin Knight and the Strange Resort (8)
Once upon a time, long, long ago. A very, very long time ago.
There was an age when darkness ruled the world.
An age when giants used hills as pillows for their slumber, when mermaids sat on rocks and sang, and when half-beasts galloped across the plains.
The People of the underground sang that this bountiful surface was now theirs.
The People of the underground were certain that they were the victors of this war.
And why wouldn't they be?
Their great king, their wise minister, and their eight brave generals wielded truly immense power.
The human kingdoms that fought against them fell one after another, and their hateful enemies of heaven hid cowardly behind the clouds, watching with indifference as the surface world burned.
All that remained was a small kingdom at the eastern edge of the continent and the defeated soldiers who had flocked to it.
The People of the underground believed without a doubt that once they captured the Queen of Ashes, who had dared to refuse their merciful king’s offer of surrender, and laid waste to her country, everything would be over.
They were wrong. It was a miscalculation. The end did not come.
The eight generals, once thought to be invincible, began to be subjugated, one by one.
An unbelievable feat, a miracle wrought by a single human knight.
The People of the underground tried everything to capture and kill the knight, but the humans held them back, protecting the knight even at the cost of their own lives.
Witnessing the humans’ struggle, the heavenly realm swiftly intervened on the surface, and more generals fell at the hands of the angels.
Of course, the generals did not go down without a fight.
Three of the four wings that heaven prided itself on were broken, and the last remaining wing was gravely injured.
The knight who fought the generals also became progressively more broken, to the point that when he fought the final general, there were more parts of him that were not his original body than those that were.
But even so, the knight ultimately seized victory. Having lost all his generals, the great king lamented as he withdrew his forces.
One would wish that had been the end of it all, but reality was not so kind.
For remnants who had not returned with the king were left behind on the surface.
The fates of these remnants were varied.
Some cried for revenge and charged toward the Land of Ashes.
Some took the path the king had once again opened for them and belatedly returned to the underground.
And some, neither continuing the fight nor returning to their homeland, hid themselves on the surface.
Having tasted the abundance of the surface world, they no longer wished to return to the arduous life of the underground.
They believed that no matter how strong the knight was, his lifespan was merely that of a human. If they just bided their time, a day would come when they could live freely.
It was an absurd miscalculation.
The knight they feared was a madman who would not stop fighting, even turning his own body into something other than human to do so. And the emerald sky was far more relentless than they could have ever imagined.
Those who had waged war on the Land of Ashes were the first to be annihilated. Next were the People of the underground scattered across the continent.
Having turned their backs on the final chance the king had mercifully given them, they were hunted down, one by one, with no path of escape.
They who had once covered the entire continent were reduced to a point where their existence could only be confirmed through historical texts.
The ‘father’ who had turned the ‘Master of the Island’ into a vampire was a descendant of those survivors, a tiny handful of people from an already minuscule group.
He always carried himself with an air of arrogance, endlessly droning on about the old war and the greatness of their clan.
The ‘Master of the Island’ could not understand her father at all.
Had he at least been a participant in that war, it might have been a different story. But her father had not experienced the war firsthand either; he was merely a man who had heard the stories from a vampire of an older generation.
A man who had never experienced an age of glory, had never seen the king or the generals, and had simply been bitten by one of the losers who made the wrong choice, forced to inherit that damn fate.
No matter how he tried to feign a life of elegance with his vampiric abilities, the moment he felt the slightest gaze from the Kingdom of Heaven, he would abandon everything he had and flee. The ‘Master of the Island’ could not understand what was so enjoyable about such a shabby life that he would speak of it as if it were something to be proud of. No, she refused to understand.
Because it would be too miserable to admit that he had to cling to something like that, lest his life feel too pathetic.
Her father, the one who made her father a vampire, and the one before that.
And her own situation, forced to inherit that cursed destiny completely against her will.
I don't care about some tangled war between the underground, the surface, and the heavens. I just want to live peacefully, quietly.
That was the one and only wish held by the ‘Master of the Island,’ Camilla.
For that alone, she had crossed the sea, surviving countless brushes with death (she couldn't go any farther even if she wanted to), and hidden herself on a deserted island, even creating a barrier.
But at this very moment.
Camilla couldn't help but feel the world’s malice.
“…So, you’re telling me that in your attempt to drive out the intruders, all of our main combat monsters were ground to dust, while the enemy suffered zero losses. And on top of that, after you kept poking at them while they were just playing by the beach, they’re now planning to invade the center of the island?”
In response to her question, which was somewhere between a sigh and a lament, the evil spirits glanced around nervously, breaking out in a cold sweat.
Camilla felt a throbbing headache.
In truth, Camilla had never intended to grant these evil spirits such a strong sense of self.
Golems that followed set orders and guarded her home—that was all she had wanted from her subordinates.
But at some point, they started giving themselves names she had never assigned to distinguish one another, developing special abilities that didn't exist at first through self-modification, and even started playing some kind of game of Four Heavenly Kings.
The problem seemed to be that she had mixed in all sorts of miscellaneous things—alchemy, necromancy, you name it—just to cut down on production and maintenance costs.
Still, they had always produced results, and they had contributed greatly to defeating those detestable fish-people, so she had just left them be. But that had ultimately led to this disaster.
“Hah, it can’t be helped.”
Camilla realized she had no choice but to step in herself.
Though she was hiding in such a secluded place, Camilla was a powerful vampire.
Superhuman strength, regeneration, bat transformation, creating minions, charm, suggestion—she possessed nearly every ability attributed to the ‘legendary vampires’ of popular lore.
The reason she hid and avoided conflict with the outside world was because she was wary of attracting the attention of the Kingdom of Heaven and their terrifying heavenly army, not because she was afraid of some mere adventurers.
I’ll just subdue them, erase their memories, and send them back.
With that thought, she tapped the mirror on the wall with her finger.
The smooth surface of the mirror rippled like water, then revealed the figures of the intruders.
A knight in plain armor, a black witch, a golden-haired girl, and…
“…Huh?”
Camilla rubbed her eyes for a moment.
A green-haired woman. Looking at her, a strange sense of unease washed over her.
And then she realized the source of that unease.
It was the aura of her own kind, something she hadn't felt from another person since her father was subjugated.
That’s why she was so dumbfounded.
“H-How is she perfectly fine under the sun?”
Vampires had many weaknesses, but the most prominent among them was the sun.
The very reason she had chosen this deserted island, so full of yang energy, as her hideout was to catch her pursuers off guard, thinking no vampire would ever stay in such a place. (Though she did figure out how those damn fish-people managed it.)
Camilla herself could ‘temporarily’ endure the sun by drawing on her mana, but it was an act that consumed an immense amount of power.
But what about that green-haired woman?
She showed no signs of struggling, no hint of her skin burning. She was strolling under the sun as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Her movements were full of openings, as if she had never known a day of fighting in her life, but to Camilla, that was what made her even more suspicious.
Ever since the great war of the past, the daily lives of vampires had been filled with constant vigilance and self-preservation. Those who failed to do so were the first to die. No, even those who did were all dead, except for Camilla.
In such a situation, for someone to be so unguarded and yet perfectly fine?
…Does that mean she’s strong enough to afford it? Incredibly strong?
A fragment of the tales of ‘old glory’ her father had so eagerly recounted came to Camilla’s mind.
“Originally, we nobles of the night were an elite force serving one of the eight generals.”
“He was the noblest of all the nobles of the night, and his wisdom reached the heavens, allowing him to perceive all of creation from the smallest clue.”
“Silver, the sun, running water… all the weaknesses that were once fatal to us were meaningless before him.”
“The foolish claim he and one of those ugly wings of heaven perished together, but I know better. There is no way he could have been defeated so easily. He will surely be resurrected. One day, he will return to this land with our great king and lead us nobles of the night once more!”
“……”
Camilla’s face, which could hardly be called rosy to begin with, grew even paler.
She desperately tried to deny the hypothesis forming in her mind.
“I-It must be a mistake.”
To prove to herself that the green-haired woman was not a vampire, she focused more intently on the image in the mirror.
Camilla’s eyes glowed strangely as she began to read not just the woman’s appearance, but her very essence.
Mana with a brilliant red luster, like freshly spilled blood.
At the deepest core of that mana, an exquisitely beautiful and magnificent chalice.
And, coexisting with it, mixed in, was pure white ho… ly… power?
Camilla’s thoughts came to a screeching halt.
Her mouth hung agape, her face like someone who had just seen a block of ice radiating a pure white chill from the heart of a blazing fire.
“A-A noble of the night… has been resurrected, wielding holy power to take revenge on the heavens!!”
Camilla’s body trembled.
She briefly considered escaping, but no matter how she thought about it, the chances of success seemed slim.
No, even if she did succeed, she had nowhere else to go.
W-Wait. Calm down. She wasn't interested in the center of the island at first. That means she didn't come here looking for me.
Various plans flickered through her mind, disappearing and reassembling themselves.
A look of grim determination filled Camilla’s eyes.
She bolted out of the mansion.
Exactly one minute later.
“I-I have committed a grave discourtesy, failing to recognize a Great One. Please, have mercy…!”
As the vampire trembled, kneeling on the ground with her head bowed, a collective question mark seemed to hover over the heads of the Tin Knight's party.
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A new illustration is out!
It’s a little awkward to use as an in-story illustration, so I’m attaching it below.