Book 19 Chapter 14
Fragments of an Old Aristocrat,
The Dirbeta Front (3)
“Lost contact in various places on the defense line! Visibility is completely blocked due to the sandstorm!”
At the time, the great demon front was manned by the most elite forces dispatched from both continents.
This was also true for the mages of the Magic Alliance, and what was dispatched to the Dirbeta Front at that time was the Magic Alliance's Battle Division 1.
If the Special Operations Division conducted special warfare, the Battle Division was composed of battle mages specialized in one-to-many combat fitting for mages, and they were usually organized into three-person teams and deployed as front-line firepower units.
“This defense line is wrong, Johnny! We have to abandon this stronghold! The ‘Joyful Venerable Witches’ Society’ (悅尊魔女會) of Stronghold No. 6, which was in contact with us, must have been annihilated.”
“……!”
“It’s as you said, senior. First, let’s rejoin the main force and wait for the section chief’s orders! There’s nothing we can do with our strength!”
The mage’s words, shouted in such a way, were heard strangely spinning.
It wouldn't be strange.
A strange man (怪漢) who suddenly appeared in the sandstorm… because his upper body was not just gnawed but shredded from the shoulder by the axe blade of an Uruk warrior.
“Ben!”
“This bastard…!”
The magic unleashed by the two mages, who simultaneously unfurled their grimoires, instantly incinerated the Uruk warrior’s body.
However… there was no time to even revel in this short victory.
Immediately after that, what appeared from within the sandstorm was… Uruk great warriors, whose size far surpassed normal physiques.
‘Scythe…?’
But their armaments were bizarre.
Uruks had always used axes or bludgeons that brought about annihilation, regardless of the prey’s armor.
They despised swords with complex usage, and scoffed at bows and spears as weapons for cowards. Among these, what they detested most were agricultural tools like scythes or shovels.
‘What kind of scythe is that big…’
The two mages were battle professionals enough to cast attack magic even amidst such horror.
However!
What happened!
The edge of the scythes swung by the Uruk great warriors glowed eerily… and wasn’t it disrupting the magic’s power!
‘Magic…?’
‘Swallowing it…?’
There was no time to prepare the next spell.
The next moment, the scythes of other great warriors took the mages’ necks, harvesting (收穫) the souls that resided within their bodies.
An Uruk wearing the armband of a warrior chief among the great warriors roared so fiercely that its voice carried even beyond the sandstorm.
“Ka du kirsha! Harvest them all! Offer strong souls to Him!”
Lyssa’s party could only arrive at such fortresses when the harvest was already complete and only sand was scattering.
“Again…”
Fride said, withdrawing the hand she had placed on the corpse half-eaten by Blashurf.
“The souls, they’re nowhere.”
Kies closed her eyes.
The sensation of extending her senses outside her body, further and farther.
The tremors of life felt far beyond the sandstorm, out of sight, were instantly extinguishing.
[↖↙(@==@)↗↘]
Kies’s emoticon was chaotic.
This implied that a full-scale offensive seemed to have already begun. Lyssa was also feeling something similar.
Fride said.
“Should we just return to <Elsbarh>? We’d cover the retreating forces while returning. And join up with Lin at the same time.”
Lyssa shook her head.
“No, the sandstorm is too thick. If the full-scale offensive has already begun, just turning back from here would consume a lot of time.”
The fact that a full-scale offensive was launched for the harvest would mean that the number of souls required for the awakening of power had reached a critical threshold.
“The start of a full-scale offensive… means that the demon’s encirclement, which was spread out in a straight line, has also become chaotic. Let’s advance as we are and annihilate the enemy’s core. And we can also get help from Sir Simian’s Assassination Division.”
Fride and Kies weren't surprised at all. They merely exchanged smiles, thinking ‘Typical Lyssa,’ and then spoke.
“Then what about Lin and Pipi?”
Lyssa, who was already heading beyond, into the sandstorm, turned back to Fride and chuckled.
“That’s Lin, isn’t it? If we trust and wait, they’ll join us at the best possible timing.”
* * *
Lin had already left <Elsbarh> a day before the Uruk and Troll’s full-scale offensive on the Dirbeta Front began.
The Uruk’s encirclement was tight.
However, the Uruk warrior squads and Trolls were concealed within the sandstorm and underground tunnels for the general offensive. Hybrid units were in charge of the outer perimeter.
“Should have packed more food. All the villages are empty.”
Pipi and Sval sat on Lin’s left and right hands, respectively, heartily munching on the corn placed in his palms.
Lin and Tourayna’s food was also corn.
The corn from the <Langbard> region was like a specialty product, nearly twice as large and thick as regular corn, and when dried, its caloric value and preservation were excellent, making it ideal as combat rations.
“!”
At that moment, a rain of arrows poured from all directions. These, tainted with green poison, were arrows used by goblins.
However!
No arrow was allowed to reach the party, due to the wind barrier (風幕) that swiftly unfurled as if raging.
“Hmm.”
Where Lin looked back, raising one eyebrow, a being with a silhouette that could momentarily be mistaken for human appeared, leading goblins.
Goblin hybrid.
Beings born from goblins being violated by Uruks, whose normal size was 7 cheok, were approximately 5.5 cheok tall, similar to Lin’s height.
“Kyaaaaaaaak!”
As the goblin hybrid let out a scream-like roar, the goblins all rushed forward simultaneously.
Culture shock!
Unlike the goblins of the Aklad continent, who used primitive weapons like stone knives, it was unusual to see them armed with iron armor and iron swords.
‘Did they steal them from humans? After all, for Uruks, human spears and swords are just child’s playthings.’
For goblins to possess such excellent armaments!
Isn’t this the level of humanity’s standing army!
If it had been before becoming the [Strongest Archmage], the boy might have been moved by this sight and unleashed his strongest magic…!
“Nothing special.”
The boy’s sensibility had already been greatly dulled by battles against incomparably more formidable enemies than these.
“They’re naturally several times stronger than goblins, but we can handle them, right? Even just one, go ahead and take it down.”
Tourayna, who normally couldn’t speak properly due to the effects of aphasia, elegantly extended her hand forward, making a gesture as if lowering a non-existent straw hat.
“I am [The Strongest], nothing is impossible for [The Strongest]…”
Sval and Pipi, sitting on Lin’s left and right shoulders respectively, glanced at Lin with narrow, critical eyes.
“Kkyu…”
“Crazy, crazy, what on earth did you do? Madman, madman.”
“Hey, what is it! Huh? Why are you two looking at me like that? I never told her to do that, did I? She’s just imitating me on her own, alright? Seriously!”
Unlike the goblins, the hybrids’ movements were different from the start.
First, their stride was wide, so their running speed was fast, and their muscles and bones were larger, so the weight they could put into a slash was also more powerful.
In an instant, the hybrid leading the vanguard rushed towards Tourayna, but Tourayna’s beast transformation, which had grown brilliantly over 20 days, was also already complete.
‘Is this still too early for Tourayna, after all?’
The fire orb that had defeated dozens of sand goblins, the hybrid narrowly evaded! Is this the power of the warrior’s blood received from the Uruks!
‘The advantage of fire magic is its power, the disadvantage is the speed of its deployment.’
The attempt to compensate for the speed by lowering the power was even the origin of Ryuken and Zernix creating the element of lightning magic.
‘Still, just seeing that she’s not scared at all in that situation, I could give her 90 out of 100 points. The gorillas of the magic tower would need at least 10 years of training to do this much.’
As the hybrid who dodged the fire orb thrust its sword tip at Tourayna, Pipi sprang from Lin’s shoulder, faster than Lin could deploy a barrier.
Flames unfolding from those wings! Firepower and speed that most mid-to-low-level magical beasts couldn’t even contend with!
Pipi pierced the hybrid’s two eyes with her fiery talons and burned its body with her wings.
“Truly, the strongest Sun Parrot, unlike some baggage… a master!”
As Lin clenched his fist and genuinely admired, Sval was flustered!
“Kkyu-ing?!!”
Meanwhile, Pipi retracted her flames and landed on Tourayna’s head.
Tourayna looked up at Pipi with her watery eyes, and Pipi also bowed her head to meet Tourayna’s gaze.
When Tourayna suddenly smiled brightly and clapped, Pipi wagged her head back and forth, expressing a smile.
“[The Strongest]…”
As Tourayna expressed her feelings for Pipi at that moment using the [Lin Phrasebook], Pipi proudly flapped her wings.
“Still, still, the battlefield is too early for Tourayna. So Pipi will protect her.”
Yes… I don’t know what clicked so well between you two, but you both rapidly became close from that day on.
Perhaps…
the reason Tourayna chose to become Fride’s disciple instead of going to the Osarius Magic Tower after I died might also be because of Pipi.
▶ ▶ ▶
The identity of the fiend (兇手) that appeared from within the fog that filled the city, no matter how one looked at it, was… Tourayna.
- I am [The Strongest]…
If that Tourayna had grown properly to adulthood, she would surely have had such an appearance.
‘No, that can’t be.’
Although the color of her hair and eyes was no longer the watery blue that reminded him of her hometown lake, but a deep azure of the abyss.
‘It can’t be. It must just be a resemblance.’
The reason why such extremely painful denial of reality filled his mind and made even breathing impossible was not merely due to the similarity in appearance.
“Tourayna, Tourayna, Tourayna.”
Because *that thing* had swung its right hand and struck down Pipi — our Pipi, who was covered in blood from dealing with the ambushing spearmen and witches, and who had been circling it so joyfully.
“Pipi!”
In that fleeting moment as Pipi tumbled to the ground, a faint memory from the depths of his recollections dimly raised its head amidst the shadows of sorrow.
- Still, still, the battlefield is too early for Tourayna. So Pipi will protect her.
The magical coordinate calculation was already complete.
If he unleashed the ‘Brain-Shattering Blood-Discharge’, awakened by the flaming Yeouiju, at maximum power, he was confident he could finish off anyone in one blow…
But…
The laughter of that day, Pipi’s flapping wings of that day, all of it, the perfectly grasped momentum of victory, simply into the pitch-black darkness…
‘What… what on earth is this… what in the world is happening right now…’