Book 19 Chapter 36
Episode 170
The Fated Enemy and Vanguard of the Mission, Shinchon Caditpol Knights (2)
Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang─────!
The storm of fierce battle carves hundreds of battle scars on this ill-fated (tragic) ruin.
Dragon's flames surge in various places with no sign of dying out, and beneath the power of life scattered by verdant arrows piercing dimensions, sprouts emerge.
The formation of blast craters by lightning was to such an extent that it wouldn't be wrong to say a meteor shower had fallen, leaving craters all over this ruin.
"Ugh, this is so annoying I could die!"
The wave of that power was more than enough to subjugate non-human entities, but… the opponent on whom this power was focused was only one.
A humanoid!
In the center of this ruin, there was only one being endlessly blocking the sacred sword's attacks with a lava spear!
"What on earth is that guy's spearmanship? I've never seen such overwhelmingly fast spearmanship before!"
Fride shouted in a bewildered tone.
'It's not a level that can be explained by simply saying 'fast'.'
Rista thought blankly amidst dozens of attacks and defenses in that instant.
'This man's spearmanship has already reached the stage of breathing.'
Can one clearly observe an opponent breathing from afar?
In the metabolic movements of life, there is no killing intent and almost no preparatory movements, making it difficult to properly observe unless one is extremely focused.
But for Bihkisa, the movements of thrusting, retracting, and swinging the spear are no different from breathing!
'It's so natural, almost like breathing. That's why there's no sound. And if you don't focus properly, you can't even see it clearly.'
The blade of the sacred sword, soaring into the sky and then swiftly cutting down through dimensions.
Bihkisa, who blocked the fierce momentum by holding his spear horizontally, immediately afterwards repeatedly somersaulted backward, retreating.
Lightning bolts repeatedly struck down with extreme precision, pursuing his trajectory!
"First Thunderclap."
The fossilized primitive men, still in the posture of pickaxing amidst their screams, vanished without a trace! Master!
"Second Thunderclap."
The fossils of Nekrons (Nekron; Necromancer, one of the Six Great Demon Races) who supervised those primitives with blood and fear crumbled into ashes! Crazy Master!
"Third Thunderclap."
The forced labor camp, built low and long in the center of the ruin, was obliterated in a single strike!
Utterly insane Master!
It is said that the Reptilians built their structures so low to make humanity crawl on all fours.
'This kid's magical coordinate calculation ability has truly reached the pinnacle of perfection…!'
After dodging such lightning strikes, each one almost creating a giant crater (volcano crater), Bihkisa, having evaded them, regulated his ragged breath.
'…So, humiliating Zernix's puppet by trampling it was no accident! I like it!'
Of course, that was after he had deeply stabbed the heart with his sacred spear and then swung it towards Lin.
As Fride switched from offense to defense to protect Lin from the volcanic force, Bihkisa was given a moment to catch his breath.
Lin had a shocked expression at the situation where his self-proclaimed [Strongest Lightning Magic] failed to inflict proper damage on the opponent.
"Hmm, the speed is sufficient… but is the power lacking? If I can make the radius longer, I might be able to catch him."
At her sight of exploring new powers rather than despairing in this situation, Bihkisa let out a delighted exclamation.
"Excellent teamwork. It's almost too much against just one person, isn't it?"
"What, you came all this way and now you want to fight fairly? If you crawl between my legs, chanting 'Lord Fride, please! Just this once, spare me!' three times, I'll allow it!"
Fride put his pipe in his mouth and feigned composure, but the moment Bihkisa whistled, his pupils dilated sharply.
"If that's the case, then I'll just call for an assistant too."
"An assistant?"
"What kind of assistant, you ask? This kind of assistant! Pyulladon, introduce yourself to these guys!"
In that instant, an eerie shadow surged out from within the sandstorm.
The first to react was!
Perhaps, in that one moment, only Kyes could react to that chillingly faint presence!
[(▣ㅁ▣)!!!!!!!!!!!!]
That reaction was to fire an arrow at Lin, who was far away.
The World Tree's arrow immediately wove itself into branches, grabbed Lin by the scruff of his neck, and slammed him to the ground…!
Immediately after, a shadow of death swept through the space where Lin's head had been.
"!"
"!"
"!"
Unable to control its own speed, what was this being that smashed several structures in the ruin and raised a cloud of dust?
It was a monstrous bird (strange bird).
Rista, who looked through the dust with her dragon eyes, let out a bewildered cry.
"Could that possibly be… Tuaki?"
Tuaki is a demonic beast characterized by its sleek ash-gray body and its snout hideously split into six parts.
It was assigned the highest risk rating among the demonic beasts appearing in the Demon World, and that Tuaki was ashes given life by Neygalas's lava.
Bihkisa smirked.
"Yes, that's right. Its name is Pyulladon. I gave it the name 'Desert Wind'!"
Fride yelled.
"Don't talk nonsense! Tuaki are originally the size of griffins, but that one is almost comparable to a wyvern!"
"It's not just its size that's similar to a wyvern. Its power isn't much different either! It's probably the largest and strongest Tuaki individual that has ever existed in history. After all, I fed it plenty of [King's Flesh]."
Kyes did not miss the blood-stained, golden-shimmering dragon scales around Tuaki's mouth.
'Was that him, the one who ambushed the flying wyvern…!'
As Bihkisa leaped onto Pyulladon's back and pulled the reins, lava began to boil from the monstrous bird's snout.
"Insane! Can it even use a breath attack?! Lin! Combine our strength! Barrier!"
It was then. Suddenly, a light pierced through the sandstorm from high in the sky.
It was moonlight!
A pillar of moonlight struck Bihkisa and Pyulladon, perfectly isolating the two of them from the hero party within a single cube.
[Join us, Bihkisa.]
In that moonlight, like a mirage, the figure of a priestess appeared, and one should note the armor, similar in texture to Bihkisa's.
That's right!
She was none other than Kardin Miu (04)!
She was Hezmana, the Judge of Divine Punishment, resurrected as a Shinchon Caditpol Knight! Bihkisa barked irritably.
"Retreat from here? Stop talking nonsense and get lost! At a moment when my 200-year-long wish might be fulfilled!"
[I found the Ark of the Covenant, but it's in a secret chamber, so I can't use my power. I need your strength to break it.]
"Shut up! Don't order me around! Are you senile, mistaking me for your paladin?"
[I will grant your trivial wish after we have fulfilled all of our long-cherished desires. I will personally bring down divine punishment with my own hands. For now, obey my command.]
Fride dashed towards them on his 16-cylinder broom. As soon as the broom started, he put his pipe in his mouth, thus being fully prepared (perfectly ready)!
"You had your fill of doing as you pleased, and now you're running away? Do you think I'll let you? Dracutos, maximum output!"
A fervent holy flame swept forth like a tidal wave, but…!
As the pillar of light surged into the sky, Bihkisa and Pyulladon's presences themselves completely vanished.
Fride said urgently.
"Rista, that's a miracle from 'Meian, the Moon of Creation,' the youngest of the <Ones Who Came>. They freely use the power of moonlight for both offense and defense. It's not spacetime travel, but rather a transference of something at the speed of moonlight!"
"That might be true normally, but… they are currently using the power of the Abyss. They must have moved through spacetime with the barrier itself. I can feel it."
"But guys, shouldn't we hurry? If they aren't directly interfering with spacetime, their range shouldn't be very far. Assuming that pillar of light wasn't a mirage, that is."
Rista, in the brief moment a single breath passed through her brain, considered numerous possibilities before drawing a conclusion.
"Kyes, Lin. The magic of that pillar of light still remains, doesn't it? Can you track its beginning and end?"
"I can find the beginning, but the end… it seems impossible since spacetime itself has been warped, doesn't it?"
"If we can reopen a spacetime that has been opened and closed once, then we can find its end too, right?"
Fride, who somewhat guessed what Rista was trying to do, pressed his lips into a straight line.
"Rista, you don't mean…!"
Rista stretched her palm towards the particles of the pillar of light, which were on the verge of disappearing.
"During the subjugation battle against the Lord of Time of the <Ones Who Came>, it is said that the King tried to annihilate himself along with the <Ones Who Came> by destroying the dimension itself."
Realm Setting (Record-Setting).
"At that time, Eldia Bete (02) Kaduel is said to have made a hole in the dimension, allowing everyone to escape. I will follow the exact footsteps of the vanguards of courage!"
Providence Engraving (Divine Law-Engraving).
"Rista, if even one of us four makes a mistake, we'll end up trapped in a dimensional rift! We'll become just like the <Forgotten Kings>. Since we're mortals, we'll die quickly."
The engraving to be carved is Benekom.
The meaning of that character string is, Shatter (Break Apart).
"Then there's nothing to worry about. We're the hero party, we never make mistakes, do we?"
The dimension, set as a realm, complied with the command of the engraved providence, shattered itself into countless fragments.
As a dimensional rift, where chaos, void, and darkness surged, opened, a storm arose, sucking in all the atmospheric pressure.
Into that dimensional rift where hair and clothing violently fluttered, Rista threw herself first, and her companions immediately followed.
"Good grief, yes, this is Rista."
Just exchanged glances like this right before diving in, without any hesitation in the act of following the hero into cosmic space.
"Deploy Divine Love Poem!"
The power of protection, bestowing the warm touch of the Creators upon the creatures of Genesis, does not lose its light even in outer space.
From the cosmic grasp that erases the ontological concepts of all things, it protects the hero party's companions!
Rista sped ahead at the front, and thanks to the magical footings created by Lin and the Ice Dragon Asruba, she could focus solely on resonating with Shirping.
"Kyes, are we there yet?"
Kyes's mission was to find the residual magical particles that had almost leaped across spacetime.
"Damn it, the Divine Love Poem's barrier is about to break! If this breaks, we'll all just die! In an instant!"
Of course, it wasn't an easy task.
This was a dimensional rift.
Because the concept of geometry was completely distorted, there was no concept of up, down, left, or right, where sideways was forward, backward was up, and nothingness was chaos in this cosmic vortex.
"Kyes, hurry!"
Kyes, who was frantically, carefully, and meticulously searching every corner of the dimensional rift with his ultimate tracking ability, in the next moment, powerfully drew the bowstring of Cerwebon.
The verdant arrow flies.
The arrow, somewhere in the dimensional rift, the moment it impacted!
"Yaaahhh─────!"
Once again, the characters of 【Benekom: Shatter (Break Apart)】, carved by the sacred sword's attack, ruptured that space.
"────Aaaahhhh!"
* * *
The technology of the <Ones Who Came> is described as a mystery itself even by the Ajin.
Infinitely overflowing radiance!
All structures of the <Ones Who Came> are products of light, and light sources brighter than broad daylight emit from all directions, whether it's midnight or underground.
"This is…"
The space Bihkisa was transferred to by the Judge of Divine Punishment was right in the middle of a priestly structure built by the <Ones Who Came>!
The central disk (circular plate)!
From the center of that disk, jagged protrusions extended, and the light emitted from their edges unified to send that mysterious pillar of light all the way to the heavens.
"This is the heart of the Ark of the Covenant. 'That person' called it an ark (chest), so I thought it was some kind of box, but it seems this priestly building itself was the Ark of the Covenant."
In the very center of the disk, a blood-red light source was floating.
"What's that?"
"That's probably… the key to the Blood-red Cathedral of <Shuriganaqus>."
"Then why don't we just take it immediately? What are you doing, old hag?"
As Bihkisa tried to step onto that disk, the light source brilliantly flickered!
As if the sun were emitting direct rays, dozens of rays of light shot out!
Bihkisa knocked it away with his sacred spear and retreated, but the strain on his body was considerable. It was powerful light.
"As you can see, in this situation, there's nothing I can do with my own power."
"You should have told me that quickly, you cursed old hag!"
"Weren't you so eager to die? Anyway, for me, whose power is mostly area-of-effect, it was impossible to shatter that orb. But it should be possible for you, who can aim for a single point."
"How annoying."
"I will block that attack, so you break it in the meantime. This is a direct order from Alma (01). Understand? A direct order from Alma means it's a command personally given by 'that person'."
It was impossible to defy the command of the Black Church's first pillar.
For she was the head of all organizations within the Black Church and the founder of this Shinchon Caditpol Knights.
Bihkisa scratched his head irritably, then charged towards the center of the disk, and at the very moment he began to swat away the light beams shot out by the light source!
Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang─────!
A crack appeared in the dimension, at the aerial coordinates where Bihkisa had been summoned, then light overflowed, forming a rift, and further, it was shattered!
"────That's enough!"
From amidst the brilliantly, dazzlingly, beautifully showering fragments of the rift, what appeared first was… a white-haired heroine scattering the brilliant light of a sacred sword!
The Last Fayquary, Rista Alter Shirping!
The red-haired priestess Fride, riding a strangely shaped broom, the archer Kyes, drawing a verdant bowstring, and the young great magician Lin, holding a staff of light, followed one after another!
'These guys, the spacetime rift I clearly and certainly closed…?'
Bihkisa, with a welcoming exclamation of "Ha!", was about to turn his body from the light source at that very moment!
That momentary flow!
The ominous flow that arises when one wish is overpowered by another wish with a greater and more desperate momentum, was severed in a single stroke!
"Miraculous World (World of Wonders)."
From this moment, when Hezmana, the Judge of Divine Punishment, performed an elegant sword dance with the ceremonial sword she wore at her side… the Seven-Branched Sword!
"One Radiant Moon."