Chapter 296

The first to move was the kelpie, with its fish-and-horse body.

The kelpie was a monster known for drowning people and, on occasion, calling up storms and floods. Rare, yes, but spotted often enough that its general profile and the standard strategies for dealing with it were widely known.

But the kelpie Milited had summoned bore almost no resemblance to the one the world knew.

The kelpie people talked about was a thing that could drown a handful of unlucky humans, and that was the extent of it.

The kelpie tearing toward Yu Ji-hyeok's group at a sprint, a storm coiling around it as it moved, carried enough power to sink an entire city if it had a mind to.

"Wait."

Just as Yu Ji-hyeok was about to hurl his spear straight between its eyes, Jin Ye-seul stepped in front of him.

"You don't need to step in for this, Ji-hyeok."

She had on the armor he'd given her, head to toe, and combined with her black hair the all-black look made her stand out from the rest of the group in a way that felt almost otherworldly.

"Hngh...!"

The kelpie came charging, snorting harshly, the storm wound around it — and Jin Ye-seul met it dead-on. Her body slid back the smallest fraction. She'd just blocked, with no apparent effort, a body-slam packing enough force to splinter a skyscraper, and she clicked her tongue softly, looking unimpressed.

"Hrrrrr?!"

"Ugh, come on. Your breath stinks."

Sharp claws extended from the gauntlets of her armor and clamped down hard on the kelpie's throat.

They looked exactly like a dragon's talons. Jin Ye-seul gripped the kelpie's neck in those talons, hoisted the thing up with a heave, and slammed it down hard onto the ground.

It thrashed wildly, and with every thrash the storm whipped harder, even spitting sparks of fire, but she paid none of it any mind.

"Hurts?"

She tightened her grip, slowly crushing down on the kelpie's throat harder and harder.

Then Lee Yu-na came tearing in toward her.

She set her back against Jin Ye-seul's and thrust the hand gripping the hilt out in front of her.

A polygonal shield of pure mana materialized in her hand in a heartbeat.

It was orders of magnitude faster, more precise, and more sharply defined than anything she could have shaped before — a mana construct on a different level entirely.

A second later, countless shards of ice came whirling down like a blizzard, hammering the spot where Jin Ye-seul and Lee Yu-na were standing — and every one of them shattered helplessly against the mana shield Lee Yu-na had pulled out of nothing.

In the next instant, cold sharp enough to freeze the breath in your mouth crashed over Lee Yu-na and Jin Ye-seul.

It didn't even register on Jin Ye-seul in her armor. And for Lee Yu-na — who'd earned elemental resistances in Professor Abel Grossman's class the same as Yu Ji-hyeok, who'd specifically picked up cold resistance, and who hadn't been lazy about training it — it amounted to no more than a slight chill.

"......~!"

The troll with the staff chanted something and shot a strange, glimmering light at the two of them.

Choi Hyun-woo had already seen it coming. He drew his sword and brought the inkdark blade swinging straight through the light.

"Not happening."

His sword had the power to cut through the very roots of any spell or sorcery.

As though to prove it true, the troll's magic was sliced clean in two by his stroke and shattered in midair like a pane of glass.

"O ancestor... your descendant — your child, who freed you from your suffering, if only clumsily — asks this of you."

Lee Ye-eun looked up at the towering hydra and murmured it quietly.

Each time she recited the prayer evenly, the World Tree branch rooted in her arm stirred, and in answer the hair ornament holding her green hair in place glinted.

"Please, stop being stingy and lend me your power — a really big share of it, this time."

She nocked an arrow with a soft creak of the bowstring and drew it back with everything she had.

In answer, the hydra — apparently finding her amusing — drew in a breath through all nine of its solid-gold heads, each one preparing to exhale venom.

"You're always so stingy, dribbling out the bare minimum!"

She snapped, irritated, and loosed an arrow formed of World Tree branches straight at the middle head of the hydra — the one that was conspicuously larger than the others.

The hydra blasted out its breath at the incoming arrow as if the very thought of it were laughable.

It had no doubt at all — that breath would melt the woman who'd shot the arrow into a single mouthful of blood-water, and erase every one of her companions standing nearby without a trace.

But the small arrow she'd loosed came on, slicing literally straight through the breath the nine heads exhaled.

Caught off guard, the hydra twisted its body, but the arrow — already loose from the string — twisted its own course as though it had a will of its own and buried itself deep in the hydra's neck.

"Bang."

As if that were all it took, Lee Ye-eun lowered the bow and murmured it playfully.

A moment later the arrow lodged in the hydra began to grow at terrifying speed, swelling into a great tree. The hydra panicked, all nine heads thrashing to try to tear free, but it might as well have been rooted deep into the earth — there was no escape.

As the hydra was steadily drained of everything it was and gradually turned into a single tree, Lee Ye-eun shrugged and muttered, a little sheepishly,

"...Huh, you actually went through?"

No, more likely it was because of this thing Ji-hyeok gave me.

She tapped the hair ornament with her fingertips, then nocked another arrow.

She turned and began loosing arrows at the clones of Gracius and Natalia Milited, who were drifting overhead and spraying down a constant nuisance of curses. Whether from having just watched what happened to the hydra or not, the two of them were keeping their distance very, very carefully.

"Grrrah!!!"

In the middle of the melee, a particularly massive werewolf threw back its head in a great howl and came barreling straight into the center of the group.

Its target — the human who, of all these surprisingly tough humans, was standing in the middle like their leader and yet doing nothing at all. It sprinted forward at full speed in a heartbeat and raised one massive arm to tear his throat out.

"Kraaaah!!!"

In that instant a hideous pain seared through the layer just beneath its skin, as though a red-hot poker had been driven in under the surface. The werewolf let out a scream of pure agony and crashed into the ground.

The cause: a thin, searing-hot line of mana, like a laser, shot out from Han Su-yeong's hand.

"Bad puppy. No manners."

Han Su-yeong murmured it and snapped her fingers once.

In answer, the Crystal and buckler that had been circling her swung outward, spinning, and moved to surround the werewolf.

"No muzzle, no leash. And it tries to bite a person?"

Then another of those mana lines lashed out from her hand.

The werewolf snarled and twisted out of the way, dodging with ease.

But he hadn't been the target to begin with, so the expression on Han Su-yeong's face didn't flicker.

"Since your master won't, I'll teach you some manners myself."

The mana line shot dead-straight at the Crystal.

The Crystal caught it and bounced it back, and the rebounded mana line came off larger and far more densely concentrated than what she'd first fired from her hand. The buckler was waiting along the line's new trajectory, its mirror-like face turned with perfect precision toward the werewolf.

By the time the werewolf realized what was happening, it was too late.

The mana line that had given it the agony of its life a moment ago now split, again and again, into countless threads that came down on it like a hard rain.

"Krrrah, aaah!!! Kraaaagh!!!"

There were too many to dodge or block, from the very first second.

The werewolf, thrashing to shake them off, ended up sprawled on the ground letting out one tortured scream after another. At some point even the screams stopped — but the mana rain didn't, not until the thing's corpse had been seared down to literal nothing, not even ash.

"That just leaves those two."

Choi Hyun-woo slashed clean through the troll-sorcerer's neck, kicked the masterless body aside, and murmured the words. His eyes were on Gracius and Natalia Milited, both still drifting in midair and chanting curses with an irritating persistence.

That was the moment.

"Gak...!?"

Gracius was hit by something out of nowhere, slammed across the room, and pinned into the far wall.

It didn't even get out a single cry — its skull was blown apart, and the body slumped limp, falling to the floor.

Standing where the shot had come from was Belluna.

"Milited..."

She'd forced her way out of Yu Ji-hyeok's shadow at some point, and now she stood there murmuring quietly.

A second ago she'd seized Gracius's head, slammed him into the wall, and crushed his skull on impact — and even that hadn't been enough for her. Her shoulders were trembling, finely.

"You took him from me... and right in front of my eyes you laid hands on that child — on the child between me and him — on my son, how dare you..."

A trickle of dark, blood-red liquid ran from one of Belluna's eyes.

"I'll kill you!!! You, and every last one of your children!"

• Foolish thing.

The space around them hummed and a man's voice, dripping with mockery, echoed through it.

• It would seem you've forgotten — you were called one of my children too, once. Beings like us, who walk through eternal life — flesh-and-blood ties are something we can find again any time, a passing dream and nothing more. Sounds like you've grown rather attached to a pet of yours.

Milited, rarely speaking out, was trying to bait Belluna. But her eyes had already gone wild with rage, and nothing it said could draw any further reaction from her. She simply turned her head, looking for her next prey, and launched herself at Natalia Milited drifting in midair.

A single gesture from her sent half of Natalia Milited's body flying.

She was reaching out to crush Natalia's face next, with the same look of contempt, when —

"Hk?!"

An arrow of mana came in out of nowhere, brushed right past her, and shattered Natalia Milited's head clean apart. The motion almost felt like showing off, like the arrow had been flaunting itself in front of her.

Belluna, who normally would have flown into a rage at such a hideous insult, only blinked.

"...My baby?"

The arrow had been formed from Ivan Hunt's mana.

She had no way of knowing that the Dragon Fang Vambrace Yu Ji-hyeok had given Ivan Hunt carried the power to shoot arrows at a target while ignoring any obstacle in the way.

That Ivan Hunt had only barely come back to consciousness inside Yu Ji-hyeok's shadow.

That even half-dead as he was, he'd realized his mother was on the very edge of losing herself.

That to drag her mind back, he'd shot the mana arrow on instinct.

None of it was something she could know.

What she could know was the one thing that mattered — Ivan Hunt was all right.

For her, that alone was enough.

"Ivan...!"

Choi Hyun-woo, who'd felt Ivan's mana the same as Belluna had, broke into a bright, openly relieved smile.

He'd been through too much alongside Ivan not to have been quietly worried sick the whole time, even if he hadn't let it show.

"Hm?"

"......"

It was then that Choi Hyun-woo felt a steady gaze on him and slowly turned his head.

The moment he saw who it was, his face — usually so steady and so respectful of others — broke into a smile that was openly contemptuous and openly itching for a fight.

"Landschi."

As if in answer, the Landschi in front of him split into several copies.

Choi Hyun-woo didn't hesitate. He charged straight into the middle of them.

The Landschis broke into nasty grins.

The kind of grin that asked, do you really think someone like you can pick out my real body?

"...Hmph!"

And without hesitating, Choi Hyun-woo cut down the real body.

"...!"

Landschi only managed to open his eyes wide in disbelief after he'd already been cleaved in two.

It was too late.

The inkdark blade had cut clean through the core of the clone — there was nothing left for him to do but wait for his existence to wink out.

"...Why don't you blame your own foolishness."

The words, spoken low, were — ironically — not for Landschi. They were for himself.

He'd shed every doubt in his heart long since.

It had been the conversation with Nam Hyun-hwa that had finally let him see it.

The drive to compete with someone. The admiration. The longing.

The resentment, the envy, the disappointment in himself, the self-loathing.

He didn't have to throw any of it away.

He'd realized just that one thing, and he hadn't expected it to make him feel this much lighter.

And only now could he finally understand the other version of himself he'd met back in Margo's dungeon — the one who'd chosen to surrender his soul to the demon sword.

Right. What had I been so caught up in?

Choi Hyun-woo murmured to himself with a small smile.

So long. Such a long road.

Let me cherish my own foolishness.

"...I see it now."

The place he'd touched for a single instant, lost in a daze in the middle of the fight against Minerva — the sight he'd glimpsed for that single fleeting second. Now, here, at last, the same view was opening up fully in front of his eyes.

He could accept, gladly, that he'd taken one more step forward.

He swung the sword without hesitation.

A burst of sword aura tore out of the blade — larger, sharper, and purer than even the sword aura of his master, Nam Hyun-hwa.

While every member of the group was steadily putting down their opponent, Lee Yu-na alone was struggling against hers.

It made sense — the thing she was up against was a high-ranking ice spirit on the same level as Belluna Hunt.

It wouldn't have mattered who took it on, anyone would have been in trouble. Lee Yu-na knew that, and she still couldn't keep down the anxiety crawling up her throat.

"Ngh...!"

And in her anxiety she slipped, and her wrist froze over.

She bit down hard on her lip and swung her hand out again, hitting the ice spirit with everything she had, but the spirit — which was, in a real sense, nature itself — turned her attack aside as lightly as brushing off lint.

No.

The word escaped her before she could catch it.

In a situation like this — even here, falling behind here — she'd never be able to stand next to Yu Ji-hyeok, never even next to the others. The fear of it settled onto her shoulders out of nowhere.

Her hand tightened around the Origin Hilt.

I can't lose. I have to win. I don't want to be abandoned.

I have to prove I'm worth keeping, prove I'm useful.

For Lee Yu-na, those words were as good as a set of shackles.

She had spent her whole life trapped in a warped self-loathing — convinced she'd been thrown away by her parents because she was worthless — and that only made it all worse.

She had spent her life wanting someone to need her.

And along the way that vague someone had narrowed down to one specific person.

In front of him — of all people, in front of him — I don't want to humiliate myself.

That single thought alone, and Lee Yu-na bit down hard and held on.

It was then.

"...Huh?"

A voice came from somewhere.

Since she'd gotten the Origin Hilt, she'd been hearing countless voices, but always — always — only at the level of whispers. The voice that was coming now carried a will and a force unmistakably different from any of those whispers.

"Wait, what?"

The voice was telling her to look properly and pull herself together — that its disciple could absolutely do this.

And there was only one being in the world who could call her its disciple.

"...Professor Grossman?"

The shout that came next made her flinch hard.

It was a wounded shout — how dare you mistake me for some other being, what's more, am I not your only master? At the words, Lee Yu-na asked, half-hoping, half-disbelieving, in a small whisper,

"R-Rauné? Is that you, Master Rauné?"

...Only then did the shouting stop.

What was even happening here. Even as she kept her body moving without pause, her head was getting tangled in itself. Then the voice let out a small sigh.

That she had always been so respectful, so polite — that was why it was helping her just this once.

So — let go of the tension, and trust the one who was trusting her.

Just as she had trusted it and let it help her, he would help her this time too.

Trust him, Rauné said.

"......"

Rauné kept speaking to her.

I will let you experience the world I see, the world we see — the world spirits see and hear and feel.

I will lend you my eyes, and my ears, and my tongue.

...So please, please be his strength.

There was no chance to ask what that meant.

"Ah."

The door opened.

To Lee Yu-na it felt as though great, warm light and wind and cloud were folding themselves around her.

And then — sights she could not have seen a moment earlier were laid out before her eyes.

She moved her hand, drawn by something, almost in a daze. With that one simple strike, the ice spirit that had been so overwhelmingly powerful was — there's no other way to put it — shattered into pieces.

"Ah..."

Lee Yu-na stood there in a daze, the spirit's shattered remains drifting around her like snowfall.

And in the middle of that snow, she could make out something else.

Something carrying clear and unmistakable malice.

She finally, finally understood what she had read in a book about sense-types back then.

So without hesitating, she sent another strike at it.

In that moment, a notification window was opening in front of Yu Ji-hyeok.

It said that a third person, following Jin Ye-seul and Choi Hyun-woo, had achieved their awakening.

It was closer to inevitability than coincidence.

Choi Hyun-woo's sword aura.

Lee Yu-na's strike.

At the end of both their trajectories stood Milited's core.

• Ah... aaaa...!!!

Hit dead in the heart from a direction it had never seen coming, Milited let out a shout half-tangled with a scream before it could help it.

When its real form began to surface, Yu Ji-hyeok let himself smile, small and quiet.

Because at last — at long last — the time had come for him to move.