Chapter 239
The story continues off the page
The Last Dance Before Midnight
A masked dragon asks the lanternwright for one slow dance
Meanwhile, Alberto and Luri were locked in a fierce battle with Gokma.
Until now, Gokma had only fought them by twisting and untwisting space, but now he revealed more of what he could do.
‘Space has shattered.’
Dimension Break.
A high-level spell that even mages skilled in spatial magic found difficult.
As the space around them twisted and slipped out of alignment, everything visible looked like shards of a shattered window.
Because space itself was warped, even adapting to it was difficult.
It caused such confusion that even taking a step or moving became completely tangled.
The only one who could remain calm within it was Gokma himself.
Since most people went mad before reaching this stage, spatial mages even regarded it as a forbidden art.
Luri was affected the most.
Since she relied on her agile movements as a weapon, her vision grew disoriented, naturally slowing her down.
Had she been an ordinary person, moving only ten paces would have made her lose her sense of direction and faint.
But Luri was a dragonspawn who had once been a warrior.
Finding a breakthrough somehow was her job.
Her innate senses adapted amid adversity, allowing her to move with a degree of freedom.
Attacks aimed at demolishing buildings came and went repeatedly, trying to push Gokma back once more.
Luri and Alberto did not exchange a word.
But being veterans of battle, they knew what they had to do.
Luri became the herder who drove Gokma into a corner, while Alberto moved like an executioner, slowly but accurately driving in each blow.
Gokma died several times, but each time he was replaced and appeared again.
As the tense standoff continued, something unexpected brought them to a halt.
“This…….”
“The smell of sulfur…….”
In this space of death, the smell of sulfur began to spread.
It grew increasingly stronger, too intense to dismiss as mere anxiety, until the entire area reeked of sulfur.
Why did it smell like this?
They shared the same question, but Gokma seemed to know the answer.
He let out a hollow laugh and said.
“Do you know why I hate humans?”
“……”
“Because their wills break in the face of death, and they become slaves. Just as they are now.”
He continued speaking as though he had known this would happen.
“The master of death has come. It seems Heinkel finally surrendered to death.”
His expression was bitter, yet he smiled at the same time.
“Still, I’m glad it was within the bounds of my expectations. Who in this world could remain noble in the face of death? I couldn’t, either.”
Then the shattered space returned to normal.
“My role ends here. I shall take my leave.”
Gokma drew a long line through the air, and the chaotic space split open.
Luri and Alberto had no desire to let him get away.
That was when it happened.
Crackle—.
“Huh?”
An incongruous crack appeared in the space Gokma had opened.
A crack that destroyed the other crack.
Crash!
The space shattered like a thin pane of glass and dissolved back into mana.
What emerged through the faint blue light was a sword.
And a woman.
“Ugh!”
Gokma forcibly twisted his body at the unexpected attack.
The blade cut through Gokma’s shoulder and passed on.
“You…….”
Her body, clad in no more than a rag, was crouched low like a beast, while the sword in her hand was raised like a beast’s claw.
That sword had just cut through space.
Slash!
The woman’s eyes glowed blue as she stared at Gokma.
When Gokma met that gaze, he felt his death.
Gokma saw through the essence of those eyes.
“Eyes that show death. The Evil Eye, then. Does that mean you are Sierra’s saintess?”
She answered.
“Man.”
“Man means yes. There’s a wolf here, but I can’t see any chains…… I see. Have the chains already begun to move?”
“……”
The woman did not answer.
Instead, only her sword flashed in this hell.
Gokma merely smiled.
He already knew where she had gone.
“You can never see even an inch ahead in life.”
* * *
-How insolent.
King Heinkel, now a skeleton, slammed Ferda into the floor.
“Urgh!”
Ferda was helpless.
He had no barrier to deploy, could barely breathe, and his mind was hazy.
There was nothing he could do but withstand King Heinkel’s full strength head-on.
-Go on, say that again.
King Heinkel’s presence resonated in that deep, resonant voice.
But the troubled, heavy atmosphere that had once surrounded him was gone.
Possessed by a demon, he had surrendered himself to madness, and now only pleasure remained.
-Where did that confident face go—the one that claimed a mage saves something until the very end?
He lifted Ferda’s body again and slammed it into the floor.
His ribs broke.
His vision kept flashing.
Ferda had no means left.
‘Someone has to come and stop him, even now.’
All he could do was pray for such a miracle.
But could that wish have somehow reached someone?
Boom!
Someone kicked down the door and entered the space where only the two of them had been.
Hope arose in the form of reinforcements, but it did not last long.
A wave of tremendous heat came through the door.
It was Ureas, in the form of Amon.
-Hwehehehehe!!!
Ureas let out a frivolous laugh like an immature child.
-So there you are, Regent Ferda! Did you think you could escape me, you little rat!?
Ureas flung down the object he had been dragging behind him.
It was Count Rooster’s head.
In the end, it seemed Rooster had been unable to make his move and had died at the hands of the Second Prince.
-It’s your turn now! I’ll cut off your head and send it to your fiancée!
Ureas threw the sword in his hand at Ferda.
It flew straight at Ferda, but did not reach him.
King Heinkel had intercepted the sword aimed at Ferda.
Ureas flew into a rage.
-What are you!? If you’re a corpse, stay dead! How dare you stand in the way of Ureas!?
-That is what I would like to ask you. Do you not even know who you have to thank for your resurrection?
-Who cares!? I must have been resurrected because I am mighty!
Ureas said in an arrogant voice.
-Serve me, you worthless wretch. If you do, I shall graciously make you my vassal.
-What an insolently presumptuous thing to say.
Claiming dominion before the demon of immortality and legions was an unforgivable provocation.
The foolish Ureas and Heinkel eventually clashed.
Like a fish already caught and cast aside, Ferda tried to escape somehow while they were distracted.
‘Move…….’
He weakly waved his arm, praying that even one muscle still had strength left in it.
He tried to stand several times, but each time his body gave the same answer: it was already broken.
X marks being drawn one after another across a checklist.
In the end, after even the last thread of hope vanished, Ferda sensed death.
‘I don’t want to die.’
Birth and death may be the natural order of things, but who would want to die?
‘I want to return alive.’
Ferda was human, too.
A human who wanted nothing more than to return alive.
‘Valdrova.’
He wanted to see her face again.
He wanted to see her so badly it drove him mad.
‘If I must die, at least let me have enough time to put that woman at ease first…….’
That was Ferda’s wish.
That was when it happened.
-You can do it.
A demon comes to those in desperate straits.
But it was not a demon for Ferda.
The sweet voice that had been sleeping inside him came to Ferda’s side.
What had been nothing more than a voice now seemed to have a tangible form.
A warm hand brushed Ferda’s face.
And stroked his body.
-In circumstances this unfair, it’s all right to let yourself go, even if only a little.
“I…… you—.”
Ferda looked up at it and found himself unable to speak.
The figure was none other than his own mother, Anna Rosnova.
-Ferda…….
Even that soft, tender voice was the same.
Without thinking, he called out to the voice.
“M-Mother…….”
-You’ve suffered so much while I was away.
The warm consolation shook Ferda’s heart.
He could not believe it.
The voice that had whispered within him was his mother?
-Ferda…… trust in your power and use it.
“My power……?”
-Yes…… it’s right here, isn’t it?
It touched something within Ferda’s lower abdomen.
It was the dark circle forged from Ferda’s regrets.
-Use this…… and everything will go smoothly.
“Everything?”
-Yes. This power can create the world you desire, and it can also take you back to your fiancée.
He could return to Valdrova.
Two pairs of horns and red hair.
Pure, gleaming golden cat’s-eye pupils and moist lips.
Soft hands and delicate shoulders.
He could return to the woman who was everything to him.
-Just this once.
Anna Rosnova’s figure waggled a finger.
At that moment, something astonishing happened to Ferda.
He felt vitality return to the body that had seemed on the verge of death only moments ago.
That was not all.
An immense amount of mana he had been unable to feel until then rose within him as well.
It was as though Ferda were back in his prime.
It resembled the mana he had possessed in those days.
-Let’s show them what we’re capable of.
That was what the voice said.
But the dark circle’s movement stopped.
Ferda had seized her hand.
-Why……?
“If I awaken that…… I’ll become no different from the person I was back then.”
-Are you afraid of that?
“Yes, I…… know how frightening it is.”
Ferda knew it.
It would never end with just this one time.
One time would become two, two would become four, and eventually he would use it as though it were only natural.
“If that happens, then what would be the point of my coming back like this?”
-…….
Ferda pushed her hand away.
It felt exactly as it had the last time.
“Please, Mother. Let me remain human. Please…… let me die like this.”
That was Ferda’s resolve.
His breath finally stopped, and Ferda sank into eternal silence.
-Who said you could?
At that moment, searing pain struck him.
“Gah!”
Ferda’s mind snapped awake.
It felt as though someone had thrust a hand into Ferda’s heart and squeezed it.
When he came to again, his mother’s image was still smiling kindly.
-My child, my child. Did you think fate was decided by what you wanted in your heart?
Another hand touched Ferda’s circle.
-It is called fate because it cannot be avoided. You tried to avoid the fate of hatred and rage you must bear, but you cannot.
Those fingers stirred the dark circle within Ferda’s body.
The circle spun faster and faster with the movement of the finger.
Vitality surged from Ferda’s body.
Ironically, that surging vitality was trying to overwrite Ferda himself with something else.
Meanwhile, Ferda himself tried to send his consciousness plunging into the distance.
-If you avoid fate, you must die.
Ferda clenched his teeth and glared at the woman.
Anna Rosnova leaned close to his ear and whispered gently.
-All I want is for you to live, whether your life becomes a great tragedy or a comedy.
Ferda fell into the abyss.
* * *
Ureas and King Heinkel continued fighting each other.
With every attack, they dealt crippling blows that shattered half of each other’s bodies, but they immediately recovered, and their seemingly endless battle continued.
-Stop for a moment.
King Heinkel was the first to stop fighting.
He had suddenly become distracted by something while fighting.
Ureas glanced at what King Heinkel was looking at, then followed Heinkel’s gaze.
They were looking at Ferda.
Half-dead, Ferda was kneeling.
He was kneeling, though he no longer had the strength to do so.
That was not why their attention had been drawn away.
Ferda’s body was arched backward, and something began to take shape from his chest.
A darkness darker than darkness itself.
The darkness itself acquired mass.
Since he used shadow magic, he already knew that such a thing existed.
But that darkness was bizarre beyond words.
A white ring encircled its edge.
-What in the world is that……?
Even Gamigin’s knowledge could scarcely identify the object.
As Heinkel quietly examined it, Ureas did not miss the opportunity.
-I’ll kill you, Ferda!
The reckless Ureas charged toward Ferda.
Then something astonishing happened.
-Huh?
As he drew close, the substance comprising Ureas’s body began turning to ash and losing its form.
The ash was being drawn into that black circle.
-W-What is this!?
Even the foolish Ureas knew this was a dangerous phenomenon.
He stopped advancing and retreated.
Even after the distance widened, the disintegration did not stop.
-Ah, no! I can’t die! I don’t want to dieee!!
It only grew more violent with the passage of time, and there was no way to resist it.
In the end, Ureas’s form vanished completely.
King Heinkel and Gamigin, who had watched it all, could only stare in shock.
-Now I understand.
Only then could Gamigin identify what that form was.
-A Dark Moon?
The darkest darkness of all.
It was said to be so dark that it swallowed even the surrounding light, whose afterglow formed a faint ring around its edge.
No one, not even Gamigin, knew what happened to things that entered it.
For it embodied the ultimate void desired by the followers of the demonic race.
-You are not human. No, are you human and yet something else? Your essence feels like ores melted together in a smelting furnace. What are you?
There could be no answer to Gamigin’s question.
Instead, the deep darkness revolved as though in reply.
The Great Demon Gamigin released his possession and fled to Hell.
King Heinkel’s consciousness returned completely.
The Dark Moon slowly devoured King Heinkel’s physical body.
He, too, was gradually disappearing like Ureas.
“N-No……!”
King Heinkel screamed as well.
“No! I don’t want to die!! I don’t want to dieee!!”
In the end, only eternal silence remained.
The Dark Moon did not disappear.
It quietly swallowed the light, as though waiting for new prey.
The fortress, having lost its master, began to collapse.