Chapter 223
★ Dark Elf Settlement ★
The Centurion felt like clutching his head.
The Dark Elf settlement had no main fighting force. Nokk—the warrior over two meters tall who had put the subterranean troops through such misery—was nowhere to be seen.
They had brought the early-summer birds to a settlement whose main force was away.
There was no way they could win. They couldn't possibly win.
The early-summer birds toyed with and wounded the Dark Elves. After hiding Punta at the base of a great tree, the Centurion concealed himself and held his breath.
(Damn it! At this rate, the Dark Elves will be wiped out! I've never heard of monsters this absurdly powerful!)
There was no end to cursing his own misfortune.
Honestly, whether the Dark Elf race went extinct or survived, he didn't care either way.
They were an obstacle when it came to fighting over the Gifted Jewel, but that was all. For the past several decades, the two sides had kept their distance and lived separately.
(What the hell... The Gifted Jewel just had to turn up out of nowhere... If it weren't for that thing, I never would've had to deal with these sickly-looking bastards.)
The Gifted Jewel, discovered roughly equidistant between the Dark Elf settlement and the subterranean city, had come to be treated in the subterranean city as something immensely valuable—something that would completely transform their lives.
(Gifted Jewel or whatever, what matters is staying alive, damn it...!)
An early-summer bird cried out nearby, and the Centurion instinctively ducked his head.
Even the Centurion, renowned for his martial prowess in the subterranean city, could only pray for the storm to pass; one early-summer bird might have been manageable, but not a flock this large.
But the cry of the early-summer birds now was not a threat. It sounded more like a scream.
Startled, he looked up and saw a Dark Elf high above, stabbing a knife into an early-summer bird's eye.
(W-what the hell is that?)
The female Dark Elf was trying to kill the early-summer bird even as her body burned—or at least take it down with her.
His heart pounded.
That was a warrior. That was what a courageous person looked like.
He felt unbearably pathetic, lying prone on the ground here.
"Aah!"
The Dark Elf was thrown from the early-summer bird and plunged into the tree. By a strange coincidence, it was the very tree where the Centurion was hiding. He braced himself, thinking she would fall, but she did not.
"She must've caught on a branch somewhere."
He had avoided the catastrophe of her crashing into the ground, but her body had surely suffered severe burns.
She would need immediate treatment.
"I've got to save her—"
Before he knew it, his body was moving on its own. He clung to the great tree and began to climb. This was a tree without any Dark Elf huts, so there were no handholds or other aids.
But climbing was no great feat for the Centurion, who prided himself on his strength and athletic ability. In his pocket was a special salve issued to subterranean military personnel. Thinking he might be able to save her if he applied it, he climbed frantically.
The Dark Elf chieftain's left leg had been broken, but the chieftain braced himself against the trunk of the great tree and skillfully fired his arrows.
However, his supply of arrows was running low, and the number of comrades still able to fight was steadily dwindling.
To make matters worse, Nikki, whom the chieftain had entrusted with Anastasia's defense, was carried away into the sky by an early-summer bird. He had not seen what happened afterward, but the chieftain could not leave Anastasia alone, so he tried to drag himself toward her on his broken leg—
A tremor running through his entire body held him back.
"I am Anastasia."
The dense magic emanating from the revered High Elf's body made her shine.
Her long hair floated gently, and sparks swirled around her.
The flames were clearly different from the early-summer birds' red fire—they were platinum white, like her beautiful hair.
"A member of the High Elf royal family, and a leader of the Elves!!"
Those words pierced the chieftain, leaving his mind numb.
How should he describe what happened next? How should he pass it down to later generations?
When Anastasia raised her right hand, a flame flashed like a guillotine blade hurled into the sky and slammed into the circling flock of early-summer birds.
With a flash, the bodies of the early-summer birds touched by Anastasia's flames began detonating one after another in a chain reaction.
The sky was thrown into chaos.
The flames Anastasia unleashed continued in a second strike, then a third, one after another.
'Kweeeeeee!!'
Then gliding early-summer birds approached Anastasia from all four directions.
Without the slightest sign of panic, Anastasia thrust her palms out to either side and gracefully spun once in place.
——Whooosh——.
A circle of flames about ten meters across formed around her.
The flames created an updraft so powerful it was terrifying, and the early-summer birds lost their balance and crashed down around her.
The impact sent dirt and sand flying, while the early-summer birds that touched the ring of flames spewed fire high into the air like flamethrowers.
——Giiii. Giiii. Giiii.
——Kweeeeh. Kweeeeh.
——Giiii. Giiii. Giiii.
High above, the flock, already reduced to half its original number, cried out about something.
They seemed confused.
The birds that had until now thought of nothing but attacking with all their might were bewildered.
"..."
Anastasia silently looked up at the sky, brought her wrists together, and thrust them upward.
"Become an arrow that pierces the enemy, and fly."
As intense magic burst from Anastasia's body, a torrent of flame that could never be called an "arrow" shot up from her hands.
The instant it touched the branch of the great tree, it carbonized it, and the hut resting there lost its balance and fell.
The flames exploded at the center of the flock of early-summer birds.
The explosion lit the sunset-darkening surroundings as brightly as midday, then the dim twilight returned at once.
Death throes echoed from the sky, and the early-summer birds scattered in all directions like spiderlings.
There was no longer any way to pursue the scattered early-summer birds. The fleeing bird silhouettes no longer held any fighting spirit.