Chapter 227 : Kai's Growth (5)
Perhaps it was my newfound understanding of Enoxia’s plight, but a fresh wave of power surged into the arrows under my command.
A storm of shafts twisted through the air, guided by my will alone, and descended upon the Ogre Chieftain. They scored his tough hide with a flurry of shallow cuts. One arrow hissed past his face, and a thin red line bloomed on his cheek.
It wasn’t enough.
The Ogre Chieftain laughed, a rumbling sound of pure contempt, as if the wound were nothing more than a gnat’s bite. He swung his massive club in a brutal arc.
It slammed into the ground with the force of a thunderclap, shattering the earth and leaving a deep crater in its wake. A shockwave tore outward, and at the same time, a deafening roar ripped from his throat—a sound born of his demonic power.
The very air vibrated, and the concussive force of the shout made my arrows stagger in their flight.
In that instant, the sickening sound of cracking bone echoed across the field.
The Ogre Chieftain’s body began to transform. Crimson veins bulged against his black skin like rivers of magma, and his already massive frame swelled to an even more monstrous size.
A chilling familiarity washed over me. He looked just like the Viscount of Sloth. Had he somehow acquired the Aspect of Sloth?
“A monstrous form indeed,” I observed.
“Khahaha… Thank you, human,” the chieftain rasped. “You call me a monster, but I see the pity in your eyes.”
He grinned and raised his club again, bringing it crashing down.
The earth heaved from the impact. The surrounding knights staggered, their footing lost.
“What is this power?!”
“Hold the line!”
But as the Imperial soldiers faltered, the chieftain unleashed his fury.
“RAAAHHH!”
With every swing of his club, the ground rippled like water. At the same time, several ogres, having finished their own opponents, turned and charged toward me. A sense of crisis unlike any I had ever known washed over me.
“Keep running, and you’ll end up just like her!” the Ogre Chieftain roared, the taunt sharp and clear.
I answered with another volley of arrows. “Don’t worry. I’ll be the one walking away from this.”
<Buckshot>
An arrow flew to a point just shy of the chieftain and detonated, unleashing a massive shockwave.
“Kgh…!”
He raised a massive hand to shield himself from the blast.
His mistake. Shielding his eyes left him blind. In an instant, I was behind him, my bowstring drawn taut.
<Heartstopper>
A searing beam of light shot forward, tearing the Ogre Chieftain’s right shoulder clean from his body.
“GUWAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!” he screamed in agony.
I had no intention of stopping. This battle could only end with one of us dead.
<Halo>
<Lightning Bolt>
Sparks crackled to life, dancing across my arrow. I aimed my bow toward the heavens and let it fly.
<Divine Punishment>
The sky roared, and a colossal pillar of lightning descended, crashing down upon the Ogre Chieftain.
“Krrggghhh!” He staggered, screaming without pause, but his massive body remained standing. “I will not fall here—AAAAAAH!”
His willpower was on another level entirely, far beyond that of any knight.
Rumble!
“Hell…!” I kicked off the trembling earth, launching myself into the air.
In that moment, a group of ogres leaped as one.
“For our people!”
“For the future!”
They crashed into me, their bodies grabbing hold of mine. Then, their dark skin stretched, swelling grotesquely before they detonated in a synchronized, suicidal blast.
BOOM!
A wall of fire and viscera slammed into me.
My Mindscape flared to life.
<Regression>
Click.
I rewound my ruined body to the moment before the blast and turned to face the next wave of charging warriors.
“For our people!”
“For the future!”
Again, they swarmed me, ready to self-destruct. This time, however, I unleashed my Aura before they could reach me.
“My apologies.”
Battle King Second Form: Soul Smite.
SPLAT!
I shattered their heads in a single, sweeping motion. Their bodies collapsed, the explosions they carried left unspent.
Watching his warriors fall, the Ogre Chieftain spoke, his voice heavy with a grim solemnity. “In the next life, may you be reborn as sons of the Goddess.”
And with his words, ethereal strings of demonic energy shot from his fingers, sinking into the corpses on the ground.
<Aspect of War: Marionette>
The dead lurched to their feet, their movements jerky and unnatural, and charged me once more. They wielded neither Aura nor demonic energy, but I knew their purpose.
I clicked my tongue and fired an arrow before they could close the distance.
<Buckshot>
The arrow exploded, blowing the reanimated corpses to smithereens. Only then did they find their rest.
I glanced at their remains before turning my gaze back to the chieftain. “You claim to fight for your people’s future, but all I see is a hunger for victory.”
“…It is a necessary sacrifice.”
“Hah… Remarkable. A necessary sacrifice. The nobility of sacrificing them to protect them. You’re a genius. Are you the tribe’s scholar, by any chance?”
The chieftain ground his teeth, his demonic energy flaring. “Do not mock their noble sacrifice!”
“Mock it? I’m genuinely impressed.”
Even as I spoke, I loosed another arrow.
<Heartstopper>
It was the fastest skill in my arsenal. Just like before, the searing light tore away his remaining arm.
BOOM!
“Krr-GUWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
The Ogre Chieftain collapsed to his knees, screaming. With both arms gone, he could no longer fight. I would not lower my guard, nor would I spare his life.
But I was mistaken.
“Khuhuhuhu…”
His bloodshot eyes darted from me to the battlefield around us. “Did… you… think… I… would… die… so… easily?” he gasped.
“Pathetic.”
“Pathetic is fine. We have… nowhere lower… to fall.”
His words came in halting breaths as his eyes began to roll back into his head. He snatched the red jewel that had fallen to the ground and swallowed it whole.
<Abyssal Realm: Prelude to War>
“What?”
He wasn’t one of the Twelve Nobles. How could he activate an Abyssal Realm? I drew a Mithril dagger, ready to cut him down.
“Too… late.” The Ogre Chieftain grinned, his eyes vanishing completely into his skull.
His body began to dissolve. His flesh sloughed away like melting wax, not into a puddle, but into a thick, corrupting fog of demonic energy that billowed across the battlefield.
The ogre warriors who breathed it in went berserk, their eyes glowing with crimson fury. The Imperial knights began to transform into Demonkin, their bodies twisting in agony.
<Mindscape: Heaven>
I activated my own domain, but it was too little, too late. The Abyssal Realm was already unfolding. At best, my Mindscape could revert the transformed soldiers to their human forms, but I couldn’t stop the ogres’ frenzy or purify the demonic energy itself.
Damn it. My Aura is too low.
If I had the reserves to maintain my Mindscape for a full day, I could cleanse this place. But the continuous fighting had left me depleted.
“All of you, fall back,” I said quietly to the Imperial knights. “As of this moment, this area is sealed.”
I moved to help the wounded evacuate, and it was then that I saw it.
“HRAAAAAH!”
The melting, colossal form of the Ogre Chieftain rose once more, moving like some unholy undead. His unfocused eyes stared at his own warriors, and then his jaw unhinged.
CRUNCH!
He began to devour them. The dead, the living—all became his prey, absorbed into his gaping maw.
“…A-AAHH!”
“It’s a monster!”
The Imperial soldiers screamed and fled. I fled with them.
Watching the chieftain greedily shove his own people into his mouth, I managed a bitter smile.
He had claimed to be fighting for his people’s future. For this to be the end… it was a bitter irony. We were enemies, but he was an enemy I could understand. The plight of the demi-humans was a sickness that plagued the entire continent.
But his methods had been wrong, and they had cost him his life.
Still, he didn’t deserve an end like this.
I let out a soft sigh and left the corrupted ground. As the monstrous form continued its cannibalistic feast, a part of me prayed that in the next life, he would find the peace he’d been denied.
But I will see you avenged, I vowed silently.
House Artezia. The architects of this tragedy. My sworn enemy. That red jewel… his transformation was undoubtedly their doing.
“It’s about time to bring down the curtain,” I muttered, and departed the battlefield.
* * *
Imperial Year 664.
A second calamity was born upon the continent.
A successor to Enoxia, the Battle Fiend.
They would call him the Ogre Lord, the King of War.