Chapter 169
Chapter 169
Still in the middle of the Southern Desert, where the night remained nothing but darkness. The place that, until just a little while ago, had been loud with clashing steel and mana exploding with booming blasts now held only the sound of ragged breathing.
“Hah… hah….”
“Kgh… kh….”
The owners of those harsh breaths stood facing each other, silently doing nothing but glare. It was Yuwon and Colbus.
Fifteen minutes had passed from Yuwon’s one-sided offensive, to Colbus overturning it, seizing the initiative, and driving his counterattack to this point. Their evenly matched, bloody struggle that seemed as if it might end at any moment dragged on, and before they knew it, it had gone beyond fifteen minutes.
In an ordinary life, fifteen minutes was too short even to chat over a cup of tea. But in a battle between transcendent beings who could kill each other with a single strike, the weight of fifteen minutes was different.
At the end of a fifteen-minute blood fight where they concentrated and poured out everything, both men’s stamina and mana did not merely bottom out—they were completely spent, crawling along the sand.
Yuwon’s daggers felt so heavy he might drop them, and if Colbus forced out even a little more strength, he would no longer be able to resist the poison planted by Yuwon’s black mana.
In other words, neither of them could move even a fingertip. They were no longer in any state to continue the duel, and the two of them knew it as well.
‘Even standing is a burden. But it has to be the same for that bastard, too.’
‘If only it weren’t for this poison, I could force the outcome somehow. Damn it….’
They focused on each other’s movements, wary that the other might still have some leeway left, but neither moved rashly. No—neither could move. They only assessed each other with sharp eyes.
In that murderous tension, Colbus finished catching his breath and, with difficulty, spoke first.
“…Let’s settle this next time.”
Yuwon answered with a faint smile.
“…Just what I wanted.”
A plain exchange that would have been nothing to two men who had once made their swords shine with light. But for them now, it was the best they could do.
Thud—
With that, both their bodies collapsed at the same time onto the soft desert sand. Neither first nor second.
A duel between two swordsmen born as ordinary humans and striving toward a supreme realm ended in the very 모습 of ordinary humans.
---
Yuwon and Colbus. The two transcendent beings who had waged a blood battle without precedent in human affairs lost consciousness and fell at the same time. In the middle of the southern desert, where nothing could be seen but sand, only Bernid and Hastings remained—still conscious, having watched the fight through to the end. The marquis, regrettably, lacked the mental fortitude to keep watching the duel of those two monsters.
“These insane monsters… It makes you wonder if they’re even human. Hah… anyway, thank goodness they’re still breathing. It really was a hair’s breadth.”
After confirming the duel had ended, Bernid and Hastings immediately went over to check on Yuwon and take care of him. What remained was dealing with Colbus.
“…”
Swoosh—
Hastings, who had glanced toward Colbus lying opposite Yuwon, drew a dagger from his waist without a word and held it in his hand.
“…What do you think you’re doing right now?”
“I’m going to kill him.”
“Kill him? A man who can’t even twitch a finger?”
“Precisely why I’m going to kill him. Isn’t it the perfect chance?”
At Hastings’s words, Bernid furrowed his brow.
“You… were you always that kind of man?”
“Third Prince, you just saw it yourself. This is an opportunity granted by the heavens. If we don’t kill him now, he will certainly grow into a monster that threatens His Majesty.”
Hastings was not wrong, and Bernid knew it well. But for some reason, Bernid could not readily let Hastings go through with it.
“Think again. Yurion won’t want that.”
“…His Majesty has always been someone who shines alone, lofty and solitary at that high place. There were those who ran ahead of him for a time, but they never became a match for His Highness. So perhaps that man may be the first true rival His Majesty has ever met in his lifetime.”
A path where there had been teachers, but no master; enemies, but no true rival. That was the path Yuwon had walked until now. The loneliness of treading a supreme realm alone, without a master or a rival.
“If you understand that, then stop. Dealing with him will be something Yurion does personally later.”
“I can’t do that. Now that I have seen his latent power with my own eyes, I have no choice. Imagine he grows even stronger than he is now and comes for His Majesty. Can you, Third Prince, truly say you can stop him? This is the first and last chance to deal with him.”
Hastings had already resolved to spill blood. In the end, Bernid’s stubbornness broke.
“Sigh. Fine. Everything you said is right. Today they collapsed together, but next time we have no idea what will happen. Go. Go kill him. If you’re doing it, do it properly.”
Permission finally fell. Hastings silently nodded in reply.
Step, step—
After the soft sound of feet on sand, Hastings approached Colbus, sprawled in a completely defenseless state.
“I have nothing personal against you. I’m sorry, but go.”
A one-sided notice delivered to someone who could not possibly hear. There was no hesitation. Hastings gripped the dagger in a reverse grip and raised his hand high. All that remained was to bring it down, and it would be over.
‘…!’
In that moment—Bernid, who had been watching without much thought, stiffened as if struck by lightning.
‘He must not die here!’
Where the thought came from did not matter. Only the conviction that Colbus must not die here, right now. That alone filled Bernid’s mind.
Chwarreuk—!
Sturdy vines sprouted from Bernid’s palm and shot out at terrifying speed, stopping Hastings’s hand that held the dagger.
“What are you doing?”
“Hastings. Listen carefully. That man… must not die here.”
“Weren’t we done talking earlier? Why are you changing your words again? Let go of this first, and then we’ll talk.”
“No. The moment I let go, you’ll kill him. I know you will.”
Hastings did not deny it. Instead, he only sent a fierce glare and answered in a low voice.
“…Let go.”
As desperate as Bernid was, Hastings was just as desperate. To Hastings, Colbus was the most dangerous enemy—someone who might kill Yuwon, and who was truly capable of doing so.
“Hastings, listen to me first. What I gained in the Great Jungle wasn’t only magic. You know it—my teacher, Kahaad, is a great magician and, at the same time, a shaman who wields wondrous arts.”
“….”
“Recently, I more or less finished studying magic and started studying shamanism. And in that field, I’m fairly—ugh!”
Bernid continued calmly, but Hastings had no intention of standing there and listening to everything. Hastings, pretending to listen, suddenly yanked the arm caught by vines roughly, trying to throw Bernid off.
“Hup!”
“Grrk…!”
As if he could not miss the chance, Hastings whipped his arm to cut off Colbus’s breath, and Bernid—momentarily shaken—summoned more vines to seize that arm.
“Hastings, you bastard… my words aren’t even finished, and you dare—! Are you trying to do this with me right now?”
With his arm tightly bound, Hastings alternated his gaze between Bernid and Colbus with indifferent eyes. No matter what Bernid said, nothing would change.
‘He dies here, by my hand.’
“If you keep stopping me, then I have no choice.”
“No! My foresight is telling me! That man must not be killed!”
“Foresight or whatever—I don’t care. No, I don’t believe it. Magic is one thing, but… shamanism? I think you’ve gotten far too absorbed in the Great Jungle’s culture.”
At Hastings’s blatant provocation, Bernid could no longer endure it. Bernid had been trying to persuade him even if it meant getting angry, but now he changed his approach.
“And what security do you have to be spouting that kind of nonsense?”
A voice gone cold and eyes like sharpened frost. As if to prove it was not mere words, Bernid drew up his mana. The collar of Bernid’s clothes began to flutter in a rough storm surge of mana.
Even with that shift in attitude, Hastings did not flinch.
“What security… Don’t be mistaken. My loyalty is not to the Aphahiel Empire, but solely to my lord—His Majesty, Emperor Yurion. I show you respect because you are his brother, Third Prince, but if you make a decision in front of me that endangers him, then I cannot simply step aside.”
“That man is not someone who should die right now. My foresight says so.”
“The only thing that matters to me is my lord’s safety.”
“…Fine. I have never liked that attitude of yours. We’ll settle it here today—who is above and who is below.”
Bernid’s gaze, blazing with anger, tracked Hastings. Hastings answered with a cold stare sharp enough to cut.
“Are you confident?”
A moment away from explosion. Then, far off in the enemy camp, a presence could be felt.
“…!”
The two who had been glaring like fire turned their eyes at the same time.
“Damn it… did they notice?”
“…Something’s coming. Fast.”
From far away, the enemy’s presence was approaching. They were closing in at a very high speed.
“We’ll have to deal with the ones coming first.”
“Agreed. We’ll postpone dealing with him until after that.”
With the appearance of a common enemy, the two men—who looked ready to come to blows at any moment—redirected their hostility toward the enemy as if nothing had happened.
“There are many of them. I’ll take the lead. Cover me, Hastings.”
“No. We can’t put a magician in front. I’ll take the lead. Cover me.”
A war between the Empire and the Valaris Alliance that had, even while borrowing the name of war, only escalated tension without any true armed clash until now. Hastings and Bernid struck the spark to the fuse.
At last, the war began.