Chapter 134
Chapter 134. Norspelskard
He could tell instinctively—this small branch possessed a divinity that he could “absorb” and add to his sacred power.
If that were the case, the speed at which his divinity increased would become overwhelmingly fast.
“I don’t feel like killing a being that carries the wishes of so many, just like that.”
He looked at the frozen statues of the frost elves.
As if protecting their children, they had fought with all their might to stop the intruders and perished in a blaze of glory.
Absorbing their lingering wishes so easily didn’t sit right with him.
‘There might be another way to use it.’
This was a branch in which the World Tree’s power still remained alive. He didn’t know yet, but surely there would be another way to use it.
He could ask Kaiman, or perhaps Archmage Eldiren on the Island of the Brown Sage.
Yul grasped the small mistletoe branch in his hand.
His hair stood on end, and every muscle in his body tensed.
The moment he held it, he felt an intense power. An overwhelming force surged back through his magic circuit.
Before it could reach his soul, he cut it off and stored it in his backpack.
“To feel this much power just by holding it… If I made a weapon out of this, it would be incredible.”
But there was one concern. Those who had attacked them.
‘There are no corpses of the frost elves’ enemies.’
Then either they came in small numbers, retrieved their fallen, or the frost elves hadn’t managed to kill a single attacker.
‘Or maybe they couldn’t break through the defensive barrier and retreated.’
That seemed more plausible. No matter their objective, they wouldn’t just leave something this valuable behind.
Now, the World Tree’s branch had no guardian, and it had fallen into Yul’s hands.
At that moment, Yul sensed a presence. Footsteps coming from outside the cave in the distance.
Multiple humanoid entities were approaching.
‘Are they after the World Tree’s branch?’
If so, Yul had effectively stolen something they had been targeting.
He briefly used Telekinesis to cling to the ceiling and hide.
After waiting, someone entered.
It was a massive werewolf with pure white fur. He wore leather light armor and had several daggers and a long sword at his waist.
He appeared to be the leader, much larger than the others.
The remaining werewolves were smaller, with dull gray fur.
“Boss, just as calculated, the frost elves’ magic has ended! Soon, the World Tree’s branch will fall into Lord White Crux’s hands.”
“Wait. Something’s off. There are traces of a camp outside. If someone came here first……”
“…!?”
At those words, a subordinate werewolf rushed in and rummaged through the corpse of an old frost elf.
“Damn it! The World Tree’s branch is gone!”
“Grrrrrrr. Who did this?! Find them immediately! Search the area and track down whoever left the campsite!”
Just then, another werewolf ran in from outside.
“There are footprints leading away from the campsite!”
“Find them at once!”
Were they planning to chase Gilsefnodo, who had left earlier?
Yul hesitated for a moment. If it were a complete stranger, that’d be one thing, but they had traveled together for a day. He couldn’t just let him go like this.
“You can play with me.”
“Who are you?!”
The moment Yul dropped from the ceiling, the white werewolf drew his long sword.
But then, for some reason, he suddenly shouted to his surroundings.
“Damn! The one who escaped has the World Tree’s branch! Go after him! This one’s just here to buy time!”
As the subordinate werewolves rushed out, Yul extended his hand to grab them with Telekinesis.
But the moment his attention shifted, a dagger shot toward him like a bolt.
He immediately leaned back and halted the object in front of him.
The dagger stopped right before his nose.
“I don’t know who you are, but you’ll regret interfering with us.”
“I’ll just beat you down and figure out who you are.”
“Try it!”
Yul decided to ignore the escaping werewolves.
The white werewolf charged with his sword. Yul tried to restrain him with Telekinesis, but his movements were too unpredictable to capture easily.
‘He’s fast.’
His physical abilities were overwhelming.
Yul felt the need to further enhance his human body.
In his normal state, Yul had evolution options like [High-Growth Muscles], [Enhanced Reflexes], [Developed Neocortex], and [Ultra-Efficient Lungs], but after coming to the Arctic, he had removed everything except one.
The evolution type [Extreme Environment Adaptation].
The rest of the options hadn’t been evolved yet. Maybe he should evolve just one.
‘Speed is all I need.’
[High-Speed Reflexes].
His thoughts became denser, and time seemed to slow down.
He could clearly perceive the form of the werewolf moving at incredible speed.
Before the creature moved, Yul took a step ahead and manipulated the ground.
For example, placing a small stone where it was about to step.
Slip.
Using Telekinesis, he caught the enemy’s slipping position—and crushed it.
Crunch.
As he compressed one leg to significantly reduce its mobility, a dagger tied to the creature’s belt flew out and embedded itself into Yul’s forehead.
“Grrk!!”
The wolf had realized that Yul could only focus on one instance of Telekinesis at a time.
In exchange for losing a leg, it had driven a dagger precisely into Yul’s forehead.
However, Yul had already seen that too.
“That was close.”
Yul lowered his right hand, which had blocked his forehead.
The dagger, caught in his palm, had pierced through to his forehead. Droplets of blood trickled down, and he felt a sharp pain.
But the pain was bearable.
“You’re really fast.”
“Then how about this?!”
“Get lost.”
As the creature tried to pull something from its chest and throw it, Yul shoved it with Telekinesis and slammed it into the wall.
Even if it tried to leap out with one leg, without precise movement, it would end up in Yul’s grasp.
“Grrr… If only I had one more subordinate.”
“What’s this in your chest? A crude bomb.”
Inside its clothing was a bomb that rapidly activated the magic power flowing through a magic stone.
“I didn’t expect you to be this strong. Are all creatures in Eures Keynes Realm at this level?”
After pulling out the dagger, Yul healed the wound with the skill 「Regeneration」.
He could have died. If the polymorph form died, his split soul would likely die as well.
‘I need to increase the combat power of my human form.’
Until now, he had relied on Telekinesis and basic evolution forms, but it felt like he had hit a limit.
“Anyway, time to shake you down. Who’s your master? The one who used freezing magic.”
“You think I’ll tell you? Aaaaargh!”
If necessary, he would torture him. Yul had already killed several people since coming to this world—what was torture compared to that?
“I’ll also find out how werewolves differ from humans or wolves, and where they feel pain.”
After a short time driven by pure curiosity, the creature finally spoke.
“Fine. I’ll talk, so stop….”
“Name.”
“Relf.”
“Affiliation.”
“A subordinate of Lord White Crux.”
“Who is White Crux?”
“A white-haired frost dragon. The master of ten thousand demons. He resides in the far north, waiting to take part in the most dangerous moment of Creation that is to come.”
“Hmm? Explain more.”
When he hesitated, Yul stimulated the discovered trigeminal nerve slightly.
“Aaaaargh! Fine! I’ll tell you! Lord White Crux is gathering all the ‘mystery’ within this entire Eures Keynes Realm for some reason! We’re just his underlings!”
“What reason?”
“I don’t know, really! A low-ranking grunt like me wouldn’t know!”
“You’re not an executive?”
“Above me is Banshee Queen Clata. She’s the one who froze this World Tree.”
“So the Banshee Queen kept attacking the frost elves but was stopped by their final resistance?”
“Grrr. That’s right. She left those foolish frost elves desperately maintaining the barrier alone and ordered us to retrieve the World Tree’s branch once the barrier disappeared!”
“Then if I take this, they’ll come after me.”
Yul took the World Tree’s branch out of his backpack. The werewolf Relf’s eyes widened.
“T-this can’t be.”
“Well, I’ve seen enough. Time to leave.”
After dealing with Relf, Yul delayed for about a day.
He waited for the other werewolves who had gone after Gilsefnodo to return—but none of them did.
“Are they all dead? Looks like he handled them.”
He had thought he wasn’t an ordinary warrior, and indeed, he was strong enough to easily deal with dozens of werewolf subordinates.
In any case, he had learned of a new faction. He just needed to be careful.
Within Eures Keynes Realm, myths were still alive and moving.
Yul continued exploring the Arctic without returning to his true form.
If he wandered around in ‘that form,’ it would attract unwanted attention.
And that assumption proved mostly correct. Being smaller meant he didn’t draw aggro from most creatures.
But when heading toward the Frost Dragon Mountains in the west, he decided to remove the restriction.
Since he had few clothes, he carefully stored them in his bag and returned to his original form using the Polymorph skill.
‘This is really convenient.’
The surrounding cold? Nothing. It was colder than the Deep Sea, but the heat emanating from his surging heart swept it all away.
Then, roughly setting his direction, he flew toward the Frost Dragon Mountains.
As he flew quite fast, he saw many things.
‘There’s all kinds of stuff.’
In the distance, centaur nomads hunted rhinoceros-like creatures while running.
He also saw a massive mammoth being chased by a human over 3 meters tall.
‘Are those the descendants of giants?’
Hunters of Yungdheim crossed boundaries and sold their prey. Mammoth ivory and leather circulated even in Snorheim, so there was quite a bit of information.
It was said they were all tall and physically robust—perhaps those were them.
Passing by various strange creatures, he approached the Frost Dragon Mountains. A journey that would have taken weeks in human form was shortened to just a few hours.
The Frost Dragon Mountains were a long range that pierced both inside and outside the boundary of Eures Keynes Realm.
Though covered in snow, large trees adapted to the cold still grew there.
Since this was beyond the tree line, most of them were likely beings infused with magical power.
Yul circled the area, scattering a magic signal.
-Hey. Where are you? You told me to come if I had a problem.
-What? You actually came? Good. Hehehe. Come to the peak of the mountains. I shall deal with you.
Rising sharply into the snow-covered sky, he looked around—and sure enough, near the peak stood a massive fortress.
It seemed to be designed to burrow into the mountain range, and on the watchtower at the top stood a giant with his arms crossed.
-Are you the Northern Grand Duke?
-Indeed, young one of the Deep King Tribe! I am the Northern Grand Duke, Norspelskard!
-Let’s go.
-That is exactly what I wish for!
The giant drew a massive greatsword from his back. The moment he saw it, the no-questions-asked rule of battle began.