Chapter 316 : Chapter 316
Chapter 316. Dragon Slayer (2)
The final day of the Academy Autumn Festival.
A dragon fell from the sky.
SPLASH!
The land turned into a sea, and the dragon sank into it.
“Leviathan’s abyss……!”
“To summon a Domain without even an offering…….”
The Inquisitors’ faces darkened.
Leviathan, having obtained a dragon’s body, was an overwhelmingly powerful existence.
“Sir Kirio. We must seal the abyss.”
“This is our chance, now that Leviathan has entered it.”
“If we fail to stop Leviathan here, the world will truly fall into danger.”
The Inquisitors spoke urgently as they looked at Kirio.
The situation was dire.
Thanks to the Inquisitors’ efforts, the barrier that controlled Divine Power had been lifted, but Leviathan’s descent could not be prevented.
People trembled in fear.
Fortunately, Cromwell’s spell was completed at just the right moment.
“Open.”
A massive Gate opened before the main entrance.
Only one person in the Empire.
The only magician capable of completing large-scale teleportation magic without a gate stone was the Academy’s principal, Cromwell Bondis.
Guided by the professors, people passed through the Gate one by one.
The remaining undead were held back by the Imperial Court Magicians, the Meteor Shower Knights, the Holy Knights, and the Lizardmen.
As Leviathan’s demonic energy grew stronger, the undead grew stronger as well, so dragging things out would only make matters worse.
Yet Kirio Tites merely stiffened his expression.
‘The 8th Prince fell in with him.’
He knew it as well.
No one who had gone to the Demon World had ever returned intact.
And to make matters worse, it was the Domain of an Archdemon.
Once trapped inside, the odds of retaining one’s sanity were slim.
‘Even if he does return, it will be one of two outcomes…….’
Either madness, or corruption.
Kirio’s pupils wavered.
“Sir Kirio!”
“Sir Kirio, make the decision!”
The Inquisitors shouted with resolute voices.
At present, Kirio was their leader.
Sealing an Archdemon’s Domain was a task that required staking their very lives.
Even if they succeeded, the souls of the Inquisitors who participated in the sealing would be sacrificed.
Under normal circumstances, Kirio would have chosen without hesitation.
But now, the words would not leave his mouth.
Having made up his mind, he opened his lips heavily.
“Wait…….”
That was when it happened.
Someone rose up from the abyss.
“Someone is coming up!”
The person floating atop the abyss, clutching a kitchen knife tightly in his hand, was none other than Radel.
He lay there for a moment, staring at the sky, then slowly pushed himself up.
And then he stepped onto the surface of the abyss.
“S-Sir Kirio! That is!”
“How in the world…….”
The Inquisitors’ eyes widened at the sight.
It was not magical power.
Neither Divine Power nor demonic energy could be felt.
Radel was simply standing there.
On the sea of the Demon World, as though it were nothing.
What followed was even more astonishing.
-How can a worm like you dare!
RIP!
Leviathan burst up from the abyss, one of his eyes torn open.
Blood streamed from his eye as he roared at Radel.
Disbelief spread across the Inquisitors’ faces.
“……What am I looking at right now?”
“How can he face an Archdemon alone…….”
“……O Supreme Deity.”
Radel walked toward the demon by himself.
WHOOSH!
Leviathan set everything ablaze, yet there was no hesitation in Radel’s steps.
Even as his feet burned away, he continued to walk forward without pause.
Kirio’s eyes trembled.
Watching Radel walk barefoot through the sea of fire stirred emotions within him that he could not put into words.
One who rose from the abyss of the Demon World.
One who walked through dragonfire.
One who faced a demon alone.
“How…….”
Kirio’s lips trembled as he spoke.
“How utterly sacred.”
***
There were others who felt emotions beyond words as well.
The 2nd Prince, Arteo, and the 9th Prince, Leon.
Arteo was desperately chanting a spell.
“Water!”
As he watched Radel engulfed in flames, he shouted again.
“Water!”
But his spell scattered uselessly in midair.
“Damn it, why is it not working!”
“It is because of the dragon’s magic power.”
Leon, standing beside him, shook his head.
“Magic is meaningless against a dragon that has mastered Dragon Speech. It manipulates the surrounding mana at will.”
“Then do something about it yourself. You can interfere with that magic power!”
“Do I look like I am standing around doing nothing?”
At Leon’s words, Arteo fell silent.
Looking closely, he saw the mana around Leon surging intermittently.
Ominous magic power rose, subsided, swirled, and vanished.
Leon’s magic power was clashing with the dragon’s magic power.
Seeing the cold sweat beading on Leon’s forehead, Arteo asked in shock.
“You…… have you been blocking the Dragon Speech this whole time?”
“Of course. If I had not, everything would have been crushed flat.”
“This is insane.”
Arteo felt as though he was about to lose his mind from frustration.
Then a single method came to mind.
‘Ability.’
A power granted by the authority of the Supreme Deity.
Magic does not work.
In that case, an Ability is the only option.
‘If I use my Ability……!’
It would not be easy, but he could manage somehow.
It was better than dying without doing anything!
At that moment, Alexius placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Teo.”
The seasoned swordsman’s deep voice cut off his thoughts.
“Look. At the 8th Prince’s eyes.”
“……Grandfather.”
Alexius pointed toward Radel.
“What do you think? Does he look like someone who has given up?”
Arteo clenched his teeth.
“He has not…… given up.”
Anyone could see it.
That boy was not exhausted.
If anything, he looked far too calm.
He was taking one step at a time toward the dragon amid those blazing flames.
Even Arteo, a member of the Imperial Court Magicians, felt chills when he looked at Leviathan.
Fear.
Despair.
An instinctive warning that it was impossible to win.
Yet that boy faced him head-on.
Saying that since he possessed the dragon’s reverse scale, he would take responsibility for the end.
“Then watch. You must also learn how to wait.”
Listening to Alexius, Arteo’s expression grew complicated.
He had wanted to kill that boy more than anything.
……Now, more than anyone, he wished that he would not die.
“But Grandfather. At this rate, he will melt before he even gets close. No matter that he has Troll’s Heart, his current regeneration speed is not enough. But if I use my Ability……!”
“Do you think you are the only one in this world with an Ability?”
FLAP!
Before Alexius even finished speaking, the sound of wings beating filled the air.
A hippogriff flew in, avoiding the flames.
Seated atop it were Shartea and Venus.
Shartea leapt lightly to the ground.
Seeing his younger sister, who had bravely torn apart the dragon’s wings and returned, Arteo could not help but feel moved.
“Thea!”
“……Brother.”
Seeing Shartea unharmed, Arteo let out a sigh of relief.
Now he understood Alexius’s words.
He was not the only one with an Ability.
However, no matter how powerful Shartea’s Ability was, using it repeatedly would place a heavy burden on her.
The 9th Prince was busy blocking Dragon Speech, and Arteo could not use his own Ability.
In that case…….
Arteo turned his head and saw a boy sitting there, his thoughts unreadable.
As he dismounted from the hippogriff, he muttered,
“……First, I need to put out the fire.”
It was the arrival of Venus, who possessed the Ability ‘Tears of the Sky.’
***
“Why should I despair?”
Radel asked the demon.
The Archdemon roared.
-Why!? You dare ask why? It is only natural for useless, weak trash like you to despair before the great Leviathan himself! You are going to die here!
Radel asked again.
“So what you are saying is that I should despair because I am weak, useless, and going to die anyway?”
The Archdemon flew into a rage.
Being asked such an obvious thing again by that worm made him furious to the tips of his horns.
But Radel genuinely did not understand.
“But Leviathan.”
Scratching the back of his head, he continued,
“That is just your opinion.”
DING.
[The user’s body has been damaged.]
[Trait, Troll’s Heart, has activated.]
[Warning! Severe pain is surging!]
Radel glanced at his Status Window.
Troll’s Heart (B)
An ability that regenerates any wound.
Regenerates at a rapid speed. (Additional Ability Activation: Health 100)
Activating the Trait brings intense pain.
The more overwhelming the enemy, the more the body and mind are elevated.
Pain that cannot kill me only makes me stronger.
Troll’s Heart had upgraded to B, but it still only regenerated at a fast rate.
It could not keep up with the speed at which the flames consumed him.
And the pain that came with every notification was overwhelming.
Even Radel himself did not know how he was still standing.
Yet, strangely enough, he felt fine.
A sensation of exhilaration, as though all the nerves in his body had gone numb.
That thrilling feeling dominated his entire being.
‘My heart is tingling.’
Reading the new description added to Troll’s Heart, Radel understood his condition.
‘The more overwhelming the enemy, the more the body and mind are elevated.’
A dragon was more than sufficient to be called an overwhelming enemy.
Facing such an opponent, his body and mind were being heightened.
Perhaps because of that, Radel felt a strange vitality coursing through him.
HISS!
Seeing Radel’s eyes brimming with energy even as his feet burned, Leviathan himself was shaken.
Eyes encircled by an uncanny glow.
They reminded him of the Great Sage of the past, and he lost his reason entirely.
-Enough talk. Die!
ROOOAR!
Dragon Breath erupted from his mouth.
“Block it!”
Radel gathered every last bit of magic power he had left and cast defensive magic.
Even so, it was obvious that it would break through before long.
“Ghk!”
Just as the searing heat was about to engulf him, a drop of water fell onto Radel’s cheek.
Plop.
“?”
The startled Radel looked up, and more droplets began to fall from above.
Drip, plop.
A heavy downpour that cooled the blazing heat.
SHHHHHH!
Rain pouring down through the dragon’s magic power in a situation like this.
Radel smiled as the rain soaked him.
‘Senior Venus!’
It was undoubtedly Venus’s Ability, ‘Tears of the Sky.’
No matter how powerful his Ability was, it would be difficult to extinguish all of the dragon’s flames.
But thanks to the rain, the inferno had weakened.
Radel did not miss the opening and sprinted forward.
TAP!
The location of the reverse scale that Senior Venus had taught him came into view.
In his right hand was the kitchen knife, and in his left, a Hayden-style Intermediate Potion.
Radel swallowed the potion and threw the bottle aside.
Then he leapt upward and shouted a spell.
“Wind!”
It was difficult to control due to the dragon’s magic power, but it did not matter.
Precision was unnecessary right now.
The wind violently hurled Radel’s body forward.
Before he could fall back down, Radel swung the kitchen knife and embedded it into the dragon’s scales.
RIP!
Then, adjusting his speed, he slid downward.
‘Do not forget. They all look the same, but they are different. Find the inverted scale.’
He remembered Senior Venus’s words clearly.
The inverted scale.
There it was, a scale embedded backward at the nape of the dragon’s neck.
-You wretched worm!
Leviathan’s roar shook heaven and earth.
But Radel did not care.
Instead, his heart pounded.
Not from fear, but from exhilaration.
Radel slid down and stopped at the right spot.
Then he took out the dragon’s reverse scale.
Sensing the ominous aura, Leviathan shouted.
-Burn!
Flames erupted over Leviathan’s entire body.
Smoke rose from Radel’s flesh as well.
HISS!
Amid the agony of his flesh melting away, Radel raised the dragon’s reverse scale high.
“Hngh!”
And stabbed it precisely into the inverted scale.
CRUNCH!
The moment the dragon’s reverse scale met the reverse scale.
-KRAAAAGH!
Leviathan screamed, sensing his end.
-I, the great Leviathan himself! How could this be!
To think that this worm possessed the dragon’s reverse scale!
Leviathan howled in a ghastly voice.
-I am destined to become the true ruler of this world!
But Radel merely shook his head calmly as he drove the dragon’s reverse scale in even deeper.
“No. You are going to become a frying pan.”
One that never sticks, ever.