Chapter 173
Chapter 173: Azure Flames Consume the Moon, Blood Stains the Royal City (Part 7)
***
...No wonder.
No wonder when I walked out of the clock tower earlier, I always felt like something was missing... I thought it was just my imagination...
Boswell had disappeared.
I remember it clearly. Before I entered the clock tower, when I stood on the roof of the main building and looked out into the distance, I could faintly see that transparent membrane in the sky. Which means... something happened while I was inside the clock tower, something that caused it to fail, or rather... break.
Something must have happened... but what?
No one except the Church knew its location.
The Church... Cataloma... the clock tower... the Divine Relic... the spine... the Goddess's Tear.
These scattered clues gradually connected into a single thread in my mind.
Suddenly, a massive shock welled up from the bottom of my heart and quickly swept through my entire body. I felt as if I had been struck by lightning, a wave of numbness rushing through me, my dark eyes going wide in the night sky as I stared toward Theresa in disbelief.
"That blood bead..."
Clack clack clack.
The extreme ice broken sickle took shape in my left hand again, frost mist rising into the night sky. I stepped forward and shouted toward the figure on the other side: "Lecter! The eggshell, what does it look like—!"
In the firelight, I saw Lecter give a slight shake of his head.
"Not sure... but Theresa is the highest authority in the royal city's church district! She must know—!"
His answer, shouted from a distance, only confirmed the guess that had been forming in my heart.
I kept my gaze locked on Theresa and drew a quiet breath.
"That blood bead, what is it!"
"Who knows?" Theresa smiled brightly.
The corners of her mouth curled high in the moonlight and firelight, carrying a certain cold and detached emotion, as if she were a mischievous child pulling a prank.
"You all... beat me first..."
Whoosh. Flames burst from the jet-black blade of the great axe once more.
I immediately shifted into a fighting stance to meet the attack, but Theresa pivoted on her heel, her torn nun's habit leaving a ghostly trail in the darkness, and with terrifying speed she closed the distance to Lecter in an instant.
"...Then we'll talk—!"
A savage slash dropped with the last word from her lips, cutting through the air with a bone-chilling howl.
BOOM!
In my field of vision, just a split second before the blow connected, a rush of wind rose beneath Lecter's feet. His entire body seemed to be swept away by a gust, launching him sideways into the air 4 to 5 meters away, barely dodging that heart-stopping strike. The instant his feet touched the ground again he twisted his body and leaped, swinging his short sword as he lunged at Theresa's back, launching a counterattack.
The next moment, things took a sudden turn.
Clack clack clack...
A familiar sound of turning gears came from the double-bladed great axe in Theresa's hand.
That's...
My heart sank, and I frantically shouted toward him: "Lecter, watch out—"
But it was too late.
The double-bladed axe suddenly transformed before my eyes. The black axe handle, originally 2 meters long, instantly shrank to less than half a meter, and then with a sharp zing, a slender blade over 1 meter long shot out from the end of the handle, piercing through from Theresa's back and driving straight through Lecter's right shoulder.
"Ngh!" Lecter let out a muffled grunt.
His momentum stopped. He gritted his teeth and raised his short sword with his right hand, but Theresa spun around and seized his wrist, squeezing hard—
Crack.
The faint sound of breaking bone rang out in the firelight.
It all happened in an instant.
"Aaargh—!" Lecter let out a cry of pain.
Theresa slowly withdrew the blade, raised it, and aimed it straight at Lecter's throat. In that same instant, my right foot was already landing at her side, my short sickle sweeping upward from below, trailing rolling white frost, and with a slash I severed her arm. My right hand's Captain Grey flashed with cold light as I simultaneously swung a strike at her head.
Theresa pulled back fast.
Zing—
The blade shaved off a few strands of her silver hair and left a thin line of blood across her face.
Her figure retreated 5 meters back. After steadying herself, she looked over and smiled.
"I'm actually quite surprised, after fighting this long..."
She swung her arm and reversed her grip on the axe body, brushing off the blood dripping from the thin blade.
"You still haven't recognized this axe?"
"A Moon Blade..."
I recognized it now.
Repeatedly scorched by the Fire of Sin, yet not a trace of melting. That all-black signature, its hardness capable of clashing with Captain Grey multiple times... there was nothing else it could be, only a weapon forged from the same Moonstone.
"That's right. This is the 8th Moon. Its name is Requiem."
Theresa lowered her head and spoke softly as she looked at her newly regenerated arm.
"In earlier years, Grand Duke Scalliger... ah, that is, your father. He donated a total of 3 Moon Blades to the Church one after another. Requiem was one of them."
"When I was running for sainthood, there was a year... a severe epidemic broke out in the northern region of Isenbell, and everywhere you looked it was... a scene of devastation. I saved a lot of people back then, and afterward the Pope bestowed it upon me... Beautiful, isn't it?"
"...Beautiful?"
I looked at her still-smiling face and ground my teeth together.
"You used it to kill those children! Those poor, wretched children—!"
The hand gripping Captain Grey trembled faintly.
"Lucas... Abel... so many people... fate has already been cruel enough to them... and even so, weren't they still trying so hard to live!"
"What gives you the right! What gives you the right—!"
Theresa fell silent.
After a long moment, she tilted her head back and looked up at the moonlight with a soft sigh.
"I told you, there was no other way..."
The firelight lit up one side of her face. In the dim, yellowed glow, those crimson irises looked almost sorrowful.
...Maybe she had her reasons.
But then again, which of those irredeemable criminals doesn't have their own reasons?
"Cough, cough."
My throat hurt from all the shouting.
"Hah— hah—"
At my side, Lecter's very breathing was trembling. I looked over with some concern.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
His face was pale, beads of sweat the size of peas rolling down his forehead, yet he forced the corners of his mouth upward: "Just a minor wound."
I took a deep breath and did my best to settle the grief surging inside me, forcing myself to calm down.
Theresa was very strong, so I... could not let my emotions take control. I had to think carefully about my strategy.
If I failed, there was probably no one left in the royal city who could stop her.
"Whatever you may have done in the past... however many people you may have saved. Right now, you are nothing but a demon."
The blood sacrifice...
If I understood correctly, she had absorbed the blood from the blood pool, which was why she had become so powerful. But... just like with Valarr and the others, the Fire of Sin would burn through that blood... as the price for it, there had to be a limit, right?
She couldn't restore her body forever, infinitely. As long as I could drain the power inside her completely... I couldn't use the power of the Abyss... Frost World was out too... it would freeze everyone nearby to death...
Then let's just see who collapses first.
"A demon, huh... perhaps."
Theresa's words, sounding almost like a sigh, reached my ears. While keeping my guard up against her, I quietly scanned the surroundings out of the corner of my eye.
...With all the fighting up to this point, things had gotten very loud around here.
Many houses near Cataloma had lit up, and I could hear all kinds of frantic screaming in the distance. In a situation like this... more people would definitely show up before long.
But Theresa right in front of me, why did she look completely unbothered... what was she thinking?
Rumble rumble rumble...
The ground beneath my feet suddenly shook violently.
Dong— dong— dong... BOOM!!
The clock tower behind Theresa rang out 3 final tolls on its own before collapsing with a thunderous roar. Dust billowed out from the center of the tower like fog, rolling toward us in great waves, blinding everything in an instant.
A moment later, the lawn beneath my feet began to cave in.