Chapter 70: His Love
(Read while Listening Recommendation: 世の中を動かすのは真実 )
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“Begone from my sight, you ugly fucking things!” Ragnar roared. His aura surged violently and took the shape of a giant ox, slamming into the thralls and the dhampirs mixed among them.
A massive icicle spear hurtled toward him from behind. He twisted his body, caught the spear in mid-air, and smashed it against his hammer, shattering it into countless glittering pieces.
But then the blood mist spread once more. Ragnar coughed violently as the dhampir rushed in, laughing wildly while its claws tore deep into his chest and body, slashing and ripping his skin apart.
“HAHAHAHA!”
“Unnnggh?!”
Ragnar tried to fight back, but the ice elf dhampir seemed to have multiplied into hundreds of copies. He knew their weakness was the blood core located in their chests, yet no matter how fiercely he swung his axe, he could not find the real one.
“Hahahaha! Teshieke…! Tshakaaa!”
The ice elf laughed in its own strange dialect, one Ragnar could barely understand. Still, the cruel intent behind that voice was unmistakable. It was mocking him, laughing at his ineptitude, his helplessness, and his weakness. The elf was toying with its meal.
“Damn it!”
Ragnar clenched his teeth and tried to block and parry the incoming blows of sharp claws, knives, and bursts of ice magic. But every strike met nothing but air. They were all illusions and hallucinations.
Then came the real attack. A knife stabbed deep into his back.
“Gaahh!”
He screamed in pain as the blade pierced him. Thanks to his incredibly thick musculature, the knife lodged in place for a moment, unable to reach any vital organ. The elf was laughing at him so viciously that it had not even aimed properly. It only wanted him to suffer.
“You!”
Ragnar’s hand shot forward and seized the elf’s face. The creature looked shocked for a split second, then smiled, realizing Ragnar could still barely move. A deadly blood poison seeped from the knife, slowly paralyzing his body.
“Nnnggh?! Y-you damn…!”
“Keheheh! Teshieke! Teshiekadahahah!”
As the dhampir laughed, it opened its jaws wide and bit into his hand, greedily drinking his blood while savoring his struggle.
“GRRRRR!”
Ragnar forced his paralyzed muscles to obey. Spiritual energy exploded outward from his body in a powerful burst.
“WHO…! ARE YOU…! FUCKING…! CALLING…! BITCH?!”
Though he had not understood a single word the elf actually said, in that moment Ragnar believed the creature had called him a bitch. And that was when he snapped.
In a surge of raw fury, he crushed the elf’s head, lifted the creature into the air, and slammed it hard into the ground.
His paralyzed muscles tore under the immense strain as blood poured from dozens of wounds across his body. His meridians began to awaken and unclog, stirring something deeper within him. Something more.
Roaring with rage and bleeding from every wound, he smashed the elf’s head repeatedly into the snow. Ice magic rained down on him, piercing his arms, shoulders, and back. But he kept roaring, relentless.
“RAAAAHHHHHHHHH!”
His axe blazed with the fire of his very soul. As the weapon cleaved through the ice elf, Ragnar tore out the blood core with his bare hands and crushed it to pieces.
CRASH!
The elf screamed as it withered away and died. Ragnar vomited blood and fell to his knees, gasping for air while staring desperately toward the house where his wife waited inside.
“F-Frigga…”
He muttered weakly. His hands trembled as he looked down at the large icicle spear now piercing his stomach.
“I guess… I’m… going first…”
His eyes rolled back as he collapsed into the snow, only a second before the barrier shattered.
Unconsciousness nearly claimed him, until his eyes slowly opened again. An agonizing pain filled his heart as it beat so fast it felt ready to explode.
“G-Gaaah?! W-What’s…! happening?!”
He looked up as the barrier shattered. Despite wanting nothing more than to rest after pouring his entire life into this fight, he could not stop now.
He heard laughter in the distance.
“Hahahahaha!”
Ragnar clenched his teeth. His vision blurred and shifted constantly, his breathing grew heavy and labored. His muscles tensed and trembled under the effects of the paralysis while his heart hammered faster and faster.
He forced himself to step forward.
“F-Frigga…”
Memories of his love flashed vividly through his mind. He remembered the day they first met during a hunt with their friends, and how much of a brat she had been.
“Hey! I was hunting that rabbit! It’s mine! See that arrow? I shot it!”
“Well, good luck next time then, kid! Hahah!”
“What?! Come back!”
She had stolen his hunt and dashed back into the village. When he finally caught up, she was already cooking the rabbit by herself. He noticed she had no family.
“You live alone?”
“Huh?! Where did you come from?!”
“I followed you! Give me back my rabbit!”
“I already cooked it, dimwit. Deal with it.”
“You’re a thief! I’ll tell the chief! He’s my dad!”
“Oooh, I’m so scared of your dad! What is he going to do anyway? Not like my life can get any worse…”
Back then, Ragnar had hated her for what she did. But after seeing the tiny, barely built tent she lived in alone, it became hard to keep hating her.
“Are you going to keep staring? If you aren’t eating, then get out.”
“Of course I’m eating. I caught it!”
“Then sit down and stop complaining.”
“Geez, you’re such an annoying girl!”
“And you’re an annoying idiot!”
They had not gotten along at first, yet they still sat together and shared the roasted rabbit, enjoying a small moment that would become the first of many.
After sharing the meal, Frigga had softened. Ragnar learned more about her and remembered seeing her hunt with other children, always known for stealing prey.
“Where are your parents?” he asked.
“Orcs killed them,” she answered in a flat voice.
“Oh…”
Ragnar had fallen silent, unable to respond. He sighed and walked away, deciding to leave her alone for now.
“Um… if you want to hunt with me… just find me. I live over there.”
“Who would ever want to hunt with a spoiled brat like you? Go away!”
That night, Ragnar thought she would never speak to him again.
But through the years, she did. She approached him, and the two began hunting together.
She remained a brat even into her teenage years, keeping the same fiery personality.
Yet she also became the prettiest girl in the village, and all the boys who had once bullied or ignored her suddenly began flocking around her.
She enjoyed the attention, and it left Ragnar feeling pushed aside. All the time they had spent together, all the hunts they had shared, perhaps they had meant nothing to her after all.
“What have I been doing?”
Ragnar sighed, perched alone on a tree branch beneath the silver moon.
Despite always having a family—unlike her—he felt lonelier than ever that night.
“Hey, idiot. What are you doing up there all alone? Do you want a wolf to eat you or something?”
But she was there for him.
“Frigga?!”
“What?”
“I… uh, weren’t you sleeping?”
“I like staying up late working on leather.”
“Ah…”
“Why are you so depressed all of a sudden?”
“I… I just…”
“What is it?! Spit it out!”
Ragnar clenched his teeth and roared back at her. “Because we’ve spent years training and hunting together, and now that you’re suddenly popular, it’s like none of it meant anything to you!”
Frigga lowered her gaze, her face twisting with annoyance before she shook her head. “Well… maybe if you stopped being such a coward and actually fought them… maybe if you told me your real feelings instead of constantly fearing them… maybe I would tell you mine.”
Ragnar gasped as she turned to leave. Then he noticed the small gift she had left behind for him. It was a pair of leather gloves she had crafted herself from the hide of the gray wolf they had hunted together a week earlier. Perfect for protecting his hands while swinging a heavy weapon. The moment he slipped them on, he felt tougher and stronger.
“Frigga…”
In that moment, Ragnar understood what he truly meant to her.
If he wanted to stand by her side in this barbarian tribe, he would have to fight for it.
He furrowed his brows, seized an axe, and charged forward the next day.
CLASH!
“What the hell is wrong with you, Ragnar?!”
CLASH!
“Damn bastard, since when are you so damn tough?!”
CLASH!
“Okay, I get it! I won’t try to make her my girlfriend anymore!!!”
CLASH!
“Please spare me!”
The cowards who had approached Frigga only for her looks quickly fled with their tails between their legs after he defeated them all.
Once the last contender was beaten, Ragnar turned back to her with a smile. She returned an even prouder one, arms crossed.
“So?” she asked.
“Frigga… I…” He stepped forward and took her hands. “I love you. I’ve always loved you!”
“I know, idiot,” Frigga laughed, her smile bright and warm. “I love you too.”
Ragnar fought back tears, too shy to make the first move.
Frigga simply grabbed him and gave him the deepest, most passionate kiss of his life.
Then she lifted him effortlessly and carried him like a princess back to her tent.
“Alright! We’re married now! Heheh!”
“W-Wait! Aren’t I supposed to carry you?!”
“Shut up!”
“Haha… You never change, huh?”
That nagging, bratty girl who drove everyone else mad was the love of his life.
Ragnar, the muscle-headed idiot, had always tolerated her.
This was their bond. This was their love.
Frigga was the woman he would fight for with tooth and nail until his final breath.
“DON’T TOUCH MY WIFE!!!”
With a furious, almost demonic roar, Ragnar slammed a hand against his chest.
His heart, which had nearly stopped, thundered back to life.
His deathly pale skin flushed with fresh color as blood tears streamed from eyes now burning with crimson light.
He suppressed the surging bloodlust with nothing but his fierce love for her.
His aura exploded outward. Wounds that should have killed him began closing at an unnatural speed. He stormed into the house, his axe cleaving through countless thralls.
Their blood cores shattered with every strike, bodies bursting from the inside out as his aura detonated them.
When the axe was not enough, he used his bare hands, crushing heads and cores, climbing the stairs even as dhampirs bit into his flesh and tried to drag him down.
“Impossible!”
“Who the hell is he?!”
“How can he still move after all those wounds?!”
They could not comprehend the barbarian who had suddenly become unstoppable.
“FRIGGAAAA!”
Roaring her name, he reached the second floor. Little Krarlak’s spirit was still fighting, holding back the thralls and dhampirs, but it was slowly being overwhelmed.
The dhampirs, nearly breaking through the spirit’s defenses, suddenly froze as a towering figure appeared before them. His eyes glowed red like theirs, yet he was clearly no kin of theirs.
“YOU DAMN… SON OF A BITCH!”
Roaring with bared fangs, Ragnar cleaved one dhampir in two. His fists crushed another. He stomped a third into the floor, then unleashed his new blood magic, piercing the bodies of dozens more thralls in a single surge.
“Nobody…! Nobody gets through me!!!”
His wild roar shook their hearts and souls. The thralls and dhampirs trembled as if facing a far higher-ranked predator.
“Wha…?!”
Alistair’s eyes widened in shock as one of his own kin rebelled violently, tearing into the rest to protect those inside the house.
“What’s going on in here? Hah… hahah… this is getting more and more ridicu—”
“Infernal Frost Giant Wyrm Transformation.”
BOOOM!
Before Alistair could finish, he was smashed into the ground and hurled across the forest, burning and freezing simultaneously as a sharp broadsword pierced his massive blood core.
“Gaaaahhhh!”
Screaming in agony, he watched Brunhild transform into an even larger, fiercer form while Sigrid poured her mana and energy into her to sustain the immense cost.
“Mind if I take some of that power?!” Brunhild roared.
The green ring on her hand activated, and the specter of a goblin king emerged, piercing Alistair’s chest and stealing precious power from him.
He immediately felt the terrifying changes in his body.
“Ungh?! W-What did you do to me?!”
Alistair’s handsome face melted away, replaced by a monstrous bat-like abomination.
“I WILL TEAR YOU APART, PIECE BY PIECE!!!”
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