My Slain Dragon Bride

Chapter 238. The Very End

King Heinkel died while sitting on his throne.

It seemed that he had been purified by divine power after having the sacred relics of the religion driven into his body.

Ferda knew that divine power meant nothing.

He had already seen Ureas survive even after coming into contact with the power of a sacred relic.

If the king had died like that, it should not have been only the kings who survived. Their soldiers should have survived as well.

Yet there wasn’t a single survivor.

By the time Ferda arrived, four kings remained, and the kings were killing one another.

And finally, only one remained.

"Ha, haha... Everyone... is dead."

There was madness in his eyes.

Blood poured from his wounds, and sweat drenched him like rain, yet what remained on his lips was a smile.

That joy lasted only for a moment.

The instant he discovered Ferda, his expression twisted.

"You, you!!"

He glared at Ferda with hatred.

Then he picked up his dagger again.

The madness began once more.

"Don’t you dare lay your hands on what’s mine!!"

He charged toward Ferda.

He tried to drive the dagger into Ferda’s heart, but there was no way he could reach him.

Ferda was a mage, while they were nothing more than humans who were no different from ordinary citizens once their crowns were removed.

And Ferda already knew what happened when someone became excited while bleeding heavily.

Before he could even reach Ferda, he became exhausted, staggered, and collapsed.

Even as his pupils were gradually losing focus, the words that escaped his mouth were absurd.

"It’s mine... Everyone... it’s all... mine....."

And so, even the last remaining king breathed his last.

Ferda silently looked down at him.

He could read the emotion in those eyes.

It was so distinct that even a blind man could have seen it clearly.

Greed.

What controlled them was the greed that welled up from within their own hearts.

It was so uncontrollable that it had rendered even their final moments meaningless.

What had made them like this?

Ferda turned his gaze away.

Then something caught his eye.

He instinctively felt it.

It’s because of that.

That black book.

The moment Ferda saw the black book, an image was driven into his mind as though it were a spell cast by trauma.

He saw Valdrova.

She was smiling happily as she held out her hand.

It seemed like something incredibly trivial, but not to Ferda.

Ferda could understand what the kings had seen.

If they merely wished for it, silk clothes would fill their wardrobes, delicacies would pile up before them, heroes would bow their heads, and beautiful women would fill their bedrooms.

That book.

If they could only possess that book, everything would be granted.

And there was only one person who could possess the book.

That was why, in the final moments, they had been unable to overcome their greed and killed one another.

Even then, Valdrova’s form continued to tempt Ferda.

But Ferda was no fool.

The dark ring within him was spinning rapidly.

It spoke to Ferda.

If you use that magic, you will regret it.

At that moment, the pounding that felt as though his heart were being squeezed gradually subsided.

Valdrova’s form faded away, and once again, the book lay sprawled on the floor.

Retrieve it.

If I retrieve it, everything will be over.

The moment Ferda made up his mind—

"You are not susceptible to this temptation."

Someone calmly walked over and picked up the book.

It was King Heinkel, who had been lying dead with the sacred relics embedded in his body.

At some point, he had risen from his seat and picked up the book.

As expected...

Ferda immediately went on guard.

Despite the deaths of so many humans, his mana was still at a level that surpassed Ferda’s.

Ferda bought some time by speaking to him.

"Your citizens have died. And even at this very moment, they are dying."

"I know. Even now... I can feel it."

"Was it worth that much to get your revenge?"

He thought for a moment before answering.

"I don’t know yet. King Hudret is still alive, isn’t he?"

Come to think of it, Hudret was nowhere to be seen.

Ferda had thought he would be the first to rush over and seize this book.

"He is a very thorough man. Even at this very moment, he is killing the people inside the city to further weaken my power."

"And you simply watch them die."

"I have no choice. I made a promise."

"What promise?"

King Heinkel’s eyes turned toward Ferda.

Ferda did not know what color his eyes had originally been.

At the very least, they could not have been the ominous green they were now.

"He asked me to make sure you were killed. Even if the revenge could not end cleanly..."

"The one who made that request... was Curved Demon?"

"Yes."

Ferda had thought that the Demon Race had come with the ambition of ruling the world.

But was that the only reason Curved Demon had helped King Heinkel?

Why would he go through all this trouble just to kill one human?

-Demon King.

The word kept flashing through Ferda’s mind.

His ominous premonition no longer seemed like mere paranoia.

The best option was to avoid a battle like this.

"You won’t be able to escape."

King Heinkel had seen through Ferda’s thoughts.

He had already resolved to kill Ferda, and that determination had led to thorough preparations.

The black book in his hand opened by itself.

An ominous light radiated from it before gathering around King Heinkel’s hand.

"Rise."

At the same time, the bodies of the knights who had become corpses began rattling as they rose to their feet.

There were more than a hundred corpses.

They had all been elite soldiers, knights, and mages.

The abilities of an Undead followed the abilities they had possessed in life.

"Bring death to the Regent."

The knights and mages who received the command charged toward Ferda.

Ferda had to fight the very forces that King Heinkel had faced.

It’s been a long time since I’ve felt this sensation.

It had been the same when Ferda had been branded a Public Enemy of the Continent and an army had been dispatched to kill him.

He had been a Fifth-Circle mage back then as well, but he had been much less experienced and far more insensitive to malice than he was now.

The pressure and despair of being driven into a corner returned to Ferda.

But he did not despair.

The Ferda of that time was different from the Ferda of now.

And I’m not the one who’s in a hurry. He is.

The remnants in the outer city should have been mostly dealt with by now, while the numbers within the inner city continued to decrease.

King Hudret had armed the knights with mass slaughter in mind from the very beginning.

If he was combing through the city like a rat hunt, the number of citizens serving as the source of King Heinkel’s power would rapidly decrease.

I just have to hold out until then.

And Ferda had another decisive advantage.

"Ghhh... Grrr..."

A Ghoul Knight swung its sword with a voice like air leaking from a punctured bag.

As Ferda watched, its entire body suddenly began to corrode.

It was a reaction that should only have been possible with divine power.

But there was no way Ferda possessed divine power.

But the knights do.

Some of the knights had prepared themselves with rituals meant to fight Undead, while the mages carried holy water.

Even while pouring everything they had into confronting King Heinkel, they had still carried sacred items on their bodies for prayers to their god.

Ferda touched the sacred relics they carried with his shadow and brought them into contact with the Undead, returning everything to its natural state.

There was a way through this.

But it was by no means an advantageous battle.

Even the slightest graze could be fatal to Ferda.

"It’s the shadows. Is it Barbatos’s magic?"

After roughly thirty corpses had corroded and disappeared, King Heinkel seemed to have figured out the secret behind Ferda’s fighting style.

For a mage, he was quick to grasp things.

"Those shadows are troublesome... I’ll make sure you can’t use them."

An Undead mage picked up the holy oil that had been on a priest’s body and poured it over himself.

As his entire body began to corrode, he set himself on fire.

"Ghegelgelgel...!"

The green flames instantly transformed into golden flames and began to burn fiercely.

Damn it.

He had realized that the flames of the holy oil prevented the shadows from moving.

The flames were fatal to Undead as well, but they were especially dangerous to Ferda.

"Ghegelgelgel!"

One of them hurriedly charged toward Ferda.

The shadow that had been extended naturally contracted and tried to spread all the way to Ferda’s body.

If the flames of the holy oil touch me, it’s over.

With that thought, Ferda’s movements became increasingly tangled.

And the more tangled his movements became, the closer the Ghoul Knight came.

However, just as Ferda’s stamina was gradually running out, so was theirs.

As time passed, the speed of the Ghoul Knights and mages that had resisted the corrosion noticeably increased.

That meant King Hudret’s army had discovered human groups and was continuously eliminating them.

"I cannot let His Majesty’s wish... go to waste."

King Heinkel finally rose to his feet and joined the battle, driving Ferda into a corner.

One sought to buy time, while the other sought to eliminate his opponent as quickly as possible.

The result came before long.

A spear held by a Ghoul Knight pierced through Ferda’s body.

"Ugh...!"

Ferda clenched his teeth tightly and did not lose his concentration.

He touched the sacred relic with his Shadow Hand, and the final knight scattered into pieces.

That was the last of Ferda’s mana.

"You truly are remarkable."

King Heinkel genuinely admired him.

He knew how powerful these beings were.

Although he had pretended to be dead, when he had experienced their strength firsthand, there had been moments when he wondered whether he might actually die.

And yet a mere Fifth-Circle mage had confronted all of them at full strength and suffered only a single injury.

"You are an extraordinary mage, Regent Ferda."

Ferda snorted.

"I don’t want to be acknowledged as a mage by you."

"Why?"

"Because you’re not a mage."

King Heinkel’s eyebrow twitched.

Ferda provoked him once more.

"Do you really think you’re a mage?"

"I am a mage."

"No. You don’t know what a mage truly is."

Ferda spoke to him as though he found him ridiculous.

"A mage’s battle isn’t like chess or Tabula. It isn’t about making the best possible move using only the pieces that are visible. In that regard, you’ve already lost."

Crash!

At the same time, the sound of a glass bottle shattering rang out.

While King Heinkel’s attention was diverted, Ferda dropped holy oil at his feet.

"A mage hides his means until the very end."

He ignited it with a small spark.

Golden flames instantly engulfed King Heinkel.

Yet his expression remained emotionless.

"A shallow trick. No matter how divine the flames may be, they cannot bring me down."

King Heinkel was already protected by a barrier.

Even though the flames had been created from holy oil, Heinkel’s power within his own domain was formidable.

"Do you think I wouldn’t know that?"

Ferda said,

"Have you ever studied the principles behind how your barrier works?"

"...?"

"Your barrier appears to be attack-responsive. Since it responds appropriately according to the situation, it is efficient, and its performance is correspondingly excellent."

Ferda had fought many mages.

The mages who sought to kill him had always been several moves ahead of him.

That was why Ferda had devoted himself to researching ways to counter them.

And he had always found a breakthrough.

"That reactive system has a limit. When something continuously harasses the caster, if a powerful attack comes in, it cannot block it."

Ferda pulled out the object he had been hiding in his hand.

It was a round, cylindrical object.

A magazine for a Magitech Rifle, and at the same time, ammunition for a Magitech Shotgun.

Ferda gripped the cylinder tightly.

He already knew how it worked.

"That is why you’re not a mage, Heinkel."

A mage hides his move until the very end.

Ferda activated the Spellcraft inside the cylinder.

The shotgun activated instantly.

BOOM!

King Heinkel’s face was blown away together with his barrier.

***

At the moment a mass of blue mana struck his face, King Heinkel’s consciousness seemed to move somewhere else.

He was sitting at a table, and a chessboard lay before him.

Instead of the thirty-two pieces that should have been there, four broken king pieces were sitting before him.

King Heinkel instinctively understood.

This is my death.

Yet, strangely, he felt nothing.

Neither joy nor sorrow touched him.

King Heinkel stared blankly at them.

Then it happened.

A figure began to take shape across from King Heinkel.

When he saw it, King Heinkel spoke the word aloud.

"Father..."

As his consciousness faded away, the first person he found was his estranged father.

He was looking down at the chessboard with the same sickly face King Heinkel had last seen.

He looked so pitiful.

"Father..."

Hot tears fell from Sigmund Heinkel’s eyes.

"I understood your words... far too late."

Sigmund had always thought his father was simply like that because of his aggressive personality.

But now he finally understood.

That to become a benevolent king, one had to become a tyrant.

That to prepare for peace, one had to prepare for war.

Sigmund had lived to the very end clinging to a dream, and he had been foolish.

That was why he was destined to meet such an end.

He wanted forgiveness.

He wanted to hear those words from his father:

You were my proud son.

He wanted to receive even the slightest bit of comfort that way.

But his father did not answer.

He simply faded away.

The chessboard and table also drifted farther and farther into the distance.

As his consciousness fell to the other side, it felt as though he were sinking into the abyss of the void.

"I..."

Only then did Sigmund feel himself awakening.

"I don’t want to die."

A lingering attachment ignited within him.

"I don’t want to die."

And then came obsession.

Even though he knew he had fallen into an inescapable swamp, he continued to scream.

And when a desperate human reaches such a state—

You have done something truly interesting, Sigmund Heinkel.

That was when a demon came to him.

It was a gigantic figure made of bones and a skull, clad in a dark purple robe.

-My name is Gamigin. I am the ruler of the Third Hell, the master of immortality and legions, and the author of that Black Grimoire you hold.

The bones rattled, producing a strange sound like a percussion instrument.

-You used my grimoire without entering into a contract with me. You should suffer the punishment of becoming an undying skeleton, and even that would not be enough. However...

Gamigin extended his index finger toward him.

Even the thickness of the fingertip was far greater than Sigmund’s entire body.

-I will give you one chance to make amends.

***

A ringing filled Ferda’s ears from the deafening explosion.

His heavy eyelids tried to send him into the distant darkness, but Ferda resisted until the very end.

He felt that if he lay down, he would lose consciousness, so he forcibly raised his body.

There was no sensation in his right hand.

A gentle breeze felt cool against him, yet painful at the same time.

There was nothing where his right hand should have been.

Valdrova’s image instinctively came to mind.

If I realize what happened, I’ll probably pass out...

He shook his head violently, unwilling even to imagine it.

Can it be restored?

It might somehow be possible if he made a huge donation to the Alte Religion, but if he did that, the fact that he was a Black Mage would become known.

If the Alte Religion discovered that Ferda was a Black Mage, they would try to kill him regardless of the reason.

No.

They probably wouldn’t be able to kill him.

After all, he was the Fiancé of the Red Dragon.

Instead, they would probably covet the wealth of the Far East that they had already been eyeing.

But this wasn’t the time to worry about such trivial matters.

"Grrr... Grrr..."

King Heinkel’s body twitched.

It was horrifying.

His body had been destroyed so thoroughly that it was impossible to recognize his form, yet he still struggled, unable to let go of his lingering attachment.

Ferda approached him.

He had to finish him off.

Before he could do something.

"Please, rest now."

Prepared to exhaust the remainder of his mana, Ferda squeezed out what little mana he had left and aimed it at Heinkel’s head.

At that moment, something seized Ferda’s hand.

The strength he felt was far too distinct to simply be a final struggle.

Could it be...?

That was a demon’s grimoire.

As long as someone held the grimoires of demons, the demons were watching him.

And they waited for the moment when a human was at their weakest.

The body that had been twitching and struggling was not merely flailing in its final moments.

It was regaining its vitality.

The bones that had been shattered into pieces gathered back toward the face and reassembled into a skull.

At the same time, all the charred flesh melted away like tar, revealing a white skeleton.

Green flames flickered inside the skull’s eye sockets, and the smell of sulfur pierced Ferda’s nose.

-You insolent creature who dares set foot in the King’s territory without permission.

Ferda knew the moment he heard that voice.

A powerful being could reveal its existence through its voice alone.

This was not Heinkel.

One of the Seven Great Demons of Hell.

The Demon of Immortality and Legions.

Gamigin.

-What shall I do with you?

Read more Chapters here - Apexnovelhub.com