Chapter 57

The sky was dark red, and the earth had been torn apart like rags.
Blood and ash, cries and the sound of steel, covered the field like a single shadow.

The endless advance of monsters rising in the east.
The humans had long since abandoned their ambition to wipe out the monsters.
Now, even holding the defense line they had built was more than they could handle.

Gradually, the defense line was pushed back, and the soldiers’ morale fell with it.

It was not a war for the great cause of the empire, but a war for survival in the present.
That was why the increasingly desperate horror was stealing the light from people’s eyes.

“When are the reinforcements coming?!”
“I don’t know!”

Even for them, there was one ray of hope.
The news of the war’s end that had come from the south a few days ago.
It was news that the archmage Lars Musica and the former Sword Saint Lucas Liberator had returned to the front.

If they came here…… wouldn’t the end come into sight?

That was when it happened.

Swaaaak.

Countless streams of arrows fell onto the battlefield.
At the sudden sight, everyone’s gaze turned toward the sky.

Kirek!

The arrows pierced the monsters’ heads and lodged in their hearts.
Thousands of arrows passed by humans and targeted only enemies.

As the monsters died one after another, the soldiers on the battlefield turned back and began searching for those who had shot the arrows.

Then.

Bwoooooom.

A heavy trumpet sound filled the sky.
At the same time, pure white flags began fluttering far behind the defense line.

White flags tinged with green.
The golden World Tree engraved at the center revealed the identity of the reinforcements.

Whoooom.

One elf stood at the vanguard.
A faint green Aura enveloped him.

The moment his sword, flowing as gracefully as the wind, thrust forward.

Kukwagagaga!

The ground beneath the monsters’ feet began to explode.

“Knights of Natura! I, Viento, shall take the lead! Let us subjugate that evil threatening our forest!”

At his shout, countless elves began running toward the defense line.
Thousands of arrows once again covered the sky, and armed soldiers moved in and out of the flow of the wind.

“W-We’re going too! Soldiers of Oratio! Cut off those monsters’ heads and end this war!”

The western mountain range of Oratio.
Here as well, a wretched sight no different from any other battlefield had long since taken hold.

The scent of flowers that had been the pride of the mountain range had been polluted by abandoned corpses,
and people even avoided looking at the mountains.

Monsters poured down from the mountain range.
Humans held them back below.

Among the east, south, and west, this was the place where the largest number of troops had gathered, but the situation was not much different from the others.
To be precise, it was worse.

The fact that many troops had gathered meant that they needed that many troops.
And needing troops meant the situation was that bad.

To the soldiers of the west, reinforcements were not something special.
They were neither a hidden card that would turn the tide nor a special hope that would raise morale.

They were merely there to fill the numbers left behind by those who had gone before them.
The arrival of reinforcements simply meant that just as many comrades had died.

That was why they didn’t expect anything.
The expectation that they could win the war.
The expectation that they could survive.
They had abandoned countless hopes beyond those as well.

They had not been like that from the beginning.
They too had held hope at first.
Until it was trampled again and again, they too had not let go of that thread of hope.

But a reality that did not improve, and instead only worsened, often made people unable to hold on to hope.
And so, the people of the west could no longer hold any hope.

Kukwagagagaga!

Until he appeared.

“I knew it already, but humans truly are weak beings. To think you requested help because you couldn’t handle trash like this.”

His voice dug into their ears like the sound of hammering in a forge.
A short dwarf stood there, revealing broad, firm, muscular shoulders.
His red beard reached down to his chest, and silver threads shaped like magic arrays were intricately braided into it.
The old leather robe he wore was scorched in places, but the staff he held gleamed as if it had been made yesterday.

“What did you say?”

A soldier, angered by the remark that ignored their hardships, opened his mouth,
but he lost his nerve under the dwarf’s sharp gaze.

“I said you are simply pathetic. They aren’t even the one at the top of the mountain range, and yet you are struggling against trash like that.”

He stroked his red beard and looked up at the mountain range.

Someone shouted at him.
If he was so great, he should do something, and wasn’t he himself doing nothing?

The dwarf answered with a snort instead of words.
Complete disregard.
The soldiers’ anger grew.

“By the way, why is a dwarf here?”
“So you lack not only strength, but intelligence as well. I am Optatum, archmage of the great Calor Empire. I am the reinforcement here to help you.”
“……An archmage came as reinforcements??”

The soldiers exchanged glances.

Did reinforcements ever come alone?
And an archmage at that, a dwarf, here?
They had never heard of such a thing before.
Nor had they ever experienced such a thing.

“It seems you don’t understand.”

Optatum let out a sigh, his face saying that he found them pathetic.

“No matter how many there are, if they cannot turn the tide of battle, they cannot be called reinforcements.”

His feet moved one step at a time toward the monsters pouring down.

Kiiing.

An intense red light glowed from the jewel embedded in his staff.

Thud!

When the end of the staff touched the ground.

Tukwagagagaga!

With a roar, the ground split open and surged upward.
It was a sight like lightning striking from the earth toward the sky.
Watching the monsters be blasted away, the soldiers couldn’t continue speaking.

“Turning the tide, even alone. That is what true reinforcements are.”

Time passed.
It had been some time since the sprouts that had endured the cold bloomed their first flowers in the warm wind.
Many changes had occurred throughout the Oratio Empire.

The south, the eastern plains, and the western mountain range.
The three fronts that had been treated as major problems for years declared the end of the war.

People were half-convinced and half-doubtful.
But because of the soldiers who returned from the battlefield, they learned that the war’s end was true.

The news spread throughout the nation in an instant,
and by the time it reached the point where there was no one who did not know of the war’s end.

“Bro. Shall we start moving soon?”

Lars spoke to Lucas.

Takang!

The sharp sound of swords clashing rang out.
Lucas’s gaze was fixed on Serpens’s blade.

The exchange between their swords continued.
Sharp chained attacks continued, each aiming for the other’s neck.

The black Aura wrapped around the boy sparked irregularly.
Serpens thrust his sword with movements that had become more concise.

Lucas blocked the attacks in a different way than before.
Unlike before, when he had shown openings, he now guided Serpens into creating openings.

Blocking those now-heavier attacks stirred something new in him.

It did not feel like it had been very long since Serpens had nearly died facing the Horn Wolf.
It felt as if he had collapsed while facing goblins only yesterday,
and his Aura had rampaged during the knight examination only recently…….

‘That one was recent.’

Crack!

Lucas’s fist drove into the boy’s abdomen.

Serpens was pushed back as if sent flying.
But he quickly regained his balance.

“That is enough.”

Lucas slung his greatsword onto his back.

“……Tch.”

Serpens sheathed his sword with a regretful expression.
He had been searching for a chance to counterattack, so he could only feel disappointed that it ended so suddenly.

The boy closed his eyes and began regulating his breathing.
The rippling and sparks of his Aura gradually calmed.
By the time Serpens opened his eyes again, every trace of his Aura had disappeared.

“It seems you are prepared to some degree. Let us go to Oratio.”

Lucas said that while looking at the boy.

It had already been nearly a year since he first met Serpens.
Time had passed quickly.

He looked back on that fact.
It felt as if Serpens had nearly died facing the Horn Wolf only yesterday.
But now, to some degree, he had become able to handle Aura.
It was the result of all the training up to now, and the special training of the last two months.

For two months, Serpens passed the brink of death dozens of times a day.
He was slashed, severed, broken, and pierced.
If not for Lars’s magic, he would have died several times over.
The floor of the training ground, stained red with the boy’s blood, was proof of that.

The reason they carried out such harsh training.
It was because Lars had said that the closer Serpens came to death, the stronger the power of his Aura became.

That those words were true was proven as they forced the training forward,
and because the process was what it was, they were able to reap great results as well.

‘Aura in just one year…….’

The reason Serpens had been able to achieve such absurd growth.

He learned Lucas’s swordsmanship, which was evaluated as perfect,
awakened Aura through Sean,
and Lars personally refined that Aura for him.

Help from external factors that were outstanding without flaw.
But the boy’s growth hadn’t been achieved through help alone.

Growth was not achieved through others.
One could be influenced by others, but in the end, growth was something one cultivated by oneself.
Just as receiving help and making use of that help were separate matters,
the boy’s growth was possible because he had steadfastly endured the growing pains himself.

‘His mental strength truly is remarkable, but…….’

Physical pain could be endured as long as one’s mental strength held up.
But if that mental strength collapsed, the pain one had endured would return doubled.

That was Lucas’s concern, if it could be called a concern.

Because Serpens had endured well until now, Lucas could not be certain that he would withstand the moment his spirit broke.
The sturdier a tree was, the less easily it broke, but once it did break, it was difficult for it to return to how it had been.

“Lars. How was I today compared to yesterday? Was my Aura a little more stable?”
“Hey, brat, I’m telling you, your Aura is far from the word ‘stable.’”
“But I can still handle it according to my will a little.”
“It’s more like lighting a fuse. If you fail to control it at the wrong moment, boom! It’ll explode in an instant.”
“You spent the last two months killing me to prevent that, though.”
“You should be grateful for that, little knight. Our style, in other words, there are only a handful of people who can give you that kind of experience.”
“Yes, yes, I’m very grateful.”

Moreover, Serpens’s Aura was the kind that gnawed away at himself.
As Lars said, it was a flame lit on a fuse.
Something that was bound to explode someday-

“Lucas! Hurry up!”

Serpens excitedly ran down the slope leaving the mansion.

What was so fun that he was smiling so brightly?
Lucas couldn’t understand.

Serpens nearly fell because he couldn’t control his speed.
But the boy managed to regain his balance noisily without falling, and raised his thumb as if proud of himself.

At that sight, Lucas’s gaze wavered faintly.

“Foolish kid.”

But soon his eyes returned to normal,
and his silent steps began to move.

It was strange.
His concern disappeared in an instant.
That kid, smiling even after nearly falling, would he not have worn the same expression even if he had fallen?
Even if his thumb had not been raised, would the corners of his mouth not have remained lifted?

“Let us go catch a carriage, Lars.”
“Got it.”

To move forward, one must not fear falling.

Words he had known better than anyone, but had forgotten at some point.
But as he watched Serpens, he realized the fact he had forgotten.

‘So he wasn’t the only one learning.’

Lucas silently stood beside Serpens.
The two walked together, Lucas shortening his stride to match Serpens’s steps.

Lars simply followed behind the two of them, humming.