Even If The Light Is Lost (4)

‘What incredible power!’

Even to the Messenger Clan, who were used to imbuing arrows with magic before shooting, it was a spell of tremendous might.

“Good grief….”

At the spot from which the arrows had been loosed stood a young woman of the Messenger Clan. She had long black hair, purple eyes, and the stature of a goddess.

“A-Arael?!”

“A-as expected.”

The Messengers realized that the arrows that had just flown were Arael’s.

Indeed, with power like that, Arael could dare to rebel against the Elders’ Council. And to reveal herself so openly in this situation—such audacity.

‘She actually revealed herself just to save people seized by the Nagas? Dashing. An enemy, but dignified and beautiful.’

‘Impressive.’

Thus the Messengers, though enemies, could not help but admire Arael’s beautiful and commanding presence.

Of course, Arael had no intention of saving those people.

But Azadine was the first to shoot at the Nagas.

Indim, who already regarded Azadine as a thorn in the eye, was incensed that he had rushed out on his own without seeking consent from his companions, but Arael swiftly issued an order.

“Provide covering fire!”

“Y-yes! Ah!”

When Arael’s subordinates, including Indim, reluctantly gave Azadine covering fire, the Nagas fell like autumn leaves in a gale.

The Naga sorcerers put up undead as a bulwark to block the rain of arrows, but Azadine rushed in and charged the Naga casters.

“Krk!”

When the Nagas tried to block with Naga curved sabers and bone spears, Azadine swung a halberd of Azure Steel, the “Azure Executioner.”

A blue afterglow flashed, and the Nagas’ limbs flew into the air.

“Grahk!”

But Azadine’s strike was too wide and showy. Because he swung the halberd in a great arc like a windmill, an opening appeared.

‘Tch!’

The halberd’s edge was far sharper than Azadine had expected.

The Azure Executioner was enchanted; fueled by mana drawn from Azadine, anything touching the blade was shoved left and right from its edge.

It was a magical halberd that did not let blood or flesh cling to it and inflicted ghastly wounds even with a graze.

Using it in real combat for the first time, Azadine was startled by the unexpected “feel” of it.

“Now!”

Seizing that opening, the Nagas thrust their spears at Azadine. But in that instant, Azadine released the hand holding the Azure Executioner.

His hand shifted naturally along the leather strap attached to the halberd’s end.

Azadine swung the Azure Executioner while gripping only the leather strap, throwing his whole body into the motion.

Scribing an even larger arc than his first swing, a blue afterglow swept out, and the heads of the charging Nagas were lopped off.

‘I’m not even holding the haft—just the leather strap—and it still shears bone! It costs a bit of mana, but what an excellent weapon.’

Even after that, power remained; the halberd, spinning as it sliced the air, flew back as if sucked into Azadine’s hand, and he caught it.

With just two swings, he mowed down Nagas and undead like fallen leaves in the wind; the Nagas—and even the watching Messengers—were aghast.

Meanwhile, while Azadine held the line, Arael cast powerful spells and destroyed the Nether servants the Nagas had summoned—the flesh-serpents.

As a result, they rescued the people with no particular losses, merely spending some arrows.

Even so, the four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon were furious at Azadine for initiating the rescue on his own.

“You bastard! Acting on your own!”

Indim looked ready to leap at Azadine, but Arael restrained him.

“There are still clansmen present.”

Addressing the Messengers who, unlike the Nagas, had not stepped forward and were watching loosely from the rear, Arael asked:

“Well? What do you intend to do?”

“We will….”

They were the very ones who had retched at the sight of humans being massacred. And when the beautiful Arael acted with haughty composure, they could not help but be overawed by her bearing.

Moreover, Arael’s prowess was peerless among the clan; even those who had not seen her firsthand knew she possessed fearsome ability and was called a living goddess.

“We’ll look the other way, Arael.”

“Will I believe that on words alone? Hand over your arrows.”

When Arael demanded it, the Messengers tossed her their quivers. Arael’s party, who had already used many arrows shooting at the Nagas, took the quivers.

“The treatment is quite different.”

Watching that, Ismail gave a wry chuckle.

Had Azadine taken the initiative, they might have turned hostile even if he had acted to save people.

But when the beautiful and renowned Arael unleashed the high magic of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon and seized the initiative, everyone gazed at her with eyes of admiration.

It was the kind of response possible only because she was a great beauty and already famed among the Messengers as a powerhouse.

Azadine understood why Ismail said as much and gave a bitter smile.

“Avoiding a fight when you can is best.”

“For saying that, weren’t you the one who picked the fight first? It was a fight we could have avoided.”

Ismail said that, but fell silent as he watched Azadine pick up a fallen baby’s swaddling cloth from the ground.

Azadine returned the child to the baby’s mother, who was trembling from the shock of near execution.

“Go. Quickly.”

“U-uuugh.”

The woman snatched up her child as if reclaiming it, then flinched away from Azadine, her body shaking. The terror of death and the shock of the gruesome slaughter sent tremors deep into her soul.

“Ungrateful wretches who can’t even say thank you!”

Aleph of the Wind approached Azadine, irritated.

“To them, the Nagas and the Messengers are allied. They can’t make sense of what they’re seeing.”

“So you acted on your own for the sake of ingrates like these?”

“Don’t dwell on it. We barely took any losses, right? If a few extra steps can save lives, it isn’t a bad bargain.”

“They’re the Hubris folk. If our places were reversed and we were in danger, they’d be the first to stone us.”

“By any chance, when you were little, did you have delusions that your mother actually meant to kill you?”

“What?”

“You seem to have a habit of interpreting things that haven’t happened in the worst possible way and beating yourself up.”

“You little— My seniority outranks yours, and you dare such insolence?!”

The four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon outranked Azadine in seniority and were in fact older.

The Messenger Clan and Aragasa had a tradition of caring about such hierarchical order between elder and younger—but that made Azadine’s provocation all the more effective.

Azadine still didn’t like Arael’s group, but for now they were among the few he could rely on; there was no benefit in needlessly souring their mood.

“Fine. I acted without a word—that was wrong in procedure. I apologize.”

“Easy to apologize with just your mouth.”

The four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon already disliked Azadine and seemed intent on using this chance to keep him in his place. But this was no time for that.

Far away, the Nagas at a distant spire noticed the disturbance and blew a conch-shell horn.

—Bwooooo!—

The blare was cacophonous.

“Damn! We’ve been spotted!”

“If you hadn’t done something useless, we wouldn’t have been!”

“No—we’d have been spotted once we got this far anyway. There are augury birds everywhere and wards laid down.”

“Don’t spew nonsense! It’s your fault!”

Though the four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon were incensed at Azadine’s glibness, they had no choice but to move quickly before enemies converged.

Azadine, Arael, and their party moved across the rooftops of Vthuma’s buildings.

The Messengers, nimble in movement, could run across rooftops as if they were flat ground, so even when Nagas or undead lunged at them, few could block their way.

The problem was the Messengers themselves. Apparently the mapping of Vthuma’s terrain had been finished, because Messengers had been stationed at every key point favorable for infiltration.

Yet no Messengers stood to block Azadine. They loosed a few half-hearted arrows, then backed off when his party approached, avoiding a clash. It was blatant shirking.

“It’s nice they’re not blocking us, but… why act like that?”

When Azadine wondered aloud, Seraph shrugged.

“It’s because Lord Arael’s renown is so high. Even if they sided with the Elders, they won’t want to stand in Arael’s way.”

Azadine eyed Seraph with skepticism.

‘He keeps scolding me as a youngster low in seniority, but he addresses Arael with scrupulous honor.’

It was hard to have a real discussion with the four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon, who held absolute loyalty to Arael. No matter what was said, everything circled back to expressing loyalty and favor toward Arael.

Arael herself, hearing this, spoke up.

“Seizing the thrones and usurping the kingdom—everyone agreed to that. But no one expected that to mean joining hands with the Nagas, committing mass slaughter of common folk, and summoning the Nether’s apostles. Whatever their hatred of the Hubris or internal frictions, no one actually wants to set the world ablaze and annihilate it.”

“In that case, you should purge the leader.”

“That’s difficult.”

“Why? I lived in the Sanctuary and barely ever saw the leader.”

Azadine had spent over ten years with Kazas as his disciple, yet he could count on his fingers the times he had seen the leader.

Leader Hathir had shut himself in and barely involved himself in Aragasa’s events—so how did he wield such powerful influence?

“Because he’s the one who supplies God’s blood to the Aragasa.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Most Elders have lived past a hundred and still maintain youthful looks. Do you know why? All of them inherit the blood of the leader, Hathir—the blood of Emperor Yaeslat.”

“What… are you sure?”

“Yes. That is precisely why I rose in rebellion. Because of my ‘exceptional’ birth, they told me to bear Leader Hathir’s child—as if they were bestowing a favor.”

Just speaking of it made Arael shudder, as if the nightmare day had returned.

“What?”

Azadine was taken aback by that.

If Arael’s birth was exceptional, Azadine’s could be called exceptional as well. Yet to him this was the first he had heard of such a thing.

“When was this?”

“When we were young—before the time I wounded you.”

“I see….”

Azadine rifled through old memories and was shocked.

So they had made such proposals to Arael openly, even when she and Azadine were still children?

“I will not be livestock. And I imagine many of the clan’s children yet to be born will not wish to be treated like livestock either. So from then on, I prepared for rebellion.”

Saying that, Arael glanced at her subordinates.

“Enough—pointless talk has gone on too long. Let’s keep moving. While the clansmen are shirking, we need to reach the thrones as quickly as possible. Right now, Hathir still likely hasn’t recovered the power he expended seizing the thrones.”

With that, Arael looked back at Azadine. As if she meant to say something—but she resigned herself and moved on.

‘What? Is she asking me to understand because complicated things happened when we were young? But….’

Hearing that Arael had also borne hardships he hadn’t known about, Azadine felt unsettled.