Even If The Light Is Lost (6)

Because Azadine and Arael were the children of the traitor Acre, whenever they criticized the Messenger Clan’s bad customs or outdated practices, their words were never taken fairly, so they were always at a disadvantage in arguments.

In this situation, support from Mediam of the Ethar bloodline became a great help—so, realizing he could not beat Mediam in words, Sion Ethar attempted a sneak attack.

Azadine knocked aside that ambush and fumed.

“You resort to force because you can’t win by words?! Have you no shame?”

Even at those words, Sion’s expression stayed calm.

“Sometimes, even by compulsory means, one must guide a child in the right direction.”

“Who guarantees that your ‘right direction’ is actually right?”

“Our clan’s many respected elders, of course. And you—who guarantees that you are right?”

“The cry of a mother who has lost her child! The blood of common folk running into this city’s drains!”

Sion Ethar felt no particular stirrings even at Azadine’s answer.

But the other Messengers were different. They felt ashamed at Azadine’s answer. From the start, they themselves had been dragged here by Sion Ethar like cattle to the slaughter.

Their hearts had already wavered when the Nagas began to massacre and ravage the city, and now Azadine’s forthright words and Mediam’s appeal drove straight into their chests. Even so, as long as Sion Ethar stood firm as an Elder, they had to stop Azadine.

Azadine choked up on his halberd like a tonfa. He meant to subdue his own people somehow without killing them.

However… if he swung this, could he truly subdue them all unharmed? He was wondering that when—

With a sound rending the air, a club came whirling in. From haft to tip it grew thicker, taking on the elegant form of a quarterstaff—a power staff.

Grimslone’s club had returned.

‘Ah.’

Seeing the club returning to him, Azadine laughed inwardly.

When he lost his hand, was defeated, and was thrown in prison, Grimslone’s minions had taken that club, their treasured weapon.

But the club’s master was still Azadine. From the moment he later awoke and commanded it to return to his hand, the club had left Grimslone’s cultists—who had fled far from Vthuma—and had flown ceaselessly toward Azadine until it finally arrived now.

“Back at just the right time.”

Azadine controlled the flying club of Grimslone, spinning it in midair. Spinning fast, it turned into a shield of light and shot forward.

“What in—what is that?!”

“A magic weapon?”

“Neat trick!”

The Aragasa stepped well back to avoid Azadine’s strike.

‘As expected, their reactions are nothing like ordinary soldiers’. Regular troops would be too busy getting pummeled to think.’

Among the Messenger Clan even the servants were masters of martial arts, so they were not easily taken down. Yet for those lacking the will to fight, this was also a convenient excuse.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

Sion Ethar rebuked those who were deliberately widening the distance from Azadine.

“Well, it’s the first time we’ve seen that.”

“We were… avoiding it.”

They offered excuses and dawdled.

“Fine. In that case….”

Azadine wanted to topple Sion Ethar quickly and free the Messengers who were fighting without true will.

But Arael, seeing that, warned him.

“No, Azadine! Ignore Sion—we head for the citadel!”

If he attacked Sion now, Sion would shove his men in front and evade, and they would get sucked into a horrific war of attrition. Even without a full explanation, those few words were enough; Azadine understood and stepped back.

But when Azadine withdrew, Sion stepped up and seized the reins of the attack.

‘Not so simple, are you?’

Indeed, that was the renowned Ethar bloodline for you—his skill in handling people was anything but ordinary.

Counting the Naga army, the undead, and even the Nether servants they had brought, more than a hundred monsters swarmed across this cleared ground. Add the Aragasa to that, and for the ten or so in Arael and Azadine’s party, it was essentially a death sentence.

However.

“Now—those with ears, stop them up! Unless you want your souls stolen by the language of darkness!”

Arael began to cry out in the Nether tongue. Then the eyes that had sprouted from the shadows stirred and blocked the Nagas’ undead approaching from the rear.

The Nagas also commanded Nether servants—but their lineage differed from Arael’s. The bloodline of the King of Storms and the bloodline of the King of Eyes that Arael used clashed, and bizarre sounds rang out. The sickening noises of maws rummaging through the living’s entrails set everyone trembling.

“Now!”

The four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon used the opening Arael created, darted across the cleared ground, and headed for the fortress. The Aragasa in the fortress tried to block them, but the renown of the four was no empty boast.

Seraph and Aleph cut a path at the front with their swords, and Janis scattered a poison mist to drive the enemy back.

When Dimia cast a spell, wooden vines sprouted to form steps and ladders, opening an easy way forward, and in other spots she conjured thorny vines to block enemy entry.

It was truly astounding prowess. Azadine, who only imitated Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon through the Kazas Grimoire, could not help but envy such skill.

“Arael?!”

When Azadine looked back at Arael, she was actively wielding Nether magic. Uttering a language too horrible for humans to describe, she summoned Nether fiends—but each time, parts of her flesh tried to change into Nether creatures.

Each time, Arael used an obsidian dagger to slice off her own flesh and stave off the mutation.

“What are you doing, Azadine? Go! Even I can’t hold this whole army alone… ptooi!”

Arael spat blood again.

Each use of Nether magic damaged her body. Yet without the Nether, she could not alone stop the hundred-odd Messengers and retainers, plus more than triple that number of Nagas and undead and the Nether servants the Nagas had summoned.

“Kh!”

Watching Arael’s struggle, Azadine swiftly took Mediam and Ismail and dashed across the cleared ground. Compared to the four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon, Mediam and Ismail lagged behind again and again, so Azadine had to cover them.

Batting away the rain of arrows and meeting the spells with his own peculiar anti-magic resilience, Azadine, too, vaulted the fortress.

“Arael!”

“Right!”

Arael turned her body and all but flew across the cleared ground, breaking through the fortress. Her movement was like a swallow skimming the surface of a pond.

But Arael’s condition could hardly be called good. She was soaked in blood head to toe—not from enemy blows, but as the price for using the Nether’s power herself.

“Whew. Is everyone safe?”

“Yes!”

In contrast to Arael, the four of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon—and even the servants they’d brought—were all unscathed.

“……”

Azadine looked at blood-drenched Arael.

“I’m fine. This much will heal soon.”

“Heal soon… you?”

Amazingly, it was true. The wounds where she had cut away her flesh with the obsidian dagger were closing rapidly before Azadine’s eyes. It resembled the green-mana magic Shati used.

“Whew. See?”

“Are you sure you’re okay? The wounds look shut, but you seem badly spent.”

“That’s why I need you, Azadine.”

“What?”

“Azadine—you will be the one to kill the leader. I’ll open the way to him, but the leader must be slain by you.”

“That’s absurd. Leave such a task to us.”

Indim of the Moon flared up.

“To kill the leader is the highest honor! However much Azadine is Lady Arael’s brother, he has hardly contributed to us—granting him that glory would be wrong.”

Arael gave a wry smile at Indim’s claim.

At that moment, Azadine felt a creepy tug, as if someone had yanked his hair. The Emperor’s Voice sent a warning.

[Danger! Azadine! It comes from the citadel!]

“What?!”

At that instant, birds rose all at once from the trees near the royal citadel. In sudden urgency, the Emperor’s Voice possessed the birds nearby and formed a living barrier.

—Thud!—

Feathers scattered like rainfall.

Leader Hathir had not been waiting idly in the royal citadel. Knowing Arael and Azadine’s party was approaching, he went out personally to intercept them.

But he had not expected the Emperor’s Voice to muster everything to protect them, even against the costly Shadowsteel Blades. Having lost the advantage of surprise, Hathir exited the citadel with the Elders and faced Azadine’s party outside the walls.

Then Shadowsteel Blades flew toward the Elders in turn. Azadine’s group scooped up the fallen blades—and used the ones they had prepared in advance—to counterattack the Elders.

“Sanctuary—unfold!”

Hathir used the magic of a king. He drew on the white mana of the King’s Church, which served the Yaegas God-King, and…

“Moonlit Cedar!”

He used the magic of Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon, and…

“……”

He used the Nether tongue—all to block every incoming Shadowsteel Blade. Both sides exhausted their supply of blades as they closed the distance until they could see each other clearly.

“The more I hear, the more laughable this is. You dare to bandy about my life.”

Hathir regarded Arael and Azadine’s party, who had approached to kill him, with a bitter smile.

He had deployed quite a number of clansmen to that forward position, yet had not expected them to preserve so many Shadowsteel Blades. Normally they should have wasted piles of them, fought continual skirmishes, and stood before him battered and ruined.

The fact that they were this intact was proof that the clansmen had not heeded his will and had deliberately shirked.

‘The baseborn will be baseborn, it seems.’

As Hathir thought thus—

“Azadine….”

Elder Kazas, standing at Hathir’s side, knit his brows when he saw Azadine, whose hand had been restored.

“Neatly done. To restore a hand—so even lopping off an arm won’t stop you.”

“Master.”

Azadine’s party had avoided the storm of Shadowsteel Blades thanks to the Emperor’s Voice.

Shrouded in darkness while in flight, those arrows became hard to see and only revealed themselves when they neared their targets.

A perfect ambush—an attack even the Messengers could not predict—but thanks to the Emperor’s Voice, they had been able to escape it.

“Why, Master?”

“What do you mean?”

“How do you possess the will to kill me for Hathir’s sake? Do I mean so little to you?”

Azadine pressed him openly—like a child suffering favoritism confronting a parent to demand why they love another more than him.

It was a strange experience for Kazas.

‘He wasn’t like this before.’

Azadine had always taken what was given to him as more than he deserved. He had accepted Aldis’s kindness and Kazas’s teaching as things not originally his, receiving them only with humbled gratitude.

Most likely, abused by others, he had rated himself low and prostrated himself.

But now Azadine demanded it proudly—

—that he was worthy of his master’s love.

‘So you are, my disciple.’

To Kazas, Azadine was a beloved pupil. And yet…