Ceramite (3)

“The Shade Hags put a bounty on your neck, Sir Azadine.”

“Are you trying to fight? Fine by me.”

Azadine drew Aurelia Dawn. The blade flared, pouring out golden light, but dense fog and darkness suddenly surged in from all sides.

As the manor’s interior was swallowed by darkness, only the wights and Sir Sork’s spectral flame glimmered. The light from Azadine’s sword was tangled in shadow and could not be seen properly.

“Ghk?!”

Selim drew his axe and looked around. The wights—scattered, then gathered again—were now on all sides, smacking their lips as they stared at them.

“Now then, an ambush like this wouldn’t be any fun, would it? You’re guests who came to my manor on your own feet, after all. Crushing you with superior numbers feels tasteless. So I’ll face you myself.”

Part of the darkness peeled back, and Sir Sork stepped forward to stand before Azadine.

“An imperial messenger, and a knight, Azadine, who received the final investiture of the Wisdom Knight Sir Plank.”

“You knew that too?”

“The Shade Hags told me. Hah—what is it about you that’s different, that you, unlike me, earned such glory?”

“…….”

Surprisingly, what Sir Sork showed Azadine was jealousy.

He envied the fact that Azadine was the subject of Sir Plank’s prophecy.

‘I never thought my life would become something someone envied.’

It was a life with more pain than joy. But to the undead before him, even that might have been something worth envying.

“Show me, then. The power of the knight of destiny.”

“You’ll see it whether you want to or not.”

Azadine charged and swung his sword at Sork.

A lightning-fast strike flew for Sork’s neck, but Sork did not evade—he thrust his own sword into Azadine instead.

Swordsmanship or not, if undead Sork and Azadine skewered each other, the living Azadine would lose out.

‘Hmph!’

Among the monsters Azadine had faced, this was the one who understood his own nature best.

Even so, Azadine knocked aside Sir Sork’s blade and went for his throat.

—Screeech!

Azadine’s foot slipped.

‘Damn….’

Sir Sork was stronger than expected. Worse, Azadine’s strength was weakening.

Azadine’s physical power was the result of synergy between bodily strength and the mana of Kazas Grimoire. But this darkness was interfering with Azadine’s mana.

“Impressive. As expected of the knight of destiny.”

Sir Sork marveled as he rubbed the mark Azadine’s blade had left on his armor’s gorget.

‘Damn it. That armor is absurdly tough. Aurelia Dawn’s edge is too soft.’

If it were an azure-steel longsword, it would be different, but a ceramite longsword had a softer edge. Normally, Azadine could break that armor with Aurelia Dawn, but with the darkness suppressing his mana, it was difficult.

“Now then, is that all? Show me more, Azadine—imperial messenger and knight of destiny!”

“Stop calling me by those grandiose names, Sir Sork!”

Azadine raised Aurelia Dawn and dove in again.

Sork chanted, pointed his left hand to the ground, then snapped it upward at Azadine as if rolling a ball.

Bone blades formed along the floor and surged at Azadine.

Azadine sprang over them and, in an instant, used Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon—Twilight Step to change his angle of entry.

—Kang!

From behind Sork, Azadine’s blade went for his neck, but Sork raised an arm and caught the strike.

“A fine trick, but regrettab—.”

“Burn!”

Aurelia Dawn blazed with dazzling gold, cutting Sork off mid-sentence.

Flames boiled up in an instant, and the blade melted. Liquefied fire streamed down Sir Sork’s arm and slammed into his entire body.

Golden flames like molten lead scorched Sork’s body.

“Kraaaagh!”

Sork screamed and began to thrash.

A perfect chance to press the attack. But Aurelia Dawn’s blade had become liquid metal, burning through Sork’s body.

Azadine swiftly lifted Moon Horn Bows, set the string, and loaded Blue Sun Farewell, shooting Sork’s head, heart, and the waist that served as the central axis of his striking power.

Blue Sun Farewell punched through the armor and buried itself deep—thunk, thunk, thunk.

“Good. Azure steel goes right through!”

Azadine grabbed an azure-steel dagger and moved to deliver the final blow to Sir Sork.

But something felt off.

‘Why are his underlings so quiet?’

Even as Sir Sork screamed in agony, the wights only watched.

Was this not a threat to him?

‘He said he was a lich, right? An immortal who hid his life elsewhere, so he won’t die from this. But even so, he shouldn’t welcome having his body torn apart.’

Azadine stayed wary of Sork, hooked the azure-steel dagger onto the bowstring, and fired.

The dagger flew fast and lodged in Sir Sork’s neck.

Then Azadine’s kick struck the dagger’s hilt, ripping Sir Sork’s throat open.

“Krk!”

Sir Sork staggered, screaming, his neck severed.

“Ku…ahahahahahaha.”

But the staggering body suddenly spun as if dancing—and laughed.

“Ah! Pain! This sweet pain!”

Sork felt rapture, not suffering, even as his body burned.

“I’d forgotten for so long! The cold and heat of flesh! Pain! So even a lich can feel pain from ceramite’s holy flames! How delightful! Yes—this is it. This is enough skill!”

“…You’re awfully relaxed. Sure, you’ve got a big torso because you’re an orc, but at that rate you won’t last long.”

Sir Sork’s neck had fallen away, and Aurelia Dawn’s liquefied blade clung to his whole body, charring flesh.

Aurelia Dawn kept burning; even the armor’s surface was scorching with a sharp hiss.

More than half his body was already burned away, yet Sir Sork calmly laughed and cast a spell.

“First, let me return this to you!”

In that instant, Aurelia Dawn sprang off Sir Sork’s body.

Azadine immediately seized Aurelia Dawn’s hilt and blocked the pouring liquefied metal with the hilt itself.

The blade re-formed, returning Aurelia Dawn to its original shape, but—

“Haha!”

Sir Sork rushed in and stabbed at Azadine. Even with half his body burned away, twisting grotesquely as he ran, he still laughed as he came—an eerie sight.

As Azadine dodged before he could fully restore his sword, Sir Sork’s kick slammed into Azadine’s body.

“Azadine!”

Selim gasped, but Azadine rode the force and landed atop the chandelier in the corridor. He had jumped off Sir Sork’s kick, dispersing its power.

“Haha! Impressive! I underestimated you. Now I’ll face you properly.”

Sork lifted his head and set it back atop his neck.

“Up to now you’ve been getting beaten one-sidedly. Isn’t that too much bluffing? If you were a normal human, you’d have died five times already.”

Azadine sneered, but he felt Sir Sork’s aura shift in an instant.

In truth, even what he had faced so far made Sir Sork an overwhelmingly formidable foe—one of the strongest Azadine had ever fought.

“Rest easy, Sir Azadine. I wanted to savor your skill in full. I acknowledge your swordsmanship and hand-to-hand are above mine. But I was originally a mage.”

Sir Sork said so and cast a spell. Magical rune letters rose and vanished around his body.

“Shall we do this properly?”

Crimson ominous stars floated around Sir Sork’s body.

—Deep-Crimson Starlight!

A crimson baleful star fired a red beam at Azadine. Startled, Azadine swung the chandelier and flipped through the air, dodging the beams.

“If you widen the distance, it’ll be dangerous, won’t it?”

“You don’t need to worry—I’ve got more than enough!”

Azadine used Flowers, Birds, Wind, Moon—Twilight Step to blink back in an instant, slamming his blade into Sir Sork’s neck and arm.

—Riposte Shock!

The moment the blade struck, a field of force formed around Sork’s body, and an electric shock hammered Azadine.

“Kgh?!”

As the retaliatory lightning paralyzed Azadine, Sir Sork twisted and slashed at him. There was no room to evade, so Azadine blocked with Aurelia Dawn.

—Boom!

Azadine’s body slammed into the wall as if launched from a catapult, and from beyond the wall of darkness, wights’ claws shot out and raked his back and the nape of his neck.

Azadine’s cloth armor stopped most of it, but part of a claw gouged his cheek, drawing blood.

“Ahh! I can’t stand it!”

“How sweet!”

In the darkness, the wights’ eyes gleamed as they licked the blood off their claws with crimson tongues, delighted.

“…Tch!”

Azadine cut down the wights closing in with Aurelia Dawn and forced himself upright.

But he was in bad shape. Just blocking Sir Sork’s attack head-on was more than his body could endure.

“I know you’re hungry, but don’t entertain a guest like that. He’s the famed subject of prophecy of the Rescue Knights Order, after all.”

Sir Sork laughed as he walked toward Azadine.

“Didn’t you say you’d fight without your underlings?”

“True, but Dilia seems to like you. How about becoming my subordinate and taking her as your wife?”

“Damn it! Sir Azadine!”

Selim tried to rush in to help, but claws burst from the darkness, targeting him.

Selim swung his axe and resisted, but darkness soon coiled around his body, and his reactions visibly slowed.

Meanwhile, the wights moved within the darkness like the fog itself, slicing Selim with sharp claws.

“You bastards!”

Selim smashed wights by headbutting them and crushing them with his axe, but their attacks also landed, wounding him.

The problem was that even when shattered, the wights regenerated within the darkness.

From the start, within this darkness, Sir Sork and his followers were nearly invincible. Fighting here at all had been a mistake.

‘I’d been winning too much and underestimated my opponent. Even though I knew the fame of the Fimbulhorde!’