Chapter 35: Darkness and Light

Part 1

A one-year gap.

Everything felt off after she had been bedridden for a year during the Cataclysm. The current world was visibly different from the world that Ianna had once known.

It was almost like heaven and earth had swapped places.

The geography was all jumbled up, and the world itself felt different. The working notion of common sense had naturally changed as well. Most of the notions that Ianna still carried had become worthless.

Accordingly, she now had a mountain of work to do. She needed to study her physical condition, adapt to the changed world, pick up new knowledge, help rebuild her kingdom, and prepare to do battle against the Bahamut imperial family.

First and foremost, however, Ianna locked herself up in her personal training grounds, where none could enter freely, without telling anyone that she had returned. She planned to travel around the world once she had finished inspecting her physical condition.

And as for the reason why she was doing this instead of telling everyone that she was finally awake…….

According to Arhad, the people who had witnessed Ianna in such a terrible state last year had grown depressed and anxious about the future, though they did not let it show. The same was true of their people, who had heard news of the disaster.

Ianna was both Ex-knights’ strongest knight and her pillar of emotional support. If Arhad was everyone’s symbolic leader who was difficult to approach, then Ianna was like the flag in the vanguard whom everyone followed after in practice. She was also their undefeatable guardian god who would never crumble no matter the enemy.

The Bahamut Empire had lorded over the human’s continent and had led many wars for eons. And her cruel imperial family had kidnapped, murdered, used, and tortured the mythical races, who had gone into hiding in the four corners.

They had found the courage to push back against Bahamut because Ianna and Arhad had been with them. They had fought their best in their belief that they would emerge victorious in the end no matter how long the war lasted.

But Ianna had been defeated by the Bahamut imperial family. She had been ambushed when she had least expected it, but it still remained an undeniable fact that she had fallen, and the Bahamut emperor had become an unmanageable monster while Ianna had been comatose.

It was only natural that the people were lost. They adjusted to the world after the Cataclysm and continued to safeguard their kingdom from Bahamut under Arhad’s command, but they were anxious and discouraged in a corner of their hearts. The blackish sea of terror, which had been lapping at their feet, had surged up to their throats and was threatening to swallow them whole.

When would Ianna wake up?

Would they be able to defend Ex-knights from Bahamut until then?

No. Would they be able to defeat the monster that was Bahamut even if Ianna woke up?

A small seed of mistrust had sprouted in the firm and blind faith they’d once had in Ianna’s strength. There were even rumors circulating that suggested that Ianna wasn’t simply unconscious but rather dead. Arhad had dismissed those rumors by declaring that she was merely asleep, but the anxiety had only continued to grow.

Ianna had decided not to reveal that she was awake and alive too rashly because she understood all this. Her first priority was to grasp the situation, so she had to keep quiet for now because things would become noisy and there would be no way for her to traverse the world peacefully if she told everyone that she was back.

The rumors would also reach the Bahamut imperial family, who were apparently focusing on growing stronger as of late, and she might be forced to face them before she was fully prepared. This was something that she must avoid at all costs.

‘Let’s take things slow.’

One step at a time. Slowly and steadily.

Then, she would be able to reach her enemy while in perfect condition.

Ianna took in the view of her personal training grounds with clear eyes.

The aura of chaos had enveloped the entire world like a curtain of darkness, but only Ex-knights, under Arhad’s protection, had been graced with the light of spring. The new leaves dangling from the tree branches and the new grasses coming up from the earth dyed Ianna’s red eyes with their yellowish-green light.

Ianna sat down on the ground.

The dirt began crawling up to her thighs, and the moisture in the air began clinging to her cheeks. The sun’s burning heat sat patiently on her red hair, and the wind blew in from somewhere and scattered her hair strands.

Ianna could feel how eager they were.

The spirits were calling to her.

“I’ll call you guys soon,”

she said lovingly, and the nature swirling around her fell silent once more.

“Phew.”

Ianna steadied her breathing and withdrew deeply into herself.

Her body was in good condition. Her weakness had gone away after a good night’s rest by Arhad’s side.

Ianna began to inspect her soul next. She needed to learn more about her newfound ‘power.’ Her will had reached the peak and had transformed into her ‘power’ during that incident. Ianna already knew what it was on an instinctive level, but she still needed to understand it properly.

Buzzzzz…….

Ianna pulled out some of the massive stores of divine power she had inside her heart. Her heart was beating pleasantly.

Then, Ianna looked up at one of the highest hanging branches of a faraway tree.

‘Rend it.’

Diagonally, from the upper-right to the lower-left.

Swish. Thud.

The branch fell to the earth. It had also been cut in exactly the same direction that she had been thinking. It had been cut cleanly even though she hadn’t lifted a single finger and had only thought about cutting it.

Shaaa.

A breeze scattered several leaves into the air.

Ianna observed the leaves and thought of a more complicated trajectory.

Pshhhh.

The leaves were sliced into pieces in exactly the same trajectories that Ianna had been thinking. They had been Rent in accordance to her will.

The amount of divine power she had inside her heart vanished by a nearly unnoticeable amount. Her heart was racing in its excitement at the fact that Ianna had manifested her power for the first time ever.

Ianna’s power was to ‘Rend.’

Ianna had materialized the power to Rend because she had strongly wished to protect Arhad, just like how Roberstein had been granted the power of Judgment because she had strongly felt that it was her life’s mission to maintain equilibrium as the strongest god.

Rending was the power to cut down ‘something’ that ‘existed’ within Ianna’s ‘range.’

Ianna’s range was the fullest range that her sword could reach and attack —in other words, her sword’s range. It didn’t matter what her target was so long as it existed inside her range. If the Truth existed inside her range, then she could even Rend apart the Truth itself. And with nothing but her will.

Her power was simple and direct, but it was also dangerous. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that the space within Ianna’s range was her ‘absolute space.’

But it also had very clear limits.

First, Ianna’s power to Rend didn’t kill her targets but cut them, just as it said on the tin, and created a moment’s opening for her.

It could dominate anything that was ‘physical.’ After all, all living creatures died if their hearts were pierced or their heads were cut off.

But it could only momentarily stun things that were ‘astral,’ like souls, or that related to the ‘Truth,’ like the Balance. These were not things that would disappear just because they had been sliced to pieces. Souls could exist in fragmented pieces and return to being whole, and the Truth could restore itself quickly even if Ianna created a moment’s opening in it. This was what had happened inside the Balance’s plane.

Second, Ianna could not use her power freely against powerful enemies because it cost too much.

She was fine with Rending small things. Her heart was still beating energetically, and her divine power had decreased by only such a small amount that it was hardly even noticeable. But trying to Rend something that could not ordinarily be cut or a powerful individual with a lot of resistance came with great risks. For example, she’d need an adamantine heart and an astronomical amount of divine power if she wanted to Rend the Balance, the greatest Truth.

‘But I no longer have Roberstein’s heart.’

Ianna’s heart was not as sturdy as a god’s. She didn’t have an infinite supply of divine power anymore either. She would end up burning through her entire life if she ever tried to use her power to Rend the Balance again.

This was also true when it came to Rending Taylon Helkan Bahamut.

The Balance was powerful, but it had no will. Taylon, on the other hand, was not only a mighty foe but also possessed a powerful ego that could resist Ianna’s power. Unique abilities tended not to work on those with ego’s that were as strong as or stronger than the user’s. In that sense, it was possibly more difficult for Ianna to use her power against Taylon than it was for her to use it on the Balance.

Ianna calmly finished reviewing all her power’s weaknesses before she then moved onto its strengths.

Her power had its uses despite its weaknesses. It allowed her to cut things with her will alone even if she didn’t have a sword, and, if you ignored the amount of divine power it consumed and the burden it imposed on her heart, it was a power completely free from the Balance that belonged to her and only her.

‘My power to Rend is the greatest incarnation of the goal that I’m trying to reach.’

This was what Ianna concluded after she had finished analyzing her power.

‘But it isn’t the peak that I’m trying to reach in and of itself.’

The stage at which she could cut down her targets with her will alone without consuming divine power or imposing any burden on her heart. The level at which she could exist in this world as a sword that was freed from any and all limits.

This was the true absolute peak that Ianna strived to reach.

‘My power is nothing more than the process I can take to get there. Besides, I’ve already experienced the peak before.’

Ianna recalled how she had Rent the Balance while saving Arhad. Her heart hadn’t been ruined, and her divine power hadn’t been consumed either. It had simply been that her body and soul hadn’t been able to persist because she had transcended past her limits to reach a level beyond them while both her stamina and focus were exhausted.

Moreover, though she couldn’t remember it well, she had also ultimately succeeded in Rending the Balance after wielding her sword inside the Balance’s plane without realizing how much time was passing. But she could recall that last moment vividly.

Ianna had not used her power during these two instances.

‘That was solely my [sword].’

It was a miracle that she had reached because she had been cornered into a desperate situation with no one to help her. Her power was nothing more than the result of her heart’s record of the experience.

‘I reached it.’

Her ecstasy surged up to her throat.

Ianna couldn’t quite remember how she had managed it at the time because she hadn’t been in her right mind back then, but she had tasted the peak once and she intuited that it wouldn’t take very long before she could reach it again. She would never need to fear anything ever again once she did.

‘I’ll take note of my power for reference and only use it when I truly need it.’

Ianna finished organizing her thoughts, stood up, and brushed off the dirt on her bottom.

It was time to see how the world had changed now.

Arhad had agreed to buy her enough time to prepare her body and adjust to the world. It was precious time that she dared not waste.

Buzz…….

Ianna wrapped herself tightly in her robes and activated the magic in her ring out of habit. Was it because Taylon also possessed the right to control the mana now? The mana resisted her for a moment.

But Ianna was still Ianna. She was the person whom Arhad loved so fervently. It didn’t take long before the mana gave up resisting her and began to obey her will. Her eye-catchingly crimson hair was transformed into an ordinary brown.

Ianna summoned the spirits before she climbed down the mountain.

[Ianna!]

The spirits were violently happy as they clung to her arms, legs, and head.

[We missed you so much!]

[We’ve been waiting for you to come back!]

[We’ve been waiting for you to call us ever since you woke up!]

Towe continuously crumbled apart and rebuilt himself, Innis had tears dribbling down from his eyes, Shweia was flapping his wings, and Kagomyne was wagging his tail like crazy.

[Uwaaaah!]

[It’s Ianna! It’s really Ianna!]

Ianna was also very happy, sorry, and grateful.

She gathered the spirits together and pulled them into her arms.

“I’m happy to see you guys again too.”

She squeezed. Then, she continued,

“I’m sorry for worrying you. And I’m so grateful for you guys too.”

She choked with emotion as she watched the spirits be so purely happy that their hearts were filled to the brim. She liked the spirits for making her feel this way. No, she didn’t need a reason —she simply liked her pure-hearted friends.

“I really like you guys.”

The spirits startled. This was the first time that Ianna had spoken about her feelings so directly. And they melted into mush as they felt the warm sincerity in her words.

Ianna hugged the spirits tight as she thought,

I’m so glad. I’m so glad that the world changed.

I’m so, so glad.

She had done a lot of thinking as she had rested after reuniting with Arhad. She had thought about the spirits too.

She had thought that she wouldn’t be able to summon the spirits very often anymore now that she no longer had an infinite supply of divine power.

The thought had made her sad. It had hurt her, and it had tormented her. But it wasn’t because this meant that she could no longer borrow their powers. The simple fact that she might not be able to see the adorable and affectionate spirits as often had brought her sorrow.

And that was when she had realized it.

I really like the spirits a lot.

Ianna hadn’t known this back when she had been able to summon the spirits whenever she so desired, and her mood had plummeted as she suddenly realized that she felt this way only after she learning that there was now a limit to how many more times she could summon them. Arhad had asked her what was wrong, and she had answered him candidly.

Then, Arhad had replied,

The world is different now from what you remember.

It’s becoming a world where the spirits can linger here for as long as they please.

“I heard that you guys think you’ll be able to walk the earth as you please soon even if no one summons you?”

[Yeah. The amount of nature’s divine power in the world is increasing exponentially.]

Then, Innis sonorously exclaimed,

[And we’re able to use it!]

The spirits were restricted in that they could not produce their own divine power in exchange for having the great power to control nature. That was why they had only been able to survive if someone else supplied them with divine power.

But the world had changed after the Demon’s heart had vanished.

[Nature’s divine power flowed all over the world in the past too, but we weren’t able to use it for our powers. This was not only because the Demon’s powerful influence shrouded the entire world but also because we had to consume all of nature’s divine power just to maintain the world and our souls.]

[But’s there’s more divine power now that the Demon’s heart disappeared and the Cataclysm happened, and there’s enough for us to use actively. And there’s only going to be more as time passes!]

The divine power of nature had become clearer and more abundant, just as the spirits had suggested. And the spirits were able to use it. This meant that they could consume the divine power of nature at will and be active in the physical plane.

[We can’t move about freely just yet, but we’ll be able to stay by your side even if you don’t summon us like this once there’s a little more divine power in the world.]

“Will you be able to use your powers freely too?”

[No. We can’t use nature’s divine power for our abilities. We can use it to travel all over the world, but we can’t use it to influence the world. And there are still other restrictions on us using nature’s divine power too. We don’t know what they are just yet, but we probably won’t be able to intervene with the world too freely since our powers are too strong.]

[Someone needs to supply us with their divine power, like before, if we want to use our powers. In other words, people will still need to consume their own divine power and get our consent before they can borrow our powers.]

[But a whole lot of different people are trying to get to know us now.]

Shweia brushed his tail feathers coyly. He seemed oddly excited as he flapped his wings.

[There’s so much of nature’s divine power in the world now that people can collect it in their own hearts and make it their own by meditating. A lot of humans have been trying to summon us after people from the other races taught them how.]

“Humans?”

[Yeah. Mana’s under Arhad’s and Bahamut’s control now, but divine power can be used freely even if it’s harder to control, so a lot of people are trying it out. But we’re not friendly with just anyone. We only let people summon us if we like them.]

[Right! Anyone who wants to walk with us needs to love nature. They can’t be evil, and their divine power needs to be tasty too!]

[Teeheehee. We love the way the world has changed. We don’t need to just wait for people to summon us like before. We won’t be lonely! It’ll be fun!]

[There are so many new and interesting things out there. The beings that live in this world are so smart, passionate, and amazing.]

[I hope those Bahamut bastards go away soon. They’re destroying nature and everything else that’s in their path. They’re even worse than the Demon.]

Ianna, who had been listening quietly as the spirits chatted, suddenly said,

“Right. The world changed quite a lot while I was asleep.”

[It really did.]

[Yeah…….]

The spirits suddenly stopped talking and stole glances at Ianna. They felt like they had been having too much fun chatting away while Ianna was getting anxious because of her absence.

“I don’t really know how the world has changed quite yet. So, I’m planning to travel around the world and see for myself.]

Ianna gathered the spirits in her arms and stood up. She continued,

“Will you guys come with me? I’d like to see the world with you.”

[Of course!]

the spirits clamored happily. They continued,

[We know a whole lot of things! We heard a lot as we travelled too. We’ll teach you anything you don’t know.]

[We’ll help you, like we always have.]

[The world might’ve changed, but that fact that you’re our friend will never change!]

Ianna smiled as she began to climb down the mountain.

~~*~~

The world had truly changed a lot.

The first thing that Ianna had noticed when she had woken up was that the auras of the world had changed so much that it had changed how the spirits’ ecology worked.

According to the information that Arhad had given her, the aura in the world was now comprised of 70% mana and 30% divine power. But the ratio tipped more in favor of divine power by the day because the divine power of nature only continued increasing.

Next, there were a lot of people who could sense divine power now, though not has many as those who could sense mana. But unlike mana, the age ranges of those who could sense divine power was very broad. It didn’t matter how old someone was, and both very young children and very old elders could sense divine power.

Ianna had been shocked to learn that ordinary people could sense divine power because it was something that she hadn’t been able to sense until she had grown incredibly strong. Though controlling it was another story entirely, of course.

It was also possible to gather the divine power of nature inside your own heart. In other words, you could always absorb and refill your supply of divine power after consuming it. This was welcomed news.

In summary, divine power was an innovative substitute for mana. There was a lot of debate over where it came from as of late, or something like that? Some claimed that God Laos’ power was shining down on earth in the form of light through the sun, and others claimed that it was being generated spontaneously from nature itself.

‘They’re both kind of wrong.’

In truth, the divine power of nature was the aura that flowed down into the world from Laos’ heart inside the Balance’s plane, which was a higher dimension. And a lot of it poured out from the sun in particular through a Law that Laos had determined.

According to dimensional theory, the 0^th dimension was a point, the 1^st dimension was a line, the 2^nd dimension was a flat plane, and the 3^rd dimension was a solid object.

But what happened if a being from a higher dimension got involved with a lower dimension?

For example, say there was a 2-dimensional world that was composed of a single flat plane. Height did not exist in this world. Any beings who lived in this world could only move from right to left or forward and backward.

If a 3-dimensional being, who was looking down at the 2-dimensional world, suddenly dropped an object onto the 2-dimensional world, then that object would appear in the 2-dimensional world seemingly out of nowhere.

The 4^th dimension was the dimension of spacetime, which included the spacetimes of progress and retrogress, and then came the Akashic Records, and beyond that was the Balance’s plane. In other words, the Akashic Records could impact the spacetimes of progress and retrogress, and the Balance’s plane, the highest dimension, could impact every dimension below it.¹

But this logic did not work the other way around. This was why Arhad had been unable to locate Ianna while she had been inside the Akashic Records during the incident with Wiffheimer.

This was the logic that the divine power of nature used to appear in the world. Laos’ divine power was actually flowing into the dimension of progress from the Balance’s plane, but the people could only perceive that it had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

‘I’ve really learned a lot, haven’t I?’

Ianna was able to learn about a lot more in great detail as she rummaged through Roberstein’s memories of the second half of the Holy Age.

The Balance had brought Roberstein to the Akashic Records, and to the center of the Akashic Records in particular, when she had asked it to take her somewhere Roygen couldn’t find her while she had been pregnant with Laos.

The Akashic Records was a spacetime of stillness where time flowed but didn’t seem to be flowing because the flows of progress and retrogress were jumbled into each other. Roberstein had been able to watch over the afterlife from there.

The gods had been terrified of death. This was because they did not know what existed at the end of death, which they called extinction.

But the souls of beings who died in the dimension of progress didn’t go extinct but instead arrived in the world of souls through the dimension of retrogress. Their karma was weighed once they arrived, and then they prepared to rest, go extinct, or reincarnate. Death was not the end.

And the whole process took place using the divine power that ‘something’ was producing from the very center of the Akashic Records.

Roberstein had not known what that ‘something’ was. She had simply assumed that something special existed there because she had noticed that it was producing divine power.

Roberstein had learned a lot about the truths of the world during her stay in the Akashic Records.

The Akashic Records was a treasure trove of knowledge. It was all jumbled up, but everything that had happened in the world ever since the Genesis —that is, ever since the beginning of time— was recorded there. Roberstein spent her time reading those records and learning about everything she wanted to know as she waited for Laos to be born.

The records that had left the deepest impression on her were the records about birth.

A mother could become pregnant after sexual intercourse, and then, after a gestational period, a new god with a completely new fragment of chaos who took equally after both parents would be born.

A process that created something from nothing.

Such was the miracle of birth.

And the gods avoided it like the plague.

A fetus would take a lot of divine power from its mother while developing in her womb during the Holy Age. It not only blindly sucked away divine power from its mother, but it also made its mother incredibly weak until it was born. And so, giving birth to a new god required tremendous sacrifice from the mother.

This was why the gods had so fiercely rejected birth. And the Holy Age and become an age without birth because the gods could live forever and had not needed descendants in order to prosper.

Roberstein had learned why birth had required the consumption of so much divine power during her stay in the Akashic Records.

First and foremost, the mother must create the baby god’s fragment of chaos in accordance to the law of heredity. This meant that the mother must break off and take away a part of the ‘something’ that existed at the Akashic Records’ origin point.

But there was an incredibly strong contractile force at play at the Akashic Records’ origin point, and beating it back consumed a tremendous amount of the mother’s divine power. This was why Phaemdra had consumed so much divine power while dragging the chaos fragments up into the world during the ancient past.

And there were still additional problems at play even after the mother had successfully created her baby’s fragment of chaos with great difficulty. Once a soul with a similar wavelength to the mother’s was connected to the fetus’ heart, then the mother must once again consume a tremendous amount of divine power to bring that soul to the fetus’ heart.

And even after all that, the mother must then continue to consume even more divine power so that the baby god inside her womb could develop. This was why the process of birth consumed so much divine power.

In other words, a soul lingering in the Akashic Records needed help from its mother, who lived in the dimension of progress, in order to reach the dimension of progress.

Roberstein thought that the process of birth was terribly inefficient.

A baby was still technically a stranger to its mother. It was no wonder why the gods rejected birth —it required them to sacrifice so much for a complete stranger. Why would they give birth to a baby when they could spend the rest of their eternal lives comfortably otherwise?

‘But we give birth anyway because children are the fruit of our love.

‘Should I really be giving birth to this child? The world is in such a mess.

‘But I don’t want to get rid of it. I want to give birth.

‘But what will Roygen think if he sees his child?

‘Ahh, what am I supposed to do?’

Roberstein and agonized and anguished all throughout her pregnancy, and her many thoughts and emotions had influenced the fetus inside her womb.

And eventually, she had given birth to Laos.

Surprisingly, the child had been born with a tremendous ability to produce divine power. And he also had a power even greater than Roberstein’s.

The power to change every Truth in the world…….

Ianna left Roberstein’s memories and returned to the present, and then she quickly compared the current world against the world from the Holy Age.

The ‘something’ that Roberstein hadn’t known about was Original Energy. The Original Energy was Laos’ heart, and he had fundamentally changed the Law of the World because he instinctively remembered how much Roberstein had agonized.

First, he had created the very first races without Original Energy and had made it so their traits could be inherited genetically. He had made it so that the hearts of every being living in this world had a defined lifespan so that life could only life for a set duration of time. And so, the first reason why mothers had to consume so much divine power had disappeared.

Next, Laos had made it so that his own heart would bear the full burden of supplying divine power to allow all life to keep living in spacetime. He had also decided to cover the divine power needed to transfer the newborn’s soul during pregnancy, so the second reason why mother’s had to consume so much divine power had also disappeared.

This had made giving birth in the Age of Magic so much easier than it had been in the Holy Age. Fetuses still had to consume their mothers’ divine power to develop, but not so much that mothers rejected giving birth in its entirety.

Moreover, Laos had sent his heart to the Balance’s plane and made it so that the divine power it produced flowed into the dimension of progress. His divine power perpetuated the cycle of nature endlessly, and he also permitted anyone to use it if their will was strong enough.

These traits had been weakened because of the Demon’s heart, but they had become more pronounced now. This was why anyone could use the divine power of nature now, and it was also why the spirits would soon be able to run around and play to their hearts’ content.

This was not a stagnant world with infinite life but a dynamic world with finite life.

No one in this world could produce divine power independently anymore, and, though their hearts had defined lifespans, anyone could use divine power if they worked hard enough.

Ianna arrived at the edges of the Truth as she understood how the world worked. She was able to figure everything out naturally even without Laos explaining things to her in detail.

Having a perfect understanding of the world was vital to reaching the highest peak. Ianna was ecstatic because she felt like the wings that had sprouted from her heart had just grown bigger.

[Ianna? We’ve almost arrived at the town.]

Ianna came back to earth when Towe called out to her.

It was just as he had said. They had almost arrived.

‘Now’s not the time for this.’

She had followed her thoughts all the way to their end out of habit. It was a fine habit to investigate a phenomenon deeply after encountering it, but it also got in her way from time to time.

But for now, she had to focus on the effects rather than the causes. She had to utilize the world’s changes if she wanted to slay Bahamut, after all.

And so, Ianna jumped headfirst into the world after the Cataclysm.

~~*~~

Part 2

“The world will be overturned soon.”

“The world as you know it will be shaken, and an age where every law will be reversed is soon to come.”

“It will be for the best that you are certain of the path you will walk before that time comes. For you will lose your way in the chaos if you are not.”

The world had been overturned, just as Millanikonè had foretold, and it had entered into the Dark Age.

Ianna finished surveying the village and thought,

‘It’s a fitting name.’

The Dark Age.

An age where the entire world had been overturned and thrown into chaos after the Cataclysm, and an age where the people must find their path even though they couldn’t see what was in front of them.

The people were busily living their own lives in each their own respective ways even amidst all the chaos.

“That’s not it. You need to melt into nature a little more.”

Ianna observed as two elves were teaching a human.

“Breathe with the wind.”

“Hwoo, hwoooh.”

“Slower! Imagine the shape of nature in your mind. Then, give that image a name.”

Divine arts, which had formerly belonged exclusively to the mythical races, were now a field of study that many people were starting to learn.

Ianna walked a little farther and stopped to observe a training ground where divine power of all kinds of colors were lingering about like a heat haze. Knights and mages alike were training in their control over divine power.

“Absorb the divine power into your body and gather it together inside your heart!”

The study of divine arts, which used divine power, was revitalized and new research was being done in the field. Anyone who already knew how to control divine power taught others whenever they had the time to spare.

But controlling divine power was fundamentally difficult. Only those who had been training for a very long time could control it.

Most ordinary civilians had already had very little to do with mana, and it was even more impossible for them to control divine power. Special cases who were an exception to this rule did exist, but they were very few and far between.

Meanwhile, mana artefacts, which had been daily necessities in the Age of Magic, had become useless because the mana refused to obey. It was possible to use the artefacts by imbuing them with divine power instead, but anyone who couldn’t control divine power to begin with couldn’t use them at all.

So, what had normal civilians turned to instead when their daily necessities had become completely unusable?

They had turned to ‘science.’

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Ianna made her way to a smithy, where the sounds of hammering were soaring into the sky like the roar of thunder. There were clusters of research laboratories established near the smithy.

The largest building among them was the ‘Cartner Science Laboratory,’ a facility that Taryll Cartner had established for the sole purpose of conducting scientific research.

The Cartner Science Laboratory had been the first of many scientific research facilities that had cropped up everywhere as the people struggled to adapt to the world, and it had taken the lead in reestablishing the constants of the laws of science. Not only did the Cartner Science Laboratory possess a tremendous amount of superb research materials, but it was also able to do research quickly because it hadn’t needed to change its research methodology.

Then, the research laboratories had begun working with the smithies to develop daily necessities that were based on scientific technology. There was an infinite variety of goods that could be made based on science, such as buckets for drawing water based on pulleys or scissors based on levers.

Weapons that would allow ordinary civilians to defend themselves were also being developed in earnest. These were namely small firearms, which had previously been overlooked in favor of magic, and biochemical weapons.

Ianna quietly peeked inside the smithy’s forge, and the blood had drained from her face as she slipped back outside.

‘How did everything change so much in just one year?’

Ianna had personally sponsored scientific research, but she had never imagined in her wildest dreams that the field would grow so big.

‘I should look around elsewhere too.’

Ianna opened up the map that Arhad had given her. The geography was so different from what she had known previously. It was so different that she couldn’t help but wonder if she had actually been asleep for centuries instead.

After traveling around the kingdom for some time, Ianna realized that Ex-knights was generally well maintained.

“Those Bahamut dogs! The bastards should suffer in the fires of hell for all eternity even after they’ve died!”

“How much longer do we have to keep suffering because of those pieces of shit?!”

“Things are already hard enough.”

On a separate note, however, the people were on edge. They were stressed out from the seemingly never-ending war against Bahamut and the sudden, drastic change in their surroundings.

“Do you really think we can beat them?”

“And Dame Rise hasn’t woken up yet either…….”

Most people were blazing in their rage against Bahamut, but more than a few were daunted and in despair.

“In any case, we’ll just have to keep fighting until we drop dead.”

“We’ll die if we lose anyway.”

Ex-knights was holding out well all things despite. The kingdom hadn’t collapsed, and the people were still adhering to the law.

But things were different outside her borders.

Ianna almost couldn’t help but wonder if she had stepped foot inside yet another world entirely as soon as she had slipped out from Ex-knights’ borders. She had been following the road, but then a mountain had appeared out of nowhere along the way. And other roads suddenly ended at a cliff or in front of the sea.

There were more than a few roads that had been cut off by some truly preposterous obstacles. It only served to prove that society had failed to maintain itself after the Cataclysm.

Rustle.

Ianna consulted her map again.

The map, which seemed to be depicting another world entirely, was generally divided up by country, but there were some stretches of land where the territory bore no name at all. It meant that the country that had once existed there had collapsed and the territory was currently stateless.

Most countries had fallen, unable to withstand both the Cataclysm and Bahamut’s assault. Had Arhad said that the people who had lost their nations had grouped together and escaped to faraway lands while avoiding Bahamut?

‘They knew that fleeing would accomplish nothing but postpone their deaths, but they had no choice but to flee anyway because Bahamut was simply too strong.’

The abandoned lands had fallen to ruin. Grasses were growing thick in between the wreckages of crumbled buildings.

But this was still serviceable. The country might hved fallen, but the land itself was still alive and breathing.

Ianna continued walking for a while until she found a land that had been totally devastated. The divine power of nature trickled in feebly and tried to sprout new life, but the dense aura of death around the area prevented the land from being restored.

It meant that Bahamut had swept through this area.

Ever since the Cataclysm, Bahamut army had grown rapidly stronger by indiscriminately absorbing the divine power of nature and divine power from anything that lived. It was fortunate that the world was overflowing with the divine power of nature, because the entire continent would have become dead land otherwise.

‘Bahamut…….’

Ianna crushed the map in her hands.

‘I need to do something about the bastards, and quickly.’

Ianna grinded her teeth and visited the kingdoms that had still kept their names. They were in such a bad state that it was stranger that they hadn’t fallen yet. Only the kingdoms belonging to the Roanne-Toraca-Jinzai-Ex-knights alliance were still doing well.

Arhad had said that, while each nation was busy maintaining and repairing their own lands, they had still helped each other out whenever they could. Ex-knight had given the most aid both in quantity and quality, but now wasn’t the time to be picking faults about that. This was because Ex-knights would suffer too if any of the kingdoms she was allied with fell.

‘Arhad must’ve really gone through a lot of trouble.’

Ianna dreaded to even imagine just how chaotic the world must have been a year ago. Society had surely only maintained itself to this extent only because Arhad had kept his cool and had anchored and guided everyone as best as he could. It hurt Ianna’s heart to think about how much he must have suffered all alone.

Ianna then sought out one of the Bahamut army’s camps once she had finished touring everything else. She stood atop a tree from far away and looked down at the Bahamut army with an icy glare.

They were like a horde of black ants. She wanted to burn them all away with fire. And she was strong enough to do so now, if she so wished.

‘But I should refrain from acting until we have the perfect plan in place.’

Ianna pondered. How should she best utilize the news that she was alive? What was the most efficient way to get rid of that terrible army?

And most importantly…

‘What is Taylon up to now?’

According to what Arhad had told her, the Bahamut army had been invading Ex-knight less frequently these past few months, and Taylon hardly ever showed up in person.

Additionally, according to Karnitz’s latest update a few weeks ago, Taylon had apparently left his army a message ordering them to prepare for ‘the war that is to come.’

The bastard undoubtably had yet another scheme up his sleeve. The bastard should start growing mad and desperate about now because nothing was going his way, so what was he up to this time?

‘If only I could visit the Akashic Records.’

She could have seen what Taylon was up to from there.

But Ianna was no longer able to visit the Akashic Records.

This was because she had lost access to the power of Judgment.

It was impossible for Ianna to keep the power of Judgment because she had defied the Balance. Besides, one’s power was the manifestation of that which their soul most strongly wished for. A soul could only possess one power. Ianna had obtained the power to Rend, so it was only natural that she had lost the power of Judgement.

‘I could probably create an entrance for myself by Rending through the dimensions, but I can’t do that much just yet.’

She had to obtain information about Taylon from within the confines of this world.

Ianna tried to hunt Taylon down while concealing her presence. But she could not find him anywhere.

She had not been able to find him even after she had reached the very edge of the continent. Ianna stood at the edge of a cliff and stared off into the distance at the horizon beyond the endless sea before she looked up at the dark and cloudy skies above.

Who cared about information? —there was only one thing that she needed to know.

‘Am I capable of killing Taylon as I am now?’

There was a years’ difference between the Taylon that Ianna knew and the Taylon of the present. It was a huge gap, and Taylon had probably grown tremendously stronger too, just as Ianna had.

But Ianna’s heart was at peace even still.

‘I’ll kill him.’

At their level, victory would be decided based on their respective willpower. A single moment’s opening would be enough to declare an outcome.

And Ianna was no longer anxious no matter what Taylon might be scheming and no matter how much stronger he might have grown.

Ianna’s soul, which not even the Balance had been able to best, would not budge before even the greatest of shocks, and she would give Taylon absolutely no quarter under she could finally cut him down. She would never lose, even if it meant that she must fight him for all eternity.

‘I should go back and train. But…….’

She had yet to see a single dragon.

She had heard that the dragons had flown the skies for months without tiring of it after the Cataclysm. There weren’t as many sightings of them now —perhaps they had settled down—, but it was strange that she hadn’t seen their colossal frames at all. They could transform into human forms —had they decided to live amongst humanity?

Ianna had an artefact that she could use to contact Terranodin, so she took it out and imbued it with mana.

But the artefact was silent. It wouldn’t even activate. Ianna tilted her head to the side and tried imbuing it with divine power next. The artefact began trembling so badly she was worried it might break.

Then, it began to flash.

[This is a recorded message. Don’t try to respond, and listen well.]

Ianna heard Terranodin’s whispering coming from it. His voice continued,

[We were drunk on our newfound freedom, and Taylon took the opportunity to catch us by surprise and subdue us. And now, he is eating us.]

Ianna flinched.

[To be precise, he is trying to absorb us whole. He is devouring our hearts and connecting them to his own, and he is melting our souls into his blood to control us.]

“…….”

[We were no match for Taylon, who was granted Kandemayon’s powers on top of the Demon’s. Fillianu was the first, and Millanikonè was the second. Gamadaian is being absorbed now, and I will be the last. It is possible that I might have already been absorbed by the time you hear this. Truly, this is all so absurd that I have not the words.]

Terranodin’s voice sounded tranquil, like it always did, but there was a faint trace of fury laced into it.

[Our contracts with our Guardians ended the moment we gained our freedom, and our former Guardians neither know about what’s happening to us nor have the means to find us because we severed every last tie we had to the world in our thirst for freedom. You are the last and only being that I have any connection to, and that is why I slipped out while Taylon was busy absorbing us to leave you this information.]

Ianna calmly and carefully took note of what Terranodin was saying.

[If you receive this message, then know that it is my wish that you prepare yourself to face Taylon, who will have stolen the power of the dragons. It takes the bastard about one to two months to absorb a dragon. Today is……]

The date that Terranodin cited was three weeks ago from today.

[Taylon will be able to read my memories once he’s finished absorbing me, so he will know that I left a message for you.]

“…….”

[But he will not know whether you were alive to hear my message or whether you are still dead because I will take measures to ensure that he will not know whether you receive my message or not. It is my hope that you will use his lack of information to your advantage in your battle against him if you yet live.]

Terranodin was silent for a moment after that.

[Ianna Ex-knights Rise.]

Then, he called her name.

[Grow stronger and stronger. Grow strong enough to surpass your previous incarnation.]

He had said this to her before.

[Grow stronger than any other in this world.]

But Terranodin wasn’t finished yet.

[Our wish is that you will guide this world to the path of longevity instead of the path of extinction.]

Currently, the world was teetering on a paper-thin line between the paths of extinction and longevity and was on the brink of toppling over to one side. But it was always the will of the living that broke equilibrium. The world would choose to walk the path of longevity if the will to live definitively surpassed the will to die.

[We want to fly over the vast expanse of land and into the boundless universe sprinkled with stars. And we believe that you are the key to unlocking the universe. And so, we will do everything in our power to persist until that time.]

That was the end of Terranodin’s message. Ianna waited, but his voice did not continue.

Ianna put away her artefact and stared out into the sea. Black waves were rushing in ceaselessly from the distant horizon. She looked down the cliff. The waves were crashing against the cliff so hard that they almost seemed to want to destroy the world.

‘You must’ve grown arrogant, Taylon.’

Arhad had told Ianna about Taylon’s secrets. She knew that Taylon not only possessed his own memories from the past but Arhad’s as well. It was easy for her to infer that Kandemayon had assisted him not only physically but also psychologically. But Taylon’s secrets were no longer a threat now that they were exposed.

‘Absorbing the dragons was probably yet another of your secret weapons.’

But Ianna had learned that he was absorbing the dragons. And it was said that someone who knew their enemy and knew themselves would win every fight between them.

‘I’ll concede the fact that you always had the advantage. But things are different now.’

Ianna was like a newborn bird. She had broken free of the shell that had been keeping her from the world and had found her true self, and now she could finally stand tall.

And she already had her wings. She had also flown before. She was not some clumsy fledgling who might fall out of the skies and die on her maiden flight. She already knew how to fly.

And now, she could fly higher and higher, all the way to the edge of the sky, whenever she so wished. Taylon might be an abyss that was deeper and darker than the vast seas, but she could still Rend him apart.

‘Just you wait.’

Her ruby eyes, burning like flames, glared at the sea so fiercely that she could have evaporated it entirely. Her life, her effort, her will, her love —everything that she was became as a single sword as she prepared to Rend apart the darkness that enshrouded the world.

Ianna went home to Arhad, who was working hard in his office.

Creak.

She opened the door and stepped inside only to find someone exhausted pushing up his glasses as he stood before Arhad and gave a report.

“Researching new technology and reconstructing the city to adjust to it have been progressing slowly, but there are no problems otherwise.”

Ianna couldn’t see his face, but his grey hair told her that he was Rikijen. She couldn’t help but wonder just how much he had been struggling all this time if he, who was usually so neat and cleanly, was looking so rough right now.

Rikijen didn’t turn around even though he should’ve heard the door opening. It was very like him to focus solely on his report and on the person whom he was reporting to while he was working.

“But the people’s emotional fatigue has reached the limit. The number of patients visiting the hospitals with symptoms like insomnia and depression have been increasing exponentially.”

Rikijen swallowed back a sigh. He continued,

“The biggest cause is the Bahamut emperor’s sudden disappearance.”

Arhad greeted Ianna with his eyes, and Ianna greeted him back.

“Things were still better while the war was still going all-out. Everyone could clearly see that the Bahamut emperor was unable to break through Your Majesty’s defenses, and we were all so busy fighting that no one had the time to stop and think. But now that the situation’s suddenly come to a lull after he disappeared…….”

Rikijen’s report continued without pause. Ianna didn’t interject and simply leaned against the doorway as she listened.

“Everyone is anxious and afraid that the Bahamut emperor will be so powerful that no one will be able to keep him in check anymore when he returns. They’re assuming that he’ll break through our defenses next time. Our defenses are unparalleled, and Your Majesty has the people’s full faith and trust, but…….”

“They’re anxious because they think we don’t have a weapon with which to make a decisive counterattack should any of our defenses fail. And their concerns have only grown worse because we’ve only been defending without attacking back all this time.”

“…….”

“But I can’t defend against and attack the Bahamut imperial family alone. There’ll be a hole in our defenses if I leave to attack, and our enemies will be quick to take advantage of any openings. Me focusing only on defending is what’s best for the people,”

Arhad said calmly. He continued,

“There’s nothing more that I can do. I’m already giving this everything I have.”

Rikijen knew this. He was Arhad’s closest advisor and aide, and he knew best that Arhad was already exerting himself just to defend Ex-knights.

“I’ll start attacking too once our defensive systems become perfect enough that there won’t be any problems even if I’m away. But it’s for the best that I focus on defending until then. We stand to lose everything if we bite off more than we can chew.”

“Yes, I’m aware.”

Rikijen’s report crumpled in his hands. He continued,

“I was venting my frustrations on Your Majesty. My apologies.”

Arhad was truly an excellent king. This was the absolute truth. Rikijen had read countless history books, but he had never once read about any king as amazing as Arhad.

Arhad had unified the races with powerful laws, and he had made thorough preparations and taken the time to bring prosperity to his new kingdom. He had been quick to establish a new order even after all hell had let loose, and he was singlehandedly keeping an enemy as powerful as Bahamut in check from the frontlines. The world would have long since fallen into Bahamut’s grasp had Arhad not been here.

But that was it. Rikijen could not see any path to victory.

The war was like two parallel lines. Ex-knights would grow studier with time, but so, too, would Bahamut grow equally sharper. Arhad would be forced to stay on the defense forever at this rate.

Rikijen believed that only she was capable of breaking through their current deadlock.

Only Ianna.

‘When will Lady Ianna wake up?’

Rikijen thought about Ianna multiples times a day. But he had never mentioned her once before Arhad.

Ianna was Ex-knights’ emotional pillar, and her fall had shocked the entire nation to its core.

Just how much worse had it been for Arhad?

Arhad continued working like nothing was wrong after Ianna had fallen into a coma, but Rikijen had thought that he always seemed unstable. He seemed unshakable and faultless on the outside, but like a fragile glass bottle who would shatter at the slightest impact on the inside.

That was why he kept all of his griping inside and directed it only to Ianna.

‘Please wake up already. You’re not the kind of person who just sleeps and does nothing while your people are in danger.’

And Rikijen was grumbling again today too.

But, why was it? He felt like he was choking up more than usual today.

“I’ll do my best too,”

Rikijen replied before his hid away his melancholy and firmly continued,

“I’m sure we’ll find the path to victory eventually.”

“Indeed. Trials and tribulations will always come to an end eventually if you keep doing your best.”

“……?”

Rikijen felt strange when he heard what Arhad had said. Arhad always spoke about ‘doing his best,’ but he had never said anything about things ‘coming to an end’ before.

Now that he thought about it, Arhad looked like he was in a bizarrely good mood today. His eyes, which had previously been as deadened as rusted steel, were glistening brightly.

‘What?’

He heard footsteps behind him just as he began to doubt. It was only then that he remembered that someone else had entered the office —who was it?

“You’re still as faithful as ever, I see.”

The voice that he had been yearning and yearning to hear again for the past year stabbed the back of his head like an arrow.

Rikijen whipped his head around as fast as lightning.

Ianna drew back the hood of her robes.

They could finally see each other’s face.

“Rikijen.”

Ianna’s visage filled Rikijen’s bloodshot eyes. He blinked repeatedly and rubbed his eyes like mad, as if he had just seen a ghost.

“Lady…Ianna?”

“Indeed, Rikijen.”

“Is it really you?”

“Did you already forget what I looked like? —it’s only been a year.”

“But you were in a coma.”

“I’m standing here now because I woke up.”

But Rikijen was still in disbelief. His eyes were shaking as if he was caught up in an earthquake.

“His Majesty didn’t resort to creating a chimera, did he……?”

Ianna grinned when Rikijen began spouting nonsense, and then she walked up to him and reached out her hand. Rikijen stood awkwardly in place as she grabbed him by the hand before he had any idea about what was going on.

“Ack!”

Rikijen screamed and his legs gave out because his hand was in agony.

“P-please let go. Stop. Kgh.”

“Has your brain rotted already for you to be saying stupid things like that?”

Rikijen stared at the other firm and calloused hand that was still grabbing his painfully throbbing one. Ianna continued,

“Look me in the eyes.”

Rikijen looked up on reflex.

“Who am I?”

She could be no one other than Ianna.

A spark of ecstasy began to fill Rikijen’s eyes.

“Ianna…Ex-knights…Rise.”

“That’s right.”

Ianna pulled Rikijen back up to his feet. She continued,

“I woke up about a week ago and was traveling around the world. You’ve worked hard to reorganize Ex-knights with Arhad while I was gone.”

“Yes…….”

There was a tremble in his voice.

He had always believed that she would come back.

Neither Bahamut nor Arhad were the strongest beings of this world, as far as Rikijen was concerned.

It was Ianna.

It had always been Ianna.

He had lived in a world filled only with his books and silence until that fateful day when he had seen Ianna’s sword for the first time during the swordsmanship competition. Ianna had become the strongest existence in Rikijen’s world ever since he had first witnessed the arrogant shine of her sword that day.

He had kept his center even as the rest of the world had grown restless upon hearing the news that Ianna had been defeated by the Bahamut emperor and was rendered comatose. He had been so shocked to hear about the tragedy that his mind had gone blank, but he had collected himself quickly enough and had helped pull others out of their bewilderment.

If Ianna had fallen, then it had only been because the situation had given her no other choice.

And she would return without fail. He had to stand strong and help Arhad keep their kingdom grounded until then.

Rikijen trusted Ianna. And Ianna had not betrayed his trust.

“Thank you so much for waking up.”

“It’s nothing to be grateful for.”

He was so happy to hear even the haughtiness in her words. He wiped away his tears on his sleeve.

“B-but now’s not the time for this.”

He snapped his head up. Then, he continued,

“We need to tell everyone that you’re alive, Lady Ianna.”

“No. I’m going to keep myself hidden for as long as possible,”

Ianna refuted. She continued,

“The news of my return is a weapon. We should use it for what it’s worth.”

Rikijen was convinced and nodded back. The secret that Ianna was alive could be used to catch Bahamut off guard.

“I’m only going to show myself before the world as Ianna again after all our preparations are complete. I need to grow strong enough for the people who lost their faith in me to find it again. I’m only going to reveal myself after that.”

Rikijen had to concur. Many of Ex-knights’ people had started doubting Ianna’s strength as of late. Ianna would have to demonstrate transcendental strength if she wanted to shatter their doubts.

“I have a general plan, so don’t tell anyone that I’m back until I say that it’s okay. I’ll be acting while hiding my real identity in the meanwhile, naturally.”

“Will I be the only one who knows, then?”

“No. We’ll need others to cooperate with us in order to put together a perfect plan. I’ll come find you when the plan starts taking shape.”

“Understood.”

Rikijen straightened out his waist and shoulders. Then, he continued,

“I’ll keep working hard until then. Actually, I think I’m going to get to work right now.”

His chest was boiling over with hope. The dark somber of his mien had brightened considerably.

“Please work hard too, Lady Ianna. And thank you again for waking up!”

Rikijen was emitting motivation from his entire being as he sketched a bow and walked out. There was a cheerful spring to his footsteps.

“Rikijen was my faithful retainer in the past,”

Arhad said quietly.

“He still is even now.”

“He is, but he cares more about you now. He trusts you more than he trusts me.”

“I’ll concede that,”

Ianna conceded the fact in a refreshing manner and smiled. She continued,

“It looks like I’ve stolen one of your oldest retainers from you.”

“You’re free to take the rest of them too.”

They exchanged a few more lighthearted jokes before Ianna told Arhad about Taylon.

“The dragons……that’s pretty serious.”

Arhad began to tap his finger against his desk as he fell into thought before he abruptly looked up and continued,

“How’s your condition, Ianna?”

“I’ve never been better.”

Ianna placed her hand above Rise, which was hanging by her waist. She continued,

“I know for certain what the peak that I must reach is now. And I will reach it quickly. Taylon may be strong, but I’m confident that he won’t be able to push me back. This is true even if we should fight right now.”

There was certainty in Ianna’s words.

Shaaa…….

Arhad heightened his focus. He sharpened both his vision and his senses as his gaze penetrated into Ianna’s body and soul.

But he could not gauge how powerful she was. Ianna had become a monster of unknown territory after just a years’ absence.

It was difficult for Arhad to imagine what Ianna had told him about her stay in the Akashic Records. They had used to walk side by side, but she was suddenly walking ahead of him now.

“Your idea of the ultimate peak of the sword is to be able cut down the entire world with a single blade.”

And so, Arhad asked,

“Is that the furthest edge of strength that you’ve discovered?”

“No. I believe that there is no limit to strength in terms of hard numbers. Relatively speaking, on the other hand…….”

Arhad filled her clear and upright eyes. Ianna continued,

“I will finally reach the furthest edge of strength once I’ve defeated you. You were always the peak of strength as far as I’m concerned.”

Arhad stared openly back at Ianna.

“But I think you’d beat me now?”

“I used to concur.”

Ianna smiled faintly. Then, she continued,

“But I’m not so sure anymore. You succeeded in defending Ex-knights against the diabolical bastard that Taylon is, and you even protected me when I was half-dead. Will my sword be able to pierce through your shield? We won’t know until we try.”

“That is true.”

Arhad readily agreed. If Ianna was the ultimate offense, then Arhad was the ultimate defense. They were going in different directions, but they were both racing toward the ultimate peak.

“But isn’t Bahamut your greatest rival now if we’re speaking only in terms of offense?”

“No. Bahamut is nothing more than a stepping stone that I must pass along the way,”

Ianna denied clearly as she walked up to Arhad. She grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him so close that their noses nearly touched. She continued,

“You are my greatest rival. You are my one and only rival both now and in the past. And you will continue to be my one and only rival forever, until the day we die.”

Ianna kissed him patiently on the lips and warned him,

“Please keep that in mind and prepare yourself.”

“How terrifying.”

Arhad’s cheeks flushed and he smiled brightly even as he claimed to be terrified. He had used to be so sick and tired of her competitiveness before, but now his loved the fact that Ianna was obsessing over him. He was beyond overjoyed as an electrifying pleasure sent shivers down his spine.

He would probably love it no matter what Ianna said. Surely, there was something wrong with his brain.

Ianna stared at him for a moment because he was adorable before she pulled away.

“I’m going to visit my friends.”

“Sure. And visit the Shalino Research Institute too while you’re at it.”

“The Shalino Research Institute?”

The doctors’ association led by Saki Celtz and Lindsay was still headquartered in Semastair.

Saki was affiliated with Jinzai, so she was technically supposed to have returned home during these chaotic times, but the Great Temple had permitted her to stay at the research institute to continue her research on Life.

“They’ve made some progress recently. You should go and hear the details in person.”

Ianna slipped out of Arhad’s office and returned to her own chambers. She pulled out a ring artefact that Arhad had made for her long ago for communication purposes and put it on her finger.

She couldn’t tell all her friends that she was awake. She could only tell those who were indispensable in the plan to destroy Bahamut.

Ianna contacted Eiji first.

He was the first friend that she had met after leaving House Roberstein, and he was her capable friend whom she had befriended even before she had met Arhad. Eiji was the most indispensable of them all.

Eiji picked up as soon as Ianna imbued her ring with mana and sent a signal.

[What the? Is this broken?]

Eiji muttered in utter bafflement from the other side. Apparently, no one could believe that Ianna was truly back —Rikijen had reacted like that too. Ianna was unable to reply because she was too busy laughing, and Eiji continued to mumble to himself in irritation.

[And I was so excited too.]

Then, he immediately disconnected.

Ianna realized that now wasn’t the time to be laughing her head off when she saw that the ring’s light had gone out, straightened herself out, and called again. But Eiji didn’t reply, perhaps because he had decided that his artefact was broken.

And so, Ianna had no choice but to contact Dorcianni instead.

[I’m watching Eiji being pissed off in real time,]

Dorcianni said as soon as they connected. She continued,

[Are our artefacts just broken, or are they actually working as intended?]

[I’m telling you they’re broken.]

“They’re not. Come to my chambers right now, but don’t tell a soul.”

[…….]

Ianna replied before either of them could disconnect her again. But they still disconnected immediately anyway.

But Ianna simply sat down at her table instead of contacting them again.

Creaak…….

She was scribbling down her thoughts on paper while she waited, and it didn’t take long before someone gingerly opened her door.

“Ack.”

Eiji gasped when the door, which had been firmly locked while its owner had been absent, opened. And he forgot how to breathe when he saw Ianna observing him with her vividly clear eyes from the center of her room.

“It’s been a…….”

Ianna was about to get up and greet him, but Eiji ran toward her and pulled her into a tight hug. There was a quiver in his voice as he said,

“I know your husband might murder me, but let me stay like this for a minute. I’m having a hard time believing it.”

Ianna patted Eiji’s trembling back without another word. Eventually, Eiji continued,

“Wow. You’re really real.”

It was only after he had felt her solidly trained frame in his arms that Eiji understood that she was, in fact, real.

The tragedy had occurred only a few days after Eiji himself had woken up from his own deep slumber. That was why he had been afraid that Ianna might have pushed herself too hard while saving him and had blamed himself.

Arhad had told him that it wasn’t his fault, and he had trusted Ianna not to die, and he had been able to focus on his work because the situation didn’t give him the time to mope around in self-reproach, but he had anguished over Ianna every time he had the chance to take a break.

But Ianna was back now.

“I was afraid that what happened to you was my fault.”

“Of course it wasn’t. It happened because I wasn’t able to focus solely on Bahamut due to personal reasons and let my guard down. It won’t happen again.”

Ianna put on a serious face and comforted Eiji when he confessed his worries. Eiji felt like everything that had been weighing on him was being washed away.

“Your Majesty.”

Dorcianni, who had been watching their reunion from behind, slowly walked up to them. She pulled the both of them into her own embrace. Dorcianni continued,

“You’re such a sleepyhead, Your Majesty.”

“A sleepyhead……. That’s a cute way of putting it.”

Ianna pulled out of Eiji’s and Dorcianni’s arms and looked to the both of them directly. She continued,

“But I wasn’t only sleeping this entire time. I’ve been working hard too.”

“Working hard? Did you go somewhere while you were asleep?”

Dorcianni asked after growing curious when she heard Ianna’s pregnant response.

“I was trapped in a Truth on a deeper level than the Truth that we visited before. I Rended it apart to break free.”

“A Truth deeper than the Truth. Amazing. I want to hear more about this in detail.”

“Who cares about the Truth?! We don’t need to discuss that right now!”

Eiji interjected before Ianna and Dorcianni began discussing scholarly matters.

Then, he scrutinized Ianna up and down and was deeply moved to find that she was not only in good shape but also in perfect health and shouted,

“I’m really, really glad that you woke up! I knew you were immortal, but I was beginning to worry because you were asleep for so long!”

“Immortal? I’m human too, you know?”

“But you don’t seem like you’d die even if you were killed. In any case, I just meant that you felt like you were immortal to me. But you took way too long while resurrecting yourself. Sniff. Thinking about everything I’ve had to suffer while waiting for you brings tears to my eyes.”

Eiji pinched the space between his eyes as he spouted nonsense. Ianna and Dorcianni patted his shoulders since it was probably true that he had suffered quite a bit.

“You’ve worked hard. Let’s keep working a little harder together.”

“Sure thing! I suddenly feel invincible!”

Eiji raised his arms and cheered.

“I’m sorry I’m bringing this up as soon as I saw you, but we need to discuss work. Take a seat.”

“Right.”

Once Eiji and Dorcianni had taken their seats, Ianna said,

“I heard that you’ve been focusing on obtaining intelligence on Bahamut.”

“Yeah —I haven’t been able to learn anything about the all-important Bahamut emperor, but I’ve been steadily gathering information about Isabella, Shailince, the Black Fox, and the Bahamut mainland. Sir Karnitz Ulter’s been helping me out a lot.”

“That’s because Karnitz is skilled.”

Ianna began moving her pen.

“Arhad’s told me the gist of things, but I’d like to hear more about Bahamut’s situation directly from you.”

“Sure. You know Fieber Pistol, right?”

Fieber Pistol was Dorcianni’s follower, whom both Ianna and Dorcianni had worked to the bone while they had been traveling around Bahamut. Eiji continued,

“He’s become something of a leader of sorts among Bahamut’s civilians. And we’ve been keeping in touch with him.”

According to Fieber, the citizens of Bahamut had learned what it was like to live while helping others instead of only stealing from each other, the joys of harvest, and peace, and many of them were turning against the war. And more than a few people had begun to rebel against the imperial family because of their cruelty.

And then, the Cataclysm had happened. The Himalapè Ice Fields had shrank in size, and a new fertile continent had appeared beyond Bahamut’s borders.

“A lot of people decided to leave Bahamut and settle down on the new continent. More than a few people have already left. But most people aren’t able to come to a decision because they’re too afraid of the empire.”

“Hmmm.”

It was pretty good. Ianna and Dorcianni had traveled around Bahamut two years ago with the intent to incite internal strife, and their efforts were paying off tremendously. It had been worth the effort.

“And a lot of Bahamut’s greater nobles were shaken too, according to Sir Ulter. Apparently, a lot of people have been trying to bring him over to their side because they want to go to the new continent and name themselves king.”

“Oh?”

Ianna was amazed. To think that something like that had happened too.

“Our Intelligence Bureau has formally begun to collaborate with Maron. A Root Dorian, the leader of Maron, has been gathering Bahamut nobles with complaints against the empire in secret. There’s quite a lot them.”

“I’m sure they’ll prove helpful.”

Ianna wrote down a summary of the information she was learning as she asked Eiji,

“And the imperial family?”

“Mm, this the most important part.”

It had been impossible to learn anything about the emperor, so Eiji had focused on gathering information about the rest of the imperial family and the Black Fox instead. There was little information about Isabella because she had been slaughtering indiscriminately before she had suddenly disappeared alongside the emperor, but there was a lot of information about Payne and the empress dowager because they were leading Bahamut’s army and had been making frequent appearances.

“We came up with a plan to punish the bastards using the information we gathered.”

“A plan to punish them?”

“Yep.”

Eiji clenched his hand into a tight fist and continued,

“We wanted to punish them with our own hands, you see.”

“We conducted some biological research on Shailiance’s hand, which I cut off a while back,”

Dorcianni added. She continued,

“And we were able to develop several skills to counter her specifically.”

Neither Eiji nor Dorcianni had wasted the year that Ex-knights had been huddling into herself. They had been sharpening their blade of revenge without rest as they waited only for the perfect opportunity to present itself.

“I wanted to go ahead and punish them before you woke up, Little Ianna, so I could brag about it when you did, but I guess that won’t be happening.”

“Should I go back to sleep?”

“Don’t even joke about that.”

Eiji grinned. Then, he continued,

“Besides, there’s a zero chance of failure if you’ll be helping us, so I feel like we could go and punish them right this instant instead of waiting for the perfect opportunity. You’ll help, right?”

“But of course. I’ll make it my first priority.”

“Great! Oh, and the Tower of Truth and the mermaids have officially joined us too. They were lying low after Bahamut left the ocean, but they decided that they couldn’t keep quiet any longer because they felt like Bahamut was about to destroy the world.”

They even had allies in the seas now. Mermaids grew weaker on land, but they were said to be the strongest race underwater.

They discussed several other things too before Ianna finally asked,

“Do you know what happened to Frillianu by any chance, Dorcianni?”

“No. Our connection was broken as soon as the Cataclysm occurred. Lady Silausa hasn’t seen her for a while either, so I guess she’s probably enjoying her freedom?”

“No. She was eaten by Taylon.”

“Oh my.”

Dorcianni’s voice was monotonous, but her expression suggested that she was alarmed. It was very rare for Dorcianni to emote this strongly. She continued,

“Taylon truly is becoming a monster. Will you be able to handle him, Your Majesty?”

“Of course.”

Both Eiji and Dorcianni smiled deeply when Ianna answered firmly.

Ianna took the chance to contact Karnitz too.

It took a few minutes before she got in touch with him.

[My lady?]

Karnitz sounded shocked as he called for her.

“That’s right, Karnitz.”

[…….]

Karnitz was silent for a while before he spoke again with a thrill in his voice.

[You’re awake. I’m so glad you’re all right. I want nothing more than to see you in person, but I’m afraid the situation won’t allow it.]

Karnitz lamented as he told Ianna that it was impossible for him to act independently because the army was acting as one. He continued,

[I don’t know exactly when, but it looks like the entire army will be deployed in one go as soon as the emperor is finished with his preparations. Ex-knights may be in danger.]

“It’ll be all right.”

Karnitz had been stiff and nervous as he reported to her, but Ianna’s reply had been composed. She continued,

“I think I’ll be able to be with you again before long.”

This meant that Ianna would not lose even if Bahamut invaded, and that she would be declaring an end to their war against Bahamut.

[I see.]

Karnitz’s voice had calmed down. He continued,

[I will wait eagerly for that day. But until then, I will do my best so that I may be a dagger hidden in your sleeve, my lady. Please let me know anytime if there is work that I must do.]

Ianna knew that Karnitz was smiling from the other side of their artefacts. She closed her mouth and chose her next words carefully before she spoke them.

“Thank you. And let me apologize again. I’ve made both you and Isphee suffer so much because I was irresponsible in saying that I would go to Bahamut when I was younger.”

[Not at all. Please don’t apologize. I know I’m repeating myself, but I came to Bahamut of my own will,]

Karnitz replied calmly as he rejected Ianna’s apology. He continued,

[So I will tell you one last time. I am glad that I came to Bahamut. I was useful to you because I came here, my lady. I have to do at least this much if I want to call myself your personal knight, my most remarkable lady.]

Ianna clenched her fists tightly.

Karnitz was like Arhad in that he had never changed in both her past and present lives. Ianna had had many subordinates but no guards in the past, and Karnitz had been her one and only personal knight who had watched her back.

“You have always been my greatest knight,”

Ianna said with her full sincerity. She continued,

“And I’m sure you will always be my greatest knight in the days to come as well.”

Ianna no longer spoke words of farewell to her faithful knight. Instead, she spoke to him about the future.

[It’s an honor.]

Karnitz chuckled quietly.

Part 3

Ianna and Eiji made their way over to the training grounds.

“Herrace, that rascal, is gonna start bawling like a baby.”

They found Herrace hard at work training.

“One, two!”

Herrace was shouting out numbers as he ran ahead of everyone else.

“Gasp gasp.”

“He’s a monster.”

Elves, dwarves, beastmen, humans……people of every race were sweating buckets as they just barely managed to trail behind him. Herrace had once been called ‘vomit boy’ during his Institution days, and he had grown a lot since.

Ianna looked at his face.

He had not only grown taller, but the lines of his face had become rougher too. His features had used to look vaguely in between that of a boy’s and a young man’s, but he looked like a fully grown adult now. He had used to be delicate and lack confidence, but now he was armed with a gentle but strong kindness about him.

“Bring Herrace over to my personal training grounds.”

“You got it.”

Ianna made her way to her personal training grounds first, and Eiji left to tell Herrace the good news.

“Gasp, gasp!”

It wasn’t long before Herrace came sprinting.

“L-Little Ianna. Sob. Soob.”

Ianna had been thinking about how much Herrace had matured just a few minutes ago, but he sank down and began bawling his eyes out, as if he had regressed back to his Institution days, as soon as he saw her.

“…….”

Ianna had planned greet Herrace in a calm and composed manner, but she found herself unable to speak up so readily.

Her emotions, which had mellowed like warm bread as she reunited with her friends, began to crumble when she saw Herrace crying.

She had naturally assumed that her friends would welcome her back, but the emotions they expressed were so deep that they shattered her expectations completely. Her heart was deafened as she confirmed just how treasured she was by her cherished friends.

And she was ever so grateful.

She was so grateful to Arhad for giving her the chance to meet them.

And she felt so proud.

She had worked so hard to give it her all in life.

And so, she realized.

That she was truly happy in this life.

“A-ah. I’m sorry.”

Herrace was unable to stay his tears quickly. He covered his face with his hands, but his tears overflowed and trickled down from his palms.

Ianna crouched down in front of him.

“You’ve always been quick to shed tears.”

“N-not anymore. I don’t cry that much anymore. But I’m just so happy right now…….”

Ianna pat Herrace’s shoulder as he flushed bright red and began clumsily making excuses.

“Thank you for coming here to welcome me back.”

“Oh, please don’t say stuff like that.”

Herrace lowered his head. He continued,

“I’m going to cry no matter what you say right now.”

A smile graced Ianna’s lips as she waited for Herrace’s emotions to settle down.

Was this how it felt to have a much younger brother?

Herrace was biologically a year older than Ianna, but Ianna had much more life experience than he did psychologically. And Herrace was the first person whom she had guided both mentally and physically from so close. That was why Ianna had always thought him a younger brother.

‘Or perhaps even a disciple, if not a younger brother.’

And Herrace seemed to reciprocate the sentiment.

He had always ever watched her from behind and chased after her ever since they were both applying to the Institution all the way until now, after Ianna had built her own country and was drawing nearer to her final battle against Bahamut.

“I heard that you saved me.”

But it had been none other than Herrace who had saved her. Ianna continued,

“You even stood your ground against Taylon Helkan Bahamut.”

Herrace, Nissi, and Angelina had broken through Taylon’s barrier and had defended Ianna during her plight. Taylon had battered Arhad and Ianna black and blue, but they had blocked his way. They had refused to fall back even as their vilest and most powerful enemy had tried to brutally suppress them.

“Oh……well.”

Herrace grew a little embarrassed when he heard what Ianna had said. He continued,

“My ability to reason became paralyzed when I thought that you might die, Little Ianna. I don’t remember how on earth I was even able to manage something like that.”

“You’ve always been like that.”

Herrace was the type of person who grew stronger when he had something to protect. He had been like that back in Roanne too, when he had refused to back down while protecting the children from Wiffheimer, who had thrust Roanne into a nightmare. Ianna continued,

“Thank you.”

And she gave Herrace her gratitude.

Herrace flinched.

Then, with a tremble in his voice, he hesitantly asked,

“Was I helpful to you, Little Ianna?”

He had asked her this before. Had it been when he had filled Ianna’s shoes while she had left to visit Kandemayon and he had brilliantly stopped Shailince when she had raided the castle?

Ianna recalled the conversation she had shared when they had collected the Demon’s fragment from Heinrich.

“I want to be your fellow knight who can help you from beside you.”

“I’m going to live the rest of my life in your land. You govern this land and I was reborn in it, and I’ll love it, devote myself to it, and protect it for the rest of my days. I’ll do everything in my power to protect my home.”

“I’m sure there will be a day when even I can be of use to you.”

And Ianna suddenly realized it. Herrace was no longer the younger brother whom she always had to look after.

He was her reliable colleague and her indispensable ally.

“You saved me when I was in danger.”

Taylon would have continued attacking Ianna and Arhad had Herrace not been there, and Ianna, who had reached her limits, might have collapsed. She continued,

“You protected Ex-knights while I wasn’t here.”

Herrace carried a lot of responsibility in Ex-knights’ defenses as of late. He had been racking in results as he battled against the Bahamut army and the monsters, according to Arhad.

Herrace, who was kinder than any other and possessed incredible talent but had been enfeebled by the Demon’s fragment and had nearly given up his sword.

He was now running ahead of everyone else. He worked himself to the bone in his creed to protect his allies behind him.

A kind and powerful knight who refused to comprise when it came to defending. Ianna had heard that Herrace’s popularity had been skyrocketing as of late. There were apparently many children who looked up to him.

“Herrace. You…….”

Ianna took his hand. She continued,

“You are irreplaceable to Ex-knights.”

She squeezed his hand tight.

“You are my fellow knight, whom I can trust to watch my back.”

A powerful light shone in Herrace’s eyes as soon as Ianna said that.

“Your fellow knight…….”

A fierce ecstasy poured out from his heart like the blinding sunlight. His long-cherished wish to be acknowledged as Ianna’s equal had finally come true. It had been worth polishing his sword and working so hard.

But, why was it? His thirst wasn’t quenched and only grew stronger.

He had been working so hard until now, but he only wanted to keep working harder.

He had been acknowledged, but he wanted to be acknowledged even more.

He never wanted to betray Ianna’s trust.

‘I want to keep receiving your praise and acknowledgement.’

He did not dare hope to surpass Ianna.

Herrace had grown blindingly strong, and he knew this too. But, there were some things that he just knew because he had grown so strong. He understood that Ianna, crouching before him, was so far ahead of him that she was even more distant than the unknown.

Ianna had always been his idol.

Ever since the very first day that they had met.

That was why he only wanted to keep chasing after her. He wanted Ianna to allow him to keep working to keep up with her.

‘I’ll need to work even harder if I want to chase after her.’

Herrace resolved himself firmly. Even he did not know where his persistence would ultimately lead him. But he would simply continue to chase after his idol, who was running so far ahead.

He wiped away the tears that had drenched his cheeks. He grew embarrassed for some reason and blushed as his eyes began swimming, and then he recalled the others who had been there with him.

“Princess Angelina and I saved you together, Little Ianna.”

“So I’ve heard.”

Angelina had entrusted her homeland to Schneider, and she was aiding Ex-knights by providing the frontlines with rear support.

Ianna recalled Angelina, who was always smiling bashfully. Angelina had only ever sought protection for herself in her past life, but she had transformed into someone who protected others after she had changed because of her nightmares. And now, she had even saved Ianna.

Angelina was remarkable.

“I’ll be sure to give Angelina my thanks later.”

“I’m sure the princess will be overjoyed.”

“But there’s something that I’ve been curious about, Herrace.”

Ianna looked Herrace directly in the eyes. She continued,

“How were you able to pierce through Taylon’s barrier?”

Herrace may have grown strong, but to think that he had been able to break Taylon’s barrier? Had Taylon truly been that weak at the time?

“Um……. That’s…”

Herrace pondered for a moment before he gingerly continued,

“About a year ago, just as the Cataclysm was happening. I…I met God Laos. Actually, Little Ianna, God Laos is…”

“Elly, right?”

Herrace was startled.

“You knew?”

“I learned along the way.”

Herrace’s explanation continued as follows.

Elly had sought out Herrace and Angelina and had disclosed her true identity while the Cataclysm had thrown the continent into chaos. She had asked them to bring the army to the Lotso Mountains because Ianna and Arhad were in danger.

Herrace had immediately reported back to Absilot and had lead the army to where Elly guided him. But an ominous aura had blocked their path beyond a certain point, and no one had been able to break inside it.

Then, Nissi, Elly’s pet cat, had jumped inside the aura, and Elly had begun speaking to Herrace and Angelina. She had said that only they, who had been heavily influenced by her, could resist the aura, and that only they could widen the path that Nissi had cut open.

Herrace had raced inside without a moment’s hesitation, and Angelina had been right on his heels. Arhad had already told Ianna about what had happened next.

Ianna understood what had happened. Laos had borrowed the hands of others to aid Ianna because he was unable to act directly due to equilibrium.

But there was still something that Ianna was curious about.

It was only natural that Angelina had been heavily influenced by Laos because she had inherited the blood of Queen Roanne, Laos’ spartoi.

“What does it mean that you were heavily influenced by Laos?”

But what about Herrace? Ianna continued,

“Does it have anything to do with the fact that you were born with a lot of divine power?”

Ianna had been curious about this for a while now. Why had Herrace been born with so much divine power?

“I’m not really sure myself.”

Herrace scratched his head. He continued,

“But God Laos said that people who did a lot of good in their past lives are likely to live long and healthy lives in their next incarnations according to God Laos’ laws. I must’ve been a really good person in my past life.”

This was something that Ianna had already known.

There were a lot of elements at play when it came to determining what kind of life someone would live.

The karma and repentance of their prior incarnation influenced their lives, having a powerful will and hope influenced their talents, and genetic and environmental factors influenced their background before they were born.

Then, acquired characteristics, such as their effort, luck, and relationships with others, transformed their lives after they were born.

Herrace had apparently been a good person in his prior incarnation, and he had been rewarded for it in his current incarnation.

“It’s strange to say this about myself, but I was apparently an extremely good person. And I apparently used to be God Laos’ friend back when he was wandering around the world.”

But that wasn’t all that Herrace had to say. He continued,

“God Laos said that he gives people like me special blessings. This is apparently why I was born with so much divine power…….”

Not only had Herrace been granted a strong heart and a lot of divine power in accordance to the Law because he had been a good person among good people, but he had also received Laos’ blessing.

This was the Truth that Laos had unveiled to Herrace.

“I was able to endure the curse of mana because I was blessed. I probably would’ve died very young if I didn’t have a strong heart and a lot of divine power.”

He was right. Herrace had overtaxed his body, but he had ultimately recovered his health.

“I guess this must be the karma and the cycle of samsara that the Faith of Laos preaches about?”

“I’m sure it is. I’m glad that you are and always have been such a good person.”

“You’re embarrassing me. I actually don’t really understand it. I don’t know what it was that I did in my past life. Is it really okay for me to be rewarded for something that I did when I wasn’t actually me?”

Herrace was blushing furiously red. Ianna looked to him and smiled a little.

“And what about Nissi?”

Finally, she asked him about Nissi’s whereabouts.”

“Oh, I’ve been looking after her. Laos —Elly, I mean— left a note saying that she was going on a trip and disappeared a few weeks ago, and she left Nissi behind.”

“Where is she now?”

“She’s usually loitering somewhere nearby……. Oh, there she is.”

Ianna turned to where Herrace was pointing. Nissi, the white cat, was hesitantly coming closer.

The cat stopped in front of Ianna’s feet.

Ianna looked down at Nissi, who was hanging her head for some reason.

“Why are you so listless?”

Nissi refused to look up even as Ianna gently petted her head. The cat remained limp in Ianna’s arms even when Ianna picked her up. Ianna continued,

“Are you God Laos’ kin?”

“Meow,”

Nissi replied briefly. Ianna took it as a yes.

She hugged Nissi tight.

“Thank you for saving me.”

Nissi’s ears perked up.

“I heard that you were sick for a while because Taylon kicked you. You protected me. Even though you’re so small.”

Nissi placed her front paws on Ianna’s shoulders and pushed herself upright so she could look Ianna directly in the eyes.

“Thank you.”

Nissi brought her nose to Ianna’s.

Why was it?

Ianna almost thought that she heard someone say, ‘Of course I protected you.’

Ianna felt strange as the tiny cat poured out her love to her. At the same time, she recalled how she had Nissi had first met.

‘Why did Nissi used to keep me at a distance back then?’

Had she been influenced by Laos because she was Laos’ kin?

But Laos had approached Ianna amicably.

“Meow!”

Nissi cried with all her might.

This time, it felt like she was saying, ‘And I’m going to keep protecting you.”

Ianna still had unresolved questions about Nissi’s strange behavior. But her questions would never be answered so long as Nissi could only meow like a cat. Ianna told herself that she would ask Laos about Nissi the next time they met.

Ianna held onto Nissi as she stood up. Then, she reached out to Herrace.

“Thank you again, Herrace.”

Herrace stared at her outreached hand. Ianna continued,

“I hope that you’ll continue to stay by my side and help me.”

The edges of his lips curled up.

“Yes. I’ll be sure to work hard.”

His lips refused to stop curling up no matter how hard he tried. Ultimately, he lowered his head. He continued,

“I’m so happy that I don’t know what to do with myself when you praise me, Little Ianna.”

Ianna realized something else as she watched Herrace in his joy.

He was her trustworthy fellow knight, but he was still also her younger brother.

“And I’ll keep praising you for good work in the future too.”

“……!”

Ianna knew that she wasn’t mistaken when she saw how elated Herrace grew at her words.

She smiled and said,

“I’ll be in your care.”

“Yes! I’ll do my best!”

Herrace shouted heroically.

~~*~~

Ianna slipped out from the royal castle and visited Priscilla and Saiwè. Eiji had contacted them beforehand, and they were waiting for Ianna in their manor.

“Kyaaah!”

Priscilla shrieked as soon as she laid her eyes on Ianna and pulled her into a hug. Her eyes welled with tears as she savored Ianna’s embrace for the first time in a while.

“Thank you so much for waking up, Little Ianna,”

Priscilla just barely managed to mumble.

Ianna quietly hugged Priscilla back. Priscilla had been her first female friend.

She had thought Priscilla was stubborn and annoying at first, but she had eventually been charmed by Priscilla’s singlemindedness. Ianna liked the way that Priscilla was stubborn about ignoring existing rumors and prejudices and only judged others according to her personal experiences.

And more importantly, Ianna had no choice but to cherish Priscilla, who had unchangingly showered Ianna with her goodwill ever since the day that they had first met.

“Thank you for welcoming me back.”

Ianna pat Priscilla on the back as she turned to Saiwè next. He was smiling as he stood next to them, and he straightened himself out as soon as his eyes met with Ianna’s and said,

“Congratulations on your return.”

He did not greet Ianna back while looking worried like the others had. But Ianna could still feel his warm trust in his attitude. Ianna thought that it was very like Saiwè to act this way as she nodded back.

“I heard that the two of you did a lot of work while I was away.”

Ianna already knew, from the documents she had read, about what they had been up to and how they had influenced Ex-knights.

Pricilla and designed and created comfortable clothes for the people of Ex-knights to wear. She had also worked hard to create armor and robes from new materials that were being studied in the research facilities after the Cataclysm. And, as always, she led the trends in fashion.

Meanwhile, Saiwè had not only been active on the battlefield, but he also had Ex-knights’ culture firmly in his grasp. He had made the culture blossom and preserved it even amidst all the chaos. He had distributed books all throughout the kingdom and had launched entertaining performances. He had worked hard to stop bad forms of merriment in its tracks and revive Ex-knights’ culture with that which was wholesome.

Thus, Priscilla and Saiwè had helped the people maintain their everyday lives.

There were more than a few people who had criticized them for being extravagant when the world might end any day. But Priscilla and Saiwè had stubbornly continued their work.

It was thanks to them that the people hadn’t collapsed even during the tumultuous time of war.

“We were only doing as we have always done. We simply continued our everyday lives.”

“It isn’t easy to continue everyday life in the middle of chaos. And it was thanks to the two of you that others were able to continue their everyday lives too.”

“You make it sound like we accomplished more than what we actually did. But the only reason why we were able to do it in the first place was because we know peace will return one day without fail so long as Your Majesty is alive. We would have thrown away our culture and whatnot and focused solely on surviving if the future ahead of us was dark.”

“What were you going to do if I was dead?”

“But that’s never going to happen, now is it?”

Saiwè replied decisively before he handed Priscilla, who was sniffling, a handkerchief. Then, he continued,

“You’re the type of person who makes people trust you, Your Majesty. You don’t seem like you’d ever die even if you were killed. You will never be slain by another’s hand, and if you were to die someday, it would only be because you reached the end of your lifespan.”

“You say the same things as Eiji.”

“I think that anyone who knows Your Majesty personally would say the same, no? It’s why we were able to look only to the bright future ahead of us and safeguard Ex-knights regardless of how bleak the present was. But those who only idolized you from afar are still anxious, naturally.”

Saiwè pointed out Ex-knights’ true problem. He continued,

“Those who began to grow nervous will only continue to be nervous even if they were to learn that Your Majesty is alive. Even if you killed Bahamut, Your Majesty will not be an absolute figure to them because you were still defeated once. The people won’t be able put their blind faith in an idol that has already cracked.”

Saiwè had pointed out the situation perfectly, and Ianna promptly replied,

“Do perfect people even exist in this world?”

Even the strongest god in the world hadn’t been flawless.

Even Laos, the Creator, wasn’t perfect.

Ianna, who had already been defeated by Arhad countless times in her past life, could never be perfect.

And so, she calmly continued,

“There is no such thing as a perfect person. I am not perfect either. So, I believe that this was for the best. It wasn’t on purpose, but I was able to show them that I’m not some kind of infallible, absolute being.”

“Then, what will you do now? Will you simply allow the people to keep thinking of you that way?”

“I am aware that we still need a symbol to center all of Ex-knights. That is why I’m going to grow stronger.”

“You’re going to grow stronger.”

“Yes. I’m going to grow stronger, and I am going to pay back Bahamut for everything they’ve done. And I will do it with such certainty that it forces the people to clear their doubts. As such, I will become not someone who will never be defeated, but someone who will emerge victorious in the end even if I’m defeated along the way. I will take their fanaticism that says, ‘She will never lose,’ and their anxiety that asks, ‘What if she losses again?’ and turn them into a healthier trust that declares, ‘She’s win in the end even if she loses now.’ I suppose you can say that this is my plan.”

“Aha. I see,”

Saiwè exclaimed. He continued,

“That is who Ianna Ex-knights Rise is. You never turn around, and you always charge forward and face everything head-on even to the point of foolishness……. And I like Your Majesty for being who you are.”

“Was that a compliment?”

“It was. Because you always manage to break through the obstacles before your path in the end.”

Saiwè crossed his arms and nodded. He continued,

“It’s a good thing. Someone who gets hurt but still manages to stand right back up despite their scars incites more trust and safety than someone who never gets hurt, since you don’t know how the latter might react once they do inevitably get wounded. And it’s nice that the former is more realistic too. It appears that I’ve been a bit too pessimistic about this. If Your Majesty manages to pull all of this off during our war against Bahamut, then I’ve no doubt that it’ll work.”

“I don’t have the leisure to do so much setting up while facing a powerful enemy. Nor do I want to put on an act just for my reputation’s sake.”

“That’s just who you are, Your Majesty, so I suppose your aides will simply have to find another way on our own.”

“Well, I trust that you’ll figure something out even without me having to order you around.”

Saiwè grinned with Ianna put her faith in her people on full display.

“Actually, I think it’ll suffice so long as we diligently spread a few rumors. People are social creatures, so they’ll believe something is true if the people around them say it is. And it’ll be even easier if Your Majesty continues to produce tangible results.”

“I’ll work hard to help spread the rumors too. I hold quite a sway nowadays,”

huffed Priscilla, who had wrapped herself around Ianna’s arm and was leaning against her. She continued,

“I know that you don’t like rumors, Little Ianna, but it’s okay since we’re technically only telling the truth, right?”

“As long as it’s all true.”

Ianna smirked back at Priscilla, and Saiwè, who had been watching them, chuckled along.

“Your Majesty is awake now, so I suppose something big will happen soon.”

“There’s still some groundwork to be done so we can topple Bahamut before anything happens.”

“So it’ll be groundwork for the sake of world peace. And in more concrete terms?”

“I think I’ll be able to decide for certain after I’ve visited the Shalino Research Institute.”

“The Shalino Research Institute……. I’m not aware about what exactly they’ve been researching because everything they do is wrapped in a thick layer of secrecy, but I assume they’ve made some good progress?”

Only those who worked at the institute, Ianna, and Arhad knew what the Shalino Research Institute had been researching.

“I won’t know for certain myself until I see it in person, but I have a good feeling about it.”

“Then I shall pray for good news. When will you be visiting?”

“Immediately after parting ways with you two. There were a lot of people whom I’ve had to visit first.”

“Then it seems that you’ve opted against visiting everybody. But then again, I’m sure it’ll take some time to plan for certain victory. It would be for the best that only the fewest number of people possible are aware that Your Majesty is back until everything is ready.”

“Indeed. I’ll keep working on our plans alongside my training, and I’ll likely visit anyone who is necessary to our plans at least one more time later. I feel bad for anyone who isn’t skilled at lying, but I only plan to meet them after all our preparations are complete.”

Ianna especially could not meet anyone from the mythical races. It was less true for halfs, but dwarves, elves, and beastmen were generally horrible liars. The beastmen varied depending on the animals they were based on, and some dwarves and elves had grown shrewder after living alongside humanity for a while, but they were only few and far between.

“Then the next time you go around visiting people, please be sure to see ‘Titan,’ whom we used to call Rust back in Camastros and is our chief weapons instructor now.”

Ianna hadn’t expected Saiwè to say this. He continued,

“It seemed like he had an effective way to deal with Zeigellant, Bahamut’s second imperial knight order.”

Zeigellant, the second imperial knight order. The order that shared its history with Pakalatua, the first imperial knight order, which had existed ever since the imperial family had first founded the empire.

Pakalatua was comprised of powerful madmen who had forsaken their humanity, and Zeigellant was comprised of large-bodied monsters whose identities were shroud in mystery.

Perzenus, the third imperial knight order which Karnitz was affiliated with, was the highest station that a Bahamut soldier could climb up to through normal means. It was impossible for someone to join Pakalatua or Zeigellant simply because they wanted to.

‘Does Titan have something to do with Zeigellant?’

Ianna recalled everything she knew about Titan.

He had been the ace of the arena back in Theodore, Roanne’s royal capital, his frame was larger than the average man’s, and he had a lot of interest in the draconic races……. And that was all she knew.

Ianna knew pretty much everything there was to know about Camastros’ other executives, but she knew strangely little about Titan.

‘I remember hearing that Mr. Niall recommended him to Eiji.’

Titan was allegedly a member of a minority race from the North and the Lotso Mountains. He revered strength and had lived by battling powerful monsters until he suddenly made a name for himself as a mercenary, and he had met Niall Sabelix, a merchant, by pure chance.

Niall had befriended Titan while assisting the latter, who was powerful but knew little about the ways of the world. Niall had witnessed Titan’s overwhelming might firsthand during their time together, and he had wanted to pull Titan into Camastros. He had done this by giving Titan a lot of alcohol and stealthily asking him about his goals.

This was how Titan had replied:

“My goal is to beat the strongest monster in the world.”

“You aren’t referring to a dragon, are you?”

“Dragons aren’t monsters —they’re beings who ought to be worshiped.”

Niall had also apparently been surprised to hear Titan say this:

“The monster I want to beat is Bahamut. The dragons are the strongest creatures in the world now, but Bahamut will overpower them and threaten the entire world one day without fail.”

Titan had stopped talking after that, but Niall asked no further and had decided to pull Titan into Camastros then and there. Niall had told Eiji exactly what Titan had told him, Arhad had met Titan after being intrigued by Eiji’s report, and Titan had taken an interest in and grown competitive against Arhad and had ultimately decided to join Camastros.

And that was it.

‘I’m curious.’

Ianna was curious about Rust, the final executive of Camastros whose identity had yet to be fully disclosed to her.

Ianna was not the type of person to dig into another’s secrets unless she had an actual need to do so. This was why it had only been after Giselle had personally disclosed the fact that she was Lumiere, the queen of the elves, that Ianna had learned about her.

What kind of person was Titan?

She would have to pay him a visit soon.

After all, if he had personally said that he ‘knew an effective way to deal with Zeigellant,’ and Saiwè knew that he had said this, then it likely meant that he too was ready to disclose his true identity now.

~~*~~

Part 4

The last place Ianna visited was the Shalino Research Institute, where Taro, Lalatua, Saki, and Lindsay were staying. Lalatua was assisting with the institute’s research because she was an expert in biology.

“You’re awake, Little Ianna.”

“Thank god!”

Ianna grew curious when she met Taro and Lalatua, so she asked them,

“Why are the two of you standing so far apart?”

Lalatua and Taro was standing far apart from each other. Lalatua was holding Ianna’s hand, and Taro was waving from afar.

Lalatua sulked and replied,

“He’s not allowed to come close to me right now.”

Had Taro done something wrong?

“How come?”

“That’s…a secret.”

Ianna didn’t sense any bad vibes from Lalatua’s answer. Rather, it made her feel oddly itchy. Lalatua also looked openly cross, but why was it? She also looked so endearing. Perhaps something had happened since Ianna had seen them last, but she had a hunch that Taro’s perseverance might snap sooner rather than later.

“I heard that your research has produced results.”

“Yeah, and they’re good results too. Let’s go see Ms. Saki, who’s in charge.”

Ianna followed Lalatua to the most remote laboratory in the institute. They saw Saki, who was still just as white as ever, pacing restlessly inside as soon as they opened the door.

Heinrich, Dorcianni, Lindsay, and Vistomanta were standing next to her. The Psychic Archmage, the Archmage of Lightning, the Archmage of Earth, and a high elf —they were truly a blindingly colorful entourage.

Sake opened her eyes wide as soon as her gaze met Ianna’s, and she smiled so hard that her mouth took on the shape of a half moon.

“Lady Ianna! It’s truly you!”

“It’s been a while, Saki.”

“I’m so glad you’re awake! But you’ve been laying down for so long —are you hurting anywhere?”

Saki ran up to Ianna and greeted her in her own way by scrutinizing Ianna up and down while checking up on her, and she beamed when she found that Ianna was not only perfectly fine but also healthier than she had ever been.

Ianna smiled warmly and greeted Heinrich next.

“It’s been a while, Lord Heinrich.”

“Indeed. I’m happy to see you again.”

Heinrich looked younger and more filled with vigor than he had before. And it wasn’t only because of how much brighter his eyes were shining. Ianna wondered if she was hallucinating that some of the wrinkles etched into his mien had vanished.

“Lindsay, Vistomanta. Have the two of you been well?”

“Of course not. But I’m sure we’ll be better after today. Congratulations on your safe return, Lady Ianna.”

Linsay and Vistomanta greeted Ianna warmly as well.

“You’re not going to say hi to me?”

“I saw you just a few hours ago,”

Ianna replied apathetically when Dorcianni grumbled, and then she turned back to Saki at long last. Saki looked immensely satisfied as she savored all the laughter around her.

“You’re awake now, Lady Ianna, and our research has been fruitful too, so I’m certain that only good things will come.”

“As they should. But why are there so many people in the laboratory?”

“Because everyone here has made an important contribution to the success of our research. I’m about to explain the fruits of our research to our greatest investor, so isn’t it only right that I called everyone here?”

“I see. I’d like to hear what exactly these fruits you speak of are now.”

“Yes! Let us be off!”

Saki took Ianna by the hand and pulled her to the center of the laboratory. The others looked proud as they followed behind them.

There was a large research bench in the middle of the laboratory. There was a colorful assortment of test tubes lined up in a rack on top of the bench.

“It’s been years since we met and you first starting lending me your aid, Lady Ianna, and now, years later, I’m finally able to show you the fruits of our research.”

There was a flask containing a greyish liquid and a flask containing a liquid that was glowing white next to the test tube rack. Saki looked jubilant as she pointed at the flasks. She continued,

“We’ve completed the cure for Life.”

Life.

The elixir of perpetual youth that had been created based off the drug called Reborn.

The knights of Bahamut who used Life obtained an abundance of lifeforce and powerful strength. In return, however, they lost their human will and began clinging only to their greed, and they became puppets to the empire as they became addicted to Life.

“Strictly speaking, the illnesses that Life causes are symptoms of addiction and a change in personality due to the influence of Ideas. But Saki, we established previously that, while it’s possible to treat the addiction, it’s impossible to treat the personality change that results from the influence of Ideas unless the patient wills it for themself. What exactly is your cure supposed to treat?”

Saki smiled serenely.

“It was simple for us to find a treatment for the addiction a few months back because the divine power of nature grew abundant and the spirits became more active after the Cataclysm. The symptoms of addiction will disappear completely once a patient has been taking the treatment for enough time.”

They had already found a cure for the addiction……so in that case…? Saki continued,

“But I continued to research how to treat the personality change that results from the influence of Ideas, and the new cure that I’ve created is meant to do just that.”

Ianna’s eyes took on a conspicuous color.

“You mean it’s possible to fix the personality change?”

“We’re not fixing the personality change, technically speaking, but rather inducing the patient’s personality to change yet again.”

Saki pulled a notebook out from her pocket and handed it to Ianna. She continued,

“This notebook contains an outline of my research methodology. Please read it.”

Ianna accepted the notebook and slowly and seriously began pouring through its contents.

­—Discovery #1: The Apex of the Soul

Heinrich, Dorcianni, and I learned how to see the astral plane at will through training. We observed the polluted souls of the Bahamut soldiers whom we brought in as research specimens through the astral plane for a very long time.

Then, one day, Dorcianni noticed that there was a part of the specimens’ souls that hadn’t been polluted and that the deepest reaches of their souls were still completely intact. After consulting with Heinrich, who is an expert in psychology, we hypothesized that the specimens were protecting the deepest reaches of their psyche through some kind of self-defense mechanism. We must target this apex of the soul.

—Discovery #2: Ideas, Brain Damage, and Brainwashing

The Ideas don’t disappear and continue to cling to the specimens’ brains. The clinging Ideas continue to pollute their souls, and their polluted souls affect their brains. The specimens’ brains are damaged, and they lose brain activity in their amygdala and frontal lobes. The specimens appear to lose their ability to feel sympathy and their ability to control their desires. The Bahamut Empire brainwashes the specimens to believe that the imperial family is absolute and that the imperial family’s enemies must be put to death.

—Targets for Treatment

The Apex of the Soul

Ideas, Brain Damage, and Brainwashing

—Improvements to Mystic #1: Heinrich’s Improvements to Mystic

Heinrich was in possession of a version of Mystic that was modified to take away all the harmful toxins from Reborn. This version of Mystic was formerly used to create medication for the king of Ex-knights and Heinrich’s grandson.

—Improvements to Mystic #2: Return

If Ideas can pollute the soul, then I hypothesized that the pure emotions of the spirits can purify the soul. Lindsay and Vistomanta proposed that we try and improve the modified Mystic by imbuing it with the power of the spirits.

……It was a success. The clean divine power and the pure emotions of the spirits that were imbued into the modified Mystic will be able to purify the soul from its apex.

We decided to call our new version of Mystic, ‘Return.’

—Compounding #1: The Inducing Agent

Lindsay and I mixed several different drugs together to create an ‘inducing agent.’

As we had hypothesized, it wasn’t possible to purify the specimens’ souls, but it was possible to guide the direction in which it was changing. We confirmed that pure emotions guided the soul toward ‘good rationality,’ similar to how Ideas guided the soul toward ‘evil greed.’

Addendum #1: We confirmed that the inducing agent is capable of erasing the Ideas of Life that had been clinging to the soul.

Addendum #2: The earth can be purified quickly if Return is planted in polluted soil. We confirmed that the rate of purification is quickened if the inducing agent is also added.

Compounding #2: The Shocking Agent

There is a prerequisite to maximizing the effects of the inducing agent.

Heinrich showed us a special plant that can temporarily suspend the functions of a specific organ. It was apparently a plant that he had modified as a means to temporarily strip mana away from Herrace’s heart. Dorcianni modified it further by giving it the trait of lightning, and thus we completed the ‘shocking agent.’

Using the shocking agent temporarily grinds the brain’s functions to a halt and clears the brain of all thoughts. The first question that users of the shocking agent ask after their brains wake up and their consciousness returns is, “Who am I?” Then, they begin to ask themselves a continuous stream of questions such as, “Why am I doing this?” It takes approximately ten minutes before their brain functions return to normal.

Compounding #3: The Stimulant

We succeeded in creating a ‘stimulant’ based on the shocking agent. The stimulant temporarily restores the user’s ability to sympathize and their ability to reason. We confirmed that the specimens experience faint emotions of guilt regarding their actions while these abilities are restored.

+ The Shocking Agent

Instantaneously reduces the user’s brain to a blank state.

+ A Small Amount of Inducing Agent

Guides the user’s thoughts toward good.

+ A Hormone Regulator

We eliminated by specimens’ motivation with hormone regulators. They will not take action even if their destructive desires are maximized if they do not have any motivation.

Snap.

Ianna closed the notebook as her head began to hurt. The notebook was difficult to comprehend because there were complicated formulas and nearly undecipherable graphs and diagrams squeezed in between each paragraph.

“This is difficult.”

Saki, whose eyes has been sparkling as she eagerly awaited Ianna’s praise, snapped back to her senses and awkwardly scratched her cheek.

“Hmmm, yes, I’m sure it is. It’s probably difficult for a layperson to understand because there’s so much jargon.”

“Could you please provide me with a summary of how the cure works?”

“Of course.”

Saki picked up the flask with the greyish liquid in her left hand and the flask with the glowing white liquid in her right. Then, she continued,

“The grey liquid is the stimulant, and the white liquid is the inducing agent.”

She shook her left hand.

“First, we use the stimulant to shock the patient’s psyche and give them a small identity crisis.”

Then, she shook her right hand.

“Next, we use the inducing agent to guide their thought patterns toward the good. By repeating this process, we can change the patient’s personality back into how it used to be before they began taking Life or even turn them into better people than they were previously. We’ve already run some clinical trials.”

Saki sighed.

“But we’re only able to guide them, and the patients’ ability to change ultimately still depends on their will. The cure isn’t very effective on patients who were already villains even before they started taking Life or if they had always enjoyed doing evil things in their heart of hearts. And the manufacturing costs are quite expensive too. There’s still more research that needs to be done before the cure can be commoditized.”

“But it’s already remarkable that you were even able to find a cure to begin with. And I saw that Return and the inducing agent are even capable of purifying the earth.”

Ianna recalled the conversation that she and Saki had shared when they had first met in Sidian long ago.

“But my life’s mission is to eliminate the Ghosts and purify the earth. Successfully completing this plan means that I will be able to set up the groundwork for accomplishing my mission.”

“I need a lot of samples, as I am trying to find a way to treat those who have taken it.”

“Because I am a doctor. As the head of Shalino, the international doctors’ association, I cannot see an ‘illness’ and simply ignore it.”

Saki had declared that her life’s mission was to treat Life addicts and to purify the earth, and she had truly spent a lot of time working toward her goals.

“You’ve managed to get it done in the end, Saki. You have my congratulations.”

Saki’s hard work had ultimately borne fruit. Saki had created the weapons by which she would complete her life’s mission.

“It’s all thanks to the help that everyone gave me. And the changing of ages helped as well,”

Saki said as she smiled bashfully. She was right. She would never have been able to complete her life’s mission but for the expansive knowledge and experience of the other mages or the change of ages.

But it was still none other than Saki Celtz Shizenmore who was the main character at the center of it all and who had led the experiments to success.

At this point, Ianna could not help but ask the woman in charge,

“Do you want to treat the Bahamut soldiers, Saki?”

Saki took a moment to consider her answer and, as if she had anticipated the question, calmly and without hesitation replied,

“I am a doctor, and I will treat any patient before me as a matter of course because I am a doctor. I am also a priest, and I will not discriminate between God Laos’ creations because I am a priest. But I am also human, so I will not ask my allies to treat their enemies who have done evil unto them.”

“…….”

“I posit that many of the enemy’s soldiers had no choice but to enlist in the army in order to survive. Some are probably even crying because they know fully well how evil their actions are but cannot allow themselves to stop. Despite everything, however, the fact that they have committed evil still stands, so I will not ask my allies to bring salvation unto their enemies.”

“And your conclusion?”

“On a personal level, I would like to use my personal wealth and Shalino’s funds to cover the treatment of any patient I come across. But I will defer the matter of the cure’s public use to you, Lady Ianna.”

“It’s public use?”

“It is possible to widely distribute the stimulant and the inducing agent. They need only be inhaled in order to be effective.”

Saki pushed the greyish stimulant toward Ianna. She continued,

“It is also possible to use the inducing agent as a chemical weapon for tactical use in warfare. It can instantly reduce people to a blank state and throw their personal values into chaos, so it can be used to cause a lot of chaos in the Bahamut army’s ranks. This drug can be used both as a cure to treat an illness or as a weapon of mass slaughter depending on the user.”

“Leave it to me if you plan to distribute it. I researched the best way to distribute the cure and the best way to maximize how much of it is absorbed into the body at Lady Saki’s request,”

Lalatua said languidly from somewhere behind Ianna. Then, Saki pushed the white inducing agent toward Ianna too.

“I will respect your choices.”

Ianna stared at the two flasks that Saki had pushed toward her.

“I will not ‘treat’ our enemies, Saki. They’ve caused far too much harm to our people.”

“Indeed.”

Saki nodded back in understanding, but Ianna wasn’t done speaking yet. She continued,

“But neither will I use it as a chemical weapon, so long as the circumstances allow.”

“Meaning?”

“I will grant the Bahamut army one final chance to ‘recover their senses.’”

She would kill the bastards who failed to recover their senses even after they were given the opportunity, but she would allow those who had managed to recover their senses to live if they so wished. Ianna continued,

“Whether you choose to treat them or not will be entirely your responsibility after that. Everything will be your responsibility, from nursing your patients to the costs of their treatment. We will not get in your way, Saki, but if you wish for us to assist you, then we will demand an appropriate price for our aid not only from you personally but also from the Bahamut soldiers.”

“I understand what you’re trying to say.”

Saki and Ianna looked at each other and smiled.

“I suppose our conversation is over, then. Please ignore the costs and focus only on creating more of the stimulant and inducing agent starting today. We’ll need to distribute large quantities of both.”

Ianna went to Arhad once she had finished all of her visits.

“……This is what I have so far.”

Ianna explained a rough outline of her plans, and the edges of Arhad’s lips curled up like he was overflowing with motivation for the first time in a while as he smiled confidently.

“You’ve worked hard. Leave the details to us.”

“That was the plan.”

Ianna created the framework, and Arhad and the rest of Ex-knights would fill in the details —and that was how their plan would come to life. It would be a plan more perfect and superb than any plan that Ianna could put together on her own while wracking her brains.

And there was only one goal that the innumerable details and tactics would support.

‘Taylon Helkan Bahamut. You’ve always seen everything around you as nothing more than food.’

Bahamut had devoured, devoured, and devoured yet again in his want to climb higher. Everything around him had been nothing more than footholds that he could use to keep climbing.

‘Yes, it’s quite remarkable that you managed to reach the peak like that.’

Ianna genuinely applauded Taylon in her heart.

‘However.’

I think I’ll be removing some of those footholds around you now.

Then, your only remaining option will be to fall.

‘You must be busy absorbing the dragons about now…….’

A chilling light glistened in Ianna’s eyes.

‘So I’ll take the opportunity to isolate you from the world.’

That was the goal she had in mind before her showdown with Taylon.

Ianna had immediately made her way to her personal training grounds after she had spoken briefly with Arhad. She needed to begin training in earnest now.

Ianna sat down in her personal training grounds.

And she began taking deep breaths.

The sights that she had always been looking to were within her grasp now.

Her limits had disappeared now that every riddle had been answered, and Ianna was endlessly free.

The wind blew and scattered Ianna’s hair. Her vivid red eyes turned toward the heavens above.

Higher.

And higher.

Higher than even the skies.

To the peak that was higher up than even the edge of the sky.

Ianna was seized by an elation that told her that she could do anything.

This elation was not some kind of foolish mirage.

I can make it!

Her powerful will blossomed in her heart like flames. The flames swallowed even her eyes as it shone with a radiant light.

~~*~~

The Black Fox.

It was a large-scale underground organization that had been notorious all throughout the South just a few years prior. Every thug and lout of the underworld had dreamed of joining the Black Fox at the time.

But every member of the Black Fox who had come from the South had quit at record speeds after the Black Fox had suffered a crushing defeat at Roanne’s courtesy and it was revealed that the organization had been working for Bahamut all along.

Then, the executives who were originally from Bahamut had taken only the members who had vowed loyalty to Bahamut and had fled North.

The base in the North that the Black Fox had returned to had already been fully equipped by the time they had arrived. There had been no need for the Black Fox to care much about securing weapons or information. And that was why the Black Fox had engaged solely in ‘human hunting’ once they had returned to their Northern base.

“Ahh!”

“Spare me! I don’t want to go!”

“Shut up and get inside!”

Smaaack!

The people took fright and stepped inside the wavering Gate while dragging their feet when the whip hit the ground.

“Shit.”

One member stopped his whip mid-swing and sighed heavily as he cursed. His colleague was puzzled to hear him.

“What’s wrong?”

“I was wondering how much longer we have to keep up human hunting for.”

The members of the Black Fox were indiscriminately capturing people and forcing them inside Gates from all across the continent. It had been the only order that the higher ups had given them.

“Damn, did you turn over a new leaf or something?”

“Bullshit. The thought never even crossed my mind.”

He spat and continued grumbling,

“It’s just that I was hoping to be able to sit back and relax while reaping all the rewards like we did back in Roanne, and it’s grating on my nerves that we’re standing here working our asses off nonstop. Hey, who said you could stop walking?!”

Someone was standing firmly in front of the Gate while refusing to budge no matter how much he was whipped or kicked, and, with a quiver in his voice, he shouted back,

“I-I know who you people are. You’re the Black Fox!”

“That we are.”

“Why are you taking Bahamut citizens captive if you’re working for Bahamut?! Rumors about your human hunting have already been spreading everywhere!”

There had been more than a few people who had just barely managed to escape the Black Fox with their lives. Every last one of them had wailed about how the Black Fox, an organization that worked directly under the imperial palace, was hunting humans, and those rumors had been slowly spreading. The citizens of Bahamut had been shocked to hear the rumors, and they had grown enraged. Not that they had any means to protest or rebel…….

“No one’s ever crossed a Gate and come back! What’s on the other side of that Gate?!”

They could not see anything beyond the ominous Gate.

“I’ve no clue myself. Just get in already.”

“Ack!”

The Black Fox member sneered as he kicked the protester through the Gate.

“But seriously, aren’t you curious? What do you think is going on inside? I can get behind hunting people from foreign nations, by what’s the point in hunting our own people?”

The members of the Black Fox truly didn’t know.

They had no idea what was happening inside the Gates. They had no idea why Bahamut was capturing foreigners and citizens alike.

“Kill that curiosity of yours.”

It was taboo for members of the Black Fox to try and learn the truth about what was happening beyond the Gates. This was because several of their colleagues had gone inside out of curiosity only to never return.

“Hmph. Well, I don’t care as long as life treats me well.”

It wasn’t the Black Fox member’s place to care about what happened to the people who were forced to cross the Gates.

“Now, now! Get inside already!”

The Black Fox member picked his whip back up and resumed sending people through the Gate.

Rattle, rattle.

An endless line of carriages carrying people who had been kidnapped were rolling in, and the kidnapped people were pushed before the Gate. They were powerless to oppose the Black Fox’s whips. And they had no choice but to step inside the Gate without knowing where it would lead them.

The dozens of Gates sprinkled all over the world connected to a laboratory beneath the Bahamut imperial castle.

Only those who had come through the Gates were allowed inside the castle basements, and they could not even dream about rebelling or escaping. Not only were the Bahamut imperial knights, who had become the very definition of terror in this new age, guarding the area but they were also being safeguarded by the empress dowager herself.

The empress dowager was frequently away because she was busy sweeping across the continent, but the mere fact that she was safeguarding the imperial knights personally meant that the security was sufficient.

The knights stared at the people coming through the Gates with a dark madness glistening in their blackish eyes.

“E-eek.”

Those who locked eyes with the knights went from boiling like a pot on fire to shrinking back like evaporated soup in but an instant.

They could not believe that the knights were human in the same way that they were. They looked more like evil spirits donning a human shell and humanoid armor. That was simply how dark and muddy the atmosphere around the knights had become.

An entrance to hell had opened up in the basements that the people had been forced into.

It was a large-scall Life manufacturing facility.

Part 5

“Heeheehee.”

Payne, the boss of the Black Fox, whistled in his room as he prepared to make his way to the Life manufacturing facility.

Life had been a priceless drug worth more than a thousand gold before the Cataclysm, during the Age of Magic where the divine power of nature hadn’t been so prevalent in the world, but it’s value had since plummeted now that there was ample divine power in the world. It was more efficient even for the higher-ranking knights to simply absorb divine power on their own now.

But Bahamut had ordered the knights to keep taking Life anyway because absorbing the divine power of nature tended to disperse some of their evil nature. Moreover, they had also started giving Life to higher-ranking soldiers who didn’t know how to control divine power and brainwashing them.

More Life was being consumed than ever before, and more needed to be manufactured than ever before, now that it was being supplied not only to the higher-ranking knight orders but to higher-ranking soldiers too.

Payne was busy.

And he liked being busy.

He was having so much fun as of late that he thought it might drive him insane.

His masters had told him that he no longer needed to avoid any prying eyes. This was different from the Ghosts situation. It didn’t matter even if the entire world knew that the Black Fox was human hunting.

Indeed. He no longer had any reason to hide.

After all, everyone had no choice but to submit in the face of absolute might.

“Hohoho.”

Payne loved wielding power —it made him feel like he was sitting on top of the world. He was ecstatic, as if he was high on drugs, whenever he saw life withering away beneath his claws.

“Heehee…….”

Payne was slowly losing his mind.

Blood, drugs, and Ideas.

Vengeance and ambition.

These things had devoured Payne’s mind, making him lose sight of his goals, and only a few driving impulses guided his mind now that he was drunk on power.

I’ll force the beastmen to surrender!

I’ll take revenge on Ex-knights!

Bahamut will conquer the world!

It won’t be long now……the day that you all fall down on your knees is soon to come……!

I’ll kill you, I’ll murder you, I’ll slaughter you!

Payne repeated to himself as he opened the door and stepped outside. Executives of the Black Fox were outside waiting for him.

“Let’s go.”

He had nothing to fear so long as he was still beneath the Bahamut imperial castle. After all, there were more than a few individuals of skill guarding him.

Ex-knights had retreated back into her territory, like a turtle drawing into her shell, after his master had defeated that woman —Ianna. Ex-knights had huddled into herself and endured beating after beating without ever once having the chance to counterattack, and she had remained silent no matter what atrocities happened beyond the citadel at her border.

“Ahahaha! The utter fools! It’s only a matter of time!”

Payne cackled as he led the way with the executives of the Black Fox behind him.

“Hmm?”

But Payne caught wind of the strange atmosphere inside the castle just then.

Baaaang! Baang!

The castle, which had been tranquil ever since the Cataclysm, was exploding.

“Huh?”

“Huuh?”

The executives began to stop in their tracks. They dropped their jaws as their expressions slackened blackly like they were retarded.

“L-Lord Payne!”

“What is going on……?”

The tip of Payne’s sensitive nose had perceived something foreign. A drug that he could not identify. Alarm bells ran in his head. Payne immediately covered his nose with a handkerchief.

“Stop breathing and stick close to me!”

The executives stuck close to Payne even though nothing had quite happened just yet, and Payne quickly tried to activate the emergency escape magic that was imbued into his bracelet.

Swish.

But his hand fell off before he could.

“Graah…….”

And someone wrapped their thick arm around Payne’s throat before he could even manage to scream. The arm was squeezing so tightly that Payne could not breathe.

“You kidnapped me like this before,”

a chilling voice resounded in Payne’s ear. It was a voice that was ever so familiar to him. The voice continued,

“You caught me off guard. I did think you were being a little too quiet, but you were quiet for so long that I allowed myself to lower my guard like an actual fool.”

“Kgh.”

“You took me away as soon as I stopped being wary because I thought I was completely safe under the rulers of Ex-knights’ protection. You stole me away like a desert ghost and left no traces of yourself behind.”

“K-kgh…”

He squeezed Payne’s throat even tighter.

“Doesn’t this feel like déjà vu? I’m doing exactly to you what you did to me.”

Payne could not best him in a contest of strength. He had grown considerably stronger because the Bahamut imperial family had granted him strength and because he had drank more Life than any other, but there was nothing he could do in the face of a surprise attack —and that was before taking his opponent into consideration. The voice continued,

“It’s time for you to face your karma.”

Cruunch.

He wrung Payne’s neck and rendered him unconscious before he suffocated to death. Then, he melted into the air and quietly slipped out of the castle.

Bang!

Baaang!

Someone was making a mess with a staff at the center of the gigantic underground laboratory.

Baang!

The endless stream of ferocious spells and divine arts coming from the end of the staff haphazardly destroyed the laboratory facilities. Even the knights and mages directly affiliated with the imperial palace could do little to stop the staff’s owner.

The higher-ranking knights had all set out for war and were busy ravaging the world, and the lower-ranking knights had been guarding the imperial palace in turns.

The lower-ranking knights had always felt an unclosable gap in power between themselves and the higher-ranking knights, and they were currently feeling something similar from the mage who was destroying the facilities. They could not help but feel this way as they saw their colleagues who had tried to jump the mage lying dead on the floor.

Their instincts were being dominated, as though they were herbivories huddling in terror before a carnivore, and they could not bring themselves to rush into the fray no matter how evil they were. And so, they instead decided to take up a defensive formation in order to preserve their military might.

“Who the hell is that? Does anyone know?”

The knights gritted their teeth as they studied the mage’s appearance.

“She has to be stronger than an archmage. She’s even using divine arts.”

“Never seen her face before. She must either be a new mage who emerged after the Cataclysm or one of the mages from Ex-knights.”

Her brown hair was flying around her, and her entire face was covered with scars.

It should’ve been possible for them to identify the mage by her innate characteristics or the individualistic habits in her magical arrangements even if they didn’t recognize her by appearance. But every spell and divine art she was commanding was new to them.

But strangely enough…

“I feel like I’ve felt that woman’s aura before.”

“You too? I feel the same. But I can’t say for sure.”

They had undoubtedly never seen it before, but strangely enough, something about her divine arts felt familiar to them. But the knights made faces and hesitated despite the familiarity.

“That woman —she’s Louise of the Weak,”

someone shouted as they figured out her identity.

“Louise?”

“Why’s she attacking us?”

Every knight and mage who heard her name recalled the fact that she was an ‘archmage.’ Louise was famous in Bahamut. How could not know about her when she had become an archmage after traveling across the Empire?

Louise had spared no effort to plant grains and other crops all over Bahamut’s frozen lands before the Cataclysm. She had encouraged the people to work together and tend to the crops. The seeds had eventually ripened into delicious grains and fruits that had become as precious sustenance to fill the people’s stomachs.

And the people of Bahamut had learned about cooperation and peace.

Louise had also not only upturned but also jumbled around the power structure in Bahamut’s rural regions by doing away with the greedy liege lords. She had beaten the living daylights out of the liege lords, hung them from their own ramparts, and had posted large flyers detailing their many crimes next to them.

Through Loise’s work, the people of Bahamut had learned freedom and just how enjoyable it could be to punish the corrupt.

Louise had planted, watered, and sprouted the seeds of hope in the hearts of the Bahamut peasants. More than a few Bahamut nobles had developed headaches as a result.

And then, she had suddenly vanished after she was done with her work.

There had been all kinds of rumors about her.

Like that she had died, or that she had gone into hiding because she was terrified of the backlash…….

No one knew what the truth was, but the important part was the fact that Louise had vanished.

So, why had Louise suddenly appeared again in the underground laboratory beneath the imperial castle?

“Ugh. Ughhh.”

“Please save us, Lady Louise!”

Hundreds of people broke free from behind the bars that she had destroyed and flocked to her.

“Save us, please save us!”

They were trembling like leaves as they begged Louise to grant them salvation. The people had been taken from all over Bahamut, and some of the had witnessed Louise’s powerful spells previously.

And that was why they had started hoping for survival. Just like when Louise had planted the seeds of hope in their hearts in the past.

“…….”

The Bahamut soldiers began analyzing Louise’s every action and observing her carefully no sooner than they had learned that she was Louise.

She was truly incredible. She had no hesitation as she attacked and defended, and it was as if her eyes could see the entire laboratory from above. She destroyed important facilities one after another and defended hundreds of people simultaneously. This would have been next to impossible unless she understood how the laboratory was structured in its totality.

Several people burst out into laughter as they realized her intentions.

“You’re planning to exercise your foolish hypocrisy here too, aren’t you, Mage Louise?!”

one of the mages censured. The mage continued,

“You’ve lost your mind. How dare to revolt against Bahamut —and from inside the heart of the imperial castle no less!— for those worthless insects? Is your life not precious to you?”

The sinister sneering crawled up to Louise like venomous snakes and tried to bite at her heart, but she neither replied nor reacted to them.

“The archmage Louise has attacked us. Requesting reinforcement.”

“We’re dealing with a foe beyond our means, Your Imperial Majesty the Empress Dowager…….”

Someone asked for reinforcements, and someone reported the invasion to the empress dowager, who was carrying out a massacre somewhere in the vast continent.

The Bahamut forces were certain that she was indeed Louise. Even those whom she had met during her stint as an imperial court mage had not figured out her true identity.

Louise, who had been staring distantly at her enemies with her turbid brown eyes, finally spoke up and said,

“Are you done reporting back?”

Louise…

No, Dorcianni had changed a lot while she had been silent as Ex-knights had huddled into herself. This was why the Bahamut forces had failed to identify her properly.

Dorcianni had grown tremendously in the year after she had witnessed the Truth with Ianna’s help. She had broken free of the limits of mana and had only continued training harder, and now she had stepped foot into a world with no foreseeable limits —the ultimate level known as the peak.

She was terrifyingly skilled, and it would have been easier for her to break free from the Bahamut forces and escape than to blink her eyes.

But the reasons why she had remained in place even still was…….

‘She’s coming.’

Dorcianni could feel the ghastly aura racing her way. Shailince was about to teleport over.

‘I should slip away by the skin of my teeth if I want to piss her off.’

Louise smiled.

Her immaculate smile belied no fear at all.

‘I have nothing to fear since I have Her Majesty watching my back. She really is so capable and reliable. And she even came back with the knowledge that Taylon Bahamut is busy absorbing the dragons. Where did she even learn such valuable information?’

Dorcianni used a tracking divine art to calculate the timing of the empress dowager’s arrival as she sang Ianna’s praises in her head. It wouldn’t be much longer now.

Boom!

Dorcianni struck her staff hard against the floor. Everyone stared nervously at the end of her staff because they assumed, from the fact that she had broken her previous pattern of action, that something big was coming.

“You know…”

Those who had heard the rumors about how she did battle understood what it meant when she struck her staff down like that. This action would be followed by a warning.

Louise’s turbid eyes took in all her enemies before her.

“Can you all just die?”

Baaaaang!

There had been no warning.

An explosion of light flooded the laboratory, and the Bahamut forces outside an area that Louise had designated melted away as those inside the area simply vanished.

And this was precisely when Empress Dowager Shailince arrived on the scene.

“…….”

Her black hair was done up beautifully, and she stomped over the remains trailing down her heels as she glowered.

‘Truly, there’ve been so many arrogant bastards cropping up as of late.’

Archmage Louise.

Shailince remembered the name because the mages wouldn’t shut up about her, but she hadn’t paid much attention to Louise otherwise. She didn’t have the time to spare caring about some woman who did nothing but go around planting seeds despite the tremendous power she commanded. But things had changed now that Louise had openly attacked the imperial palace.

‘Who is behind this wench?’

Was it Ex-knights?

But there was no reasons for Ex-knights to do good deeds for Bahamut, their enemy, through Louise. The crops grown in Bahamut were all converted to war supplies and became the foundation for their efforts in breaking down Ex-knights’ ramparts.

Besides, Ex-knights had been solidifying her defenses in terror over the past year, so what reason did the bastards have to suddenly assault the imperial castle only to rescue the worthless ants whose only use was to become ingredients for Life?

‘She could be working with a third party.’

Shailince could not even imagine that this was Ex-knights’ doing. And so, the scales in her mind tilted toward the possibility that there was a third party at play.

‘Is she unhappy about what the Black Fox is doing?’

The laboratory was thoroughly in ruins, and the Gates that connected to every region in Bahamut had been dispelled.

‘How annoying.’

Shailince’s duty was to preserve Bahamut’s military might and deal with the small fry until Taylon was ready to step back into the fray. That was why she was charged not only with commanding the army but also with other busywork, such as training the soldiers and manufacturing more Life.

How dare you get in our way?

‘I’ll murder you.’

Her bloodlust was boiling. Shailince glanced over at the arrangement of Louise’s Teleport with the intention of reading the coordinates inscribed within.

Her black eyes took on a conspicuous color.

‘This is…….’

It was most certainly a Teleport, but it was heavily modified and also included a concealment function that made it impossible for Shailince to read any coordinates.

‘She’s remarkably skilled.’

Many strong individuals had appeared after the Cataclysm, and Shailince had been gathering intelligence about them —especially if they were from Ex-knights. But Louise was more special than them all.

Those who had already been strong to begin with had grown stronger too.

In particular, Shailince’s son, Taylon, was beyond all compare. She couldn’t help but shiver whenever she felt just how powerful he was through their shared blood.

‘The wench was lucky too.’

Louise had attacked the imperial castle while Taylon was unable to make a move. She would never be able to escape alive otherwise.

‘I’ll have to start by reconstructing the Life manufacturing facilities for now.’

Shailince smacked her tongue and contacted Payne.

But Payne didn’t respond. This was something that could never be.

Shailince personally made her way to Payne’s chambers. There, she found the Black Fox executives strewn about over the floor, a severed hand, and the broken remnants of a crushed bracelet.

She also found a dagger stabbed deeply into the wall and a white piece of paper without much difficulty.

Shailince opened up the note and read it.

Open your eyes, imperial family of Bahamut!

We have been a quiet witness to your atrocities as we lived beneath your feet for too long. Let this be a warning, for we refuse to keep silent any longer as your actions threaten to breach the very limits of evil. Repent your wicked ways, and look after your people whom you have trampled so horrendously. For you will regret it if you do not! Payne, the leader of the Black Fox, is only the beginning!

“Oh?”

It was a foolish warning.

Repent? What for? The people? Why should we?

The monster called Bahamut had climbed out from the ocean, conquered the North, founded the empire, and ruled over all. This was how he had lorded from the highest seat in the world of man.

The people under the imperial family’s rule were no different from the fish in the sea.

In terms of landed animals, they were no different from cattle that was raised as livestock. Cattle was only fed fodder and protected in order to fatten them up and squeeze out their milk, and once they had been drained of their milk, they would be butchered and eaten.

“Amazing. To think they would grow so impudent.”

Shailince was genuinely impressed. It was amazing how mere insects had managed to kidnap Payne while avoiding Bahamut’s eyes. They had undoubtedly devoted their hearts and souls to prepare for this.

This third power had allegedly been lurking in Bahamut for quite some time, judging by the words ‘for too long,’ but that was also in and of itself praiseworthy. It meant that they had survived Bahamut’s purge.

“How amusing.”

A ferocious smile alighted Shailince’s lips. She continued,

“Give it your best short.”

Performing her duties had truly been more tedious than she had ever imagined. And so, this incident would be her entertainment to lift her spirits back up.

~~*~~

In a region covered by not two but three layers of barriers.

A pile of people tumbled out from a powerful blast of light.

“Ahh!”

“Oof!”

Hundreds of dizzy people tumbled onto the earth. But they were only dazed for a moment, and they quickly turned their envious eyes to their savior standing at the center of the crown and knelt before her.

“Lady Louise!”

“Louise! Louise!”

Louise’s might had been so overwhelming that even the Bahamut forces had been helpless before her. The people went wild as they chanted her name.

“Thank you!”

The people of the North had hardly ever expressed their gratitude even just a few years ago. They had always assumed that there were underlying motives lurking behind every act of generosity. Bahamut culture had dictated that acts of generosity ought to be rewarded by forcing the receiver to pay the price for what he received instead of offering a word of thanks.

But the people of Bahamut had learned how to express their genuine gratitude and had grown accustomed to doing so after Louise had toured the North. They had learned that pure goodwill that asked for nothing in return could truly exist.

Then, at some point, the people had begun expressing their gratitude first and, if the giver didn’t demand restitution for their efforts and the receiver wasn’t in a situation where they could repay their debt of gratitude immediately, voluntarily began promising to repay their debts of gratitude someday down the line.

And this wasn’t the only change. The words ‘thank you’ were powerful. The number of people expressing their goodwill without asking for anything in return grew exponentially, perhaps because of the sense of accomplishment and the encouragement that was endowed in those words.

The people had most certainly perceived the positive changes, and the culture in Bahamut was beginning to shift ever so slightly.

“Thank you!”

The people cried out to Louise without pause in their gratitude.

“Listen up, all of you,”

Fieber Pistol, who had been watching over the situation by Louise’s side, stepped forward and clapped his hands. He continued,

“Now’s not the time for this. We need to establish a plan.”

The people recognized who he was.

Fieber was famous. He was rumored to be Louise’s right-hand man, and he and his subordinates travelled to every nook and cranny of the North to spread Louise’s teachings. He also helped those who were faced with difficult times. He had once been the leader of the southeastern bandits’ alliance, but now he was a kindhearted vagabond who either repelled the bandits he came across or rounded them up to do good deeds.

“All of you here are witnesses. You saw with your own eyes what the imperial family and their direct subordinates, the Black Fox, have been up too, right?”

“…….”

The people whom Louise had rescued were silently enraged. They may have revered and feared the Bahamut imperial family as gods, but they were still furious with the circumstances nonetheless.

They had simply been suppressing their fury because they knew that their wrath could never touch the imperial family, and they had felt terribly dispirited as a result.

They were livestock who had been taught defeat. Mere cattle who could do nothing to the masters who pulled their yoke even as they were dragged to the slaughterhouse.

“What will you do now?”

“…….”

The people were not able to readily respond.

Would they return to their villages and resume their daily lives?

But most of them had been abducted from their villages. There was a high probability that the Black Fox would simply come to kidnap them again if they returned and pretended like nothing had ever happened. It would not be easy for them to simply return to their daily lives now that they had learned the truth.

Then, would they protest against the Bahamut imperial family and fight back?

But they had no choice but to resign before they could even take up arms because the result of that fight was a foregone conclusion.

“We should……run away,”

someone muttered.

That was their only choice, realistically speaking. The earth had expanded after the Cataclysm, and now there was more landmass that was suitable for human habitation than ever before. There was a higher possibility that they would be safe if they escaped outside the empire’s borders. Besides, there was a lot of people who had fled Bahamut already.

But escaping wasn’t a perfect solution by any means, especially considering the fact that there were such emigrants who had still been abducted by the Black Fox among their number. This meant that the human hunting was taking place beyond Bahamut’s borders too.

“How far will you be able to run?”

Everyone turned their attention to Louise’s lips as her emotionless voice vibrated through the air. She continued,

“This world became spherical after the Cataclysm. You can run ever onward for as long as you like, but you’ll still find yourselves back here eventually as long as you still live on this earth. You’ll have to go to outer space if you want to make a perfect escape.”

“But even then, we’d still have a better chance at survival if we run instead of fight.”

“Do you really believe that? Then, let me guarantee you this. The Bahamut imperial family will chase you down to the ends of the earth and slaughter you eventually even if you try to run.”

The people were puzzled by what Louise was saying.

“Why would Their Majesties go so far just to kill a few lowly pheasants like us……?”

“Because the imperial family wants to be the ‘strongest.’ They’ll want to take on the ‘gods’ themselves once they’re done conquering the continent. And so, they’ll go out of their way to eat every other living being in the world because they’ll need more power if they want to strike down the gods.”

It didn’t quite hit home for the people as Louise began speaking about the gods. But they did acknowledge the fact that the Bahamut imperial family was dangerous beyond all reason. Louise continued,

“They don’t see us as humans, their equals —they see us as mere footholds. They will cut off our heads and drink of our lives even after we surrender.”

Someone was about to protest and ask how any human being could ever possibly do something so horrible, but the wretched realization that the imperial family might do exactly just that shut their mouth. After all, they had only just escaped from a terrible place where they hadn’t been treated as human beings.

“If you want to live, then you need to fight.”

They needed to fight.

Louise had spoken firmly, but the people only shook their heads no as the despair in their hearts were put on full display.

“Their Majesties are too strong. We’ll lose no matter what.”

They had been dominated by a terror and awe that reached all the way down to their bones ever since the day they had been born. To them, the Bahamut imperial family were absolute beings who could be likened to otherworldly monsters when compared to the masses.

“We will lose.”

The people were crushed in their sense of defeat, and there were shadows over their faces. Their powerlessness became as curtains that darkened the atmosphere around them. Louise surveyed the people quietly before, as if she was genuinely curious, she asked,

“Are you able to see the future?”

“Of course not.”

“Then why are you so certain that the fight will end with your defeat, and why do you refuse to even attempt to rise to the challenge?”

“Isn’t it only obvious? We might not be able to see the future, but this is a foregone conclusion!”

“Are you certain about that? Then what about the crops that you’ve been farming?”

The people recalled the green sprouts growing in their backyards at Louise’s mention.

The sudden cultivation of crops had swept through Bahamut like a storm. Bahamut’s citizenry were generally not farmers, but the vast majority of them were still growing crops in small patches of land in their own backyards.

“The North was a dead land for over millennia.”

The North had been a land where the winter winds froze everything, where the sunlight tended not to reach, where the soil was nearly devoid of nutrients, and where everything had been polluted by the power of death and Bahamut’s domination. Louise continued,

“Have you ever predicted that you might be growing crops in your own backyards someday?”

“…….”

“No, right? Most people assumed that it’d never be possible, and you resigned yourself to reality by either plundering food from others or by relying on the food supplied to you by Central Bahamut.”

Louise brought her fingers to her cheek and began tapping. She continued,

“But there were also people who never gave up until the bitter end. They taught themselves how to cultivate all kinds of crops, modified existing crops after countless failures, and went all the way to the Great Forest of Shaob, a repository of all flora, just to do research……. And, as a result of their efforts, they managed to create strong crops that were capable of growing even in the North. All because they continued fighting without ever giving up.”

The people began looking up one after another as they heard what Louise was saying.

“The future isn’t set in stone, and it’s possible to fulfil even the most fleeting of dreams if you keep fighting for it without ever giving up.”

The people understood what she was trying to say, and they saw the reason in her words. But her words were still far too idealistic.

“We’re only ordinary people.”

They were ordinary people who had lived painfully ordinary lives.

They were not special.

They were neither exceptional geniuses nor prominent figures.

They were ordinary people who had been busy just surviving day by day. Impoverished pheasants who hadn’t been able to achieve even the tiniest of their goals. They were quick to flee and quicker still to give up. Worthless beings who would never leave their mark on history.

Anyone who miraculously managed to fulfil colossal dreams was someone special. The people who had created the crops had surely been special too. And the imperial family were surely special people among special people.

How could the ordinary ever possibly hope to best them?

“We are not heroes, and we will never be able to topple Bahamut.”

“There are no ‘absolutes’ in this world because there is always an opening somewhere. And you misunderstand me —I never said that you had to be heroes or topple Bahamut yourselves. I only said that you need to fight.”

How was that any different? Louise put her hand inside her pocket when the people started looking blank. She continued,

“You claimed to be worthless beings who will never leave your mark on history, right? History might sound all grandiose, but it really isn’t anything to write home about. If you write a diary entry every day and hand it down the generations, then that’s history. History is nothing but a written record of someone’s life. And no one here is worthless.”

The people stared back at Louise in a daze before they suddenly realized that she, who was more than capable of crushing them in but an instant, had never once treated them like they were worthless.

“Your lives may be small individually, but they can come together to make one special whole. This large world that we live in is nothing more than an aggregate of many such tiny wholes. In other words, you are a part of the world, and you can influence the world at large in any manner you wish if you come together.”

It had been they themselves who had decided that their lives were worthless.

Heroes were nothing special. They were simply those who did everything in their power to struggle for all they were worth —such were the heroes of this world.

“There are ways to take a stand against the imperial family other than by facing them head-on. For example, you can poison the Bahamut army’s food supply, or you could quietly support those who do decide to fight them head-on from behind the scenes.”

The people slowly became inspired as Louise told them that their lives weren’t worthless, that they were special. They leaned in their ears and opened their hearts. Louise continued,

“Maybe you might die. Words won’t work on the Bahamut army. And maybe you might run away in terror. But you need to understand that anyone who runs away will have no right to partake in the honeyed fruits of the labor of those who choose to fight.

“…….”

“Besides, why would you be tasked with facing the Bahamut imperial family head-on? It’ll be the very powerful who play that part. People who are much stronger than even me. And that’s how we’ll emerge victorious.”

Louise’s alluring words carried a saccharine certainty within them. The people forgot their defeat as they listened to her and they began nodding along as if they were bewitched. Louise continued,

“The Kingdom of Ex-knights will aid our cause. I’ve decided to ally with them.”

“Does that mean we’ll be borrowing outside forces?”

someone asked gingerly. They continued,

“But what if they decide to stab us in the back later?”

The question was oozing with wariness, but it were not dyed in any animosity toward Ex-knights. This was the result of Maron’s and Eiji’s intelligence organizations’ hard work.

“Have you heard any stories about or read any books about Ex-knights recently?”

Most the people present answered yes.

Writings from of Ex-knights’ culture —like novels, for example— had begun cropping up one volume after another in Bahamut’s villages.

Those who were curious read the books in secret behind the Bahamut government’s back, and those who wanted to read but could not had asked others about what kind of land Ex-knights was in passing.

It was thanks to this that the people of Bahamut no longer thought of Ex-knights as a kingdom driven mad in her desire for blood and vengeance.

“Ex-knights isn’t greedy for others’ land. We only need to cooperate with them until the Bahamut imperial family is gone. Ex-knights has promised that they won’t interfere even if we decide to reclaim our home or build up a brand new country. And in the event that they do break their promise, I will be here to stop them.”

Louise had finished saying everything that she had to say. And so, she continued,

“So, what will you do?”

The people’s visages were glowing with determination.

“We’ll fight!”

They couldn’t trust Ex-knights, but they did trust Louise.

“Let’s fight!”

Louise had said that they needn’t be on the frontlines themselves, which made it seem all the more doable. Instead, they would be hiding behind those who did fight the Bahamut army in person, disturbing the flow of information, or grumbling at any family members who were affiliated with the army.

They had to fight, even if only to survive. They finally understood that Bahamut was their enemy and not their guardian god.

“Damn the imperial family!”

Those who had been born as citizens in the Bahamut Empire were generally very rough in temperament. They carried a strong desire to retaliate and were very combative even if they counted among the weak. They were like fighting dogs who were wary about those stronger than they but would bite as soon as they believed that the strong had grown weak, and this spirit was the very foundation of Bahamut’s culture.

The people blazed in their rage as soon as Louise had drawn away their fear.

“What should we do?”

they asked like lost children.

They were already overwhelmed by the sheer fact that they had decided to take up arms against beings whom they considered absolute. They had abandoned any desire to flee, but they had no idea what to do next and began wandering blindly because they didn’t even know what was right from wrong or the direction they should be heading.

Or perhaps they did know, but it was only human to want to lean on a prominent figure like Louise anyway.

The people wished for Louise to guide their way. And Louise did not betray their expectations.

“Go back to your villages and begin spreading rumors. Tell the world what happens to those the Black Fox kidnaps, and tell the world how Bahamut treated you.”

The people listened to her attentively, but a chill of anxiety continued to stab at their hearts.

“But what if the Black Fox or the army comes to attack us?”

“There will be someone from our alliance in every village, so you should be able to defend yourselves to some extent even if you’re attacked. But this means that you’ll have to fight back too, naturally.”

Louise waved her staff. She continued,

“Besides, you’ll only be speaking the truth —what can they possibly do about it once it’s out there? If you’re scared even still, then just use my name.”

There was no hint of fear in her apathetic words. The anxiety that had dominated the crowd slowly subsided and faded away in the face of Louise’s composure.

“We will give your rumors wings. Besides, our alliance will eliminate the Black Fox soon enough, so there’s no reason to worry too much about them.”

~~*~~

Part 6

The rumors spread like a flock of birds soaring into the sky.

“The Black Fox……!”

“The Bahamut imperial family……!”

The survivors went around the villages to air their grievances. Those who no longer had hometowns to return to paired up to visit other villages and rage as they told everyone about what they had been through.

“Is this true?”

“No way…….”

The people’s hearts were shaken because the cries the survivors spat out were sincerity itself.

“Do they really need to go that far?”

The people tried to ignore them at first. After all, it would be far too cruel if what the survivors were saying was true. It was already hard enough just to survive, and being forced to face the truth would be no different than having the sky itself crumble down above them.

But the situation did not allow them to simply be content with what little peace they had.

Maron was busy whispering the truth everywhere it could reach.

“The Black Fox rips out the hearts of the people they kidnap and uses them to make elixirs of youth.

“The elixirs are then taken by powerful Bahamut soldiers and loyal Bahamut nobles.

“And they know that the drugs are made from our hearts when they take them”

“They don’t see us as humans at all.”

Maron had continued working with Ex-knights’ Department of Intelligence after its initial meeting with Ianna, and it had grown in size after absorbing several other anti-Bahamut nobles. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that Maron was everywhere in Bahamut, save for the imperial capital.

Maron had even made connections with neutral nobles after the Cataclysm. The neutral nobles did not actively participate in anti-Bahamut activities, but they had agreed to not get in Maron’s way.

And so, it had been simple for the members of Maron to spread rumors about the Black Fox and the imperial family all throughout the empire.

Their whispers, individually as quiet as feathers, swept across the entire world like a hurricane.

“My word!”

“Seriously?”

“How could they?!”

A rumor spread by one person was a lie.

A rumor spread by two people was speculation.

But a rumor spread by three people was the truth.

And eventually, the unbelievable rumors were accepted not as nonsense meant to slander the imperial family but as the undeniable truth.

The people were horrified when they were forced to face reality.

They had already known that the Black Fox was kidnapping people and taking them somewhere. It was also well-established that those who were taken by the Black Fox would never return.

But the people had still held onto their trust even as they shuddered in their anxiety.

After all, they were still citizens of the Great Bahamut Empire no matter how poorly they were treated. The Bahamut imperial family had elevated the empire by dying the world in terror with their all-powerful might for an immeasurably long time. The imperial family had defended Bahamut’s citizens with their might, and they had also supplied the citizens with food using their might.

And in return, the citizens of Bahamut had become soldiers on the battlefield upon the imperial family’s orders. They had become blacksmiths who forged the weapons the soldiers wielded. They had become the flag of Bahamut so that they may declare that the empire’s large territory belonged to Bahamut alone. They had become stairs to support the imperial family’s authority so that Bahamut and her imperial family may remain great.

The citizens of Bahamut knew better than to say that the imperial family cared about them, even as empty words, but they had still believed that the imperial family at the very least needed them.

The Black Fox was an organization that reported directly to the imperial family. That was why the people had attempted to remain optimistic as they told themselves that the Black Fox was kidnapping people to forcefully draft them into the army.

But to think that the Black Fox had simply been turning them directly into nutrients!

“We’re nothing but livestock to them.”

The people felt as though they were being treated as dead lumps of meat.

They may be the stairs that supported Bahamut, but they still had their own lives. They were still human beings who loved, had fun, wept, and raged.

The upper brass of Bahamut had essentially denied their very lives.

“Do you think it’ll be possible for us to survive in Bahamut?”

“It’s looking like they’re taking anyone who isn’t a soldier than turning them into the drugs…….”

The people began to distrust and doubt the empire.

“They say that Ex-knights puts the people first and foremost.”

The stories they had heard but ignored in the past began cropping up from their subconscious as their discontent blossomed.

“They say that even the mythical races, who had fled to the four corners, are back in the continent and living happily in Ex-knights.”

“I heard that everyone there has the opportunity to climb up the social ladder.”

“Apparently, anyone can live affluently while doing what they want to do.”

The work that Maron, the anti-Bahamut organization, and Ex-knights’ Department of Intelligence had been devoting themselves to was finally bearing fruit.

The flow of information had originally been under strict control in Bahamut. Accordingly, the people of Bahamut knew little about the situation outside of the empire’s borders. And even if they did somehow come across any relevant information, they took little interest in it because it was completely foreign to them.

But the Bahamut imperial family had recently reached their ‘conclusion’ and no longer felt the need to conceal their destructive instincts. They no longer concealed the fact that they viewed others as little more than food, and they felt no need to go out of their way for those they considered their inferiors. After all, they needed only to rule with their absolute power and force the people to obey them, just as they had when they had still lived in the sea.

Maron and the Department of Intelligence had used this as their opportunity.

They had slipped information about Ex-knights to the people of Bahamut. They were also secretly supplying foreign texts to the people of Bahamut and handpicking heartwarming stories to spread amongst the empire.

Their work had become as seeds.

“What are we, even?”

And the seeds eventually sprouted and grew into a sense of loss.

“Is it really okay to just let things be as they are?”

“No, we’ll be eaten too at some point.”

“Should we run away?”

“But we might still get caught even if we run.”

“Then what do we do? Do we fight?”

“What if we don’t fight? Would we simply die?”

“Do we even have a chance to win if we fight?”

Maron continued to feed the ignited flames.

“I heard that the Mage Louise will help us fight…….”

“Lady Louise is apparently leading an organization.”

And the piece of firewood known as Louise, who was not only renowned throughout Bahamut but also had yet to record a single defeat to her name, fanned the flames exceptionally well.

“Lady Louise said that her goal was to get rid of the imperial family.”

“Will that mean that the empire will disappear?”

The Bahamut imperial family was the Bahamut Empire. If the imperial family disappeared, then so, too, would the empire fall to ruin.

The people harbored their grudges against the imperial family, but they were also anxious about the prospect that their very identities might disappear too.

“What will happen to this land if the empire disappears?”

“Will Louise take charge?”

“No —I heard that she wasn’t very interested in wielding power.”

“I heard that Louise’s organization is working with Ex-knights, our enemy nation. It came from a trustworthy source. Do you think that Ex-knights will take over our land?”

Just then, one of the survivors of the Black Fox’s kidnappings spoke up and said,

“I heard that the empire’s territory would become stateless and that we’d be granted freedom. Ex-knights apparently won’t interfere even if we decide to claim the land as our own and found a new country. They apparently have their hands full with stabilizing their own territory.”

It was easy for the people to understand what this meant.

“Doesn’t that mean that anyone can just decide to declare themselves king?”

“Whoa!”

Some began blazing in ambition after learning of this, and others shrank away in reluctance.

“Things will get noisy for a while if the empire disappears.”

“I don’t care about ambition —I just want to live a quiet life…….”

“Do we need to find ourselves a powerful new ruler?”

And so, while the rumors raced through the empire like wild horses over grassy plains, the people’s defiance ballooned, and the coming revolutions began taking shape under the waters, the Black Fox……was quickly heading down the path of dissolution.

Booom!

Every Gate that had been connected to the underground research laboratory beneath the Bahamut imperial castle exploded at once on the day that the laboratory had been raided.

Additionally, unidentified assailants wearing masks and a white band around their forearm attacked the members of the Black Fox and the Bahamut soldiers who had been stationed near the Gates.

The Black Fox and the soldiers protecting them were objectively strong. And yet, the assailants were so powerful that the Black Fox members and the Bahamut soldiers could not handle them.

They waited for their superiors to give them new orders, but their superiors were silent. But this was only natural, since Payne had been kidnapped and the other executives were still unconscious.

Payne, who had been forced out from the South after Eiji’s betrayal, had been dealing with all of the Black Fox’s important matters by himself. Payne worked morbidly, and, though a few of his brethren were Black Fox executives in name, Payne excluded them from any important work and kept the authority to command the Black Fox only to himself.

Shailince, the empress dowager, was technically above Payne in the organizational hierarchy, but she only issued orders to and received reports from Payne. This was why the entire organization fell apart when Payne, the person holding everything together by himself, disappeared.

“Spare us!”

The cries for salvation became as death throes.

After all, the assailants had no reason to spare their victims. It was ridiculous that the Black Fox and the Bahamut soldiers were begging for their lives after condemning countless others to their deaths.

The members of the Black Fox retreated haphazardly as quickly as their feet could carry them because they knew that they were doomed to die otherwise. But they suffered many losses even as they fled. This was because their assailants chased after them persistently to continue their assault.

The surviving members of the Black Fox hid in some of their secret hideouts. But their efforts had been in vain. Every last one of their hideouts had been raided at the same time that the Gates had been attacked.

“Shit!”

They were flabbergasted. How had their enemies pinpointed every last one of their hideouts so precisely and attacked them all in one fell swoop?

“Don’t these bastards remind you of Camastros?”

“Why would you even bring them up? —you’re giving me goosebumps.”

“They’re wearing masks and they’re attacking us.”

“You’re right, they really are similar. Fuck.”

The members of the Black Fox who had moved their base of operations from the South to the North grew wary at the mere mention of Camastros’ name. The way that their current assailants were wearing masks and attacking without declaring their identities reminded them of how Camastros had once operated.

And so, the Black Fox began collapsing like a sandcastle caught by the waves. It would take a while for them to regroup together again because Payne, their cornerstone, had vanished too. The frightened members had no choice but to lay low.

The great raid on the Black Fox was concluded within a day, and the operation to clean up any loose ends was coming to an end only a week later.

The Black Fox’s hideouts had crumbled apart, and stacks of black smoke were rising from the wreckage. The people were dispirited as they realized that the barely identifiable ruins had once been the Black Fox’s bases.

“Was the Black Fox always this weak?”

“We were letting weak bastards like them walk all over us this entire time?”

It seemed to them that the Black Fox had collapsed all too readily.

“They were working directly under the Bahamut imperial family —there’s no way there were that weak. So many people died while trying to defy them. It’s not that the Black Fox was weak, but rather that Lady Louise’s organization was strong.”

This was the truth.

Louise —Dorcianni— had stopped working publicly after Ianna’s fall and had instead been working with Eiji and Maron to raid the Black Fox. She had gathered information, crafted a perfect plan, and brought together individuals of special skill from Ex-knights to create her organization.

This had all taken place in the utmost secrecy, and the Black Fox had been none the wiser to it.

Payne of the Black Fox had let his guard down.

The Black Fox had known no enemy after they had moved their base of operations to the North —and during the year that Ex-knights had spent focusing solely on the defense especially. Their defenses had naturally fallen apart because they’d had no enemy to be wary of.

Their enemy had hit them like a hurricane while their guard was down, so they had no choice but to get swept away. In one sense, this had only been the natural result.

And, as for what Empress Dowager Shailince had been doing in the meanwhile?

She had labored in vain.

She had traveled to each of the locations that had been connected to the underground laboratory via the Gates one by one only to find that most of them had been utterly demolished.

There had been a few places where the battle hadn’t quite finished yet, but she could not find her enemies even there. According to those who had only survived because of Shailince’s timely arrival, their enemies had suddenly teleported away mere moments before Shailince had arrived.

To add insult to injury, their enemies would return to finish off the Black Fox once Shailince moved to another location while being blinded in her rage. Their enemies knew exactly where Shailince was at all times.

In other words, the Black Fox’s members had either been annihilated or their enemies had already fled from every location that Shailince had hurried to.

‘Those bastards are planning to annihilate the Black Fox!’

Shailince had uncovered her enemies’ goal, but she was unable to gather the Black Fox’s members together to protect them. She had no means of issuing a command to all of them at once.

Ultimately, Shailince had not even seen her enemies even once as the Black Fox was annihilated. And then, she had learned that Louise’s organization was working with Ex-knights while she was losing her mind from anger.

“How dare they…?”

The wretches of Ex-knights, who had been curled into themselves and focusing only on their defense like hedgehogs, had been aiming for Bahamut’s internal affairs while she had been looking away.

They had very deviously chosen to support a bonafide Bahamut organization to create internal strife within the empire.

“How dare they……?”

Shailince was so furious that her vision was dying white.

“How dare they……?!”

She was so angry that she lost her ability to reason.

Shailince had once lead all of Bahamut with her cold and cruel rationality, but she had been losing her ability to reason fairly often as of late.

It had started after Eiji, whom she actually cherished in her own way, had betrayed her.

Then, Shailince had also changed as Taylon awoke the Bahamut progenitor’s power, began sharing Arhad’s heart, and grew stronger by absorbing the dragons. Her patience grew thin and she grew more violent before the explosive and vicious power.

“How dare those damned insects?!”

Shailince refused to forgive the bastards who had dared to deceive her.

And so, she had posted new bulletins all throughout the empire under the imperial family’s name.

Louise, the traitor, was now a wanted criminal.

And she had a ten billion gold reward on her head.

“Ten billion gold…….”

“My word…….”

“A hundred million gold just for providing useful information too…….”

But the people were terrified, not captivated, by the astronomical sum that went beyond their ability to imagine. The sheer number of zeroes in the reward told them everything they needed to know about Bahamut’s ferocious fury and Louise’s greatness, and it made the people want to run away from even the wanted posters instead of making them want to capture Louise.

But Shailince wasn’t done yet.

“Please spare us!”

“Your Imperial Majesty the Empress Dowager!”

“We will never defy the imperial family!”

Shailince had gathered together the remaining Bahamut forces in the North and ordered them to burn down villages and slaughter the people. Even Louise’s people could do little to stop her madness.

“Stop hiding away like a rat and show yourself and your organization, Louise, you traitorous dog of Ex-knights!”

How dare you preach at me about looking after the people.

You’ll show yourself at once if you really care about the people. Innocent people will continue to die in droves because of you if you don’t!

You probably care about the public opinion, considering that you’ve been talking about helping the people and whatnot, so crawl out before me at once unless you want to incur the people’s hatred!

What Shailince was doing was something that only a ruler who saw her people as little more than mere insects could do.

Shailince’s brutality was meant to drag Louise and her organization to the forefront to dump the brunt of the people’s malcontent on them.

This was how she had always done things.

The people of Bahamut despised anyone their liege lord pointed to and said, “This bastard is the reason why I tormented you,” rather than despising the liege lord himself. Their reasoning was simple. After all, rebelling against the strongest authority of their land would only end with their deaths.

The people of Bahamut were submissive even to the lords of mere villages —so how could they possibly stand up to the Bahamut imperial family, who were the lords above the lords?

But things were different this time.

“What did Lady Louise even do?!”

“She should be rewarded for being a loyal subject who helped increase our food supply during times of war!”

Louise had already achieved ‘hero’ status in Bahamut. Over half of the populace carried at least lukewarm goodwill for her.

“Why are they making such a big fuss about one crazy mage?”

There were people who disliked Louise too, of course. They were the people in power who enjoyed Bahamut’s status quo. And they expressed their frustrations about Louise, just as Shailince had wanted them to.

“But it’s Louise who was in the wrong, isn’t it? Isn’t burning down villages indiscriminately going too far?”

But even those people raged against Shailince too.

“The lord of Shmir nearly fainted when he realized that his lands had been ravaged. And he was a zealous follower of the imperial family too. Tut tut.”

“The lord of Pamhel was beheaded for trying to appeal his case.”

“What do I do if my lands are targeted next?”

“Shit. They’re going overboard.”

“There’s no point in being loyal to the imperial family anymore.”

The strong realized that the imperial family was no longer their shield and began considering other means of survival. A few of them entertained dreams of working with Louise, who was at least trustworthy, to topple Bahamut and crown themselves king.

Rumors stating, “The Bahamut imperial family will devour all the life in the world once they’ve established themselves as the strongest,” and, “Western Bahamut is already done for,” had also spread all throughout the empire by this point.

The fact that all news from western Bahamut had cut off completely immediately after the stirs created by the truth behind the creation of ‘Life,’ the elixir of eternal youth, lent credibility to the rumors.

Shailince’s brutal actions while these rumors were spreading had served only to add fuel to an already raging forest fire. And the cornered people of Bahamut began to rise up in protest one after another.

“We can’t live like this!”

“We’re human too!”

The vast majority of the people of Bahamut decided to fight once they had learned exactly how the Bahamut imperial family viewed them.

“We need to fight!”

Most of them were among the weak who had been weeded out in Bahamut, but even they had a role to play. They supplied war munitions and information to Louise and her organization on the frontlines. They also hid themselves whenever Shailince’s army attacked and helped Louise’s organization by attacking Shailince’s forces from behind.

“I’d like to fight with you.”

And it wasn’t only the weak. There were also hugely influential nobles and strong warriors who had retired because they didn’t want to be tied down to the army who also joined the cause. They sought out Louise’s organization and cooperated with them in secret.

“We can’t let this continue,”

Louise declared one day as if she was simply saying hello to a passerby while on a stroll. She continued,

“Let’s stage a revolution.”

It didn’t take long before a large ‘Revolution Army’ was established because the conditions for one were met and they had a core figure to lead them.

The rebel army was so extensive that it was difficult to tell the revolutionaries apart from ordinary citizens.

“What? A Revolution Army?”

It wasn’t long before Shailince had heard about the formation of the Revolution Army too.

“Hah!”

She scoffed at the preposterousness of it all.

The dogs were barking fearlessly before the tiger.

Truly, nothing was going her way these days.

Large cracks began to form in Shailince’s pride. And her fractured pride tore at her ability to reason.

“These damned……very well!”

Her crimson lips cracked into a grin from ear to ear. Her black eyes glistened in madness.

“I’ll slaughter the lot of you as you wish and use you as nutrients!”

The first large-scale civil war Bahamut had ever known had just begun.

“Kill everyone at will, civilian or otherwise, until the sinners surrender!”

Shailince drafted every last noble in the empire and order them to go to war, and she summoned the army, which had been scattered in battle all throughout the continent, in one place. Every soldier and commanding officer in the Bahamut army, save for the Knights of Pakalatua and Zeigellant, assembled before her.

“Crush them!”

“As Your Majesty commands!”

The powerful and evil Bahamut army was absolutely obedient to the imperial family. Their heads were filled with the thought that they had to lead their men around and violate everything in the world now that Shailince had given her orders.

And yet…….

Strangely enough, the emotions that breathed quietly inside their wicked hearts was not only their bloodlust but also a discomfort and a suspicious bewilderment that they never would have felt normally.

~~*~~

Certain people were seeking out the Bahamut army to do a certain job while Dorcianni was busy taking on the Black Fox.

“I think this much is enough for here.”

They were divine arts users from Ex-knights like Lalatua. Their job was to distribute the stimulant and inducing agent that Saki had developed.

“We could have just killed the lot of them and gotten this over with. Tch, we’re basically wasting precious medicine.”

“There’s no helping it since this is what our great Lady Knight wants.”

Researchers from Ex-knights, led by Lalatua and Taryll Cartner, had devised an efficient means of distributing Saki’s medicine. They could disseminate the medicine stealthily without their enemies’ notice if they used a combination of lesser spirits, divine arts, and science.

“Disperse one last time. Haah!”

They had spared no effort in disseminating the medicine up until the moment when Shailince had convened the army. It was thanks to the medicine they had disseminated that the Bahamut army, which shed neither blood nor tears, had begun feeling a faint and unidentifiable sense of bewilderment.

The people from Ex-knights began moving too after they had confirmed that the Bahamut army was returning to the empire.

“We should head out too.”

They planned to distribute the medicine inside the empire also.

~~*~~

Part 7

They day of Payne’s kidnapping.

“Eiji, you damned piece of shit…….”

“Oh, you can curse me as much as you’d like. This is great. Who would’ve thought there’d ever be a day where I got to see you of all people kneeling before me.”

Payne woke up in a dark room and glared daggers at Eiji, his nemesis whom he’d like nothing more than to tear to pieces.

Eiji was being sarcastic, but he was glowering right back at Payne as dense hatred sparked out from his sharp cerulean eyes like lightning.

“Heeheehee,”

Payne snickered as his lips twisted bizarrely.

He was going insane. Eiji had heard that Payne was able to get high even without the help of drugs recently. These days, Payne only returned to his right mind after tearing someone to shreds or after eating some random person’s heart.

But he was in his right mind today.

Payne confirmed that Eiji had yet to lay a hand on him. After all, he had woken up naturally instead of being forced awake. It was surprising that Eiji had waited so patiently for him to wake up.

“What are you planning to do to me? Forgive me and rehabilitate me with empty words like the good little dog of Ex-knights you are? —you people are so nauseatingly fake.”

“I think you’re misunderstanding something —ours is the kind of kingdom that’ll strike back twice as hard if you hit us first.”

Eiji laughed as if Payne had said something ridiculous. He continued,

“We do give people the chance to rehabilitate themselves if their crimes are minor or if that’s what their victims want. But do you really think that I, of all people, would give you that chance? You?”

Of course Payne knew that Eiji would never do that. He had simply wanted to grate on Eiji’s nerves by reciting Ex-knights’ phony laws because Eiji devoted himself to his kingdom so wholeheartedly.

“So? Are you planning to torture me, seeing that you haven’t killed me yet? Or…….”

Payne’s turbid eyes moved to the table next to Eiji. There was a large and flat box sitting on the table, and he could smell the faint scent of drugs coming from it. He continued,

“Are you planning to torment me with drugs?”

Payne cackled. He puffed out his chest even though he couldn’t even move properly because his arms were tied together.

“Why don’t you try it?”

Payne could not physically feel pain.

He had personally made his body that way.

He had developed all sorts of drugs to help with the war efforts after he had finished developing Life. His greatest works included a psychotic that eliminated fear and heightened bloodlust and a paralytic that prevented one from feeling pain without hampering their movements.

Payne had experimented his drugs on himself. And as a result, his soul could no longer feel fear and his body could no longer feel pain. Thus, torture would not work on him.

Moreover, Payne had used so many different kinds of drugs that his own body had transformed into some kind of heinous drug in and of itself, and even the most potent drugs did little more than make him shiver in pleasure.

Payne was composed as he observed Eiji. But Eiji simply shrugged instead of raging at or fretting because of Payne’s behavior.

“I know that you’re just trying to buy time by acting composed. You probably want to leave this place alive because your ambitions haven’t completely borne fruit yet. Dying is probably the one and only thing you want to avoid right now.”

Payne bit his lip. Eiji continued,

“You’re trying to buy time, right? That’s why you’re trying to goad me into torturing you. After all, you can’t feel fear or pain thanks to your experiments, and nothing will happen to you to matter what kinds of drugs you’re fed because your whole body is already oversaturated with them. Your plan is to simply endure until the Bahamut imperial family comes to bail you out.”

Truly, the damned bastard knew how to read people well.

He knew too much.

But this was only natural. After all, if Payne was the highest authority on drugs, then Eiji was the highest authority on intelligence.

“So I thought long and hard about it.”

Eiji placed a hand on the table beside him and began tapping his finger against it. He continued,

“What’s the best way for me to take my revenge against you?”

But there was no such way of taking revenge from Payne.

The dreadful agony that Eiji had suffered at Payne’s hands and sorrowful memories that had been branded into him wouldn’t wash away simply because he got his revenge. This was something that Eiji had learned as he tortured Bruce to death.

Moreover, Payne was the boss of the Black Fox.

It was impossible to count just how many people the Black Fox had tormented over the course of Bahamut’s history. Even Payne himself had stolen countless lives with just a snap of his fingers.

Eiji could grant Payne the most dreadful death ever, and it still wouldn’t be enough. No form of punishment that existed in the world could possibly settle the debt of Payne’s karma.

‘It probably won’t be until after Payne’s death that he really pays for what he’s done.’

Eiji knew what the afterlife was like thanks to Dorcianni’s and Ianna’s efforts. It was there that Payne would ultimately be made to pay the price for his sins.

And so, Eiji had decided to simply get his revenge in whatever form he wanted. He had chosen a method that would also allow others who similarly loathed Payne to settle their grudges to some extent too.

“I’m not going to torture you. After all, torturing you would only end up making me feel worse.”

Eiji opened the box. There were dozens of vials lined up neatly inside. Eiji continued,

“Please come in.”

Creak.

The door opened at Eiji’s signal, and two people stepped inside.

One of them was Saki, whose white hair glowed faintly even in the dark room. Payne recognized her.

“Saki Celtz Shizenmore. The woman who was once a crazy bio mage before turning into a priest-cum-doctor. And next to her…….”

Payne frowned. He continued,

“Absilot Tiger.”

“Do me a favor and don’t say my name. Makes me wanna rip yer muzzle out.”

Absilot’s tail, which had been wrapped around his waist, smacked the floor in his irritation. Payne flinched out of instinct before shuddering in displeasure.

“And? What are you planning to do with these people?”

“I’m going to treat you.”

“What?”

What sort of nonsense was this? Payne continued,

“You really have grown soft during your stay at Ex-knights. You’re going to get your revenge by treating me?”

Payne cackled.

“You take pride in your abilities. You’re proud of the fact that your body is basically a lump of highly concentrated drugs and the fact that you aren’t capable of feeling fear. It was all thanks to your exceptional skill in compounding drugs.”

Eiji ignored Payne’s ridicule and calmly continued,

“So I’m going to erase everything you’ve obtained from your drugs using skills that surpass yours.”

“Well, whatever, do as you like. Let’s call it your revenge. But do you really think you can treat my body? My body’s been polluted by an aura so dreadful that even the spirits are afraid to touch me. And yet, you plan to treat me with your skills? No one in the world is better at compounding drugs than me. I personally guarantee you that it’s impossible!”

“We won’t know that until we try it. But do you really think that it’s only by chance that your mind is clear right now?”

“What?”

Buzzz…….

A dizzying assortment of magic circles were drawn around Saki, who was standing next to Eiji. Meanwhile, Absilot summoned a greater spirit.

“I’m going to break you using the same set of skills that you’re so damn proud of.”

Bullshit. Payne tried to sneer at Eiji, but his lips suddenly refused to obey him. Eiji continued,

“You’re going to be deceived by the very same ambitions that you’ve been craving all your life.”

Eiji’s voice was growing distant.

The ambitions that he’d been craving all his life?

Payne wanted for Bahamut to conquer the world and for every last creature on earth to bow down before him……and he had no idea what Eiji could possibly do with his ambitions.

“And I am going to kill you just as you try to grasp onto hope.”

Finally, Payne’s eyes glazed over and his mouth fell agape.

Baaaang!

Payne’s glazed eyes regained their light as a thunderous roar shook the earth.

“W-what the…?”

Eiji grew bewildered as he stared up at the crumbling ceiling.

Craaash!

A black colored woman gushing a blackish aura leapt down as the ceiling broke apart.

“Argh!”

“Kgh!”

The aura descended like a blade and sundered Saki. She fell over with a thud and stopped moving. She had died on the spot, as far as Payne could tell. Absilot had survived thanks to his thick muscles and steely bones, but he was seriously wounded and had passed out because of his injuries.

“So this is where you were, Payne.”

Payne brightened up.

“Master!”

It was Shailince!

Shailince pointed her finger at Payne. Then, her aura destroyed all his restraints.

“Move!”

Shailince was stepping over Eiji as she dominated the scene. Payne ran to her and grabbed Eiji by the hair as he struggled.

“Won’t you please give this bastard to me, Master?”

Shailince, who had doted on Eiji in the past, looked down at him in contempt and kicked him hard.

“Very well.”

Payne dragged Eiji and Absilot over to the Bahamut imperial castle.

He killed Eiji by putting him through the worst kinds of torture in the world, and he got Absilot addicted to drugs and turned him into a slave.

And so, time continued to meander, both slow and fast, like a river.

Ianna, the knight of Ex-knights, had died on the day of the Cataclysm, and Ex-knights had simply been concealing the fact. Arhad, the king of Ex-knights, was ailing because his wounds hadn’t fully recovered, and he was depressed and anxious after losing his lover.

Taylon, the great emperor of Bahamut, had successfully finished absorbing the dragons. And ultimately, Taylon burst open Arhad’s heart, stole the rest of the Demon’s soul, and become complete. They destroyed Roanne, Bahamut’s longtime nemesis, and executed her royal family.

Eventually, Bahamut conquered the entire world. The world knelt before Bahamut’s feet in terror.

Darkness enshrouded the world.

“Hahahaha!”

Payne laughed maniacally.

He was looking down at a sea of beastmen who were waiting only for his commands.

Assisting Bahamut had been worth it. Payne felt satiated as he stood high on the stage and looked down at the terrified beastmen below. Once-intimidating savage beasts from the top of the food chain didn’t know what to do with themselves as they shivered before a mere fox.

Hahahahahahaha!

Payne spread open his arms.

“This is the best! The best! This is truly the best!”

Bahamut had conquered the entire world, and every creature in the world, including Absilot Tiger, the greatest savage beast, obeyed his every command.

He could finally die with no regrets.

Smaack!

Payne’s vision flashed white just then.

The whiteness was followed by a head-splitting pain in the right side of his temple.

This was very strange to Payne. His nerves were not sensitive enough to perceive this terrible pain.

But it hurt. The fact was, that it hurt.

Smaaack!

Payne was dithering in his dizziness when his forehead felt like it would break open next.

‘What?’

He could finally die with no regrets, but that didn’t mean that he wanted to feel pain. Something had undeniably happened to his body.

Smack!

Smaack!

At long last, his entire body began to hurt.

Payne staggered as he looked ahead.

The masses were still looking up at him.

And yet……something was strange. The terror had been wiped off their faces. There was no emotion on the creatures’ faces as they stared up at him.

Murmur murmur.

Then, the creatures, who had been shuddering in so much terror that they could not even move their lips, began saying something all at once so suddenly that it was jarring.

Payne flew into a rage. He had no doubt that the bastards had done something to make him feel pain.

How dare you?!

he was about to shout, but his mouth refused to move.

Smack!

He head hurt dreadfully yet again.

His vision grew dark, perhaps because of the pain. And then, even the darkness lifted. The sky was bright, and it was the middle of the day when the darkness cleared.

Whoaaaa!

‘What……?’

Payne blinked as he failed to grasp what was happening.

He was still looking down at the masses.

But the circumstances had flipped on its head.

His arms, which he had so boldly spread open, were now tied behind a large wooden pillar, and his feet, which had been planted firmly on the ground, were also died to the pillar.

And beneath his feet were a heap of oiled branches that made for good kindling.

Swish, smack!

Swoosh, smaack!

“Kgh!”

Payne was hurting because he was being stoned. Countless stones were hurtling toward him.

“Die!”

“Die, ringleader of the Black Fox!”

The lowly humans were cursing at him in their rage and loathing.

‘Am I dreaming?’

Payne was so dazed that he could not tell reality from fabrication. But to be honest, he dearly hoped that this was the dream.

“Hey, you awake?”

A voice that he hated burst into his eardrums just then. Payne whipped his head around and saw the green-haired man standing in the distance.

Eiji was grinning from ear to ear.

“Did you have a nice dream?”

Payne snapped back to reality as soon as he saw Eiji, whom he had personally killed with his own hands, standing there all hale and hearty.

This was reality.

And, now that he was awake, Payne was made to understand that Bahamut’s complete conquest of the world had been nothing but a dream.

A shadow fell over his face.

“Y-you…”

He tried to scream obscenities, but he could not speak because his swollen lips and the lacerated insides of his mouth hurt too much.

‘It was illusion magic!’

But since when?

It wasn’t difficult for Payne to infer the answer to his question.

The dream had started with Shailince rescuing him.

It had been immediately before his rescue that Saki had activated her magic. It had undoubtedly been a loathsome illusion spell that had made him dream in vain.

Eiji was practically whistling as he cheerily told Payne the truth while the latter was bleeding out wretchedly.

“So, how’d you like Ms. Saki’s illusion spell? That spell shows the dreamer a realistic dream of their dearest wishes coming true, so only the dreamer knows what they saw. But I can more or less guess what your dream was about. You’ve always wanted Bahamut to conquer the world so you could look down on everyone from above, so that’s probably what you dreamt about, right?”

Payne thought he would die of humiliation with each and every word Eiji spoke. Eiji continued,

“How do you feel now that you know that it was all a lie? Hmm?”

The truth showered down upon Payne like a hail of arrows and pierced his heart. Eiji, who was grinning sunnily in his elation, looked like a monster wearing the mask of an innocent child.

“I felt a ti~ny bit sorry for you, so I prepared you a stage where you could look down at everyone and have everyone look up at you in reality too. Aren’t you grateful?”

“You bastard!”

But a rock came flying at Payne just as he lost his ability to reason and began cursing aloud.

Smaaack!

“Ahh!”

The rock hit him squarely on the forehead, and his features crumpled up in pain.

“Hurts, doesn’t it?”

Eiji smirked. He continued,

“Your body really was something else. We couldn’t cure you fully even after using all of our newest techniques. But we still managed to treat you about half-way, so you should still be able to feel pain and fear. It’s nice to see you writhing in pain.”

Eiji’s words suggested that Ex-knights’ medical techniques had surpassed the pharmacology that Payne had been so proud of.

“You bastard!”

Payne vomited blood as he struggled. But the magical steel chains wrapped tightly around his body refused to let him escape. Payne spat out all kinds of obscenities and promises for vengeance at Eiji.

Eiji nodded along like he couldn’t have cared any less as he let Payne’s curses go in one ear and out the other.

“Oh, right.”

Then, he opened his eyes wide as if he had just come up with a great idea. Eiji continued,

“I was able to extract a lot of data in a short period of time thanks to you. Your data will be useful in treating a lot of people. So, thanks. Or, maybe I shouldn’t be thanking you at all. I mean, we’re basically just cleaning up after your shit, after all.”

Payne glared at Eiji with bloodshot eyes as the latter quipped sarcastically.

“You! —just you wait until I break free and get my hands on you!”

“You’re welcome to try, if you even can. But, what can you do?”

Eiji’s visage, which had carried a hint of playfulness until now, suddenly washed away of all emotions as if someone had poured cold water over him. He continued,

“You’re going to be executed today. You’re going to die at my hands.”

Payne’s heart skipped a beat.

He already knew. Everything about the situation screamed that he was about to be executed today.

‘This is how it ends?’

Is this really the end?

It couldn’t be. His wasn’t a life that could end so pointlessly!

Payne wanted to live. But his executioner was Eiji of all people, and not someone he might possibly be able to persuade otherwise. There was no point in even trying to negotiate. Besides, even Payne himself would rather die than try to negotiate with Eiji.

He had no savior among the masses either.

“Give me back my family!”

“You evil bastard!”

People were screaming at Payne from every direction. They wailed at him to bring back those whom the Black Fox had sacrificed, and they blazed fiercely in their fury against the villains who had persecuted them.

Payne could feel it.

Countless beastmen stood amongst the crowd that was hurling stones at him. A primitive wariness made his hair stand at edge.

The beastmen glared at Payne with their ferocious, beastly eyes as they made their disgust known. They sneered at him with their teeth barred, as if they were saying that he was unseemly, that he should hurry up and drop dead. They were also wary of their surroundings and were on the lookout for anyone suspicious who might be lingering nearby.

But no one seemed to carry any goodwill for Payne.

‘Do I really have no choice but to die like this?’

Payne’s body and mind had been treated against his will, and he felt a chill that settled down to his very bones. He, who had feared nothing in the world once, was slowly being seized by terror.

The great ambition that had been passed down between each generation of the black fox tribe.

Was he really about to be killed so pathetically at his hands of his mortal enemy, whom he would like nothing more than to rip to pieces, when that ambition was so close to being fulfilled? Payne had never even imagined that this was a possible outcome.

‘Please save me —anyone!’

But Payne’s screams were conveyed only to Eiji, who was standing next to him.

Crackle.

Eiji received an ignited torch from one of his subordinates and held it up with one hand.

“Are you hoping that someone will rescue you?”

The torch’s hot fire felt colder than ice to Payne. Eiji continued,

“Have you still not managed to grasp the situation you’re in right now? No one here’s on your side.”

Payne’s body froze stiffer with each and every step closer that Eiji took.

They were the only beings who could possibly save him in this situation. Payne wailed,

“Master! Your Majesty!”

Eiji smirked as if he had been expecting it.

“I knew it. The Bahamut imperial family’s your only hope, aren’t they?”

Someone signaled to Eiji from afar just then.

Eiji chuckled a sigh. He sounded like he was glad, angry, and empty all at once. The emotions mixed into his laughter were so complex that Payne could not comprehend them.

“Hey, your hope is apparently on her way here right now.”

Payne heard every last word clearly. His shadowed visage visibly brightened up. Eiji continued,

“Are you happy? Well, I suppose you should be happy while you still can.”

Eiji suddenly grasped the torch in his hand tighter.

“Since you’re going to die a very painful death before anyone has the chance to save you!”

Eiji let go of the torch. It was like a ball that had been glued tightly to his palm had suddenly dropped down.

“This is goodbye!”

And Eiji bid an eternal farewell to the Black Fox, which he had been a part of for nearly his entire life.

Payne opened his eyes so wide they nearly popped out of his head.

“N-no!”

The torch cut through the air and tumbled toward Payne’s feet. The flames billowed as soon as they touched the kindling below and soared up as if they meant to pierce the heavens. The fire clung to Payne’s body, which was also drenched in oil.

“Ahhhhh!”

Payne screamed as the flames engulfed him.

‘I can’t die like this. Never!’

Payne struggled with everything he had in an attempt to escape, but his efforts were to no avail. The steel chains binding him were sturdy, the flames were ferocious, and he was powerless against them.

His body began to melt.

‘Ah, ahhhh.’

Payne, whom Eiji had barely managed to bring back to his right mind, went insane once more. He could not possibly endure this dreadful agony while he was still sane.

And then, the dream that the illusion had shown him suddenly spread out before his eyes once more. Payne deluded himself into thinking that the eyes watching him from beyond the flames carried the light of obeisance.

‘That’s right —submit to me!’

This was his brethren’s long-cherished wish.

Smaaack!

But the red-hot rocks that flew toward him through the flames broke down his body. They pushed away his hallucination as dragged him toward his demise.

Payne briefly regained his sanity once more just as he was on death’s door.

His was seized by terrible pain. Every creature in the world was looking up at him. Their eyes glistened in the darkness as they glowered at their prey.

Die! Die!

Darkness covered the world. The beasts and humans, whom he had thought were submitting to him, were devouring him whole.

Die! Die! Die!

Blackish evil spirits appeared out of nowhere and rushed toward him. They began tearing into him. Payne was familiar with these evil spirits.

They were the grudges, the Ideas, of Payne’s victims.

Just then, he felt a familiar aura beyond the flames. His master, whom he had been awaiting so dearly, was finally here. A paper-thin sliver of hope passed by him for the last time in his life as the flames and Ideas stabbed him mercilessly.

“Save…….”

But his head dropped down just as he opened his mouth to plead for salvation. His body was at its limit, and he no longer had the strength to even scream. Payne’s consciousness began to fade away as he failed to grab the hope dangling right before his eyes. And then, someone’s words suddenly echoed in his head.

“I’m going to break you using the same set of skills that you’re so damn proud of.”

“You’re going to be deceived by the very same ambitions that you’ve been craving all your life.”

“And I am going to kill you just as you try to grasp onto hope.”

Payne chewed over Eiji’s words and thought one final thought.

‘You asshole.’

His wandering soul was pulled into the endless darkness. And in that very moment, Payne, the boss of the Black Fox, met his demise.

~~*~~

Part 8

A few weeks after Payne had been kidnapped.

The people of Bahamut’s rage had reached its breaking point because of Shailince’s never-ending massacres.

And one day, Louise’s Revolution Army drained every last drop of Shailince’s patience by darting around while staying out of her reach.

“There is to be a grand execution held in the Tuwata region to the south, Your Majesty,”

a terrified knight reported to Shailince.

Clang!

Shailince threw the glass bottle that had been next to her on the floor, shattering it to pieces.

“Why are you reporting a mere execution to me?!”

After all, executions were being held frequently all throughout the empire. The Revolution Army had been apprehending every member of the Black Fox they could find and were executing them as they lay the foundations of the revolution.

“This…one seems more serious than usual. I believe someone important will be executed there.”

“Important?! It’s probably just another noble!”

The executions weren’t a problem in and of themselves.

Shailince didn’t care how many executions were held.

After all, her head had been hurting as of late.

She had been stubbornly massacring village after village, but she had underestimated just how vast Bahamut’s lands were and how many people there were in the empire. They had been able to wipe out Western Bahamut and digest the region slowly, but the millions of Bahamut soldiers in the army weren’t nearly enough to deal with Northern, Southern, and Eastern Bahamut all at once.

She couldn’t simply keep the army outside Bahamut’s borders all the time either. She had to let them back inside to torment the empire itself too. Those were her son’s orders.

‘Was I too hasty?’

The thought cross her mind, but it was already far too late. She had come too far to pull out now.

Moreover, there was yet another problem that was being a thorn in Shailince’s side.

Something strange was happening to the army. The soldiers had caught some kind of mental illness. It was almost as if the mental illness was a contagious disease.

She couldn’t even point out the illness’ symptoms. Some soldiers shed tears in their melancholy, others were terrified as if they were being chased down by something, and others still simply stood around in a blank daze.

She had no idea what was causing it.

Was it a side effect of Life brainwashing? But why was it happening now?

None of Shailince’s subordinates knew what was causing the illness either. Payne would have been able to figure it out quickly if he was here…….

Shailince was overwhelmed.

But it wasn’t as if she could contact Taylon and Isabella either. Isabella was helping Taylon absorb the dragons. It would be dangerous if Shailince interfered.

Besides, she would rather bite her own tongue and die than scuttle over to her own children and whine about how the small fry were giving her a hard time.

A blinding light flashed outside the window just then.

Baaang!

Shailince opened her eyes wide as she swung the window open.

She had thought it was streak of light, but it had actually been a spear. The spear was quivering as it remained lodged directly next to the window.

There was a piece of paper tied to the end of the spear. Shailince untied it irritably and read its contents.

Dear Shailince Bahamut,

I cordially invite you to Payne’s execution.

Right now, in Tuwata.

—Eiji

Shailince’s ability to reason snapped apart.

“It was you, Eiji, you bastard!”

Shailince realized that Eiji had been the mastermind behind everything as soon as she saw his name. The shrewd and cunning bastard had planned everything.

She had thought that he had simply died after Ianna Ex-knights Rise had rescued him because there had been no news about him at all, but Eiji had apparently been alive this entire time.

Eiji.

Eiji, Eiji!

‘You bastard!’

There mere thought of Eiji’s name was enough to make Shailince feel faint. Her fury boiled so hot that it dyed her vision red.

Eiji had wounded her pride, which she valued more than even her own life, and was the target of her imperial wrath.

She hadn’t even been able to kill him after she had gone out of her way to catch him because her son had wanted to use him as bait to capture Ianna.

She had consoled herself with the knowledge that he had probably died because she had half-crippled him and had pushed him to death’s doorstep anyway, but he had somehow survived. And not only was he still alive, but he had wounded her pride yet again.

I should’ve just murdered him then and there!

Each and every one of Eiji’s familiar letters seemed to prick her.

And then, Shailince saw the long postscript that had been written on the back of the letter.

You danced on the palm of my hands so obediently that it was actually pretty disappointing. But I’m glad that you’re stupider and more arrogant than you were before.

The very first sentence of the postscript was enough to make the veins on Shailince’s temple pop out, but it only got more ridiculous from there.

You at least have the brains to know that the execution’s a trap, right?

Because it is. I’m going to kill you today if you show up at the execution. But this will also be your one and only opportunity to try to kill me too. I’m planning to make myself scarce after today, you see.

Payne’s execution is also a great chance for you to get rid of the revolution, which I’m sure is giving you a massive headache about now, in one fell swoop. All the people of Bahamut who are actively participating in the revolution will be present at the execution. The Revolution Army will crumble if you show up and terrify them with a display of your power. Don’t you want to come and slaughter us all?

You wouldn’t let such a good opportunity slip through your fingers, now would you?

You’ll come, right? Hmm?

Oh……. But I suppose it’s entirely possible that you can’t come because the emperor restricted your actions. After all, you’re just a bygone old hag who wasn’t allowed to kill me even after you tortured me so badly all because your son ordered you not to.

And I guess it’s possible that you won’t come because it’s a trap too. The great Empress Dowager Shailince Bahamut already had her pride bruised black and blue because of a few traps that the lowly insects set for her. What ever will she do if her pride gets wounded even more?

You’d be making a laughingstock of yourself if you still failed to show up even after all my jeering. But I guess I’d just have to give you my pity at that point.

Shailince’s hands were quivering as she clutched the piece of paper.

To be honest, I don’t actually care whether you come to the execution or not.

If you’re not going to come, then just stay quietly in your castle and wait. I’ll just have you die a dog’s death without being able to do a single thing instead, you ancient hag.

The long postscript made the remaining shreds of Shailince’s rationality implode.

‘How dare you?!’

The letter crumpled in her hands.

‘I’ll murder you!’

Shailince knew all too well that that Eiji had signed the invitation with his own name with the intent of provoking her. She also fully understood that his childish jeering and obvious push for her to attend the execution was because there was a trap waiting for her there. Payne was already as good as dead since Eiji of all people had kidnapped him, and Shailince knew that it would be impossible for her to save Payne even if she attended the execution.

And yet, she still had to go.

She could not simply let Eiji be. She had been a noble being since the day she was born —had anyone ever mocked her to this extent before? And the lowly thing had attended to her on countless nights too!

She would die of anger if she simply let him be.

‘Very well —I’ll go and slaughter you just as you wish.’

And more importantly, Shailince was confident.

She had the power to break through any trap Eiji had laid and strangle him to death. She might not be strong enough to take on the entire continent by herself, but she was more than strong enough to destroy everything in her field of vision.

Besides, this was a good chance to rid herself of the Revolution Army, just as Eiji had stated.

And so, Shailince ultimately teleported herself over to the execution with a large army in tow.

The first thing she saw after teleporting was Payne, who was burning to death from the highest place in the area.

Eiji was standing alone next to him.

Eiji saw Shailince too. His cerulean eyes seemed to freeze over as he watched her black hair scatter in the wind.

The masses froze in a different sense of the word.

Presently, it was said that no one had met Shailince and lived to tell the tale. Most of the people of Bahamut here had never seen her before.

Great Bahamut.

Bahamut, the Gods of the Continent!

The people had resolved themselves to bring about a revolution with Louise, but they had worshiped the Bahamut imperial family as gods their entire lives, and their brains stopped working, like rabbits standing before a predator, now that they were finally meeting them.

“T-the empress dowager.”

“It’s the army!”

The army that Shailince had brought clashed against the masses.

“Get them!”

But the Revolution Army and elite soldiers from Ex-knights’ army were hidden amongst the masses too. They had gotten themselves in formation as soon as they saw the signal that Shailince was coming, and they were able to clash against the Bahamut army immediately.

“This day will be your execution!”

Shaaaaa!

A sticky and ominous aura of darkness exploded out of Shailince as she shouted. The darkness raced, as if it meant to devour the entire world, and covered the execution plaza like a dome.

All life convulsed as the cruel aura seized them. A chill ran through their hearts and souls. It felt like death itself, which was repulsive to anything that lived, was standing right next to them.

It was an execution in the darkness.

Everything else vanished from Shailince’s field of vision, and only Eiji remained. She was being blinded by the darkness called rage and hatred.

She rushed forward with the single intent of slaughtering Eiji.

But someone stepped out from behind him just then.

She raised her hand up toward Shailince.

“I’ll let you be the empress dowager who famously dies after being struck by lightning.”

It was already too late by the time that Shailince realized that a vast amount of divine power was moving. A blinding light shredded through the darkness.

Boooooom!

A colossal bolt of lightning fell over the execution platform where Shailince and Eiji were standing. Then, the lightning bolt turned into a powerful pillar of flame and soared back up to the heavens. It seemed to signal the start of a crazy festival.

Swish!

Shailince ignored the lightning’s incandescent light and tried to rip off Eiji’s throat. But Eiji had already leapt back and was standing behind someone else.

In the end, all that remained after the light had faded away was a round barrier of fire that covered the sky, Shailince, Eiji, and the mage who had created the barrier.

“Hi there,”

the mage greeted Shailince as she drew back the hood of her robes.

Shailince recognized her at once. The owner of the hideously burned face was none other than Louise, whom she had heard so much about.

But Shailince had noticed Louise’s real identity now that she was actually seeing her in person.

She grinded her teeth audibly.

“You bitch……. You’re Dorcianni Demariposa.”

“You must really be stupid if it took you that long to figure it out.”

Louise took off her mask to reveal Dorcianni’s dreamy features. Dorcianni seemed entertained as Shailince looked like she was about to faint from anger.

“You fucking bitch.”

Shailince was choked by a rage greater than what Eiji made her feel as she looked to Dorcianni.

The real mastermind had been Dorcianni all along.

It was Dorcianni who had stolen Eiji away from Margarita and educated him.

It was Dorcianni who had convinced Shailince to keep Eiji under her wing when she was massacring the Roygens.

It was Dorcianni who had murdered Margarita to conceal Eiji’s betrayal.

It was Dorcianni who had rescued Eiji after Shailince had tortured him.

And it was Dorcianni who was protecting Eiji while standing against Shailince.

It had always been Dorcianni all along!

Dorcianni was the mastermind who had planned the seed of betrayal, sprouted it, let it take root, watched it bud, and waited for it to blossom!

Eiji had been nothing more than Dorcianni’s puppet. Dorcianni had practically been making a fool of Shailince this entire time.

“You vile bitch! You’ve been planning this ever since you started teaching Eiji!”

Shailince poured her curses upon Dorcianni. Dorcianni stood quietly and let Shailince curse her before she tilted her head to the side.

“Hmmm. I told you at the banquet too, but I planned no such thing. To be honest, I’d still be on your side right now if Bahamut was closer to the Truth than Ex-knights, you know?”

Shailince was offended by the way Dorcianni was suggesting that Ex-knights was superior to Bahamut. She didn’t want to be ridiculed by these lowly insects for a second longer.

Her black eyes glistened with bloodlust.

“Why are you yapping away so confidently? Do the two of you truly think you can defeat me? I’m confident that I can even hold my own against your king as I am now.”

“Oh really now? But, don’t you think that we invited you here before we had a good feeling about our chances against you too? Why do you think that Louise and the Revolution Army always managed to slip your grasp? Do you remember how I cut off your hand?”

Dorcianni was emotionless as she responded to Shailince’s bloodlust. She continued,

“We preserved your hand and studied your exclusive skills and techniques day and night. One of the fruits of our research gave us a means to keep track of you, and that’s how we were able to grate on your nerves.”

It had been simple for Dorcianni to create a spell to track Shailince using a part of the latter’s body, much like how Ianna had once been able to keep track of Isabella using the fingernails that she had dug into Ianna’s ankle.

“And we were able to gauge the extent of your skills by observing you in secret. I concede that you’re incredible, but the fruits of my research are just as amazing, so I like to think that I have a decent chance against you. After all, you aren’t Taylon Helkan Bahamut.”

Shailince was shocked at the fact that she had never noticed that she was being tracked, and her face turned red, then white, and then blue before a black shadow finally fell over her features.

“I applaud your audacity.”

Ultimately, she made a strange face as she began cackling. Shailince continued,

“I’ve never been able to go all out before. So why don’t you show me the fruits of your so-called research?!”

Shailince took the initiative.

Hundreds of shadow snakes burst out from Shailince’s shadow and lunged toward Dorcianni. The black snakes squirmed and ripped their mouths open as if they meant to swallow even the flames. They split into two every time they opened their mouths and multiplied to the thousands as they tried to rip Dorcianni apart.

Bang!

Dorcianni planted her staff into the ground. Lightning scattered everywhere and shredded the snakes into pieces. But the snakes only continued to multiply.

Flashy, terrifying, heavy, and destructive spells were also thrown into the den of infinite snakes.

Light flashed, darkness devoured, flames surged, ice stabbed, the earth shattered, and the wind roared.

Eiji was quietly deflecting Shailince’s spells with his glowing daggers as he defended Dorcianni.

Sure enough, Shailince was strong. She didn’t bat an eye even though Dorcianni and Eiji were fighting her together. The two of them skirted here and there and avoided taking any fatal blows, but they were still being covered with wounds while Shailince was perfectly unblemished.

Shailince determined that they were fighting at their best. The fact was that they were, and the winner of their battle was all too clear. The scales of victory would begin tipping before long.

‘But why?’

Shailince couldn’t help but feel that something was off. She could not see any despair in their faces.

“Wow. You really are strong,”

Dorcianni exclaimed candidly.

“You think that I’m strong, so why aren’t you falling into despair?”

Shailince wasn’t smiling. She continued,

“What’s giving you the confidence to keep your composure? Have you already resigned yourselves to the fact that this will be your grave?”

The wounds she was giving them suggested that she could finally feel refreshed today, but Dorcianni’s nonchalance was souring her mood.

Dorcianni smiled.

“Did you really think that we never realized how powerful you are? I could ask you the same thing —what gave you the confidence to even come here? Why did you come here when your children are so busy absorbing the dragons that they can’t even move?”

Shailince’s heart skipped a beat.

How does this wench know about that?

“You were probably confident in your ability to deal with the likes of us. But we have someone invincible backing us too, just like how your son is empowering you.”

“…….”

“You still haven’t noticed yet? She’s been right here this entire time.”

The scales tipped.

A monster of unprecedented might, whom Shailince had utterly failed to notice, made her presence known from within the flames as Dorcianni spoke.

Shailince was so alarmed that she nearly fainted as she spun around.

The monster greeted her.

“It’s been a while, Empress Dowager of Bahamut.”

Shailince stiffed up in shock.

Ianna Ex-knights Rise.

It was only then that Shailince discovered that Ianna had been observing her quietly from the flames.

“How?”

Ianna had been protecting Arhad, who had been stabbed in the heart, like a madwoman the last time that Shailince had seen her.

The Bahamut imperial family had assumed that there was a very high likelihood that Ianna would survive and Arhad would die that day. Ianna had a chance of survival because she could use the spirits, but Arhad would likely die because his heart was in tatters.

But their assumptions had been off the mark. Arhad had survived just fine, and all news about Ianna had gone strangely silent.

Ianna had never shown herself no matter how intensely Bahamut had attacked afterward, and Ex-knights had huddled into herself like a turtle who would die as soon as she stretched out from her shell. Ianna had remained silent even as her people had started to seriously doubt her.

Moreover, the Bahamut imperial family had sensed that Arhad’s once impenetrable mind, which had remained adamantine like an ocean frozen in time no matter how fiercely Taylon assaulted him, was beginning to crumble apart. They could tell even if Arhad pretended that he was fine. He was like a castle of sand who only appeared solid on the surface. And he would surely fall apart if a large wave hit him.

Time passed, and the Bahamut imperial family had determined that Ianna’s silence was not by intention. She was likely either dead or in critical danger.

Or, perhaps she had saved Arhad’s life at the cost of her own.

And so, the Bahamut imperial family had decided to keep an ear out for any news about Ianna’s survival and focus only on shoring up their strength and shaking Arhad until they knew anything for certain. It would not be difficult to torment Ex-knights if Ianna wasn’t there.

“How……?”

But Ianna had appeared before Shailince while looking perfectly fine without any warning whatsoever. Not only was she in perfect health, but she now even had a peculiar aura about her that had made Shailince freeze up for a moment.

An entire year had passed, but Ianna’s appearance hadn’t changed one bit as if her time had stopped since the last time that Shailince had seen her. But there was a marked difference in the aura she emitted. She had been stronger than Shailince even before her absence, but now…….

“Ugh.”

Shailince grew extremely agitated as she experienced an emotion that she had never known before in life.

It was the same distinct sense of terror that Shailince herself had always imposed on others.

The instinctual fear that prey felt when faced with a predator.

They were only locking eyes, and yet a chill had already run down Shailince’s back. A loud alarm in her head was warning her that she needed to escape right now.

Shailince couldn’t believe it.

‘I, of all people, am feeling this way?’

Even Arhad, the original Demon, had never made her feel like this. All Arhad had ever made her feel was an unpleasant sense of kinship and the impulse to take Demon’s origins from him.

But now, Ianna had cornered Shailince into an emotion that she had never known before.

Ianna looked like a mysterious monster in Shailince’s eyes.

A boundless peak.

The sky beyond the sky.

A higher being who stood above even the dragons.

She had thought that Taylon was the only person in the world who could possibly reach that stage, but Ianna was already there.

‘What has she been doing all this time?’

Shailince felt like she had been doused in icy waters. She regretted being so impatient that she had come here even though she was fully aware that it was a trap.

“I’ve never seen you make that face before, Shailince.”

Dorcianni’s cerulean eyes glistened with intrigue. She continued,

“You look nervous.”

Dorcianni smirked at Shailince.

“Does Her Majesty scare you?”

But Shailince ignored Dorcianni’s provocation —she needed to figure out how to escape right now. And if she couldn’t escape, she was attempting every spell in her arsenal to at least tell her children that Ianna was alive and had grown unimaginably stronger.

Pooow!

Shailince’s shadow snakes attacked the barrier of fire. But the barrier, shaped like an upside-down bowl, refused to budge as if it meant to trap her here forever. The barrier cut off everything from the outside world, even communication magic.

This place would be Shailince’s grave.

“Are you trying to run? But I told you earlier. I researched day and night to make a net just to catch you. You’ll have to kill all of us here first if you want to escape.”

Do you even think that’s possible, you damned wench? I’ll die the very moment that monster draws her sword!

Thud.

Ianna leapt past the flames and landed behind Dorcianni and Eiji. Her sword was hanging at her waist, and her empty hands were dangling by her sides. But the pressure she gave off was overwhelming even still.

“Don’t worry. We’re your opponents. Her Majesty is only here to watch.”

Dorcianni was taunting Shailince. Shailince wanted to rip her to teeny, tiny pieces. Ianna would undoubtedly step in if Dorcianni or Eiji were in danger of dying —how could that be called merely watching?

The end. The end. The end.

Shailince sensed the ‘end’ looming over her for the first time ever as she perceived their difference in strength. She would have fallen back and run away to prepare to fight again another day if only she could, but the area around her was closed off.

Beads of sweat fell from Shailince’s forehead.

Would she have to dance like a clown on stage even when she could already see how this fight would end?

Shailince was terrified as she was backed into a corner and her death drew nearer. She had lost her bite like an animal who had been put into place. But her wounded pride refused to yield and slowly reared its head.

‘I’m a clown? Today is my end?’

Don’t be ridiculous!

Who’s the clown here?! Who decided that today was to be my end?!

She refused to simply die quietly.

‘I should thank you for deciding to stay back.’

Shailince decided to start by taking Eiji hostage. Ianna would have no choice but to let her go if she took Eiji hostage, considering Ianna’s personality. Dorcianni was capable of casting all sorts of spells at will, so Eiji, a physical fighter, was the easier target.

Shailince also took into consideration that she wouldn’t make it out of here alive.

‘If I can’t escape, then I’ll just take you with me to hell!’

And ultimately, she surrendered herself to the currents of the river called pride.

The problem of her survival vanished from her mind entirely.

Rumbleeee!

Countless snakes began writhing at once as Shailince gestured with her hand. The snakes created a dome around her, cutting off the light from the barrier of fire, and wrapped their dark frames protectively around her.

Swish……. Swish…….

The shadow snakes melted into the darkness and lunged at Eiji and Dorcianni without pause. Dorcianni and Eiji were forced to move their limbs in a dizzying manner as the menacing snakes attacked them from every direction, and they were slowly pushed apart.

The snakes targeted Eiji more heavily than they did Dorcianni. Eiji’s frame was slowly being dyed in blood.

But Eiji maintained his composure even still. His cerulean eyes remained a chilling blue. He had been obsessively keeping track of Shailince’s exact location even as the darkness made it difficult for him to tell front from back.

He had only been pretending to defend Dorcianni earlier. In truth, he had been tossing, placing, and retrieving dozens of daggers and short swords while measuring their locations and making slight adjustments to their placement.

‘One, two, three…….’

Shailince was acting differently from before Ianna had made her presence known.

She was acting hastier now, and she was being more mindful of her own safety.

This allowed Eiji to finish earlier than he had expected.

He had completed the perfect trap with which he would ensnare Shailince.

‘Now, come at me. You want to take me hostage, right?’

Eiji staggered on purpose when he was close enough to Shailince. Shailince didn’t miss the chance and sent thousands of snakes after him as she reached out toward him.

The path was clear now. Eiji opened his mouth.

“I finally caught you.”

Eiji dug his way through the snakes with every last drop of strength he had as he mumbled to himself. He didn’t even care that the snakes were biting chunks of flesh off him. His legs carried him to Shailince in but an instant.

“Kgh!”

Eiji thrust his dagger into the split-second opening in Shailince’s defenses, and she raised her arm up to block it.

Poooow!

Eiji’s dagger bore its way into Shailince’s wrist. It also began to quickly suck away her blood.

Something strange began happening to the barrier just as Shailince realized that something was wrong.

Shhhhhh!

Thick chains made from divine power erupted from the blades of the daggers and swords that Eiji had placed all over the area.

Shaaaaa!

Hundreds of chains explosively shredded their way through the shadow snakes. The ironclad chains shattered their foes indiscriminately as they tangled and combined into each other, as if someone was scribbling a bunch of lines with a pen, until they created one flat surface.

The shadow snakes and the glowing chains danced rampantly, and Eiji took hold of a few chains in the meanwhile and pulled at them hard.

Crunch!

Cruuuunch!

The chains sprang upward, and Shailince, who was at their center, was immediately entangled within. It look less than an instant before Shailince’s legs were tied together and her arms were bent upward. The thick chains also circled around her throat and pulled her head up like she was a prisoner who was about to be hanged.

“Arghh!”

Shailince choked as she was defenselessly dragged into the air.

He had succeeded.

Eiji let out a deep sigh and stared apathetically up at Shailince. She looked like a moth caught in a spiderweb. She was struggling with all her might, but she could not break free of the trap that Eiji had revised dozens, hundreds of times just to catch her with.

Shailince was red in the face as she tried to pry off the chains, but just touching them made the strength leave her for some inexplicable reason. Why was it? What on earth were these chains?

“It’s no use. These chains of divine power were created specifically to suppress your body and power,”

Eiji readily told her the answer.

Dorcianni had given Eiji the chance to take revenge. She had helped him so that he could take revenge on Shailince with his own two hands. That was what these chains were. It was Dorcianni who had been supporting Eiji in this battle, and not the other way around.

“So this is how it ends.”

Shailince glowered down at Eiji with an incredible amount of bloodlust in her eyes despite the agony she was in.

“You adored me.

“You were furious with me because you adored me.

“You lost your ability to reason because you were furious.

“You fell into my trap because you weren’t thinking straight.”

Calmly, Eiji continued,

“And you underestimated me from beginning to end. That’s why you ended up like this. You had so many chances to kill me, too.”

Shailince, who had been silent for a while, groaned. The bloodlust was slowly fading away from her eyes. She began cackling like a ghost as she felt her strength drain away.

“Yes……. I really should have killed you sooner.”

Shailince mused over the past as she thought about why she had ended up like this.

Philliad, her elder brother, had inherited the Demon’s fragment from the previous emperor just because he had been born first.

Shailince had acknowledged that being older gave one superiority in Bahamut tradition, but she had always been quietly enraged because she had always thought that she was much more talented than Philliad ever was. She had also scorned him for losing his mind to lust and wasting his time instead of focusing more on destruction.

And then, Philliad had done something stupid and had lost the Demon’s fragment. That was when Shailince’s hatred for her elder brother and her rage against the Roygen Clan had peaked.

That was why she had incarcerated Philliad and massacred the Roygen Clan.

She had spared Eiji in part because he could be helpful in chasing down the thief that had stolen the Demon’s fragment, but it had also been because of the twisted perversion that she had inherited.

Eiji was a symbol of Philliad’s incompetency.

And Shailince could mistreat him and crush him underfoot!

His glib, silver tongue. His face, which was exactly to Shailince’s tastes. His affection as he claimed to know no one but her. His absolute obedience had only ever been a secondary issue.

……I should’ve just killed him with the rest of the Roygens.

“Yes, I see. I should’ve just killed you. Things ended up like this because I arrogantly let my guard down…….”

Shailince’s rage toward Eiji and Dorcianni had evaporated. And now, her rage was being pointed directly at herself. She acknowledged it now that she was at death’s door. Shailince continued,

“Is it because we’re siblings? Both Philliad and I made exactly the same mistake.”

How could us siblings have both been so foolish?

She must not follow in Philliad’s foolish footsteps. She might have been forced to suppress her desire for destruction and suffer tedium because of Philliad, but she should have always maintained her cold rationality.

But Shailince was extremely emotional and tended to act on instinct, and so, she had failed to do that. She had indulged in her twisted perversions to stave off boredom, and in so doing had committed the very same errs that she had once scorned Philliad for.

That was root of Shailince’s demise. It may have been triggered by Philliad’s foolishness, but Shailince had to acknowledge the fact that she had been just as foolish too.

“But that’s only because Philliad and I were incomplete.”

She and her brother had neither been perfectly human, perfectly the Demon, nor perfectly Bahamut. It was their incompleteness that had created the openings that had allowed her enemies the chance to counterattack. But the foolishness would end with Shailince’s generation. She continued,

“You must be happy about catching me. So yes, be happy while you still can.”

Shailince’s dark red lips curled up as she madly screamed,

“But my son and daughter will become perfect and absolute. You can struggle all you want, but you’re fated to die!”

“There is no such thing as perfect or absolute in this world. Everything has its flaws, and everything has its weaknesses.”

Ianna, who had only been watching from behind this entire time, walked up to where Eiji was and calmly refuted Shailince’s derision. Ianna continued,

“Just like how I was caught off guard and nearly died because I thought I had special information that no one else could know, and just like how you got caught in a trap and are about to die because you thought you could never be defeated.”

The smile was wiped off of Shailince’s mien as Ianna quietly mocked her own past actions while also ridiculing Shailince’s predicament.

“It’s only natural to hope that your powerful allies will have certain victory. You are free to think what you wish. But I must say it’s quite funny to watch you yapping away after you’ve become a right mess and are about to die.”

Ianna sneered at Shailince, who had grown pallid like she had recently been dowsed in cold water.

I was wrong.

And Shailince realized that she had been mistaken about something.

That woman Ianna…

Nothing would have gone wrong if only Ianna had never existed.

Everything would have still worked out just fine even if she was just as foolish as Philliad had been and had abused Eiji, even if she had acted arrogantly while being blind to everything else.

Dorcianni would have still been on Bahamut’s side and would be bowing at her feet, Eiji would have been caught, tortured, and killed as soon as he betrayed her, and Arhad would have been robbed of his soul once his heart had been destroyed.

Bahamut’s victory would have been so smooth and easy.

“What the hell are you?”

Shailince chewed on her lips. She continued,

“Are you a god?”

One who was special, like the almighty Creator.

“A demon?”

One who was always lacking and in want.

“Or are you a monster?”

One who’s greed was endless, just like Bahamut.

Shailince could not quite define which of these Ianna was. Just what on earth was she that she had been the first to reach the highest reaches that even Bahamut could not see?

She was peculiar and terrifying. It was like she was something other than even a god, a demon, or a monster.

Readily, Ianna replied,

“I am human.”

“Human? No ordinary human could possibly grow as strong as you!”

“Who can say? Is race really that important?”

Ianna had initially planned to ignore Shailince’s insanity and urge Eiji forward, but she decided to drag things out through conversation because she sensed that he still needed some time.

“Humans, gods, demons, monsters —we’re all the same in that we have bodies and souls in life. Everyone is special, lacking in some way, and greedy regardless of their race. Everyone pursues their own unique goals, and everyone seeks to reach further heights once they achieve them. Strength is only one such goal.”

There was no emotion in Ianna’s features as she continued,

“One’s starting point might differ depending on their race, but there is never a limit to how far anyone can go. If there is a limit, it’s something that was self-imposed or imposed upon them by society. You should know this too. Would Bahamut, who was originally nothing but a microorganism, have been able to climb up to the peak of strength and lord over others for generations if how high one could climb was limited by their race?”

Shailince understood what Ianna was saying.

She had no choice because Ianna was using Bahamut’s own history as her example.

She still wanted to refute it. She wanted to refute it no matter what because she knew that this was the Kingdom of Ex-knights’ ideology, under which humans and mythical races alike lived in harmony.

But she had no choice but to accept it.

What else could she do? Bahamut’s long history, which were practically her own roots, was telling her that Ianna was right.

“Ha……haha.”

What a monster. Ianna was human. She was human, but she was so powerful that she had transcended the limits of her own race.

Shailince Bahamut had fallen behind in the race to grow stronger because Ianna existed. It was a clean and simple end.

“You’re entirely right. No one in this world is perfect or absolute.”

Shailince no longer cared about what Ianna was now that she was powerless before death’s door. She continued,

“And that’s why you’ll be killed by my children too, even if you’re acting all conceited now.”

Instead, Shailince’s soul made herself content in the knowledge that her son was strong. She acknowledged Ianna’s strength, and she acknowledged that she herself had been defeated too, but Taylon was just as much of a monster as Ianna was. Shailince continued,

“You were already caught off guard once —who’s to say that it couldn’t happen again? You said that you nearly died last time, no? In that case, you’ll surely die next time. There won’t be anymore second chances. Ah……right. He might just decide to keep you as a toy, too. A broken toy.”

“I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see. But you, at least, will never know what happens. I’ll send your children over to you soon enough, so just shut up and wait for them in death.”

And so, Ianna indifferently crushed Shailince’s last shred of pride underfoot. She called Eiji’s name once she was done making a mockery of Shailince.

“Eiji.”

Ianna studied his condition.

He was still quivering.

Ianna had only listened to what Shailince had to say and dragged out their conversation because Eiji wasn’t faring so well.

She had mocked, ignored, and trampled over Shailince to show him that Shailince was really nothing special because she wanted to give him enough time to ready his heart.

“Yeah.”

Eiji was still pallid, as if he was cold even inside the hot flames, as he responded.

And he was, in fact, cold.

He was recalling something he had seen a long, long time ago in that cold and damp basement.

There was a layer of frost over the densely packed columns, and flickering on top of the candles that lined the frozen walls were dim flames that were only just bright enough to allow for vision.

The corners were filled with piles of dust that had never been cleaned, and the entire area was splattered with blood —there was no way of telling whose. There was a fly buzzing around —how did it get inside?—, and the entire place was crawling with all kinds of other bugs that he could not name.

His brethren, the Roygen Clan, were lying dead on the floor before him, and Shailince was wheezing. Eiji was standing next to Dorcianni, and he fell to his knees into the puddle of blood below when Shailince screamed at her to drag him over too.

He knelt before Shailince like a dog as he begged for his life.

He kissed Shailince’s feet like a beggar as he begged for his life.

He had done all that…….

A bead of sweat rolled down Eiji’s cheek —was it from the heat or from his terror?

Dorcianni grabbed him by the wrist as he sank into his past. Eiji snapped back to his senses.

“Pull yourself together.”

Right. I need to pull myself together.

This was the present and not the past —Dorcianni hadn’t abandoned him, and he had an almighty friend in Ianna by his side.

And today was the day that Shailince would finally die.

She would die wretchedly with just a flick of his finger.

She was a worthless woman who was being derided by his new master.

“Eiji.”

Ianna watched over him quietly as she placed her hand over his shoulder and asked,

“Shall I kill her for you, or would you rather kill her yourself?”

She had asked him this question before. Eiji knew why she was asking it again.

“Please kill her.”

Ianna had asked him this question on the day that Margarita had died, and Eiji had asked Ianna to kill her for him. He had borrowed Ianna’s hands because he hadn’t been able to kill Margarita with his own due to his trauma.

“You’re really asking me that now?”

Eiji grinned brightly. He continued,

“Of course I’ll kill her myself. I’m not who I used to be back then.”

He squeezed the chains that he was holding.

Then, he looked up at Shailince, who was still dangling in the air.

He was looking up at her like he always had, but the situation had turned on its head. He could hardly believe that Shailince was dangling before him like that even though he had put her there himself. But this was real.

It was time to put everything to an end now.

Taylon and Isabella, the current generation, yet remained, but Eiji’s personal revenge would end with Shailince’s death because he had no direct connection to her children.

“Is there anything you want to say to me?”

Eiji asked the woman who had grasped his life in her hands all his life.

“May you be unhappy until the day you die!”

Shailince poured curse, upon curse, upon curse over Eiji. She never changed even despite her wretched circumstances.

“I knew you’d do that.”

Eiji let Shailince’s, who couldn’t move a muscle, words in one ear and out the other as he took a step closer. He continued,

“I always hated the world. I always thought it was so unfair that evil people could live as they pleased as long as they were strong. But then, I learned that karma really does exist. And I was even given a chance to avenge myself after I endured everything to the bitter end while sharpening my blades.”

Her black eyes, reflecting her wounded pride, glared daggers at him as if looks could kill.

“I’ll probably never be able to forget about you or my other mortal enemies, who made my life so miserable, even after I’m finally able to get my revenge.”

But Eiji didn’t cower.

“But I’ll still be happy anyway. I might not be able to forget everything, but I’ll bury the memories somewhere deep inside while enjoying my happiness. And whenever I recall them, I’ll just let them wash over me and stay in the past while not letting them affect me —maybe I’ll even talk about them as stories to share over a drink. You’re going to mean nothing to me.”

Cliiink.

Eiji manipulated a few of the chains by tugging on them, causing the barrier of fire, to which they were connected, to begin wavering. Shailince saw her demise coming upon her as she watched the chains and the barrier interact.

“Things are looking up for me already, actually. You were cursing me just moments ago, but I’ve already forgotten what you said.”

Eiji took hold of all the grudges he carried inside him alongside the chains in his hand and smiled brightly.

“Our conversation ends here. Just shut up and die now.”

Cliiink.

Eiji pulled the chains, and the barrier of fire came closer and started to shrink. The flames converged into a hot fire. The crimson flames sublimated into cerulean rage as they crept closer to Shailince.

Shailince struggled, but the chains had been created by drinking her blood and did not break. She understood that this truly was her end.

Her entire being was drenched in sweat.

“I won’t die even if you kill me,”

she said as she clenched her teeth together and quivered. The vessels were popping out at her neck. She continued,

“I won’t die as long as Bahamut’s soul still breathes within my son and daughter! It doesn’t matter how much you struggle. Bahamut will one day rule the world!”

In the last of her acrimony, Shailince cried out,

“We will overturn the world, slaughter the gods, and make a mess of everything, and we will create a new world order!”

“Shut up.”

Dorcianni had finished preparing the spells for them to leave.

Eiji pulled hard at the chains, heated by the flames, one last time.

Cliiink!

The chains contracted, and the cerulean flame that had been burning nearby shot toward the center of the web. The center of the web exploded as it was burned by a heat hotter than the surface of the sun.

Shailince couldn’t even scream. Her body had burnt up and turned to ashes instantaneously.

Disaster had fallen upon her so suddenly that her dazed soul lingered in place for a moment. The spirits’ pure powers had helped create the flames, and they greatly damaged Shailince’s lost and wandering soul.

Buzzzz…….

Shailince’s soul was weakened, and Ideas filled with deep resentment sprang out from it. They were the rage of those whom Shailince had slaughtered, their cries as they tried to curse their killer but had been overpowered because she had been too strong.

They transformed directly into a hatred that tore apart, shredded, stabbed, and lacerated Shailince’s soul, leaving it to tatters.

The cerulean flames, as chilling in color as the eyes of the Roygen Clan, seized her limp soul and choked it. Her flailing soul eventually lost its strength and plummeted down to the afterlife.

And so, Shailince’s life had ended.

~~*~~

Part 9

The darkness that Shailince had shroud the plaza in was ominous.

The sky, which had been so bright and clear that people had joked about how it was too a good day to finally execute the ringleader of a group of villains, was dark and heavy. There was a murky current in the air that almost seemed like it would leave fine coal dust on your fingers if you reached out and touched it.

Shailince had lowered the Revolution Army’s morale while raising the Bahamut army’s when she had interrupted the Revolution Army’s execution ceremony and turned it into a battlefield.

“Die!”

Both the Revolution Army and the Bahamut army lost their minds inside the dark aura. Both armies tumbled against each other like dogs fighting in mud as they spat out their malice unto each other.

But the darkness only dominated the execution grounds for a very short time.

Just as the empress dowager, who had created this battlefield, had rushed toward Payne, who was being burnt at the stake, and the green-haired executioner whom no one had ever seen before…

Craaackle!

A great rift had appeared in the blackened sky. A brilliant light appeared from somewhere high in the sky and shattered the darkness. The light pierced through the sky like a javelin shot from a ballista and crashed down to earth.

Everyone stopped in their tracks as they witnessed the light shred apart the darkness and fall down. The blinding light had made their vision turn white.

The colossal bolt of lightning fell down upon the execution grounds like a giant’s foot. The light, which had shattered the darkness, splintered into tens of thousands of branches as the currents tore open their path. The high-pressured aura dispersed, and the boiling heat erupted and ripped apart the air like a bomb.

Booooooom!

“Argh.”

The thunder roared as it exploded. The people covered their ears in pain as their eardrums popped.

“L-look over there.”

Shaaaaa.

Immediately afterward, they saw that the lightning bolt had transformed into a raging hellfire that burned so fiercely it seemed to topple the heavens.

“Do you think the empress dowager’s still alive?”

Most of the people had witnessed it. The lightning bolt had crashed directly into Shailince. Those who weren’t familiar with magic almost thought that the heavens had brought its wrath down upon her.

“Of course she’s alive! Hey, watch out!”

The Bahamut army had only recoiled temporarily because of the lightning bolt’s sheer destructive might, but they quickly began slaughtering their enemies once more. The elite troops from Ex-knights and the Revolution Army turned their eyes away from the flames and resumed the battle too.

No one present believed that the lightning bolt had been enough to kill Shailince in one shot. The Bahamut imperial family were undefeated absolute beings. The people of Bahamut knew deep down to their bones that Shailince was a monster stronger than even the lightning bolt.

“Just keep fighting for now!”

Everyone here was an elite member of the Revolution Army. There were a few civilians present who had simply come to see what was going on, but most of the people present were here to specifically face against the Bahamut army before they could rescue the Black Fox’s Payne.

“I’m sure Lady Louise will figure something out!”

They had come here prepared to lay down their lives because Louise had promised that she would do something about Shailince if the empress dowager made an entrance.

And Louise had not betrayed their trust. The powerful bolt of lightning had surely been Louise’s doing. No one knew what the empress dowager was up to because she was trapped inside the flames that the lightning bolt had wrought, but Louise was surely holding up her end of the bargain, considering that Shailince wasn’t jumping back out to massacre them all.

‘We should do our part too.’

The Revolution Army was emboldened by Louise’s actions, and they raised up their weapons and focused solely on their enemies before them.

“Ahhh!”

“Kgh!”

The Bahamut army was stronger than the Revolution Army. The elites of the Revolution Army counted among the strong too, but even they were no better than rabble before the Bahamut army. Only those with superior mental and physical strength were allowed to become soldiers in the Bahamut Empire. They Bahamut army regularly received specialized training too, so it was only natural that the Revolution Army couldn’t hold a candle to them.

And the Revolution Army knew this best. The members of the Revolution Army had longed only to join the Bahamut army’s ranks back when they had still been ordinary civilians. They had admired the knights and soldiers who achieved such glorious achievements.

And now, the Revolution Army was fighting the very same army they had once admired so. It wouldn’t have been strange for them to turn tail and run away in fear. But they gritted their teeth and shouted as they stood strong against the Bahamut army.

‘Lady is Louise is fighting the empress dowager.’

‘She’s fighting for our peace!’

‘So I have to fight too!’

Screams resounded, blood splattered, and death was rampant. They killed and killed, as if their senses had been paralyzed, and they fought as if this day was to be their last.

And then…….

The Revolution Army slowly began noticing that something was wrong with the Bahamut army as they continued to fight desperately.

‘What’s wrong with these bastards?’

The Bahamut army had charged them like a stampede of water buffaloes intent on destroying everything in their path, but their attacks were all over the place.

“U-ugh.”

“Ahh…….”

They sometimes paused with unfocused eyes as if they’d been hit on the head, and they sometimes clutched their heads like they were in pain. And the Bahamut army’s strange behaviors only grew more pronounced as time passed.

“Things are in our favor.”

This was the result of Ex-knights’ mages dispersing a lot of the stimulant among the Bahamut army. The stimulant was a terrific biochemical weapon, just as Saki had guaranteed.

A moment’s opening in the middle of battle spelled one’s death.

And so, the tides were turning in the Revolution Army’s favor.

‘We might win?’

The Revolution Army was puzzled, but they did not let slip the openings they saw in the enemies’ guard.

The time of cruel death flowed ceaselessly. Shailince couldn’t break free from the flames and the Bahamut army’s battle lines began to weaken, emboldening the Revolution Army to keep pushing the Bahamut army back.

But both sides were beginning to grow exhausted both physically and mentally.

When would this fight end?

Would one side need to die before the fight could end?

Everyone’s mixed feelings only grew more complicated as the fight stretched on.

The darkness that Shailince had created had been slowly retreating ever since the lightning had ripped it apart. The light of the sun was dispersing the darkness in every direction as it poured down to the earth.

Its radiant light shined down from the skies, and people began to lose focus and their thoughts began to stray as their movements dulled in their fatigue.

‘Why must we fight against our own people?’

This was the question that had seized most people’s minds.

‘If only the army joined the revolution too.’

The Revolution Army wished only for the Bahamut army to cast aside their loyalty.

‘Does this mean that soldiers will kill their own people without hesitation as long as the imperial family orders it? But some of their families are probably civilians too.’

‘Why are they so faithful to the imperial family when the imperial family sees the people of the empire as nothing more than a means for them to grow stronger and their blades could turn on any of us at any time?’

Conversely, the Bahamut army had been faithful to the Bahamut imperial family throughout their entire lives, and they wished only for the Revolution Army to surrender.

‘How could they revolt against the imperial family? The heartless fools!’

‘The imperial family is the strongest. No one can ever possibly defeat them, and no one should even try to.’

The Bahamut army did not want to kill their fellow Bahamut citizens if they could help it. After all, their own families might number among the Revolution Army.

‘But we still have to kill them.’

‘The empress dowager will never agree to spare them.’

Their thoughts bounced this way and that in a dizzying manner. The soldiers of the Bahamut army were at a loss, and the uncomfortable anxiety sitting in a corner of their hearts and the sorrow they had always kept concealed began to grow bigger.

A dilemma had taken root in their hearts ever since the Revolution Army had condemned the Black Fox for their heinous actions and rose up against them and the Bahamut army had begun slaughtering people indiscriminately as they marched from village to village.

The imperial family’s orders were absolute, but…….

‘They said that the Black Fox was ripping out our countrymen’s hearts while they were still alive and using them to make Life, right? Was the Life that I drank made from people’s hearts too?’

‘What if my family was among the Black Fox’s victims? I’ve been anxious because I haven’t been able to get in contact with them as of late…’

‘I burned down my own village with my own two hands. My family was there too. But I didn’t dare disobey.’

They had been brainwashed to obey the imperial family’s orders as absolute, and they would have never been tormented by such thoughts had the brainwashing still held a vice grip over them, but the stimulant affected their brainwashing too. Their brainwashing began losing its hold over them, and the soldiers’ hearts became a mess.

Shaaaa.

And suddenly. The flames, which had seemed like they would never go out for all eternity, suddenly shrank in size.

The Revolution Army grew nervous, and the Bahamut army became expectant.

The flames transformed into a chilling bluish color as they shrank. And they could slowly see something strange beyond the flames once they had turned so blue that they were translucent.

A humanoid figure was being bound tightly by what looked like hundreds of flames. The firmly bound silhouette, who wasn’t able to move a muscle, belonged to a woman.

Was it Louise or Shailince?

Swiiish.

The chains seemed to move.

And the flames exploded against the figure all at once.

Boooooom!

Until finally, they created a colossal current before they were extinguished.

“…….”

The entire execution grounds had vanished. There was only a large round crater left behind in its place. Neither Payne’s, who had been burnt at stake, or the woman’s, whom they had seen beyond the flames, corpses were there. Nothing of them had been left behind. Only their ashes were scattered into the winds.

Everyone stopped in their tracks.

“Continue the battle!”

a commanding officer of the Bahamut army shouted menacingly, and the soldiers snapped back to their senses and began brandishing their weapons once more. Shailince was invincible, as far as the Bahamut army was concerned, and they believed that it was impossible for her to have died. The Revolution Army shared the sentiment.

“The woman inside the fire wouldn’t have been the empress dowager, right?”

“Does that mean it was Lady Louise?”

A strange mood began to settle in between the revolution and Bahamut armies.

Then, someone jumped into the center of the crater and waved a flag.

“Lady Louise has……cough, cough!”

It was Fieber Pistol, an executive of the Revolution Army. Everyone turned their eyes to him because he was waving a large red flag.

Fieber yelled out the results of the battle so loudly he thought his throat might burst open.

“Lady Louise has defeated Empress Dowager Shailince Bahamut!”

Fiever roared sonorously as the veins popped out from his neck, and a wind spirit carried his voice so he could be heard clearly from every corner of the area. He continued,

“The evil empress dowager was struck by lightning, and she died without leaving a single trace behind! Lady Louise has brought down heaven’s wrath upon her! The Revolution Army is victorious!”

Those who were able to grasp the situation began flopping around like fish leaping out of water.

“Impossible!”

“Her Imperial Majesty the Empress Dowager is dead?!”

Friends and foes alike were left shocked.

“Yes, the empress dowager is dead!”

Fieber shouted enthusiastically in his already excited state.

“Do not be misled!”

Officers of the Bahamut army went around and tried to keep the soldiers in order, but their unrest was not easy to dispel.

After all, Shailince was nowhere to be seen even though the lunatic was shouting loudly about how the empress dowager was dead.

‘Did she really pass away?’

They were shocked.

They had not been nearly this shocked even when they had heard that their late emperor, Philliad, had been killed by King Schneider of Roanne. After all, Philliad had been incarcerated by Shailince because he was weak, and Shailice had been the de facto strongest figure in the previous generation of the imperial family.

Shailince was a monster, so how could she have died in a place like this?

But everything about the current situation strongly implied that she was indeed dead. A stunned silence rippled out in circles with Fieber at its center.

The commanding officers of the Bahamut army grew listless, and their shouts for the army to maintain battle lines grew quieter and less frequent.

Their hands stopped brandishing their weapons because they did not know what to do. Their breathing grew ragged too, perhaps because the fighting had been so fierce.

“Look here!”

People began talking as they shattered the silence.

Kay, a member of the Revolution Army, also called out to the confused Bahamut army soldier who had been trying to kill him just moments ago.

“Why do we need to be fighting right now?”

The soldier shot a stiff glare back at him.

“Because you staged a rebellion. We would never have needed to fight if you’d just lived your lives quietly.”

“This isn’t a rebellion —it’s a revolution! You know about the horrors that the Black Fox carried out under the imperial family’s direct orders and how the upper-ranking knight orders ravaged the West, don’t you?”

“…….”

Important information was restricted within the army’s ranks, but the information couldn’t be silenced completely because there had never been such a large rebellion with so many civilians involved in Bahamut before. The soldiers had whispered amongst themselves about the reason why the rebellion had been staged in the first place, and the soldier did in fact know about the things that Kay was referring to.

“We would’ve died without anyone’s notice sooner or later if we didn’t stage a revolution. We would’ve been forced to live the rest of our lives in anxiety like we were smoked jerky, never knowing when we’d be eaten, even if we somehow survived.”

Kay continued to vent,

“Most of the empire’s citizens decided to revolt. Your family’s probably joined the revolution too. Pointing your blade at us is no different from killing your own family with your own two hands.”

But Kay hadn’t needed to go out of his way to point this out, as the soldier, much like the rest of his peers, was already suffering as the brainwashing he had received that made him obedient to Bahamut clashed against the responsibility he felt over the wellbeing of his family.

All soldiers underwent military training and brainwashing, under the guise of philosophical education, once they enlisted.

This was what their brainwashing taught them:

The barren and dry North had been able to develop because the Bahamut imperial family existed. The soldiers had no choice but to obey the imperial family if they wanted to feed their families.

The Bahamut Empire was rich and powerful, and her citizens were treated as citizens of the strongest nation in the world, because the imperial family fought in the frontlines. The rest of the world would gnash their teeth and assault Bahamut as one if the imperial family wasn’t present, and the people of Bahamut would lose their social status immediately.

They could not end the war after all this time. The war was already ongoing, so they might as well dream of making the empire so powerful that none could dare look down upon her. They had been born to the world, so they might as well swim in the big ocean instead of the little pond.

……The brainwashing preyed primarily on their fears about what would happen if they were no longer number one and secondarily on their fears that the lives they enjoyed now might vanish into thin air, and then it blinded them by dangling the glory of world domination before their eyes.

This was how Bahamut brainwashed her soldiers, and the brainwashed soldiers generally stopped thinking for themselves, as if their brains had turned into stone. And so, they had been turned into mere tools for the Bahamut imperial family’s use instead of individual human beings.

They saw themselves as sacrificial pawns who had no choice but to throw away their lives if the imperial family so ordered it. And the terrifying idea that it didn’t matter even if the rabble died by the masses so long as it was for their sacred goal of world domination had entered their hearts.

“Conquering the world is Bahamut’s long-cherished wish. The times changed after His Imperial Majesty Emperor Taylon Helkan Bahamut ascended the throne, and now it’s finally time for that wish to see the light of day. If our lives are needed to fulfill that wish, then it’s only right that we should lay them down. The Black Fox did what they did, and the West was ravaged, only to ensure our future victory,”

the soldier parroted feebly.

“Are you seriously suggesting that that makes it okay?”

Kay glared as he asked again,

“Even if it’s your family that’s sacrificed to ensure our future victory? Even if you get sacrificed too?”

The soldier could not readily reply.

The stimulants that the Ex-knights mages had dispersed was forcing the Bahamut soldiers to look back at their original goals.

From the invisible promise of glory to their fears of falling in social status, and from their fears to their worries about their family and the rest of the world.

Most soldiers had enlisted in the army in the hopes of obtaining better lives. They were the hopes of their respective villages. More plundered food and tributes from foreign nations were allocated to their hometowns with every merit they accomplished in battle. This system was so deeply engrained in the soldiers that they could not even imagine any other way to live.

Glory was something they could grow greedy about only after they had ensured their survival, and survival was always their first and foremost priority.

“Glory is a problem for the future. Immediate joys, no matter how small, are more important to us than conquering the world. We’d rather live safe and stable lives while we’re still alive than be honored after our deaths.”

There had always been many more civilians than soldiers. Those who were not a part of the military cared more about living their ordinary lives in their homes, their small villages, than they did about world domination.

“……But conquering the world was supposed to be about fighting for safer and stabler lives,”

the soldier replied hesitantly. He continued,

“That’s what everyone thought at first. We dreamt of everyone in Bahamut becoming soldiers and contributing to our quest for world domination, and we hoped that the Bahamut Empire would become even richer and more powerful, just as you suggested. This was the only way we could survive in the barren North.”

But that was no longer the case.

Sometimes change never happened, sometimes it happened very slowly, and sometimes it happened explosively like torrents rushing out from a broken dam, just like the Cataclysm.

The change that the people of Bahamut had experienced was the Cataclysm. They hadn’t known it for long yet, but the people of Bahamut had learned the ticklish feeling of sharing with and helping each other instead of plundering and stealing from each other all the time, and they had also learned how worthwhile it could feel to harvest their own crops. And they had learned about how abnormal their way of life was as foreign texts began to circulate throughout the empire.

Simultaneously, the Cataclysm had changed the world to make it easier for life to live in it.

“The world has changed,”

Kay said with his full sincerity. He continued,

“There was so much more fertile soil that no one else had laid claim to after the world expanded, and we took up that land and have been farming on it to our hearts’ content. We can feed ourselves without having to fight other nations. World domination is nothing more than vainglory now. So, why must we continue this war?”

“…….”

“We could always fight just because we like fighting, I suppose. We could always grow stronger just to win the war. But everyone can grow as strong as they want without having to take divine power from others now because the world is practically overflowing with it. We could always grow stronger that way and be glorious while fighting other nations, just as we’ve always done.”

Kay glared fiercely as he continued,

“So why must the imperial family sacrifice us to make the army stronger? The world is so vast, so why are they ordering you to kill your own people as we plead for our lives? Does that even make sense to you?”

Kay looked to the silent solider and firmly said,

“The answer is simple. The imperial family sees us as mere tools of war or livestock that can be butchered and eaten at any time and not as human beings. The world has changed so much, but they still don’t see any reason not to ‘use’ us. That’s why they think it’s only natural to sacrifice us to make themselves stronger, and why they’re trying to eliminate us like they’re simply throwing away a broken tool now that we’ve revolted.”

The soldiers had already been thrown into chaos and couldn’t tell right from wrong because the stimulant had broken the effects of their brainwashing, and the Revolution Army’s sincere persuasion threw them deeper into chaos still.

“Anyone could become their sacrifice. We rose up in order to prevent that and lead peaceful lives!”

“…….”

“Are you going to live like a tool or like livestock until the day you die? There are an infinite number of chances for you to grasp happiness on this land…….”

“Stop listening!”

Pow!

The soldier’s colleague who had been standing next to him kicked Kay away in the middle of the latter’s impassioned speech. The soldier’s colleague continued,

“He’s spouting bullshit.”

Then, he glared at the soldier and said,

“You must be in a critical state if you’re keeping quiet even after hearing all that bullshit. But don’t you dare forget. Bahamut is worth nothing without the imperial family. Ex-knights and Roanne will come at us like dogs in the name of revenge the very moment Bahamut collapses. There’s no going back for us. We have no choice but to keep moving forward.”

Most of the soldiers regarded the Revolution Army’s cries as nothing more than bullshit because their brainwashing still held firm. But there were also several soldiers who were shaken, like the soldier who had been speaking with Kay.

What did they do now?

They stood at the crossroads of a choice and trembled.

“Hahaha.”

Fieber’s eyes were bloodshot as he waved his flag from the eye of the storm. He was shivering in delight as he quietly sang Dorcianni’s praises.

She killed Shailince Bahamut!

She’s so cool!

She’s the greatest mage ever!

He regretted the fact that the people didn’t know that Louise was Dorcianni. How could they not see how absolutely amazing Dorcianni was?!

But the plan was to use this battle as the opportunity to say that Louise had been gravely wounded and have her retreat from the frontlines. Dorcianni had handed the reins over to the leaders of the revolution just yesterday, and she was planning to shed her role as Louise and start cooperating with the Revolution Army as a mage of Ex-knights starting tomorrow.

And so, Louise would become an invincible legend and serve as the Revolution Army’s sturdy backbone. They had initially planned to have her die alongside Shailince, but they had later determined that it was too early to have her leave the stage completely just yet.

‘Whoops, now’s not the time for this!’

Fieber was in the middle of carrying out his mission.

His mission was to make sure everyone knew that Louise had been victorious and to instigate disorder by throwing some bait.

Fieber straightened out his voice.

Then, he cleared his throat and shouted,

“I am Fieber Pistol. I am an executive of the Revolution Army! And I was once a disciple of Wiffheimer Potestas, the late Bahamut court archmage!”

Everyone present knew who Fieber was.

The Bahamut court mages who knew Fieber had disclosed his identity as soon as he had declared that he was a big shot in the Revolution Army. They had also spread rumors that he had fled because he hadn’t been able to withstand Wiffheimer’s teaching methods. This had caused people to mock Fieber for being weak.

“I’m sure there are many of you here who think that I’m weak. But I didn’t run —I left because I was disillusioned by Bahamut and began question the empire’s true colors.”

The truth was that he had, in fact, run away, but Fieber wore a grave expression and brazenly declared that he had left for the greater good. He continued,

“I wandered the world and finally found my answer in the Himalapè Ice Field to the north. And now I will share the secrets about Bahamut that I learned there!”

People stared at him as they wondered what he would say next, and the commanding officers of the Bahamut army wondered whether they should kill him or not as Fieber continued shouting.

“The Bahamut imperial family are a bunch of alien monsters wearing human masks. They are from a lineage of draconic monsters. Taylon Helkan Bahamut plans to become a god and eat all the life that’s left in the world after he’s finished conquering the world!”

Fieber’s surroundings grew noisy as he rattled on about something that the people could hardly believe. A few people believed him, and a few more began to harbor doubts, but most people reacted by thinking that he was a madman.

“What should we do, Commander?”

an officer asked the commander of the Bahamut army gingerly as he ignored what Fieber was saying.

“Hmmm…….”

But the commander of Shailince’s personal troops had led his army from the vanguard at Shailince’s command all his life and could not decide quickly.

To begin with, he still couldn’t believe that Shailince was actually dead.

Shailince was surely still alive and simply unable to move about, and this was surely just a ploy, which meant that they would surely be punished later if he ordered the army to withdraw. Moreover, the Bahamut army would inevitably lose morale if they withdrew.

On the other hand, the Bahamut army would immediately be routed if Shailice was truly dead and Louise reappeared on the battlefield in perfect health.

The commander had to decide.

A lone knight slowly approached the commander just then.

“We must withdraw.”

It was Karnitz Ulter. He was a knight that Perzenus, the third imperial knight order that was focusing on subjugating the South instead of subduing the Revolution Army, had sent as reinforcements.

Karnitz was rumored to be faithful and skilled, and the commander fell deeper into thought upon hearing what Karnitz had said.

In a stronger tone, Karnitz continued,

“There are elite soldiers from Ex-knights here too, according to our spies. We must make minimizing the losses to our army our priority. I am certain that Her Imperial Majesty the Empress Dowager, who is surely still alive somewhere, will be considerate of our circumstances.”

The commander had already been considering a retreat, and Karnitz successfully persuaded him into making it his final call.

To think that Ex-knights, which had been huddling into herself all this time, had finally decided to interfere.

The execution was undoubtedly a part of Ex-knights’ schemes. Ex-knights was prudent, and they must have prepared thoroughly to capture the empress dowager if they were here. They might have even planned to annihilate the Bahamut army too.

“We withdraw.”

“I will shoulder the blame too should anything happen.”

“There’ll be no need for that. At the end of the day, I’m the one who gave the order.”

The commander saw how the Revolution Army had grown elated and how the Bahamut army had grown dispirited.

‘This is difficult.’

The army had been acting strange as of late. The number of soldiers who claimed to be mentally ill had increased exponentially. And not only was there a rebellion going on, but Shailince, their iron-blooded ruler and an invincible monster, had openly been defeated —so what were they supposed to do?

The aftershock of today’s execution ceremony would not be small.

‘Even I feel a little strange.’

The commander gnashed his teeth.

Ultimately, the Bahamut army was forced to retreat.

The Revolution Army did not stop them.

“Whoaaaaa!”

the Revolution Army cheered.

The myths surrounding the strongest beings had shattered. Louise was neither the king of Roanne, their old enemy, nor the great knight of Ex-knights, and she had been just another nameless mage until a mere few years ago…….

And she, their savior, had brought down heaven’s wrath upon Shailince!

They had defeated the terrifying Bahamut army!

An unknown emotion began squirming from within the Revolution Army’s hearts.

‘We can do this!’

It was at this moment that the people of Bahamut had lost their fanatic awe for the Bahamut lineage, which had ruled the empire as the strongest beings in the world ever since the empire was in its fetal stages. It wasn’t unlike how the people of Ex-knights had lost their blind faith in Ianna Ex-knights Rise after she had been defeated by the Bahamut emperor’s hands last year.

~~*~~

Part 10

In a faraway region of one of the four corners that was wrapped in multiple barriers.

Rumble.

A crimson dragon that was larger than a mountain was bound tightly by black snakes that looked like thick ropes and lying on the ground. Thousands of large magical lances pinned the dragon’s colossal frame down in place, and the dragon was struggling hard even though he could not move a muscle.

“Hmmm.”

Isabella had been sitting on top of the dragon’s back as she made sure that the restraints stayed intact while also absorbing the divine power of nature for fun.

“Did you feel that, Lord Brother?”

she asked Taylon, who had driven his arm into the dragon’s chest, when she sensed the disturbance.

“I did,”

Taylon replied.

“Mother died —did I feel that right? It was the same feeling as when our fool of a father died.”

“You’re right. She’s dead.”

They did not grieve Shailince’s death. After all, that which tied them together as family wasn’t any sort of affection but rather the kinship of people who shared the same goal. Moreover, the sense that they were all ‘one body’ had only grown stronger after Taylon had unsealed Bahamut’s soul and made it his.

It didn’t matter to them that one of them had died.

Though they were curious…….

“Who do you think killed her? She died without even bothering to contact us, which means that she was cornered so badly that she couldn’t. Arhad of Ex-knights? Schneider of Roanne?”

They were the only two enemies Bahamut had in the world who were capable of killing Shailince.

“Mother was arrogant and tended to act on emotion,”

Taylon replied offhandedly as he pulled hard at the dragon’s —Terranodin’s— gigantic artery. His fingers seemed to have fused into the artery. He was in the process of sucking out all the divine power that was inside Terranodin’s heart. Terranodin flinched and tried to stop him, but his struggles were to no avail. Taylon continued,

“Our dear little brother is the most likely culprit. He was probably waiting for the perfect opportunity as he curled into himself like a hedgehog. He’s more than capable of provoking Mother into falling for a trap and killing her if he worked together with soldiers from Roanne.”

“Is that so? Anyway, what do we do now? It’ll be difficult to control the army properly because Mother’s dead and we’re stuck here. What if Ex-knights decides that this is the perfect chance to strike Bahamut?”

Isabella stared quietly back at Taylon as she continued,

“Not that it really matters how hard the bastards struggle, of course.”

Black waves of ecstatic satisfaction filled her eyes, which were black like her older brother’s.

Monsters. They were like monsters.

Isabella was so glad that she was a part of the same generation as Taylon.

“I’ll decide once I’ve finished absorbing this bastard. There are a lot of very interesting things inside the dragons’ knowledge. I feel like everything will be clear once I’ve finished absorbing this bastard too.”

Taylon observed Terranodin, who was closing his eyes, with the snake-like pupils of his own. He continued,

“You’re resisting quite fiercely. Why do you even care so much when I’ve already finished absorbing the rest of your brethren?”

[…….]

Terranodin hadn’t said a single word ever since Taylon had pulled his hand out of the dragon’s body. And he maintained his silence even now.

“Well, whatever. We’re just about done here anyway.”

The Heart Sharing spell was complete.

And the tedious adaptation period was over too.

Cruuuunch!

Taylon squeezed the artery hard and forced a lot of his own aura through it. Bloodlust and hunger poured through the artery and directly into Terronodin’s heart like a hurricane.

Crack.

Terranodin groaned in agony. A thin barrier, the shield that he had been holding up until the bitter end, had shattered.

The fierce clash and boundary between Taylon’s and Terranodin’s identities crumbled away.

“After all, this is how it ends.”

Taylon licked his chops as he stared at Terranodin’s enfeebled and colossal frame. The unsatiable hunger from the deepest depths of his soul was clamoring. Countless unidentifiable monsters and fused together and were lurking inside his body. The name ‘Taylon’ now belonged to a monster who was growing increasingly uncomfortable with a human’s small body.

The monster was howling in his want to devour the last dragon of the four corners.

“I’ll be sure to eat you well.”

Taylon smiled smoothly as he squeezed Terranodin’s artery. Terranodin’s divine power, soul, and heart —he opened the doors so that he could absorb the dragon’s everything.

Cruuunch.

Terranodin’s body began crumpling around his heart like it was made from paper. His body went up in smoke and vanished like extinguishing flames, and his gigantic heart and soul were sucked into Taylon without even having the chance to resist.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

Taylon’s shadow swelled up into a gigantic monster before shrinking back down into the shadow of a robust young man.

“You’re still resisting even after I’ve devoured you, I see.”

Taylon closed his eyes.

He violently suppressed Terranodin’s soul, which was shaking up the world inside him, and swallowed it. Then, he forced Terranodin’s thumping heart to fuse with his own and made it his.

Terranodin’s ancient memories naturally began flowing into Taylon. Countless bits of ancient information, as well as information about Ianna, poured into Taylon’s soul like a torrent.

Taylon read the dragon’s memories with great intrigue, but he frowned heavily when he reached the end.

“Oh dear……. It looks like Ianna Ex-knights Rise will know that I’ve eaten the dragons if she survives.”

“What? But how?”

“The last dragon left her information about her through an artefact.”

“Oh my…….”

Isabella, who had walked up to Taylon at some point, smiled happily. She continued,

“You know… Don’t you think that she might actually be awake right now? I think it’s more likely that she woke up than to believe that Ex-knights and Roanne, who’ve practically been playing dead until now, suddenly decided to team up to kill Mother.”

“I concur. I’m certain that she wasn’t awake before we came here, but it’s entirely possible that she’s awake now.”

“Hoho. How entertaining.”

Isabella moistened her lips as she thought about Ianna.

Her greedy hunger would never be satiated until she either made Ianna hers or ate her away.

“Isabella, return to Bahamut with Pakalatua and gauge the situation. Assume that she’s awake and keep yourself carefully hidden.”

“Okay. And what about you?”

“There’s one last place I have to visit.”

Taylon was still starving as he looked down at the ground below.

He understood now that he had obtained the power of the four dragons who had bene maintaining equilibrium. The four of them had been merely fractions of Laos’ power.

Swallowing incomplete fragments had only served to make him hungrier.

He wanted to devour the complete thing.

He had been to the Akashic Records exactly once before.

And he remembered the vast quantity of things that had existed there.

How would it feel to devour it all?

‘I couldn’t find Kandemayon or Laos no matter how hard I searched, so it’s likely that I’ll find them there too.’

He had naturally come to learn how to open the door to the Akashic Records because he had obtained the power of the four dragons on top of Kandemayon’s.

Boooom!

Taylon used his draconic strength to stomp down hard against the earth. His single step made the earth ripple like waves.

Crackleee.

Shaaaa…….

A dimensional door opened up as space, not earth, ripped apart. Taylon jumped down into it without any hesitation.

Taylon twisted his body as he plummeted. He looked up, and he saw not the sky but the entirety of the vast world itself.

He scrutinized the world carefully as he searched for something. And he found it quickly enough.

‘Ianna Ex-knights Rise.’

You really are awake. Taylon enjoyed himself as he studied her.

‘You pitiful thing. You woke up only to face more misfortune.’

Taylon felt satisfied as he continued to fall endlessly downward.

‘There will be no more second chances for you.’

~~*~~

“Come here.”

Arhad welcomed Ianna back once she had returned to Ex-knights’ royal castle. Ianna tottered over and plopped down heavily into the sofa. She still had a lot of work left to do, but it was important to rest while she could. Now was the time to let down her guard and rest deeply by Arhad’s side.

Arhad sat down next to her and said,

“You’ve worked hard. How was it?”

“Shailince was very strong. The fight was difficult even though Eiji and Dorcianni prepared thoroughly. I had no choice but to step in. Shailince had probably grown stronger on her own too, by absorbing divine power and training, but it seemed like the power that Taylon was sharing with her played a larger role. The dragons’ powers were especially amazing.”

“I’m sure they were. They were the strongest lifeforms in the Age of Magic, after all.”

Taylon now possessed Bahamut’s, the Demon’s, Kandemayon’s, and the four dragons’ powers on top of his own. Shailince shared some of his power, and she had been significantly stronger than when Ianna had seen her last.

“You could have used it as the stage for your official revival, you know?”

“I thought it would be better for the future if the people believed that they succeeded by their own strength.”

Ex-knights prioritized her people first and foremost. Allowing the people of Bahamut to grow self-reliant now would serve to lessen future annoyances. They didn’t care whether Bahamut splintered apart, banded together, or sought entirely new territory of her own later, but they wanted to make sure that the people of Bahamut would figure things out amongst themselves without bringing any harm to Ex-knights.

“And we need to eliminate Taylon’s support base too.”

The bastard had climbed his way up to where he was by tramping other underfoot, so they would remove his foothold so that he had no choice but to fall all the way back down when he fell.

“That’s true.”

Arhad agreed, but he still thought it was a shame that Ianna hadn’t been able to add to her renown.

Ianna had been ‘secretly’ participating in difficult battles and increasing their allies’ morale by leading them to victory. But she had never identified herself in any of them, so officially, it was like she had never lifted a finger.

“Were you able to gauge how strong Taylon is through Shailince?”

“I think I’m a little stronger, judging by the woman’s strength and attitude.”

Shailince had been visibly shaken as soon as she had laid her eyes on Ianna. It hadn’t been because Ianna had seemingly returned from the dead bur rather because she had grown so absurdly powerful. She had stubbornly insisted that Taylon would win in the bitter end, but that had been nothing more than the final, frantic struggles of a criminal who had been condemned to death. Ianna continued,

“But I’ll still need to widen the gap between us before Taylon decides to make his appearance if I want to secure our victory. You and the Ex-knights army will be charged with defending the land and the people when we fight Taylon, so in practice, the battle will be a duel between him and I. And I won’t let my guard down because I’m not completely certain that I’m the stronger and he’s the weaker between us. I will focus solely on my training until it’s time to fight him.”

Ianna betrayed no feelings of elation or superiority. She was simply composed.

Ianna drew a vivid picture of Taylon, who was surely encouraged by his newfound power, before her eyes.

‘Just you wait and see,’

she muttered.

It doesn’t matter if you’ve eaten the dragons.

Neither does it matter if you’ve obtained the power to defy the Balance like I can.

Nor does it matter even if you devoured everything in the world and obtained all the power it comes with.

Nothing you do will matter. It doesn’t matter how strong you are!

I will destroy your ambitions, your greed —you everything.

We could fight for all eternity, but I will defeat you in the end.

I like to pay back what was done to me by at least twice fold, you see…….

Arhad wrapped his arm around the back of the sofa and sank deeply into it.

“I think it’s just about time that Taylon finished up absorbing the dragons.”

Arhad was calm even though the final battle was drawing closer.

The slightest mishap had been able to bring his rage to a boil and dye his mind white-hot this past year, and he had been blinded in his despair because he hadn’t been able to be with Ianna. He would grow so anxious if the same thing happened again.

But he had nothing to fear right now because Ianna was right here by his side. Arhad had suffered so much this past year while Ianna was absent, but he trusted her now that she was back, and she did not betray his trust. If anything, Ianna had come back significantly stronger.

Arhad placed his hand over Ianna’s rough one. He trusted that he would be able to overcome any trial or tribulation that came his way so long as he could hold her sturdy hand. They would be victorious no matter what Taylon did so long as Ianna was with him.

Perhaps Ianna had read his mind, as she nodded and said,

“Yes. I was prepared for either Taylon or Isabella to show up by now, but I have yet to spot a single hair from their heads. They haven’t even issued any orders to their army, which was thrown into chaos after losing its highest-ranking commander. In other words, they’re probably still absorbing the dragons……but it’s taking longer than I anticipated. Or perhaps Terranodin is buying us time like he said he would in his message?”

“There’s no way for us to tell. It’s also possible that they’re done absorbing the dragons and are waiting to catch us off guard. Or, they might even be growing stronger still through means that we have no way of predicting.”

“I’ve been considering that too. I’m also prepared for the possibility that Kandemayon will betray her promise despite what she’s said.”

“How clever of you. After all, she’s already tricked us once, so there’s no guarantee that she wouldn’t try again.”

Kandemayon had promised Ianna that she would no longer interfere in the fight, and it was unlikely that she would be able to try anything funny when Laos was with her too……but one could never be certain. Arhad continued,

“In any event, we should always be prepared to defend ourselves no matter when Taylon decides to attack. We’ll also need to spur on the Bahamut revolution before the bastards decide to make their move.”

“The revolution is progressing successfully. And a lot of the people of Bahamut’s faith in the imperial family will crumble after what happened today.”

Ianna had slipped into the crowd to gauge the mood immediately after Shailince had died instead of stepping up into the spotlight. The Revolution Army had been shaken, naturally, but the Bahamut army, which had been heavily brainwashed, had been shaken too. Many people would surely change sides if the people’s distrust of the imperial family continued to grow stronger. It had been worth the extra effort to distribute the stimulant and inducing agent.

“It’s karma. The people have no reason to follow rulers who don’t treat them as people. The rulers in question aren’t even absolute figures anymore now that we’ve introduced the possibility that they can be defeated.”

This had been their goal for holding the public execution. They had wanted the people of the empire to witness the previously undefeated imperial family, whom they worshiped as absolute beings, being defeated.

Shailince hadn’t been aware, but mages allied with Ex-knights had been stationed at every village in Bahamut, and they had magically broadcasted Shailince’s death, where she had been powerless as she was erased without leaving even a single speck of dust behind. All the people of the empire had been greatly shocked, both commoners and nobles alike.

The empire would collapse on itself if it was provoked just a little more.

Historically speaking, there had been many cases in the past where a nation that had withstood the test of time for a while had suddenly fallen to ruin in the blink of an eye, and they had always been brought to ruin by either one of two things: a foreign invasion or internal strife.

It was always the nation’s people who had decided the nation’s fate. After all, a nation could only be established because its people existed.

Bahamut’s order existed solely upon the law of the jungle. The imperial family suppressed and exploited the people with their strength. This was why Bahamut had no choice but to be shaken to the point of threatening to crumble apart because its very foundation had started to crack.

Everything that had been rotten inside Bahamut would now fester and burst open, and she would fall to ruin from the inside because of her own people.

“The people would have still continued to follow the imperial family all things despite if the imperial family’s victory was already set in stone. That’s why no one dared to defy me in our past lives.”

Arhad had placed his hand over Ianna’s, and she squeezed him back when he overlayed his past self, which was as faint as a midsummer night’s dream now, on top of the current Bahamut imperial family.

“You’re wrong. You were the emperor of Bahamut, but you were still different from the imperial family.”

Ianna recalled the praises that had been sung of Arhad’s name in the past.

Arhad had brought the Bahamut Empire genuine prosperity when he had been her emperor. He had improved the people’s lives by several levels in order to win their authentic obedience, and he had never sacrificed his allies in vain.

Arhad had been starved for divine power in this life, but even still, he had never used it as an excuse to hurt people. He had only ever hunted monsters whose egos were already polluted and lost.

“The Bahamut soldiers appeared to follow you because they sincerely wanted to, in my eyes. They weren’t brainwashed to act like mere tools like they are now. The fact that you were overwhelmingly powerful likely factored into it as well, but the fact that you were exceptional in your governance was probably more important. I hated you back then because you were my enemy……but I have always acknowledged the fact that you are an amazing ruler. Straightforward and single-minded bastards like Rikijen would never be so loyal to you if you were like the current Bahamut imperial family.”

How did she know to say such endearing words?

Arhad leaned in and listened to Ianna’s articulate words as they fell from her lips. He loved her as she assured him that he was neither the Demon nor Bahamut. And it spurred him work even harder because he did not want to disappoint her.

“You are leading Ex-knights exceptionally even now. You asked me to be your guidepost, but I’m certain that you would have always been king somewhere even if I wasn’t there with you.”

Arhad, who had been savoring Ianna’s words with his eyes closed as though he was listening to the most beautiful melody in the world, quickly asked her,

“Are you trying to say that I possess the qualities of a king?”

“Are you asking because you truly don’t know after all this time? Or do you simply want to hear me sing your praises?”

It was both.

He wanted the person whom he trusted and respected most to confirm that he was doing well over and over again, and he also wanted to hear honeyed praise from the person he loved most in the world.

Arhad didn’t reply, but Ianna could tell what the answer buried deep inside him was just by looking at his face now.

“Why do you think it is that I trust you and follow you?”

Ianna whispered quietly as she placed a hand on Arhad’s shoulder. She continued,

“I don’t follow people who aren’t capable. And I never once imagined you as anything other than a king. You have always been a king to me in both my past and present lives. Do you think that I would have willingly placed myself under your banner if I thought that you didn’t have what it takes to be king? Well……I suppose I would have followed you regardless if you asked me now.”

Arhad smiled.

“I think it still could’ve been fun if you were my ruler and I was your knight or your advisor. I’m confident that I would have supported you from behind with everything I had.”

Ianna blanched.

“You’re still saying that after watching me all this time? Or are you merely joking? Being strong doesn’t automatically make you a good ruler, and I don’t possess the talent it takes to govern a country.”

“But I think that you have more than enough talent. You just don’t want to be a ruler, don’t you?”

“That’s also true. I strongly desire to grow stronger on a personal level, but my ambitions are rather lacking when it comes to anything else. I ignored all of my duties of governance back when I used to be a duchess of Roanne. I would’ve asked Schneider to grant me more territory and actually governed it properly if I’d had any desire to lead people. But I didn’t.”

“You have a point.”

“And that’s why you, who is extremely impartial to everyone else except for me and yet also so greedy, are much more suited for the throne than I. I am better suited as a knight because I’m an idiot who knows nothing but the sword.”

Ianna brought Arhad’s face closer to her. Then, she continued,

“You had no choice but to become king, and I had no choice but to become a knight. Are you satisfied now?”

“Very.”

It was only then that Arhad smiled back happily as he pulled Ianna in for a tight hug. Ianna’s face glowed feverishly as she hugged him back. Arhad continued,

“I like this…….”

He savored the feeling of Ianna’s warmth in his arms.

He resented being so busy. He wanted to throw all his work aside and stay like this with Ianna forever, but the rest of the world wouldn’t let him. He wanted to spend his days reciting his feverish love for her forever, but now wasn’t the time to be floundering in love.

He had starved for Ianna’s love all his life, and he was still starving even now as she loved him. Ianna’s love was dense and deep, but the time that she had loved him was still far too short to satiate his hunger.

But neither Ianna nor Arhad were the kinds of people to be so blinded by love that they neglected to address the immediate danger before them. Rather, they were the types of people to deal with that danger as swiftly as possible in order to guarantee their eternal love.

‘All we have to do is eliminate the Bahamut bastards.’

Ianna stayed quietly in Arhad’s fiery embrace for a while before she kissed him on the cheek and gently pushed him away.

“I’m going to go and train. And I’ll come back much stronger than I am now.”

Simmering in Ianna’s red eyes as she repeated that she would grow stronger yet again were unidentifiable flames.

“…….”

Even Arhad was spooked by that fire —hotter than the scorching lightning. But Ianna’s gaze was focused on neither Taylon nor Arhad. She was looking even higher, to some unknown realm that only she could gaze upon.

Arhad found himself growing anxious yet again.

Taylon was no longer a problem.

Ianna had grown abnormally stronger after she had woken up from her long slumber. And she had grown terrifyingly stronger still after a round of training. Even Arhad could not tell just how far Ianna would go.

How far was Ianna planning to go?

He had used to think that their intended destination was the same, but now he couldn’t help but wonder if that had never been the case.

Arhad had wanted Ianna’s love in their past lives, and Ianna had wanted to best Arhad in military might.

Arhad still craved for Ianna’s love more so than anything else even now. He could not help but wonder whether Ianna still wanted the same thing as before too. Whether her first and foremost goal was still to grow stronger.

And that was what made him anxious.

They had ended up in a tie as an all-piercing sword verses an impenetrable shield when they had sparred after Ianna awoke so they could see how strong she was. But Ianna had completed her isolation training now, and Arhad could tell even without having to spar against her.

If he fought Ianna now…….

He would lose.

But Ianna was looking to higher heights even still, and she was eager to fly to somewhere so high that he might not be able to reach her.

He felt like a bird with the freedom of flight was sitting perched on his shoulder. He was anxious that Ianna might leave him behind to fly someone far away. Ianna was truly incredible as she grew stronger and stronger still, but Arhad was afraid. He no longer had the means to tie her down.

“I’ll take my leave now.”

Ianna broke free from Arhad’s arms and kissed him one last time on the forehead as she stood up.

Arhad took hold of her hand before he could stop himself.

Ianna saw the pitiful light in his eyes when she looked down at him.

“Do your best.”

Arhad instantly hid away his emotions and kissed Ianna’s fingers tenderly as if that had been his intention all along. Then, he slowly let her go.

Ianna smirked.

She had seen right through him.

Ianna knew what Arhad was feeling even if he didn’t tell her.

“You’re so stupid.”

Ianna yanked at Arhad’s arm just as he pulled away and let herself fall on top of his frame. She climbed up his legs, wrapped herself around his neck, and kissed him deeply.

Her eyes, which had been looking beyond the sky and outer space, beyond the Balance and the Truth, and beyond even the world itself, were suddenly filled to the brim with only the man she loved.

“If I’m a sword, then you’re my wielder. My true worth can only shine when I’m by your side.”

Ianna was racing toward uncharted lands, but in the end, she was a single human being who was crazily in love with one single man.

What use was there if she only grew stronger but didn’t have a reason?

She would only end up like Bahamut.

Ianna had obtained so much more in love, and it was because of love that she could aim for even further heights. Her love for Arhad was the foothold that lifted her up, and it was the reason why she wanted to grow stronger.

The reason why I’m trying to grow stronger, the reason why I’ve grown as strong as I am now —it’s all because I love you and wish for your happiness. You’re so stupid for growing anxious when you already know just how much I love you.

Ianna crushed Arhad and his stupidity beneath her and kissed him until they were both out of breath. She grabbed him by the back of his neck, spread open his lips, and devoured everything that he was.

Arhad slowly broke free from his anxieties as Ianna kissed him heatedly. He put his hands down and drank of Ianna’s ardor to his heart’s content.

“…….”

Ianna pulled their lips apart while rubbing their noses together once she had greedily taken her fill of him.

Her eyes were blazing with fire as she looked back at Arhad.

Ianna was also starving for love. She had simply been reigning it in, fearing that her mind might scatter otherwise, because she could not relax and dillydally around with him right now.

Her entire soul was standing at edge.

“That wasn’t enough, was it? It wasn’t enough for me.”

She was so resentful that it pulled her nerves taut, and her rage and bloodlust for a certain target was brought to a boil. She continued,

“So let’s push through so that we may bring about a complete conclusion.”

Ianna grabbed Arhad, whose breathing was ragged, tightly by the shoulders.

“I’m going to murder them,”

Ianna muttered bloodthirstily as she wondered where Taylon was right now.

~~*~~