Chapter 108
Luna ran against the flow of the road, where each building was burning pitch black.
The deeper she went into the docks, the thicker the dark gray smoke became, and towering flames surged upward as if they would pierce the sky.
Because the alarm bells had rung several times, there was not a trace of human presence.
“Where is that child? It should be around here…”
Holding back a cough, Luna hurriedly scanned her surroundings.
If His Highness discovered that she had broken their promise, it would be a problem. She needed to find the child quickly and return to the temple.
Fortunately, the child was standing roughly where she faintly remembered. However, the flames had grown fierce, turning the surroundings into a sea of fire.
Crack!
At that moment—
One of the buildings near the child exposed its frame and finally collapsed, unable to endure any longer.
“Watch out!”
The child, drawn by the voice calling out to them beneath the massive chunk of wood falling from above, turned their head.
The moment Luna met those innocent violet eyes, her pupils dilated.
Instinctively, she wrapped mana around herself and swiftly reached out toward the child.
Thud!!
“Aaah!”
It was a hair’s breadth away.
The blazing chunk of wood slammed into the ground with a dull crash.
The child flailed their arms and legs, overwhelmed by the unbelievable experience of floating in midair thanks to wind magic.
“Are you okay?”
“H-Hic! I’m okay! Please put me down!”
When Luna set them down, the child fidgeted, rubbing their hands against their shabby gray clothes.
“Thank you for saving me.”
“Child, where are your parents? Didn’t you escape together?”
“My parents… I don’t have any. But my sister—ah! My sister!”
The child answered shyly, then suddenly lifted their head as if realizing something important.
The moment they met Luna’s gaze with wide eyes, they dashed like an arrow toward a cliff, light brown hair fluttering behind them.
“W-Wait! It’s dangerous to run off alone like that!”
Despite barely reaching her thighs in height, the child was astonishingly quick.
Before she knew it, Luna was swept along, chasing after them.
“Ah, what should I do?!”
With every step, she was moving farther away from the temple.
Khalid’s face flashed through her mind, and she bit her lip in frustration at this unexpected predicament. Still, she couldn’t bring herself to return alone.
“Ugh, I don’t care anymore. Hey, wait! Let’s go together!”
Meanwhile, Khalid was searching for a gigantic magical beast near the cliff where his statue stood.
The beast was advancing toward him, turning the entire coastline into a sea of fire as it went.
Its appearance resembled a black dragon, but since it could not fly, it was closer to a bipedal lizard.
“It might be even less than that.”
Its massive body only knew how to destroy whatever it saw. It was neither agile nor intelligent.
In short, it was a creature inferior even to the crows of the snowy mountains.
Still, it possessed all the grotesque traits of a magical beast: sharp claws, long protruding fangs like buckteeth, and a maw that occasionally spewed fire, none of which could be ignored.
With most of the holy knights and guards dispatched to put out fires, allowing the flames to spread further would be troublesome.
“The best method would be to take its head off in one strike…”
Clicking his tongue as he looked at the beast’s neck, which was as thick as a house, Khalid frowned.
He could unleash that much sword aura, but doing so here would likely create new ocean currents or bring about a tidal wave as a backlash.
“Grrrooo—”
At that moment, the beast roared and turned around.
It seemed as though it had fulfilled its role and was now trying to return beneath the water.
“Can’t be helped. I’ll borrow one.”
“Y-Yes!”
Khalid seized the spear a holy knight was holding, wrapped it in a Sword Master’s aura, and hurled it at the beast with all his might.
“Graaaargh!”
The power unleashed by a Sword Master was overwhelming.
The spear shaft spun like a raging current and pierced straight into the thick back of the beast’s neck.
Caught off guard, the beast screamed in pain and thrashed its torso and tail violently.
Still, a single spear merely inflicted the irritation of having a thorn embedded in it.
The beast twisted its body and charged heavily toward the cliff from which the spear had been thrown.
Its reptilian red eyes rolled incessantly as it searched for the chewable creature that had dared stab it.
The inside of its horrifying maw began to glow ominously, as if it were about to spew a massive amount of fire once more.
Khalid drew his sword from its scabbard.
As everything unfolded according to plan, he curved his lips in satisfaction and coldly looked down at the beast, which had pressed itself right up to the base of the cliff with its mouth wide open.
Inside its throat was filled with violet fireballs, as if it would erupt with molten lava.
“Not a chance.”
Khalid swung his icy blade with practiced ease.
With a single motion, the massive stone base beneath the statue—nearly as large as a lighthouse—was sliced diagonally and began to tilt.
Without hesitation, Khalid kicked the absurd monument modeled after himself with force.
He had already adjusted the angle so that it would fall straight into the beast’s gaping maw.
Losing its balance, the statue crashed down with a thunderous roar and lodged itself deep into the beast’s throat.
The beast, its airway completely blocked, emitted a tortured groan as it gaped helplessly.
“Grrrk—!!”
Soon, the fireballs embedded inside its body began to combust and explode aimlessly.
The beast writhed in indescribable agony, clenching its jaws as it tried to crush the statue.
Khalid did not miss that opening.
Without hesitation, he leaped toward the beast’s nape, stepping on the spear embedded there.
Using the spear shaft as a pivot, he drove his sword in and cleaved through its neck with force, as though drawing a crack across its entire throat.
The thick neck split open, exposing its interior as black blood gushed out in torrents.
Even this failed to satisfy him, and he frowned.
It was taking too long. To reduce this gigantic beast to ashes, he would likely need to repeat this process several more times.
“Grrrraaa—!”
Sensing death, the beast crushed the statue with a mad bite and let out a deafening howl.
In an instant, the pain that had felt like a thorn became a threat to its very life.
As if realizing it stood at the crossroads of death, the beast’s wing joints twitched repeatedly before it suddenly unfurled enormous bat-like wings.
The wings were so large that one wondered how they had been hidden at all. With a single flap, a powerful gust swept away all the gray smoke in the area.
Khalid’s brow furrowed even deeper. The thought of this wretch flying away made irritation surge within him.
He needed to finish this quickly and return to his wife, yet time kept slipping away.
Unaware that the reaper was still clinging to the back of its neck, the dull beast swallowed its pain and lifted itself into the sky.
And then—
As if that weren’t absurd enough, waste-like byproducts began falling from the deformed creature’s body, gradually gathering together and transforming into the same kind of primitive magical beasts they often faced.
“This is driving me insane.”
It truly was maddening. If things continued this way, nothing would be accomplished.
Khalid sheathed his sword once more, crouched like a spring, and took a draw stance.
Flash!
As he steadied his breathing, a blue glint flickered in his eyes. When he unsheathed his sword at lightning speed, a flash of sword aura tore through the sky.
One of the beast’s wings, which had been preparing to flap again, fell uselessly to the ground.
“Kraaagh—!”
Amid the beast’s spine-chilling convulsions, Khalid bared his white teeth.
Though the regenerating beast would soon grow a new wing, he had bought himself some time.
Since it was already airborne, cutting off its head right here might not be such a bad idea.
At that moment—
“Kyaaaah!!”
What pierced his ears was Luna’s scream, mixed in with the beast’s roar.
Beneath the massive wing he had severed, he clearly heard her voice.
“Luna?”
Khalid’s heart sank as he looked down at the ground covered by the fallen wing.
It wasn’t too late yet. If he shattered the falling wing into pieces—
But he could barely sense her presence.
If she so much as took a single step and got caught up in it—
“Damn it!”
Without another thought, Khalid tried to leap down toward where the sound had come from.
And then—
Flaaash—
A brilliant white pillar of light suddenly shot up into the sky, striking his vision. It was unmistakably the light of purification.
“Luna!!”
“Y-Your Highness?”
Khalid’s gaze plunged beneath the pillar of light that pierced straight through the beast’s wing. There, Luna was holding a child tightly in her arms, releasing purifying mana.
At the brink of being crushed to death, she had pierced straight through the thick hide of the beast.
Khalid relaxed for just a moment—then narrowed his eyes at the child trembling as they buried their face against Luna’s chest.
The boy, with sandy-brown hair and freckles scattered across his face, had sharp amethyst-colored eyes that reminded him strongly of someone.
A chill ran down his spine.
“That insane bastard—Luna! Get away from him!!”
The child, who had been gazing innocently up at the sky, turned toward Khalid and broke into a wide grin.
