Chapter 72…
Akrasion’s battles are brutal.
No — any knight who has fought for years on the Derkan Plain would be the same.
Their enemy weren’t monsters that would stop when an arm or a leg was severed.
There were hundreds, even thousands of them.
Fighting those things with your life on the line could never be easy.
A single stroke to end a life, then a thrust to the vital point so the victim never rises again.
That was how Akrasion had fought until now.
Even if the target changed from monster to knight, nothing about that would differ.
Pfwhaaaak—!
“Kuhk!”
A stifled scream burst out along with a spray of blood.
But that lasted only a moment.
A person whose throat has been cut cannot speak.
With the blood pooling on the ground, a round head tumbled across the floor.
Milleon turned his face to the side with a cold, hardened expression.
Akrasion had been cutting down the pristine white-clad knights mechanically.
Except for the one who looked like the commander, thirty-one in total.
By contrast, Akrasion had only eleven, but they were the ones dominating the battlefield.
Milleon wiped the blood off his sword and then looked the other way.
‘Lord Dante.’
He had just watched Dante cut down a knight commander named Yuren.
The once-immaculate white armor had been shattered into dozens of pieces and fallen to the ground.
It was an overwhelmingly powerful blade.
He didn’t know exactly how skilled the opponent had been, but they were nowhere near the level needed to block Dante’s sword even once.
Still, Milleon watched Dante with a worried expression.
‘What on earth is happening?’
The battle had been planned.
They had been preparing for today, so that was not strange at all.
But Dante’s expression was unfamiliar.
Anger, anguish, regret, murderous intent.
All of those emotions were aimed at a single person.
Lucia.
Wasn’t he the sort who wouldn’t show his feelings outward for trivial reasons?
For Dante to show that kind of face meant something serious had definitely happened.
Unfortunately, Milleon could not tell what the reason was.
“Don’t just stare — go over there.”
At that moment, Zionhak approached, wiping the blood from his face.
“…He’ll be fine.”
“Fine, my foot.”
Clicking his tongue, he gave Milleon a light shove on the shoulder.
“Our captain looks about to cause an accident. Go stop him. If he really injures the marchioness in such a public place, there’ll be trouble.”
Zionhak’s words made sense.
Lucia was up to something and was stirring things up for the Aquites family.
But only a very few people knew that fact.
To ordinary observers, it would only look like Dante was persecuting his own mother.
And what if he took her life?
Dante’s honor would be buried deep in the ground.
As a child who killed his mother.
That must never happen.
“Understood.”
Milleon pretended he had no choice and took a step toward Dante.
Someone blocked his way, but that person was cleaved in half by the moonlit blade and collapsed.
Clack—.
Walking along the blood-stained path, he soon reached Dante’s immediate vicinity.
“The cleanup is nearly finished, Lord Dante.”
Dante, who had been about to swing Arpheon at Lucia, paused.
“How many remain?”
“Fewer than five.”
“Any wounded?”
“None.”
This was a conversation they had repeated in the duchy many times a day.
It felt strange to have it here.
“It’ll be over soon.”
“Sir Trisiel and Sir Yelodi are finishing up. It should be — it’s finished.”
While they exchanged quick reports, the battle ended.
Such an anticlimactic outcome.
Milleon had expected Lucia to be plotting something huge.
But it turned out the opposition was only a little better than Silver Obscura — some thirty-some knights.
He felt almost deflated.
“Clear the battlefield.”
“As you command.”
Milleon signaled to his comrades.
Zionhak, who’d been eavesdropping from a distance, nodded and ordered the men to clear the field.
“Lord Dante.”
“Speak.”
“You must stop here.”
The tip of the killing intent that could be unleashed at any moment was still aimed at Lucia.
“There are many watching.”
Zionhak urged Dante in a voice full of concern.
But Dante did not take his eyes off Lucia.
If anything, his gaze burned more fiercely.
It would not have been surprising if he had cut her throat right then and there.
If Dante truly swung his sword here, his honor would be irreparably ruined.
Whatever the underlying cause, outwardly it would look like filial impiety.
Dante hesitated for a moment.
He felt the sincerity of Milleon’s worry.
“…Bind Lucia. We’ll interrogate later. For now, detain her until my father arrives.”
Milleon let out a relieved breath and bowed his head.
“Understood.”
But at that moment—
“You want to bind me?”
Lucia asked.
Had she calmed herself while they spoke?
Compared to a moment ago, her face no longer showed bewilderment.
No — expression itself had vanished.
Nothing of emotion could be seen; she looked like a doll.
Milleon’s eyes narrowed.
‘This is not good.’
An undefined sense of dread kept pricking his instincts.
He’d only felt this before in the Murodia Mountains where Erebos once dwelled.
“Answer me. Do you truly intend to bind this mother of yours and throw her into prison?”
Her voice was calm.
Completely different from her earlier shocked, stammering self.
It was alien.
Without realizing it, Milleon clenched his sword tighter.
The other Akrasion knights did the same.
They had paused while efficiently organizing the corpses and the wounded and were now watching.
They all felt something strange.
“Now that I think about it, I haven’t even spoken yet.”
Only Dante — and he opened his mouth with a look as though he had been waiting.
“You have no right to be called my mother.”
“My, this is surprising.”
Lucia’s mood shifted immediately.
No — it was the atmosphere around her that altered.
Milleon felt as though his body weight had multiplied dozens of times in an instant.
The reason was clear.
Lucia Aquites.
The unknown aura seeping from her whole body.
“So you were hiding power after all.”
Unlike the stunned Milleon, Dante spoke as if it were nothing.
At the same time—
Kwaaaaang—!
The ground beneath Lucia erupted as if a volcano split the earth.
A crimson aura surged up like a volcanic plume and quickly engulfed the surroundings.
“All units, prepare for combat!”
Zionhak’s shout rang out.
Except for Sierra, who had gone in search of Patrick, the ten remaining Akrasion knights leveled their blades at Lucia.
It was an unfamiliar, alien energy.
But the rank, bloody smell it exuded was something no human could give off.
“When did you know?”
Her tone was impassive but oddly affectionate.
It was grotesque.
Everyone present felt that.
Lucia’s appearance was twisted in some way.
She felt closer to a monster than a living person.
“Let’s say since I was ten.”
Dante paused at her question, then answered.
On hearing that, Lucia nodded.
“No wonder I thought it strange when you suddenly insisted on meeting the Sword Lord. You were running away from me after all.”
That was accurate.
“So you came back only because you were confident you could handle me now?”
A sense of contempt clearly came through.
The dissonance between her face and voice amplified her strangeness.
“That’s not entirely wrong.”
He’d ended the monster waves, gained power incomparable to before, and Lucia’s behavior had been suspicious.
So he chose to return.
And beneath that choice lay the belief that he would no longer be victimized.
He didn’t expect she’d been hiding this much power, however.
“You were clever even as a child, but apparently I underestimated you.”
Lucia let out a small sigh.
“This wasn’t power meant to be shown like this.”
Her gaze fell upon Yuren, bleeding and fallen.
“Since the one who came to help ended up like that, there’s no choice. Aaron, are you there?”
Suddenly she spoke into empty air.
Then…
Someone tore open the space and appeared.
A middle-aged knight with dull blond hair and a sturdy build stepped out.
He glanced languidly between Lucia and Yuren, then spoke.
“The plan has gone awry.”
“It’s the order’s mistake. We specifically requested they send their finest.”
“I suppose they prepared in a hurry.”
Dante’s brows knitted.
A strange word had come up.
‘The Order?’
This was a clue.
A clear lead to uncover the real backers behind them.
“It seems the Aquites family’s plans must be completely withdrawn. We worked on this for a long time; it’s a pity.”
“We couldn’t help it.”
At the knight Aaron’s words, Lucia shrugged and then looked at Dante.
“First, we should purge this place. Before the Empire’s sword reaches it.”
“Understood.”
Clomp.
Aaron took a step toward Dante and slowly removed the glove from his hand.
A crimson inverted-cross emblem on the back of his hand caught Milleon’s eye.
“My name is Aaron Valderra. I am, in a lacking sense, the captain of Silver Obscura.”
No wonder.
The knight commander had not shown himself; he’d been hiding his body like that.
“Pardon my rudeness, but now everyone must die. You included, and Akrasion, and every living person in this manor.”
“Do you have the ability for that?”
When Dante asked, Aaron answered with a languid smile.
“If I did not, I wouldn’t have revealed myself in the first place. I am not a coward.”
Wooooooommm—.
The emblem on the back of his hand began to writhe.
Fwoooom!
An alien, blood-red magic burst forth.
“Let’s see if you can survive. If you can, that is.”
The red night began.
