Chapter 145. The Bloody Banquet (3)
“I’m telling you, it’s there.”
“It’s not.”
“Ah, I’m telling you, it’s there.”
“I’m telling you, it’s not.”
There were two men bickering on the wall.
“Ah, when a mercenary loses his touch, he loses his life.”
“I quit being a mercenary a long time ago, man.”
A soldier next to Wiseman was beating his chest in frustration.
“Then let’s just shoot one. I’m telling you there’s a deer in front of us.”
“...Go ahead. If there isn’t, I’ll deal with you by military law.”
On a night where even the moon was covered by clouds, casting only a faint light.
Two archers from the former Thornbush Mercenary Corps were arguing whether there was a deer in front of them or not.
“Since when have you been a soldier to talk about military law?”
“I’m already in a bad mood for being pushed to wall duty, you picked the wrong day.”
The soldier, ignoring Wiseman who was warning him while chewing on jerky, nocked an arrow towards the darkness.
“They’re partying over there too, so if I catch a deer, let’s have a drink too.”
Before Wiseman could even agree, the soldier shot the arrow.
THWACK-.
The arrow flew through the darkness and stopped with a heavy impact sound.
“See! There’s something! I was right, wasn’t I?”
The sound, as if piercing leather, was clear proof that there was something in the darkness.
Since there was no gate or any entrance, it couldn't be a person.
“Alright, you were right.”
Wiseman nodded with a sour expression.
“But something’s strange.”
“What excuse are you trying to make now?”
Wiseman said to his subordinate who was smiling slyly and itching to go down and retrieve the deer.
“But why isn’t the deer screaming?”
“...Huh?”
Sensing something was wrong, the two men quickly peeked their heads over the wall.
Just then, the moon, which had been hidden by clouds, found its light and shone outside Norington’s walls.
The arrow fletching with the Cadmus crest was shining in the blue moonlight.
And it was slowly rising.
“...Captain.”
The things that had been hiding in the bushes and slowly crawling up raised their heads one by one in the moonlight and slowly stood up.
They raised their heads and were staring at Wiseman and the soldier with void eyes.
Wiseman felt a shiver run down his spine as he saw the grotesque sight.
“Light it!”
Wiseman, grasping the situation, quickly blew the whistle he was holding with all his might.
“This is crazy!”
The soldier who had just shot the arrow, following Wiseman’s order, lit an arrow that was prepared with a torch from the brazier and shot it towards the inside of the wall.
The arrow, wrapped in oil-soaked cloth, hit the prepared firewood as if it were being sucked in.
SCREEECH-!
Along with the sharp whistle sound, the warning beacon was lit.
“Attack! Attack!”
Wiseman’s desperate shout echoed far from the quiet walls of Norington.
In response to that sound, things were crawling up the walls of Norington under the pale moonlight.
***
“I have decided to acknowledge and accept my limits. And to rely on it.”
Blanc saw the void slowly spreading in Count Lacie’s eyes.
‘How was he hiding it?’
It was the Void, but it was clearly different from the Void of the previous life.
If the Void of the previous life was the Void in human form.
“So it became easier. I was ashamed of myself for struggling with things like being a mere count or the hegemon of the south.”
What was in front of Blanc now was a human in the form of the Void.
“Simon-!”
Blanc quickly spread the night sky he was wearing wide.
The cloak, embroidered with stars, stretched out endlessly and enveloped Count Lacie.
Countless stars shone in the illusion, enveloping the Void that was trying to extend into reality.
“My lord!”
There was a knight running with two swords in response to his master’s command.
In one hand, the sword of Aselheit, and in the other, the sword given by his master.
The blind knight rushed out of the darkness and jumped into the night sky without a moment’s hesitation.
“Sir Hansen-!”
“Everyone, evacuate...!”
Knight Commander Hansen, grasping the situation, quickly signaled to Rakshar and tried to evacuate the surrounding lords.
But it was a little too late.
“Kuaaargh-!”
Unfortunately, a lord who was near Count Lacie was pierced by a sword.
“Why... why...?”
Count Lacie smiled and said to the dying lord, who was staring wide-eyed in disbelief.
“I’m jealous. Because you only play with him and not me.”
His smile was pure.
It was a decision and action born from pure human desire, free from the status of a count and the position of the head of the Southern Union.
In an instant, the knights around Count Lacie surrounded the corpse of the fallen lord.
“I wonder what choice you will make when you reach your limit.”
Blanc, who received Aselheit’s sword from Simon, glared at the Void with his blue eyes shining.
“Is it the Spirit Tree you cherished so much, or the Norington you built up with bloodshed?”
Count Lacie’s smile deepened.
“Or will you be unable to protect either?”
There were red lights penetrating Blanc’s night sky.
What was initially one was multiplying endlessly.
“My lord!”
The warning beacons signaling the enemy’s attack were spreading quickly, dyeing the windows of the banquet hall red.
“Will you admit it when you reach your limit? Blanc Cadmus, Lord of Norington, Seeker of the Blue Star, the newly rising hero of the south.”
Finally, the darkness of the Void completely swallowed Count Lacie’s two eyes.
“That you, who are better than me, are no different in the end-!”
BOOM--!
As Count Lacie let out a void shout and drew his sword, the door blocking the banquet hall simultaneously exploded.
The people who were unfortunately nearby were sent flying like paper from the impact, and those who were far away covered their ears and screamed.
“Wha, what are those things?”
Count Lacie’s knights were entering through the thick dust.
Their swords were already flowing with the blood of Norington.
“Ughhhh...”
With their appearance, something was rising.
The lord who had just fallen was slowly getting up, his void eyes shining.
‘Damn it-!’
Adolf, seeing the pitch-black eyes of the dying lord and Count Lacie’s knights, was horrified and drew his sword.
“Show me! What will you, the so-called hero, do!”
Against the mad, void shout of Count Lacie, the only regressor in this world drew his sword.
Blanc, with one eye closed and biting his lip hard, shouted towards the Void from within the night sky.
“My World will burn white!”
A single streak of light shining in the ever-spreading Void stretched out towards Count Lacie.
***
KABOOM-!
While Blanc and his knights were holding back Count Lacie, Hansen guided the distinguished guests through the door on the opposite side.
“La, Lady Ciella!”
Rakshar kept Ciella and Emilia by his side amidst the confused crowd and unleashed his werewolf’s sharp senses without reserve.
BOOM- KABOOM-!
People were crossing the dark corridor, filled with fear like a flock of frightened sheep.
From behind, the brutal sounds of Blanc’s knights clashing with the void beings echoed.
“...”
However, amidst the clamorous sounds, Rakshar heard something dissonant.
It sounded like a snake slithering up something.
Rakshar turned back, drew his claws, and glared into the dark corridor.
As the sound got closer, Rakshar’s expression grew more fierce.
“What the-! What are those things!”
“Strange things are following us!”
Soon, everyone here could see what Rakshar had felt.
The distinguished guests were horrified as they saw the things following them.
Among them were lords who had wandered the battlefields and knights who had pursued honor with a sword, but no one could help but be horrified by the current situation.
“They’re not human!”
Climbing the walls, scaling the windows, sticking to the ceiling.
There were dark knights approaching, writhing strangely like snakes.
The things that were slithering out of the darkness, making it their home, flicked their tongues and looked at them with void eyes.
“...!”
They were smiling, their pitch-black mouths wide open.
“This way!”
Hansen tried to maintain his composure as much as possible, but.
“Sir Hansen! They’re in front too!”
He could not help but be flustered at Jerome’s scream-like report.
A situation of being trapped between a rock and a hard place.
It was a situation where even in the mind of a seasoned, even wily knight, he could only imagine the worst.
“Damn it.”
Ulvent put on the brass helmet he always carried and glared at the things in front.
His determined gaze shone from within the deeply worn helmet.
“All units, form up!”
The soldiers guarding the distinguished guests, following Ulvent’s command, put their shoulders together and instantly formed a formation.
A situation where Ulvent and the soldiers were at the back, and Hansen and the knights were confronting them at the front.
However, it was a situation where they had to move one way or another.
Because even now, things that were flicking their tongues were crawling out of the darkness.
“...We’ll break through.”
Following Hansen’s command, Rakshar, Jerome, and Sten raised their respective weapons.
As a hazy aura rose from their weapons, a faint light began to appear in the dark corridor.
However, the light they produced seemed too weak to dispel the surrounding darkness.
The things that were flicking their tongues, watching the scene, simply smirked as if to mock them.
“...All hands.”
“We want Cadmus.”
In a touch-and-go situation, one of the beings, human but not human, spoke.
“...What?”
One of the things that had been stuck to the ceiling dropped down and slithered like a snake.
It fell with a squelching sound like a lump of sticky mud and rose from the darkness.
“Ciella Cadmus. If you hand her over, we will let the others here live.”
His pitch-black, flicking tongue was split in two.
“Our goal is the extermination of the Cadmus family. So if you just hand her over...”
“What a load of crap.”
SHATTER-.
Before the void being could finish its words, something came flying.
Something that fell at the void being’s feet with a brilliant shattering sound.
“This is a sign of rejection...”
“Just get lost and die! You bastards!”
KABOOOM--!
There was a huge explosion that shook the corridor.
It was an explosion so intense that it planted the emotion of bewilderment, even for a moment, in the void beings who had nothing in their pitch-black eyes.
When the heat that seemed to burn everything and the hazy dust cleared, all that was in front of the knights was a corridor filled with heat and.
“Hwaaaah...”
“Cough cough.”
The corpses of the void beings that had turned into charcoal.
“Who the hell are you to demand my sister-!”
There was a man taking out a potion while flapping his robe.
“You insolent bastards-!”
Something as red as his reddish-brown hair was dwelling in Franz’s eyes.
Franz turned his body and threw a potion at the things that were chasing them.
“...!”
Ulvent, seeing the potion bottle flying over his head towards the dark beings, instinctively shouted.
“Everyone, raise shields!”
KABOOOM-!
With a huge explosion, Ulvent felt the shield he was holding become hot.
And that with that formidable heat, the things beyond would not be safe.
While everyone was staggering, there was one man standing tall amidst the sound, reverberation, and heat of the explosion.
In his previous life, Franz had not been recognized for a long time and only gained the title of Explosion Mage upon joining the Liberation Front, but this life was different.
“Try flicking your tongues again, you bastards-!”
A man spewing anger towards the darkness with a small potion bottle held between his fingers.
In this life, Franz was the Explosion Mage from this moment on.
***
KABOOOM-!
Thanks to Franz’s valiant efforts, a path was cleared, but the Void that Count Lacie had spread was already eating away at the Cadmus mansion.
Screams and the smell of blood filled the air everywhere, and Hansen instinctively realized that all escape routes were already blocked.
“Guide the people to my workshop.”
Hearing Ciella’s words, Hansen thought that was the only way now.
“Understood, Lady Ciella.”
Some nobles were flustered as Hansen led them upstairs instead of down to the first floor, but it couldn't be helped.
They too knew well that they could not go down to the death-filled first floor now.
Upon reaching the third-floor corridor where her workshop was, Ciella quickly bit her thumb.
“My lady...”
A red liquid began to form at the tip of Ciella’s white finger.
“Where was it?”
Ciella, guided by Emilia, stood before a certain tile in the third-floor corridor.
That tile was no different from the surrounding ones, but.
“It’s here, my lady.”
The moment Ciella smeared her blood on it, it revealed its true form.
RUUUMBLE---.
As the tile that absorbed Ciella’s blood glowed red, a huge bulkhead began to descend, separating the corridor.
“Ooh...”
The stone wall, which looked thick and strong just by looking at it, was a bulkhead closing door commissioned by Ciella and made by the dwarves.
“Everyone, come inside!”
Ciella continued to move, smearing her blood on the hidden devices.
“Quickly!”
RUUUMBLE---.
A whispering sound began to be heard from the darkness.
Ciella slowly stepped back, not taking her eyes off the descending bulkhead.
“In the end, I have to use this.”
Ciella knew well the tragedy of Cadmus.
She did not want such a tragedy to happen in this mansion again.
“Kiaaaak--!”
THUD-!
The bulkhead succeeded in blocking the corridor at the last second, making a heavy sound.
Another Cadmus, who knew how to look back at the past and prepare for the future, had finally succeeded in blocking the darkness as she intended.
BANG-! BANG-! BANG-!
However, the sounds made by the terrible things could still be heard from beyond the thick bulkhead.
Ciella looked down at her thumb, which was still bleeding.
“Follow me, everyone.”
There was still one more place where she had to put her blood.