Ch.122The Black Mage and the Dark Knight (10)

The world rushes by in a blur. Llewellyn dives in with successive accelerations, attacking continuously.

A swiftly swung elbow. The elbow aimed at Valterok’s head suddenly stops mid-air.

Anti-magic force and mana repulsion. Interference through them. Llewellyn’s accelerated cognition recognizes this, and his body immediately rotates.

CLANG!

“Hmm!”

What he did was simple. He pushed against the blocked space with his trapped elbow, then used the resulting force to spin and deliver a roundhouse kick.

It was a technique any second-rate martial artist could perform, but the situation was different.

Against Valterok, most wouldn’t even attempt such a move.

Truly a courage comparable to the Dragon King or the little-known Elven Abbot. Valterok laughed heartily as he pulled back his blocking arm.

In his vastly accelerated perception, Llewellyn exhaled roughly, and both he and Valterok leaped toward each other simultaneously.

To ordinary people, it all looked like two pieces of black steel chaotically grinding against each other.

Valterok deflects Llewellyn’s extended leg with his sword hilt and brings his blade down.

As Llewellyn twists his body to avoid it, the anti-magic force touching the ground repels against mana, piercing through Llewellyn’s body like thorns.

Intestines spill from his torn abdomen, and his pierced elbow bends and falls away.

To make matters worse, Valterok grabs the spilling intestines.

A sharp intake of breath. A wide rotation of the body. Anti-magic force explosively erupts behind Llewellyn’s body.

He accelerates like a flail. The ground approaches faster than Llewellyn’s intestines can tear free.

Llewellyn grits his teeth and wraps blood magic around both arms to brace for impact.

CRASH!

In the moment of collision, his consciousness blurs. The temporary protection granted under the name of “temporary health” disappears from the continuous attacks, and even the repeated mourning fades away.

But his robust body quickly regains consciousness. A time shorter than even a moment. Yet for a being at the pinnacle of Black Knighthood, it’s a sufficient opening.

Just as Llewellyn crosses his arms to concentrate blood magic.

SWISH!

With a long whistling sound, a black arrow flies in and pierces through Llewellyn.

A simple technique—concentrating anti-magic force at a single point to achieve transcendent acceleration, then thrusting with a demon lance.

Though different from the horizontal acceleration of the lance charge that symbolizes the Black Knight Order, its power was…

Cough! Blood flows from Llewellyn’s mouth as his spine is pierced and shattered by the demon lance.

While Llewellyn cannot move with his spine in pieces, Valterok raises high the demon lance that has impaled him.

Without breaking his acceleration, Valterok twists his waist powerfully and drives Llewellyn into the ground.

Consciousness fades, the world spins, and the stars slowly forming in the sky blur like a halo around the moon.

Like an angel’s aureole that comes at the moment of death. He’s dying.

Llewellyn grits his teeth and consciously regenerates his spine. During regeneration, his spine firmly grips the demon lance.

When Valterok flinches at that strange sensation…

[Explosive Leap]

Llewellyn’s legs kick off the ground.

With a boom, Valterok soars upward. The tremendous leaping force lifts both Valterok’s heavy weight and Llewellyn simultaneously.

The leap force pierces through Llewellyn’s spine again, shredding his entire internal organs as he’s impaled to the base of the demon lance, but…

Both knew this wouldn’t be enough to kill him.

Llewellyn spits blood from his mouth and unfolds his fist.

He takes a palm strike. A simple attack of extending his palm.

But the Dragon Slayer technique turns even that into a slashing attack.

SLASH! CLANG!

He aims for the face. Not the demon lance that impaled him or the wrist holding it, but a vital point.

At this unexpected choice, Valterok smiles clearly despite his bewilderment.

Somehow the demon lance has left his hand. His head shakes. Though he has no brain to suffer concussion, his posture inevitably collapses.

It’s a palm strike that poured all leaping force from point-blank range. Naturally, this would happen. As Valterok staggers and unwittingly tilts, Llewellyn’s leg kicks his face, creating distance.

The distance opens. Three steps at most. There’s no opening. But the reorganization is complete. Valterok sees Llewellyn now holding his demon lance.

[Mage Slayer]

[“May all black mages die, and may I die as well.”

-The first Anti-Magic School’s Reconstruction Dean.

This demon lance was created by a mage of the first Anti-Magic School—]

…

……

………

Things rise chaotically in the corner of Llewellyn’s vision, but he ignores them and grips the demon lance with both hands.

He doesn’t know how to use it properly. Even with the engraved knowledge, he doesn’t know how to use a demon lance, especially on the ground without words.

However, Llewellyn was confident he could handle this demon lance better than a Black Knight.

Their gazes cross. Clear hostility in their entangled eyes. The moment Valterok accelerates by tilting his body using sky walking…

With a crunch, Llewellyn vanishes from sight.

In the wide detection range of anti-magic force, he wasn’t sensed due to the mixed anti-magic forces until he rushes in from the left side that had been ignored.

The demon lance. A familiar technique.

It’s a technique used by Blood Knights, the knights of vampires. But he missed it because it didn’t utilize blood magic. Valterok instantly raised his arm to block.

CLANG!

Cracks form in the armor. Tremendous dragon strength. Power that could crush bones, pulverize flesh, and shatter armor.

But he caught it. Valterok deflects the demon lance along the surface of his armor and grabs it. Reclaimed. The moment he thinks this…

Llewellyn disappears again.

‘How—’

CRASH!

In that moment of thought, another attack comes from behind. A precise and powerful elbow strike aimed at his spine.

Valterok inhales and forms an anti-magic wall to receive the blow, then swings his longsword widely.

SLASH!

As Llewellyn’s body flies away, Valterok sees his gray eyes gleaming toward him and realizes.

He already knew Llewellyn had mixed the leap he was using with Blood Knight techniques.

That’s why his presence became unreadable.

But he didn’t know Llewellyn could use it with each leg separately, using it twice. Essentially, he had to block attacks from two unpredictable directions.

The growth is pleasing. Excellent. Valterok pursues Llewellyn with the thought of raising his non-existent mouth corners.

The thrusting demon lance, at the moment of thrust, explodes with anti-magic force from the handle end, creating additional acceleration, direction change, and rotation.

A powerful strike that killed every black mage encountered on the way. An attack that pierced and killed humans enhanced by magical means in a single blow.

But it doesn’t connect. Llewellyn avoids the upward thrusting spear by moving diagonally. Two fists dive inward.

CLANG!

He swings his longsword against those fists. Blocking one fist with the swung sword, he deflects the following left fist with a blade formed from anti-magic force.

Then he dives in and thrusts his head forward. With a cracking sound, both Llewellyn and Valterok’s heads tilt backward.

Without time to recover from the ringing skull, Llewellyn’s hand grabs Valterok’s head.

‘Surely not.’

CRASH!

It was exactly that. Who would have thought someone would headbutt armor, especially a Black Knight’s armor.

As Valterok staggers back, Llewellyn charges again. Like an arrow, Valterok holds his weapons diagonally and takes his stance.

And so, sounds like a swarm of bees filled the ruined Servan.

What they do is simple. Llewellyn’s attacks mix punches, elbows, knees, kicks, headbutts, knife hands, and fingers with all manner of techniques.

Valterok deflects them with his armor, blocks with his demon lance, parries with his longsword, and attacks back with the hilt, tip, anti-magic force, and blade.

They interlock. Each collision makes the heated blood magic and black blade appear red, and the dented armor that couldn’t deflect the blows makes booming sounds.

Both accelerate simultaneously as if they had been waiting.

Retreat with anti-magic force, then charge. Charging with the demon lance tucked at the side.

Llewellyn uses his monstrous strength to roll his foot backward, then executes an Explosive Leap with both legs simultaneously.

What he thrusts is one of the hardest parts of the human body—the elbow.

The elbow wrapped in layers of blood magic collides with the demon lance.

—!

A thunderous sound erupted.

A sound louder and more massive than the bell of the clock tower that once stood in Servan. From its center, the two figures were thrown in opposite directions.

Valterok crashed into the columbarium where civilians were, destroying it.

Llewellyn was driven into what was once an office, demolishing it.

While Valterok rose and dusted off his armor, telling the retreating civilians who feared him, “Not yet.”

Llewellyn breathed heavily and desperately steadied his creaking body to stand up.

Perhaps because the temporary health had been completely drained in the series of collisions, cutting off the mourning, even standing up was not easy.

His breathing was rough, and his heart imbued with divinity beat even more violently.

Perhaps because he was sending divinity throughout his body to accelerate regeneration and consciously reinforcing himself.

His heart, as if revealing it had been overworked, had weakened its beating.

Llewellyn instinctively knew. Even if this heart stopped, he wouldn’t die, but the moment it stopped, it would be difficult to exert his strength.

He couldn’t use weapons either. The mana in the Star Blade couldn’t overcome anti-magic force, and the Screamer was too heavy a weapon to use against such a being, leaving large openings.

He needed another weapon, another means. At this rate, only defeat awaited.

As he gasped for breath, clearing through the debris and about to pass through the broken door of the office, it happened.

[You’ve come.]

A familiar voice stopped Llewellyn in his tracks.

He unconsciously turned his head to look back. It was a voice he had heard before, one he thought he would never hear again.

[I believed you would come, but I didn’t know when. All I could hope for was that you would arrive in time.]

A polite voice with an even more polite manner.

A voice so benevolent it was hard to believe when he heard about the betrayal.

Magistrate Servan.

His voice was being heard.

[First of all, if you’re hearing this, it means I’m dead.]

Llewellyn’s body stiffened.

[I don’t intend to blame you. I was prepared for this since coming to the New Continent. But I can’t say I have no regrets.]

His eyes were now fixed on something placed on the office desk.

It was an axe, wrapped in red-green wind and humming.

A small hand axe. Actually, oddly enough to be called a hand axe, it had only a handle with no axe blade.

But Llewellyn knew it was a hand axe the moment he saw it.

[But I don’t have much time left. So, I’ll keep my regrets to myself. Just, let me say one thing.]

Llewellyn walked to the office desk and reached for the hand axe placed on it.

[Hero of Servan, none of us blame you.]

A white lie.

Clear enough for even Llewellyn, with his limited social experience, to recognize.

[This is a modest gift from Servan. May fortune follow you on the difficult path ahead.]

But even clearer was the goodwill. Something that remained even after death and disappearance.

Despite never having seen his dying moments.

[Mourning]

[Remaining Duration: 60 seconds]

[Temporary Health: 10]

As if seeing his final moments.

Llewellyn moved his halted hand again and grasped the hand axe.

[North Wind]

[“My child, I pity you.”

-???, to ‘Father’.]

[This hand axe is not actually a hand axe. With only the handle remaining, it is a divine artifact that operates on a new power, neither mana nor anti-magic force.

When gods still existed in this land, a god left this behind when departing.

This axe forms a blade of red wind the moment it is held in hand.]

[This weapon cannot be destroyed.

It adds 3 points to hit rolls and damage rolls, and returns to the wearer when thrown.

When the bearer of this weapon is attacked, once every 6 seconds, it halves the damage and enables a counterattack.]

Then the wind blossomed.

Llewellyn stepped outside with the hand axe in his grip.

Because he still had work to do.