Ch.1254What Is This Power…?

– Groooooo….

A burning land. Thick bloody mist. Gray mountain ranges and dark red rivers.

“…This again. It’s really getting tiresome.”

What awaited me as I fell asleep hoping for a brief rest was the now all-too-familiar hellscape and—

“Don’t you ever get tired of this?”

【 GRRRRR….】

The enthusiastic welcome of a detestable monster that only grew more irritating and unpleasant the more I saw it.

The evil god of hatred and predation, Vanirgand, a wolf-like figure boasting a massive body that distorted all sense of perspective.

This insufferable fiend, who had invited me to fight with high probability whenever I fell asleep, was baring its teeth at me today as it always had.

“Well, I suppose this will end someday. Though I have no idea when.”

I immediately summoned Durandal into my grasp and charged toward the beast.

“So let’s fight for now! Just like always!”

A battle that had become no different from daily routine. There was no reason to exchange words anymore. Just fight until one of us dies, then wake up when it’s over.

【 GRRAAAAAH—! 】

Vanirgand welcomed me with a roar that collapsed cliffs and ravines.

From its swinging claws, from the chains wrapped around its body, from the teeth in its wide-open maw, waves of force that tore and crushed space burst forth and swept in all directions.

That much was exactly as I had predicted. It wasn’t news that the beast had observed and learned to use my space-severing slash. I suppose I should say I’m used to it by now?

However, not everything was exactly the same as before.

—-

“Kyaaaaat!”

The most effective counter against space severance is to deploy one’s own space-severing ability.

To counter the whirling space-severing slash coming at me, I also channeled power into Durandal to unleash a space-severing strike.

– Crack.

No, I tried to unleash it.

But what shot forth from my sword in the next moment wasn’t the faint golden slash carrying the power of space severance.

“Huh…?”

With a sensation like molten tar being poured into my arm, a jet of pitch-black energy burst from around my forearm like flames or lightning.

The moment I turned my startled gaze to look at my forearm, the energy rapidly expanded, coiling around my arm and blade like a snake before extending outward as a black wave.

– Kwaaaa…!

A pitch-black slash emitting an energy eerily similar to Erzsebet’s arm of death.

It was something that billowed like silk yet was sharp as obsidian, blazing like flames yet cold as an ice sea—truly worthy of being called a wave of death.

– Passsssk!

The space-severing slashes that collided with the black wave shattered the surrounding space like glass, and Vanirgand, growling briefly as if intrigued, extended the chains wrapped around its body like a shield to block it.

Black lightning and metal fragments of unknown material collided, shattered, and scattered, until both sides dissipated into dust.

“What is this?”

I was dumbfounded by what I had just done.

Not because I couldn’t understand what had happened, but because although I understood, I couldn’t fathom why.

‘Wait, why did this come out?’

I had tried to unleash a space-severing slash, but what manifested was a wave of death. It was Bellona’s power, awakening and extending of its own accord without my intention.

– Kigigik…!

And it wasn’t just spontaneously emerging—it was forcibly suppressing Durandal’s resistance, which seemed to reject that power, placing tremendous strain on the blade.

The discomfort in my right arm had completely disappeared since I was invited here, so I thought I might be able to move normally here… but was that my misconception?

【 Death…? Krrr… You’ve swallowed something unpleasant…. 】

Perhaps recognizing the nature of this power as a similar kind, Vanirgand shook its head to shake off the chain fragments and growled in a way that was hard to tell whether it was laughter or a threat.

【 Do you know? If you fail to hold the reins of that power, you will be devoured by it instead. 】

Is it saying that if I fail to control it, I could die like Erzsebet—no, that I will definitely die?

How amusing. Both that it thinks I wouldn’t know this, and that such a warning is coming from none other than this creature.

“That’s rich. Are those words that should come from your mouth? That’s exactly what you’re trying to do.”

Someone might think you actually care about my body. When in reality, all you want is to subjugate my mind and take over this body.

【 …You are my prey. Did you think that I, Vanirgand, would tolerate another taking the livestock I’ve carefully fattened? 】

Vanirgand answered with a snort. It sounded somewhat like an excuse. Though the ravenous look in its eyes, like that of a fiend starved for over a thousand years, proved it was sincere, not an excuse.

Right, you’re saying even if I’m to be eaten, you should be the one to eat me? I appreciate the honesty. It would be even better if you’d just die soon. If you committed suicide with your tongue hanging out, I might even show you some love.

“The livestock would be you. You’re the one chained up, eating my leftovers.”

With that taunt, I swung my sword again to unleash another wave of death.

Whether this power would work against it. Whether this was happening only here or if the power of death would emerge in reality too. What would happen if I continued using it here.

Though I still couldn’t answer any of these questions, since I also didn’t know how to suppress it, my only remaining option was to try using this power for now.

—-

The unprecedented developments continued even after that.

Not just the anomaly in my arm, but Vanirgand’s fighting style had also changed somewhat from before.

– Kuuuung!

When it struck the river of blood with its forepaw, the surging water hardened into sharp, pointed forms like massive stakes or icebergs, piercing through the space where I stood.

“Tch…!”

I reflexively dodged and swung my sword to shatter them, but the fragments scattered into the air, turned back into blood, then crystallized like icicles and flew at me all at once.

‘This is…!’

An attack method that seemed very familiar. And that wasn’t all. What momentarily bewildered me was…

“Kyaaaaat!”

As I charged forward, shattering the blood spears with the rune of destruction, and swung my blade toward its forepaw—

Just as the blue-silver blade was about to cut through its hide, its entire forepaw momentarily transformed into a mist of blood, dispersing to evade my slash.

“What…!”

Immediately after, the returned forepaw struck my body, crushing my left arm that I had extended to block, and slammed me into the middle of the burning plain.

– Kwaaang!

With a thunderous sound, burning soil and rock erupted like a volcano, blood spikes poured down from the sky like heavy rain, and a black wave surged upward to erase them all.

I gritted my teeth and rose from the crater covered in fire and ash, glaring at the beast with my left arm hanging limply, all its joints crushed.

“…What was that? I’ve never seen that ability before.”

A technique I had never experienced even once despite having fought hundreds of times.

Not only the method of manifestation but even the form felt so alien that it seemed fundamentally different from any technique the beast had shown before.

【 You don’t recognize it even after seeing it? It’s the power of the offering you unconsciously gave me. That leech of a woman who called herself an ‘Empress.’ 】

Vanirgand answered, seemingly mocking me.

The power to control spilled blood and wield it as a weapon. The power to transform one’s body into blood mist to evade attacks.

Both were not abilities the beast originally possessed, but rather the powers of the Blood Empress it had devoured and was now utilizing.

It was an explanation that seemed plausible yet difficult to accept.

“Erzsebet…? How did you get her power… No, more importantly, she couldn’t use such abilities in the first place?”

First, the part about devouring Erzsebet’s divinity that I had offered was difficult to understand.

While I did kill Erzsebet and take her power, what I took wasn’t her divinity as a vampire but the divinity of death that was manifested using that power as a sacrifice.

Though it became poison because I couldn’t control it, even if I could control it, I would only be able to wield the power of death, not the vampire’s abilities.

How could it possibly steal and utilize the blood divinity that had been completely consumed and disappeared in manifesting the arm of death? It made no sense.

Above all, while manipulating blood as a weapon might be understandable, the ability to transform oneself into blood mist was something that even Erzsebet herself had never demonstrated when she was intact.

【 That’s because she had imprisoned the divinity of death within that body. 】

However, Vanirgand already had an answer prepared. A definitive answer that allowed it to flaunt its knowledge to me with arrogance.

【 The moment she transformed her body into the illusion of mist, the death trapped within would be released. Unless she intended to commit suicide, how could she dare attempt it? 】

The explanation was that this was an ability Erzsebet herself could naturally use, but because she was sealing the divinity of death, she couldn’t even attempt it.

Hearing that answer, I could at least accept that part.

Though I still couldn’t understand how it had obtained Erzsebet’s own power, the beast didn’t seem inclined to explain that far, so I had to leave that part as an unresolved question.