Ch.161The Day Is Approaching. (1)

Olivia lifted the unconscious Kiel with levitation magic. After removing the magical power that had been digging into his body and personally feeding him a potion, he would regain consciousness in a few hours.

‘…By the way.’

Olivia looked around with a troubled expression. The area was filled with monster corpses. The fact that high-level monsters like Triside had already appeared meant that similar phenomena might be occurring throughout the continent.

‘And yet it’s still quiet, which means…’

Someone must be gathering monsters in secret.

Crack!

All the corpses in the cave froze instantly. When Olivia clenched her fist tightly, the frozen corpses shattered into pieces, turning into puddles of blood. The cave interior, which had been filled with blood and entrails until just moments ago, transformed into a proper “cave” in an instant.

“…Where did she go now?”

Olivia emerged above ground and looked around. The Serial Murderer, who should have been waiting inside the barrier, was nowhere to be seen.

Thud!

A presence was felt from behind. The Serial Murderer’s scythe, having landed from the sky, was covered in dark red blood. Olivia could instinctively tell that it wasn’t human blood.

“Olivia! You’re here!”

“Were you hunting monsters?”

“I was bored, so I caught a few while waiting. But who’s that…?”

“Sword Master.”

The Serial Murderer’s expression became strange. No matter how ignorant she might be about worldly matters, she at least knew who the Sword Master was.

Kiel Rothschild.

“Do you… know him?”

A strange feeling.

The Serial Murderer unconsciously frowned. This was different from before. Back then, her heart had felt ticklish and stuffy, but not as unpleasant as now.

Looking at the Sword Master gave her that unpleasant feeling. She didn’t like the fact that he was connected to Olivia’s magical power.

“Yes, we know each other.”

“Since when?”

“About…”

Olivia, who was about to answer that it had been about six years, closed her mouth and looked down at the Serial Murderer.

“I don’t remember clearly. What’s certain is that I’ve known you longer than Kiel.”

“…Really?”

“You’ve been around much longer.”

“…Heh.”

It wasn’t difficult to predict how the Serial Murderer felt as the corners of her mouth twitched uncontrollably.

Olivia, confident that she had hit the mark, asked the Serial Murderer who couldn’t hold back her smile:

“Can you guide me to where you were hunting monsters?”

“Y-Yes! Follow me! It’s over there!”

Olivia nodded casually and moved toward the direction of the “passage.” There, a centipede as large as a mountain was rolling on the ground with its head severed. It was the Serial Murderer’s work.

Though not as potent as the cave where Kiel had been staying, the poison emanating from this centipede monster was still formidable.

Olivia clicked her tongue as she touched the carapace of the centipede monster, Antinus.

‘…Even Antinus.’

This confirmed it. There was at most one year left until the Demon Lord’s advent.

Crack!

The passage connected to the demon realm distorted again. Just as a monster resembling a huge boar poked its head through, the Serial Murderer’s scythe moved.

The Serial Murderer split the massive monster in half with a single stroke.

“…Hmm!”

The bone and muscle tissue were slightly tougher than the monster she had just caught. If she hadn’t imbued her scythe with more aura, she wouldn’t have been able to cut through it in one go.

Olivia also noticed the difference and approached the passage. The rift was gradually growing larger. The monsters becoming stronger was likely due to the dimensional restrictions being lifted as the rift expanded. She couldn’t just leave such a dangerous thing behind.

Roar…!

Demonic energy erupting from the passage pushed against Olivia. But she effortlessly countered it with magical power far exceeding it.

The passage vibrated from the intense magical wave.

‘It’s not easy to destroy.’

Despite pouring in tremendous magical power, it only trembled.

Like pouring water into the sea doesn’t raise its level, Olivia instantly realized how powerful the force maintaining the connection between dimensions was.

There was a reason Kiel couldn’t destroy it.

Nevertheless, she didn’t stop pouring in magical power. Leaving the passage would clearly cause problems in the future.

‘…I’ll destroy it.’

Olivia’s heterochromatic eyes shone more brilliantly. Her white hair and robe swelled wildly following the flow of the outpouring magical power.

The passage could no longer withstand the magical power that seemed about to burst and let out a scream.

Screech…!

As the passage split with a thunderous sound, ominous purple light refracted in hundreds of directions. Even as the split surfaces rapidly recovered, it wasn’t enough to match the speed of collapse.

Crackle!

Blue magical power condensed to its limit and exploded.

Boom!

Space itself crumpled, recovered, and exploded.

Olivia grasped the explosion, compressed it, and isolated it within an ice crystal.

A cube that seemed about to burst at any moment. Though suppressed by Olivia’s power, it contained enough energy to annihilate the area as soon as she stopped infusing magical power.

‘…I didn’t expect it to be this powerful.’

In other words, at least this much power was needed to attempt a connection between dimensions.

Tsss…

The crystal cube that had been emitting light incessantly gradually subsided. The Serial Murderer, who had been watching the scene, opened her mouth wide.

“Olivia, you… could do that too?”

Olivia looked down at her hand with a dazed expression. Isolating the dimensional explosion’s aftermath in the cube was her intention, but she couldn’t understand what happened afterward.

Olivia swallowed dryly and clenched and unclenched her hand several times.

‘…What was that?’

No matter how much Olivia had reached the truth, it was limited to lightning and ice elements. She could only apply the mental images gained from these two fields to natural laws and spacetime, but affecting dimensions themselves as she just did was impossible.

That means…

Olivia sighed deeply and stood up. It wasn’t a problem to worry about just yet. Or rather, it was already too late to worry.

“Let’s go.”

“Where to?”

“The Holy Kingdom.”

They couldn’t use teleportation. The mountain range where Kiel was located was near the border between the Holy Kingdom and the Empire.

Until now, the demonic energy emitted by the passage had acted as a suppressant, but now that she had destroyed it, using large-scale techniques like spatial movement would be detected by the magical arrays deployed by the two Dragon Lords.

‘…Maybe I should have just left it alone instead of destroying it.’

She sensed the presence of holy knights not far away. They were probably guarding the path to ensure that Kiel’s closed-door training wouldn’t be disturbed by others.

Olivia slowly began to walk.

*****

“Two unexpected guests in just three days.”

The Imperial Capital of Lactea. The Princess’s Palace.

The place where the two Dragon Lords and the returners who had reached the pinnacle of their fields stayed.

Princess Aria, who remained there alone, was handling her teacup as usual.

“Coming when everyone is away. It’s hard to call this a coincidence.”

Aria didn’t speak formally as usual. It wasn’t to display her dignity as a princess.

It was because her opponent wasn’t worthy of such respect.

Imperial knights lay collapsed like corpses throughout the room. After the Golden Tower Master Melina’s visit, the White Dragon Lord Carthian had personally applied enhancement magic to their bodies and minds, but it seemed to be of little use against the intruder before her.

Indeed, the only way to deal with an extraordinary powerhouse is to reach the same level. Aria inwardly clicked her tongue.

All the returners were away. Even the Dragon Lords who had been by Aria’s side had been dispatched for their respective missions once she reached a level where she could protect herself.

The Seven Demon Mirrors. They were gathering the keys to open the hidden chamber beneath the Empire.

Only the Neck Mirror, Euran, remained intact, but Aria had her own plans.

A method that only someone with her level of intelligence could even imagine.

To execute that method, she had dispatched all six returners.

“Is it arrogance, or have you failed to understand your position?”

A woman with a voluptuous figure appeared in the previously empty chair, looking at Aria.

Blood-red eyes, lips curved in a characteristic sneer.

“Well, it doesn’t matter. Such things are of no importance.”

“…”

“I hear that five years ago, it was you who planned to capture ‘her’?”

A seductive voice that could enchant anyone.

“Impressive. To think of subduing a transcendent being who has half-escaped humanity with just six mortals… and with you directing the operation from afar. How much trust from those around you must you have earned to pull off such a thing? Honestly, I was amazed.”

“It would have succeeded if you hadn’t interfered.”

Aria replied coldly.

“Northern Duke, Asmodeus.”