Ch.325Chapter 325 – Hakan (3)

Eve couldn’t use magic.

It wasn’t that she was incapable of handling magical power, but rather that she hadn’t received the specific training needed to sense it.

Of course, she possessed another special and powerful ability, but that didn’t change the fact that she couldn’t use magic.

Yet magical energy was emanating from Eve.

‘No, it’s not from Eve.’

More precisely, it was coming from the sword and armor she wore.

Those two items were the source of the magical energy manifesting around her.

“Eve, what is that?”

“They’re items made in Rubrum’s lair.”

Eve replied without taking her eyes off Hakan.

Hakan stared at Eve for a moment as she watched him.

Then he laughed loudly and began swinging his sword.

At the same time, Eve spoke to me.

She was restraining me from jumping in by raising one arm.

“Kay, please trust me.”

I was about to refuse her request, but

Eve continued with a smile.

“I’ll create an opening, then you can smash his back to pieces.”

Without waiting for my response, she charged toward Hakan’s sword.

Hakan’s blade was already closing in on Eve, and she thrust her new sword toward him.

“Do you think you can block with that sword?!”

With Hakan’s shout, his greatsword sliced through the air menacingly.

And then.

-CLANG!!

A terrifying impact sound rang out.

Eve had successfully blocked Hakan’s greatsword.

“Huh?”

“‘That sword,’ you say. You clearly lack discerning eyes.”

Eve immediately deflected Hakan’s greatsword upward, then swung her own sword.

Hakan parried her blade, and the two began fighting, exchanging sword strikes.

Soon Hakan was gritting his teeth while Eve spoke with a relaxed expression.

“Your swordsmanship is quite crude.”

“Damn it, just, get hit!!”

Perhaps this was the price of becoming a monster.

Hakan couldn’t wield his sword with precision because of his bulk and strength.

In fact, one of his hands was busy just trying to keep up with Eve’s blade.

And finally, Hakan exposed an opening.

“There it is.”

Eve didn’t miss the opportunity and thrust her sword into the gap.

-SHUNK!!

Eve’s sword plunged deep into Hakan’s hand that held the greatsword.

She twisted her body to add rotational force to the embedded blade, and her sword easily severed Hakan’s arm.

“My arm?!”

“For a customer who doesn’t understand the value of items, let me explain properly.”

Eve spoke again as she held her sword with one hand and began thrusting.

As Hakan retreated in shock, Eve continued speaking.

“This sword is made of dragonbone—specifically from the Red Dragon of Malice who supposedly fought against a hero in ancient times.”

“What are you—”

“My sword is not just for show.”

“You should properly assess the value of items,” Eve said as she swung her sword widely at Hakan.

Hakan backed away and tried to bite Eve with the sea dragon head attached to his other arm.

“Die…!”

“I already knew.”

With those words indicating she had anticipated the sea dragon head’s attack, Eve narrowly avoided it.

Then she struck the head with her arm opposite to the one holding the sword.

“What…!”

The arm was forced backward, and Hakan shouted with a surprised face.

Eve calmly explained:

“My armor is also specially made from materials directly granted by the Red Dragon of Malice. Beyond its defensive capabilities, it can be charged with magical energy to activate enhancement spells.”

Hakan looked at Eve in disbelief.

Eve glared at him and said:

“Remember this well for the future, customer.”

With Eve’s words, Hakan lost his balance.

The sea dragon head had been forced back with unexpected strength.

Taking advantage of his imbalance, I quickly climbed onto Hakan’s back and drove my halberd fiercely into it.

“Ugh, get off, get off!!”

Hakan thrashed wildly, trying to throw me off.

While regenerating the arm Eve had cut off, he tried to turn the sea dragon head around to bite me.

“Connect!”

But the sea dragon head was quickly bound by ropes of light emanating from paper fragments floating in the air.

It was Sera’s support.

“Kay!”

“Got it!”

After repeatedly striking his back, I jumped off when Hakan started thrashing and returned to my companions.

Meanwhile, Hakan had regenerated his arm and swung his sword, but it was deflected by a shield Chris had summoned.

Hakan shouted in frustration:

“Damn you all! Without relying on tools…!”

“I’m not sure that’s something to criticize? Using stronger tools to become stronger.”

Eve replied flatly.

Then she added with a slightly bitter tone:

“To be honest, I didn’t want to rely on tools either, but I didn’t have the luxury of time to worry about that.”

Eve’s eyes briefly turned toward me.

When I looked at her, she smiled faintly, then turned back to glare at Hakan and said:

“There are things more important than pride. But a fool like you wouldn’t understand even if I explained it, would you?”

“You…!”

Hakan shouted in anger.

His body grew slightly larger in response to his rage, and seeing this, Eve quietly said:

“Kay could probably handle this alone easily.”

“But,” she said, looking at me.

A momentary sadness flickered in her eyes before gently disappearing.

“To reduce Kay’s burden even a little, let’s end this quickly. Does anyone object?”

“Of course not.”

Sera replied, holding her staff and book.

She was looking at Hakan with a sharp expression, unlike her usual gentle demeanor.

Chris, spreading her golden wings, silently pointed her stone staff at Hakan as she moved toward us.

The three women exchanged glances, and then Eve looked at me.

“Kay. Fight freely. We’ll support you.”

Eve said this while resuming her stance and facing Hakan.

“Let’s finish this quickly and all get some rest.”

I raised my halberd at Eve’s words.

“Sounds good.”

With that.

I kicked off the ground and charged at Hakan.

“Who’s going to finish whom quickly!”

Lightning began to course through Hakan’s body.

He swung the sea dragon head like a flail, and I deflected it with my halberd as I charged.

I immediately changed my armor’s form to enhance my wings.

I also switched my weapon to a jousting lance, spinning it rapidly before charging toward Hakan.

Hakan couldn’t react to the sudden charge, and the shoulder with the sea dragon head was pierced and disappeared.

As the sea dragon head vanished, Hakan raged and tried to swing his sword.

“‘Protect the young lamb.'”

Chris’s golden shield specialty interrupted Hakan’s sword swing.

Then Chris quickly flew to his side and extended her stone staff, activating another holy spell.

“‘Rest for the wandering lamb. Purify the impurity.'”

“Tch, undead…!”

Hakan seemed to realize what Chris was trying to do.

But he had no way to stop her spell.

“AAAAARGH…!!!”

Hakan began to scream.

Starting from the arm holding the sword, flames suddenly began to consume him, spreading across his entire body.

Holy flames of purification were burning him.

“Y-you, you woman, you wench!!”

Hakan changed his target to Chris in agony.

He tried to swing his sword to cut her down.

“Like I’d let you!”

After completing my direction change, I quickly transformed my armor to be thicker.

I threw an anchor with a chain at Hakan, binding both his sword and body.

With Hakan still burning and now bound by chains, I immediately threw him in the opposite direction.

And Eve was already precisely positioned there.

“Just as I foresaw.”

She had already seen the future and knew Hakan would fall there.

She raised her sword and,

using her magically enhanced body, delivered a powerful slash across Hakan’s arm.

“GYAAAAH!!!”

Hakan’s sword arm was severed, and the cut area began to burn even more intensely.

As his arm was cut off, Hakan’s body rolled across the ground, and I immediately returned my armor to normal, approached him, and kicked him.

Then, while reverting my armor, I released the accumulated lightning at him.

Hakan’s airborne body began to burn even more intensely from both the holy flames and the magically concentrated lightning.

“Not over yet!”

I said as I pursued Hakan through the air.

I quickly changed my weapon back to a halberd and struck him with all my might.

Finally, his lower body with four legs shattered, and Hakan’s body began to fall.

Facing him, I clenched my fist and uttered the activation word.

“Impact.”

The lightning accumulated in Hakan’s body exploded.

Burning, he fell straight toward the ground.

He crashed into a massive, melting heap of flesh.

+

‘Why?’

As his body burned, Hakan thought.

‘Why is this happening?’

Just moments ago, Hakan had been overflowing with power.

He had been rampaging, destroying everything around him, feeling like nothing could stop him.

But now, he was in this state.

The powerful arm with the sea dragon head and the arm holding his prized greatsword had long since left his body.

His body, which had seemed capable of endless regeneration, began losing its power as it burned in holy flames.

What little strength remained was disappearing as the lightning that had struck his body exploded.

His overflowing power had vanished without a trace.

Now, he was facing death.

‘No.’

Hakan truly screamed inside.

He didn’t want to die yet.

There was still so much he wanted to enjoy.

He didn’t want to lose everything just because he had chosen the wrong opponents.

But his will alone couldn’t reverse death.

After screaming internally for a while, he sank into the mass of flesh.

All that remained was to meet his end buried in this heap of flesh.

‘I said no!’

Desperate to survive somehow, Hakan instinctively bit into the flesh before him.

And then he realized.

‘…It’s the three-headed hound’s corpse.’

He didn’t know what materials were used, but he knew it was a creature made using powerful magical beasts.

It had considerable magical energy flowing through it to move, but perhaps because it was too crude, it ultimately met its end, melting away at the hands of that Kay person’s companions.

‘Is this my end?’

Like the melted corpse of that massive three-headed hound.

A miserable death was his fate.

‘Is it over now?’

Gradually, Hakan began to resign himself.

He wanted to struggle to survive, but there was no way left.

After all, from the moment that crystal was embedded in his abdomen, he was already destined to die.

Hakan would die here.

[No. You will not die yet.]

A voice echoed in Hakan’s mind.

[I have tasks that need to be done through you.]

‘What….’

Hakan was dumbfounded by the sudden voice.

At the same time, the crystal embedded in his stomach began to glow ominously.

‘Is it because of this?’

Is this crystal why he could hear the voice?

Could the voice intervene because of it?

[Yes.]

The voice answered.

[With your remaining life, you will fulfill my will.]

‘What can you do with this broken body?’

Hakan thought as he felt his eyes slowly closing.

‘Get lost.’

He mentally responded to the voice that somehow felt unsettling.

And then.

[You have no right of refusal.]

With those words.

Hakan felt a headache coming on.

‘Damn…?’

[Be grateful.]

The voice said.

[That I am using you.]

‘Damn…’

Hakan’s consciousness was cut off.

And thorns began to extend from his body.

They started to consume the mass of flesh.

+

I sensed something was wrong immediately after Hakan was buried in the mass of flesh.

Suddenly, thorns began to extend from Hakan into the flesh mass, and screams erupted from around us.

“W-what are you doing to the Guardian Beast’s corpse?!”

“Damn it, what is that monster trying to do now… Retreat quickly!!”

The voices of what seemed to be an enemy commander and Archery rang out.

My eyes remained fixed on the mass of flesh.

The mass had begun to form a sphere.

From within, Hakan’s head slowly emerged.

“He’s still not dead?”

“He’s so persistent…!”

Chris and Eve exclaimed in surprise.

Hakan rolled his eyes wildly before looking down at us.

Then he spoke quietly:

[“To not bow before a god, you remain irreverent.”]

Hakan’s voice was mixed with something else.

Then Hakan opened his mouth.

A beam of purple light shot out from his mouth.

It was a beam composed of holy power.

“‘Protect the young lambs!'”

Chris quickly created a shield to block the beam.

The air around us heated up momentarily, and screams could be heard as if caught in the blast.

Shortly after, as the light ceased, Chris’s shield disappeared.

“This holy power is…”

Chris held her stone staff with an unusually serious expression as she looked toward Hakan.

We all looked at Hakan.

Buried in the mass of flesh, Hakan smiled and said:

[“You impious ones still haven’t been erased.”]

The voice gradually changed.

It wasn’t Hakan.

Realizing this, I gripped my weapon as the entity distorted its face and spoke:

[I won’t greet you with pleasantries about meeting again, soul from another world.]

“…Emiris.”

That deity who had briefly appeared in Ferarius through Kara’s body.

That god had now appeared here again, using Hakan’s body.