Chapter 8 – Escalation #3

Stars fell from the sky.

A rain of fire blanketed the skies of the royal capital.

Crown Princess Daphne’s eyes fluttered open to the rain lashing against her cheek.

Through a hazy vision and a numb mind, she saw a dark, black sky.

A cold downpour poured from a sky blanketed in jet-black clouds.

Stars.

A rain of fire.

“Ah…”

A dazed voice and a white puff of breath escaped her lips simultaneously as sensation slowly returned to her cold, drenched body.

“Ugh…”

The first thing she felt was pain.

She was on the cold, hard stone floor.

Crown Princess Daphne was buried amidst the rubble.

Blood, mixed with rain, trickled through her hair. Her body, bruised blue beneath the debris, was swollen red with broken bones.

“Haa… ha…”

Letting out a shallow breath through her pale lips, Crown Princess Daphne gritted her teeth against the screams and wails she could hear through the curtain of the downpour.

Her memories returned.

Stars had poured from the sky, and the shattered fragments had rained down upon the capital.

The capital’s defensive barrier had been hastily activated, but it was impossible to completely block the celestial disaster.

Screams and roars.

The royal palace crumbling, the capital burning.

“Agh… ugh…”

Crown Princess Daphne pushed herself up from the debris.

She ripped off the hem of her dress, which was torn and soaked, getting in her way, and looked around.

Corpses were strewn everywhere among the rubble.

Beyond the castle walls, flames that defied the downpour soared toward the sky.

And the Outer Gods.

Monstrous beasts in the form of giant creatures, trampling the royal capital.

“Dion…”

Crown Princess Daphne found Prince Dion collapsed at her feet.

He was bleeding from his head, but thankfully, he was still breathing.

It seemed they had survived thanks to the defensive magic Dion had cast the moment the palace collapsed.

Crown Princess Daphne sat beside the unconscious Dion and looked forward again.

She could see the palace walls, broken and battered by the stellar assault but still standing.

Yet, Crown Princess Daphne trembled in fear.

She couldn’t control her shaking hands and, without realizing it, let out a childlike sob.

It wasn’t the attack of the stars that terrified her.

It wasn’t because of the giant Outer Gods trampling the capital.

It was the being that stood beyond the walls.

The one who was walking straight toward this place.

A crack ran through the castle wall.

In the heavy silence created by the downpour, the wall that had stood strong for three hundred years was letting out its final death cry.

It was breaking.

The castle wall was collapsing.

Pushed by a force too immense.

Like an anthill collapsing under a human’s step.

The rain poured down.

Beneath a thunderclap that covered the sky, a colossal being revealed itself from beyond the crumbled wall.

It was a man.

A giant, his body covered in scars.

“The Azure… Dragon…”

Crown Princess Daphne had never seen the man before.

But she knew who he was.

He was the very source of all her fear.

CRACK-BOOM!

Amidst the thunder, he took a step.

Wielding rain and lightning, he was truly like a god.

Crown Princess Daphne trembled.

She had to do something, anything, to stop him from approaching, but she couldn’t.

Not even a strangled cry could escape her forced-open mouth.

And it was the same for the others.

The knights and soldiers who had pulled themselves from the rubble failed to do their duty.

The faint of heart burst into tears, and even those who didn’t could only tremble, unable to move.

The Azure Dragon continued to walk forward.

Crown Princess Daphne gritted her teeth and clenched her fists.

Even as she shed tears she couldn’t hold back, she finally pushed herself off the ground and stood.

The Azure Dragon saw her.

Despite the considerable distance between them, the dragon’s blood-red eyes met Crown Princess Daphne’s blue ones.

Crown Princess Daphne wet herself.

As if demanding a price for meeting the dragon’s gaze, a suffocating pressure violently constricted her chest and throat.

But Crown Princess Daphne did not collapse.

She stood on trembling legs and faced the Azure Dragon.

It was a meaningless resistance.

Simply facing him would not drive the Azure Dragon away.

But Crown Princess Daphne did not back down, and for a brief moment, the Azure Dragon paused his steps.

“The Queen of Lions, is it?”

Still young and weak, but a queen nonetheless.

The Azure Dragon found her to his liking.

But that was all.

The option to turn back in admiration of her courage did not exist.

The wish of Aylia, the Goddess of the Broken World, was intertwined with the desires of the Azure Dragon and his people.

The World Stone had to be obtained.

The Azure Dragon took another step.

Crown Princess Daphne let out a ragged breath and drew the sword from her hip.

Lightning struck.

The sky flashed, and the delayed clap of thunder shook the capital.

And because of that, she saw them.

The forms of the Outer Gods, illuminated under the whitely flashing sky.

The sight of a pure white sword aura, wreathed in frost, slicing through the neck of a giant Outer God.

The Azure Dragon stopped in his tracks.

Crown Princess Daphne, too, watched as the Outer God collapsed, its head severed.

The downpour continued.

And once more, a silent bombardment of light exploded above an Outer God’s head.

Wings of pure white light, clearly visible even in the darkness, rose like stars in the capital’s night sky.

Crown Princess Daphne knew who they were.

The ultimate, frosty sword aura that severed the Outer God’s neck, and the pure white angel who wielded a sword of light.

And so, she shed tears again.

Tears born not of fear and terror, but of hope.

Because their appearance also meant his arrival.

He was coming.

To stand against the Azure Dragon.

No, to peel back the black sky that covered the capital.

“A heart of steel, an indomitable will, a body unrivaled under the heavens.”

The Azure Dragon knew him as well.

The only man Aylia feared in the Pleiades from which Yuder and Cordelia had disappeared.

The invincible hero who had created miracles time and time again.

“Landius.”

The Warrior of the Sun.

The glory of the morning that drives out the night shall be with him.

Landius swung his Solar Blade toward the sky.

A golden flash of light cleaved the darkness of the capital.

*

The vast, black divinity coalesced.

Before Cordelia and the Witch, it took a single form.

A noble and beautiful Beast of the Black Moon.

It was like a hound, and also like a wolf.

The black beast, which stood at least three meters tall at the shoulder, had the same green eyes as Yuder.

Cordelia looked up and met the beast’s gaze.

The green eyes, set in flawless jet-black fur, reflected Cordelia’s own blue eyes.

She knew without a word.

It was Yuder.

Even though his form had changed, Cordelia knew.

“So you really were a beast, huh? After all that time you spent calling me one.”

As Cordelia spoke playfully, the black beast—Yuder—gave a playful smile and licked her cheek with his enormous tongue.

The size difference was so great that Cordelia’s small face was instantly covered in slobber, but instead of getting angry, she burst out laughing.

“You’re like a puppy.”

At Cordelia’s simple assessment, Yuder, instead of frolicking again, quietly lowered his posture.

Laughing and chatting with Cordelia was always a joy, but right now, they had to hurry.

“Alright, let’s go.”

Cordelia climbed onto the back of Yuder, who was lying prostrate on the ground.

His jet-black fur was incredibly soft, and his body, packed with hard muscle, made her think, This is Yuder, all right.

“I don’t think I need to tell you what to do.”

At the Witch’s words, Cordelia nodded, and Yuder slowly rose to his feet.

Having released his divinity, Yuder could tell.

Not only the direction of the Pleiades but also how far away it was.

[Hold on tight, Cordelia.]

At Yuder’s voice, which rang directly in her mind, Cordelia lowered herself further, hugged Yuder’s neck tightly, and whispered in a tiny voice.

“Beast Fusion Yudelia?”

Yuder smiled again.

He felt that no matter the crisis, he could overcome it as long as he was with his sun.

[Let’s go.]

“Yeah, let’s go.”

To the Pleiades.

After giving the Witch a nod, Yuder raised his head and glared at the sky—at the world beyond.

In his beast form, he activated the power of the Nine Heavens and Nine Gates.

With a thunderclap that shook heaven and earth, a jet-black bolt of lightning shot upward.

*

Aylia stared at the royal capital, her heart filled with anxiety.

Landius.

The Warrior of the Sun.

The invincible hero.

A miraculous being born of the Pleiades.

A monster of a man.

He was truly like the sun.

A being who had created miracles time and again, even in the depths of dark despair.

Thus, his appearance stirred conflicting emotions in the two goddesses.

The young goddess Athalia clasped her hands and smiled through her tears.

Aylia gritted her teeth and let out a ragged breath.

Landius and the Azure Dragon advanced toward each other.

The human hero and the eerie Outer God clashed head-on.

This much is within my calculations, Aylia thought.

Landius’s existence was a variable that could not be ignored.

That was why Landius was at the center of every plan Aylia had ever made.

So she could remain calm.

Even before the hero of the sun, who shone with enough light to drive away the darkness not just from the capital but from the entire Pleiades, she could struggle to maintain her composure.

It’s going according to plan.

Everything is as I first envisioned.

Aylia’s own wish would be fulfilled.

Aylia’s thoughts were not entirely wrong.

In fact, although the battle in the royal capital had just begun, it was proceeding almost identically to the blueprint she had drawn.

The imperial capital was not much different.

The Soul of the First Sword, found by the Outer Gods, was playing its part better than expected.

He, who was advancing toward the horizon, was growing stronger with each passing moment.

The Holy Nation of Yudelia should be fine as well.

The one who had gone there was the War God.

Landius might be a different story, but no mere mortal could ever stand against his sword.

So Aylia smiled.

To calm herself further, to put her mind at ease, she shifted a part of her consciousness that had been focused on the royal capital to the Holy Nation of Yudelia.

And then, Aylia let out a stunned sound.

She gasped in horror at a sight she could never have imagined.

*

Count Chase knew.

He knew who his dear friend was facing right now.

What kind of being he was fighting.

But he wasn’t worried.

Nor did he think of joining the fight himself.

Because Count Chase knew.

Something that was completed because Yuna had returned.

Something he had realized because Yuna had returned.

Therefore, Count Chase’s role was not to fight alongside Count Bayer.

It was to eliminate all obstacles so that his dear friend could fight to his heart’s content.

“It’s always my job to clean up after him.”

His voice was tinged with complaint, but his face was smiling.

And Count Bayer was smiling too.

His sword was pushing back the divine sword of the War God.

The reason was simple.

When he had faced Yuna again, when he had looked back on the past through her.

Count Bayer realized what he had forgotten.

He could understand what was needed to take another step toward the horizon.

The Sword of Wind.

Nothing was set in stone.

Limits did not exist.

A wild wind blew.

Count Bayer’s sword once again pushed back the War God’s, and the one-armed god was forced to retreat a great distance.

Maia looked at Count Bayer.

Count Bayer felt Maia’s gaze but paid it no mind.

Thinking of Yuna’s face, he took a powerful step forward.

“Because the wind is always—free.”

There was no shame.

He swung his sword with a shameless smile.

Toward the horizon that drew near.

The Sword of Wind surged forward.

A storm raged.

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Translated By: Meher (RaidenTL)

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