episode_0196

“…What happened?”

Meanwhile.

Neria, the Vice-Commander of Astro, was bewildered.

A sudden darkness had swept through the entire underground city.

Following that, even the slightest sound had ceased.

Only pitch blackness and silence surged.

“This is…”

The girl surveyed her surroundings.

While Yuda and the Monarch dealt with the Dawnbreaker, Neria was to face the specters on the city’s outskirts.

The tense atmosphere, filled with encroaching enemies until just moments ago, had settled into an eerie calm.

The screams of those awake, the tearing sounds of structures breaking, the roars of monsters…

All had vanished, as if they had been but a dream.

The streets she looked back upon were all asleep.

“…”

The Monarch’s Royal Guards, protecting the remaining survivors.

Those evacuating under their protection.

Even the specters, who had been rampaging wildly like dogs in heat.

Once engulfed by the pitch-black mist, all of them had lost consciousness.

The nightmare that had sprouted from the seed had, at last, swallowed the kingdom.

Currently, the girl was the only person awake in the city.

‘No way.’

A blackout state.

The pitch-black mist filling the underground had put the kingdom to sleep.

A terrible nightmare dyed an entire city in night.

The reason Neria alone remained unaffected was likely due to her constitution.

A constitution loved by the stars. A constitution she herself considered nothing short of a curse.

The starlight deeply confined within her heart seemed to have blocked the nightmare’s approach.

The girl chewed her lips tightly.

‘Should I call this a blessing?’

Her resistance, which wasn’t pushed back even against disaster-class dark magic.

Aside from a slightly hazy feeling, Neria had taken no damage.

The girl calmly surveyed her surroundings.

‘This black mist… must mean something went wrong with the plan.’

Neria acted calmly.

If the plan had gone awry, the top priority was to assess the situation.

She needed to confirm how critical the current situation was.

The girl began to walk without hesitation.

Tap.

Her light, quiet steps.

Her movements, devoid of any presence, cut swiftly through the pitch blackness.

Neria illuminated her vision with a light held at her fingertips.

The surrounding scenery was eerily still.

“…”

It was quiet.

And peaceful.

The trash that would normally litter the streets.

The drug dealers that would be lined up in every alley.

The beggars sprawled on the ground, reaching out their hands.

All had been crushed by the deep nightmare and embraced silence.

A blacked-out world.

“—Disloyalty.”

Neria, paradoxically, felt dizzy.

Aside from the pitch blackness that stained her vision, it felt as though nothing else existed beside her.

Such silence was one of the nightmares the girl had endured ad nauseam.

The days she was bound by chains and iron bars.

“—You are a child full of all kinds of malice.”

“—You were born with the destiny of misfortune, and will surely burn your surroundings to ashes.”

The old man stood beyond the iron bars.

A prophecy whispered as he looked down at her, who was battered and bruised.

The Monarch had imprisoned Neria under the pretext of control.

Thanks to that, most of her youth was filled with memories of that place.

Eight years of hell that remained as a lifelong shadow.

“—Please do not wish for happiness from the outside world.”

The cold, cramped, dark, and lonely iron cage.

The memory suddenly resurfaced, but Neria roughly pushed such nightmares away.

Solving the immediate situation before her was the priority.

She believed she had no time for personal reflection.

The girl soon reached the center.

“Master-nim…!”

More precisely, the plaza located in the center.

It was where Yuda and the Monarch should have originally resolved the situation.

However, the scene Neria found in the plaza was entirely different from what was planned.

The seed had already sprouted, and Yuda and the Monarch lay sprawled beside it, unconscious.

And between them stood a woman covered in a blood-red veil.

Neria instantly grasped the opponent’s identity.

‘Is that… the Dawnbreaker?’

An extraordinary aura flowed around her.

The pitch-black mist swirling around her.

Demonic energy so dense it distorted the surrounding vision.

Even blood tears flowed down from beneath the thin veil.

She was no ordinary woman at first glance.

Neria gripped her dagger and stood guard.

“…”

After a moment of staring, the Dawnbreaker’s lips finally parted.

As if she had been waiting for Neria.

The woman’s voice was utterly bizarre.

“The pitiful star has found this night.”

“…”

“Judging by your appearance, have you come to greet your Master too?”

“Objective. Entering the Dawnbreaker subjugation battle.”

Neria muttered indifferently.

There was no one to hear her, but it was for the sake of calming her own nerves.

At that, the Dawnbreaker let out a blatant scoff.

“How truly laughable! Hahaha!”

“…”

“This night sky has abandoned you, yet you still believe in hope?”

“…”

“Your destiny is like that of a miserable, lonely worm. Licking wounds hidden by petty lies.”

“…”

A sickeningly twisted voice.

Neria understood less than half of the woman’s words.

However, her given role remained unchanged.

To protect her Master with all her might.

And to carry out the failed mission in their stead.

“I won’t delay.”

Clink.

The girl gripped her dagger in a reverse grip.

A scorching heat spread through her palm.

The fiercely heated blade pointed at the Dawnbreaker.

Her silver eyes were cold and composed.

“Please step right in.”

Her momentum did not falter in the slightest.

Watching such a star, the woman shed tears as if in sorrow.

Dew mixed with blood and demonic energy flowed down her pale cheeks.

Sizzle. The flesh where the tears passed turned black and corroded.

Her two hands, neatly clasped, offered a prayer.

“Salvation for this pitiful star… Ah, Goddess.”

The Dawnbreaker extended her hand.

At its end, a sword forged from nightmares.

Creeping screams hung like a complete gallows.

Following that, the blood-red woman kicked off the ground.

Tap.

The distance narrowed with flickering afterimages.

The girl’s dagger and the woman’s nightmare collided.

A thick tearing sound echoed.

“Child, I will stand in your way.”

“I’ll politely decline.”

Clash!

In the city where all things slept.

There, a star’s desperate struggle began.

***

Neria was rational.

To be precise, she always strove to be rational.

It was more advantageous for leading a group.

But there were moments when she wavered.

‘Master-nim.’

None other than Yuda.

Matters related to her Master.

Perhaps it was due to an inexperienced heart, or perhaps affection.

Neria became anxious whenever she was involved with the boy.

It was the same this time.

“Hah, haah…”

Swish!

The pitch-black blade charged ferociously.

Neria barely twisted her head to evade.

Above the blade, her ragged breath mingled like mist.

The girl was wavering.

‘She’s strong.’

Neria clutched her deeply cut right arm.

Her breathing was also clearly labored.

The silver-haired girl’s eyes darted.

‘Master-nim.’

Her gaze naturally drifted to the back.

Yuda, lying unconscious.

Perhaps it was due to seeing her Master in such a helpless state for the first time.

A mental shock remained in Neria, unbeknownst to her.

Such inner circumstances caused her posture to constantly falter.

The girl clicked her tongue.

“Tsk…”

Her brows furrowed tightly.

In front of her, the blood-red woman stood.

With the girl’s blood staining the tip of her elegantly extended sword.

Unlike Neria, who was somewhat disheveled, her body was completely unharmed.

This was because Neria’s attacks had not reached the woman.

‘My attacks aren’t getting through.’

An invincibility effect was applied to the Dawnbreaker.

Despite Neria’s repeated attacks, she hadn’t been able to land any effective hits.

Conversely, the cuts inflicted by the nightmare were steadily increasing on her own body.

The Dawnbreaker still looked down at the girl from behind her veil.

An endlessly relaxed expression.

“How pitiful.”

Nightmares swirled around her.

“Even with such faint light, you’re not extinguished. Still, how commendable.”

The woman’s assessment was no exaggeration.

Even from an objective viewpoint, Neria was holding up well.

Normally, according to the Dawnbreaker’s patterns, even a small scratch from her would plunge someone into an eternal nightmare.

This was why Phase 3 Dawnbreaker was unbeatable.

She possessed an almost invincible effect, along with an overpowered passive skill.

It was called a status effect, but every one of her attacks was effectively an instant kill.

Neria was merely blocking the nightmare based on her latent starlight.

Thanks to that, she was able to fight hard even against an awakened Dawnbreaker.

But—

“Ugh…!”

That was the extent of it.

Just barely holding on, not dying.

Corrosion was progressing from the cuts crisscrossing her body.

The dense nightmare seemed ready to devour Neria at any moment.

Illusions periodically overlaid her vision.

“—Disloyalty.”

“—Please do not wish for happiness from the outside world.”

The nightmare couldn’t put Neria to sleep.

But it would occasionally show her terrible illusions.

However, even that alone was enough to burden Neria.

It was like poking at a festering wound with an ice pick.

The girl grit her teeth and swung her dagger.

The more she did, the clearer the scenes from her past became.

“—Your destiny is truly tragic.”

“—You’ve received the stars’ blessing… no, curse.”

“—Your light will become a conflagration. Burning those you love, and eventually, even the world.”

“—The reason I confined you is also thus. To protect what is mine.”

“—Child, please do not wish for happiness from the outside world.”

“—Even if you struggle, you cannot change your innate destiny.”

The flickering voice of the old man.

In front of Neria, the Monarch stood instead of the Dawnbreaker.

An icy gaze pierced the girl’s heart.

The old lips murmured as if in pity.

“—Therefore.”

“—Therefore, die by the light that incinerates people.”

They were the exact words she remembered.

Neria’s breathing, as she swung her dagger, wavered for a moment.

And the cost of that fleeting moment was heavy.

A sudden sword strike grazed the girl’s face.

Slash!

“Ugh…!”

A blinding flash in her vision.

Then, with a burning pain, she clutched her eye.

Her right eye had been hit due to her faltering posture.

Neria hastily cauterized the wound with light.

It was at least an act to prevent bleeding and corrosion.

Sizzle!

“Ugh, haah…!”

Of course, it was intense burning pain.

And she had no choice but to sacrifice her right eye’s vision.

The girl gathered her wits, gripping her sword.

Her vision still blurred.

“…Damn it.”

In front of her, the woman still stood.

Without a hint of fatigue, pointing her jet-black sword.

Neria realized.

‘Perhaps…’

This might become her burial ground.