Chapter 236: Chaos (2)
It felt as though someone’s desperate scream had echoed from somewhere.
“…Huh?”
Was it just my imagination?
No, it wasn’t.
In that instant, Mercedes flinched as a sharp and intense pain shot through her chest.
Without realizing it, she blankly stared toward a certain direction.
It was the direction where the Academy stood.
“…….”
That sensation just now….
It was while she was lost in thought.
“Sir Mercedes.”
Someone called her name and rushed straight at her.
As she slightly turned her head at the voice calling her, she saw a bizarrely shaped Mire-like Creature that had already lunged right up to her.
Kwa-ddeudeuk!
Before she could even blink, someone smashed the Mire-like Creature away with all their strength using a warhammer.
It was the orc, Kruak, Behard’s comrade and sworn brother, along with the crouching water buffalo.
“On the battlefield, a blind mistake leads to irreversible consequences.”
With a heavy metallic whoosh, he swung his warhammer and spoke quietly.
“…Be cautious. If anything were to happen to you, I would have no face to show my brother.”
“Yes.”
At his reproach, Mercedes slightly bowed her head—unlike her usual self—to show that she would be careful.
Borrowing the words of her twin younger sibling, she had a mouth rougher than most mercenaries, but she wasn’t shameless enough to hurl harsh words even at someone who had just helped her.
“More importantly, even if it’s a festival day, this is a bit excessive.”
The lizardman, Briik Konapa, shook his neck as though bells were ringing and forcefully struck away the Mire-like Creatures charging at them.
Then, as he muttered something under his breath and extended his finger, violet flames ignited over the bodies of the fallen creatures.
“Since it’s also the height of the festival, I was planning to get thoroughly drunk today.”
“Hup!”
Harira, the werewolf, grabbed something resembling the head of an approaching Mire-like Creature and crushed it with all her strength.
Then she shook her hand off in disgust and muttered,
“…Yeah, at the very least, this doesn’t seem to have been scheduled.”
At the end of their gazes were fleeing citizens, soldiers stepping forward to protect them, and Mire-like Creatures indiscriminately lunging at anyone they saw.
“We can’t take this lightly.”
Kruak, who tacitly took on the role of leader whenever Behard was absent, spoke.
“They look insignificant on the outside, but each one possesses no ordinary strength.”
As he mercilessly pulverized another charging Mire-like Creature with his warhammer, he continued,
“And they don’t die easily either.”
“Hmm.”
Konapa then pulled something from his bosom and threw it.
A uniquely shaped dagger, writhing like a snake, embedded itself into a Mire-like Creature—but it paid no heed and continued charging.
Watching it, he sighed.
“Yes, that is certainly true. Even paralytic poison has no effect at all.”
He nodded.
“If this continues, it truly won’t be something we can just laugh off. To begin with, for so many incidents to keep occurring in the Capital like this….”
“Indeed.”
Mercedes nodded in agreement.
It was excessive. Even she thought so. It was absurd.
“…….”
…Yes, it was truly strange.
For countless major and minor incidents to erupt within less than half a year.
Under normal circumstances, it would have been unimaginable.
It could never have happened through external enemies alone.
Yes, not through external enemies alone.
‘Who could it be?’
Mercedes quietly organized her thoughts while keeping her guard up.
Handling the current situation came first.
Just as they had done until now, they would be able to overcome this as well.
‘But….’
For some reason, she felt that this incident would bring a storm incomparable to any before it.
She could only hope that it was merely a baseless fear.
“…Are we the only ones fighting back?”
At Harira’s muttering, Konapa replied,
“The soldiers over there are fighting diligently.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
She clicked her tongue softly.
“They’re just holding out. I meant—are there no others like us who are pushing these things back toward their source?”
Even as she sharply retorted, Harira tore apart and crushed three Mire-like Creatures in the meantime.
“Just a moment.”
As she spoke, Mercedes closed her eyes and began concentrating.
The other three, as if accustomed to it, surrounded her and guarded all directions.
After a moment, she slowly opened her eyes and nodded.
“…No. There are others besides us, scattered here and there.”
Someone fighting ferociously while freely wielding an axe and a chain-sickle.
Someone who, though holding only a shield, stood firm like a fortress wall and instead drove the Mire-like Creatures back.
Someone using strange and powerful magic tools that even she had never seen before.
Someone who, as if having glimpsed the future, avoided every attack without even looking—like performing acrobatics—while cutting the creatures down.
And lastly, someone who was clearly human, yet astonishingly wielded the sorcery of the Frost Giants….
Each of them had their own distinct traits, but they shared one thing in common—they were all people she had passed by at the Academy from time to time.
And they were people she had never imagined possessed such strength.
‘It seems my eye for talent wasn’t that good.’
Mercedes lightly reproached herself.
To be unaware of such powerful individuals—she would have no excuse if Behard teased her for her poor judgment.
Or perhaps, when she thought about it, wasn’t this proof that they had concealed their strength that well?
‘Focus. Let’s focus.’
She shook off her thoughts and concentrated once more.
Her domain spread further outward, and soon she sensed something.
“……Huh?”
With a voice filled with immense loss and disbelief, she murmured,
“Behard?”
She quietly murmured the name of her twin younger sibling.
The name of the sibling from whom she could no longer feel even the faintest trace of energy.
* * *
Someone’s desperate scream rang out.
It was Menoruka’s scream.
“Ah, ah…! Aaaah!!!!”
She screamed as she caught Behard’s body, which collapsed powerlessly.
Urkvar looked down at him and muttered quietly,
“In that brief moment, he twisted his body and avoided instant death.”
Clicking his tongue, he added,
“…Foolish. To reject this side’s goodwill and choose a path of suffering for yourself.”
“Keugh….”
Behard coughed up blood once more.
Unlike before, it was pitifully faint—like he was expelling his final breath.
Holding him tightly, Menoruka hurried to cast recovery magic, but it would not respond to her will at all.
“Why, why…? Why! Why…!”
As she shouted, she glared at Urkvar through her tears.
“Why on earth…! Why!”
Looking down at her, Urkvar replied in a calm voice,
“You, too, will eventually come to understand this old man as time passes.”
“Understand what, exactly!”
To her anguished cry, Urkvar answered,
“That in the end, what matters most above all else is none other than family.”
“Family…?”
At his answer, Menoruka let out a hollow, incredulous laugh.
“Family, family… Did you truly just say family?”
“Yes.”
“…Then, Grandfather, please answer me.”
Clenching her teeth, she hugged Behard and asked,
“…Did you truly regard me as family?”
“What?”
“Within the family you speak of—was I included?”
“…What in the world are you talking about?”
At her question, Urkvar asked back as though he did not understand.
Instead of answering, Menoruka silently loosened her collar and exposed her chest toward him.
“Here.”
Then she pointed at the iron needle-like object embedded in the very center of her chest—the very thing that had made Behard hesitate earlier.
“This.”
This thing, piercing through her heart and lodged there.
“…Was it not you, Grandfather, who drove this into me?”
“…?!”
At her words, Urkvar flinched.
Seeing his reaction, as though he acknowledged it, she pressed on,
“…I remember everything. About the Man without a Head, and about that day…! And why I had lost my memories until now…?!”
Menoruka could not finish her sentence.
Because Urkvar had suddenly seized her by the throat and lifted her up effortlessly.
“Ugh…?!”
She struggled, but his grip did not budge in the slightest.
Looking at her futile resistance, Urkvar muttered quietly,
“…You truly are a clever child.”
“Urgh, kh—!”
“A granddaughter so exceedingly clever—under normal circumstances, I would have nothing but joy….”
He muttered as though genuinely regretful.
“But at least for now, I had hoped you would remain foolish.”
“Ugh…!”
Even as she writhed, Menoruka glared at him with fierce eyes.
Urkvar sighed in sorrow and spoke in a saddened voice,
“Menoruka, Menoruka… my child, my pretty child, my granddaughter—why do you glare at this old man with such eyes?”
As he murmured that, he suddenly kicked Behard’s head with the tip of his foot.
Behard no longer moved at all.
“Surely you’re not reacting like this just because I crushed the heart of a mere human?”
“From him—!”
At Menoruka’s sharp cry, he nodded as though he understood.
“I know, I know. There is no need to provoke your anger further by touching the corpse of someone already dead. I will stop.”
Saying so, Urkvar carefully lowered his foot from atop Behard’s head.
Even so, Menoruka continued to glare at him with murderous intensity.
Looking at her, he spoke in a coaxing, gentle tone,
“My child. Do you truly remember everything?”
“…….”
“…Yes, you would not lie. Otherwise, you would not look at this old man with such eyes.”
Then…
He nodded slowly.
“Will you not help this old man?”
“…….”
“I see. It seems you will not.”
Even as he said that, he nodded as though slightly disappointed.
“It will not hurt, so there is no need to worry. When you come to your senses… yes, that child will also be revived within you… and then, our whole family will truly be together again.”
As he said this, he slowly began reaching his hand toward Menoruka’s head.
Menoruka stared at the hand approaching her and muttered shortly,
“…I will not forgive you.”
Urkvar nodded.
“So be it. You have every right to do so.”
It was at that moment.
Just before his hand touched her head, a sudden flash of light burst forth.
No—he only thought it had.
“Hmm.”
Clutching his throbbing wrist, Urkvar looked at the one who had snatched Menoruka from his grasp.
Junongren, his body in tatters, held Menoruka in his arms and glared at him savagely.