Chapter 127

“Meisa-!”

Seeing the barrage of lightning pouring down from the sky, Cadrum shouted out loudly.

Only nobles of House Aravion could unleash such powerful lightning from the sky.

And given that there was no other wizard with a bloodline as powerful as that, and with a connection to Turan, it was a natural deduction.

However, contrary to expectations, her figure was nowhere to be seen in the sky.

Even though lightning magic could be set to originate from a distance, it would still be hard not to be noticeable.

Taking advantage of that moment of confusion, Turan on the ground also sprang into action.

“Hmm!?”

“What is this...?”

He opened the cap of a large bottle, origin unknown, and a transparent liquid spread out in a fan shape.

The surrounding nobles, though startled by the incomprehensible action, did not respond with significant wariness.

Pure water, after all, was not a particularly effective means of attack unless used to overwhelm by sheer mass.

Not to mention things like poison.

Only a few who were particularly cautious quickly backed away to avoid contact, while a considerable number simply frowned and shielded their faces with their hands.

Of course, they had to pay the price shortly after.

“Kwaaaah!”

“It burns!”

“Water, water! No-”

The effect of the Water of Death, used in actual combat for the first time, was truly excellent.

Had it been Spirit of Fire or some other attack magic, the excessive firepower might have endangered the hostage, but this liquid, if properly controlled, left no room for its destructive force to spread indiscriminately.

While a few who had let their guard down screamed in agony as their flesh burned from the Water of Death, Turan swiftly infiltrated the area and snatched up the collapsed Melo.

Since Cadrum and the others nearby had already fallen back, there was no one to interfere.

"Catch him!"

Before Cadrum could even finish giving the order, the wizards who had formed the encirclement cast their spells.

Did they think it was fine to kill Melo and Turan since Meisa had appeared?

The attacks that flew in were ruthless, as if they didn’t care whether the targets lived or died.

In response, Turan activated his Guardian magic artifact while shielding the unconscious Melo and deployed the Green Shield.

It was a powerful defensive magic artifact he had obtained in the past from a noble of House Varaha, which moved automatically to block deadly attacks.

The shield spun through the air, blocking the lightning strikes of two Aravion elders and then deflecting the magic from Cadrum and several other high-ranking wizards, before returning to Turan’s arms.

But even after safely fending off the attacks, he couldn’t simply laugh it off.

‘No, what kind of magic consumption is this...’

As a chunk of his strength was drained, a dizzying wave of weakness hit him.

At this rate, it might have been better to just take a few hits.

Of course, doing that would’ve meant the Melo he was holding would have died, so he had to endure this much.

As Turan retreated, another bolt of lightning fell from the sky, burning up three knights and one noble of a vassal house.

Only then did those forming the encirclement seem to realize that the enemy was not alone and began to flounder in confusion.

“Where is Meisa, where is Meisa!? Even if we lose that one, we must capture Meisa!”

Cadrum shouted to the noble next to him holding a large stone tablet.

It was a detection magic artifact that Meisa had once used during the dark elf subjugation, one that displayed surrounding life forms.

He must have detected Turan’s approach with that as well.

“Something is flying in the sky, but... judging by the red color of the dot, it’s not a person but a magical beast!”

“What.”

“Also, if the location shown by the magic artifact is correct, we should be able to see it from here, but there’s nothing visible!”

Just as he said, the one flying in the sky and launching the lightning bombardment was not Meisa, but Bije.

It seemed the nobles of Aravion had never imagined that a myth-grade magical beast could be cloaked in concealment while dropping lightning from the sky.

At that moment, the noble holding the stone tablet shouted again.

“Two more are coming!”

[Uwooooooh-!]

A thunderous roar echoed from afar.

Solif charged into the battlefield, smashing through every tree in his path as if he were a massive magical beast.

The wizards’ eyes widened at the halo that appeared on his back.

“No way, why is someone from House Varaha-”

A wizard of the Sun Bloodline appeared without warning.

Before they could even react to the shock, Meisa silently approached from the opposite side and thrust her sword straight toward one of the Aravion elders.

“Kh-!”

“Block it!”

With a loud boom, an invisible shockwave flew in and blasted five or six nearby wizards into the air.

The long, thin thrusting sword in her hand was forged from a magic artifact of a House Zahar noble, and could unleash shockwaves with its stabbing and slashing motions.

It was an item made for Meisa, whose main attack method was lightning, to compensate for her lack of physical power.

"Kuk!"

"That one is also an incredibly skilled person! Don't let your guard down!"

Amusingly, even while looking directly at Meisa’s face, the Aravion nobles didn’t immediately recognize her identity.

The difference between her now and her previously emaciated, skeletal appearance was simply too vast.

Not to mention the current situation was too urgent.

Before they knew it, they were no longer the ones surrounding but the ones being surrounded and unilaterally attacked.

At this, Cadrum amplified his voice with wind magic and shouted.

“...Do not retreat! We still hold the upper hand in terms of strength!”

To them, Turan was merely a Zahar noble somewhere between the upper and top ranks.

Even adding in two unidentified top-class nobles and one myth-grade magical beast wouldn't tip the scales in their favor.

How many wizards were gathered here, and what kind of magic artifacts did they have?

As the wizards regained their morale and launched attacks at the revealed Solif and Meisa, the battlefield descended into chaos.

“Damn you...!”

With a growl, a snow leopard suddenly appeared and lunged at Solif.

Slightly larger than a tiger, it surprisingly possessed enough close combat ability to contend with Solif.

A myth-grade magical beast, with power greater than top-ranked nobles.

As one top-class noble of the Nagin family controlled the beast, the fight quickly reached a stalemate.

Solif moved nimbly, killing other nobles and knights one by one, but with each attack, a new wound appeared on his own body as well.

Meanwhile, Meisa skillfully soared through the sky, devastating enemies with lightning and shockwaves.

Only then did a few nobles, finally recognizing her identity, shout in shocked voices.

"Miss!?"

“No way!”

Though her appearance was drastically different, there were not many top-ranked female Aravion wizards with long reddish-brown hair.

Especially since their leader Cadrum had just mentioned her name moments ago.

Some nobles of vassal houses, who had believed Meisa to be kidnapped, were shaken by the shocking truth that they were now under attack by the very person they thought they had to rescue.

Cadrum took advantage of that confusion and shot a sharp glare at Turan, who was exiting the battlefield with Melo.

“That bastard...!”

An bastard born to some Zahar noble, a good-for-nothing trying to climb the social ladder by seducing a great noble house's daughter with a treasure containing the power of the now-extinct Mimic.

That was all he had thought of him, so the current situation was nothing short of shocking.

What was that acid-like liquid he had used earlier? Where did he find such a powerful Varaha noble?

And why had Meisa become so strong?

‘Don’t tell me-’

The image of the Great Sea Serpent that had recently turned the North Sea upside down briefly crossed his mind, but Cadrum stopped thinking as he looked at Meisa dominating the battlefield.

Now was not the time to think about such things.

‘I must take her down first. Just capturing her is enough to accomplish the original goal.’

Meisa was overwhelming two Aravion elders while also fending off attacks from dozens of wizards below.

She had already surpassed the days when she was called the strongest heir, reaching a level where she could go toe-to-toe with the relatively weaker family heads of great noble houses.

And on top of that, the wretched appearance she once had was nowhere to be seen, now she possessed stunning beauty as well...

‘I’m jealous.’

Though she was currently in a man’s body, having lived for so long, she had long forgotten the differences between male and female.

Cadrum did not imagine possessing Meisa as a woman, but rather envisioned claiming her body itself.

If that beautiful and powerful body became his...

But it was a desire not permitted to him.

Because the owner of that body had already been decided.

Considering the time and effort invested into it, there was no chance the ownership of that body would fall into his hands.

“Tch.”

Clicking his tongue in regret, the moment Cadrum reached out his hand, Meisa, who had been flying through the sky, suddenly turned her head at the sharp sense of danger she felt.

Though Cadrum was certainly one of the most powerful wizards within House Aravion, there were several others present here of comparable strength.

Even so, an intense instinct told her that she should not ignore that gesture.

“Ugh!?”

In that instant, a surge of green light erupted from Cadrum’s hand and rushed toward Meisa.

Its speed was so fast it far surpassed even sound.

Fortunately, she twisted her body quickly and avoided a direct hit, but the brushing contact with her forearm and leg made them burn, and blood trickled down.

It was clear she would not have survived if it had struck directly.

‘God’s Magic...’

A special power used by fallen gods.

Even their pursuit of soul magic had been to attain such power.

Though they still hadn't figured out how to use it properly.

Meisa, while performing evasive maneuvers, quickly cast lightning down upon Cadrum, but surprisingly, he merely stood still and smiled as the lightning struck him.

With a crackling sound, the electricity wrapped around his upper body, then was absorbed.

“No way-”

As the heir of House Aravion, Meisa knew exactly what that power was.

Sky Guardian.

One of the sacred relics House Aravion prided itself on, the legacy of the Thunder Lord.

Originally, it was an artifact only the family head could use, but it seemed he had brought it specially for this occasion.

Realizing her lightning had been nullified, Meisa gritted her teeth and continued her evasive maneuvers, narrowly dodging Cadrum’s successive attacks.

Of course, dealing with attacks from other wizards simultaneously while doing so was impossible.

Even minor fireball spells from knights or mid-tier nobles, when continuously hit, accumulated damage across her body.

‘It’s harder than I thought...’

She glanced to see what Bije was doing, and saw her engaged in an intense aerial battle with four Aravion nobles.

They had conjured orbs of light to illuminate the night sky and prevent her concealment, relentlessly pursuing her and forcing a war of attrition.

Though Bije’s flying speed was much faster, granting her the initiative, being driven from the vantage point above the battlefield meant she had effectively lost the power to intervene.

‘At this rate-’

Just as she thought it was dangerous, a deafening explosion echoed from afar.

The now-familiar noise brought a sigh of relief from Meisa.

Stopping her evasive flight, she looked downward and saw that one side of the encirclement had been torn open, as if by a giant blade.

*

Turan, having used the gap created by Meisa and Solif to escape with Melo, first checked on his condition.

“Melo, are you alright? Can you wake up?”

Whether he had been beaten and tortured, Melo was quite badly injured and had not yet regained consciousness.

His cheeks were hollow, as if he hadn’t eaten for days.

Still, fortunately, his life didn’t seem to be in immediate danger.

After flying for a few quick minutes and hiding Melo safely in a cave, Turan returned to the battlefield, which was still raging.

Solif was fiercely battling a snow leopard he hadn’t spotted earlier, while being struck repeatedly by dozens of wizards, and Meisa was desperately dodging attacks from two Aravion elders as well as Cadrum and the other wizards.

The power radiating from Cadrum’s body had clearly reached the peak of the top tier, seemingly even stronger than Meisa had once been, suggesting he too was fully utilizing his power as a possessed body.

Instead of jumping straight into the battlefield, Turan maintained his Concealment and searched for the noble who had the detection magic artifact.

‘Where… there you are.’

The man was shouting something desperately toward Cadrum, but Cadrum, completely fixated on targeting Meisa, didn’t register it.

He was probably trying to report that Turan had returned.

At that, Turan immediately created a wind path and hurled an ordinary pebble, blowing off the head of the noble holding the tablet.

The battlefield was so chaotic that no one even noticed his death.

Of course, if attacks like this continued, they wouldn’t stay unaware for long, none of them were fools.

He had to achieve the best possible result in a single strike from the shadows.

‘This is my specialty.’

What Turan pulled from his pouch was a massive iron ball, roughly the size of a human upper body.

Among the iron balls made by Meisa, this was the only one designed not for anti-personnel use but for anti-magical beast or anti-army purposes.

Originally improvised during the fight against the Great Sea Serpent, it had now been properly manufactured, and since it couldn’t be used with a regular slingshot, he also had to use a specially made one prepared in advance.

‘Trajectory... alright, here.’

His attack wouldn’t distinguish between friend and foe, so he had to avoid Solif and Meisa, while ensuring as many enemies as possible were in the line of fire.

Naturally, the final target was Cadrum, the commander, and the one threatening Meisa with an unidentified magic.

A moment later, having completed all his calculations, he fired the iron ball while simultaneously creating a wind path and detonating Spirit of Fire.

The slingshot gave it one acceleration, and then the enormous amount of Spirit of Fire contained in the ball-sized vessel provided a second acceleration through explosion pressure, cutting through the middle of the battlefield.

"What-"

Though Zahar's Concealment magic hid the caster’s actions, it had its limits.

The flash caused by the explosion drew the wizards’ gazes momentarily to Turan, but by then it was already too late.

The iron ball, which had absorbed Turan’s magic through dozens of rotations and was further accelerated by the Spirit of Fire, tore through everything in its path.

Even a top Nagin noble who had a fairly powerful defensive magic artifact that could block at least one of Turan's normal slingshot attacks.

But just as the iron ball that had dismembered over a dozen wizards in an instant reached Cadrum, a golden flash burst from his upper body.

An enormous amount of electricity exploded outward, and shortly after, Cadrum, who appeared unharmed, sighed.

“I thought I was going to die...”

Turan didn't know that the Sky Guardian had a function called electric charge barrier, which instantly melted the metal iron ball.

However, through the Mimic relic, he could sense the immense power emanating from the armor Cadrum was wearing on his upper body.

As Turan rapidly closed in on Cadrum, he examined his inner essence.

As expected, alongside the Storm Bloodline he had confirmed earlier, a new symbol had been added, one he hadn’t seen before.

‘Rapids... and one I’ve never seen.’

One of Cadrum's symbols resembled two water drops mixing together.

It was clearly different from the Rapids bloodline, which took the form of a flowing river.

And the cloud that should have been intertwined with lightning was separated, sprinkling rain.

While he observed, Cadrum, having also recognized Turan’s presence, spoke with a sharp gaze.

“I was planning to kill you, but now I think I’ll keep you alive and ask a few things. Like how you pulled off that alchemy, and what that power just now was.”

“That makes two of us. Though it's kind of annoying.”

The two looked at each other like predators sizing up their prey and smiled.

*****