Chapter 408: The New Martial King (1)

Trails of light tangled chaotically to bloom into a massive flower of destruction.

Croterian Sword: Blossoming Rose.

Dozens of slashes surrounded Drel and Dios from all directions. Beltia pulled herself free after briefly sealing their movements.

"Karnak!" With her face flushed red, she continued kicking off the ground and charged straight toward Karnak.

Drel and Dios did not pursue her. Instead, they allowed her to chase Karnak and turned in the opposite direction.

—She's moving just as expected.

—Then let us do our part.

Beltia raced forward at terrifying speed while cutting down every obstacle in her path. Karnak continued retreating while directing the soldiers of the left wing to block her advance. At a glance, it was a cruel tactic, He was using ordinary soldiers as meat shields. However, there was no real problem with this method. Most of the allied army's left wing consisted of Twilight forces, specifically, undead troops.

"Go forth, my servants. Fight until your bodies shatter." Under the command of Karnak's spoken authority, the undead hurled themselves at Beltia without regard for their own bodies, only to be smashed apart and scattered.

Human soldiers fired arrows from the outer edges, doing their best to restrain her movements from a safe distance.

Meanwhile, the three fallen popes were also on the move. The colossal water serpent, stone-and-earth giant, and blazing firebird advanced across the battlefield. However, they were quickly intercepted.

Standing before Valeria's aquatic, serpentine form were Varos and Milia. Varos gave a broad grin while pointing his silver aura blade toward her. "It's been a while, Valeria. Though you probably don't recognize me."

"Why would I not recognize you? You're the lackey of that man."

"Yep. Guess you really don't," said Varos.

Leven, Lapicel, and Alius took on Beneville. Facing the one who had destroyed the Hatoba Church, Alius burst out in fury. "You impostor! You dare to call yourself pope! This time, the goddess's judgment will fall upon you!"

A cold sneer came from the stone giant. "An impostor, you say? Even after witnessing this power, you still dare speak such words?"

Drel and Dios abandoned their pursuit of Beltia midway and instead headed toward Splendia. Gazing at the blazing wings of fire, Dios clicked his tongue. "So this is the Incarnation of Divinity that I've only heard about? It's my first time seeing it in person."

With a surprised expression, Drel glanced back at him. "Truly?"

After all, Dios was an archmage. It seemed natural to assume he would be familiar with such things.

Dios shook his head. "Just a few years ago, the world was not so chaotic that the popes of the church needed to resort to such measures."

All three fallen popes were stopped in their tracks and unable to make their way towards Beltia. Taking advantage of the opening, Karnak continued retreating.

A female knight clad in crimson armor came charging forward, toward him. "Lord Karnak!"

It was Serati, carving through the enemy ranks as she swung the Sword of Sunset. Upon seeing her approach, Karnak smiled in satisfaction. It's proceeding exactly as planned.

***

This was the plan Karnak had devised.

First, he would provoke Beltia and lure her deeper into the battlefield. Once that happened, the three fallen popes would be forced to join the fight, since they could not abandon her. They would be defeated one by one, scattered across the battlefield.

The most crucial part of the plan was dividing their forces appropriately. The Martial King of Cyphras had to be defeated by the Saintess of Twilight. Only then would her reputation shake the entire continent, and her Grace grow even stronger.

The problem was whether Serati possessed the ability to defeat Beltia. To be honest, it would be a difficult battle. No matter how much stronger she had become through Grace, her opponent was still a martial king.

But with Grateria supporting her through magic, and Karnak joining the fight as well, they had sufficient chances of victory. Meanwhile, the remaining members would take care of the three fallen popes.

Who faced whom would depend on the situation, so he had divided up his forces to be as balanced as possible.

Varos was grouped with Milia, Drel with Dios, and Leven with Lapicel and Alius. While they each took on one of the fallen popes, Karnak would join Serati to face Beltia. In doing so, they could highlight the Saintess of Twilight while also preventing Beltia and the fallen popes from escaping.

So far, it's going as planned.

At last, Karnak and Serati met on the battlefield. The two crossed paths, brushing past one another.

Seeing Karnak slip behind Serati for cover, Beltia trembled with fury. "How long do you intend to run, you despicable coward!"

"Well, I can't exactly deny that he's despicable..." With a bitter smile, Serati stepped forward to block her path. "But you're not the one who should be saying that after taking so many lives!"

Her dark aura blade blazed with flames. Beltia's sword responded with bursts of golden light. The two streams of sword strikes collided midair, unleashing a brilliant explosion of light.

***

A giant of stone and earth, larger than most fortress walls, took a step forward. "You wretches!"

Each time its foot came down, the ground shook violently, gouging deep craters into the earth. "I'll crush you all!"

Alius barely dodged the descending foot as his face turned pale. The sheer presence of the stone giant filling his vision was utterly overwhelming.

It had taken only a single step, yet to those facing it, it felt as though a mountain itself were collapsing. Is that truly the secret art of our order?

Meanwhile, Leven and Lapicel remained calm.

—It definitely looks bigger than when we faced Jedex. Wasn't that called the Black Sun back then?

—Still smaller than grandpa dragon's original body, though.

—You really shouldn't compare it to that. They're on entirely different levels.

Thanks to Grateria, Lapicel had also learned Karnak's secret. In other words, she had finally been added to the exclusive magical communication channel for Karnak's subordinates. When she first found out, Lapicel had trembled with betrayal.

—Unbelievable! So all this time, everyone's been talking except me, Lord Karnak?

—I-I'm sorry.

—That's so mean! I thought everyone was seriously contemplating something important!

—I said I was sorry. I've committed too many sins, that's why.

Only after extracting a promise that he would never leave her out again did Lapicel forgive Karnak. Then again, once she understood the circumstances, she could somewhat understand why it had been kept hidden. Looking up at Beneville, Leven sent another message.

—It's coming, Lapicel!

—Yes!

With a deep, rumbling roar, Beneville swung his massive right arm.

Wrapped in silver aura, the two leapt into motion. Leven dashed to the left and Lapicel to the right while extending their aura blades to full length. The two whip-like streaks of silver sword aura lashed repeatedly against the giant's rocky body.

Loud explosions erupted across Beneville's body. But only fragments flew off. His body remained largely unaffected. The opponent was simply too massive and too durable.

The stone giant pulled back its arm and roared. "Futile, you wretches!"

Countless chunks of rock sprouted from its body and shot into the air. Moments later, innumerable fragments rained down like meteors. It was such dense bombardment that there seemed to be no space to evade.

Even so, Leven and Lapicel dodged them all. Leven even found time to mimic Beneville's tone and mock him. "Futile, my foot!"

Had he followed Karnak for too long? The habit of taunting opponents to unsettle them had become second nature to him. The change in his habits proved how important one's environment truly was.

Then he counterattacked once more.

Delphiad Swordsmanship: Sovereign's Strike!

A flash of light slammed into the stone giant's shoulder. With a sharp cry of pain, fragments of rock burst outward in all directions. Benevill faltered, caught off guard by the unexpectedly powerful impact.

Was Sir Leven always this strong at this time?

Beneville knew well that the young man before him would one day become the Martial King of Delphiad. After all, the future Leven was already among Tesranach's subordinates.

But the Leven Strauss he knew had never displayed such martial prowess in his early twenties. In fact, to be precise, he had not even been an aura user at that age. Yet the present Leven had already reached the realm of a silver knight. That was nearly ten years ahead of schedule, compared to his previous life.

He could understand why Lapicel was so strong. Her soul belonged to the Martial King of Cyphras. She had simply inhabited a young body, and her memories had been lost.

But Leven possessed nothing more than the soul of his younger self. How could he have become this strong so quickly?

How is something like that even possible?

In truth, Leven himself found it rather astonishing. So I really have grown quite strong.

He had always thought he was barely keeping up with the others, struggling to match their level. Yet before he realized it, he had already reached a realm that should have been impossible at his age.

Even his father Gallard and his older brother Emil Strauss—both geniuses among geniuses—had not mastered silver aura in their early to mid-twenties. Yet, on second thought, it wasn't an entirely impossible feat.

In terms of basic physical ability, there was not a great difference between a body in the twenties and in the forties. The real differences lay in aura capacity, mastery, and accumulated experience.

Thanks to Karnak's chaos aura, his aura capacity had been filled to its limit. It was as if decades of training had been condensed into a much shorter time. As for technical proficiency and diverse combat experience, he was not that far behind his future self either. He had encountered countless battles while following Karnak around.

In fact, when it came to life-or-death battles or duels against overwhelming opponents, the present Leven might have experienced even more than his future self. How many martial kings had he fought so far? And how many archmages?

Experience, after all, was the greatest teacher. With natural talent and environment working together, Leven's explosive growth was, in some ways, only natural.

Leven let out a bitter smile. Still, it's not like I'm in any position to get arrogant.

Varos, Drel, Lapicel. He was practically surrounded by young silver knights. Lapicel, in fact, was still only a teenage girl.

Get a grip, Leven! You still have a long way to go!

Encouraging himself, he launched forward once more. A sharp battle cry tore through the air.

***

A massive serpent of water, stretching dozens of meters long, churned across the battlefield. A man and woman relentlessly pressed their attack around it.

It was Varos and Milia. At first glance, they might have seemed weaker than Leven's group. After all, Leven's group included two silver knights and a high inquisitor, while they only had one silver aura user and a second-class inquisitor.

But that assumption only held true if one judged Milia solely by her abilities as a priest. Brilliant wings reflected across the serpent's watery skin, shimmering upon the blue surface, and the beautiful song of an angel echoed throughout the battlefield.

Having transformed into a radiant-winged angel, Milia continuously hurled spears of light, tearing into the massive serpentine form of Valeria. Valeria retaliated with water bullets and spears of ice, but fighting back proved difficult.

In her angelic form, Milia possessed power that easily surpassed that of a purple knight. With a fighter of that caliber soaring through the sky, it was nearly impossible for one bound to the ground to land a proper hit.

Valeria frowned. Damn it... how troublesome.

And even when she did manage to land a hit, it proved less than effective. By sheer luck, one of Valeria's ice spears struck true, and the Angel of Radiant Wings staggered momentarily in midair.

But she did not fall to the ground. Instead, she quietly offered a prayer. "O Latiel, grant your servant the power of healing!"

The cracked armor and wings mended themselves instantly, and the falling angel rose into the air once more. That was the problem. This angel possessed combat power exceeding that of a purple knight, and it could also wield a priest's healing magic.

Seeing her rise again, the allied soldiers burst into cheers.

"It's the Angel of Twilight!"

"Lady Serakal's angel!"

Milia didn't know whether to cry or laugh after hearing their spirited cheers. That's not true... I serve Latiel.

But she could not openly deny it. They had to raise the prestige of the Twilight Order by any means if they hoped to gain even a sliver of a chance against Tesranach. Feeling the gradual shift in people's perceptions, she gave a sigh. At this rate, it really might become the Church of Eight Goddesses.