The spear aims for the lower body.
Judas swings the shield down and misses.
The sword targets the head.
Bow your head.
Again, another sword aims for the body.
Using the shield, he pivots on the ground to dodge.
He’s starting to hit his limits.
His muscles ache like they’re going to tear.
Breath is heavy.
Sweat runs down his face, obstructing his vision, making him wipe it away repeatedly.
‘This can’t be happening….’
He can’t lose.
Even if he loses, he doesn’t need a result saying he did his best.
Only victory and survival hold any value.
But reality never works that way.
A mace comes flying like a siege weapon.
He raised his shield.
“Ugh…!”
He should’ve let it go, but he failed.
His arm feels numb.
In that moment of hesitation, the survival expert warned from behind.
There aren’t any enemies behind.
In that case.
‘Magic…!’
Aside from elite fighters capable of close combat, the wizards are waiting from afar.
One of them is definitely ready.
It’s too late to dodge.
As he hesitates, dozens charge again.
The enchantment on his armor has worn off.
He can’t defend.
So.
‘It connects.’
If he can evade and avoid a fatal blow, he could fight again.
At that moment of decision.
– Thunk!
He hears the sound of something embedding into his flesh.
With a yelp, a beastly cry follows behind.
‘…!’
Judas avoids and deflects incoming weapons in succession.
When he turned around, someone was slashing down with a sword diagonally.
He lowers his waist to barely evade and strikes their leg.
With a sickening thud! their knee is severed.
Their upper body sways in the air.
He lunges forward, feeling blood and guts spill onto him.
“Kiiing….”
Yuel is trembling after getting hit by a sharp ice spear in the backside.
“……”
There wasn’t time to hesitate.
Judas uses his sword like a shovel to dig into the ground.
The rocky ground rises, creating a wall.
It shields him from the enemy and Judas.
It’s not a wall that can hold out long.
It’s enough to buy time for Yuel to escape.
Fortunately, Yuel’s wound isn’t deep.
He’ll hobble a bit, but he can run away.
“Go.”
Yuel looks up at him with anxious eyes.
Every moment counts.
He needs to get her off the battlefield quickly.
Judas speaks as calmly as possible, in a reassuring tone.
Thinking it might be the last time, he gently pats Yuel’s head.
“Go, and bring back someone to help. That’s all. Got it?”
Yuel struggles to stand and reluctantly leaves him.
He has no time to watch Yuel retreat.
The rock wall crumbles.
It breaks apart from a single point, and a platinum knight comes crashing through.
They thrust a spear at him.
Judas deflects the sword vertically, then counterattacks.
The platinum armor stains red, split asunder.
Just as he tries to move forward.
“…!”
His feet are stuck.
He’s caught by a giant root sprouting from the ground.
It’s a restraint spell.
The next royal guard charges.
The sword drops.
In the moment he blocks with his shield, the guard raises a hand on the opposite side.
A dagger, held in reverse grip.
He twists his upper body, but there’s no angle to evade.
It aims straight for his face.
The tip glistens as it strikes.
– Pooch!
Pain erupts as blood splatters across his face.
But Judas doesn’t die.
Those who witness it feel an overwhelming dread.
His unwavering determination bordered on madness.
“What the….”
The dagger pierced through Judas’s cheek, reaching the other side.
He opens his mouth to avoid a fatal injury.
In other words, it merely punctured his cheek.
The royal guard tries to pull the dagger out, but it won’t budge.
Judas is biting down on it fiercely.
The guard, seeing him glaring back with the dagger still lodged in his face, is paralyzed by incomprehensible fear.
His body freezes.
Though his face is impaled, Judas feels neither fear nor pain.
After watching helplessly as Elijah crumbled due to someone else’s unknown past, he felt all sensation fade.
The long-simmering anger began to flare up when he saw Yuel getting hurt.
He was on the brink of losing his mind.
With the dagger clenched between his teeth, he gripped his remaining sword tightly and lunged.
He thrust it into the guard, twisting and pulling it out.
The guard’s upper body split in half at the waist, falling apart.
“This scum can’t be allowed to leave….”
His face, drenched in crimson.
His golden eyes glinted with malice.
He looked feral, like a beast in rage.
“I can’t let you… go to the lady….”
Judas staunchly spoke while leaning on his sword.
Even with fatigue and wounds, his spirit remained menacing.
“I guess I have to chip in as well.”
Geist was preparing a spell.
“We’re bound now. Unleash the magic sequentially.”
If allies get caught in it, they’ll just have to bear it.
They’re that dangerous.
Judas barely clings to his fading consciousness.
He looks at the enemies.
‘I can’t die….’
Enemies charge from all directions.
His feet are bound.
He sees the wizards preparing something.
Because Elijah had tried to read his memory, he can’t use the discovery of revelation.
He has no means to defend against magic.
‘The full moon….’
Before he knew it, night had fallen.
The full moon hung high in the night sky.
It felt like the technique he could only perform when the moon he held was complete, and when he captured its pupils.
In the slowed perception, he thinks.
The epiphany comes like rain slowly soaking clothes.
Like a watercolor painting bleeding, it slowly approaches.
At the moment of growth, he felt neither joy nor excitement.
He just wanted to kill the enemies quickly, again and again, to go back to Elijah’s side.
They have to face each other.
He wanted to apologize for the things left unspoken.
This was merely a means and process to return to her.
‘The sword energy is a line.’
The sword energy spun together with his mana is a very thin line.
‘If you draw that line numerous times, it turns into a surface.’
If fired without gaps, the sword energy could form a hemispherical surface.
Could it be possible?
He doesn’t know.
Until now, he’s never executed it successfully.
He should have, if he needed to.
It isn’t much different now.
Countless weapons from the royal guards rush toward him.
Giant rocks starting to fall from the sky, lightning, flames, ice, and more.
A barrage of magic attacks.
He’ll erase them all at once.
Judas plunges his shield into the ground and grips his sword with both hands.
He’s not cutting objects, but space.
Like he’s slicing through the sky, he arcs the sword upwards.
– Slash.
Even before the enemy’s attack reaches him, his movement is complete.
Spears and swords.
And a multitude of magic descends simultaneously.
Just as it’s about to crush him like a bombardment.
An ivory light bursts outward around him.
It pushes away the ground as it advances.
The royal guards’ weapons that touched the light shatter, their armors tear apart, and their bodies disintegrate.
The boulders are crushed, the flames and lightning scatter, and the ice disintegrates and explodes.
All magic is nullified.
Even after obliterating the enemies, the light continues to push forward.
It resembled a moon suspended above the ground.
The captain of the royal guards wanted to applaud.
‘Using sword energy as a surface.’
That hemispherical light was created without gaps using countless sword energies.
It’s no surprise that one’s body would crumble upon contact.
For a moment, the ground trembles with sword energy.
A yellow sun rises in that very spot and engulfs Judas.
“Hooh.”
The captain of the royal guards marveled.
“Is this the sun that imitated Elijah’s magic?”
Some geniuses surge ahead of everyone else, greatly impacting countless people related to their endeavors.
Elijah was one such genius among geniuses, and Geist was another genius influenced by her.
He had watched Elijah’s magic and sparred with her several times.
And he finally succeeded in imitating it.
Though it’s far weaker than the original master’s magic.
“I wonder if I’ll get called to action.”
“Don’t let your guard down. It won’t end here.”
“Hm. All remaining royal guards forward. We’ll respond if they break through. I’ll join too.”
At that moment when Judas was engulfed by the sun, he held his breath.
‘Elijah?!’
It can’t be.
Elijah can’t use magic right now.
This is an imitation of Elijah’s magic.
Though he was immune to fire, this space had been fully enveloped by magic.
There’s no air to breathe.
He hurriedly dashed outward.
When he burst out of the sun, a royal guard was approaching right in front of him.
They swung their weapons as if they’d been waiting in unison.
“!”
His reflexes were animalistic.
He swung his sword sharply, creating a crescent-like blade that sliced through the royal guard’s body.
As their body split and blood spurted, someone charged right at him.
It was the captain of the royal guards.
“Remarkable indeed.”
A massive zweihander crashed down.
He barely managed to block it.
“Gah-!”
Even blocking didn’t stop the attack.
He lost his shield and fell backward.
– Skreee….
He managed to stop himself by stabbing the sword into the ground and shakily stood up.
The captain of the royal guards charged again with his zweihander raised.
He bid farewell.
“With respect to your loyalty.”
In that moment, the survival expert sounded a warning from behind.
Geist’s magic was completed.
A massive ice spear aimed to crush him was launched.
Evasion was impossible.
Judas gritted his teeth.
‘If I’m going to die anyway….’
I’ll take one of you with me.
He charged at the captain of the royal guards with the resolve to die.
He never expected to see flashing memories.
Elijah’s face danced vividly before his eyes.
A woman he had been with for five years.
This farewell might just be the real thing.
“Elijah… I’m sorry.”
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