I can feel the heartbeat of life approaching from all directions.
While pushing against the knight clad in splendid armor, I didn’t even look back at the ambush happening from the sides. The blood I had left floating behind me moved and blocked it.
Two humans, swept away by the red wave, were shredded in an instant, their bodies becoming a mess.
As the two heartbeats faded away, the liquid that constituted their lives succumbed to my will and attacked my fellow humans.
‘…My head hurts.’
While it was a much smaller scale compared to what I used when I smashed the castle gate, constantly moving my body while simultaneously controlling the same amount of blood left me with a sensation in my head that felt like it was snapping.
Could it be because the battle was far fiercer and longer than expected?
I was now paying the price for judging that it would be better to just end things rather than waste time saving my strength.
Of course, it was also true that I had pushed myself a little too far to get here, but there was no remedy for my throbbing head and my body that kept drooping like waterlogged cotton.
“Foolish knight. You stake your life on an honor that won’t be rewarded. How pitiful.”
Though I felt like cold sweat was pouring down and I might pass out at any moment, my voice entering my ears was calm, without so much as a quickened breath.
Who would have thought that the training I did with Stella back at Iron Grave would help me in this way?
My experience of fighting with Stella until my regeneration was completely depleted, challenging myself to exceed the limits of my kind while controlling my bloodsucking urges, ensured that no matter how exhausted my body and mind were, it would never show on the outside.
That was fortunate. I couldn’t show weakness in front of the vampires who followed me.
To the humans, I must have looked like an absurd being who neither tired nor ceased to unleashing attacks.
Indeed, the face of the knight, who had fiercely resisted me even after losing his left hand, contorted in shock.
“No! The struggle of warriors is never—”
“Is it not meaningless? That’s quite the uplifting news. Now you have an excuse to die peacefully.”
The knight’s sword shook again, as if he felt pricked by that remark and was hastily trying to defend himself.
At best, it was a brief and feeble hesitation of a second or so. But in the fight of the strong, that short moment could spell life or death.
I used dark magic to conjure an illusion of myself overlapping just a fist’s distance in front of me.
The target of my hallucination was the nameless knight.
In terms of sword skills, excluding the strongest knights I fought when I briefly clashed against the allied forces, he was among the best humans I had encountered, rare to find with the smell of blood around.
And ordinarily, such a strong human wouldn’t fall prey to simple illusion magic without divine magic aiding him.
But can even the strongest of humans be absolutely flawless in mind?
Right now, I had the conviction that it was possible.
Perhaps it was due to the repeated deaths of his comrades and the fear that, on the outside, seemed to overwhelmingly loom over me. The knight swung his sword a moment too early and failed to notice the overlapping illusion.
“What?!”
As his sword swung past my illusion just a fist’s distance away, the knight’s eyes widened in shock and confusion as he sensed something amiss.
A fatal opening created by one missed strike.
I quickly closed the distance and slipped my hand between the knight’s crossed arms, protecting his torso.
The tip of my fingers met the hard nape of his neck, slipped through the joint between his helmet and armor.
“Gah!”
With a swift motion, I pierced the knight’s neck with my hand, simultaneously jarring the trajectory of the sword that had been aimed at my heart.
Ignoring the pain from my left shoulder, I gripped the neck of the fiercely resisting knight.
Crack, I felt the spine break along with the tendons.
With the pungent and fragrant smell and the throbbing headache subsiding, his eyes rolled back to reveal pupils dilated and devoid of light as they revealed the truth beneath his dislodged helmet.
Thud, I caught the knight’s collapsing body with mine.
I was thirsty. Up until now, I had struggled to suppress my bloodsucking urges, but my now fatigued body was craving quality blood like never before.
“Avenger of the Dukedom!!”
Some knights shouted rudely, trying to interrupt my meal.
But right now, I didn’t have the time to deal with them.
I manipulated the blood pooling on the ground to ensnare the knight’s ankles.
At the moment his gaze flicked down, a single drop of blood shot forth from my fingertip and swiftly pierced his throat.
The enemies visibly hesitated.
Perhaps they finally realized it was meaningless resistance.
I swiftly cut down the kingdom’s soldiers crowding toward me while sensing the presences of Plona and Eleonora drawing closer, preparing to start my meal to soothe my weary body and mind.
*
Even amidst the chaotic battlefield, news of the defeat and death of the captain of the royal guard spread quickly.
And at least within the Bertica Kingdom, the fact that the strongest knight, who held symbolic importance, was overwhelmed and crushed without even putting up a real fight was enough to break the spirit of those desperately resisting.
The balance that the royal army had been struggling to maintain with a fearlessness toward death began to crumble in an instant.
With each punch thrown by Martini and Jeil, the vampires advanced step by step.
As soon as Plona and Eleonora entered the castle, they completely eliminated the archers and wizards left on the castle wall, leaving the royal army with no hope of a two-sided pincer attack.
Most of the few holy knights had fallen long ago.
Only the priests, who deployed divine magic to weaken dark magic in the area, remained as the last variable for the royal army. However—
“I found it.”
From the neatly cleaned castle wall, Lavina jumped around, surveying the battlefield from various angles, and a triumphant smile spread across her face.
Considering the slight decrease in efficiency, the priests had split into two and were constantly moving around.
Half had been dealt with, and the remaining half had finally come into Lavina’s sight.
“I won’t let it go!”
Without hesitation, her hand drew back the bowstring.
The fine platinum hair fluttered in the gentle breeze created by the wind spirits.
She concentrated.
Instead of creating a noisy storm that blows away everything in its path, she refined an orderly wind that could quietly fly and only tear apart objects once it was near the target.
The moment her fluttering hair stilled, an arrow was loosed from Lavina’s hand.
Whoosh!!
A brief silence was transformed by the winds into a heavy boom as it flew away.
With a scream of pain erupting, the dim light that had been hovering over the battlefield vanished, and the darkness of night returned.
The delicate balance that had been barely maintained quickly crumbled.
The vampire forces advanced, trampling over the fallen human corpses.
“Don’t fall back!! If we retreat, our families, our friends, our loved ones will be devoured by vampires!!!”
Amidst a significant number of desertions from the royal army, someone shouted.
A desperate yet resolute tone.
Despite the evident fear lacing their voices, the courageous shout that rose up as if to say “listen” almost kindled the dying ember of bravery in the hearts of the royal army.
“Indeed. Please fight hard against us.”
Thud, the already implanted fear chilled the boiling courage.
The soldiers’ gazes converged on one spot. There stood Aria, having taken a brief meal and in a calm demeanor, confidently standing back to normal.
“Your meaningless resistance is just what we need to adorn the climax of this hunt.”
Aria threw something from her hands at the soldiers.
Thwack, splash.
Nearby soldiers instinctively flinched, but nothing happened.
The soldiers, reading the atmosphere, soon realized that the object thrown by Aria was a resplendent helmet.
It was a magnificent helmet adorned with decorations permitted only for the foremost knight of the Bertica Kingdom, the captain of the royal guard.
The expressions of the humans, who had mustered their courage, became twisted.
Eyes hastily fleeing from the helmet, a reminder of defeat, making it so that they couldn’t contemplate why the thrown helmet landed with a heavy thud without rolling on the ground.
“It’s our victory.”
With Aria’s declaration, the blood that had filled the helmet erupted in all directions, sweeping over the nearby area.
Cheers erupted from the vampires, screams from the humans.
A one-sided massacre began. The unwavering courage and resolute determination turned to dust and disappeared.
As the long night came to an end, at the dawn of a new day, there were no living humans to be seen except for the captured prisoners at Beliar’s final defense line.
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