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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Ruby
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The weapon in the giant’s hand was an axe.
He was holding an axe as enormous as his massive body.
Kwang!!
The giant’s right foot stomped on the prison floor.
The soldiers around finally noticed the presence of Yuma’s group.
“Wh-what’s this?”
“Intruders!”
Kidnapping, imprisonment.
These were forces that had aided in carrying out illegal acts.
Even if Yuma revealed his identity now, they wouldn’t easily surrender.
And it didn’t seem like words would get through to the drooling giant in front of him now.
Yuma stood before the giant.
“Grrrr!”
“Morton!! Kill them all! There’s no enemy you can’t kill!!”
A shout from a man behind the giant echoed.
The giant’s name seemed to be Morton.
‘He is strong.’
Yuma directly observed Morton with his Search Eye.
‘Dragon.’
This confirmed that the being occupying Count Rubelt’s body was indeed a dragon.
“Grrrr…”
Drooling and glaring at Yuma, as soon as Yuma stepped on the stairs, Morton—
“Kwaaaaaaak!”
With red energy flowing all over his body, he lunged at Yuma.
Morton’s arm rose high.
Then it plunged straight down.
The axe, wrapped in red energy, fell ferociously.
Its trajectory oppressively cut through the air.
Kwaaaaaaa!
Yuma gripped [Black Dragon Bernak’s Fang] in reverse.
And he carefully observed the end of the axe’s trajectory with his eyes.
The exact center point of the axe blade.
That was the ‘parrying point’.
He accurately identified that point with his [Ultra Focus] skill.
And he swung the short sword held in reverse.
Jjjjjjjeong!!
A circular golden impact burst out, indicating a successful parry.
Yuma felt a tingling pain bloom in his arm.
But.
He doesn’t fall.
The red flash that burst from [Black Dragon Bernak’s Fang] completely swept over Morton’s upper body, including his head.
Morton’s two legs, which had been standing firmly, collapsed.
Ku-ung
It was instant death.
The faces of the soldiers who had been relying on Morton stiffened completely.
Yuma scanned the faces of the soldiers who had walked forward with his eyes.
With his Search Eye activated.
The highest was only 65.
Yuma looked at Hestia and Cloney.
“Don’t show mercy in your actions. It’s important to subdue them completely.”
Cloney nodded her head firmly with a determined face.
Hestia dashed forward the moment Yuma finished speaking.
It seemed to be a foregone conclusion that these were indeed the people who had aided in kidnapping her beloved brother.
Even without Yuma’s words, Hestia wouldn’t have shown mercy in her actions.
Hestia’s body charged fiercely.
She swung the sword [Full Moon’s Kiseteria] that she had received from Yuma without hesitation towards the soldiers.
Cloney held her staff and shot out lightning.
It was magic supporting Hestia, the swordswoman with Sword Master-level talent who was charging ahead.
Chwaaaak!
“Kuaaaak!”
Hestia, who had struck fiercely, slashed diagonally across the upper bodies of two soldiers standing blankly.
Cloney dropped lightning on the heads of enemies rushing towards Hestia.
Blood splattered and sprayed on the walls.
Behind the two quickly neutralizing the enemies, one more figure followed.
It was Knight Murphy.
His sense of justice, which had been suppressed by realistic circumstances, was rising again.
‘I knew it!’
It was his first time directly facing this prison.
But he had heard from senior knights and knew.
That these were innocent children who had been captured without any crime.
The fact that the count had vaguely overlooked such things meant that the count could be the mastermind behind this.
Murphy had already sensed it. He just couldn’t step forward.
Because he was afraid.
But seeing the children behind the iron bars filled him with an intense sense of guilt.
And to overcome that guilt, he had to get his hands bloody.
Murphy subdued the soldiers alongside Hestia.
It was a battle crossing diagonal lines.
They had taken the lives of 8 people. 10 were bound.
Click!
Yuma, and the blonde noble lady of the count’s family, Luine, opened the doors of the prison rooms with the key that had been hanging from the pocket of the man who was the jailer.
Inside were boys and girls.
And a few adult men and women were also tied up.
The missing people who had disappeared from the count’s territory.
“…My brother Kaisen isn’t here. We might need to go down to the basement.”
Luine untied the children’s restraints and tried to calm the children who were trembling in anxiety, but couldn’t hide her gloomy emotions.
Hestia opened the door of the fourth prison room.
Then a loud cry burst from Hestia’s mouth.
“Haruk…!!”
She had finally found the brother she had been searching for for days.
“Sister!”
Haruk, with his brown hair flying, fell into Hestia’s arms.
Hestia patted Haruk with tears in her eyes.
“I thought you were dead!”
After visually confirming that Hestia had found Haruk, whom she had been looking for, Yuma moved towards the dark stairs leading underground with Luine.
In the underground prison, a young man with blonde hair was sitting in a chair.
Perhaps out of consideration for keeping him underground, the environment looked more like a room than a prison.
Of course, long iron chains were still attached to his ankles as restraints.
The young man, Kaisen, had to squint his eyes at the bright light seeping in from the suddenly opened ceiling door.
“Brother!”
Luine quickly ran towards Kaisen.
“…Luine?”
Kaisen, the eldest son of the Rubelt Count family, widened his eyes as he recognized the face of his youngest sister.
“Eldest son of the Rubelt Count family, Kaisen.”
Kaisen noticed that there was a man behind Luine.
Yuma took out the golden token signifying his role as the 1st Princess Bridgette’s proxy from his bosom and placed it on the desk.
“I am Yuma, proxy of the 1st Princess Bridgette.”
“The proxy of Her Highness the 1st Princess…?”
‘He doesn’t know me.’
Well, if he had been stuck here continuously for several months, it would have been stranger if he did know about him.
“Tell me what you came to know that got you locked up in this unidentified prison.”
Kaisen looked at Luine.
It was a gaze asking if she knew what kind of person Yuma was.
“He is indeed officially appointed by Her Highness the 1st Princess. He has already achieved results in driving out corrupt forces from a village.”
“…I see, Luine.”
The 22-year-old young man, Kaisen, stroked the hair of his young sister.
Kaisen knelt on his right knee and showed courtesy.
It was courtesy towards the proxy of Her Highness the 1st Princess.
“I apologize for not recognizing you.”
“How could you know, being locked up in a place like this. Just answer the question.”
Kaisen, rising to his feet, opened his dry mouth again.
“My direct knight, who was scouting the mountainous areas of the count’s territory, informed me. He said he saw a dragon… A pitch-black dragon with bright red eyes, chewing and eating a woman.”
Kaisen continued speaking while sweating profusely.
“He told me with a face drained of all color. And then… he died. Suddenly at night.They said he had an affair with a senior knight’s wife, and the enraged senior knight slit his throat.”
Kaisen slowly shook his head.
“My knight wasn’t that kind of person. He was a knight who pathologically tried to maintain his moral standards.”
Kaisen recalled what happened next.
“So I went to see my father, Count Rubelt. Because the disappearances happening in the count’s territory and the scene my knight had witnessed connected in my mind.”
It was quite a rational deduction.
Going to see the count wasn’t a strange decision either.
From Kaisen’s position, he couldn’t have known that Count Rubelt’s mind had already been taken over by that dragon.
“But when I brought up these questions, my father’s demeanor suddenly changed. As if… a different person’s soul had possessed him… And he ordered me to be confined. When I lost consciousness and opened my eyes, I was here. I heard the low voices of children every time the guards opened the ceiling door to bring meals. Because of those voices, I came to know.”
Kaisen gritted his teeth.
“So I became certain. The disappearances in the count’s territory. And the man-eating dragon… That these things were directly connected to my father, Count Rubelt.”
Yuma nodded.
“Your deduction is correct. It’s highly likely that the one who has taken over your father, Count Rubelt’s mind, is a dragon. The chewing and eating of people is either just a desire for slaughter or a means of prolonging life.”
Yuma didn’t find the existence of such a dragon particularly surprising.
After all, several such dragons had appeared in [Loop Blood] as well.
And the fate of those whose minds were devoured by such dragons wasn’t very good.
Yuma intuitively felt that Count Rubelt would meet a similar fate.
“I’m going to drive out the current Count Rubelt. That will be the first step to resolving this situation. Whether you immediately take over the count’s position or not, that’s not an important issue to me.”
After quickly organizing his thoughts, Yuma told Kaisen his conclusion.
“The most effective way to drive out the current Count Rubelt is your testimony as the eldest son. And there are also eyewitnesses upstairs.”
The children who were imprisoned here.
Those children will be witnesses to the count’s atrocities.
“Tomorrow morning, as soon as dawn breaks, we’ll go up to the count’s castle.”
A frontal assault.
That’s what Yuma was planning to do.
‘If he’s cornered, he’ll break out of his nest.’
If we shatter the results he has achieved, the dragon will break out of its nest.
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