Chapter 364: Another Encounter

That night was unusually long.

Compared to the desolation all around, they were inside a relatively luxurious building. The originally abandoned fireplace had been cleaned out, pre-stocked firewood stuffed in. Firelight wavered, constantly driving back the cold of night.

But Seviel didn’t feel any warmth at all.

Not to mention the stench of unknown origin around them—enough to make her want to vomit up last night’s leftovers—the thing that made her feel chilled through... was the monster.

It was right nearby.

The huge monster looked as if it were woven and twisted from pure muscle; its skinless body was laid bare and bloody. Several anaconda-like arms served as tentacles; other arms flailed about, gripping all sorts of rusty weapons stained with black blood.

It was hard to describe the monster’s form. It was like a coiled serpent, but its serpentine body had sprouted so many thick, nauseating limbs. At the very top, two heads on disturbingly long necks protruded, smiling in bliss, swaying as they looked in different directions.

Seviel knew how strong this monster was. She had already fought it for more than ten minutes.

And yet...

She lowered her head, looking at her slightly trembling palm and the demonblade smeared with blood.

In those ten minutes, she had clearly left no fewer than a hundred wounds on the monster... and yet now it was still as if unscathed, staring at her with a predator’s gaze.

Those wounds were healing at a speed visible to the naked eye.

The magic affixed to the demonblade had no effect.

And...

Seviel let out a long breath, constantly mustering the mana and battle-aura within her.

A certain chill within was ceaselessly eroding her body; she felt that if she didn’t spare the focus to resist it, she might become something she absolutely could not accept.

In short, crisis upon crisis.

“But it’s not time to despair yet.”

After only a brief respite, Seviel planted her sword and forced herself to straighten her back.

Yes, it wasn’t over. She wasn’t fighting alone. She still had...

“So hungry...”

“Heehee, so hungry...”

“Really want to eat...”

The monster suddenly uttered grating mutters—but this time with a genuine joy absent before.

A fleshy cord that had snaked up from the floor—now rubble—suddenly retracted. At the end of that cord... hung a person.

A living person.

Seviel’s eyes flew wide; her trembling pupils reflected that person’s face.

She knew that person.

Of course she knew that person.

Because that was her companion—the one hiding in the dark, ready at any time to surprise-attack the monster.

Her only remaining companion.

“Sorry, Seviel.”

The man spat a mouthful of blood, glanced at the hole through his body, then raised his head to meet Seviel’s eyes, smiling miserably:

“You’ll have to handle the rest alone.”

A small magic scroll slipped from him; a faint glow flared, and the man vanished on the spot.

Falling with it was also a spell, which slammed into one of the monster’s heads and tore it into bloody fragments.

“Bastard!”

Seviel’s eyes instantly reddened.

She hadn’t expected her always-reliable companion to get knocked out so easily.

“Saying stuff like ‘if we do well this time, I’ll confess to you,’ and then you get eliminated this fast—what kind of man is that?”

“Even a confession you hide and tuck away; you think I didn’t know? Coward!”

“Damn it, damn it, damn it!”

After a string of curses, Seviel no longer had time to think about any of that.

Because the head blown off the monster had practically regrown in an instant.

Dazedly staring at its now-empty fleshy cord, it first showed confusion—then sudden rage.

“Hungry...”

“So hungry!”

The monster roared. The man’s magic hadn’t hindered it at all—if anything, it had made it even more frenzied!

Its thick limbs swung; muscles writhed; the rusty weapons—like torture devices you’d only see in books—rushed in at their prey, trailed by cold and stench.

Ding.

Ding.

Ding.

Steel clashed.

Seviel was like a tiny boat in a storm, struggling to withstand the monster’s assault.

What do I do?

Despair crept into her thoughts.

By herself, she absolutely could not defeat this monster.

As for help...

No—there might still be help.

Seviel’s eyes slid sideways, glancing to another spot not far off.

There, too, a fierce battle was raging—but compared to here, their state was slightly better. At least it looked like they still had some spare strength.

Ask them for help?

No, impossible.

Because those people... were enemies.

Seviel thought with a stab of hatred.

As elites of the Kingdom of Saint Pedro National Magic Academy, even facing such a terrifying monster, they shouldn’t have been this pathetic.

But earlier they had been fighting their nation’s mortal enemies—the savages from the Empire of Leopold’s Saint Maria Academy.

In the middle of battle, these monsters suddenly ambushed them. Caught completely off guard, both sides suffered catastrophic losses, ending up like this.

“Damn it, is this fate?”

Saint Pedro and Leopold were neighboring countries, constantly clashing along their border.

But due to the difference in national strength, Saint Pedro was basically suppressed in every international arena.

The two academies, academically, also had an old feud. They had thought the people sent this time weren’t as outstanding as expected—surely a great chance to lift their heads high—but who could have thought...

“Forget it.”

In despair, Seviel’s demonblade flared bright. She readied her last ounce of strength to unleash a final strike.

She lifted her head proudly and gave a tragically beautiful smile:

“At least I fought to the last moment myself—and I wasn’t saved by the enemy. That way I won’t shame my academy and my country...”

Boom—

Before the words were finished, a thunderous blast rang out, drowning even the monster’s roar.

Seviel and the monster both halted their attacks, blankly raising their heads toward the source of the sound.

The ceiling blew open.

Moonlight poured down—chill and desolate.

A golden-haired man descended from the sky. The night wind tousled short hair clearly styled by a top-tier barber. The moon high above became his backlight, tracing a cold halo around him.

Just his profile alone—its lines so perfect it felt sketched by the Goddess—made Seviel, heart pounding from battle, suddenly freeze for an instant.

“So handsome.”

In that brief daze, the man was already above the monster’s heads.

He lowered his eyes to the hideous creature; his gaze was calm as he murmured softly:

“Ninth one.”

With that, the pure white twin blades in his hands traced arcs more perfect than the moon, and the monster’s two fine heads thudded to the ground.

“Roooar—”

The monster finally reacted. The fallen heads were still roaring—blissful of expression, furious of gaze.

Muscles like giant serpents surged. Thick limbs clenched their rusty weapons and, heedless of injuring themselves, snapped back in a sudden coil.

“Careful!”

Seviel couldn’t help but cry out—because at this moment Muen looked like a little white mouse fallen into a nest of snakes, about to be devoured at any time.

But Muen merely glanced at Seviel, his eyes still calm.

He spoke, as if repeating it countless times already, calling softly and skillfully:

“Liya.”

Moonlight was once more veiled, casting a vast shadow.

A girl of exquisite, lovely features—enough to move even a woman’s heart—stood beneath the moonlight.

The night wind fluttered her long skirt. Even though beneath the hem lurked those accursed leggings, her figure was still so perfect it left no room for nitpicking.

She extended a finger and pointed down.

Dark metal plates fell upon those thrashing limbs.

Then, they pressed down hard.

Starlike points of light bloomed on the plates, sketching out esoteric lines in an instant.

“That’s... a magic array?”

Seviel’s eyes nearly popped.

A Multi-Magic United Matrix, commonly called a magic array.

As the name suggests, it links multiple spells together in a special way to achieve effects a single spell cannot.

Generally it’s used to set up barriers, construct rites, enhance weapons, or make traps.

But in actual combat, very few people use it directly.

Because of its complexity, setting it up often takes far longer than ordinary spells.

Yet at this moment, Seviel felt as if all her magic classes had been fake.

An array so complex it bordered on dizzying was constructed in an instant—and what flowed within wasn’t just mana, but also...

Holy Light.

“Ah—aaah!”

The monster’s roar turned into a scream.

All its thick limbs were nailed into the ground, unable to move. The hiss of burning crackled across its body. Every inch of its flesh convulsed and struggled—you could imagine the pain it was suffering.

And the golden-haired man stamped down, crushing the monster’s newly sprouted head—and its scream—back into the floor, as if disliking the grating sound.

Right after, he tightened his grip on the pure white twin blades—and cut.

Cut.

Cut.

Cut.

In that moment, Seviel couldn’t begin to count how many times the man swung, how many times he struck.

All she could see was the monster’s flesh torn before it could regenerate, ripped and seared by those razor edges.

The spattered blood couldn’t even stain the man’s perfect profile or his expensive clothes—because it simply could not pass through the tight lattice of blade-light that even water couldn’t penetrate.

Another {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} full moon rose.

A crimson moon—built of blade-light and blood.

...

...

“Please... rest in peace.”

Under sacred motes of light, another pained, broken soul was purified; another filament of light appeared within Liya’s crystal.

Seviel stared blankly at all of this, then turned to look at the man who had remained by her side.

Only after her soul had steadied from that earlier shock did Seviel finally recognize the man’s identity.

The Empire of Leopold, son of Duke Campbell—Muen Campbell!

It was actually him!

The “soft persimmon” in the intel—the “little lamb”!

As a citizen of a neighbor of Leopold, Seviel had access to more information than most.

She knew who he was, and knew all about his experiences.

Precisely because of that, she found it hard to believe.

Among the kingdom’s younger generation, there had always been one existence everyone regarded as a rival—and yet despaired of catching up to.

The Empire’s Ice Snow Witch, that almost perfect third Imperial Princess blessed by the Gods.

And that Princess, they’d always said, had a not-so-impressive fiancé—something they used as consolation, even as a secret source of gloating relief.

Now she realized this “not-so-impressive” fiancé was... this strong?

This is the little lamb?

Have you ever seen a little lamb go “huff-huff” and casually butcher a lion?

Is this really that tabloid playboy who had a foot on who knows how many boats, wouldn’t even spare his own teacher, and looked like he might get stabbed to death by the Princess at any moment?

Gossip ruined me!

Seviel took a deep breath.

Although she had only seen him in that hall not long ago, for caution’s sake, she still had to confirm it again.

She patted the dust from her clothes, smoothed the creases of her dress, and took out a small mirror to fix her hair.

Even if she’d been saved, they were enemies on the national stage. Even if he was strong, gifted, and handsome, strikingly handsome, handsome again—

She absolutely couldn’t lose her momentum!

“Um...”

Seviel pocketed the mirror, looked at Muen, and asked shyly:

“Hello, thank you for saving me. To be safe, may I ask your name and... and your sound-transmission stone frequency? So I can repay you...”

“Liya Angel.”

“Eh?”

“My name is Liya Angel.”

Appearing before Seviel as if by teleportation, Liya extended her hand with a smile:

“And you are?”

“Se... Seviel.”

“Ah, Miss Seviel—that’s such a lovely name.”

Liya seized Seviel’s hand and shook it vigorously, her smile gentle:

“But there’s no need to thank us. As a Saintess candidate, helping others is only right. My Knight will be happy about it too, so set your mind at ease.”

“...Oh. Oh, okay—I’m very at ease.”

Seviel’s mouth twitched.

She kept feeling the Saintess candidate didn’t mean “set your mind at ease,” but “give up.”

A little scary.

...

“You two chat first. I’ll go help Senior Fanny over there.”

Seeing Liya looking so cute, Muen couldn’t help but be a little amused.

But now wasn’t the time to calculate a girl’s cuteness. He’d been paying attention to the other side ever since earlier—he simply hadn’t gone because he didn’t want to leave Liya alone while she was purifying the soul.

Over there, though the battle looked relatively stable and Senior Fanny faintly held the upper hand, still...

“Senior Fanny, why are there only two of you?”

A few minutes later, Muen flicked the blood from his blades and looked gravely at Senior Fanny, whose hair was a little disheveled but who wasn’t particularly bedraggled.

Behind her, the merchant-guild president’s daughter—Vicki—was pale, apparently still not adapted to the horror of the scene.

To one raised in comfort, the blood and stench were a waking nightmare.

As for Marshall and Aaron, who should have been with Senior Fanny, Muen hadn’t seen a trace.

“Marshall and Aaron were eliminated.”

Fanny’s face was solemn; she gave a bitter smile:

“We were ambushed. Those two didn’t even have time to react before they were injured badly enough to trigger their Magic Scrolls and got teleported out.”

“At least their lives should be safe.”

“Ambushed...”

Muen thought of that first moment when they’d encountered a monster.

If he hadn’t reacted quickly back then, Liya might well have been ambushed.

After all, before those monsters appeared, no one would have thought this so-called Golden Nation would be in this ghostly state.

Damn Church—their pit was as deep as expected.

Muen closed his eyes once, then opened them.

“Even if it was an ambush, both of them wouldn’t go down at the same time. What else did you run into?”

“When we were ambushed, we were in the middle of fighting them.”

Fanny lifted her chin, indicating Seviel over there.

“They were ambushed too—and worse than us. They were also down to two... mm, now down to one.”

“Fighting at a time like this doesn’t sound like your steady style, Senior.”

“Had no choice.”

Fanny’s bitter smile deepened:

“We entered this town earlier than most, so we scouted ahead. We found this building that was clearly different from the others—more luxurious. We thought it might be the residence or workplace of someone like the town chief.”

“Maybe a rich man?”

“In a place where you don’t even need to farm, where would an objective ‘rich man’ come from?” Fanny shook her head.

“True.”

“While searching here, we ran into them—and then we started fighting.”

“So...”

Muen’s expression tightened:

“You found something?”

“Mm.”

Fanny pointed at Seviel:

“It’s with her.”