Chapter 339
Chapter 339. The Holy Grail of Revenge (1)
Caesar’s powerful golden aura completely severed the demon’s right foreleg. He felt a rush of adrenaline, finally freed from the painful sensation of vomiting blood that he had endured until just now. He felt as if he could get drunk on this sensation, that made it seem as if he could fight for a few days.
-Kiiiieeeeehhh!
The demon writhed in pain and shot the thorns on its back in all directions. Caesar swung his sword to create a huge gust of sword wind and deflected the thorns.
Rationally, it was clear that his entire self would burn at the end of the Dance of the Fireflies. He knew at least that he wouldn’t last a very long time.
The demon’s recovery was abnormal. New bones and flesh were already sprouting from the severed leg stump and growing back.
Intuitively, Caesar realized that out of anyone here, he alone could kill that demon.
-Stop! If you stop now, you can still live on somehow!
Arwen stopped Caesar. If he used only one attack, Hillis could still save him.
But Caesar shook his head. Even if he hadn’t used the Dance of the Fireflies, considering the unfavorable battle situation, it was clear that Bloody would have used the Dance of the Fireflies instead. In order to hold out until the support of the Butterfly and Crow tribes arrived, someone had to die anyway.
"No, I can’t live." Caesar smiled at Arwen. If he didn’t go all out right now, even Arwen and Hillis’s safety couldn’t be guaranteed. Furthermore, the safety of his colleagues and boarding house friends, whom he had stayed with in the capital, would also be in danger.
"It seems I had more than I thought." Caesar laughed cheerfully. "I’ll cut it into as many pieces as I can!"
Even if he couldn’t kill it, even if he fell, he had to at least keep the demon from moving for a while... So that no one else would die or get hurt other than himself.
Caesar began running once again with all his might, jumping high above the demon’s head.
The demon shot its tongue at Caesar, the one who had severed its leg. Its tongue moved so fast it didn’t even leave an afterimage. However, Caesar shot out a strong aura blast, tracking the tongue with his eyes. The tongue was split in half; Caesar stepped on it as it fell helplessly through the air and took another leap forward.
"Enlightenment! Splitting the Sea!" Caesar yelled, firing off a giant wave of golden aura.
The demon’s huge neck the size of a castle wall was severed, and its head fell to the ground. Caesar didn’t stop at that, scattering more powerful golden aura waves to hack apart the demon’s body.
The pieces of the demon tried to reattach to each other, but Caesar unleashed golden aura waves without stopping. As soon as a severed part reattached itself, it was severed again. As soon as it was severed, it reattached itself again. But then Caesar would sever it again before attacking another spot.
No one dared to intervene amid the unceasing rain of sword aura.
As hours and hours passed, and the demon’s flesh was severed and reattached repeatedly, its regeneration began to slow down. Hillis’ divine power permeated each of its parts, suppressing its regeneration speed.
The endless cycle of sword strikes and regeneration gradually became more frequent, but eventually Caesar stopped swinging his sword. The golden mana surrounding him died down and the sword fell from his hand.
"This must be my limit,” Caesar said. The demon’s regeneration hadn’t stopped, but his limit had come.
The skin on his hand that was holding the sword split apart and cracked. From the wound, instead of bright red blood, dried-up dark red fragments fell. Caesar collapsed backward and smiled as if he were relieved.
As Arwen approached Caesar, her eyes turned red as if she were about to cry.
-Don’t die.
"I didn’t live all that long, but it wasn’t a bad life,” Caesar said. The cracks, which had started from his hand, climbed up his arm and began to spread throughout his body.
As he heard his own dry, crumbling death, Caesar looked up at the sky peacefully. "If there’s anything I regret, it’s sad that I felt empty thinking only about what I had lost, instead of what was next to me."
Perhaps because death was near, his senses were heightened. He felt several auras flying over from far away. Still, he was relieved that he had properly earned enough time, and that it wasn’t a dog’s death.
"Sorry." Caesar wiped away Arwen’s tears with his crumbling hands.
-Don’t die.
Arwen poured out her divine power with all her strength. However, she could only slow down the cracks, but not stop them.
"...D..." Arwen’s mouth moved and made a sound.
"Don’t... die! Don’t leave me behind!" Arwen shouted desperately. She didn’t want her family to die anymore. She didn’t remember her old family, but she still thought that.
Hillis arrived next to Arwen as she desperately poured out divine power.
"Unni! Please save this fool! It’s possible if it’s you! Right?” Arwen asked.
But in truth, she knew that Hillis’s divine power had been constantly flowing toward Caesar from the time he had first attacked the demon. In addition, because Hillis was suppressing the demon’s regeneration and supporting the allied forces, she had little divine power left.
Hillis didn’t answer. Arwen cried as she picked up the magic wand, saying, "If it’s Teacher-nim...! I’m sure! If it’s Teacher-nim, he’ll fix it!"
Although it could only be used one time, there was a spell on the magic wand that would allow Awen to teleport to Den.
As soon as Arwen tried to use the spell, however, Caesar grabbed Arwen’s arm and stopped her. He said, "Stop it. Den must be fighting by now. We can’t risk putting Den in danger."
"But...!" Arwen had to try grabbing at even the last straw.
Then Hillis smiled and stroked Arwen’s head, saying, "I’ll save him. Don’t worry." She untied the rosary that she was wearing around her neck.
"Saintess-nim, that’s...!” Albatoss, who had been watching Hillis from behind, groaned.
Hillis’s rosary was a divine spell called "Miracle," the greatest anomaly that a saintess could create.
Albatoss closed his eyes and looked away. Likewise, the surrounding paladins closed their eyes and looked away. It was an honor to see a miracle being used, but in averting their eyes, they were tacitly condoning Hillis’ willful use of it.
Hillis instilled divine power into the miracle that she had originally decided to save for her older sister, Vibrio. She prayed, "Generous Mother, please present a future to Mother’s child, who sacrificed himself and became a lamp for the many."
If she used the miracle, her older sister could certainly easily be released from the brainwashing. Hillis was well aware of that, but she used the miracle without hesitation. She firmly believed that Den would save her older sister.
A sacred white light emanated from the rosary and wrapped around Caesar’s body. His crumbling, cracked body appeared to travel back in time, returning to normal. His exhausted vitality returned, and his body that had aged from excessive use of power was reconstructed.
"How do you feel about getting to live a new life?" Hillis asked with a playful smile, absorbing the surplus divine power left in the air.
Caesar was dumbfounded and said, "I don’t know what that is, but isn’t it something precious? Is it okay to use that on me?"
"Of course. Nothing is more precious than a good man who sacrifices himself. I’ll just write a letter of apology,” Hillis said.
It was clear that the use of a miracle wouldn’t simply be resolved with a written apology if it were discovered. However, Hillis shrugged casually. She would have to suffer for a year, but she could just make another one.
In the distance, William could see the Butterfly and Crow tribes gathering from the direction of the Demon’s Territory. And from the direction of the empire, a giant dragon and two magicians quickly flew over. It was the Dragon King and two of the great madosas.
"Oh, my. I haven’t seen that guy in a long time, not since the sealing of the Demon King,” the Elemental Specialist Arpen said as he landed.
"Father!" William was surprised by Arpen’s arrival.
Arpen spoke, looking at the demon starting to regenerate slowly again. "I came in a hurry after seeing the emergency signal, but I fell into the trap of the Curse Specialist. But you’ve finished it. Good job."
"No, I didn’t do anything in particular,” William replied.
Arpen tapped Mirpa’s shoulder and said, "Alchemy Specialist, let’s freeze it first."
"How funny. It regenerates even when you hack it apart like that,” Mirpa remarked.
Arpen and Mirpa drew their magic wands and began to freeze the demon in immutable ten-thousand-year ice to prevent it from regenerating further.
As she watched the scene, Hillis stroked Arwen’s head and took the magic wand in Arwen’s hand, saying, "Well, it’s not enough of a price to pay for using the miracle, but let me borrow this for a moment."
"What? Oh, yes!" Arwen replied.
Holding the magic wand, Hillis activated the teleportation spell imbued in it. Just in time, her divine power had been restored using the power of the miracle. She said, "I need to say something to Den, who left me and went off by himself."
"Wait, hold on a second, Saintess-nim!" Albatoss tried to catch Hillis, but the teleportation spell was too fast.
* * *
Because the pet dragon flew hard without sleeping, it took only about a day to cross the Demon’s Territory, the land where about five countries had fallen. Five countries didn’t sound that wide, but it would have been appropriate to call such a distance a continental crossing.
Here and there, one could find places like Olympus Forest that couldn’t be inhabited by humans, as well as places that resembled the Arctic further north. In the terms of my previous life, it could be said that those fallen countries occupied a landmass similar to Russia.
"Which one will be the winner?"
After a leisurely breakfast thousands of meters above ground, my father, grandfather, and I seriously deliberated. There were three target locations, but time wasn’t on our side. There were two days at most, but honestly, if we couldn’t end things by today, that could be considered a failure.
"Well, it’s best to follow your instincts at times like this."
"All three of them seem to be important."
My father and grandfather seriously contemplated the situation.
Considering that my father and grandfather couldn’t choose even with their instincts, that meant all three places were related to the summoning of the Demon King.
"Let’s split up.” I suggested attacking three places at the same time.
My grandfather nodded. "Good. I’ll choose first as the elder."
My father shook his head and said, "I want to fight the Demon King, too.” Somehow, he seemed to have no intention of stopping the Demon King summoning.
"I want to see the summoning ceremony too. Of course I’m going to interfere with it, though," I said. Personally, I wasn’t interested in the Demon King, but I was interested in the ceremony itself. The summoning of the Demon King could stimulate a magician’s imagination.
“Huh-huh, you brats haven’t learned filial piety. My father must be guarding the altar." My grandfather had a leisurely smile while touching his beard. He seemed to want to fight my great-grandfather again.
"We don’t know which location is the right one anyway, so let’s decide by rock-paper-scissors,” I said.
My father and grandfather found my opinion interesting and nodded.
"Fine with me, Youngest."
"We can compete on who has the best instincts."
Rock-paper-scissors seemed like a game of luck at first glance, but it had quite the psychological element. In addition, since all three of us were superhuman, various factors such as super vision, instantaneous judgment, and instinct would be added to the mix.
"Rock, paper, scissors!"
Right as I shouted, my father and grandfather’s hands flashed from scissor to rock, and kept changing as they stuck out their hands.
But did we have to go this far?