Chapter 195

The boy’s face was decaying.

“It seems you didn’t quite understand what I said.”

With each word, Valenciaunos quickened his pace.

“I don’t know how powerful of an explosion you can create.”

The boy spoke firmly as if driving a nail into a wall.

“It will be stronger than you think.”

“If the high nobles are injured vaguely, we can imprison them under the pretext of treatment. If they die, we can intervene in the inheritance and make deals with their heirs. It’s easy. If they don’t listen, we just bring a ten-year-old illegitimate child and insist they have inheritance rights; that night, those noble families will come with money and beautiful girls. Well, if the nobles have good luck and don’t lose even a finger in that explosion, then nothing will happen.”

Valenciaunos had already received the boy’s nails lightly, like a rotten wall filled with thousands of nails.

“What?”

The darkness under the hood swayed significantly.

“I might have to express some regret about their subordinates being dead, but I can suppress that much. I still have that level of authority. And our authority will only grow stronger.”

“You… are insane?”

Valenciaunos frowned at the question as if pondering it for a moment, then clenched and released his fists, flicking his fingers several times, nodding his head.

“Yes. I’m insane. No matter how I think about it, it feels that way.”

The boy almost stepped back in a fleeing manner.

“Many innocent people will die. At least five thousand, don’t you think?”

Valenciaunos lightly leapt across the gaps between the canals, chasing after the boy.

His bright yellow eyes shone with a belief close to madness.

“I’ve killed a hundred times that, a thousand times that. Their deaths were all tragic. Sadly, someone had to make a decision, and I chose to save a hundred thousand people. It’s the same this time.”

However, that gaze and that voice did not blaze fiercely nor were they laden with emotion.

“……!”

As if processing a document caught in a pile of papers stacked like mountains, it was cold and almost lethargic.

Valenciaunos understood that this was the problem.

He could neither turn away nor could he stop his steps.

It was time to move forward, rather than to blame himself. No, even while blaming himself, it was time to advance.

“If there’s something different, it’s that your death won’t be particularly regrettable. Ah. That was a slip of the tongue. I apologize. You will definitely not die. Let me correct that. Your suffering will not be regrettable at all.”

The two gradually distanced themselves from the swirling chaos of battle.

The sounds of fighting and Rudi’s gunshots came faintly from behind.

Valenciaunos gazed at the boy with a look of disdain.

“I know. I’m ruthless, arrogant, overly relaxed, and debauched. And I prefer compromise over fighting. I’ve already prepared a compromise plan to send to the Ironblood Party leader Marcus. If he doesn’t accept it, I must kill him, but if he does, I can certainly go along with him.”

The boy withdrew, drawing a translucent blade from a sword that only had its hilt left, gathering green flames.

The darkness within the hood shook precariously.

Valenciaunos looked at the boy with unwavering eyes.

“But you guys are always like this. If you don’t like the place you live, you can scream or make a ruckus. As the landlords, we can either crush that or apologize. But you don’t give us a choice. I’m the best negotiator, but there’s nothing I can do against those who insist on burning it all down just because they dislike the house.”

“We—.”

“Shut up. I know what you’re trying to say. I’ve been hearing that sort of thing for decades now.”

* * *

“Decades?”

Valenciaunos did not respond to the boy’s question.

Instead, he thought to himself that another reason to pluck out the boy’s tongue had arisen with his mysterious smile.

“Do you know how hard the necromancers serving the Death God have worked for the past one thousand years? And what about those who serve God Amon? They dedicated themselves diligently to blend into society.”

“Really?”

“The necromancers contributed to solving unsolved murders through research on reviving the memories of corpses, and the werewolves went on armed pilgrimages to the northern front and fought for over three years until about seventy years ago. The fact that they can live comfortably in this world now is all due to the price of blood.”

The boy asked.

“What about you guys? What price did you pay?”

Valenciaunos answered while igniting flames.

“The founding emperor of Solletarass freed humanity from your oppressive heterogeneous races. After fighting with their lives on the line and winning, they earned rights and freedoms. I inherited those rights and responsibilities through blood.”

“Responsibilities?”

The boy asked, as if he had heard something strange, and Valenciaunos shrugged as if there was some problem.

“Our ancestors fought against heterogeneous races a thousand years ago, and a thousand years later, we stand against the old ones. Yes. Our duty and right are to catch and tear apart infiltrators like you to extract information.”

Then, Valenciaunos continued, “Let’s enter the imperial palace. You filthy sinner, before I burn you to ashes.”

The boy also did not back down obediently.

“Then the filthiest sinner would be your twin brother. Yes. I was thinking of entering the imperial palace someday. But that’s not today.”

The moment those words finished, Valenciaunos erupted with volcanic rage.

His face contorted like a demon, and the coldly calculated malice transformed into fierce anger.

“Having uttered that child’s name with that despicable mouth, I shall drill holes through your teeth and insert wires to give you electric shocks! I will stretch your tongue long and drive thumbtacks into it, and then burn the skin over it. I was going to cut off your limbs right away, but you’ve changed my mind. You! You will plead for death from me!”

Valenciaunos kicked the ground and launched himself.

* * *

From behind the boy, green flames flickered, and arrows of fire made from green flames shot forth.

“Hahaha!”

Valenciaunos received that attack with his body, moving forward through the dimly lit corridor.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Green flames struck his body clad in white uniforms.

“What do you think about the pain of your soul being burned away, brother?”

Each one was a horrifying magic that penetrated and spread into his body, burning his flesh beneath the surface with just a brush.

Yet Valenciaunos did not flinch, drawing out the Black Tear, covering it with an orange mana blade mixed with the spell’s flames.

‘Brother?’

“You don’t know pain.”

He was a body that had consumed the essence of transcendence, divinity, and immortality.

Now, if he received effective hits from fire or heat-type magic, it would be time for him to feel embarrassed.

“Then how about this!”

The boy swung his hand, and three green flame arrows gathered to form a spear entwined by a serpent.

Swish!

The ominously flickering spear of fire shot forth, slicing through the darkness.

Crack!

Valenciaunos grabbed the closest shaft of the spear with his dark-red scale-covered left hand and blocked it.

The charge from the duke’s tall figure came to a sudden stop, the spear’s propulsion and the duke’s force creating symmetry.

Sizzle!

That symmetry eventually tilted toward Valenciaunos.

Bang!

Valenciaunos scattered the green flames from his grasp and summoned six ‘fire spears’ into the air.

A crack appeared in the darkness under the boy’s hood.

“!”

“This much should inflict some pain!”

Swish!

The fiery spears overwhelmed the boy.

Though originally designed to penetrate and explode, the spears that fell around the boy grew in size instead of exploding, attempting to envelop his body.

Valenciaunos tightly clenched his fist, and the flames crawled maliciously, intruding into the boy’s body.

‘I succeeded once against the infiltrator. Now I can use it again.’

With his delicate technique used to painfully deal with infiltrators before his return, he forced flames into every hole in the body: eye sockets, ear holes, mouth, nostrils, sweat glands, pores… igniting the fat within and burning him from the inside out.

As if realizing how immune he was to flames, the boy’s shoulders stiffened for a moment.

* * *

Valenciaunos moved forward, wearing the smile of a victor.

“Do you feel something went wrong now?”

“Ugh!”

“You should have realized from the moment you entered this city! You dare to obstruct my grand life!”

Valenciaunos raised his sword towards the boy engulfed in flames.

“You will be powerless before me! The Emperor will take your loyalty oath! The united empire will send all of you who despise this world and life to the afterlife!!”

Crouched down, the boy leapt at that moment.

Valenciaunos’ sword sliced through the air, and the boy momentarily ignited green flames, absorbing and then pushing back the orange flames.

The boy thrust a translucent sword he pulled out, aimed at the duke’s eyes.

He intended to kill him instantly or to stab him repeatedly until he died.

Crack!

Valenciaunos’ left hand crushed the green flame sword.

“!”

He seized the boy by the collar with his left hand and lifted him high.

“Surprised?”

He swung the boy with force and slammed him against the adjacent stone wall.

Crash!

The boy tried to regain consciousness, swinging his left hand in retaliation at Valenciaunos’ side.

Crack!

The sound of his clawed fingers, fuelled with green energy, bouncing off the dark-red scales rang out.

Valenciaunos violently threw the boy to the ground and left him there until he rose again.

The boy unleashed a powerful kick aiming at Valenciaunos’ knee, and Valenciaunos allowed it, striking the boy’s temple with his scaly left hand.

Thump!

“Get up.”

“Urgh!”

Rumbling!

The boy spat out green flames that ignited Valenciaunos’ body, who, unfazed, laughed sinisterly within the conflagration.

“Is there nothing stronger?”

The slit eyes gleamed ominously in the dim underground.

The boy gritted his teeth and summoned three translucent green serpents from his sides, which bit at Valenciaunos’ face and shoulders.

The duke lightly shifted his feet, and a golden haze from the incantation enveloped him.

Whoosh…

As soon as the green energy touched the golden aura, it melted and scattered.

At that moment, fear crept into the boy’s voice.

“You… how?”

Valenciaunos answered with a smile like a lord of a fortress that would never crumble.

“I have attained transcendence. I’ve consumed divinity and immortality. Even feeding randomly caught beggars like this would make one a superhuman; how much more me, who resembles the founding and previous emperors?”

“Still… you can become this strong?”

It’s much harder to grow defense than attack.

To be able to comfortably withstand all attacks meant there was a substantial gap in actual skill.

“This much? Naturally. Originally, I was holding back a bit due to my body, but now is not the time to hold back.”

Valenciaunos lifted the Black Tear and cut off the boy’s hood.

‘I’m desperate too.’

The desperation of the weak is frightening, but the desperation of the strong is beyond words.

“First, let me see that pretty face… What are you?”

* * *

Though the symbol of royalty was nearly white platinum hair and golden eyes, not every member of the royal family had white hair and golden eyes, and those traits were not the exclusive property of royalty.

So, even the day Valenciaunos saw the white-haired boy in the imperial palace, he didn’t think too much about the identity.

Once infiltrated, one never returns, and good infiltrators are either dead or waiting for the day they will die.

‘I thought it would just end by killing him.’

The boy had platinum hair close to white and red eyes, and his face resembled Valenciaunos’ enough that he could be called a younger brother.

Of course, there was also a real possibility of him being a cousin or a nephew.

‘Kidnapping an illegitimate child… erasing memories or altering them, and with the talent inherited from royal blood…’

Then it could explain why he had this much power without mutations.

Those who received the power of the ancients were incredibly strong.

Naturally, if the boy had royal blood mixed in, he couldn’t be spared.

An infiltrator endowed with remarkable sensitivity inherited through lineage, trained to be so.

The situation Valenciaunos and Jeilliris were most concerned about had become a reality.

Valenciaunos raised the Black Tear, and the boy dropped the dagger that had only its hilt left and crawled on his knees.

“Please, spare me. Uncle.”

“Die for me, dear nephew.”