Chapter 219

(219)

Princess Sererassie ascended the observation tower of the main palace in the imperial palace alongside the warlocks.

The warlocks surrounded Sererassie in a circle, each drawing mana and imbuing it with a lightning attribute before sending it to her.

Sssshhh-.

A white aura shimmering with blue light coalesced around Sererassie.

Wielding magic through another’s mana was a perilous skill. A careless move could result in the death of both the sender and receiver, even bystanders. The mortality rate of a single spell could reach 300%.

However, the warlocks trusted Sererassie’s talent, and Sererassie trusted her own efforts. Using the magic inscribed on her Icaris pearl earrings, she floated two meters above the ground, accepting the mana from all the magicians.

Zzzzjjit!

In the turquoise-lit night sky, electricity crackled between her white teeth, and tendrils of her long, indigo hair wildly flared in all directions. This was due to handling such an enormous amount of power.

“Ah.”

She emitted an indifferent groan as if dealing with someone else’s pain, her gaze fixed on the colossal alien far away and the capital ablaze.

Sererassie drew a large circle in the air using her yellow-gemmed staff.

Ssssssing.

The circle, composed of mana, spun rapidly, scattering a soft golden glow into the air.

Circle Magic.

This magic, originating from the elves, amplified spells through the heart’s mana circuit, creating phenomena that astonished the heavens and shook the earth.

‘Why wouldn’t they run? Why would they fight?’ Sererassie pondered.

She drew another circle in the air.

The second circle partially overlapped the first, creating two intersecting points.

Zhhhhiiing!

Fierce flames erupted at the intersecting points, Sererassie’s face momentarily contorted, and both circles began to absorb more mana.

‘I wasn’t originally like this, was I? My life is the most precious, isn’t it? There are also dreams I haven’t achieved, right? Aren’t they the most important?’

Like with the knights’ mana control, ultimately, the most efficient way to amplify mana was through the rebound formed by the collision of circles.

Creating a rebound through the collision of circles amplified the power of magic. Each intersection doubled the strength, and with each added circle, two new intersection points were created. Therefore, a 2-circle magic was four times stronger than a 1-circle magic.

‘But then, why am I still here?’

Without hesitation, Sererassie kept drawing circles in the air.

The third circle, the fourth circle emerged in succession.

Circle 4.

The magic’s power increased 256 times from the beginning, and gasps of admiration and worry erupted among the warlocks.

“Remarkable.”

“Indeed, Princess Sererassie.”

“Not a time for admiration! It’s getting dangerous!”

“This many wizards’ mana resonating together means the power is hundreds of times stronger, but so is the backlash. If the mana conduit can’t withstand it…”.

“It’s fine,” Sererassie assured with a smile, her calm demeanor betraying no unease.

‘Because they chose to stay?’

Beneath her composed expression lay a hint of superiority and playfulness.

She swung her staff, drawing a fifth circle in the air.

Circle 5.

Zhhhhiiing!

Crazed flames erupted from the ten intersecting points. A 5-circle magic was 1,024 times stronger than a 1-circle magic. Against regular soldiers, it could handle an entire army alone, and it was capable of taking down even a knight armed with the highest-grade armor inscribed with incantation circuits.

She was already quite formidable alone, but now Sererassie amplified the magic by gathering the mana of dozens of the most powerful battle mages from the empire.

Pshhh, Pshk!

Something exploded, and blood trickled from under her nails.

Before a few warlocks could scream, Sererassie summoned the power of dragon speech. While circle magic utilized the body’s mana, dragon speech directly commanded the external mana in the air.

Wuuuuhh.

A golden glow enveloped her body, and the veins bulging in her differently colored eyes subsided.

“Your Excellency!”

“This is too much!”

“Even with the power of dragon speech!”

Ignoring the cries of the battle magicians trying to stop her, Sererassie responded:

“The emperor mastered 6-circle magic at an age ten years younger than me.”

Although she maintained her usual demeanor, it wasn’t her true feelings.

‘I know it’s dangerous. Of course, I do.’

She couldn’t understand why she was lying or why she was performing this grand magic here.

Ivory Tower magicians treated those who couldn’t handle mana like beasts, considered only magicians as truly human, and respected only their alumni.

‘I didn’t want to be a hero, you know. No matter how much I think about it.’

Even after learning so much in two years, ordinary people still held little significance to her.

…Or so she thought.

‘Is it the fear of daily life collapsing? Is it because I’ve been influenced by Valenciaunos and his sense of royal responsibility? Tenti’s competitiveness or Rudi’s bond?’

Sererassie gazed at the capital that had turned into a sea of flames and the towering alien partially submerged in a canal far away.

Lightning flashed in the eyes of the genius magician, and the will to live surged like a bolt of lightning into the sky.

‘If what’s driving me to act foolishly makes me feel more empowered, it might as well be good, wouldn’t you say?’

As dark clouds gathered to create thunderclouds, the alien’s body swelled.

Haaahhh!

Its massive maw turned upward, preparing for a second psychic wave.

Simultaneously maintaining the circle and thunderclouds with a dragon word, Sererassie raised her staff and drew a sixth circle.

“Your Excellency!”

“You must stop!”

The warlocks screamed as they tried to stop her, but Sererassie had always lived for the moment since she was young.

‘Dreams are still the best, aren’t they?’

“Since this body will inevitably decay and disappear in the future, shouldn’t I live a life worth remembering?”

At that moment, she entered the threshold of the sixth circle.

Krrrrrrraaaang!

Amplified 4,096 times—2 to the twelfth power—the lightning surged through the clouds.

The lightning was now more of a column than just a flash.

Flash!

The white pillar of lightning struck the alien’s gaping maw.

‘Of course, it’s me.’

With blood flowing from every pore of her face, Sererassie collapsed like a rotten tree.

* * *

The colossal alien let out a tremendous scream and thrashed about.

“OOOOOO!”

The already shattered surrounding buildings turned completely into rubble.

The lower jaw hit directly caught fire and crumbled, smoke rose from its entire body, and three of its thick legs snapped off.

Tentia watched the alien in an oddly inappropriate snicker.

“Hahahaha.”

The previously gargantuan alien now shrieked and wailed like a child.

“Now!”

At Valenciaunos’ voice, four figures sprinted forward.

The first was naturally Tentia, the second Matheos, the third Rudi, and the fourth Valenciaunos.

Though the avenue was still crawling with infiltrators.

“Receive the grace of holy flames!”

Saint Matheos incinerated them with overwhelming divine power.

Keeeruuuk!

Huge alien creatures resembling decaying seagulls flew overhead, spewing acidic saliva and excrement.

Smoke rose from the imperial highway paved with solid stones, which were now crumbling to powder.

“Your Excellency, go!”

Rudi’s green eyes gleamed with a red glint as she sprinted forward.

Tahk, Taahk!

Moving like a top-grade hunting dog, she swiftly ascended the terrace and reached the relatively intact stone building in an instant.

Click, whirl, snap.

The upper and lower rotating dual-barrel Caspa reloaded new ammunition, and the shoulder stock was firmly set on the maid sniper.

‘I only wished for a flowery path for His Excellency.’

Two consecutive magical arrows split the air.

Pooow! Pooow!

The two seagull-like aliens flying toward Valenciauno literally exploded.

‘It’s a fiery path.’

Dozens of aliens flapped in the sky, and the surviving infiltrators gathered, while the road to the giant alien was still ablaze with flames created by the Azure Knights’ bombing.

‘Still, I’ll always be by His Excellency’s side. I’m not the only one who feels this way.’

“Haaaaaaa!”

A knight in a red cape dashed through the flames.

Kang, Kang, Kang, Kang!

A 3-meter tall flaming monster lunged with two long necks, but…

Sssshh!

Tentia’s single strike severed the heads.

“Your Excellency! I don’t know what you’re thinking, but regardless, I, Tentia, will assist to ensure you attempt as You wish. Stick close behind me!”

The call of the enemy knight was answered with a nod from the Bandit Duke, who continued chanting a spell.

“To you, sir!”

As Tentia felt her heart pounding, she kicked off the ground.

The knight’s heart, possessing the mana affinity of an elf and the physical body of an ogre, responded to the aesthetics of loyalty and the romantic allure of the battlefield.

That was the kind of creature she was.

“Siikk!”

She severed the leg of a burning scale giant, crushed the metal exoskeleton of an infiltrator with her auxiliary weapon, a battle mace, and threw the flaming undead back into the fire to keep it blazing.

“Hahahaha!”

The blood-red mana blade burned infinitely heavy, its swings cutting down all manner of creatures that had no place in this world.

That moment of complete immersion, forgetting to breathe, forgetting the heat of her body, even forgetting that her lord was following behind—

“Kiiieeeek!!”

“Damn!”

She inevitably hit her limits, and unwanted thoughts crept toward the knight.

* * *

“Haa.”

Tentia exhaled roughly, patting the cuirass that had just deflected an attack.

Had Marcus’ spell and enchantment not reinforced the armor, it would have been pierced earlier.

Slowly raising her head, she inspected the state of the massive alien.

The whale-like creature remained colossal even in its damaged form.

She only just noticed—it was continuously being strengthened and healed by teal energy flowing from the magical realms in the sky.

The path there was still far, filled with all sorts of infiltrators.

Her trembling hand gripped the sword.

Actually…

She had anticipated something like this.

‘How do you overcome fear?’

‘Sister, I’m not afraid of death. Rather, there is something I fear more than death.’

She recalled a conversation she once had with a senior at the 아카데미.

The knight’s dream is to command the battlefield.

While others are screaming and fleeing, standing alone against the enemy, feeling one’s own greatness and uniqueness as an existing presence.

But Tentia had met Valenciaunos, seen people getting hurt, and witnessed the world’s pain where heroic knights were needed.

Of all the people she had killed in the slums, was there not a single innocent among them?

That question still lingered in a corner of Tentia’s heart.

She certainly knew.

A knight is one who carries the burden of killing, one prepared to slay the innocent on command, in crude terms, a human butcher.

Yet Tentia had seen too much.

One cannot enjoy a blood-soaked life endlessly, nor can one live solely on duty.

“I will continue moving forward.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Before their eyes stood numerous undead skeletal soldiers.

Each was massive, composed of the bones of four or more people, wielding large iron clubs made from skeletal remains.

They had all transformed into undead on the spot where they had been killed by the initial psychic wave and now coalesced into a single entity.

“Kiiiieeeeek!”

“The knight Tentia of Lord Valenciaunus moves forward!”

Taking a deep breath, Tentia cut through them.

“Rest for even the fallen!”

Her mood was not one of overwhelming exhilaration.

It carried a bit of melancholy and respect.

But she still held pride in the fact that she was clearing Lord Valenciaunus’ path.

‘Just as I both resent and revere you, I treat myself in the same way. A single sword can accomplish countless tasks, all being the essence of the sword. A single person can also perform countless tasks, and all that they do embodies their essence. I will acknowledge the shadow and move toward the light.’

Her protected figure was not a perfect person either.

‘Stolen a saint, colluded with thugs, received bribes, and killed as easily as eating a meal. Always thinking they were in the right.’

The more flaws she saw, the more it seemed like someone they needed.

Yet Tentia found her own reason to follow Valenciaunos regardless.

‘He cherishes those around him and grants moments of glory.’

That is what made a knight continue as a knight.

At that moment, Tentia sensed her vision clearing remarkably.

It was more than the effect of the charm-enhanced helmet.

The muscles, bones, and mana streams visible to her eyes became several times more detailed.

The level she was preparing to ascend had arrived before her eyes.

Chak, Chak, Chak, Chak, Chak.

As a great wave of flaming skeletons surged toward her like a tsunami.

Even her white armor smoked and burned red.

The red knight in a red cape raised a red sword.

The seventh stage of imperial swordsmanship, Yujyeom Museuk Dae (Visible but Substantial Sword).

A sword that is seen but exists.

Tentia’s sword qi was no longer heavy at all.

It flowed infinitely light, like blood.

Swish-swish-swish-swish!

As the wind danced, it effortlessly cut down the enemy.

The knight who split the wave of skeletons cried out.

“Your Excellency, leave this to me and move forward!”

It was a line she always loved.