〈 Chapter 154 〉 Siege Warfare (3)
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“I knew you were coming.”
She reluctantly released the optical modulation.
After all, if she was already aware of her presence, it felt wasteful to expend magic on optical modulation.
The fake princess then said to her:
“I can’t ignore the presence of royal blood, no matter how hard I try.”
In fact, she had heard from Allen.
If it was someone like a demon king, it was easy for them to sense her presence.
However, it was odd that this applied not only to the demon king but also to the white knights on the upper floor.
‘Those guys…’
It probably had something to do with their research.
They were working on a project to make the fake princess into the real princess.
To do that, they must have studied the unique presence of the real princess countless times.
And thanks to that, time was stretching out longer than she imagined.
There were only about 8 minutes left.
She needed to cut off the fake princess’s breath within those 8 minutes.
Therefore, Elsie raised her sword without another word.
Eight minutes wasn’t too short for words, but who knew?
Allen trusted her with this important mission. Losing due to carelessness in such a mission would leave her with nothing to say.
‘I don’t want to lose.’
She had already assessed the guy from their previous conversation in the plaza.
He wasn’t being used by the captain of the knights or the white knights.
He was simply obsessively fixated on the real thing.
The only thing she could give him was death.
She began gathering light magic into her sword.
The light stretched out, forming a larger sword.
Seeing this, the fake princess said:
“How remarkable for a princess to cultivate such combat ability. Should I call it impressive, or… is it just thanks to that impressive bloodline?”
“Well, it’s thanks to the impressive bloodline.”
At least that’s what she was showing right now.
The innate light magic was only possible because of the bloodline of the Leim royal family.
However, she had more than that.
Using the speed gained from the awakening pill, she approached the fake princess.
Though not as fast as Allen using the wind’s power, it was certainly beyond ordinary recognition.
Of course, the fake princess couldn’t exactly be called ordinary either.
She swung her sword.
The brilliantly shining light sword elongated, aiming to cut down the fake princess.
However, the fake princess blocked it.
“Is that the extent of your impressive bloodline?”
The glowing, sinister light sword in her hand resembled the royal sword she once saw in her father’s hands when she was a child.
But unlike that royal sword, the form of this sword was formless, and its light was different from pure golden light.
‘But…’
It was still no easy feat.
She distanced herself from the fake princess again.
Though she hadn’t reached awakening yet, since she was a demon king, it was said her skill should be on par with or even beyond hers after taking the awakening pill.
And she felt it was true when she met the sword directly.
‘She’s definitely stronger than me.’
But then again, other demon kings outside were also taking down strong Yusera and Allen as a team.
There was no way the 72nd demon king would be weaker than her.
However, just because she was stronger didn’t mean she couldn’t win.
The poison in her eyes thickened.
‘But I will win.’
She charged at the fake princess again.
And began clashing swords.
The light produced by the two was similar, and the lights kept colliding, illuminating and coloring the white room.
While exchanging blows, the fake princess suddenly began to speak.
It was a story she had never brought up before.
Only something she could say to ‘the real’ Elsie, a story she desperately wanted to tell.
“Do you know? The bloodline of Rodeleim vanishes the moment it strays from that filthy incest.”
Elsie knew that much.
It wasn’t a topic anyone would bring up, but it was clear just by looking at the lineage.
However, this wasn’t just a problem for the Leim royal family, as it subtly occurred in other prominent families too.
Stigma follows through blood, and of course, if one possesses a powerful stigma, mingling with impure blood was not favored.
The issue was that the fake princess’s words had a somewhat different connotation.
If one strayed from incest, they would completely ‘vanish.’
“What do you mean by that?”
The fake princess replied with a bittersweet, mocking smile.
“Literally. The moment even one drop of blood mingles that strays from the Leim bloodline, the cursed blood hidden somewhere in the veins manifests. The head and eyes turn completely black. Just like the humans from Sakh who are unfavorably viewed by the kingdom.”
She spat out her words while clashing swords with Elsie.
“That’s why the Leim royal family has always been careful. They didn’t want to reveal that a single impurity mixed with their bloodline. But… your father, the previous Leim king, was indulgent.”
In no time at all, the fake princess’s gaze had dulled with malice.
In that moment, her sword cut into Elsie’s shoulder.
“Ugh!”
The searing pain coursed through Elsie’s body.
Though her arm didn’t fall off from being pierced by the light sword, it was enough to leave it in tatters in an instant.
Elsie immediately pulled a potion from her inventory and poured it onto her shoulder.
The potion immediately healed her bones and grew new flesh, but it didn’t take away the pain.
Even so, as soon as she poured the potion, she swiftly readjusted her grip on the sword.
Seeing her, the fake princess continued speaking.
“He often disguised himself and came out to enjoy his nights, but there were no humans who could fail to see he was a king. Because of that special atmosphere unique to your bloodline. Soon, the king’s illegitimate children began to be born outside the palace. Then the royal family made this decision.”
She laughed maniacally.
“They decided to send all the illegitimate children to the White Tower to use them as subjects for the white knights.”
Elsie felt she was finally beginning to grasp her identity.
“You were one of those illegitimate children.”
The test subjects up there were probably the same.
That meant, in other words, a relationship of half-sisters.
Perhaps a relationship where their fates could have been switched.
“Yes, I have been… the fake princess from the moment I was born.”
It was at that moment.
Elsie charged at her again.
This time, using the swordsmanship learned from Allen, she attacked faster than her original range.
“Ugh!”
Blood from the fake princess splattered.
But the color of that blood seemed strange.
It was an unusually dark and murky, almost indescribable color of blood.
It was like… chaos.
“It was truly horrifying. They knew that they couldn’t turn a fake into a real one with conventional methods. So they focused on chaos.”
Illegitimate children infused with chaos.
Among them, those who had become more than human must have been the lucky ones.
In most cases, exposure to chaos leads to a rampage and death on the spot.
But the fake princess…
“I withstood the chaos for a week. It was a horrifying time I can’t even imagine again. Of course, just because I wanted to forget doesn’t mean it went away.”
“A week…?”
“Yes, the greater pain came after that. They inserted the royal sword into me after I managed to survive a week of chaos.”
“What do you mean…”
She was naturally recovering the part Elsie had severed.
The method wasn’t the same as other demon kings.
It was akin to the method used by the white knights upstairs, who would cauterize and stitch their wounds using light magic.
There’s no way it wouldn’t hurt.
But in that moment, she looked as if she felt no pain whatsoever.
And the reason was in her response.
“Literal. They sliced open my belly and inserted the royal sword into the space created from tearing apart my organs.”
That was a foreign object.
No, it was a large and sharp sword beyond just a foreign object.
In terms of pain, it was at a level where instantaneous death from shock wouldn’t be surprising.
But she survived even then.
“It was so painful. To make matters worse, the divine power the royal sword possessed began to clash with the chaos that was already permeating my body, destroying me from within. If I hadn’t heard that voice then, I wouldn’t have survived.”
“A voice?”
“Yes, a voice. It was definitely a god. I accepted his offer and became a demon king. More than anything, I gained the power to become real.”
Her power started to grow even stronger.
“My mind turned completely blank from the experiments.”
She deflected Elsie’s sword.
She slashed at Elsie’s thigh.
But Elsie immediately poured a potion there.
“But it was good for dyeing my hair blonde.”
The fake princess was already lost to madness.
Even if she sustained lethal injuries at times, she quickly recovered her body.
It must have been painful, yet she did it over and over.
“What’s more important is that I gained the ability to absorb the royal sword.”
Thus, the brutal battle continued.
Elsie poured potions on her wounds every time she was injured, while the fake princess used light magic to heal her wounds.
It was clear that neither side was in a normal state.
But at the same time, both had a toxicity that vastly surpassed normality.
“If I can absorb all the original abilities of the royal sword and make them my own, it would mean making the royal sword my own.”
“Then the royal sword still…”
“Yes, it’s still inside me.”
That smile was madness.
“I hold the royal sword. So, I am the kingdom.”
At that moment, the light of the magic Elsie infused into her sword collided with the light sword created by the fake princess.
The crossing lights clashed, but in the end, it was Elsie who was pushed back.
Not only was she pushed back, but she couldn’t withstand the pressure from the fake princess’s sword and rolled on the ground.
“I will become the king. If I become a king, I’ll finally have a name.”
Her voice contained fury.
The sorrow she had endured spilled forth with her agitated voice.
“Soon, I will absorb all the power contained in the kingdom’s sword.”
She had been waiting for this moment.
“I am neither experiment number 13 nor the 72nd demon king. My name is now Ershiarah Rodeleim!”
She had purposely let the ‘real’ see her do this, to show the fake becoming real and the real becoming fake.
As she was about to draw out the last remnants of her power for awakening through her sword…
Suddenly, the voice of the quiet Elsie echoed.
“Do as you please.”
That voice was heard not in front of Elsie, who seemed to be kneeling, but from behind.
“I’ve gained another name.”
The name Ershiarah felt now foreign.
Elsie was fine with it.
Actually, as long as she could achieve revenge, she didn’t care about names.
The only reason she had a name to care about was that Allen called her Elsie.
Just before the effect of the awakening pill was about to end.
Using the extended range of her magic, Elsie fixed her afterimage and moved behind the fake princess.
This was possible because the fake princess had succumbed to rage.
Meanwhile, Elsie could use her anger.
She enveloped her palm with light magic.
And thrust it into the fake princess.
“This is it.”
She felt something solid in her hand.
A warm and mushy object nestled among the joints and organs, feeling cool and firm.
That was certainly the royal sword.
Yes, she would concede.
She would admit that the kingdom prior to the coup wasn’t beautiful either.
The royal family had dragged the illegitimate children to the white knights’ laboratory, hiding that filthy gene from the royal sword.
And at some point, the misled white knights had been engulfed in collective madness.
But that wasn’t a reason to destroy the kingdom.
“I will inherit the throne.”
In that moment, an immense amount of light erupted from the fake princess’s abdomen.
The light penetrated the White Tower and rose to the surface.
It was the light that had traditionally proved the birth of a new king.
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