Chapter 91

Chapter 91

Jiken fired a flame spell into the sky.

Whoooosh! Bang!

It was a signal for the King’s Order to return after the completion of the cursed sword capture operation.

Meanwhile, Karnak was binding the cursed sword with chains of mana. As he infused mana into it, he called out to Jiken.

“If you’re done, give me a hand over here.”

“Got it.”

After dispelling the crystal prison magic, Jiken headed toward the cursed sword and added his mana to Karnak’s chains.

For now, they temporarily suppressed the power of the cursed sword, waiting for Meili and Millia. Once the two clerics arrived, they would seal the sword for good with holy spells.

While the two mages were managing the cursed sword, Trib and Harris approached Serati.

She had laid the ash-gray-haired girl they had rescued on the ground and was carefully examining her.

“What should we do with her?”

Serati asked, and Trib responded calmly.

“We’ll leave her to priestess Meili when she arrives.”

He looked down at the girl with pity.

“Tsk, tsk. She’s so young, and to have gone through something like this...”

Harris, too, looked at the girl with sympathy.

“Will she wake up safely? Her body must be badly damaged.”

Suddenly, Harris tilted his head in puzzlement.

“Something’s strange.”

“What is it?”

“I assumed her body would be in bad shape, but...”

Trib soon understood Harris’s point.

“You’re right. This is odd.”

For aura users, it’s relatively easy to assess someone’s physical condition at a glance.

To their surprise, the ash-gray-haired girl didn’t seem injured at all. She was filthy, with dirt on her body, but physically, she appeared perfectly healthy.

“Could the cursed sword’s influence have had some unexpected beneficial effect on her?”

“It’s not like it’s some kind of miracle medicine.”

While the three of them were pondering this strange situation, a faint aura began to emanate from the girl’s body. Serati, startled, bristled.

“What is this?”

It was an intense aura, something no ordinary girl could possess.

Alarmed, Trib glanced at the cursed sword Mareda.

“Could it be that the connection wasn’t severed?”

No, there was still no discernible link between the cursed sword and the girl.

So, what was this power?

‘It doesn’t even seem like necromancy...’

Suddenly, the girl’s eyes snapped open.

At the same moment, the three aura users leapt into the air like startled cats.

“Gah!”

“Ahh!”

“Eeek!”

It wasn’t because they sensed any killing intent.

The overwhelming sensation that washed over them caused their bodies to react instinctively.

But for aura users of their caliber, even Trib, who was at the Blue rank, to be startled like this?

‘What the heck is going on?’

As they watched in astonishment, the ash-gray-haired girl slowly rose to her feet.

She appeared normal. It was just a simple act of standing up.

Yet, an inexplicable sense of pressure weighed down on their shoulders.

The reason became clear soon enough.

Behind the small girl’s back, a purple haze began to rise.

A terrifying power of destruction spread outward, manifesting as a purple mist.

Trib and Harris’s eyes widened in shock.

“...An aura user?”

“And a Purple Knight at that?”

***

The girl was barely twelve or thirteen years old. Even if she had started martial training as a toddler, at best she would have only mastered the basics by now.

Of course, there are rare geniuses in the world.

Some are blessed with such talent that they awaken their aura at an incredibly young age.

After all, even Serati, standing here now, was a genius who had awakened her aura in her early twenties.

Especially in this era, where the strongest warriors, the Four Great Martial Kings, had all awakened their aura in their mid-teens.

But awakening at that age is one thing; being at the Purple-level at such a young age is unheard of.

So, this phenomenon had to be related to the cursed sword Mareda...

But there was no connection!

They still couldn’t sense any link between the girl and the sword!

As Trib and Harris stood there, baffled, the girl muttered softly.

But why was she so angry?

The next title, however, was beyond comprehension.

“Cursed Death King!”

Karnak’s eyes went wide.

“...What?”

***

Growling like a beast, the girl glared at Karnak.

Her dirt-streaked face was revealed beneath the matted ash-gray hair. It was the face of the child he had seen many times before.

‘Who is she? How does she know my past?’

He had no idea.

Karnak had never cared much for others. He didn’t bother remembering the appearances of people he encountered unless absolutely necessary.

‘But for some reason, she feels... familiar...’

Once again, a purple aura flared up around the girl’s shoulders.

“Arrrghhh!”

With a scream, she launched herself forward.

Though her hand merely came down in a light chop, it carried an overwhelming force.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The purple aura blade surged toward Karnak as if it would slice him apart. Serati urgently stepped in front of him.

“Lord Karnak!”

She tried to deflect the attack with her sword coated in battle aura, but the difference in power was overwhelming. She was blasted backward in an instant.

“Ugh!”

Even as she was flung back, she couldn’t believe it.

‘What... How can there be such a difference in power...?’

She was using all her strength, coating her blade in aura, and swinging with all her might, while the girl had only casually released the aura with her bare hands—and yet it crushed her so easily? How vast was the gap between them?

With Serati out of the way, the girl aimed a hand blade strike at Karnak’s head. Desperate, Karnak resorted to necromancy.

“Shadows, protect me!”

There was no time to use chaos magic.

Only necromancy, a skill so ingrained in him that he could cast it even in his sleep, could be activated in time.

The purple aura collided with the necromantic barrier, producing a deafening explosion.

Boom!

The barrier shattered in a single strike, and Karnak was hurled backward.

“Argh!”

At this rate, he was about to be beheaded in an instant. As his face turned pale, something happened.

From afar, about a dozen arrows flew through the air.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

The girl, who had been chasing Karnak, stopped and turned her head.

Aura flared from her entire body, and she shattered the incoming arrows mid-air with ease.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Karnak, barely alive, saw a group of soldiers charging toward them from across the valley.

“Young master!”

“Lord Karnak!”

“Captain!”

It was the 1st and 7th Battalions of the King’s Order, led by Baros. They had finally returned after receiving Jiken’s signal.

Seeing the fallen Karnak, Millia shouted in warning.

“Be careful! The enemy is using necromancy!”

From her distant vantage point, she had mistakenly assumed that the barrier Karnak had summoned was the girl’s attack.

Karnak was relieved. He had almost been caught.

The King’s Order soldiers surrounded the girl, looking around cautiously.

“Captain Jiken?”

“And Sir Trib...”

Baros surveyed the scene, taking in the fallen comrades and assessing the situation.

“The mission was a failure. What about the cursed sword Mareda...?”

Then he realized—he didn’t fully understand the situation yet.

The girl’s hands were empty.

“Wait a minute... Where’s the cursed sword?”

In the distance, the massive two-handed sword was lying on the ground, tightly bound in mana chains.

The soldiers muttered in confusion.

“The cursed sword is over there?”

“Then why... What’s going on with this girl?”

No one could grasp what was happening. Had the mission succeeded, or had it failed?

Meanwhile, the girl calmly observed the King’s Order soldiers surrounding her.

She no longer pursued Karnak and Serati. Instead, she seemed to be prioritizing the soldiers.

“Humans...”

Her ominous voice came out once again.

“I must save humans...”