Fear was reflected in Alexis’ green eyes. A black mage was a far cry from a sword duel between people of similar skill.
No matter how skilled he was, he was no match for a group of murderous maniacs. Sensing the child’s fear, the woman found it quite amusing, the corners of her mouth tugging upward.
Then she blew on the dagger in her hand. Upon doing so, the dagger floated motionless in the air, away from her hand.
Though she bore no outward markings, this woman was clearly a black mage. Alexis’ hands were sweating as he held the blade.
The dagger soon flew fiercely toward Alexis’ vital point.
He barely managed to deflect it once. The terrifying blade quickly returned, striking his wrist. His sword rolled onto the ground.
The dagger then crossed his ankle. He barely had time to groan before he fell limply to the floor.
The swordsmanship, which had been practiced to death without sleeping properly, was of no use in the face of black magic. His breath caught in his throat at the overwhelming sense of helplessness.
The woman smirked and took a step closer, as if she wanted to play with her dying prey some more. Then her gaze stumbled upon the child’s sword at her feet. She stared at the engraving on the hilt.
“Oh, I almost killed the precious child of the Fabian family.”
The woman’s seductive voice made Alexis’ heart sink.
A black mist emanated from the woman’s hand and enveloped Alexis’ body, and he quickly lost consciousness.
××××××××××××××××××××××
Mary stood alone at the edge of the Maccabi cliffs. She turned around as she felt slight movement.
Her gaze fell on Eliope. Her dazzling silver hair gleamed covetously as if illuminating the surroundings.
Lips as red as roses arced into a brilliant smile. It was Mary.
Everything was the same. He couldn’t believe his eyes.
She had indeed come to see him. All the way to Xenos.
He was overwhelmed by the unbelievable reality. Memories of her flood his mind.
He walked slowly. The closer he got to her, the more foggy his mind became and the more his body relaxed.
“Mary.”
As soon as she called her name, she ran quickly and fell into Eliope’s arms. The moment he held her, Eliope felt a sickening sensation.
She felt cold, like a corpse, and his senses were tingling. There was no scent of favia that always followed Mary.
The arms around her waist felt strangely strong, then he recognized the dark aura emanating from her.
But it was too late, as he turned to look at her face again.
While he was off guard, an arrow flew out of nowhere and pierced Eliope’s heart. His heart was the center of all his magic.
His mana was immobilized, trapped by the red-tinged arrow. He instinctively tried to pull the arrow out, but the moment he touched it, he realized that the shape of the arrowhead was not normal.
If he forced it out, his heart would be torn out and shards would come out. It was just a superficial wound that would never have been a problem under normal circumstances.
It was all due to a single letter that caused such an absurd result. He stared at the woman with Mary’s face in despair.
“You’re…… what…….”
Eliope’s breathing quickened. The woman smiled wickedly and whispered in his ear.
“Hmph, you’ve got some nasty things attached.”
Weakened, Eliope sank to his knees, unable to fight off the pain. The Emperor’s guards, watching from afar, rushed over.
Then the black mages emerged from hiding and quickly surrounded the guards as if they had been waiting for them. In unison, the black mages created a black mist.
It sizzled like black flames, threatening to engulf the guards at any moment. The power was immense.
Nathan drew his sword. The guards’ weapons and armor were imbued with strong defensive magic, but victory or defeat could not be measured.
There were only four of them and dozens of enemies.
In the meantime, the black mist was about to charge at the guards, but Eliope’s blue magic stopped it.
He clutched his heart and drew on what little magic he could muster against the black mages.
The two opposing energies tangled and snarled like beasts. The non-magic users among the guards finally managed to draw their weapons.
They were no match for the guards. Nathan cut them off one by one with sleek movement.
The black mages fell mercilessly to the guards’ lightning-fast blades. It wouldn’t be a disadvantageous battle as long as the Emperor held on.
He gathered his remaining strength to defeat the enemies and gradually closed the distance between him and the woman.
The woman disguised as Mary felt a strange interest in the Emperor’s magical power, which was stronger than expected.
However, the arrow in his heart contained a red energy conflicting with the water magic. If she released the red energy by forcing it out, the Emperor would soon lose consciousness.
The people he had brought with him were sacrifices to drain his energy anyway. The problem was the guards.
She had to delay time until the Emperor exhausted himself.
She watched her subordinates die with a languid face and nodded to the remaining people.
They dragged Alexis, whom they had hidden in a corner.
Alexis was in great shock as the situation unfolded before him. A man was bleeding and emitting blue light.
He was surrounded by black mist, and they were struggling against it. As the two energies clashed, fierce flames erupted.
And not far away, the Emperor’s guards battled black mages. Then a familiar silhouette caught his eye. It was his father.
‘Why is my father here…….’
Tightly bound by the black mist, Alexis’ entire body stiffened, unable to lift a finger. No matter how hard he tried, no voice came out.
He couldn’t do anything, like a living corpse. The mysterious woman grabbed Alexis by the scruff of the neck and led her to the edge of the cliff.
When Nathan spotted his son, he froze in place, eyes wide as if he’d seen a ghost.
“Alexis!”
A black mist surrounded Alexis’ body. The woman knocked him to the ground and crushed his face with her foot.
Her intentions were clear. If he didn’t stop now, she’d drop him.
Nathan paused, and a blade from out of nowhere grazed his shoulder. He raised his sword again.
However, at that moment, the woman dropped the dagger in her hand onto the child’s abdomen.
The blood from Alexis’s body soaked through his clothes and dripped to the floor.
As Nathan stepped forward, the dagger that had been embedded in the child’s abdomen floated back into the air and fell to his right thigh.
Alexis’ blood splattered everywhere.
The dagger that had fallen to his thigh repositioned itself and pointed at the child’s eyes.
Nathan couldn’t dare move forward. If he moved, Alexis would die.
In any case, Alexis’ life belonged to them. Even if he stopped, they would show no mercy.
But the situation in front of him made him unwilling to move. While he hesitated, the Emperor coughed up blood.
The blue light flickered wildly and gradually weakened. As the suppressed black energy slowly escaped, it obscured the guards’ vision.
Lost sight, they were helplessly attacked by enemies. The blue light shrank even further.
A seductive smile spread across the woman’s face as the tide turned. Alexis couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
In the distance, he saw his father collapse. The dagger embedded in his gut slipped out and floated into the air.
It flew at high speed and lodged in the nape of Nathan’s neck. Alexis collapsed to the floor, tears streaming down his face.
But his body, bound by black magic, was unable to make a sound. Only after a while did the surroundings grow quiet.
The woman slowly removed the mask from her face. The beautiful face was gone, revealing grotesque eyes filled with black pupils.
A long scar ran from the corner of her mouth upward to her cheekbones, forming a grotesque, eerie smile on the wretched creature’s face, tainted with patches of rot.
The woman stroked the child’s face in despair and whispered wickedly.
“Sweetheart, I’m going to make it easy for you and let you go in peace.”
Alexis stared at the woman’s face, etching it into his memory. The face of the black mage, the so-called minion of the Devil, was filled with an ugly energy he had never felt before.
His body, bound in black mist, hovered in the air. As soon as she pulled the black mist away, he plummeted down the cliff at a terrifying speed.
Is this how it ends? Then at one point Alexis stopped in the middle of the cliff.
He opened his tightly closed eyes. His clothes were hanging from a stone jutting out of the middle of the cliff.
The black mist was nowhere to be seen. He groped around in his now-free hands, desperately searching for something to hold onto.
He stretched out his arms with all his might. His nails broke, his skin was torn, and his palms were bleeding.
In the meantime, the pain in the area where the knife was inserted became more severe. He lost so much blood, his mind is foggy.
Beneath the black cliffs was a deep sea with raging waves. He couldn’t die like this.
He looked up again, and something caught his eye.
A shriveled, ribbon-like sprout. It was a polyarun, long since withered.
Alexis closed his eyes. He couldn’t hold on any longer and fell off the cliff.
