Episode 147

“Prepare yourselves!”

As the gates finally opened, countless monsters poured out, enough to blacken the sky.

Even seeing it with my own eyes, it was hard to believe.

Even though it was a situation I had somewhat anticipated, I couldn’t hide my sense of shock.

“Sierra, please move to a safe place!”

Saying so, Ludwig rushed forward.

In an instant, a clash broke out between the allied forces and the monsters.

To the knights who hesitated at the overwhelming numbers, Ludwig shouted.

“Do not be shaken by their numbers! Most of them are nothing but large low-grade monsters—stab their hearts and they will die!”

“Yes!!”

The clash between the two forces could only be described as a living hell.

It was a disaster that finally arrived at the end of a long, long peace.

Even though it was a surprise attack before any tactical instructions could be given, the allied forces led by Ludwig fought the monsters on equal footing.

Moreover, knight orders that had arrived belatedly continued to join the allied forces.

At that moment, a giant shadow loomed over me.

When I looked up, a mid-grade monster was approaching me from the air.

“…!”

But soon, the monster that was about to strike me was split in half.

With a thud, the fallen monster collapsed, and Bergeus approached me and said.

“What are you doing in the middle of the battlefield without a hint of fear?”

“Bergeus?”

“That foolish descendant couldn’t even focus on fighting because he was too worried about you.”

Saying so, he suddenly lifted me up and carried me away from the battlefield back to Chetwind Manor, which was some distance away.

“You stay here until it’s time for you to fulfill your role.”

At that moment.

Boom-!

A massive explosion sounded among the allied forces, and I could see wounded soldiers falling everywhere.

“What was that sudden…?”

As the black mist from the explosion cleared, there stood Crown Prince Lucion—no, Hertz.

Next to Hertz was Jenna as well.

“So he finally shows up. That damn bastard.”

Bergeus ground his teeth as he spoke.

When Hertz tried to cast black magic again toward the allied forces, Bergeus immediately hurled a sword made of light at him.

Hertz, who had been watching the brutal battlefield with a pleased expression, barely dodged the sudden attack.

“Oops.”

Then he looked this way and his eyes widened.

“Bergeus!”

Hertz laughed in surprise and shouted.

He appeared instantly in front of the castle where we were and spoke as if he were greeting an old friend.

“Bergeus, long time no see. I didn’t think we’d meet again like this.”

“Yeah, I came here just to tear you apart.”

“Haha, to think that you, weakened after such a long seal, believe you can face me.”

Hertz laughed mockingly as he spoke.

“Come then, if you think you can.”

Leaving those words behind, he entered one of the many fissures floating in the air.

Bergeus glared at the spot where Hertz disappeared and said to me in a low voice.

“To completely destroy the dimensional wall, a sacrifice is needed. Someone who possesses a power completely opposite to mine.”

“A completely opposite power?”

“Black magic. That bastard is going to offer a powerful black magician as a sacrifice soon.”

“A black magician…”

“I’m telling you this now just in case. As for that damn bastard—I’ll handle him.”

Finishing those words, Bergeus flew without hesitation into the fissure where Hertz had gone.

Watching Bergeus disappear between the fissures after Hertz, I turned around at the sound of approaching footsteps.

The one who was approaching from behind was none other than Jenna.

“Hello, Sierra? It’s nice to meet you again like this.”

There was no more awkward politeness.

Jenna’s atmosphere had changed completely from before.

She pointed to the sword in my hand and said.

“Kirios, the sword that holds the power to reseal the gates of the demon realm. If you hand it over quietly, I’ll spare your life. I promise.”

“…….”

“It’s not like I want to kill you, Sierra. We were close friends when we were young, and even now, when things have gone astray, I bear no ill will toward you.”

[Sierra, be careful. I can feel a strong aura of black magic from her. She’s inherited a significant amount of Hertz’s power.]

I glared at Jenna at the warning voice of Askan ringing in my ear.

[She’s too much for you to handle. Stall for time until I can materialize.]

Even while still recovering his strength after purifying Bergeus and Daniel, Askan spoke firmly.

I stared directly at Jenna and said.

“I knew it from the moment I questioned the perpetrator of the East District explosion. That you were connected to them.”

“…….”

“In the end, it was all the same person. Crown Prince Lucion, the bomber Louis, and Hertz. You were connected to all of them.”

At my words, Jenna shrugged casually.

“Yeah, that’s right. But so what?”

“You were involved in the East District explosion too, weren’t you?”

“The explosion incident was all because of you, Sierra.”

“What?”

“You ended the plague that swept through the East District. It made things troublesome.”

Jenna said something incomprehensible.

At that moment, Askan muttered as if realizing something.

[They needed sacrifices to open the demon gates.]

“What do you mean?”

[To cause a demon gate outbreak on this scale, you need sacrifices. A lot of death. Monsters love the aura of death.]

Which meant…

“So they spread the plague, and when that failed, they caused the explosion in the East District to create mass casualties to open the gates?”

“Exactly.”

Jenna nodded indifferently, and I was at a loss for words.

“Thanks to your constant interference, it was troublesome in many ways, but in the end, we achieved it. What he wanted.”

Jenna smiled as she looked at the monsters pouring out of the sky.

“Why? Why would you do something like this? You grew up without lacking anything in Selber. Why?”

“Sorry, but I don’t have time for pointless chats with you. Honestly, I lied about sparing you too. You’re going to have to die right here.”

As she spoke, she rushed at me.

“……!”

She reached out to snatch Kirios from my hands, but at that moment—

[Damn, I can’t materialize yet. Use my power to suppress her.]

Following Askan’s instruction, I swiftly grabbed Jenna’s wrist and used the spirit’s power to block her from using black magic.

“Let go of me!”

Jenna struggled, trying to shake me off.

That’s when a fuzzy, unfamiliar memory suddenly surfaced in my mind.

‘This is…’

Jenna’s memories.

I felt a burning heat around the area where Terium’s Blessing was engraved near my neck.

Maybe this was the manifestation of Terium’s Blessing.

I had wondered whether it would ever awaken, and if it did, what kind of power it would grant me.

I absorbed Jenna’s memories in a very short time.

From when she first handed me the fruit of betrayal at the age of five, to the more recent moments when she conspired with Hertz to start a great war.

Reading someone else’s memories was still unfamiliar to me, but there was a lot of useful information.

Most of all…

I uncovered a memory that felt like discovering an ancient relic deep underground.

It wasn’t from this lifetime of Jenna.

[At last, the threads of fate have entwined to bring you two together again.]

At Askan’s words, I looked at Jenna.

In the ancient past, there were two emperors who overthrew a tyrant and fought against the monsters.

Tias and Rosette.

The two were irreplaceable friends, working together to end the dark ages.

But one day, Rosette fell for Hertz’s temptation and betrayed Tias.

The ending for the two, torn apart by Hertz, was tragic.

Tias was killed by her best friend Rosette, and Rosette was eventually hunted down and killed by Daemond, who was enraged by Tias’s death.

Their two souls, after wandering for countless years, had finally reunited.

Here, as Sierra Drenihan and Jenna Selber.

In the moment I stood stunned, Jenna knocked my hand away and stepped back.

“So this is the spirit’s power. Disgusting.”

I stared at Jenna and said.

“…Do you know? In the end, Hertz will throw you away too.”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous. He loves me, more than anyone.”

Based on the memories I read, Jenna was nothing more than Hertz’s cherished ‘sacrifice.’

A perfect vessel needed to fully tear down the dimensional wall.

Right before coming south, Jenna had inherited a huge amount of black magic from Hertz.

An amount a normal human body could never withstand.

Yet she endured because she carried Rosette’s soul within her.

Because she was born inherently with the power of purification, no matter how much black magic was poured into her, she could withstand it.

In every way, she was the perfect sacrifice Hertz had been hoping for.

“When you were taken out of Selber and abandoned at a border orphanage. When you were left there long enough to forget your own face. When he finally came to fetch you only when he needed you.”

Each time I mentioned a memory I had seen, Jenna’s expression twisted more and more.

“You were always just a disposable tool for Hertz to achieve his goals.”

“Shut up!”

At that moment—

Suddenly, Jenna froze as if she had turned to stone and cried out with a pale face.

“Lord Hertz! Are you hurt?!”

At Jenna’s cry, I turned around to see Hertz staggering, holding his bleeding shoulder.

‘What happened to Bergeus?’

“Haa, damn lizard bastard….”

Hertz let out a sigh filled with annoyance.

“If I drag this out any longer, my body won’t hold up. Even if I put off dealing with Bergeus, I have to break down the dimensional wall now.”

At those words, Hertz swiftly approached Jenna and stabbed her heart with a spear.

“…….”

It happened in the blink of an eye, and I widened my eyes.

Jenna stood dazed, staring at the spear piercing through her, then suddenly collapsed to the ground.

Like a doll whose life had been drained, Jenna merely opened and closed her mouth.

‘Why.’

Her lips mouthed those words. She couldn’t even make a sound, but it was a desperate cry directed at Hertz.

“You have fulfilled your final purpose. It was a life doomed to die anyway. Consider yourself lucky I let you live this long.”

Rosette. In her past life and again in this one, a puppet played by Hertz.

For a brief moment, I recalled Jenna’s innocent smile from when we were young.

If not for Hertz, could we have remained good friends?

“Jenna.”

The moment I spoke her name, Jenna’s body lost its form and disintegrated.

Like the end of a black magician, her remains scattered into the air like dust, and I blinked while watching.

The instant Jenna fulfilled her role as a sacrifice, the ground shook violently.

In an instant, the sky filled with black clouds, and cracks began to appear everywhere.

Now it was harder to find places in the sky without cracks than ones with them.

“Finally! The demon realm and the human world are practically one now!”

The gale blowing from Hertz was so fierce that I couldn’t even keep my eyes open properly.

At the same time, the black clouds that covered the south started to spread across the entire continent, and the plants and animals around them began to die one after another.

I could feel it in my entire body—there was truly little time left before the dimensional wall collapsed.