Youngest 245
by CristaeEpisode 245
Thump. Thump.
Attack magic rained down from above.
A legion of golems loomed before him.
Liam let out a short, shallow breath.
Of course, the attack magic was deflected by the sturdy barrier, but he couldn’t help feeling anxious.
The ruins of a collapsed temple.
He was guarding the area around a half-destroyed chapel.
Inside, Rubian was working to complete the portal, so until then, it was up to him to hold this position.
‘But where is this barrage of attack magic coming from?’
Liam scowled, glancing up at the sky.
“M-Mister!”
Just then, a mage who had volunteered to stand watch with him spoke up, his face stricken with fear.
“What if the barrier breaks?”
“It’s rich, you asking me that—me, a non-mage.”
“Uh, I’m just an ordinary mage, not anyone special…”
“Still, among all the cowards, you’re the least cowardly.”
He was the only one among many who’d stepped forward to fight.
“Hurry up, fairy.”
Liam muttered under his breath.
He had no real worries about the three monsters rampaging below, but he couldn’t know how much longer the barrier would hold.
“Before that old crone of an elder exhausts her strength.”
Magic attacks thundered down from above, as relentless as a storm of lightning.
It seemed someone was dead set on breaking through this place, unleashing a barrage from afar.
‘Still…’
The Mage King’s dark beast experiments.
Liam recalled the information he’d gleaned from the children in the prayer room.
He’d heard that they extracted blood from dark beasts, then injected it into humans to see if their mana would turn into dark mana.
‘Was it really only humans…?’
If he’d been the researcher—
He’d have experimented with a wider range of subjects.
For example.
The beast stones in their possession.
The magical beasts sealed in those stones had their mana frozen solid, as if deep in hibernation.
The mana of a beast was simpler and more consistent in its flow than that of a human. Even more so the magical beasts sealed in stones.
‘Moreover, the mana of magical beasts and dark beasts shares certain properties that set them apart from that of humans…’
It was possible they’d already succeeded in creating magical beasts mutated by the blood of dark beasts.
Like those seen in the southern Babylon—ones far more than mere illusions.
Real ones.
If so, why attack only with those crude golems?
If they’d unleashed those mutant beasts from the start, this side would have fallen far more swiftly.
‘Perhaps they don’t have many of them yet, or they’re waiting for a surer moment…’
If it were him—
“Ah.”
A twisted smile appeared at the corners of Liam’s mouth. At the same time, he slipped off the necklace hanging at his throat.
“A rear assault, of course.”
If you use your brain too much, do you end up blowing a fuse?
If I still have room for such idle thoughts, I must not have blown mine just yet.
My eyes darted endlessly.
My mind spun furiously, overrun with information and knowledge, all of which I longed to spew forth. As I traced sigils and breathed words into existence, I begged for my hands to keep pace with the blinding speed at which my mind raced.
My breath came in gasps, my heart pounded.
Outside, something kept shattering and crumbling.
Please, please.
I must finish the portal’s spellcircle before it’s too late.
“Kh…”
A groan slipped out—not from me.
“Edelin!”
It was the elder who faltered first. Her face had gone deathly pale from the severe drain on her mana. The barrier was visibly weakening.
“Someone help Edelin!”
I snapped my head up—and froze.
The people huddled in the chapel, trembling, shrank deeper into the darkness, their faces etched with fear.
“So many palace mages here.”
“The First has come, at last, to kill us all…”
I had erased their Crests.
They no longer had a reason to bow before the Mage King, nor any grounds to submit.
Yet—
‘Was their time in bondage too long?’
I cried out, desperate.
“I understand your fear, but if we stay like this, we’ll all die!”
“S-surrender…!”
Someone finally blurted out what they’d been holding in.
“If we truly have no hope, isn’t it better to surrender…?”
Voices like that flared up among the crowd. Edelin, eyes burning red, snapped at them.
“How dare you!”
Like thunder, her shout made them all flinch.
“Have you grown so used to being scorned as vermin by the Mage King, that now you intend to become worms in truth?”
“But Elder! Even if you ask us to fight now…! We—we don’t have any of that strength…!”
“And to think I’ve protected people like you all this time!”
Edelin’s cry was as sharp as a rasp across the throat. The people exchanged uneasy glances. The elder coughed violently, and a thin spray of blood spattered from her lips.
“Edelin!”
Quickly, I poured my mana into her barrier.
“Please, just do what you must!”
The elder’s face hardened into that of a warrior. She gritted her teeth, as if wringing out every last ounce of power from her mana core.
“Long ago, when you were a child, I passed you once in the palace. You wouldn’t remember…”
“…”
“I’m sorry. I should have protected you back then.”
Now, at last, I could see why she’d stayed here, protecting these people with all her heart.
“I know full well that I have no right to blame them, not truly. So please, consider this my atonement—and live, live to the end.”
Boom! Something large and heavy smashed down against the barrier.
Edelin bit her lip, mustered her core’s mana, and attempted to patch the barrier that threatened to split.
Just as I moved to help her—
“Grandma!”
“Aren!”
A little one, darting out like a squirrel, ran forward and placed their hand over Edelin’s.
“I—is this how? Use my power!”
The child sobbed, snot and tears streaming down their face.
“I’ll give you all my bread from now on. So, so please, don’t die yet. Huuuwaa, Grandmaa!”
The child’s mana was feeble—so feeble, it seemed like nothing at all, as light as a feather.
At that moment, Aren’s mother stepped forward.
“Sorry, Elder. I let myself get swept up by everyone else…”
Smiling sheepishly, she wrapped her arms around the child and added her own feather-light strength. Next came the father. Then the older brother. Then the neighbors. Then the next neighbors…
Soon, the weakened barrier had regained its solidity.
Lastly, even the man who had urged surrender wiped away his tears and rushed to the wide spellcircle, adding his power.
“You all…”
Edelin dabbed at the blood on her lips.
“Rest for a moment, Elder. We’ll still need your help, but just for now…”
The power of any one of them was insignificant. But brought together, it achieved something remarkable.
For the first time, the mages seemed to understand that. Now they, too, wore the faces of warriors.
‘Wizeria… you coward.’
Surely—by now, even you must feel something, don’t you!
Since coming to Arcadia, I had called upon that power—never once answering, always hidden away like a fugitive.
Willingly.
My eyes glowed red, and in an instant, the spellcircle most perfectly suited to them rose up in my mind.
I shared the revised spellcircle with the others.
“The mana… it takes so much less than before!”
As joy spread among them behind me, I hurled myself once more into the portal’s spellcircle.
Something exploded overhead, but it was blocked away by thick stone walls; it didn’t reach us.
Edelin came to help reinforce the portal’s spellcircle.
“Thank you. I’ve lost count of how many times you’ve helped us…”
“No.”
I shook my head gently.
“I’ve been helped by you at least as many times!”
“…”
“This is the final formula.”
With the help of Wizeria’s power, the spellcircle was finally, perfectly restored. Mana surged through it.
As soon as the empty arch flickered and a blue veil rose to life—
—Titiyaaaaaa!
Somewhere, the angry roar of a lion rang out.
Grinning, I braced myself to leap straight into waiting arms.
“Halt.”
Liam leveled his sword at the shadow hiding behind a tree. The less-cowardly mage who had guided him let out a squawk and ran for his life.
“Was your plan to weaken the barrier from hiding, smash a beast stone, then attack us from the rear?”
The mage, robed in black vestments for concealment, froze mid-motion.
“…How did you…”
“Among the magical beast species that could be sealed in a beast stone, those with high mutation potential when exposed to dark beast blood—especially those suited for ambush attacks. That narrows things down. With just a five-second deduction, it was obvious what you planned.”
“…?”
The mage’s shoulder sagged, just slightly.
Liam had half-expected a response like, ‘Grgh—so you figured it out!’ He pushed his glasses up—with his middle finger, naturally.
He pressed on with his reasoning.
“And considering the traits of such beasts, you’d need terrain like this to hide the shockwaves and signatures when summoning them from the stone. That could only mean this cedar grove. Of course, you couldn’t stray too far from your target, so factoring in a beast’s average speed per second, this is the inevitable location. That took me seven seconds to deduce.”
“…?”
The mage’s silence deepened.
With a long sigh, Liam thought: Not an easy mark, this one.
“All right, I’ll admit it. Eight seconds.”
“Kh…”
At last, a response! ‘Grgh, you figured it out!’
“I never thought that deeply. You’re insane.”
“…?”
No, apparently not.
Liam frowned for real this time. He hadn’t even thought about it for eight seconds? Maybe this opponent was not to be taken lightly after all.
In that moment, the mage flicked his fingers and cast a spell.
An axe-shaped gust howled by, splintering the tree next to Liam. The mage widened the gap between them while Liam ducked aside.
“Ch.”
Liam clutched his leather gloves tight, thinking—
Ugh, I really hate sword fighting.
He was the type to never forget anything learned.
He was good at mental work because he wanted to be, and good at physical work because his natural-born blood simply made it so.
All he had to do was hold out until backup arrived…
Surely, the least cowardly of the cowards had run for help, so someone should be here soon.
With that thought, Liam pressed forward, sword raised, keeping his eye on the retreating mage—
“You…”
In the white moonlight, Liam caught sight of the mage’s face and froze solid.
“The First? Mm. Black eyes, gray hair. And a Crest on the left cheek!”
Ah.
It’s you.
Liam smiled.
The bastard who shoved my precious little sister into a pit of misery.You