Chapter 134.1: Premonition in the Barren Wasteland
◆Dark Knight; Kuroki
Diadona and co retreated right before us.
And yet, it didn’t feel like we had won at all.
Rather, it felt like if the fight had indeed started, we wouldn’t be able to foresee what would happen. Especially when it came to the Serpent Queen, I had a really bad feeling from the cup that she summoned.I mean seriously, what in the hell was that?
Well, let’s save that question for later.
At least we managed to avoid an unnecessary fight with the Serpent Queen.
Then I turned around, facing Rena and Totona.
A flying ship came down from the sky.
It was Rena’s flying ship. It had finally arrived.
I also saw Reiji walk by himself towards us.I noticed that he had been watching me since I revealed my identity.
That’s why I knew that he would do this.
「Let’s fight, Dark Knight!」
Reiji readied his two swords, glaring as he spoke.
「Wait a minute, Hero of Light!」
「Wait, Reiji-kun!」
Both Chiyuki and Totona came in a hurry as soon as Reiji declared his challenge.
Nevertheless, Rena stopped both of them.
「What’s the meaning of this, Rena?!」
「Don’t stop me! He’s Shirone-san’s childhood friend! I must stop them from killing each other!」
Both of them shouted at Rena.
It seems they were quite enraged to see Rena block their way.
「Calm down please, it’ll be alright. No one is going to get injured. Let’s just see their fight with a cool head.」
She spoke with a clear and serene voice that everyone could hear.
Rena’s line of sight met mine, Reiji who stood behind Rena hadn’t noticed that line of sight.
It seems she saw through everything.
Honestly I hate doing this.
I mean, please stop having weird expectations from me.
The people from Gypseal and the Lion Queen, Sekhmetra, who felt sort of a sign from Reiji and I, chose to stay on the sidelines and watch quietly.
「I have no reason to fight though…」
I replied so while raising my demon sword.
Yes, I had no intention of backing off the challenge from Reiji.
This was our fight.
Eclipse and Bennu were circling above our heads.
But in my case, I still couldn’t perfectly control Eclipse.
I couldn’t use Eclipse to attack.
But the same could be said for Bennu.
Bennu was in an extremely weakened state right now.
Meaning that we couldn’t use our spirits.
Thus, our fight would be a fight with pure skill.
「I see, sorry for the trouble, but I just feel that we have to fight here.」
Said Reiji with his usual daring smile.
But I noticed that his smile was different from his usual smile.
I mean, what did he mean?
Was he by any chance scared of me?
No, that’s impossible… Especially for Reiji.
「Here I come.」
Reiji was closing in on me.
His leap was akin to a light arrow.
If I stay still, Reiji would move.
Reiji’s movement was within my expectation.
He attacked with both of his swords.
I parried the first sword with my sword and used the recoil to parry his second sword.
Reiji, whose sword strikes got parried, spun around without losing his stance and used the spinning momentum to unleash another strike.
This slash had more edge than before.
Nevertheless, it wouldn’t work since I knew this attack would come from the very beginning.
I could easily deal with something like this.
I parried all of Reiji’s attacks that came like a torrent of waves with my sword.
And then, I parried Reiji’s right slash.
The moment I did so, Reiji spun and landed behind me.
When he did so, I spun my sword to my back without even turning around to block Reiji’s back attack.
And just like that, I used my right leg as an axis and spun my waist and shoulder, flicking off Reiji.
「What the!」
Unable to cope with my blow, Reiji’s body spun a few times in the air before landing on the sand again.
His physical ability and reflexes were as high as usual.
Without a moment of delay, Reiji unleashed another attack with both of his swords.
His movements were like that of a dance.
Rena’s valkyrie, Ishtar’s catfolk chamberlain, the sphinxes who came with Sekhmetra, everyone raised a cheer.
“I’m so damn jealous!” That was what I wanted to say.
Moreover, the battle against Alphos from a while ago was even more horrible than now.
The women from back then seem to still hate me even now.
Damn, this is why I hate fighting against a handsome dude.
My sword clashed with Reiji’s again.
Numerous clashes followed after that. And then, Reiji suddenly leapt back.
He was about to use his magic.
Did he give up on trying to defeat me with a sword?
「LIGHT BULLET!」
Dozens of light bullets appeared around Reiji, and fired at me.
「DARK BULLET!」
I could counter the magic with my sword but I decided to use magic too.
I created bullets from dark energy, matching his numbers, and made them clash against the light bullets.
The bullets clashed in mid-air.
The collision between light and dark energy created a storm of magical power around us.
「Eh?」
I let out a startled voice.
That’s because Reiji had plunged himself through the area of collision between light and darkness bullets and rushed straight toward me.
It seems he rushed the moment he fired the light bullet.
That was truly a bold tactic.
A single mistake would cause him to be injured by his own light bullet.
「GOTCHA! LIGHT BLAST!」
His sword was traveling at the speed of light.
But, such a crude surprise attack wouldn’t be able to reach me.
Even if I had no idea what he was trying to do, I knew that he was trying to do something.
「PHANTOM MIRAGE!」
I cast shadow magic, walking as if swaying.
The phantom stepped forward before me.
It slipped through all of Reiji’s lightspeed sword attacks and arrived behind Reiji.
Reiji had no idea what just happened since he was befuddled by the shadow passing him.
After waiting for Reiji to turn around, I swung my sword at him.
And just as I had expected, Reiji managed to catch the blow in the nick of time with both of his swords, getting blown away.
Reiji, who got sent flying, braced his leg on the sand as the residual force of my blow sent him backward, leaving two long trails on the sand.
He didn’t fall from that blow eh?
Maybe I went too easy on him.
I readied my sword again.
But, Reiji didn’t come to me again.
「Are you done?」
「Yeah, that’s all…」
After a momentary silence, Reiji shook his head as he returned his sword back into its sheath.
Only then did I heave a sigh of relief.
It seems he was satisfied with the result of our short clashes.
Bennu, who was flying above us, had also vanished. Maybe he was sent back to the spirit world.
Meaning that it was safe for me to send Eclipse back too.
The people around us looked dumbfoundedly in silence.
「TOTONA, I’VE FULFILLED MY PROMISE! I’LL RETURN IMMEDIATELY!」
I looked at Totona and told her so.
My role in this mission, and trip to Gypseal had ended.
There was no need to stay in this place any longer.
It’s time to return to Kuna’s side.
Totona made a sad face when I told her so.
But, the wise Totona should’ve understood my reason.
I used return magic to return to Kuna’s side.
Since we were currently outside of Gypseal’s barrier, the return magic should work fine.
The space warped for a moment and then the next moment, I had already arrived inside the king’s private room of the sweet castle.
Kuna, who was already sitting in the bed, greeted me upon seeing my return.
She looked really delighted.
Since Kuna was happy, I also felt happy in turn.
「I’m home, Kuna.」
「Welcome back Kuroki.」
I fell into the bed after I took off my armor.
I was so exhausted.
The process of taming Eclipse took most of my stamina.
Since my affinity with the spirit was already bad to begin with, I forced him to surrender with brute force.
And doing so drained most of my stamina.
「Sorry Kuna. Let me sleep a bit…」
「I understand, Kuroki. Come, Kuna will give you a lap pillow.」
Kuna gave me a lap pillow.
Thus I placed my head on her lap, and closed my eyes.
Just like that, I felt my consciousness descend into a comfortable darkness called sleep.
◆Black Haired Sage; Chiyuki
Reiji returned to us after he fought that person, the Dark Knight.
「What’s the meaning of this, Reiji-kun?! He came to save Shirone-san you know!」
Come to think of it, for what reason did he come to Gypseal?
It should be to save Shirone.
And just a while ago, Rena formed a united front with him to save us.
Even the fact that he helped Totona wasn’t strange.
Since Totona wanted to save her big brother, the reason why they were working together was simply for mutual benefit.
Alas, I had no idea who had asked who to form an alliance.
Nevertheless, that was a trivial matter.
Thanks to him we managed to get the scorpion god’s poison. Shirone-san could be saved with this.
While it might be true that we had no reason to work with him, there was no need to fight him immediately.
「Sorry Chiyuki. But, this is a fight I can’t afford to back down from.」
Said Reiji as he let out a smile.
What in the world with that meaningful smile?
「Are you by chance troubled about something, Reiji?」
Rena also came to greet Reiji.
Totona was standing beside her with a vexed look on her face.
Looking at the situation until now, she was obviously on bad terms with Rena.
Maybe she didn’t want to be together with Rena.
「Yeah, sorry for making you worry about me, Rena.」
Reiji apologized to Rena.
Rena came in a hurry since she was worrying about Reiji.
Properly speaking, she didn’t trust his ability.
