Awakening the Great Bloodline Chapter 144

Chapter 144 — Law and Rupture

The battlefield was silent, but it was the heavy silence left behind by death.

The bodies of those who had already drawn their last breath lay heaped upon the muddy ground, and broken weapons and shattered fragnts were scattered like refuse swept along by rainwater. A thick stench of blood hung in the air, making even breathing feel suffocating.

The Knight Commanders shouted until their throats gave out, but their cries drifted uselessly through the air. No one could answer. The hands gripping swords had lost their strength, and the eyes had long since been broken in by despair. This was no longer a battlefield — it was a grave for those who could endure no more.

"Guh…… Aaaargh!"

Kohtan's presence shook the battlefield once more.

Imran moved to give chase, but his limits were clear. He pushed aside mounds of mud with his energy and saved a number of n, but dozens died in an instant.

'There isn't much ti left.'

Calix watched as his light grew dimr by degrees. No matter how great a Master, the supply of energy was finite.

Just then, Kohtan drew close and swung his sword. Water droplets spun around the blade, unsettling the human senses as though gravity itself had vanished.

Grrk!

He barely deflected the strike aid at his shoulder. A ragged breath escaped his lips. A foul stench stabbed at his nostrils, and his lower body was pressed down by the mud so that even the slightest movent brought fierce resistance.

And yet—

'It isn't so different from back then.'

The days when he had plunged into muddy pits without even proper diving equipnt. To struggle and thrash was to invite the end.

Calix stopped resisting. Instead, he read the direction of the pressure. He took in the speed of the water droplets raining down on him, the treacherous footing beneath him, and the force of the current — accepting all of it.

Then, the world flipped upside down.

Sensory confusion swept over him, but he did not lose his center. With The Mind's Eye, he discerned his own position and felt the enemy's movents against his skin.

[Core energy — mass release detected]

The black water droplets were bent one by one in their trajectories through the pressure field. He did not et them head-on or force them down — he simply nudged each one just slightly, letting them flow past.

At the sa ti, he responded to each slipping foot and swaying torso, maintaining the rhythm of offense and defense.

'His movents can be read in advance.'

When a clashing sword was pushed, he let himself be pushed. As though reacting to falling stones during a dive, he pressed the flat of his blade against the other and drew it inward.

One mont of carelessness and he could be cut — but conversely, as long as he avoided only that……the weapon would be sealed.

Kohtan's movent hesitated for just an instant. For the first ti, the Slaughterer's montum was caught by the ankle.

Imran ca charging in from the left, and in that gap the surrounding knights caught their breath and fell back. For a brief mont, the slaughter paused.

But Calix paid it no mind. At so point, he had stepped deeply into his inner world.

Imran's sword-light spread faintly. Calix used that speed as his asure and looked back at his own. How fast, and how precise? No — did that even hold aning in itself?

Countless questions chased one another endlessly.

But there was no need to rush. Just as a diver who thrashed in terror was swallowed by the mud pit, the path opened only when one entrusted one's body to stillness.

The root and the principle were the sa.

Calix stepped into the reach of his opponent's attack. Rather than advancing straight ahead, he angled diagonally and slipped inside.

Szzzt.

Even so, the pressure catching him below the waist was fierce. It was not rely the viscosity of the mud — it was dark energy recoiling. The entire space was Kohtan's domain.

To this, Calix did not counter with energy, but accepted the current entirely.

'One must let the current live — and yet know how to govern it.'

Imran's counsel had been right.

He had already experienced the darkness dwelling within his Core. Rough and unruly, yet it remained alongside him still. The enemy's was no different. Rather than forcing his way through, he acknowledged the opponent's domain and crossed straight through it.

No matter how many tis the question was posed, the sa answer rose back up.

'I had only forgotten — the answer was always within .'

Of course, Kohtan did not stop even then. He t Imran's sword, which aid for his flank, and the impact of the collision vaporized water droplets, scattering toxic vapors.

The Master surpassed him in speed, yet soon Kohtan's silhouette blurred and slipped outside the attack range. He had bent the tiline in an instant.

And the mont Calix launched himself forward once more—

Every sound in the world went out.

***

Calix sensed a change within himself. The battlefield was full of noise, yet nothing reached his ears. Voices, groans, the squelching of mud, the clash of steel — even color itself — had disappeared.

As though dark ink had bled across the world, only a black-and-white realm remained. Even so, Kohtan's shadow spread ever darker within it.

Then, dread-fire rose from the tip of the sword. Darkness and chaos rged, filling the surface of the famous blade Srna. Yet even that was no more than a tool.

What mattered was the one who held it — himself.

'I am Calix.'

The veil fell from the young man's eyes. All that remained was his own essence. The sa words as before, yet holding a different aning now.

Empty Heart — the realm of emptying the heart.

The dread-fire gradually subsided. The intensity of the fla diminished, yet it gathered into sothing far more solid. Even so, not a flicker moved in Calix's eyes.

The body moved ahead of the sword, and his own will moved ahead of the body. Everything else no longer warranted attention. The pressure field that had deflected the black water droplets, The Mind's Eye that had corrected the sensory confusion — all of it fell to lower priority.

'Even this — all of it is to move forward.'

One target, one alone — Kohtan.

Again, reality followed the current of the inner world. The body advanced along the path the will had taken, and in response to the movent, the blade radiated light.

And at the end of it, grey energy coalesced. Neither light nor darkness — a unique color, a current that shimred as if viscous, cleaving through the black tide as it advanced.

Shwoooosh—!

Sword t sword. Calix's blade rose at a slant and aid for the right shoulder, and Kohtan t it with a smooth defensive motion.

Had nothing changed from before, it would have been deflected outward.

Crack!

The instant the blades t, the spine of Kohtan's sword shattered. The Legion Commander's head snapped back slightly, and broken shards flew up into the air. By then, Calix's shoulder had driven its way inside his body. The sword followed — that ca next.

The blade was driven in an instant through the opening left by the lock. The energy wreathing the opponent's sword resisted, but the force of chaos bore down and crushed it all.

Kohtan tried to twist his body away in haste, but—

He was half a beat too late.

Crack-crack-crack!

With a splitting sound the blade scraped across, and the Red Knight's shoulder vanished as though a great bite had been taken out of it. Kohtan retreated hastily and looked down at his own forearm.

His entire right hand hung in tatters, barely attached.

[……How dare you.]

It was the first ti. The darkness that had consud all was turned back. The power that Legion Commander Midra had been left in shock by. Calix's chaos surged against the current and once more carved away another shell.

"Look at , Kohtan. Your opponent has already been decided."

Calix's voice resounded low.

The eyes within Kohtan's helm flashed. There was no expression, but seething fury seeped through in threads.

In that gap, the Mountain Rabbits gained breathing room as well.

"Hey, get up on your feet!"

Gregor hauled Helmut Barben up out of the muddy water. Marik looked after Nuvel Groxat, and the dwarf Basim gathered together the survivors who still had the will to fight. Their numbers — a scant few dozen. But the eyes that had been subrged in death regained a glimr of life.

Their gazes fixed on Calix, then shifted to Legion Commander Kohtan.

Shhh.

The smoke bleeding from the shoulder was blocked and stilled by black water droplets. The forearm that had looked ready to fall to the ground at any mont restored itself to its forr state.

Yet that emotion — that alone would not be erased.

[Even should your sword carve my flesh, what aning does it hold?]

Beneath the helm, a red line of light blinked.

[Unless eternal rest is offered, this body will not perish. That is the law I have set.]

After a pause, as though still drawing breath, he conjured a new sword from the air.

Calix did not answer separately. Having emptied his heart, what remained beca only more clear. The dread-fire fla had settled low, yet in its place a stronger current enveloped his entire body.

His gaze t Imran's. The two exchanged a silent conversation, then at once charged together toward the enemy.

Shhhk—!

Two swords crossed as though their trajectories had been decided in advance. The jet-black energy exploded outward, but there was no wavering to the very end.

Malevolent force churned through Calix's body and flowed back out. The darkness was Kohtan's, yet simultaneously it was his as well.

Then, cleaving through the black water droplets, three swords collided.

Crash—!

He had now grasped the second realm of a Top-Rank Swordsman — Empty Heart. No outward change was visible, but Imran was the first to perceive the shift.

When one thrust, the other imdiately deflected, and in the ensuing counter — a horizontal slash — the upper body was arched back to avoid it with the gap of a single toe's width.

The swords of both sides interlocked in a dance. Rather than attacking recklessly, both subtly angled to deflect the other's force. Before a rebound could occur, the next motion was already underway, and the instances of energy colliding in midair dropped sharply.

Calix was fully imrsed.

When the opponent stepped forward he fell back, and when an opening appeared he advanced half a step without missing it. On solid ground, footprints would have been etched closely together, interweaving like a jointly designed pattern.

Above all, his coordination with Imran himself was incomparably excellent. When Kohtan aid for his throat, Calix would force the withdrawal of the sword from the right by bending the angle of the wrist.

[Ghr……]

The enemy commander's brief groan contained the reality of the present mont.

Imran thrust his sword at Kohtan's legs, and it caught on the sword's spine by a hair's breadth. In that instant, Calix traced a trajectory that grazed the outside of his throat.

He anticipated and encompassed not only the enemy's movents, but his ally's as well.

The air around them slowly grew heated. This was no re figure of speech — the collision of forces pushed the currents outward, forming a circular space. Naturally, the muddy water surged and rolled in waves.

At its center, three beings intermingled and clashed.

Because they were those who could never stand on the sa side, the circumstances differed from when Imran and Calix had t. It was not a matter of yielding to each other — it was that the montum of both sides had achieved perfect equilibrium.

"Enter……In there?"

The survivors watching this sight could not bring themselves to step forward, warned off by pure instinct.

Bang!!

In one mont, the blades of all three t head-on from the front. Two pairs of eyes and one red line of light within a helm clashed across the steel. The tal trembled faintly, but neither side gave ground. Human sweat evaporated as fast as it ford, and feet clenched against the earth and stone as though gripping it.

Then all three fell back simultaneously. They reset their stances with a short distance between them.

[Law does not change. Do you still fail to grasp even this?]

Kohtan acknowledged both of them and yet mocked them, and—

"……Let's end this quickly."

Imran conveyed in a handful of short words that his body was not at full capacity, and—

Calix—

'There isn't much ti. I must accept the risk.'

He saw only the path leading to victory.

Just then, out of nowhere, sothing long suppressed deep beneath the earth let out a low, rumbling cry.

That was the mont.

Kraaaaang!!

From beyond the ridge, a thunderous roar shook heaven and earth. Mounds of soil shot skyward, and the enormous body of a great beast burst through the crest of the hill.

"Behind us! The rear has collapsed!"

At the very mont when an atmosphere of life-or-death tension was building to its peak, the main body of the allied forces crumbled. Whether it was due to the tunnel worms, or because they had been ambushed, was unknown. What was certain was the fact that Kohtan's subordinates had brought the wall down.

Soon, allied soldiers were pushed out into the center of the battlefield.

Pfft—

Those who had fled to survive toppled forward, engulfed by black water droplets. Calix found himself knowing, despite not wishing to, that his judgnt had been correct. Ti was not on his side.

"……Wouldn't it be better to pull out now, even at this stage?"

Soone's murmur beca, in an instant, everyone's thought.

But while all were watching the allied soldiers crumbling one after another beyond the ridge, Adrian alone raised his head and looked in a different direction.

His gaze was not directed at the collapsing front line — but toward the far side of the darkness, toward a light that no one had yet seen.