Chapter 71: The Light of Divine Nas (Part 2)
Arcane’s gaze turned to Kal.
The man who had co to him in search of answers, ntioning him—and the mont he was brought up, this strange phenonon had occurred. Could this truly be a coincidence?
“I didn’t get to hear the full answer earlier. What is his Divine Na?”
“……”
Kal, who had just exchanged whispers with Rengua, narrowed his eyes at Arcane’s silence.
Rengua hadn’t been able to read the Divine Na, but he had discerned that its content had changed.
“Since the Divine Na has shifted, we need to revisit the discussion, don’t we?”
“…What kind of person is he?”
The fact that Arcane was now asking about him only solidified Kal’s conviction.
The Light of Divine Nas that Rengua had witnessed monts ago undoubtedly belonged to the Master of the Siren’s Hymn.
A being capable of altering even the immutable Divine Na—a phenonon thought to be governed by the unchanging laws of the world.
‘It has to be him. It can only be him.’
Kal felt more certain than ever that he was the one.
“Let tell you what I know about him. Will you refuse the deal again?”
“……”
This ti, Arcane slowly sat back down in his chair.
His expression was more serious than ever before. The interest he held in him had evolved beyond curiosity; his gaze now brimd with caution and wariness.
[Insight That Pierces the Soul]
Kal recalled his own Divine Na, the one etched into his mind.
Perhaps it was this Divine Na’s influence that had brought this sudden insight to him.
Kal’s thoughts began to spin quickly.
It felt as though an unexpected opportunity had presented itself—to keep soone as significant as Arcane by his side. So, he decided to throw out the biggest bait he could.
“I have a plan to catch him. Will you join ?”
“What do you intend to do once you capture him?”
Kal bared his teeth in a savage grin, as if the question were unnecessary.
“I just want to et him.”
“Then I’ll arrange the eting.”
Arcane hesitated for a mont, clearly deliberating over Kal’s proposal.
As a servant of prophecy, Arcane never moved without a revelation.
But then—
“……!”
Arcane’s earring suddenly trembled, and his pupils flashed like a streak of blue lightning. The change was so fleeting that neither Kal nor his companions noticed it.
Monts later, Arcane’s expression returned to normal, and he nodded slowly.
“I’ll allow it—for a limited ti.”
A limited-ti alliance.
Though the phrase implied Arcane could leave at any mont, Kal didn’t care. Having the fad Arcane by his side, even briefly, was already a triumph.
What could be accomplished if Arcane’s knowledge of Divine Nas was combined with Kal’s experiences from his regression?
The idea of such forces aligning to glimpse the flow of the world made Kal smile involuntarily.
Kal extended his hand, and Arcane clasped it.
Fate-bound Arcane and Kal the Slayer.
Thus, an unlikely alliance was forged over the shared goal of tracking him.
***
Kukukukukukung—!
The entirety of Laup Forest trembled.
The cliffside once known as Dominic’s laboratory had barely endured the rampage of a monstrous red beast but finally crumbled under the aftershocks of an explosion.
Massive boulders swept through the forest, creating a scene that resembled a landslide.
The countless chira corpses strewn across the blood-soaked earth, the giant red beast, and Dominic’s mangled body were all buried beneath layers of rubble.
Thick clouds of dust obscured the surrounding view. Eventually, a lone figure erged slowly through the haze.
“Cough! Cough! Damn it all!”
Fenry staggered forward, hacking violently as she brushed off the dirt caked onto her body. She looked utterly disheveled, covered in gri to the point where, from afar, she might have been mistaken for a dark elf.
Shoving aside debris, she stepped onto solid ground and gently laid down the person she had been carrying.
Despite her careful touch, Fenry growled savagely as she released the man from her grasp.
“Ten-thousand-gold jobs catching dark elves, my ass. From now on, no Black Rose contract will start below twenty thousand gold.”
Arthur Clayton.
Their fateful connection had begun with a ten-thousand-gold contract in Beneta, and his words had sohow brought her all the way here.
Never in her life had soone made her suffer this much. To save the man lying before her, she had fought like hell, enduring every kind of hardship imaginable.
If not for the bond of the Mark, she would have abandoned him long ago—or beaten him to death on the spot.
But despite the ferocity in her eyes, her hands, which carefully adjusted Arthur’s body, were as tender as if handling a fragile child. This only made her feel more frustrated and aggrieved.
As long as the Mark of Life remained intact, Arthur absolutely could not die.
“You know it’s cheating if you die here, right? So don’t you dare give up.”
Arthur’s condition was, to be honest, beyond words. It wouldn’t have been inaccurate to say he was already dead.
The massive wound in his abdon, inflicted by Dominic, was a mortal injury in itself. But in addition to that, his left arm was gone, his left side and both thighs were torn open to the bone.
The cataclysmic explosion that had ended the battle had left his body in shambles. Fenry didn’t even know what had caused the blast.
The only silver lining was that his body was regenerating rapidly.
The bleeding had already stopped, and new flesh was visibly growing over his wounds.
It was an astonishing rate of recovery—enough to leave her speechless.
She was certain it had to do with the heart she had shoved into his mouth earlier.
[Don’t you want to save ?]
Covered in blood and on the brink of death, Arthur had spoken those words while clutching a small girl.
[I need the heart she swallowed.]
Fenry hadn’t hesitated for long.
The Mark of Life compelled her to prioritize saving him above all else.
She had ripped the heart from Arena Huaton’s mutilated body and fed it to Arthur without a second thought.
And the results were unfolding before her eyes. Arthur’s complexion was slowly returning to life.
Fenry sat on a nearby rock, placing a smoking pipe in her mouth.
Taking a long drag and exhaling deeply, she felt the tension drain from her body.
Looking up at the sky, she noticed the sun was beginning to set.
It felt like the longest, most exhausting, and most cursed day of her life.
Tapping out the ash from her pipe, Fenry’s gaze fell on the limp corpse of Arena Huaton lying beside Arthur.
Her body was torn to shreds, her heart ripped out—a horrifyingly grueso sight.
The reason Fenry had bothered to bring the small monster’s body with her was simple: even in death, Arena hadn’t let go of Arthur, clinging to him until the very end.
The damned creature had made her suffer to the bitter end.
Fenry quickly began calculating.
‘This is a total loss. A massive loss.’
She had given the Mark of Life to Arthur because of the significant help she had received from him, but this had gone far beyond her expectations. She had saved him not once, but at least ten tis—and each ti, she had suffered imnsely.
There was no question about it—she would demand extra paynt. A lot of it.
“That thing of his should cover it. Should I just take it now as an advance?”
Her greedy gaze settled on the Dark Rose, adorned with obsidian, hanging from Arthur’s chest. She had been tempted to steal it earlier but had refrained after noticing the way it shimred with a faint light.
The blessing seed to be tied to its presence, so she had left it alone for now.
Licking her lips, Fenry tore her eyes away from the Dark Rose. It was crafted in the shape of a black rose, making it all the more desirable. It felt like it should have been hers from the start, as though soone had stolen it from her.
“If he tries to act cheap, he’d better be prepared.”
She resolved to squeeze every last drop of compensation out of him when the ti ca.
Her only concern now was Arthur’s ntal state when he woke up.
Would he still be Arthur? Or would he beco sothing else entirely?
She had seen what happened to those consud by a heart. She had to be prepared for the worst.
The possibility of having to kill the Mark-bearer with her own hands lood in her mind.
It was the worst-case scenario she could imagine.
‘If he tries to kill , I won’t even be able to fight back, will I? Maybe I should modify the pact—or just get rid of it entirely.’
The more she thought about it, the more appealing the idea of severing the bond beca.
As Fenry mulled over the various situations that had unfolded, slender shadows descended around her like bolts of lightning.
Nearly twenty masked individuals surrounded her. Fenry glanced at them, clicking her tongue in annoyance.
They were mbers of the Black Roses.
“When exactly did I disappear that it took you this long to show your faces? Can’t you see what kind of shape I’m in?”
“…We apologize.”
“I went to the trouble of raising you lot, but you’re barely worth the money. Useless, the lot of you!”
As the masked figures lowered their heads in sha, Fenry exhaled a long stream of smoke in their direction, letting the conversation end there.
Considering she had vanished without a trace, it wasn’t surprising the Black Roses had taken ti to find her. In fact, she wondered if she should praise them for managing to track her down at all.
She had been dreading the thought of carrying Arthur’s unconscious body herself, so their arrival was perfectly tid. But then, her expression tensed as she glanced at her subordinates, a sudden thought striking her.
“The money. You brought the money, didn’t you?”
“If you an the gold coins scattered across the bed, we’ve collected them all and sent them to the Blue Roses for safekeeping.”
“You checked under the bed too?”
“Yes, we did.”
Fenry let out a sigh of relief.
If they had failed at that, she might have been tempted to grind Arthur into dust herself.
“Take him with you.”
“What about the body lying next to him?”
Fenry bit down on her pipe, casting a brief glance at the small monster’s corpse.
“Burn it.”
Surveying the area, she noticed that the traces of battle had been completely buried beneath the collapsed debris.
Now, no one would ever know about the desperate fight or the miracle that had occurred here.
The living would move on, while the dead would remain buried in this place.
“Understood.”
Monts later, black smoke began to rise.
The Black Roses turned their backs on the burning corpse and quickly disappeared, carrying Arthur with them.
Watching Arthur being taken away, Fenry slung a leather bag over her shoulder.
She had grabbed the bag just in case—it belonged to Arthur. Naturally, this would also incur additional charges.
She remained at the site, taking one last look at the surrounding rubble.
The spot where she now stood was empty, save for the hollow sound of the wind. Only the ashes of the burned girl drifted faintly through the air. Fenry stared at the blackened ground, now devoid of any trace, and murmured softly.
The words Arthur had whispered to the small monster just before he lost consciousness.
“In your next life, don’t be human—beco a flower instead.”
Thus ended Arena Huaton, the ultimate creation of Dominic Huaton, said to possess a hundred hearts.
***
Ordor Forest.
A place known as the final sanctuary for witches, a reclusive domain that repelled the footsteps of humans. Yet it wasn’t a barren forest devoid of all human traces.
Precisely because human presence had long since disappeared, the forest was peaceful and serene.
In this tranquil space, however, a small commotion erupted.
“L-Lily!”
“Ahh! Don’t push !”
A group of won wearing voluminous robes burst into a room as though breaking through a door. With a loud clatter, the witches stumbled and tumbled over one another, clutching staffs, crystals, jewelry, and various luminous objects brimming with a radiant glow.
The Light of Divine Nas.
Amidst the overexcited upper-ranked witches known as the Dortas, Lily let out a quiet sigh. The scene reminded her of sothing that had happened several months ago.
As expected,
“Th-there’s no one among us who can interpret this!”
“Not a single character!”
“Lily, you must…!”
The exact sa situation was unfolding again.
How could even their lines be identical? Shaking her head, Lily turned to look at her large mirror.
A faint light emanated from the mirror.
[Arthur Clayton – Hunter of Divinity (Divine)]
[Third ntal Barrier]
[Siren’s Hymn]
[Heart of Retonicalus (R.H)]
The details of the Divine Na, now fully updated, reflected clearly on the mirror’s surface.
Every detail, perfectly and unmistakably.
User Comments
0 comments from readers