Chapter47 - The Trap to Catch a Bat
The Griffin soared into the sky.
This ti, it was a longer flight than usual.
Eclipse was quite a distance away, and thus a lot of ti was spent in the sky.
“......”
“......”
Nevertheless, no conversation was exchanged atop the Griffin.
You were silent.
I was silent, too.
The only sources of sound were the harsh wind and the gentle breeze.
There was no particular reason for that.
Neither of them were talkative people, nor did they have any reason to talk much.
The last conversation they had was a refusal.
─That alone is absolutely impossible.
The request to be taught the gatekeeper's unique swordsmanship.
It had been firmly rejected.
It was rejected so cleanly that it felt like there was nothing left to bring up again.
I didn't hear the reason.
I had a guess, so I didn't press further.
I just decided to wait a little longer.
The fruits of that wait were slow to co, and Eclipse arrived much faster.
“Is this your first ti seeing it in person?”
“Have you seen it before, Young Master? Not seeing that place is the way to protect one's life.”
Below the Griffin, Eclipse was visible.
Eclipse had the appearance of a massive temple and altar.
A structure that looked like it belonged in a desert.
Even from here, the sll of blood was thick.
Just how much blood had been splattered upon it.
The vengeful desires to live had clumped together, forming clusters and exuding a sinister aura.
Brrrr.
The Griffin trembled.
It was the man riding the Griffin who had trembled.
The Youngest Son's head turned.
He asked bluntly.
“Are you scared?”
“...What are you suddenly talking about?”
“If you feel like you're going to piss yourself, just say so. I don't want to soak the Griffin's feathers.”
“......”
The lion's body spiraled down and landed.
Looking out at the demonic realm from outside Eclipse.
Next to the giant altar, it was surrounded by a pure white wall.
The wall had still not lost its pure white color.
The sinister aura of the demonic realm kept the white bones, the main material of the wall, from decaying and even increased their hardness.
“The White Bone Wall. A symbol of the sacrificial ritual, said to have been made by piling up the useless bones from human sacrifices on the altar. It's even bigger seeing it in person.”
“You seem to have studied a lot.”
“It's my house and my land. These are things I should naturally know, not in the realm of study.”
“...You bought this place, hooo. Never mind.”
The carts of money that had entered through the gates I had strenuously opened.
I wondered where the money bags in those carts had gone, and here they were.
I wished he had just given a raise rather than buying this kind of trash.
The Youngest Son pointed to the gate of the White Bone Wall with his chin.
“Take a good look. It's your new workplace.”
“Don't be ridiculous.”
Words that the Head Maid would have stopped ca out without hesitation.
But this place, of all places, warranted it.
Because this was a place where no one in the East could guarantee their unconditional survival.
That was especially true if there were only two of them.
“It's impossible to reach the altar today. I roughly asured the distance from above, and it would take quite a flight even for the Griffin.”
There was no telling what would happen in the anti.
So at first, without the Griffin.
“Let's go on foot, just us. This is an investigation, not a conquest, for now.”
“...I understand for now.”
The gatekeeper didn't talk back.
This ti, he too thought the Youngest Son was right.
Although the Griffin was a powerful being, that place was a space where variables were created by the space itself.
If it were a situation where only aerial combat was forced, it would be a different story.
But while riding the Griffin, their fighting thods were bound to be limited.
So, the seemingly most insecure option of walking was, ironically, safer.
“Did you bring a sword? Even if you didn't, there's not much I can give you.”
“This is enough to protect my own body.”
A bone tied tightly at his waist.
Looking closely, it was a sword made by taking only the desired parts from a Skeleton Soldier, weaving and attaching them together.
He tapped the bone sword.
“It's a difficult sword to protect two people with, but if it's just , it doesn't matter.”
“Right. That's enough. Right now, it's like two tigers leaping into a sheep pasture.”
“Please correct that to one cat and one tiger.”
“Alright, kitty. Let's go. We're off to war.”
ow (fuck)─
The gatekeeper swallowed a curse and followed behind him.
***
Sowhere in the Eastern Ocean.
Cross the line marked by fog, and the territory changes.
The master of the world changes.
The sea that turns ordinary people into small fry, the sea of monsters, is revealed.
The Silver Mask, one of the three divine garbs of Mystics, floated on the sea of monsters in a small boat.
However, to the sothings in the sea, it was not a small boat.
The giant monster octopus, the Kraken.
It was being mistaken for the terror of fishing boats and the nightmare of fishern.
It was a branch of curse, illusion.
“...As I thought, fishing doesn't suit my taste.”
The Silver Mask sat cross-legged on the small boat and waited endlessly.
He waited until the sun set and the set sun rose again.
A monster that drags even giant warships down into the deep abyss.
A monster that feeds on it as its main diet.
Gurgle-gurgle-gurgle─
Large and small bubbles rose crazily to the surface of the water.
But even the small bubbles were the size of a person.
“Finally here.”
The sll that ca from the bursting bubbles was the foul breath of the thing below.
And it didn't just end with the sll.
It surfaced, opening its foul-slling mouth as wide as it could.
Kwwaaaaaaaaaaaaang─!!
A dark blue whale shot up from below, as if shattering the water's surface.
The splashing water it kicked up created a double rainbow and a brief downpour.
Kuuuuwaaaaaaaaaaa─
The whale that swallows the Kraken that swallows fishing boats went back into the sea.
The small boat that had been floating on the sea disappeared without a trace.
It was sucked in along with the Silver Mask into the widely opened mouth.
“I hope you're alive. You monster.”
The Silver Mask furrowed his brow and slowly steered the small boat.
He lit a fire and made a torch.
Then it beca visible.
The debris that had gotten caught around this mouth, unable to pass to the next stage.
From the corpses of other monsters to ships that had unluckily rolled this far.
And.
There was another monster that had voluntarily jumped into the monster's mouth.
“Halsin Morpheor. The last, the strongest vampire hunter. It's an honor to et you.”
“......”
A long-haired madman, sorting through the edible at on a corpse.
His hand stopped in mid-air.
His white hair, shining in the light, was disheveled in every direction, and his clothes were rags.
His exposed skin was covered in scars, all of them nail marks.
From the soldiers of the vampire nobles, the ghouls.
But the nurous wounds etched over his vitals could not kill him.
The sa was true for this whale's stomach.
“It's been about 10 years. If you're still this sane, maybe the curse of the blood nobles never existed.”
“...N,o.”
As if he hadn't used it in a very long ti.
His throat, making the sound of grinding tal, painfully ford the next words.
“Their curse, until you kill a blood noble. It does not disappear. Therefore, my exile does not end either.”
Clap, clap, clap.
The Silver Mask suddenly clapped.
It was a small echo, but thanks to the resonance inside the stomach, his ears went numb.
But to the Silver Mask, Halsin's words had brought this much of an echo.
“Then this is incredible luck and coincidence. A blood noble, barely ten years old, is now roaming the world. Kill it for .”
“Ridiculous...”
His hand continued to tear at the at he was tearing from the corpse.
“Vampires have a very complex reproductive process. The children they bear are raised like gold. And yet one is roaming the world.”
As if telling him not to joke.
Halsin took a handful of at and walked sowhere.
The Silver Mask also got off the boat and followed him.
“It's true. He's even a direct descendant of the Queen.”
Thud.
His steps stopped, just like his hand a mont ago.
But this ti, instead of denial, sothing else followed.
“─!!”
A mad laugh echoed insanely inside.
My ears were already numb from the clapping earlier.
Now, it felt like a drum was being held to my ear and beaten relentlessly.
It was the sa for the whale.
Kuuueeeeeeeeeeoooo─
The whale opens its mouth.
That thing opened its mouth.
“You son of a─!!”
The mad laughter continued on.
But the Silver Mask's curse didn't make it to the end.
Swept away by a tsunami-like wave of seawater, he barely managed to avoid swallowing it deep into his throat.
Then the seawater gradually receded.
And even by the ti the whale had barely cald down.
“Khuhuhuhuk...”
Halsin's great laughter had not stopped.
I clearly saw him laughing underwater earlier too.
And yet, the way he was stuck fast to the roof of the mouth was certainly that of a madman.
Thud─
Halsin ca down from the roof of the mouth.
He was still letting out a hollow laugh before he collapsed, flopping onto the small boat he had managed to keep from breaking.
“...Are you saying you'll follow?”
“Yes. You've succeeded in capturing my interest. I was getting tired of life in a whale's stomach anyway, and was about to wrap a kraken's leg around my neck and die.”
If the story about the Queen's direct descendant was a lie, I could just kill that guy.
The Silver Mask's face wasn't visible due to the mask, but from the way he was running over, he looked very happy.
Sitting together in the small boat, he repeatedly nodded.
“A good thought. If you, as a vampire hunter, were to claim the head of a Queen's direct descendant, what greater honor could there be.”
“...Honor. I don't kill those bats for sothing like that.”
As he spoke, his hand naturally moved to his neck.
Sothing hanging by a string was caressed.
“Since you ca in so skillfully, you can probably get out just as skillfully.”
“Of course.”
I deceived the opponent's eyes and made it mistake for prey.
If so, then inside this stomach.
“I will make the whale mistake its dive ti.”
The whale, whose breathing had beco uncomfortable for so unknown reason, would imdiately surface.
I'll aim for that mont.
Furthermore, this vampire hunter here will also aim for the rapidly rising Youngest Son.
Just as you set a mousetrap to catch a mouse.
To catch the Youngest Son, a bat hunter was resummoned.
***
The gatekeeper looked down at his own hand.
The Bone Sword, its tip broken off.
It was a stroke of luck that it even remained in one piece.
Carrying a person on his back, he had continuously parried the attacks of demons made of sinister energy.
He wanted to dodge, but his movents were not what they used to be.
With a person on his back, it's hard to exert his full strength from his pri.
In an unforeseen situation, a person's breath runs out faster.
“You damn rascal. If you called yourself a tiger, you shouldn't be on my back right now, should you.”
The Youngest Son was completely unscathed.
He wasn't hit by a curse.
He wasn't hit by a demon.
It was only natural, since he just collapsed on his own with a thud.
For a mont, I was flustered and the strength left my Bone Sword.
Dozens of demons made of sinister energy, demons made of corpses, demons made of white bones, appeared and surrounded us.
But why was it?
“Dammit...”
I certainly thought I wouldn't protect him.
I even brought the Bone Sword.
But the mont he collapsed, my body moved like a flash of light and caught him before he hit the ground.
As if that wasn't enough, I put him on my back.
I didn't know why.
There were too many things to see, too many things to avoid, to think about that now.
Here on the barren land of Eclipse.
Dozens of monster corpses that had fallen upon it.
Things with only arms, things with only eyes, things with only legs, and so on. The forms and combinations were terrifyingly nurous.
To avoid becoming one of them, the Bone Sword moved diligently.
“Get lost!”
Chwaaaaaak─!!
A slash of condensed magic power erupted from the broken Bone Sword.
It parried and simultaneously cut off the incoming claws.
“Young Master. The desire to abandon you is growing. Either get up or say sothing. Just do one of the two.”
If you don't want to do that either.
Then just stay like that a little longer.
Thwack─
I stabbed the Bone Sword into the ground.
I scraped the hand holding the Bone Sword with my teeth, drawing blood.
The palm, painted with dark red blood, faced the ground.
“My unique swordsmanship does not use a sword.”
That's why I couldn't teach him.
It wasn't that I was being needlessly stubborn or proud.
This was achieved through pure enlightennt in curses, sothing they call simdeuk in the south.
“Stay lying down as you are. You'll be cut.”
Instead of placing him down properly, I just dropped him carelessly.
He didn't notice afterwards as he was concentrating his mind on one place, but.
The closed-eyed Youngest Son's hand, whether by instinct or a desperate struggle, he did not know.
It slowly moved towards the blood he had dropped.
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