Chapter 292.
"So, is that all you wanted me for?” Malecia yawned, covering his mouth with his hand sleepily.
"Yeah, good work. Go and rest comfortably. I told them to treat you like a prisoner of the highest level."
Malecia spoke with a relaxed smile. "Thank you for that. I couldn’t bathe for some time thanks to someone, so I’ll wash up and get some more sleep.”
"Hahaha, such poor treatment.” I knew full well that this someone was me, but I pretended not to know.
Hearing this pretense, Malecia sighed. "Right, he treated me quite harshly.”
At these sincere words, I asked suggestively, "Then, do you have any thoughts about coming under my employ? I’ll act with only the highest regard for you. I don’t treat people poorly."
Malecia raised both handcuffed hands with a look of regret. "Unfortunately, my life was already bought a long time ago. Being a mercenary is a job where everything goes downhill if you lose your credibility."
I smacked my lips at his refusal. The more we talked, the more I coveted him. I said jokingly, "Didn’t you ask me to call you the Black Knight before?"
"Well, I’d appreciate it more if you called me that.” Malecia smiled mischievously and left through the door. Caradoc was waiting outside, and he escorted Malecia down the stairs. If it’s Caradoc, he’ll notice beforehand if Malecia tried to pull any nonsense.
I clicked my tongue as I felt Malecia’s presence grow further away. "What a sly person.”
As I was mumbling, Tristan jumped off the roof and came in through the window. He cried out in surprise, "Oh, my! For Master to call someone else sly!”
I sighed. "He pretended to cooperate with the interrogation while simultaneously trying to figure me out and flip the questions around. Yet, the way you’re talking seems to be pretty cheeky?"
"Ayy, when did I ever speak cheekily to Master?”
I shook my head as Tristan whistled and avoided my gaze.
* * *
A messenger horse came running with a notice for the Magic Kingdom’s main army as it headed for Fort Shellen, bearing a red flag that signified an emergency. As soon as it arrived at the campsite of the main force, the horse collapsed from exhaustion, and the knight riding the horse did not have a healthy complexion either.
"I belong to the defense forces stationed at Shellen Fortress! Emergency! It’s an urgent matter! Please take me to the command headquarters!"
When given the knight’s identity and rank, the soldiers guarding the entrance delivered the information to the upper line. Soon afterward, a group of knights emerged from the command headquarter barracks and brought the messenger back to the command headquarters. When the knight bearing the notice entered the barracks, he couldn’t breathe due to the heavy atmosphere. It was as if there was no oxygen in the air.
"Everyone, I think we have important news, so why don’t we put off the fight for a while?" The gentle middle-aged man who just spoke was sitting at the topmost seat. He was General Bringer Di Peset, the commander-in-chief of the kingdom’s main force.
A madosa who was sitting at the right of the commander-in-chief yawned and nodded at this suggestion. "All right."
He was Alpha, the oldest disciple of the great madosa, the Curse Specialist. He continued, "Since the Commander-in-Chief says so, let’s move on."
As Alpha withdrew his aura, a madosa sitting across from him followed suit, wearing a robe symbolizing the Magic Kingdom. The man in the robe was the Madosa John Hower, who was considered the best disciple of the great madosa, the Space Specialist.
When the auras filling the barracks disappeared, the knight bringing the news could breathe again. With the intangible aura that was pressing down on him dissipated, he was able to look around. The knight realized that a battle of pride between the great madosas’ disciples was in full swing until the moment he’d entered the barracks.
"What are you doing!? If you have a message, say it quickly!"
The one who yelled was Philon Tri, a great warrior of the Green Mane Tribe, which occupied the largest faction of the Hunter tribe. He crossed his legs with an irritated face and fiddled with a yellow-green mask with his one remaining arm.
"Don’t push him like that, Great Warrior. Don’t you think he needs some time to regain his breath?" At the commander-in-chief’s words, Philon Tri snorted and crossed his legs.
"So, what’s the status of Shellen Fortress? I heard that it isn’t a very favorable situation."
When the commander-in-chief asked, the knight lowered his head and talked about Shellen Fortress’s situation. "Shellen Fortress... has fallen into the hands of the enemies."
Everyone inside the barracks drew their attention to the knight in an instant.
"The fortress has been taken? That natural fortress that the legendary Mercenary King was protecting?"
"Yes, the Mercenary King singled me out just before the imperial army’s all-out attack began and told me to notify you that the fortress has been taken."
The commander-in-chief clenched his fist in disbelief. "I thought he could at least hold on until the main force got there."
At the commander-in-chief’s lamentation, the knight shook his head with a face of shame. Then Alpha asked, frowning, "Five of my fellow disciples were present there, not just Malecia. What happened to them?"
"I left just before the fortress was taken, so I do not know exactly, but they all seem to have been taken prisoner."
Alpha was surprised. "All of my fellow disciples present at the siege are madosas. No matter how urgent the situation is, it shouldn’t have been difficult to escape by themselves!"
"That’s- all of a sudden, Doomstone Blade stormed into the fortress!"
The inside of the barracks froze.
"Who, who did you say stormed in?"
The commander-in-chief stuttered and asked, and the knight replied again with a woeful look, "The Crow that brings destruction, Doomstone Blade, stormed in!"
The air grew heavy with fear when it was reported that Doomstone was in the fortress.
"There were no messages about the chief of the Crow Tribe participating in the war!"
The commander-in-chief was growing flustered when the Space Specialist’s disciple brashly got up and shouted, "Ca, calm down!"
"Do I look like I can calm down right now?! This is a breach of the arrangement! I will tell my teacher-nim immediately!"
At John’s shout, Alpha sighed. "If there is such a monster, we also cannot rush to assault the enemy."
"But! Are your fellow disciples not being held captive at the fortress?!" The commander-in-chief yelled.
Alpha casually replied, "I will negotiate and meet them separately in the name of my teacher-nim, the Curse Specialist. Teacher-nim and the Crow Tribe’s Alchemy Specialist know each other, so it is possible."
At Alpha’s words, the great warrior of the Green Mane Tribe stood up and shouted, "Wait! Sir has already promised to join the war!"
"I know. It was a promise that he made due to his agreement with the Tri Sirs, but we can make enough holes to get out of it."
Even if he was going to participate in the war, it was the Curse Specialist’s decision whether to fight with a sword or magic. The great warrior did not have the power and ability to force him to fight using magic.
"Uduk!" The great warrior stared at Alpha with his teeth clenched, but Alpha didn’t like the fact that he was participating in the war in the first place.
"Everyone, calm down for a moment! Let’s see if what this person says is true first!" The commander-in-chief calmed the two madosas and glared at the knight who was the source of the barrack’s violent change.
"You. Are you sure Doomstone Blade is there? Isn’t there a good chance you might have been mistaken or something?!"
At the commander-in-chief’s question, the knight knelt sadly and hit his head to the ground. "Uheuk! My comrades surrounded Doomstone Blade, but I saw with my own eyes that they were subdued through his martial aura alone. I’m a piece of trash who left his comrades behind!"
The commander-in-chief had wanted to hear that the knight may have been wrong, and he frowned.
The atmosphere was already at its worst.
"You...!
"Cough! Cough!"
The commander-in-chief tried to rebuke the kneeling knight for not reading the mood, but the knight coughed and vomited blood. "Keuk, I’m, I’m sorry. I was hit by an arrow while leaving the fortress...”
At the words of the knight, everyone in the barracks looked at the commander-in-chief in unison. The commander-in-chief had just become trash who grew angry at this knight, someone who’d escaped at the risk of his life and brought information. The commander-in-chief noticed their gazes and had no choice but to shut his mouth.
"Wouldn’t it be better to send the knight to the medical corps first?"
As the Space Specialist’s disciple looked at the commander-in-chief critically, the commander-in-chief coughed in vain and shouted so those outside the barracks could hear, "Someone get in here and help this knight to the medical corps!"
"I am sorry." The knight slowly rose from his seat, wiping the blood from his mouth, and a soldier who was standing guard outside of the barracks came inside to help him.
"Thank you." The knight thanked the supporting soldier and tried to leave the barracks, but suddenly his abdomen was penetrated by a huge magic spear.
"Huk!"
"Is it an enemy?!"
In this abrupt situation, the people inside the barracks equipped weapons in unison and grew tense. Those trying to respond to the enemy’s surprise attack grew bewildered when they saw the man responsible for shooting the spear appear outside the barracks.
"Teacher-nim?"
When the Space Specialist’s disciple was flustered and called his teacher, the Space Specialist dug his ears and became irate. "Why is the meeting taking so long? I told you to keep the power struggle to a limit and come back!"
To the Space Specialist, it seemed more important that his disciple was running late than the knight he had penetrated with a magic spear.
"Teacher-nim, why...”
The Space Specialist saw his bewildered disciple and clicked his tongue. "Tsk tsk, you’ve still got a long way to go. Hey! What are you doing pretending to be dead?”
The knight that had collapsed with his abdomen penetrated lifted his head and laughed cheerfully at the Space Specialist’s words, "Ahahaha, I got caught. I wasn’t expecting to meet a great madosa here."
"Are you the one presumed to be a great madosa in the imperial army? Your skills are certainly not bad, all right.”
The knight shrugged at the Space Specialist’s assessment. "Nice to meet you. Feel free to call me Den."
The Space Specialist was not interested in Den’s greeting and observed the body that Den was controlling. "That body is made up of a dragon tooth soldier’s basic composition. You must have a lot of dragon bones, then? Seeing as you sent an expensive dragon tooth soldier to an enemy camp.”
"Oh, my hometown is overflowing with them, so it’s fine."
"Overflowing? Come to think of it, the outer appearance resembles an alchemic life form. Are you perhaps a disciple of that crazy old woman?" The Space Specialist asked.
Den nodded. "If ‘crazy old woman’ is referring to Mirpa Einsmall, she is indeed my teacher-nim."
"Ahahaha! That crazy old woman created trouble. I can’t believe she actually raised a great madosa! Hahaha!"
The Space Specialist was laughing cheerfully, wiped away his tears, and said, "I thought the first one to become a great madosa would be the eldest son of that old maniac of the Butterfly Tribe, but that old man Arpen must be heartbroken! Hahaha!”
"Besides that, I heard he lost a bet and had to give up quite a bit."
At Den’s words, the spaceman smacked his lips and said, "Well, in terms of the bet, I also lost too, so tell your teacher I’ll give it to her later since I’m in the war right now."
Den scratched his cheek, at a loss for what to do. "Well, I’m in a war, as well."
"So? Why don’t you leave the fortress and deliver the message?"
The Space Specialist responded as if it were natural, and Den sighed. "I also have certain circumstances, so that’ll be difficult."
"Really? Even if we meet in battle, I’m not going to go easy on you."
"Hahaha, please be gentle. Now, for security purposes, this body will explode in five seconds. Five, one!"
Boom-!
Leaving out the numbers between five and one, Den’s dragon tooth soldier created a massive explosion.
"Cough! Cough! Jeez, what a rude bastard! You have to count all the way!” The Space Specialist grumbled, protecting himself and his disciple with a barrier.
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