‘Ah.’
Valarak and Ariella.
The two heads of their respective bloodlines each hurled attacks at the other.
And every time those attacks crossed,
the emotions they felt were carried within them and collided as well.
‘Ahh.’
After receiving the Progenitor’s blood and being reborn into a new life, as one of the heads of a great bloodline,
Valarak had commanded every member of that enormous house with a single word.
Even fear of the sun—
foolish as it was, it had never properly understood such a thing.
And by the time it finally had,
it had already gained the power to cover that sky with red mist.
In other words.
Though it had lived for such an unimaginably long time,
‘What is this?’
Valarak had never known fear.
And now.
‘What is this, I say...!’
An emotion it had never known throughout those long ages was beginning, for the first time, to hammer at it.
KWAAAAAAANG!!!
...And there was no way it could possibly possess any resistance to that emotion.
Kwaaang...
Fear gave rise to hesitation in action.
Kwaang...
And hesitation made its movements dull.
Kwang...
This had already been a contest whose winner could not be predicted with certainty.
And now, just slightly,
pang.
the weight on the scale of victory tilted
in a direction unfavorable to the grand duke.
“...No.”
And then.
Because of that fact...
“Disappear...!”
“!?”
The grand duke’s fear, which had slowly been swelling, exploded violently.
***
“Disappear!”
KWAANG!
The grand duke, in the middle of its fierce clash with Ariella,
swung its fist and knocked her far back.
At that,
“...!?”
Ariella’s eyes widened in shock.
That was only natural.
She had no way of understanding the grand duke’s action just now.
‘When it should have been doing everything it could to eliminate me quickly, it pushed me away instead?’
Even if it drove her far back,
the blood leaving the grand duke’s body was still flowing toward Ariella.
Would it dispose of Ariella in a quick, decisive finish,
or would Ariella endure long enough for her growing strength to overturn the grand duke?
If the battle continued like this, the grand duke still had a chance of victory.
If anything, that chance was still higher on the grand duke’s side.
Ariella had been in the middle of thinking of some way to shift even a little of that probability toward herself.
And yet.
It was the grand duke that had pushed her away instead?
“Useless things...!”
As Ariella stood there in bewilderment,
she heard the grand duke shout, face flushed red.
“If you vermin had properly attended to me, there would have been no need for a battle like this!”
As though denying the emotion it had felt and trying to shift the blame elsewhere—
“If you had let me know the Progenitor’s will sooner... I never would have suffered like this!”
The grand duke shouted in a voice full of rage.
“Worthless trash.”
Its gaze turned toward some distant place.
And staring there,
the grand duke began to issue a single command.
“If your lives are useless anyway.”
“Offer them up.”
At those words,
Ariella stared at the grand duke with wide eyes.
And then, a moment later—
PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAK!!!
Blood enough to stain even the sky red began to surge in from every direction.
***
...While Ariella and the grand duke’s battle continued, the awakened defending the city could do nothing but watch.
‘We want to help, but...’
That battle
was taking place on a level they could not enter in the first place.
Especially since both of the ones fighting were vampires.
Even if they tried to help with their own power,
there was a high chance their light would only interfere instead.
“What are we supposed to do...?”
“But where is the Guide—”
“Where...!?”
Still.
They could not just stand there staring blankly.
So they began searching for the one who could give them orders.
The one who had guided them.
“The Guide!”
Finding him was not difficult.
He had suddenly appeared alongside the woman now fighting the grand duke.
Then, after exchanging some kind of words with the grand duke,
he had done nothing but stand there blankly in place ever since.
“What should we do from here—!”
They approached him,
wanting to ask what came next.
But then—
“Quiet.”
Someone stepped in and stopped them.
One of the first awakened of this land to come face to face with Shin Youngjun.
It was Wei.
“I don’t think we should speak to him lightly. He isn’t just standing there blankly. He’s clearly doing something important of his own.”
“But we can’t just do nothing...”
“I’m not saying we should do nothing. We need to do what we can.”
After saying that,
Wei carefully approached Shin Youngjun.
“I don’t know what kind of thing you’re doing that has you so out of it, but this place is far too dangerous. We need to move you somewhere safe first.”
“Ah...!”
The battle between those two beings in the sky was far too violent.
The aftershocks were sending massive debris crashing down in every direction.
Just as Wei said, they could not leave this man standing here exposed.
People gathered and supported Shin Youngjun’s body,
while others stood guard around him in case an attack came flying their way.
And then—
“...all.”
At that moment.
Wei noticed one thing.
“...because...”
The man who had seemed to be unconscious, standing there blankly—
their Guide was not still.
“...you all...!”
“Is he... talking to someone?”
There was no way to know who the other party was.
But he was clearly having a conversation.
That said,
the conversation was no more than fragmented words slipping out like sleep-talk.
Most of it was hard to understand at all.
“...Just as you said...”
But.
“...if we use that passage to the west...”
As if he had deliberately opened his mouth for them to hear,
“...at least me and my squad... might be able to flee to Seoul...”
a very small part of it
contained words they could understand.
“...!”
At that,
the awakened carrying Shin Youngjun stared wide-eyed in shock.
If they had heard correctly, then what had just come out of his mouth was—
‘There’s a way to escape from here?’
Come to think of it,
this Guide was a stranger from a different land than theirs.
And.
If he had succeeded in coming all the way from a distant place to this land,
it would not be strange if he also had a way back.
“...”
The people’s gazes all turned toward the distance, as though by prior agreement.
KWAANG, KWAAAAANG...!
Two vampires wielding transcendent force.
Their fierce battle, reminiscent of myth, raged in the sky above the city.
Of those two,
whichever one won would decide their fate.
And from the awakened’s point of view—
‘The noble following the Guide...’
‘...is being overwhelmingly pushed back.’
That fate did not look bright.
Of course.
There was a difference between what they saw and what was really happening.
As time passed, the grand duke was weakening.
But.
From the perspective of those who did not know that,
the female vampire who had come to help them looked only as though she were barely holding back the grand duke’s overwhelming assault.
‘...The Guide isn’t in good condition either.’
From what they could see,
their chances of surviving this were desperately low.
And in the middle of that,
they had just heard there was some kind of opening through which they could escape.
‘The west...’
There were many awakened.
Not ordinary humans, but awakened with a wide range of abilities.
If they truly set themselves to it, finding an “exit” somewhere in the west would not be difficult.
They had no idea how it was meant to be used.
But with this many capable people gathered here, they might be able to figure that out too.
It might be difficult to get a great many people out.
But if it was only enough for him and his squad to escape—
‘And the number of people who heard that is roughly this same group...’
If they could find that escape route and activate it,
...then they might be able to leave this dangerous battlefield behind
and flee to Seoul, the land that man had come from.
***
“...You all heard it too, right?”
The hearing of awakened was sharp.
Even if it was only a faint voice leaking out like sleep-talk,
everyone nearby could hear it.
And based on what they had heard,
their gazes all turned at once toward the western side of the city.
The place they had just heard about like sleep-talk,
somewhere there was supposedly a safe escape route—
—Krrrgh...
At the same time,
“The vampire bastards are coming.”
They began to hear the sounds of monsters approaching.
That exact same place.
“Tch.”
“I was hoping it would be as late as possible, but it looks like they’ve finally started swarming in.”
Yes.
The reason they had been watching the west
was not because an escape route lay there.
‘Even before the battle began... we expected that if fighting broke out here, the vampire bastards would soon come swarming in.’
They had been keeping watch outside for exactly that reason.
Which was why they were able to realize the enemy had begun to gather.
“If we put the Guide here, there’s no chance of him dying from some blind piece of debris.”
And then.
Those who had succeeded in moving Shin Youngjun to a safer place looked at one another and spoke.
“...We’ll go heal as many of the wounded as possible.”
“Then we’ll restore the collapsed formations...”
“The combat-ready fighters move out immediately. Most of the defenses on the inside were destroyed by that grand duke, but there should still be plenty of measures left for dealing with enemies coming in from outside...”
Having assigned each person what needed to be done, they all began moving at a pace that left them breathless.
‘There was a way to escape?’
And.
As they carried out their duties with everything they had,
they gave a faint smile to themselves.
‘And even with something like that... he still didn’t run?’
The one who had spoken of that escape route had been none other than the Guide himself.
That meant that even though he had possessed a means to abandon this land and escape,
the Guide and those under him had chosen not to leave.
And.
...It was not hard to guess why.
Me and my squad... might be able to flee to Seoul...
The answer had already been there in the very words he had spoken.
He was not satisfied with only himself and his squad surviving.
He wanted more than that.
More people.
‘For us.’
For them.
He had given up a safe escape for their sake.
—Krrrrooooogh!
Then.
Whether they had heard about that escape route or not,
there was only one thing left for them to do.
“They’re coming!”
“All fighters, to the outer perimeter of the city!”
Those who had been fighting to stop the grand duke spread back out toward the edges of the city.
—Krrrgh!!!
—The grand duke is fighting the enemy!
—Come, brothers! We must aid the grand duke!
The woman fighting for their sake already seemed to be at a disadvantage as it was.
There was no way they could allow other enemies to join in and assist the grand duke here.
“Stop those monster bastards!”
“You must never allow them to interfere in the battle between the one the Guide brought and the grand duke!”
If that Guide had risked his life to remain in this land,
then they too—
“We defend this city even if it costs us our lives!”
—ought to defend this land with their lives.
“All forces!!!”
—Brothers!
And then.
As countless monsters came flying toward the city,
and the awakened were just about to let loose their own battle cry in answer to that charge—
“For the Guide!”
—For the grand duke—
at that very moment.
[Offer them up.]
From high above in the sky, one heavy voice rang out.
And then—
—...for...
Puhwaaaaaak!
The countless monsters charging in.
That horde so great the awakened had been forced to brace themselves for death.
“...That thing calling itself a grand duke.”
Vanished in an instant.
And what remained before the awakened’s eyes was not some vast army of monsters.
“What in the world...”
Splash...
What remained was the beings that, until just moments ago, had been vampires.
...And from them,
“What have you done...!”
a vast sea of blood.
