143 – Son of the Dragon – 3

It was a massive battle.

The battlefield had grown too large to be summarized by that single word, so now even Ye-min could only laugh.

It was good that they were able to circle around and launch a surprise attack on the retreating horde of vampires.

That was where the good part ended; once the thousands of vampires gave up on retreating, they scattered and dug into the expeditionary force, mass-producing ghouls by biting the weak, instantly creating a chaotic mess, and shaking the entire expeditionary force with a number that was infinitely small in comparison.

If Lucy had not seen through the location of the trap zone and warned Ye-min, they would have been lured by them and plunged their entire forces into the traps in an instant.

“Support! Support the west!”

“You damn ghouls—block them, don’t let them break through!”

“Damn it, Paul! Pauuuul!”

[Break through at a single point! 12 o’clock! It’s the 12 o’clock direction!]

In such a chaotic battlefield, Ye-min’s command worked surprisingly well.

Her voice, which was not particularly loud, was amplified by a special skill to reach the ears of all two million soldiers of the expeditionary force, and the expeditionary force moved according to her words without any question due to the mysterious magic contained in her voice.

Lucy was simply dumbfounded as she watched Ye-min lead millions of people all by herself without even an adjutant.

―You… what is that? You’re commanding an absurd number of humans like your own body.

“A unique skill. A skill that conveys my will to those influenced by my charm and makes them move as I wish. It can be applied in various ways, but—as expected, it is most effective when commanding a large army.”

―What? That is close to a taboo in terms of interfering with people’s free will…! Besides, wasn’t your unique skill that powerful one that fires sword energy?

“That’s a skill I learned thanks to Oppa during the tutorial. I practiced to death and barely managed to raise it to legendary.”

―Growing a skill to legendary grade is impossible unless you have a master who has already reached a high realm, or some sort of miracle… You.

Lucy had been surprised even when she heard that Ji-hye had grown her Mana Circuit to legendary grade on her own, but that was something she could somehow accept if she assumed that Ji-hye was born with a genius talent for handling magic power.

However, upgrading the grade of an active skill required a different kind of realization, specifically, at least several decades of hard training.

‘Yet she achieved that in just ten years out of sheer obsession with my contractor.’

Dumbfounded, Lucy shook her head in disbelief and thought.

Indeed, this woman was dangerous, and she must never be allowed near her contractor.

Ye-min, who had no idea that Lucy was thinking such things, checked the war situation and heaved a sigh of relief.

“Good—fortunately, it will be settled somehow.”

Ye-min also grew tense when those who were relatively less influenced by her charm were bewitched by the vampires’ illusion magic and began to rush straight toward the trap zone, but fortunately, the others built a defensive line to stop their breakaway before the traps could trigger.

This was thanks to the Earthlings, who were able to move relatively actively compared to the other expedition members under the influence of the Adaptation skill.

It was funny considering she had been worrying about how to deal with them, treating them as the only obstacle to this operation just moments ago.

“If we just win like this, it will be a great victory. Only about a hundred thousand people died, too.”

If anyone other than Lucy had seen Ye-min smiling as she said ‘only’ a hundred thousand people, even a thousand years of love would have cooled, but of course, there was no one else around them right now.

Ye-min had not bothered to manage her image during the second round of the tutorial, but she was incomparably thorough when management was needed.

―Only?

“I mean, more than half of the vampires are already dead. Even though the expedition members aren’t very strong, it means we killed at least one vampire for every fifty members who died. Isn’t this a huge victory? I don’t do it much because it’s annoying, but I guess I really do have a talent for commanding. …To be honest, I was even thinking of sacrificing up to half of them.”

―Your character is really the worst.

“Aren’t you the same?”

―Could you please not compare a spirit’s character to ‘human’ personality? More importantly, look over there right now.

Ye-min, who turned her gaze in the direction Lucy was pointing, soon narrowed her eyes and expressed doubt.

“That… the direction the vampires are heading toward is the trap zone. Are they trying to lure the expeditionary force again? Or are they trying to bypass and attack from the side the expeditionary force avoids?”

―It doesn’t look like they are fleeing.

“That… feels uneasy. Please step in.”

―…….

Lucy had not really revealed her power until now.

Rather than preparing for variables, she simply did not want to place an extra burden on Gi-jun, who had invaded the Lord of Thorns’ castle.

Therefore, she had repeatedly performed only the task of gathering her leftover energy into light crystals, supporting the expedition only to the extent of occasionally throwing a light crystal whenever they seemed to be pushed back.

And until now, that alone was enough.

This was thanks to Ye-min’s ability to command a large army, which was beyond imagination.

―Right, it looks like I need to step in for this. You, hold onto that properly so you can activate it at any time.

“I’m already prepared.”

The ‘that’ Lucy spoke of referred to the artifact she had borrowed from Patum.

Ye-min reflexively gripped the short, thin cord in her bosom tightly.

Although it looked quite shabby for something Patum had bragged about as a treasure of the empire, Ye-min, who saw the item information, acknowledged that Patum had really cared for her a lot.

―Ah, as expected!

Watching one of the vampires throw themselves into the trap zone without any defense, Lucy let out a single scream.

As a black stake that shot up from the ground pierced the vampire’s heart, the bastard turned into a drop of blood and vanished.

The blood seeped into the stake and disappeared—the meaning of that was clear.

Since they could not drag the humans in, they had finally begun to offer themselves as sacrifices!

“Those crazy bastards!”

However, what drove them crazy was that they could not actively block them even if they knew their intentions.

On the contrary, they would gladly drag the humans into the traps along with them.

If Lucy, a powerful entity who had no reason to fall into the traps, had not been here, they would have gone through all kinds of trouble trying to wipe out the vampires with long-range attacks alone.

―Stop annoying me with your interference and just disappear, all of you!

Lucy shaped all the crystals she had made one by one until now into spears and shot them toward the vampires.

The shower of light spears pouring down around her looked like a meteor shower.

The vampires, who had already lost their will to fight, had no room to dodge it.

―But even if they trigger that trap now, it wouldn’t affect the Lord of Thorns’ castle. Why at this timing? Is there a reason to trigger an overflow in Gratia at this point, right before the final battle with the Lord of Thorns?

To state the conclusion first, there was.

An entity that gave off a massive sense of intimidation was flying in a straight line from the center of Valahia, the Lord of Thorns’ castle, toward where they were—.

He was none other than the half-brother of the Lord of Thorns, who had prepared for destruction and set him free to carry on the lineage of Kudlak; naturally, he was a legendary-grade monster.

―You must be joking… at this point?

The main force of the expedition was between the Uncommon and Rare grades.

The Unique-grade forces were extremely few, and when it came to the Legendary grade, the spirit Lucy was the only one.

Throwing a legendary-grade vampire into such a place? Even if they literally poured in millions of Uncommon-grade ones, they would all be ground to dust.

But what was even more serious was the horde of vampires that had started to leap into the traps at this exact timing, and that bastard who was flying in a straight line as if aware of them.

An overflow created by sacrificing a mere few thousand vampires could never bring down Gratia.

However, if an overwhelmingly strong power commanded the overflow and charged straight into the heart of Gratia, wouldn’t that make quite a difference…?

―Aah, really! I didn’t want to place a burden on my contractor!

Right now, when he was already facing the greatest enemy of his life, it would not be enough even if she quickly wrapped things up here and joined him to help, yet she had to fight another enemy here and waste her contractor’s spiritual power!

But what was even more annoying was that, strangely enough, the quality of the spiritual power flowing from her contractor felt like it had increased since a while ago.

There was no way his spiritual power had suddenly grown beyond Legendary to the Epic grade.

Since it could not be a natural change, the answer was—either her lovely contractor had gained a unique realization regarding spiritual power, or someone else…

For example, a dirty evil spirit, who followed the contractor around like a stalker and occasionally let out unpleasant laughter, had made a new contract with him and changed his spiritual power.

‘I wish it were the former, but there’s no way. It’s so frustrating, but the efficiency of the spiritual power has instantly increased by nearly 30%. Besides, the spiritual power seems to keep growing, so could it be that this dirty evil spirit…’

Was she devouring the souls of others to replenish the contractor’s spiritual power?

If it was that evil spirit, it was highly probable.

However, since the only souls the evil spirit could devour right now were the vampires swarming in the Lord of Thorns’ castle, it was ambiguous for her to argue about it.

‘Besides, thanks to that, I’ve become able to try fighting that guy…’

Lucy let out a sigh, but quickly organized her thoughts.

For now, killing him was impossible.

No matter how much Lucy was a spirit who had reached the legendary grade, she could not finish off a legendary-grade vampire alone without her contractor.

However, considering his situation and true purpose—it might be possible to drive him away quickly.

―First, pull the people back! You mustn’t provoke him carelessly!

At Lucy’s sharp instruction, Ye-min immediately did as she was told.

After all, Ye-min was also aware of the entity flying in from afar.

She immediately used her skill to make the expeditionary force, which was pushing the vampires back, retreat all at once.

And then she called out the name of the reliable party member who had been rolling around on the front lines, slashing the necks and stabbing the hearts of the vampires until now.

“Shin.”

“I’m here, but—what on earth is that, Noona!”

“I don’t know, but it looks like Lucy has a plan.”

Although there were strangely many legends rolling around in the Lord of Thorns’ castle, once they came outside, legendary-grade enemies were hard to even encounter, and surviving an encounter was even harder.

It was not so strange that millions froze from his presence alone.

―My brother has prepared a final gift for me.

The bastard spoke in a leisurely voice as he flew through the air as if sliding, without even spreading his characteristic vampire wings.

Just from that gloomy yet elegant voice, one could easily guess his level—.

―Use that!

Lucy shouted in a voice audible only to Ye-min.

Without hesitation, Ye-min threw the cord into the air.

Gleipnir, the chain that could bind everything in the world and was especially fatal to the dark/evil attributes, manifested and bound the Lord of Thorns’ brother tightly in midair.

It did not just stop his movement.

By blocking the flow of magic power, it neutralized the target’s magic defense and left the body defenseless, which became an even more fatal weakness for a vampire who controlled the flow of blood.

―Stab him!

Lucy shouted again, concentrating her light on a single blade.

Eun-shin, who was holding that blade, kicked off the ground and leapt into the air the moment he heard Lucy’s voice, taking a position behind the back of the enemy bound by Gleipnir.

His only worry was whether the enemy would notice him—but his stealth, which had almost worked against the Demon King even in the tutorial, had developed brilliantly through over ten years of training, making it so that even a legendary-grade enemy could not perceive him until right before being attacked if they were bound by Gleipnir.

―Squelch!

―Kuhahak?!

―Good job, now hide!

To tell him to hide after having him one-sidedly stab a legendary-grade enemy—there was a limit to being unreasonable, but Eun-shin desperately manifested his stealth again as he fell to the ground.

―What is this?! There was—no mention of this!

The moment he was stabbed by the dagger imbued with light, the enemy was automatically released from Gleipnir’s restraint and regained his physical freedom—but his confidence, which had been overflowing just a moment ago, was greatly reduced by the sudden restraint and surprise attack.

Since his heart had been pierced by something carrying powerful light, it was a wound that would not have been strange to die from if he had not been a vampire with strong regenerative powers.

He hastily consumed a large amount of Blood Power to repair the wound—but if he suffered such a surprise attack even once more, he would not be able to avoid losing his combat power.

―Did they say the kingdom was on the verge of destruction? Indeed. If such incomprehensible disasters are happening countless times, it has no choice but to fall…!

The bastard could not bring himself to think that he had been ambushed by someone of a lower grade than himself.

This must have been a larger, irresistible force, such as magic or a miracle.

No, it had to be!

Destruction had come to Valahia like an unavoidable fate, and the situation had become so serious that his hated brother had set him free!

If so, staying in this space any longer was dangerous.

Although it was displeasing to move according to his brother’s wishes—now was the time to look further ahead and move.

―Kuh, no matter who oppresses us, Valahia will be eternal!

In the end, he hid his presence just like that and moved as quickly as possible to leave the place.

He was in such a hurry that he even ignored the vampires who were confronting the humans.

―Good.

While the entire battlefield was frozen by the overly sudden and impactful appearance and the quiet exit that was the opposite of it, Lucy, who felt that his presence had completely vanished from the area, muttered in a calm voice.

―We fooled him perfectly.

Ye-min felt that the magic power to use it was completely drained from Gleipnir, which had flown back through the air, and asked her back in a dumbfounded voice.

“Fooled him? Is that it?”

―It’s not the end.

Lucy calmly continued.

―He left all the vampires behind and went. We have to catch all of them. Are you going to let an overflow happen?

Since that made sense when she heard it, Ye-min decided to command the troops again to hunt the vampires.

Although they could not bring themselves to set foot in the trap zone and only poured attacks from a distance, fortunately, that alone was enough.

And immediately after Ye-min, who had slain the last remaining vampire, let out a sigh of relief.

She realized that Lucy was no longer present here.

* * *

And ‘he’ arrived safely in Gratia.

Strangely—the scent he had felt from the thing that had ambushed him, a familiar presence,

Was being felt near the Gratia Royal Palace.