89 episodes
26 The Realm of Demons (1)
A night with a crescent moon as red as blood.
“ Heh heh, heh heh!”
A man was running frantically through the night streets where even the moon was covered with clouds and there was hardly any light.
The sound of breathing that is harsh as it has been running for a long time.
Such a man, Kellyn’s heart was beating like it was going to explode, but he never stopped running.
No, it went faster than that.
It’s like when you stop, you stop breathing.
“ Ugh… … !”
Fear filled Kellyn’s eyes.
all, all dead
by the ‘it’ that are now chasing him.
Now, only Kellyn remained in this estate.
‘ Come on, get out of here!’
Even if he escaped from the territory, he could not know if the ‘they’ would come after him, but Kellyn just kept running.
Because now in his head, the only thought was that he had to somehow get away from ‘them’.
The fear that ‘they’ gave was beyond imagination.
To the extent that it completely paralyzes human reason.
‘ Look, I see!’
At that time, there was little hope in Kellyn’s eyes as she ran while panting.
Because the exit of the territory was slowly coming into his sight.
Kellyn rushes to the exit, squeezing out her last strength.
It was finally time for his new model to pass through the exit.
hee hee hee!
The laughter of ‘they’ could be heard in Kellyn’s ear.
Tickle!
His body stopped on the spot as if caught by something with him.
No, actually, Kelly couldn’t move.
It was as if his whole body was wrapped around hundreds of invisible threads.
“ Oh, no!”
Kellyn vomits a desperate voice as she feels her head spinning regardless of her will.
In front of his eyes, ‘they’ slowly appear and start to shed a bizarre laugh.
The moment he saw that smile, only Kelly knew.
“ Ah… … .”
That all of this was just their entertainment in the first place.
There was no way for him to escape from the beginning.
Soon after,
Quad Duck!
One of the ‘it’ swallowed Kellyn’s body.
* * *
A quiet outlying road that exists in Hubris, the capital of the empire.
Whoa!
A horsepower car with a luxurious appearance was running at high speed on the road.
Shrek-
Shion was quickly scanning through some of the papers in his hand in such a horse-drawn carriage.
There is one reason why Zion is here now, out of the imperial castle.
It was just to save the medium that Goeui talked about in the past.
It was originally intended to depart immediately, but the emperor’s funeral had to be postponed, so it was delayed a lot.
There,
‘ Heukseongha 4 stars.’
Even if they somehow managed to penetrate up to the 3rd castle, it was an area that could not be reached from the 4th castle if the body was not intact.
Even the recoil of the lunar eclipse did not fully recover, and I did not know what would happen if I tried to raise it forcibly with this body.
‘ But if, on the other hand, you can improve your body through skepticism… … .’
I didn’t know if the wall that had been blocked would be broken and it would be able to achieve rapid growth like a flood of water.
“ That’s all the information we have about the five great families on our side. We’ve compressed only the most important points.”
Aileen, the head of the Moon Eye branch, who was sitting opposite Zion, blinked and pointed to the documents that Zion was reading, and made a look of how it was.
The reason she is here is because of the instructions given by Zion in relation to the arrangement and reporting of newly discovered information and this mediation case.
“ Not bad.”
Eileen, who had a surprised expression for a moment at Shion’s praise-like words that she had almost never heard of before, opened her mouth with a slight glance.
“ There is one thing I want to ask you.”
“ Tell me.”
“ Proof of succession at this funeral… … Is that what your majesty intended?”
Of course, from the outward appearance, it seemed that the 4th Prince Utekan had failed in plotting to disqualify him as the successor of Sion.
However, Eileen, who had seen Zion up close until now, couldn’t shake the thought that Zion’s breath had entered everything.
“ What do you think?”
Shion smiles and asks.
‘ Also… … .’
At that smile, Eileen nodded with a look that said yes.
“ Thanks to that, now, among the aristocrats who attended the funeral of His Majesty the Sun Emperor, there is only talk of His Majesty. And the power of the 4th Prince was also noticeably weakened. There are also signs that an internal division is about to take place. Probably because the 4th Prince promised to hand over the corps belonging to Jeongroo-gun to His Majesty at will.”
Hearing her report, Shion recalled the meeting with Utekan two days ago.
Contrary to the expectation that he would overturn the board with rage, Utekan meekly handed over the Wolro Corps, one of the True Five Army, to Shion himself.
As if Azela’s work didn’t exist.
However, Shion was able to discover the great anger hidden deep in Utekan’s eyes.
I don’t know if it was originally Utekan or Tarahal’s, but the 4th Prince seemed to have a tendency not to show any signs when he was extremely angry.
‘ I might be able to use my hands there again soon.’
It was what I was hoping for.
The more the Utecan moves, the clearer the gap will be.
Utekan was also included in the ‘enemies that revealed this’ that Shion had told Azela.
“ Oh, and His Majesty Zion. Do you remember the last time you went to the underground auction house?”
Eileen’s voice interrupted Shion’s thoughts.
“ Yes.”
“ The unidentified group that you destroyed at that time is still trying to find out your identity. Of course we blocked everything on our side.”
‘ It must have been quite sweet.’ At that, Shion smirked as she remembered the Sharin Mei she had seen at that time.
He stirred it up so much, but it was rather strange to stand still.
In addition to that, she is probably bursting with tantrums by now due to her personality, who cannot live without being harmed.
“ What did you order more than that?”
“ Ah, here it is.”
In response to Shion’s question, Eileen presented some new papers.
Like a personal statement, the personal details of each person were recorded in detail one by one.
“ Is this the mercenary you requested, right?”
“ Right.”
Shion nodded while lightly scanning the documents.
These were none other than the mercenaries that Zion would take this time.
However, Eileen’s eyes looking at Zion like that had a light that could not be understood.
“ I heard that you were asking these people to be rescued, but… … Are you really okay?”
A voice full of doubts came out of her mouth.
“ It’s been a while since all three of them started working as mercenaries… … His skills are at the level of barely doing pull-ups at the bottom of the silver level of the adventure series. There is one priest, but he can only use basic holy magic because he is half a penny, whom even the god he worships does not know.”
Of course, if it was a silver rank, one person would do it, but if Eileen made up her mind to save it, within a few hours, she was able to get a mercenary group with the highest level of gold and command it in front of Sion.
Still, I couldn’t understand why they had to take these people along.
“I need it.”
Shion, looking at the documents with drowsy eyes, mutters without emotion.
Eileen looked into Shion’s eyes and felt goosebumps on her body without realizing it.
It wasn’t just now.
There was a time when she looked into Zion’s eyes and felt that she was not human.
Eyes as if they were just consumables, not people, everything that exists in this world.
What would the image of a person with eyes like that look like?
Eileen suddenly wondered about it.
Whoa!
In the meantime, the horsepower car that arrived at the mercenary street outside the capital city, which was the destination, stopped moving.
“ Oh, and.”
Shion, who got out of the horse-drawn carriage with her hair and eyes dyed black, looked back at Eileen as if she remembered something.
” Tell Riusina to come to the place written here when you’re ready.”
“ Are you here? Why go to this place… … .”
“ Just in case you don’t know, I’ll be prepared.”
Sion’s new model, who got out of the horsepower car with the last unknown words, began to slowly move away.
* * *
“ Ha ha ha! Isn’t this your first expedition, Zion? There is nothing more exciting and trembling than doing something for the first time. When I first became a mercenary and explored the dungeon… … .”
Shion glanced at the man next to him who continued talking without even breathing properly.
This brown-haired man by the name of Rat was the leader of the Rat mercenaries chosen by Sion.
He couldn’t hide his excitement from the first time we met until now, probably because he was excited about a request that made money after a long time.
“ Lat, shut up. What are you going to do if the client cancels the request because you are too noisy?”
At that time, a woman with dark skin and a resilient body, glanced at Shion, and tapped Rat’s side with her elbow.
“ What are you talking about, Amber? I’m just passing on knowledge to Zeon. It’s good to know a lot before you start exploring in earnest. Anyway, if Zion-sama continues to be interested in adventure in the future, this is a necessary content.”
The reason Lat said this was because of the status of Zion that Eileen had provided this time.
Zion Harness.
As the youngest child of a wealthy aristocratic family in the capital, he is a young man who has a lot of romance for adventure.
They were the first mercenary corps hired to start the adventure of such an immature child, and that was the form of Zion they recognized.
Of course, it didn’t match the original look at all, but
‘ Rather, this is better.’
Because this had to be kept secret.
Therefore, even within the Imperial Palace, only Thierry knew about Shion’s outing, and even Eileen, who was with him before, did not know where and for what reason Sion was going.
“ You think so, Ellie?”
“ For that, more than half of what Rat said is his story… … . And this is our second dungeon exploration, and at that time, Rat whined from the entrance of the dungeon that he couldn’t enter because he was afraid… … .”
At Lat’s words, a woman with a cute impression in golden hair and a priest’s uniform opened her mouth quietly.
Contrary to her timid tone, the woman’s words were quite spicy.
“ Ha ha… … ha ha ha! what do you mean, that Don’t worry, Zion. I think Ellie is remembering it wrong.”
Rat quickly excused himself with a bewildered expression on his face, but Zion blew his words out of one ear, paying attention to a woman called Eli.
The reason why Shion chose this mercenary group was because of that woman.
‘ Elesis Desire.’
A colleague of the hero in the chronicle and a future saint.
And one of the most sacred pedigrees in the world.
Currently, he is just a wandering priest, but in the not too distant future, he will inherit the divine mantra and awaken as a true representative of God on earth.
However, the reason why Shion found her was different from when she had met other warriors before.
This time, I was planning to use it only for Zion himself, regardless of the main story.
Elesis was a necessary figure in order to obtain the medium that Zion had envisioned.
‘ Let me borrow some.’
When Zion speaks to himself, remembering the hero he has not yet met,
“ Oh, by the way, Zion-nim, if you go at this speed, it will be late afternoon when you arrive at the dungeon you set as your destination. The dungeon at night is much more dangerous than during the day, so why not fix it nearby and leave the next morning?”
Rat’s voice was heard in his ear.
“ There is also a small estate named Angelosh right next to the dungeon.”
“ I do.”
Shion nodded at Lat’s words.
Because that was exactly what he wanted.
They knew they were going to explore an unknown lower level dungeon near the Great Forest of the Western Empire, but in fact, Zion had a different destination.
The realm that Rat spoke of now, Angelosh.
The place where the legend that an angel descended is handed down was the true destination of Zion.