55 – Return
One, two, three, four…
I count the number of Immortals roaming the gorge.
Roughly a little over twenty.
The corpses of the monsters killed in the previous battle lay decomposed and scattered on the ground.
Broken rocks were scattered everywhere, making the already narrow path even narrower.
“Such creepy monsters….”
I frowned as I watched the approaching Immortals.
I had seen monsters resurrected in the form of corpses before.
But the Immortals were even more eerie, as they retained their appearance from when they were alive, unlike skeletons or zombies.
Except for their empty, burning eyes, their flesh remained intact and their equipment was unchanged.
However, if there were any body parts that were injured when they were attacked by monsters, those parts moved without being restored.
The most horrifying thing was that they looked almost the same as when they were alive, which meant their faces were recognizable.
Although I didn’t know their names, I definitely recognized the faces.
Even if I had only been in the same expeditionary force for a short time, if their faces were the same, they couldn’t help but feel familiar.
The size of the monster unit that Bloodstain led to the Horn Gorge was much larger than what the kingdom had estimated.
That’s why the sacrifices of the expeditionary force were inevitable.
But as I watched the Immortals wandering in front of me, unable to rest in peace, I felt an indescribable sense of responsibility.
If I, who had been in charge of the deputy command of the battle behind Mileia, had made a slightly quicker judgment, could we have reduced the number of casualties?
A moment later, one Immortal raised their sword and charged at me.
Since it was the first time I was encountering this type of monster, I should first cautiously assess their strength.
Clang!
I parried the sword of the Fire Beast with a sword full of magic power.
The sharp metallic sound echoed in my ears.
The force of the Fire Beast’s sword, as it struck mine, traveled through my arm and into my body.
Hmm, this is the feeling for now.
Surprisingly, the Fire Beast’s attack wasn’t that intense.
Immediately, the next strike flew at me, but I sidestepped and avoided it.
Crash!
Then, the Fire Beast’s sword sliced through the rock behind me.
It cleanly cut through the rather large rock as if it were cutting through wood.
“What? That destructive power…”
As I witnessed the rock being sliced, I felt a cold sweat running down my back.
The attack I just blocked with my sword didn’t feel like it had that level of destructive power.
I thought it was nothing special, as I was able to block it without much difficulty.
“Yunoa was taken aback by the huge difference between the power she thought she had and her actual power.
The disparity was so great that the scale used to compare the size of the powers broke.”
At that moment, the narrator suddenly spoke to me.
The difference between the power I thought I had and my actual power is too great?
What does that mean?
“Ah!”
The next attack from the Immortal aimed for my waist, and I quickly moved my body back.
Slowly, other Immortals around me began to gather towards me.
“The concept of strength is relative.
Even though Yunoa had learned to apply a little bit of magic, her mind was still lacking.
There was no need to be discouraged just because the visible attack from the opponent seemed strong.
It was a foolishness to not realize it even after experiencing that attack directly with your body.
What’s the use of holding a sword to catch a dragon?
It was useless unless you regarded it as a sword to catch a dragon yourself.”
Narration mixed with unique sarcasm, and spoke to me.
Relative strength.
It was a powerful strike that could split a rock, but when actually receiving it directly, it didn’t feel that strong.
So there was only one answer.
Were the Immortals attacking me weak on purpose?
Of course not.
If I had come to that conclusion, then Naration would have cursed at me as a fool, but I wasn’t that stupid.
The Immortals’ attacks weren’t weak; it was because the side that was receiving them was much stronger.
The unique magic I obtained from Ainblad’s magic prison seemed to have a tremendous effect.
If I had received that strike from the Immortal in the past, I would never have been able to withstand it intact.
But now, it was possible.
And very easily at that.
To confirm the conclusion I had reached in my mind, I decided not to dodge the attack this time.
The flaming warrior’s sword flew towards my neck.
Clang!
I raised my sword and blocked the attack.
If the flaming warrior has inherited his abilities from his past life, his sword must be filled with magical power.
But the magical power imbued in my sword far surpassed his.
Therefore, the destructive power of the attack was neutralized, and I was able to stand there, feeling only a slight shock.
“Next…!”
The flaming warriors started to gather.
It was time to start organizing things.
I took a step back and assumed a sideways stance.
If I can have this level of defensive ability just by filling my body and sword with magical power, what about the attack?
Concentrating my mind on the magical power in the blade, I swung the sword horizontally.
At the moment when the sword drew a large trajectory, I released the magical power of the sword into the air.
It was a technique I had first learned when I became an adventurer, the sword energy.
Chak-chak-chop!
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The sword energy, created widely along the trajectory of the sword, pierced through the waists of the flaming warriors.
The color of the sword energy was not the same bluish hue as before, but rather a strange shade close to crimson.
Some of the flaming warriors raised their weapons to protect themselves from the sword energy flying towards them.
The flaming warriors at the back also created protective barriers with magic.
However, the crimson sword that flew at high speed pierced through everything.
Kwaaang-!
It was a power that exceeded expectations.
Even after piercing through the fire zombies, the sword continued to fly and collided with the rock wall, disappearing with a loud noise.
Deep marks, easily over 10 meters, were engraved on the massive rock wall.
The fire zombies struck by the sword all collapsed to the ground with their waists or legs severed.
“What… what is this?”
His hands trembled with an unfamiliar power.
He knew that the peculiar magic he obtained from Einblad would have an effect, but he never expected it to be this powerful.
It was one thing for his manageable magic power to become stronger, but even he himself had trouble adapting to it.
Dealing with these fire zombies right now became an easy task.
However, when he swung the sword, he felt that he exerted too much strength because he hadn’t properly adapted to the power he possessed.
Was it because of the foreign magic power that his body had not accepted before?
This could be an unexpectedly troublesome issue.
For now, it was not a problem as he was alone and only fire zombies were present in front of him.
But in situations where he had comrades or allies mixed with enemies, failure in controlling his magic power would be fatal.
What if there were allies at the end of the trajectory where the sword flew, rather than a rock wall?
Just the thought of it was dreadful.
“Yunoa finally realized a new problem that had arisen for him.
The magic power wielded by the Queen of Pureblood Vampires, Rudmila, and the magic power wielded by humans were drastically different in nature.
The magical power he absorbed into his body was so powerful that it even changed the nature of the stored magical power that had been accumulated through magical conversion.』
The narrator reassured me of my thoughts.
When I was trapped in the magic stone prison, no matter how hard I concentrated, I couldn’t control the magical power that felt red.
So I let the blue magical power that I could handle pass through the magic stone prison and merged the qualities of the two magical powers.
As a result, the power of the magical power became stronger, but the merging was not only an advantage.
“I guess I need a lot of practice….”
I held the sword and looked at the remaining immortals.
From now on, one by one, let’s deal with the immortals with restrained magical power.
“Hoo….”
I took a deep breath and concentrated my mind again to fill the sword with magical power.
This time, instead of sending out sword energy, I directly stabbed the immortals.
Slash-!
The immortal’s body was cut diagonally as easily as cheese.
There was no fear that I would lose to the power of swinging the sword and accidentally cut strange places.
The center of my body was fine, and it felt like swinging the sword as usual.
The cutting power was on a completely different level from before.
Alright, it seems that the problem of controlling magical power only occurs in technical aspects.
This time, I tried converting the magical power of the blade into flames.
As before, the flames of magical power would burn from the blade, creating a state where it could be used like a flame sword.
Whoosh-!
As I watched, a violet flame erupted fiercely from the sword, extending several meters longer than the blade itself.
The swirling flames that had burst from the sword engulfed the Fire Lion in front of me before I could react, leaving me startled enough to let go of the sword.
The sword fell to the ground, and the flames that had been wildly spreading from the blade dissipated into the air.
“Well… that was unexpected…”
This is a real problem.
I have absolutely no control over it.
Thinking that I must find a way to control this immense power technically, I picked up the sword again and charged towards the remaining Fire Lions.
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