Episode 78: Three Suns
Lich Balam groaned at the summons pounding in his mind.
—Balam, Balam!
—Someone has destroyed an altar. What happened?!
“Even if you ask me so suddenly….”
Zzzt!
Though he had lost his physical body and existed as a spirit parasitizing the joints of bones, he could never grow accustomed to this pain.
Perhaps it was only natural. It was divine punishment inflicted by the one who held his soul as collateral.
—I did not ask to hear such answers!
The Demon Sword threatened him.
—Check the altars. Did I not report that some fellow calling himself a duke had arrived? His soldiers may have found the altars.
“But the entrances to the hidden caves where the altars are hidden were all concealed by magic. Ordinary soldiers could never find the hidden cave—”
—Balam!
“…I shall check.”
The Demon Sword was short-tempered. Trapped within the underground cemetery of Rotphalen, the Demon Sword could not move, so Balam had to serve as his messenger.
—Do you know how much vitality is required to erect a single altar! Check. Find the destroyer of the altar and slay them!
Not long ago, fresh troops had been replenished to the human front lines, which had become locked in a stalemate with the undead.
Perhaps, as the Demon Sword said, a few of those soldiers might have luckily discovered the entrance to a hidden cave.
The altars erected with the Demon Sword’s sinister mana were a kind of temples.
The priests were black magicians; the high priest was Balam.
The Demon Sword was growing in power, endlessly absorbing human vitality.
The Demon Sword’s believers soon became walking corpses—undead—and targeted humans to regain vitality.
Balam raised himself with mana and flew in the direction the Demon Sword had indicated.
Soldiers on the ground entered his sight. This was behind the front lines, a position where they normally would not be seen.
‘Are those the humans who destroyed the altar?’
“Your Grace, shall we enter?”
The troops of the ducal army, organized as core forces, were waiting near the hidden cave for Binaeril.
Binaeril had been confident he could handle it alone, but the Duke had opposed.
After persistent persuasion, they had finally agreed that the Duke would wait near the hidden cave with a small number of knights.
“Let us wait a little longer. It has not been long since Sir Binaeril entered.”
“What if something has happened to Sir Binaeril?”
“He has the strength to have wiped out a group of black magicians by himself at Paguin Castle. Let us trust him and wait.”
It was the hour when the setting sun brought on twilight.
One of the knights discovered a long, stretched shadow in the sky.
“What is it, a bird?”
He shaded his eyes with his hand and looked above.
The shadow was a bit too large to be a bird. And since when did birds drift rather than fly?
“What is that?”
Balam was looking down at them.
He had no intention of hiding his identity.
“Humans. Armed knights.”
Judging by how they were positioned near the hidden cave, they were likely the culprits.
“Vermin.”
Balam felt irritation surge up within him.
Because of these ignorant humans, he had to endure the Demon Sword’s wrath.
He spread his palm and extended it toward them.
And chanted.
It was the very same magic that had killed the lord at Paguin Castle.
“Your Grace. There is something above our heads.”
The Duke turned his gaze and identified Balam’s figure.
Backlit by the sunset, he could not make out what it was.
But when the being stretched its hand forward, the Duke felt an indescribable, ominous instinct.
“Raise your shields!”
The ducal army’s discipline was strict. The knights were already following his command before their minds could process it.
Black mana shot out and collided with the knights’ shields.
Duke Dux swung his cherished flail and batted away the black beam.
Balam’s empty pupils widened greatly.
‘He batted away my mana?’
Magic is a product of mental strength.
The reason Balam could wield destructive magic with his emaciated body, and the reason a magician’s strength was said to be proportional to age, was all because magic was a product of the spirit.
That was why Balam was surprised. Resistance to magic was the sign of a powerful soul.
And for a human to swat away cast magic as easily as throwing a stone—he could not help but be astonished.
He did not know, but Duke Thorben Dux was a warrior among warriors who had crossed countless lines of death in the northern snows.
It was obvious that he possessed a powerful soul second to none in the Empire.
“Black magician! Capture him!”
Duke Thorben Dux raised his finger and commanded.
But the knights could not respond to this order.
“Your Grace. How are we to capture him?”
Balam was attacking them from a height utterly beyond reach even if they raised their swords.
They would need nets or slingshots just to catch him.
“Beoron! Give me a dagger.”
Beoron drew a dagger from its holster and handed it to his liege lord.
Duke Dux raised the dagger straight and assumed a throwing posture. Bulging muscles could be felt even through his clothes.
“What foolishness is this? Do you think a dagger thrown from this distance will reach?”
Balam snorted at him.
But it reached. And the dagger flew at a terrifying speed.
Balam twisted his body in shock.
It was a monstrous strength, utterly inhuman.
The dagger thrown by the Duke lodged deep in his torso, between his lungs and ribs.
Thrown with such force that only the hilt was barely visible.
“His Grace has caught the black magician!”
A premature cheer burst out among the knights.
But the Duke did not let his guard down.
‘That fellow, doesn’t he look fine for someone stabbed in the lungs?’
His thought was correct.
Balam grabbed the slightly protruding hilt of the dagger and pulled it out with force.
Rotten entrails came out with the dagger.
Tossing the dagger far away, Balam lowered his altitude and approached the ducal army.
“He’s coming down!”
“Does he mean to surrender?”
He did not. Even if his body was meaningless, he merely wished to see the face of the human who had wounded him.
“Who are you.”
A voice filled with dense, nauseating mana—the same that had filled the basement of Paguin Castle—echoed in the knights’ heads.
“Urk—”
Several knights with weak mental strength could not endure his stomach-churning voice and dry-heaved.
Duke Dux stood tall and opposed his mana.
Balam marveled at the Duke’s fierce spirit.
“I am Duke Thorben Dux, who rules the southern Empire. Who are you?”
“You are Duke Dux?”
With the sunset at his back, Balam faced him and removed his hood.
The light behind him reflected off white bones, clearly revealing his emaciated flesh.
“A skeleton…! He is not among the living!”
“I see it too.”
Knight Asdal looked back and forth between Balam’s smooth head and the Duke, recalling the thought that there were three suns, but did not utter such blasphemy aloud.
“I am the Conqueror of the South. The Empire’s only Duke. Hero of the Northern Front. Husband of Melina and father of the only child, the jewel-like Vivian—Thorben Dux.”
“Melina? Vivian? Who are they?”
“I am not finished. Father of Vivian, who is like fresh dew in the morning and a sunset jewel in the evening, like the shade of a great tree in summer and the warm midday sun in winter….”
“Um, Your Grace. Please stop….”
Lord Beoron learned for the first time that a corpse reduced to white bone could make such a dumbfounded expression.
“…Such is the father of Vivian. Who are you!”
“You speak incomprehensible nonsense. My name is Balam.”
“A black magician?”
“Do not treat me the same as those novices. I am… the agent of the Demon Sword, an immortal being. A lich!”
Balam thought those who heard his true nature would be shocked and frightened.
But they were not. Duke Dux looked down at Balam with a pitiful expression and spoke.
“What is that? Some kind of make-believe game?”
“…You insignificant worms!”
“One’s standing is not determined by a few fancy epithets. I do not fear one who decorates his name with words befitting an adolescent boy.”
‘You introduced yourself far longer.’
Balam thought so, but he could no longer engage in such amiable conversation.
Because Duke Dux was swinging his flail, aiming for his skull.
“Kuh! What are you doing!”
“In any case, it is clear you are our enemy. Then die.”
Bwoong— Bwoong—
The Duke’s flail tore through the air with a threatening sound, aiming for Balam.
The iron ball attached to the chain was, by itself, about the size of an average adult man’s head.
If struck by such a thing, not even bones would remain.
Balam raised his body again.
“Coward!”
“You who attacked suddenly are the greater coward. Are you not ashamed to call yourself a duke?”
“This is the Imperial greeting!”
The Duke’s knights had also never heard of this greeting.
This time, Balam was not careless.
He heavily raised his mana and chanted a spell.
“Torrents of death and decay!”
Black rain fell from the sky.
The black rain that first touched the horses’ skin melted the flesh with a sizzling sound.
“Hihiiing!”
The horses thrashed in pain. The knights, including the Duke, leaped from their horses and gathered in unison, building a wall of shields over their heads.
“Ha! How long can you endure!”
Balam violently poured mana through his outstretched hand.
The rain grew increasingly fierce.
Sssss—
The sound of shields corroding rang out above the knights’ heads.
The shields they had raised were round shields to begin with, ill-suited to blocking this kind of attack.
The groans of soldiers struck by raindrops through the gaps in their armor gradually faded.
“Damn…!”
“Your Grace, retreat and leave us behind. We shall somehow draw his attention.”
“What nonsense is that!”
“We have no way to counter his magic. It would be better if at least Your Grace escaped alone.”
“Beoron! Speak no foolishness! Who do you think I am!”
The Duke gripped the chain portion of the flail he held with both hands.
“I am!”
He twisted the chain with all his strength.
The chain, unable to withstand the Duke’s grip strength, groaned and twisted.
“The Mercenary King of the North!”
The Duke, having broken the chain with his bare hands, broke free from the turtle formation despite his knights’ attempts to stop him.
“I am Duke Thorben Dux!”
He stood unprotected in the black rain and swung the chain with its iron ball attached.
Spinning it round and round to build momentum, Duke Dux squinted his eyes and aimed at Balam floating in the air.
“Is that even human!”
The Duke and Balam exclaimed simultaneously.
The Duke’s iron ball flew through the air and rushed toward the lich.
Balam could not withstand that attack while maintaining his spell. His body would not hold.
“Wall of black mana!”
Balam eventually cancelled his spell and chanted a defensive wall.
Even the shock transmitted through the barrier of black mana was dizzying.
Balam felt a slight chill at the Duke’s monstrous strength.
He dispelled the mana barrier and glared down at the Duke on the ground.
“Have you shown me everything you have? Now it is time to die, Duke!”
But nothing today went according to Balam’s will.
At that moment while the ducal army and Balam were facing off, Binaeril Dalhaim walked out of the hidden cave.