Chapter 232 - A Giant Chessboard

Seeing Zed's reaction, Ferda studied him again. No matter how he looked at it, this was not the reaction of someone caught in a Trauma's power.

"You don't feel anything?"

"Sorry? Oh, those eyeballs seem to be trying something. Is that what you mean?"

Ferda nodded, and Zed scratched his head as he answered.

"It's not that I don't feel anything. I've trained myself to recognize the sensation. Growing up as the son of the Red-Eye Clan's captain is no easy life."

"Is that so?"

"Letting your guard down gets you killed in that line of work. They put me under illusions at all hours. At worst, they even tried to make me kill myself. Well, I suppose they did it because the work was that dangerous..."

His expression was bitter, yet he smiled as though he could not quite bring himself to hate them.

"Ugh..."

A moment later, Arwen, who had been standing in a daze, caught his breath, cold sweat running down his face.

"What... just happened? It felt as though I'd fallen into some terrible nightmare..."

Arwen had come to his senses. That was strange. They had not even touched the eyes yet. How had he escaped that vicious illusion? The only variable here was Zed. Which meant...

"Zed."

"Yes?"

"I'm going to look at one of the eyes you're watching. If I fall into a trance, can you stab that eye and destroy it?"

"All right."

Zed did not understand, but nodded, figuring he could find out in time.

Ferda raised his head and met the gaze of one of the purple masses lodged on the wall. To his surprise, nothing happened. For the first time, he could look properly at its form.

"Master Ferda?" Luri called cautiously.

"I'm all right."

Seeing that Ferda was unharmed, Luri lifted her head to look at the mass as well. This was her first proper look at it, too.

"It seems you used your eyes to destroy what was inside those eyes."

"I haven't destroyed it. I've only nullified it for a moment."

"Can you destroy it?"

"Of course."

"Then do it."

Zed's eyes shone bright red as he met every eye's gaze.

SCREEEECH!

Then something astonishing happened. They began to tremble, spilling liquid from within. They seemed to be weeping, as though confronted with their greatest fear.

'If a Red-Eye clansman's gaze makes them collapse...'

It meant those eyes were vast collections of magical formulas. Zed had broken the formulas with his red eyes, causing their physical forms to collapse.

'What a terrifying power.'

Ferda had been rather annoyed that Zed wasted his time on nonsense like the Bunny Swallows. Now he was glad that was all he did.

"You lot would've been in real trouble without me, wouldn't you?"

As Zed puffed himself up, Ferda quietly nodded.

"You're more useful than I thought."

"Was that supposed to be a compliment?"

Luri chimed in. "They do say even a grub has a talent for rolling."

"So they do."

Hearing even Arwen and Luri talk that way made Zed reconsider how they had been treating him.

At any rate, they were able to enter the cathedral safely. Where Alte's emblem should have been was a giant eye, and beneath it stood a skull totem built from bones. The townspeople gazed up at it, chuckling.

"Heh heh..."

"Heh heh heh..."

It was a chilling sight. They were almost nothing but bones, seemingly struggling even to breathe, yet their faces were smiling.

"Is that eyeball doing this to them?"

"Most likely."

"Vile creatures..."

This was a place that deepened one's hatred of Demons. Dwelling on that revulsion, they turned to the matter at hand.

"What will you do with the civilians here?"

"..."

Ferda examined their faces again. Zed's eyes had already nullified the eyeball. Yet the people still gazed at that revolting thing, their expressions no less steeped in twisted joy. They were already more like the dead than living humans.

"Give them rest."

"Understood."

Arwen and Zed raised their swords.

"No." Ferda stopped them. "I'll do this myself. All of you, go outside."

"Yes, sir."

Killing helpless commoners was no easy thing. That burden was Ferda's to bear.

Earth's Punishment, the staff Lucy Philiaz had given him, rose into the air. Ferda lifted his hands on either side of it, manifesting a magic circle. Its intricate design took shape in an instant, then condensed around his staff.

The blue mana turned red, and crimson currents buzzed above Earth's Punishment. Waves of force drove back the encroaching air as he barely held the condensed power in check. Ferda gripped the staff in both hands and raised it overhead.

A fifth-tier emission spell.

"Electric Wave."

He slammed the staff into the floor, and red electricity spread out from it.

BOOOOM!

The powerful current burned everything away. The purple flesh clinging to the walls. Gamigin's dark magic, piled high in the form of skulls. Even the innocent people who had merely smiled, knowing nothing.

Everything the current touched peeled away, layer by layer, and vanished. The densely packed commoners became heaps of pure white ash. With that, the totem barring the way into the inner castle was destroyed.

A moment later, the city began to shake. Something had changed in the Legion magic.

"What's happening?"

"It seems the barrier around the inner castle has fallen."

Ferda looked up at those words. The thick black barrier was gradually fading. Apparently, the totem he had destroyed had been the last. Now that the barrier blocking entry to the inner castle had weakened, it was time for an all-out assault.

This was where it truly began. Ferda's objective was to keep Gamigin's dark-magic book out of the kings' sight.

"Let's move to the inner castle."

"Yes, sir."

They set off, but did not get far. An unsettling rift appeared before them. The man who emerged from it was a jarring splash of color against the black and gray ground. His snow-white skin put them on guard at once. Luri's hatred ran all the deeper because he had exposed a painful weakness of hers.

It was Gokma, once counted among the seven baleful stars.

"Well done, Mr. Ferda."

"..."

"That was a newly improved Trauma. What a shame we couldn't test it on you and Miss Luri. Who would have thought the Red-Eye Clan's power would be the key to breaking a Trauma's formulas?"

"Much like you nearly dying from a kitchen knife?"

Ferda had touched a sore spot, but Gokma smiled.

"Indeed. Such is the world of magic. No advantage is absolute. A formula activated by eye contact can be broken by eyes, and even one of the seven baleful stars can fall to a child's kitchen knife."

Gokma gestured toward Ferda. Space warped around his shoulder. Ferda already knew this spell: Point Distortion, which twisted space to its limit, then used the recoil to cause an explosion.

"Master Ferda!"

With her keen senses and swift reflexes, Luri seized Ferda and pulled him clear of its range.

BANG!

The distortion spell aimed at his shoulder burst in empty air. Seeing the explosion for the first time sent a chill down Zed's and Arwen's spines.

"Master Ferda, leave him to me."

Luri gripped her enormous axe and directed her killing intent at Gokma. Though a Dragon Spawn, she could unleash Dragon Fear. Yet even with her full strength behind it, Gokma remained utterly unmoved.

"I'm afraid I don't have the leisure to fight you. I have work to do."

Something appeared above Gokma's snow-white hand. A dark-magic book. It was identical to the one that had manifested when the king of Heinkel fought Duke Yurei.

'That means he's going to use Gamigin's magic...'

Which of Gamigin's spells would be useful now? Ferda sifted through the list of spells in his mind. Banishment was the likeliest choice: banish Luri, the greatest obstacle, then deal with Ferda. Given her speed, the opening would be brief, but long enough to catch him unguarded and kill him.

"You're thinking of Banishment, aren't you?"

"!"

Gokma, too, was a cunning opponent. He had seen straight through Ferda's thoughts.

"But what about the opposite?"

Gokma pointed at Ferda. Rather than banish a troublesome guest who would only return...

"I'm going to invite you to the castle."

He would simply choose whom to invite. Having stepped into the domain, Ferda had no choice.

* * *

Five minutes before Ferda's abduction, in the audience chamber of the Heinkel Kingdom's inner castle.

Seated on his throne, the king of Heinkel watched everything: the invaders pouring into his capital like cockroaches, mercilessly slaughtering his citizens.

"Ah..."

Each time, it felt as though a thread connected to his body snapped. Gamigin's Legion was magic that enabled rule by converting subjects' lives into mana, and so he was connected to them all. He could feel them disappearing one by one with painful clarity.

Sometimes, rather than a single strand, it felt as though scissors had cut through an entire bundle. At those moments, his throat tightened. Though learning dark magic had left his body far removed from humanity, the king of Heinkel agonized over the loss of his citizens.

"Does it hurt?"

Gokma's voice came from behind him. The king answered respectfully.

"It does. My people, who once smiled at the sight of me, are dying."

"All things are empty. Why suffer so?"

"I must still be sorely lacking. I cannot understand Lord Godwin's will."

Gokma gave a faint chuckle and stepped in front of him.

"The spell keeping intruders out of the inner castle will soon collapse."

"Yes. I can feel it."

"That man Ferda saw through it. Of Gamigin's defensive domains, the absolute barrier that uses paired totems is something only someone deeply versed in the dark arts would recognize..."

One would need knowledge on par with Erdes, the chair of the magic society who loathed Dark Mages, to recognize it. After all, anyone else who had delved that deeply into dark magic had died at her hands.

"Are you ready?"

"Of course. My preparations are complete."

"I hope you achieve your revenge."

With that, Gokma tore open space and vanished. The king's gaze never left the magically conjured view of the city.

Suddenly, he thought of his childhood. Why did people fight? The land was so vast and grain so plentiful. Why did people go hungry, and why did bandits run rampant?

Sigmund Heinkel loved peace. He firmly believed he could serve his people by mastering every field of knowledge and implementing policies for their benefit. He often went out on inspections, examining what his people needed and striving to improve their lives.

But Sigmund's father, the previous king, disapproved of him.

["If you were born a king's son, act like a prince."]

He wanted Sigmund to master only martial arts and hunting. He even observed those lessons, sometimes teaching them himself, to keep the young boy from straying. But Sigmund insisted that violence could not solve everything and only resisted.

Father and son were such polar opposites that it was hard to believe they shared the same blood. Their conflict deepened, and they grew distant. In the end, they lived like strangers, but there was one thing they still did together: chess. Only chess connected the two, who clashed over everything else.

["Do you know why I play chess with you?"] his father asked.

["Isn't it to improve my knowledge of strategy?"]

["You're half right."]

Having understood even half of his father's intent felt both pleasing and strange.

["Because this is the only time you become cruel."]

["I do?"]

["Look. How many pawns did you have before you?"]

["Eight."]

["How many remain?"]

Sigmund looked down at the chessboard.

["Three."]

["Three remain. That means you sacrificed five to survive."]

Only then did he think he understood. The pieces before him now looked like people, spears in hand, staring ahead with fear-filled eyes as they stepped forward on trembling legs...

["That is what it means to protect a country. You kill and sacrifice others to preserve it in the end."]

["People are different."]

["Yes, people are different. But a king is not a person."]

He touched the king piece as he spoke.

["You are powerless, able to move only a single square. To survive, you sacrifice, kill, flee, and flee again. So long as you live, this game does not end."]

["..."]

["Always bear that in mind."]

The next day, Sigmund's mother died. The son grieved for his mother, and the husband sobbed for his wife. After that, his father stopped even playing chess with him.

The following year, his father, too, died of illness. Their conversation over the chessboard became the last they ever shared.

Sigmund became king. Peace endured. In time, he reached the age his father had been. He made friends, found a wife, and had children.

Just as his father's lesson began to fade from memory, everything changed. Yurei was captured, and pressure came from every side. They were being turned into Demon Followers, though they had never even met any.

Only then could he understand his father's words. He had sought peace, but the world hated peace. The world was a giant chessboard.

A king sacrificed, killed, fled, and fled again. What became of a king who had sacrificed everything? In the end, he did not die. Killing a king in chess was not aristocratic.

Aristocrats. What were those so-called nobles? A general who failed in war took full responsibility and died. What glory did they hope to enjoy by sacrificing hundreds, failing, and surviving?

"Despicable creatures."

A game in which thousands died for one person's desires should never be allowed to begin. The king of Heinkel's goal was clear. He would kill every king.