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chapter 23
“Who’s there?!”
A priest, who had also noticed the children, shouted sharply.
“Wow, that sounds like a line from a puppet show villain… though the vibe is way weaker.”
“What did you say? You filthy little—!”
“Jerril.”
“Ah, again? Did I say something wrong?”
“No, you did well. Keep going. It’s working nicely.”
The enraged priest tossed Illay aside and advanced toward Jerril and Yuri.
Despite facing an enemy, the Ersioni brothers remained completely unfazed.
In fact, it was Illay who looked startled, and the brothers even spoke to him as if trying to calm him.
“You’re Illay, right?”
“…Yeah, that’s me.”
“You really sparkle….”
“What?”
“Never mind. Can you walk? Let’s go. Someone wants to see you.”
Hearing that someone wanted to see him, Illay hesitated for a moment. Meanwhile, Jerril, who had been handling the priest alone, shouted.
“Ebeveb, he’s slower than the little one!”
“You little rat…!”
Jerril nimbly dodged the priest and landed in front of the two.
The priest, having lost track of Jerril, showed a violent surge of emotion in his eyes.
Black, sticky, swamp-like energy.
All that negative emotion converged and overflowed from the priest’s frenzied eyes.
“I’ll kill you all!”
Black hands slithered out from the ground at the priest’s feet.
Jerril dodged in horror, narrowly avoiding the grasping black hands.
“Why is the genre changing all of a sudden?!”
“Jerril, watch out!”
Illay and Yuri ducked to avoid the black hands that were reaching for them as well.
A small voice muttered nearby.
“Is there an abnormal phenomenon happening around us?”
Yuri turned toward the source of the voice. A silver-haired boy was scanning the surroundings with a stern expression.
For some reason, it looked as if he had experienced this many times before, but another wave of black hands forced Yuri to abandon that thought.
Rolling on the floor to avoid the grasping hands, Yuri realized that these phenomena weren’t just simple spatial rifts where monsters appeared.
Negative energy continuously poured from the cracks, corrupting everything it touched.
Naturally, humans were not safe either.
Seeing the black hands swarm toward the sluggish Yuri, Illay urgently pushed him out of the way.
“Illay!”
“Ugh…!”
In the end, Illay was caught by the black hands instead of Yuri.
The boy groaned quietly as pain wracked his entire body.
“I’ve always hated you,”
The priest, now completely consumed by darkness, muttered ominously.
“Especially those eyes. Looking down on everyone as if you alone are noble! You still think you’re some great prince? Wrong. You’re just worthless trash abandoned by your parents.”
Prince… The brothers barely had time to react to his words before the barrage of violence and insults made them frown.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“No idea. Must be a pathetic bundle of inferiority complex.”
Yuri worried that the innocent-looking prince might be hurt by the priest’s words.
But then…
“Smile?”
The so-called innocent prince twisted the corners of his mouth into a sharp, deliberate smirk.
“So, what now?”
“…What?”
“Want an introduction? Though I doubt there’s much to tell.”
Jerril couldn’t help but admire him.
“Wow, strong. You pass.”
“Pass? This is not the time to admire him!”
The priest’s veins burst. The whites of his eyes turned completely black.
“Th-this… Kraaagh!”
Black hands erupted chaotically from the priest’s darkness-infused body.
“Ugh!”
As Illay, enveloped even more by darkness, groaned in pain…
“This is kind of cheating.”
“Why won’t this stop?”
Yuri and Jerril picked up broken shards of glass and started cutting through the black hands.
Panicked, Illay shouted:
“What are you doing… Run! Quickly!”
“Shiny brother, you shouldn’t treat people like trash.”
“Huh…?”
“We may act like villains, but we’re not trash.”
“Jerril. Stop talking and cut this thing.”
“Cheh.”
“I said just go!”
It was absolute chaos.
Yuri and Jerril tried to sever the black hands restraining Illay, while Illay kept shouting to escape.
The fully darkened priest erupted with malevolent energy.
Black hands rained down like a storm above them.
“Oh, we’re doomed.”
“Is this even possible in magical theory?”
“…Told you to run.”
Illay muttered in despair.
There seemed to be no escape.
“Why on earth are you here at this hour…?”
The boy’s face, filled with layered despair, was suddenly interrupted.
Piiing!
A streak of light suddenly cut across their eyes.
“Hmm, what’s this? Got really cute, huh?”
At the same time, the black hands covering the sky were shredded to pieces.
Through the hazy dust, black hair, as if slicing the night sky itself, fluttered.
A presence on the battlefield that gave awe to allies and despair to enemies.
The battlefield’s demon, the annihilator of the abyss, the sword-obsessed one.
Those under the black rain looked up in wide-eyed awe at the figure standing in front of a glowing stained glass.
“…Lirian?”
Around the girl, starlight sparkled, symbolizing a transcendence.
A sacred radiance granted only to those who crossed the barrier.
The light, resembling the hope of dawn, earned her the world’s reverent title: Master.
“Long time no see, savior.”
Lirian playfully smiled at the silver-haired boy.
Soon, crescent-shaped purple sword energy flew in, shattering all the hands restraining Illay.
Soft rustling…
The battlefield was swept by light.
The destroyed temple resembled ruins.
Cough cough.
Dust and stone fragments fell from the broken surfaces.
Illay coughed as he struggled to stand.
Looking around with a bewildered voice, he called out:
“Lirian…?!”
“Did you call me?”
Lirian saw the shock on the boy’s face as he spun around to look at her.
Disbelief, vacant shock, pale with emotion—astonishment, confusion, and overwhelming joy.
Why is he like that?
Tilting her head, she approached Illay.
“Wow, really tiny, huh?”
“Who’s saying that….”
Illay, taken aback, couldn’t believe that the smaller child was patting his head.
“What… what are you doing?”
“Enjoying the childhood of the savior, who will grow too fast to stay cute?”
“What? You know who I—”
The boy froze mid-sentence, staring at Lirian.
“…Who are you?”
“Huh?”
“Why do you call me savior?”
He grabbed her wrist firmly. His face was guarded, but his actions betrayed anxiety as if she might vanish.
Lirian widened her eyes, then, understanding the situation, gave a cat-like mischievous smile.
“Ah, so savior was like that too?”
She used his own momentum to pull him closer by the wrist.
They were now just a handspan apart.
Illay panicked.
“As for who I am….”
Lirian whispered discreetly.
Illay swallowed nervously at the close proximity.
Having admired the unfairly perfect faces of the world since childhood, Lirian winked.
“It’s a secret!”
“What?”
“Baby savior will figure it out. If I tell you everything, where’s the fun?”
Ignoring his bafflement, Lirian spun around.
“Don’t worry. I’m Lirian Ersioni. But now, maybe closer to a ‘sword spirit’.”
She turned her head, confident she’d given enough hints, eyes gleaming with curiosity.
‘Tiny me really is tiny.’
Admiring her own tiny hands, she hummed in delight. But a sigh and a grumbling voice came from behind.
“I’m not a ‘baby’.”
“Then a cute baby savior?”
“…Sigh. First, let’s clean this up.”
“Good idea, cute baby savior.”
They carried the unconscious Yuri and Jerril to safety.
Lirian’s attack was precise. No one was injured, only knocked out.
However, something non-human had been cornered.
“Judging by the traces of magic energy, a sorcerer must’ve appeared.”
Looking at the priest, they spoke.
The black energy flowing from the rift—negative energy—is called ‘magi.’
If caught in the abyssal sorcerer’s illusion, magi concentrates on the face, especially the eyes. Seeing the priest’s black tears suggested an abyssal sorcerer had appeared.
As Illay glanced at Lirian with a contemplative expression, she teased:
“Why? Can’t resist how cute my tiny self is? Just look openly. Baby savior is cute, so I’ll allow it.”
“…Please stop.”
He was speechless at the cheeky words of the five-year-old.
