Chương 25: Chapter 24: Velkyne’s Treasure

The three of them returned to the carriage, an uncomfortable silence hanging between them. Yuto wore a look of deep sorrow, and Flokiro continued to hold Yuto's hand. Rivian didn't ask any unnecessary questions of the two of them. She seemed to be wondering how she should react. She then asked only what was necessary.

"So, Yuto. Why are you in Velkyne?" Yuto turned his head as he sat on the horseman's seat. His eyes, which were always dark, looked gloomier than usual.

"There is something I need to find. I believe I told you that already," he said, his voice raspy. Rivian gave a short sigh and shook her head.

"Yes, you did say that. You didn't explain to me where it is, or what exactly it's supposed to be."

"A sword," he replied.

"A sword...?" Rivian asked, confusion in her eyes. It wasn't easy for her to understand right away why he would come all the way to these dangerous ruins of a fallen kingdom for a weapon.

"It's stored deep in the palace. I need it back." He said no more and gripped the reins. The sword, called Velkyne's Treasure, was not simply a sharp piece of metal. It had been Yuto's favorite weapon in his past life, left to him by Luke Velkyne, his father. My father... He knew the Constellations meant to kill him. Yuto bit his lip. He had been too young at the time to understand what his father had learned and to inherit the sword.

Instead of telling the truth to his son directly, Luke had left behind a book so that Yuto could continue his legacy one day. The sword was sealed away in a small room hidden in an underground passageway. But that was in a world where Yuto had been a prince of Velkyne. Frankly speaking, he could not be sure he would find it there in this one. Even if he wasn't certain, he had to see for himself in the ruins of his kingdom. Perhaps... my father did seal it away in this world as well.

Even in this world without Yuto, he would have seen through the Constellations' lies, at least a little. For the price of learning too much, the Constellations had killed him, but he would have seen that coming. If that was the case, there was a possibility that he had hidden the sword beforehand. Yuto looked up. The thick purple fog partly obscured the Velkyne Royal Castle in the distance. Very little of the silver-white building, once beautiful and grand, remained.

Half the walls had fallen, revealing the bare scaffolding, and the sky-high towers had been bent at strange angles and left to hang over the ground. A place that had once signified the glory of the name of Velkyne was no more than a glorified tombstone now. It broke Yuto's heart. He tugged at the reins. * The closer they came to the capital of Velkyne, the louder grew a pulsing in Yuto's heart, different from his heartbeat.

The core formed from the vengeful ghosts inside of him was reacting to something that Yuto didn't know. What is this...? Yuto frowned as he directed the horses. The many ghosts of the subjects who had been buried alive on the night of the disaster wandered this place. The spirits he had taken in at the Penalty Zone had also been mocked and killed by the Constellations. Did they feel a sense of connection to the spirits of this place? That couldn't be the only reason.

The core was reverberating, but Yuto also felt a disgust that made him want to vomit.

"Ugh..." Yuto wasn't alone in this. Rivian, who was looking around her anxiously, clapped her hand over her mouth. Her face was pale.

"What... What is this? It's different from poison... Something has polluted the air..." she said. Yuto gazed at Flokiro, who was sitting on his left. Flokiro was also scowling.

"Ether," Flokiro said, sniffing the air.

"The ether is tainted. Badly."

"Ether?" Yuto asked. Ether was the energy that comprised the entire world and everything in it. Out in nature, one could find clean ether everywhere, and on a battlefield full of dead bodies, the ether would be polluted. Yuto had been in many battles with Flokiro in his past life and was quite accustomed to what tainted ether felt like. Never on any battlefield had he been as disgusted as he was now, however. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

It's to be expected that the ether is unclean, since most of Velkyne's people died that night... He had a gut feeling, though, that there was more to this than that. The closer he got to the heart of the city, the more revolted he was, and the stronger his core screamed. This ominous energy wasn't just dirty—it felt purified, in a more lethal and evil sort of way. An electric shock coursed through him, sent by the core. Instinct made him turn his head.

There was purple fog everywhere around them, and poison wafted over the ground, and through it all coursed the refined and malignant ether. Yuto's gut pointed him toward a spot not visible from here, beyond it all. The Iron Horses turned in the direction he guided, and it was no longer toward the royal palace.

"Yuto? Where are we going?" Rivian asked, taken aback. She had been rummaging for an herb that would help with the nausea, one hand on her mouth.

"I don't know," Yuto said frankly.

"But something tells me I have to go that way. There is something there," he added. This feeling had come from the spirits in his core, and he wasn't going to ignore them. He had made a vow in the Penalty Zone to make them, along with their hatred, his own. He had promised he would get their revenge after making them a part of him. This was the place that had formerly been Velkyne, and Yuto was its last king.

If some terrible sin that could not be allowed to exist still existed in this sorrowful land, he would snuff it out at any cost. Rivian saw the ferocity in his eyes and didn't ask any more questions. She sighed. Yuto was a complicated person, with many secrets. A loud voice shouted at them from the fog.

"Halt!" Five men holding crossbows rose from the ruins of a fallen building, and ten armed with swords and spears jumped out of a building below them. Yuto glared at the group. They were too well-equipped to be grave robbers and thieves who lived on the pickings of these ruins. They were so well-armed that they could have been the city's own soldiers. The crossbows they were aiming from the roof, for instance, were repeating crossbows, not ones that had to be reloaded after every shot.

"Hehe! The daughter of House Marigold! I wonder what she's doing in this hellhole of a city?" mocked one of the crossbowmen from above. He had apparently guessed who Rivian was through the family sigil on the carriage.

"She's not guarded, either. You're not going to say that a child and one Evomon are your protection, are you? That would be absurd!"

"Oh, don't you worry. We're actually reasonable people. Put down your weapons and get on your knees. Then we'll have ourselves a nice little chat." Yuto watched them while they cackled among themselves. They weren't all humans, either. There were even a few orcs, with green skin and far taller than two meters, among the ones armed with swords and spears. What in the world?

He had known that orcs had also drifted into the ruins, in addition to the other criminals, but it puzzled Yuto that they would join forces with humans. Most non-human races, such as elves, were not too fond of humans. The orcs, however, outright hated humanity. Orcs would not work with humans unless there was a very real need to do so. What were they doing, fighting alongside human beings just so they could steal from hapless people who had wandered in? It made no sense to Yuto.

"You deaf? Put down your weapons and get on your knees!" yelled the crossbowman from the roof.

"Flokiro, protect Rivian," Yuto said. He didn't wait for an answer and used Void Steps instantly. Black smoke swallowed him up, and the next moment, he was on the roof.

"Huh?" None of the five crossbowmen could figure out where he'd gone. They didn't adjust their aim. In fact, they didn't even seem to know that Yuto was now above their heads. The black, smoky tendrils extending from behind Yuto turned into two hands. They shot downward and flattened two of the crossbowmen against the roof. Blood exploded like air from a popping balloon and sprayed in all directions. The other three screamed and tried to retaliate, but again, Yuto was too fast.

He was below them now, and the Obsidian Dagger was in his hand. It dug into a man's belly, chest, and neck almost at the same time. The man choked, clutching at his neck, but blood still flowed from his other injuries. While he staggered, the other two fell prey to the Void Hands. The hands separated their torsos and lower bodies.

"Wh-what the hell?" The men below yelled when they heard the screams from the roof. They didn't understand any better how Yuto had gotten up there, but they were smarter.

"Grab the girl!" someone shouted. Three men armed with spears screamed and charged at the carriage. Flokiro leaped from the horseman's seat and launched two balls of flame that hit the thieves and exploded. Flokiro made for the remaining attacker, but before he could, vines rose from the ground and wrapped around his leg.

"Aaaah! The fuck?" It was Rivian's magic. He fell onto his face, writhing. The more he struggled, the tighter the vines bound around his body. Rivian gritted her teeth. Unlike the Blood Wolves they had killed yesterday, this was a human, just like her. As the daughter of a noble, she had never killed a man with her own hands.

"Don't kill him!" Yuto called to her.

"Just hold him! I have questions for him." There were seven thieves remaining, and he didn't really need that one to be spared. Yuto didn't want Rivian to commit murder for no good reason, however.

"A-all right!" Rivian shouted. Yuto heard her and jumped off the roof. Void Steps was particularly ether-hungry, even more than the other Void Skills. He didn't have a clear idea of what was happening in this city yet, so he planned to avoid wasting ether if possible.

"You son of a b*tch! Who the hell are you anyway?" screamed the thieves at him when they saw him drop from the roof. Someone tried to stab Yuto with a spear. A Void Hand slammed him into the ground before he could even get close. The man was crushed against the ground like a soft fly. The blood that sprayed threw the remaining two thieves into a panic, but the three orcs grew red-eyed. Orcs had bodies that were superior to humans. Born with violent tendencies, they didn't fear battle. One roared and lunged at Yuto.

A bolt sank into one eye. Yuto was holding a crossbow that he'd brought with him from the roof. He reloaded the crossbow deftly and continued to fire. An ordinary fourteen-year-old boy couldn't have the strength to pull the string back, but it gave Yuto no trouble. And his aim was frighteningly accurate. Both eyes were shot in the blink of an eye, and another bolt stuck out of the neck as well, where it was unprotected by armor. The orc fell over mid-run.

The other orcs bellowed in a rage and covered their heads with their thick arms to protect against Yuto's bolts. They ran toward him. Yuto threw the weapon aside and picked up a spear, which had fallen nearby after a Void Hand squashed him. Reminds me of old times, Yuto thought with a wry grin. He took aim. In the past life, Yuto had come out victorious from countless battles without any Void Skills to help him, and the sword was not the only weapon he knew how to use.