Kori gave a crooked smile, his already ugly face twisting even further.
“Thank you for trusting me. As expected, the messenger—”
“There’s no time for talk.”
“Yes, yes!”
“Lead the way.”
“Follow me.”
Without hesitation, Kori took off running somewhere—heading in the exact opposite direction from where Cedric was.
Yuri hesitated for a moment, then quickly followed after him.
Suddenly, someone shouted.
“Where do you think you’re going?!”
Laurent stumbled as he ran up.
He had been unconscious after Cedric left his body, but now he seemed to have regained his senses.
He glared at Yuri.
“You still trust that bastard?”
“L-Lord Laurent…”
Laurent looked like he was about to slash Kori with his sword, so Yuri stepped in front to block him.
“Laurent, calm down.”
“That bastard can’t be trusted.”
Yuri shot back sharply.
“Are you the one to talk, after stabbing me with your sword?”
“That was an accident.”
“Right, right. So just calm down. There’s no time for arguing.”
“Yuri Briole.”
Laurent grabbed Yuri’s shoulder.
“Don’t be fooled.”
“Let go, I said.”
“You—”
Laurent’s body was still not fully recovered from the damage Cedric had inflicted. As he tightened his grip on Yuri’s arm, he clutched his abdomen and bent over in pain.
Seizing the moment, Yuri pushed Laurent’s arm away.
“Laurent, we’ll talk later.”
“Yuri Briole…!”
“There’s no time to waste.”
“Following that bastard is a waste of time. No, worse than that. Are you planning to walk right into a trap?”
“I’m not.”
Laurent glared fiercely at Yuri.
Kori, anxious and watching the tense exchange, seized the brief silence to grab Yuri’s sleeve and shake it.
“P-please, hurry, Your Highness.”
As Laurent reached out again, Kori squeezed his eyes shut and shoved him back.
“Ugh!”
“I’m sorry, Lord Laurent!”
Then he pulled Yuri along.
“P-please, hurry.”
“All right.”
“Yuri Briole!”
“Calm down, calm down.”
Ignoring Laurent, the two of them ran toward the direction where Zbeta’s prison camp had been.
Behind them, the groans of dying soldiers echoed through the air.
Yuri glanced back.
Cedric must have seen Yuri with Kori, but there was no interference.
“Cedric isn’t reacting.”
“Huh?”
“He must have seen us together, but he’s just letting it be.”
“W-well…”
Kori panted heavily.
“I tricked Cedric. He thinks I’m cooperating with him.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes…”
Yuri wanted to ask more, but Kori shook his head sharply.
“T-there’s no time now. Please, hurry, Your Highness.”
“Understood.”
They passed through the rubble of a collapsed tower and pressed onward.
Soon, Kori manipulated a hidden mechanism buried in the ground, revealing a passage leading underground.
Beyond the steep staircase stretched an impenetrable darkness.
Yuri said, “Go ahead.”
“Yes.”
“…”
“…”
“You’re not coming?”
“I-I’m afraid of the dark. My eyesight isn’t good.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes…”
“I’ll lead the way.”
Yuri, already a master beyond human limits, used his mana method to pierce through the darkness with ease.
The two descended the stairs.
“This is…”
Yuri was stunned by the sight before him.
He had never imagined such a vast cavern beneath the surface. Though there was a training ground for Fiore under the Briole palace, nothing this tall or expansive.
Even after descending for a long time, the space was a single, massive chamber.
From the dizzyingly high ceiling, an unknown light source glowed faintly.
“What is this place?”
“An underground palace. It’s going to become an underground city.”
The dim lighting cast shadows over Kori’s face, making it hard for Yuri to read his expression.
“Kori.”
“Yes?”
“So where is Cedric’s true body?”
Kori pointed in one direction.
Yuri followed his gaze. In the center of the endless space stood a fortress-like structure.
“We have to go there first.”
“Right.”
The air was thick with dark magic, stinging Yuri’s skin on contact. He wrapped himself in mana for protection and ran toward the fortress with Kori.
Their footsteps echoed in the silence.
Despite no sunlight reaching this underground chamber, an ecosystem thrived.
Trees and grass grew, and occasionally birds flew.
On the ground were geometric lines that couldn’t have formed naturally, as if someone had marked them in advance.
“What are those lines?”
“T-they’re for building the city. We’re making roads and buildings along them…”
“A planned city, huh?”
“Yes…”
Yuri chuckled softly. Cedric seemed overly confident in his victory.
Their destination grew closer.
The fortress they approached was larger than any castle Yuri had ever seen.
“Are we there?”
“Yes, yes. Huff, huff…”
Kori raised his hand.
He pointed at the gate, the fortress’s structure, and beyond the spires.
“That’s it.”
“Hm?”
“That…”
Atop the fortress hung a small sun-like orb, illuminating the entire underground.
Kori pointed at it.
“That’s Cedric’s true body. He sealed his power inside it.”
It was so high up.
Looking up at it, Yuri felt a sudden wave of helplessness.
It was like being tasked with cutting down a celestial body in the night sky.
“So we have to destroy that…”
Yuri clenched his fist around the Guilty.
That orb was the very force sustaining this underground ecosystem.
The power Cedric had gained by sacrificing countless human lives was immense—beyond what any one person could handle, no matter how hard they struggled.
But it had to be done.
Yuri took a deep breath, squeezing his exhausted core to its limits. Mana surged through him, his entire body glowing with the spirit energy of the Soul Slash.
His senses sharpened to a preternatural level, perceiving the world in an instant.
He began to unleash his power.
At that moment, he poured everything he had into the attack.
Bathed in pure white light, Yuri looked at Kori.
“Kori.”
“Yes?”
Before Yuri could say what was on his mind, a tremendous force struck down like lightning from above.
Yuri was thrown to the ground.
Had he not reacted immediately, he would have died on the spot. The shockwave shook the very ground beneath him.
Yuri lifted his head.
The core Kori had pointed to was attacking him.
Holding the Guilty tightly, Yuri remained on guard—and then a voice came.
[Hello, Yuri.]
Cedric’s faint form descended before him.
He smiled gently.
[And well done, Kori.]
As soon as those words left his lips, Yuri turned around.
There stood Kori, his hood fallen back by the shockwave, smiling softly.
“Ugh…”
Laurent gritted his teeth as he watched Yuri and Kori disappear into the distance.
“Yuri Briole…”
He recalled the past.
Seeing himself twisted and broken, Kori had smiled with satisfaction.
No one would react that way without a warped heart.
Kori had followed him, delighting in his fall from grace when everyone else had turned away. So it was only natural he would now follow Cedric’s plan to destroy the world and build a new order.
But Yuri Briole still trusted Kori, innocently.
Laurent wanted nothing more than to run after them and grab Kori by the collar.
But his body wasn’t fully healed, and he couldn’t move as he wished.
“Damn it!”
He cursed under his breath as several knights, stripped of their will by Cedric, approached.
Laurent swung his sword. The blade lashed out like a whip, cutting down the knights.
But their numbers kept growing.
He wasn’t confident facing them all while still weak.
“Ugh…”
He glanced away.
While Yuri was gone, chaos had erupted on the front lines. Cedric was constantly shifting positions, single-handedly shaking the Anti-Empire Alliance forces.
The situation was dire.
Breathing heavily with sword in hand, Laurent suddenly sensed someone approaching from behind.
“Laurent.”
It was Jared. He seemed to have recovered.
“I came to help.”
Laurent shook his head.
“No need.”
“Those of us taken over by Cedric should help each other.”
“Don’t help me. You should go stop Yuri Briole.”
“Your Highness?”
“That guy right now…”
Laurent explained what had happened earlier.
But Jared just shrugged.
“What’s there to worry about?”
“Huh?”
“Kori might be right.”
“You believe Kori?”
“No. I believe in Your Highness.”
Laurent glanced at Jared.
Side by side, they cut down the knights controlled by Cedric without pause.
“I don’t believe in Kori. I believe in Your Highness, who trusts Kori. If Your Highness followed Kori, then that’s the right choice.”
“You really trust Yuri that much, huh?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you think he could make a mistake?”
“No.”
“And if that choice is wrong?”
“You have to accept it.”
Jared smiled faintly.
“I only believe in Your Highness.”
Zbeta’s prison camp was silent.
There was no one left alive.
In the massive pit where Cedric had buried humans as offerings for a sacrificial ritual, corpses were piled in layers upon layers.
These people had been sacrificed to summon a god from another realm, and now, their bodies were rotting black with decay.
Only faint echoes of the distant battle between Cedric and the Anti-Empire Alliance occasionally drifted through the air.
Then, suddenly—
A hand emerged from among the corpses.
“Ugh…”
The owner of the hand struggled to pull themselves free, gasping for breath.
Pushing through the heap of bodies was none other than the Black Knight, Elizabeta.
Though battered and bruised, she was alive—having survived the ordeal—and was now making her way out from between the sacrificed remains.
“Damn it…”
Her entire body ached, and the lingering effects of the dark magic left her in a weakened state, but she had to move quickly.
Elizabeta forced herself upright, gripping the edge of the pit as she tried to climb out.
Without mana, scaling the walls was nearly impossible.
Just then, a hand reached out to her.
“…”
Elizabeta looked up.
A woman was extending her hand.
“Take my hand. I’ll help you up.”
After a brief hesitation, Elizabeta grasped the offered hand and, with her help, managed to pull herself over the edge.
Once outside the pit, Elizabeta found she wasn’t alone—there were quite a few others standing nearby.
What stood out was that most of them were women.
Panting heavily, Elizabeta sank to the ground and looked up at the woman who had helped her.
“What… what happened here?”
She clearly remembered infiltrating Zbeta, being discovered, and then losing consciousness under some unknown force.
That was all she could recall.
She had no idea what was going on now. Judging by the scene, it seemed they had all been offered as sacrifices for dark magic—but why were they all still alive?
The woman smiled gently.
“You were all offered as sacrifices for dark magic.”
“I know that. But…”
Then why were she and the others unharmed?
Had Cedric made a mistake?
Suddenly, Elizabeta noticed something glowing on the woman’s forehead.
It looked like a symbol—or perhaps a mark.
“Someone helped us.”
“Who?”
“I’ll explain everything slowly. For now, let’s get out of here. What’s your name?”
“…Elizabeta.”
“Elizabeta. Come on.”
The woman reached out her hand again. Elizabeta took it and stood.
“My name’s Jane.”