Chapter 36: Oh! My God (1)
36
Kirik?!
Ian’s sword tangled with mine, scattering the snowflakes hanging in the air.
Kakakakang-!
A contest of pure skill without using mana.
‘Just how much swordsmanship has he crammed into that head of his?!’
The sword path was visible.
Reproducing it was not impossible either.
But the problem was the number of techniques in that swordsmanship.
“Where are you letting your attention wander!”
Kakang-!
Ian’s blade, which had dug in along an unfamiliar route, hooked onto my hand and pulled it away.
A grotesque sword style incorporating the weapon-seizing techniques of the southeastern desert region.
At the throbbing sensation transmitted through the back of my hand, I let go of the sword I had been holding.
“Well, failed again this time, right?”
Ian’s mischievous face looked at me.
The assignment he set during our sparring was to use two different sword styles as if they were one.
I wracked my brain and tried to unfold a move, but as you could see, the result was a crushing defeat.
“Huh…!”
“I’m at a loss for words. How many sword styles came out in a single spar?”
Exclamations spilled from the mouths of the knights who had been watching the duel between Ian and me.
All kinds of swords were stuck into the training ground where Ian and I stood.
Broadswords, bastards, sabers, two-handers, scimitars.
There were even shields and spears stuck in there, not just swords.
“Tomorrow I should try with two single spears. Want to try a rapier?”
“Like hell I’m fighting a spear with a thin sword. I’ll take a shield.”
Wiping away the flowing sweat, I shot back at Ian’s joke.
It had been three days since I got up from the sickbed after receiving Pion’s treatment.
Perhaps because I had come back from the brink of death, my physical condition seemed far better than before.
‘My stamina keeps improving, and my body feels much lighter.’
I didn’t want to admit it, but Ian’s teaching method was helping me greatly.
The ability to perfectly reproduce an opponent’s swordsmanship the moment you see it.
Thanks to that, I was absorbing the countless sword styles Ian displayed every day like a sponge.
‘If only he had mana, he really might have conquered the continent….’
I thought that, then immediately shook my head.
‘No, that can’t be.’
As I thought that, a scene from that day 200 years ago rose in my mind.
Berkel Leinrant.
And the twelve knights who followed him.
Their swords, breaking through the war machines I had poured my heart into creating with unstoppable momentum.
Those thirteen swordsmen alone—I could not imitate them even if I tried to recall and reproduce them.
‘Is it because I can’t use mana? Or is it something else….’
It was around the time I was tracing my memories and sinking into thought.
“Hey! Over there, at watch post number 32!”
“Are you insane, what is that?!”
At the murmuring voices of the soldiers, I raised my head.
The iron wall stretching endlessly into the distance.
From the watch post installed there, voices filled with shock were spilling out.
“What is it, did undead get in?”
“If that were the case, the reaction feels a bit different.”
Seeing the pale faces of the soldiers, I moved my steps toward where they were.
Since the incident that happened before, the Big Raven Knights had been avoiding me.
Thanks to that, I was able to move among them while receiving relatively fewer glares.
Kurururur…!
The iron gate connecting the wall and the outside opened, and the culprit that had horrified the soldiers slowly revealed itself.
“This is….”
Pushing through the gathered soldiers, I looked at the thing that was carried out on a cart.
Geurk?! Geureureu…!
The bodies of two men grotesquely tangled together.
They had cut up corpses, stitched them together, and then revived them as undead.
“U, ugh?!”
Unable to endure the miserable sight, several soldiers hurriedly left the area.
‘The stitching marks are obvious. It’s an undead artificially created.’
Thinking that, I recalled a conversation among the knights I had heard in the temporary ward.
An alien form, numbers more than five times greater.
Their concern had been that the undead attacking the wall were multiplying.
“Miller, Varid!”
While I was examining the forms of the undead, a voice filled with shock and rage came from behind me.
“Ah, ahhh…!”
Elite soldiers of the wall armed with black cloaks, crossbows, and daggers.
Those who went outside the wall to seek threats—the Watchers.
“Who… who did this!”
A man clutching the limp remains of the undead screamed at the top of his lungs.
A comrade who had shared meals from the same pot had returned like this.
The shock must have been beyond words.
“It’s not the Empire’s bastards.”
“How can you be so sure?”
When I questioned Ian’s words after seeing the undead’s form, Ian frowned and spoke.
“They use the same corpses, but the Empire’s necromancers are soldiers. They don’t waste corpses like this.”
“…That’s true.”
Listening to Ian, I exuded demonic energy toward the remains of the undead.
The black aura, imperceptible to the living, swept over the twisted body of the dead.
The structure of the reconstructed corpse, the processed areas, and even changes in the skeleton.
‘It wasn’t constructed with a spell or mana. They stitched the corpses together by hand.’
Nausea rose up on its own.
This was a lump of flesh forcibly kept moving with only a semblance of life.
It wasn’t even something that could be called undead—just a murderer’s vile hobby.
Crack!
I forcibly suppressed the murky emotions surging up.
An insult to the dead, and a desecration of necromancy.
More than that, what provoked my anger was the intention behind sending this to the wall.
‘They deliberately turned the Watchers’ corpses into undead and sent them to the wall.’
My mouth twisted on its own.
These Watchers must have reached their stronghold and been captured.
And the ones who created this undead were sending a warning.
If we interfered in their affairs, we would end up the same.
And at the same time….
“What is all this commotion!”
As that was happening, knights appeared belatedly, pushing through the gathered crowd.
“This is…!”
It was not the vice-captain I had seen before.
His build was much larger, and the sword he was holding was a military saber personally bestowed by Leinrant.
“Captain Korax!”
The soldiers called his name.
Korax.
The captain of the Big Raven Knights, and the supreme commander responsible for defending this Great Wall.
“The Watchers…. have returned as undead!”
“What in the world is going on?! What on earth is outside the wall…!”
The Watchers were the finest elite soldiers of the north, roaming the snowfields as if they were their own home.
When such men returned in this miserable state, the other soldiers could not escape their shock.
The fear that sprouted among the people would gradually grow in size, until eventually it enveloped the entire wall.
If that happened, it would be over.
A soldier without a weapon could still fight, but a soldier without will could not.
“Do not fear-!”
At the moment I thought that, a thunderous voice shaking the entire wall dragged them out of their fear.
“If you feel fear at the sight of your comrades’ corpses, then that is exactly what they desire!”
Korax shouted as he addressed the soldiers gathered around.
“What you should feel is not fear! It is rage!”
Charisma that overwhelmed the chaotic crowd, and fighting spirit that did not waver in the slightest.
At the sound of his voice, the trembling of the soldiers subsided, and strength flowed back into the hands gripping their weapons.
Boom-!
The sword Korax was holding slammed into the ground.
He was the head of the knights who had guarded this wall for decades.
The protector of the wall.
“All forces, prepare for invasion! Let the entire continent know that even after thousands of years, this wall shall remain unbroken-!”
As if answering his roar, thunderous cheers covered the wall.
Soldiers and knights moving in perfect unison.
As I watched them with inward admiration, his footsteps approached me.
“Klein Leinrant, Second Young Master.”
Korax’s voice called my name.
When I raised my head and met his gaze, eyes like those of a colossus looked down at me.
‘What is it, what now?’
I looked at his face with a dazed expression.
But that thought lasted only a moment.
“Captain of the Big Raven Knights, Korax. I have presented him as you ordered.”
“……As I ordered?”
“Yes.”
Having spoken completely unexpected words, Korax pointed behind himself with his iron-like arm.
“……!”
The vice-captain, Boran, stood there, rigid with discipline and at a loss for what to do.
‘No, wait. Don’t tell me…?’
Boran stood perfectly at attention.
Only after seeing that did the words I had spoken belatedly come back to me.
Three days ago.
That one line I had blurted out absentmindedly during my battle of nerves with Boran.
‘Bring everyone above you and below me here right now, you bastard.’
“…….”
I let my guard down.
He spoke well, carried himself seriously—I thought a proper knight would finally show up, but it was my grave mistake.
‘I was an idiot for believing there would be an exception….’
I pressed my forehead, recalling a proverb passed down in my family.
Just as my ancestors had said, the captains of the Leinrant knights….
There were no normal ones.
“Please forgive us. My subordinate Boran committed a grave discourtesy.”
After explaining the full circumstances, it was Korax who bowed his head first.
Disciplined movements that did not match his massive frame.
He was the very model of an impeccable knight.
‘I thought nothing good would come of this.’
Thinking that inwardly, I waved my hand.
“It was my fault for failing to restrain my emotions. There is no need for you to worry excessively, Captain.”
“I thank you for your magnanimity, Young Master.”
As the captain of a single knight order, he held a position equivalent to Dunkel.
And if he was the one overseeing the entire wall, then I too had to show manners befitting that status.
‘I already feel uneasy about having fought him, and raising my voice here won’t do any good….’
As I thought that, Korax, who had nodded with a stiff expression, opened his mouth.
“However, Young Master Klein. There is something I wish to make clear.”
A cold, inorganic remark.
Before I could respond, Korax’s saber swept horizontally across the ground.
Kagagagak-!
The cold stone floor was gouged out, and a line was drawn between Korax and me.
Do not cross this line.
It was gentler than the vice-captain’s hostility, but it was a clear sign of refusal.
“…I thought the bad blood between myself and the knights was over.”
“It is over. None of my subordinates will make an issue of this.”
Having said that, Korax looked at me and continued.
“There will be no coercive measures like before.”
“Then that is a relief.”
“During the two months you remain here, we will provide every possible convenience.”
“I appreciate that as well. I was in desperate need of a research space.”
“Therefore.”
“Therefore?”
When I pressed him after he paused mid-sentence, his face, which had been like stone, twisted into a frown.
“Please do not interfere in any battles or missions that occur from now on.”
“…….”
As I stood there silently listening to his words, Korax’s voice followed, as if driving in a final nail.
“This wall is not a place where a Necromancer like you may roam around as if it were a playground.”
After hearing those words, how much time passed?
Facing Korax, who looked at my face as if urging an answer, I smiled and enunciated clearly.
“I don’t want to.”
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