Chapter 42: Ice Castle, My Longed-For Home (1)
42
“Damn nephew bastard. Are you fully recovered?”
It was around the time when the fatigue covering my entire body had peeled away by one layer.
With a gruff voice, Ian appeared.
It had been four days since the battle ended and since I had woken up again.
“What were you doing that you’re only coming back now?”
“What do you think? Sealing off the underground passages, hunting nearby monsters, and going around cleaning up undead corpses.”
“Is it really fine for a wanted man to wander around doing that?”
“Then what was I supposed to do? If I left it alone, they said the people here wouldn’t even be able to farm.”
At Ian’s words, snapping back at me instead, I had no choice but to nod.
‘Come to think of it, the snow will be melting soon.’
Unlike most continents where winter began in November, November in the extreme northern regions was spring, when the snow melted.
“Isn’t it strange? Other places are just starting to get snow, but here the snow melts for two whole months.”
Listening to Ian, I looked out the window at the sky spread beyond it.
Anomalous weather whose cause even mages and spirit callers could not explain.
Yet this bizarre seasonal shift was, paradoxically, a precious lifeline for the people living by the Wall.
“Ugh, heave-ho—!”
“Hey! A bit more to the left!”
“Who put the barricade here?! Move it right now—!”
Four days after the battle.
With the hoarse shouts of laborers as background music, the Wall—once shattered in many places—was regaining its original form.
“So.”
It was around the time I was spacing out while watching the people work.
“You were singing nonstop about going outside, and now you’re saying you’ll go beyond the Wall entirely?”
Ian said that while looking at the cold-weather gear and climbing tools placed on one side of my room.
“There’s something I need to look for beyond the Wall.”
“Look for? Snow, undead, monsters. Is there anything else worth finding out there?”
As Ian snickered while saying that, I opened my mouth.
“Once you go past that, there’s something else.”
I pointed at the pure white area drawn on the terrain map beyond the Wall that the Watchers had recorded.
“Wait a minute, then you’re saying now….”
Realizing where my finger was pointing, Ian frowned deeply and asked me.
“You’re saying you’re going to the Ice Castle?”
“Yes.”
“By yourself?”
“I’ll take a few guides with me.”
“And the knight commander here approved that?!”
“Well, he even prepared equipment for me and told me to have a safe trip, didn’t he?”
“Good grief! Aren’t you something!”
When I retorted without backing down, Ian clicked his tongue as if he were dumbfounded.
“Why are you going there anyway? You barely survived death, and now you want to head straight for the underworld road?”
“I don’t intend to die. I’m going because there’s something I need.”
“Something you need? What the hell is that?”
“A weapon.”
At those words, Ian fell silent for a moment.
“…”
“…….”
The silence lingered in the annex for a while, and only after some time passed did Ian ask again.
“In the Ice Castle, is there still armament left behind by Akimond?”
A serious tone, unlike his usual playful way of speaking.
I, too, simply nodded slowly without saying anything.
‘There’s no point hiding it from this man anymore.’
The interrogation before we arrived at the Wall, and Priest Garrison’s attack.
If he compared those events with the information he already knew, it wouldn’t be wrong to say I’d been exposed long ago.
He simply chose not to bring it up aloud.
“The Empire has sent a large-scale reinforcement force to Hellian.”
When I told him the contents of the letter that had arrived from the main house, Ian’s expression grew heavy.
“Both the number of reinforcements and their quality. They can’t even be compared to last time.”
Even if we had secured victory a few times, the enemy’s forces were overwhelmingly strong.
Even borrowing the strength of Rudel, a top-tier swordsman, we had failed to stab a dagger into Hellian’s back.
‘And when I think about that red liquid Hellian was drinking…. I absolutely have to stop by the Ice Castle.’
In addition, there was one more reason I wanted to go to the Ice Castle.
The Akimond Order.
Setting aside the irony of fighting a group named after myself, what mattered was the nature of these bastards.
A pleasure-killer group that conducted human experiments as casually as eating a meal, stitching corpses together and turning them into patchwork.
They had failed once, so next time they would come with even stronger forces.
“If I just waste time like this, I don’t know when I’ll die. That’s why I’m not going to be picky about means or methods.”
What I could currently handle was one Death Knight and thirty Skeletons.
And just a few ghosts.
It was an impressive achievement for someone of fifteen, but compared to my past life, it was a paltry amount of power.
For someone like me, who had to eliminate the collateral branches, the Empire supporting them,
and all the lurking sources of anxiety beyond that, it was woefully insufficient.
“If I return from the Wall, Uncle won’t have any reason to protect me, and you wouldn’t do so anyway, right?”
Ian did not deny my words.
Only because we were inside the Wall could he hide; he was still a public enemy of the Empire.
If he acted together with me, he couldn’t even guess what kind of danger might come.
“And one last thing.”
I unfolded another map the Watchers had handed to me, not the one I had drawn.
Two Watchers who had been captured by Necromancers and turned into chunks of meat.
It was a map containing the movement route of the Akimond Order that they had delivered at the very end.
“It’s just a guess, but…. there’s also a chance these guys have made their nest in the Ice Castle.”
At those words, Ian ground his teeth.
The route I had drawn leading to the Ice Castle and the route they had taken.
The two lines almost perfectly overlapped, starting from a single point.
“Then those lunatics might have Akimond’s armaments…?”
“It’s possible.”
After Berkel and thirteen knights drove their swords into Akimond’s heart, the five million undead that had blanketed the continent lost control and went feral.
The undead, rampaging without any system, were barely defeated one by one by the allied forces, and by pushing the undead threat beyond the Wall, the continent was able to claim victory in the war against Akimond.
However, the seeds of anxiety always remained.
Akimond was dead, but his stronghold, the Ice Castle, had remained an inviolable domain.
“Other than Berkel and the twelve knights, no human has ever set foot in the Ice Castle. Akimond’s corpse was never recovered either.”
“Then….”
“That means the countless magical devices and armaments inside the Ice Castle have been sleeping there for hundreds of years.”
At those words, Ian let out a groan.
“Then the biggest reason you’re going to the Ice Castle is….”
“Wouldn’t it be better for me to have them, rather than letting them fall into those hands?”
At that, Ian spread both hands as if he couldn’t win.
It meant he had no more grounds to stop me.
“Just don’t die. Got it?”
Watching Ian add that last remark at the end, I replied with a mischievous smile.
“I absolutely won’t die.”
“Huuh…. Huuh…!”
Clang—!
A transparent vial struck the wooden floor and shattered into pieces.
A single drop of red liquid remained there.
Paying it no mind, a woman clutched her chest and drew ragged breaths.
“Klein…. Klein…!”
Each time a voice filled with rage spilled out, the room trembled once.
Klein Leinrant.
A piece of trash not even worth a pebble kicked underfoot.
A monkey bastard born from the legs of a filthy barbarian dared to humiliate her.
It wasn’t enough that he rejected the hand she extended to him and publicly disgraced her—he even drove her knight to his death.
And on top of that, in the end, he did something to her successor, Hector….
‘Not knowing your place, you dared lay a hand on my son…!’
It was right as she was spewing fury with that thought—
“Duchess Hellian.”
At the voice coming from behind her, she immediately changed her expression.
Just moments ago, Hellian had looked like an evil spirit, possessed by hatred and madness.
“You arrived sooner than expected.”
But now, her figure reflected between the candle flames was gentle, like that of any noblewoman.
If there was one difference, it was her eyes.
The ominous aura felt from Hellian’s eyes was enough to make even a seasoned knight’s knees tremble.
“It looks like things are progressing well. In about two more months, it should be complete.”
A clear young man’s voice filled the study where Hellian stood.
“Yes. Two months….”
As she said that and turned around, a man dressed in priestly robes stood there.
“The conditions proposed by the Order. There won’t be any changes, right?”
“Of course, Duchess.”
The priest, wearing a benevolent smile, said so and bowed his head.
Black long hair brushed past his vestments and flowed down like a waterfall.
“If you provide the corresponding payment and the ‘materials,’ the Order will side with you in the coming war.”
“Good. Very good.”
Nodding in satisfaction at the priest’s words, Hellian looked out over her domain spread beyond the window.
Land that had once belonged not to her, but to the Duke of Polwyvern.
But not anymore.
Status, land, power, money, even strength!
She would grasp all of it and place the entire world beneath her feet.
‘Yes…. Just a little more…!’
Cough!
Hellian, who had been chuckling while baring her teeth, suddenly broke into a dry cough.
Blood pooled thickly in the hand covering her mouth.
Her face turned pale for a moment, but upon checking the color, she relaxed and straightened her body.
‘Thank goodness. It’s not Sacred Blood, it’s my blood…!’
Not the transparent hue of ruby, but dull blood.
She even felt exhilaration at the fact that the blood she so utterly despised—the blood of the Leinrant—was flowing out.
Yes, I’m no longer something like a Leinrant.
A chosen human who has accepted holy blood, Sacred Blood…!
“Archbishop Palliman.”
When she called the name of the man standing behind her, the black-haired priest, Palliman, bowed his head.
“Please be sure to convey my thanks to His Holiness the Pope.”
“I will carry out your command.”
“Oh, and one more thing.”
As if something else had just occurred to her, Hellian stopped Palliman and spoke with a sinister smile.
“No matter how much we may be friends, I believe public and private matters must be strictly separated…. What do you think?”
Rumble—!
With that single remark from Hellian, every object in the room began to tremble.
Crack! Crack!
Unable to withstand the pressure, cracks spread across the fireplace and the marble decorations.
It felt as if an earthquake had struck.
“…….”
An indescribable oppressive force seized the entire space, but Palliman, who received that pressure head-on, did not so much as flinch.
He remained calm, as though nothing were happening.
When the confrontation between the two continued for some time—
“You need not worry. Duchess Hellian, ma’am.”
Ma’am.
As someone of an archbishop’s rank used the highest honorific toward her, Hellian withdrew the pressure she had been exerting, looking satisfied.
“You already carry Sacred Blood abundantly within your body.”
After saying that, Palliman took out a small box from his robes and placed it on the desk in the study.
An ornate box decorated with gold and jewels.
When Hellian opened it, three vials containing red liquid gleamed in the light.
“Ahh…!”
Watching her greed-soaked eyes sweep over the vials, Palliman’s eyes curved into a smile.
“You will soon wield a power that no one will dare to approach.”
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