Chapter 208 — 언령(言靈) 혹은 언령(言令)

Chapter 208

Word-Spirit (言靈) or Word-Command (言令)

“Father, what on earth are you going to do if you get caught…!”

Rodeo stamped his feet, glancing nervously around.

The house soldiers with him were just as restless.

No wonder—Count Calliger had just slipped away, saying he’d be back in a moment.

Two Demon Kings had appeared, the tide of battle had plunged into a whirlwind of chaos, and no one had the mind to watch this side.

But if an order to retreat came down, it would only be a matter of time before someone noticed Count Calliger’s absence.

Worse, the count had headed for the collapsed cavern.

The very ground beneath where Hyul’s lingering will and Reda were clashing at full tilt.

And it was also the place Elric had rushed off to ahead of the main force…

What on earth did he go in there to do?

‘Is he planning to hit Elric from behind…?’

Ever since Viscount Kuranshivil’s head was lopped off, Rodeo knew his father, Count Calliger, had been stalking something.

Nervous at the thought of missing his chance, yet eyes glittering like knives, he’d been intent on digging something out of Elric.

And now he must have judged this the moment and gone after him.

‘Please, just come back safe…!’

For all the wastrel of a life Rodeo had led, Count Calliger was still his only father.

He’d seen the infamously sly Viscount Kuranshivil fail to pull any tricks and get taken down by Elric.

In Rodeo’s heart, the old shadows were fading, replaced by a growing terror of Elric.

All he could hope was that his father wouldn’t march down the same road as Kuranshivil.

* * *

“So that’s why you were in such a hurry. I knew it—you found something down here.”

Count Calliger used magic to open a separate tunnel beneath the caved-in grotto and moved through it.

He’d suspected something since the moment Elric split from the main force.

There had to be something in this cave.

“I heard this was where the barbarians’ guardian dragon or whatever it is stays, right? If so, it could really be a dragon’s nest. Even if it isn’t, there’ll be something on that level.”

Unlike Viscount Kuranshivil or the other men, Calliger didn’t dismiss the place as merely a barbarian haunt and ignore it.

If anything, seeing that the hireling who’d brought them, Sailor, knew a barbarian woman who was a shrine maiden, he’d wondered if there wasn’t more to it.

And that suspicion proved right on the mark.

Count Calliger saw an opportunity.

A chance to remove Elric, the thorn in his eye, and take everything for himself.

“In a battle this chaotic, an unfortunate accident wouldn’t even be strange.”

He believed that once this battle ended, there would be no more chances to eliminate Elric.

Before, he’d thought of Elric as a greenhorn; no matter how wildly the boy strutted around as a so-called hero, his guard would slip eventually.

But the moment he saw Viscount Kuranshivil cut down without a prayer, his thinking flipped one hundred and eighty degrees.

He had to strike first.

‘Or I’ll be the one struck.’

Elric already held every weakness of his in hand.

He’d even had his actual control over the house soldiers stripped away.

And when this battle ended?

Elric would ride this momentum, achieve great merit, and surely return to the heartland.

He’d be lauded a hero again, hailed as the return of Merbinger—everyone would be in a frenzy.

Given that, the fate of Count Calliger, who’d taken a stance against him, was as clear as day.

‘The Fourth Prince will never leave me be.’

Prince Cromhel might put on a friendly face, but there were times he was impossible to read.

Hadn’t he cut off Rodeo’s arm just to curry favor with Elric?

And if he learned that Calliger had tried to use Crown Prince Zeraitz, he would cast him aside without hesitation.

No matter the footing Calliger had built within the Fourth Prince’s faction, Cromhel was not a man to blink at such things.

Therefore—

‘It has to be now.’

Count Calliger even felt this might be for the best.

Now, at a time when not one but two Demon Kings—thought utterly annihilated after the Great Demon War—had appeared.

Elric would be too busy dealing with them to look elsewhere.

When would a clearer chance ever come?

‘If I can secure the Mado Gyeongsik and unravel the remaining secrets of Interresia… yes. If I can do that, all of this might turn into a blessing in disguise.’

He didn’t know how Hermann and Sailor would move after Elric was dealt with.

That would be decided once this matter was wrapped up.

‘Come to think of it, was that fool Kuranshivil right in the end? If I’d taken his hand then and moved together, this might’ve been far easier.’

Like an elephant stumbling backward onto a mouse, the idiot had blundered into something.

But Viscount Kuranshivil picked the wrong moment and paid for it.

Calliger, however, was different—or so he believed.

Click.

He slipped a hand into his coat.

Whssshh…!

Razor wind leaked out around him.

His fingertips fondled a piece of arcane gear.

The tool that would bring him victory.

Caw! Caw!

Unseen, a crow trailed silently after him.

* * *

‘Grandfather… why are you here?’

Elric felt a powerful déjà vu at the sight of Usdan.

Just as his grandfather had visited the Temple of Flowers more than forty years before Elric did—

Now, in the guardian dragon’s nest, he had found the old man’s trace again!

‘Did he know I would come here someday as well…?’

The Temple of Flowers was one thing—he could have predicted the Mado Gyeongsik’s arrangement would be released there.

But this nest—how had he known?

Did he truly possess “foresight” that looked into the future?

Elric drew a steady breath and focused on the exchange between Usdan and the guardian dragon.

—Mer… binger…!

—Yes. I am Merbinger.

—At last you’ve come! Merbinger…!

The guardian dragon’s voice trembled with emotion. Even as he forgot his own existence, he had clung to a wretched life on the sole resolve to keep his eggs alive—and now light had finally broken through.

But that joy didn’t last long.

—But I am not the Merbinger you’ve been waiting for.

A silence fell, heavy enough to choke.

Now, the guardian dragon’s voice carried futility and a deep anger, as if he were being mocked.

—Then… what are you?

—I am one who prepares.

—Pre… pares? For what?

—One who prepares to fend off the greater upheavals and calamities to come. Sadly, I have not been marked by the stars and cannot stop them. But I can, in a small way, read the courses of the stars, and so I strive to lessen the damage those calamities will bring.

Usdan’s voice held a quiet bitterness.

—So… then? What are you… trying to say.

—The Merbinger you await will come here before long. The seed our Progenitor planted in us has only just begun to show signs of sprouting.

—…Then?

—I came to ask you to wait. A little. Just a little longer.

As he spoke, Usdan seemed to hand something to the guardian dragon.

‘What’s that?’

Elric tried to focus, thinking it might be an important clue about Usdan, but the mental realm quivered again and shifted to another scene.

From that brief meeting, the guardian dragon found new hope and waited once more for Merbinger to appear.

Only, there was something Usdan hadn’t accounted for: after he left, impatience began to gnaw at the dragon.

So when, one day, a boy broke into the labyrinth within the nest using the Eye of the Azure Sky—

—I will share my blood. Bring Merbinger here… bring Merbinger to this place.

The guardian dragon tore off a remaining piece of his heart and gave it to the boy, leaving that plea.

And then—

As time passed, beings who looked like demons began to gather near the nest.

He didn’t know how they’d traced the presence of one who hadn’t left the nest in over a thousand years to guard three eggs.

Perhaps the trail had been picked up when the boy who bore his blood went out into the world.

In any case, the guardian dragon understood that his time was running short.

—Hurry. He must come quickly….

And now—

At last, the guardian dragon had met Elric.

【Even so, I’m glad we’ve met like this.】

Amid the maelstrom raging through the mental realm—

One shard of the dragon’s consciousness managed to open its eyes.

Perhaps to make speaking with Elric easier, the dragon’s will took on human form. Was it a coincidence that face resembled Usdan?

“How can you be sure I’m the one?”

At Elric’s question, the guardian dragon’s lips curved in a wry smile.

【Because your grandfather said so.】

【And because your scent reeks of our kind. Lord Shainak’s scent. With the smell of that one clinging to you this thickly, who else could you be but the Merbinger I’ve awaited?】

“You said you were waiting for me. I don’t follow.”

【I don’t know the details myself. When the rest of my kin left, I was an ignorant whelp. The youngest of the brood. That’s why I stayed, and why I brooded these eggs. Now they’ve grown so hard I wonder if they can ever hatch.】

【But this much I can tell you: all of it stems from the seed your Progenitor planted. Your grandfather watered it and fed it; the one to reap is—】

“You mean me.”

Elric fingered the Mado Gyeongsik hanging at his throat.

【We dragons were once close to your kind. Magic (魔法). Mado (魔道). You might call us partners bound by such things. Merbinger was our sovereign, and we were Merbinger’s voice. Then, as ages passed, it was forgotten…!】

The guardian dragon broke off, grimacing. He lifted his head as if sensing something.

【Right. We don’t have much time.】

Urgency and regret colored his tone.

He lowered his gaze to Elric again.

【What happened long ago, whether you are the Merbinger I waited for—none of that matters. There is no trust between us yet. A trade will suffice.】

“I agree.”

【Beneath the collapsed ground lies a hidden stone chamber. Brood the three eggs there. And wake them.】

Elric’s eyes gleamed.

To possess dragon eggs—

To brood three of them, no less—was a tremendous feat for any mage.

But—

“I want to help, but I don’t know how.”

He had no wish to deceive this pitiful creature nearing its end. A kindly lie would still be a cheat.

Did the dragon read his thought?

A faint smile touched the dragon’s lips.

【No. You do know how.】

“What… is it?”

【‘Spring.’】

“…!”

【Where warm sunlight falls, life is conceived.】

Thump. Thump.

Elric felt his heart race.

His fingers tightened on the Mado Gyeongsik.

【Now, name your price. You can do this, and I know it—so I entrust you with the three eggs. In return, what do you ask of me?】

“I want to learn True Speech… no, the Dragon Tongue. Is there a way?”

If he could grasp even the far edge of the Word-magic system, everything might unfold naturally.

Time was the only thing that worried him; there wasn’t enough of it to truly learn anything.

【There is.】

Thankfully, dragons were the progenitors of magic; of course he had a solution.

In that instant—

The guardian dragon’s eyes sank deep.

【Eat my heart.】

The Mage Who Devoured Talent