Chapter 217 — 용아병단(龍牙兵團)
Chapter 217
Dragonfang Legion
‘It took this much just to make him bite.’
After taking down Viscount Kuranshivil—
Elric had simply watched, letting Count Kalliger strut and preen.
Truth was, even before this, if he’d cared to push a little harder, he’d had more than enough chances to sweep away that thorn in his eye.
All authority already rested in his hands, and with Herman and Saylor on his side, he could have slapped on a convenient charge and lopped the man’s head off.
There was just one reason he hadn’t.
The ring.
He wanted to learn exactly what the ring on Count Kalliger’s finger was.
It had resonated with the Arcane Regalia before, so it was clearly a family artifact.
But with no idea of its use or how to handle it, he couldn’t just snatch it.
He considered subduing the man and interrogating him, but knowing how mulishly stubborn Kalliger was, he doubted he’d talk, so he shelved that plan.
So Elric waited.
Waited for the bastard to use the ring.
But for whatever reason, the man was infuriatingly cautious. In the end, Elric had to resort to his last card.
He maneuvered Count Kalliger into taking the dragon egg.
If he was carrying off something that precious, he’d have to use the ring somehow.
And now—
Finally, he’d stepped into it.
“Took you long enough. I was starting to wonder if you’d ever use it.”
Elric idly jingled the ring now on his own finger.
The gem still shed a chilly light. Fine letters etched along the band rippled and crawled.
『So this is the Arcane Signet.』
At that, Mephisto made a brief remark.
[You know it?]
Mephisto shrugged.
『It’s famous enough. If the Arcane Regalia symbolizes the head of house, the Arcane Signet symbolizes your house itself.』
A strange light flickered in Elric’s eyes.
The family’s symbol.
Which meant from the start its purpose was entirely different from the Regalia’s.
The Arcane Regalia represented the patriarch’s authority, whereas the Arcane Signet represented the house as a whole.
[You don’t know what it does, do you?]
『If this king knew that, I’d still be in Mervinger, not playing at Demon King, wouldn’t I?』
[Point taken.]
Elric had hoped to squeeze more out of him, but it seemed this was something he’d have to figure out himself.
『One thing is certain.』
[…?]
『Now that even that has come back to you, there’s no one who can dare slander Mervinger as fallen.』
Pfft.
A dry chuckle slipped between Elric’s lips.
[For once.]
One corner of his mouth quirked.
[You’re right.]
Elric reached into the air and drew out a long ice lance, gripping it.
“Mervingeer! I’ll kill youuu!”
Crackle!
Rrrr-rrrumble, rrrrumble—
Count Kalliger, half gone in the eyes, thrust a mini-staff at him. The crystal orb blazed, and bolts came lashing from the sky in a ceaseless downpour.
“Funny, that’s my line.”
Boom!
Shaaak—
Kicking off the air hard, Elric dropped straight down toward the count.
Lightning chased after him in volleys, but it couldn’t cross the wall of winter storm now wrapped around him like a shield. With nowhere to go, the bolts splintered into dozens of threads and dissipated.
When Elric reached him in an instant, Count Kalliger’s eyes flew wide.
An immense pressure crushed his shoulders.
It felt like a boulder the size of a house was hurtling down a slope at him.
You won’t even taste good.
The aura Elric exuded was Dragonfear he’d gained upon becoming Dragonkin.
Layered with the Sigil of Baleful Slaughter, it sharpened into a murderous fighting intent.
For a man who hadn’t fought a proper war since the Great Demon War, it was a force that could only disconcert.
Even so, Count Kalliger didn’t retreat.
As if to say he wouldn’t lose, that he’d smash that boulder somehow, he drew up even more mana.
Ffffft!
His sleeves snapped in the gale. Mana gusts leaked out in streams.
And yet that was all.
‘W-what…?’
Only then did Count Kalliger realize something was wrong with his body.
His mana wouldn’t circulate.
As if it had been bound tight by something.
Only then did he notice the ground under his feet had glazed over with ice.
From there… a force he hadn’t anticipated burrowed into his body and paralyzed his mana core.
It was the Nether Sigil.
After capturing Demon King Reda, Elric had gained this sigil. Using it to handle demonic mana with finesse, he’d devised a new tactic.
Demonic toxin.
Demonic mana is the most vicious element to a human; mixed with ice venom, its potency was amplified to the utmost.
That was why Count Kalliger’s mana had frozen to a halt.
No, it wasn’t just his mana.
His metabolism slowed to a crawl; his body went stiff. He couldn’t even feel his fingertips, couldn’t twitch his mini-staff.
Shrrrk, shrrrk!
At the same time, chains of ruthless frost sprang from the ice and wrapped him round and round.
“No!”
Elric’s outthrust ice lance had already come to the space between his brows.
“I said no…!”
For the first time, fear flickered in Count Kalliger’s eyes.
The ice lance—Elric—grew larger and larger in his sight.
“Nooooo!”
Fear broke into a scream.
A ragged cry that he couldn’t die like this tore out of him—
Thunk!
The ice lance punched through the count’s brow in an instant.
And then—
Crackle-crackle!
Ice spread from the hole in his forehead, racing across his skin and sheathing his entire body in a breath.
That was the end of Count Kalliger.
Tap.
Fffff—
Elric landed behind him and released every sigil he’d invoked.
Crrk. As the chains of ruthless frost sank back into the ice, the frozen corpse shattered into dozens of pieces and collapsed in a clatter.
Elric spared it no more attention.
This settled all punishment for the two rebels who had turned their backs on the house—
Yet, strangely, he felt no satisfaction.
Perhaps his sights simply reached farther now.
Instead, he turned his interest to the ring Mephisto had called the Arcane Signet.
Count Kalliger had tried to hide the dragon egg with it.
A storage chamber set in a pocket space, clearly.
‘If I remember the sequence right…’
Elric fed mana into it following the pattern he’d observed through the crow’s eyes as he shadowed the count.
Click!
With the sound of a ‘door’ unlatching, cracks spread in the air and a new space opened wide.
Elric grabbed the box with the dragon egg and stepped in without hesitation.
‘Well now?’
At that moment, Elric was more than a little surprised.
There was a great heap of treasure.
Shelves lined the walls, laden with goods that looked rare at a glance.
There were even relics from centuries past—things almost impossible to find nowadays.
It seemed his forebears had stashed the items they’d collected here and there in ages past.
『They really gorged themselves, didn’t they. So this was Mervinger’s original vault?』
Mephisto took in the pocket space and let out a short, dry laugh.
『True enough. The Mervinger lot were never oddly power-hungry, but they did have a healthy greed for things. Especially for rarities of their era—they’d break their backs to collect them.』
It all looked better than the trove Elric had found in that safehouse on the Yetis’ plateau.
『But these here… looks like not just your ancestors’ finds. I see a lot that feels… off.』
Every so often, pieces entirely different in kind and era from the rest were mixed in.
Likely things Count Kalliger had gathered on his own—and there were a lot of them.
The problem was how bizarrely they were arranged. And many were fakes.
No eye for things at all; he’d just dragged in anything he fancied a treasure.
“…son of a—”
『Hm?』
At Elric’s mutter, Mephisto turned his head, puzzled.
“Son of a bitch.”
Elric’s face was twisted with rage.
“Gods damn that bastard! He gorged himself like this and wiped his mouth clean the whole time, did he? If I’d known, I would’ve strung him up by the dozen and kept him from dying out of spite…!”
Seeing this place, he understood why Mervinger’s fortunes had declined so quickly.
When this much wealth vanishes overnight, it’d be stranger if the house stayed fine.
‘Grandfather, you foresaw my future so well—how did you not see your descendants’?’
Thinking of the ever-present Usden Mervinger who showed up wherever he went, Elric felt both awe for the man’s greatness and a petty resentment that he’d failed to safeguard the smallest, most crucial things.
If only things like this had been properly kept—
If only he’d taken measures so small men like Count Kalliger couldn’t get their hands on them, Father might not have suffered so long with illness.
With such thoughts, he couldn’t help resenting him.
‘Did you truly not see something like this, or did you see and look away? I can’t help but begrudge you.’
In the end, Elric heaved a sigh that seemed to sink the floor and went deeper in.
The pocket space was thoroughly divided by sections.
Deeper in, shelves of magic tomes lined the way.
Family spellcraft, all of it exceptional.
The same kinds he’d seen in the safehouse, but many looked older and more potent.
『“Elemental Buff”…? So this survived?』
Mephisto stared at one worn booklet and started.
“You know it?”
『It’d be stranger not to. It’s one of your lost magics. A spell used by your patriarchs.』
“…!”
『Same with this “Deadly Demonic Phantasm Flame.”』
Mephisto’s eyes narrowed.
『There’s a lot here I hate to look at. Makes me want to put a torch to it.』
In that instant, Elric understood.
Exactly what this place was for.
‘The house’s vault and the patriarch’s vault… no, more like a private study.’
Thump!
Thump!
How fickle a thing the heart is. The resentment toward Usden that had dampened his mood gave way to a renewed, hard pounding in his chest.
Family spellcraft he could already get from the safehouse, but the patriarchal spells were different.
They were the deepest roots and the flowering of the Mervinger magical system.
Elric’s magic would surely grow that much deeper.
But—
What set his pulse racing most lay elsewhere.
He crossed the stacks’ corridor to the very back.
There was a new room there.
Unlike the other chambers that simply opened off the hall, this one was sealed tight with a door.
『Everfrost Coldiron? What the hell did they stash in there to make a solid door out of this stuff?』
Mephisto wore a look of disbelief.
No surprise—Everfrost Coldiron was a rare metal, mined only in small quantities from the deepest, most frigid hearts of the perennial snows where the great ranges of East and West met.
And they’d used it not just for the door but for the walls. To his eye, it was madness.
But anyone could tell at a glance this was the most important place.
The final room.
The ‘true’ treasury within Interresia—the one Count Kalliger had obsessed over yet never breached.
『Looks like it’s locked. You’re not going to be able to—hm?』
Mephisto broke off, eyes going round.
The Arcane Regalia hanging at Elric’s neck was blazing with light.
The Talent-Swallowing Mage