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Chapter 4: A Fierce Battle 

The day finally came for Lucius and Reiss to execute their plan to kidnap Celia, just two days after Lucius made his arrangements to get the jump on his partner. However... 

In the skies several kilometers east of Rodania, two shadows were chasing each other through the air at a tremendous speed. The shadow in front was Reiss, and the one giving chase was Aishia. 

You’ve done it now, Lucius. I never imagined a betrayal at the last moment like that... 

Reiss flew at his maximum speed to flee from Aishia while recalling the events from several moments ago with an annoyed grimace. Reiss and Lucius had visited the central office of the Restoration together. 

“It seems like Princess Christina and Princess Flora are returning by airship, so everyone’s in a rush. I didn’t think everyone in the central office would be out, though...” Reiss said, gazing out the window. 

“Maybe something’s happened. So what are we gonna do? Shouldn’t Celia’s lecture be over soon?” Lucius asked with a faint smile. 

If everything was occurring as he planned, Arein and the others would have sent Christina and Flora to the Paladia Forest already. Based on the look of things, it had gone well, making him chuckle to himself on the inside. 

“She normally returns to her estate from the front entrance, but with this many people out and about, we won’t be able to attack her within the premises. Oh dear...” Reiss looked towards the door as though he noticed something. 

“What is it?” 

“It’s extremely faint, but I can detect a spirit’s presence approaching. As expected, it must be the contract spirit of the Black Knight. It seems like it’s in spirit form right now, but even in spirit form it’s giving off a faint presence. How terrifying,” Reiss said with a light shrug. 

“...Isn’t it going to notice your presence too?” Lucius checked. 

“Veiling my presence is my forte, but even I’d be noticed at close range. If the spirit’s got sharp senses for detection, it may even notice that we’ve stopped by this room.” 

“I see. So what now? Do we attack it in this room? Or wait for it to go outside?” Lucius asked in a rather calm tone. 

“If it passes by the room then we’ll go after it, but if it enters this room then we’ll do it here. If it enters the room, you should handle it. The contract spirit should show itself immediately, so while you’re fighting the spirit, I will apprehend Celia Claire,” Reiss said somewhat rapidly, as though he was pressed for time. 

“I see.” 

“It’ll be here soon, so you should move next to the door.” 

“Right.” Lucius approached the door as instructed. Shortly afterwards, someone knocked on it. 

“They’re here... What are you doing?” Reiss whispered. His attention had been drawn to the door, but he frowned in suspicion when he saw Lucius take two magic crystals out of his breast pocket. 

“I’ll show you a little mercy and erase my tracks when I go.” 

“What are you—” Reiss’s confusion intensified. 

Lucius immediately activated the magic crystal. “Transilio.” At the same time, he dropped the other magic crystal in his hand onto the ground. 

“What?!” Reiss’s eyes widened in surprise. That was the last he saw of Lucius before he disappeared. The space distorted and Lucius vanished in an instant. 

Meanwhile, the barrier spell in the magic crystal Lucius had dropped absorbed all the magic essence emitted by the space sorcery. A circle of light roughly one meter in radius appeared, completely shutting off the torrent of ode and mana from leaking outside. Even its creator, Reiss, wouldn’t have noticed the sorcery being activated if he hadn’t seen it with his bare eyes—the exceptional quality had backfired on him. 

“Excuse me...” 

Immediately after that, Celia entered the room. 

 

Several minutes later, in the skies above the east Rodanian outskirts... 

Good grief. After all I did to emphasize how capturing Celia Claire would be the best possible move for him. Do you detest my interference that much, Lucius? 

Reiss sighed, wondering when the last time he felt so panicked was. When he looked over his shoulder, he could see Aishia hot on his tail. 

Having entrusted Celia to Sara and the others, Aishia was rid of her burden and able to increase her speed. Reiss also accelerated, but the distance between them was slowly growing shorter. 

She’s definitely getting closer. We’ll soon be out of the forest and out in the open wasteland with nowhere to hide. It’ll only be a matter of time before she catches up... I guess I have no other choice. 

Fleeing would be a challenge at this rate. With that thought, Reiss resolved himself. The moment he flew out of the forest, he descended rapidly. He landed first on the level wasteland and waited for Aishia to come down as well. 

“Had enough of running?” Aishia asked after descending several meters away. 

“Yes. I could see you would catch up soon at the rate we were going.” 

“Indeed,” Aishia replied shortly. She quietly assumed a battle-ready stance. 

“If I promise never to sneak into Rodania ever again, would you let me go?” Reiss suddenly pleaded for his life. 

“No.” 

“Then how about a little chat? I’m quite interested in you.” 

“I’m not interested in you,” Aishia replied flatly. 

“Hmm. Spirits develop a stronger sense of self with the passing of time and increase in rank, becoming more similar in appearance and personality to humans, but your sense of self is awfully faint. You’ve reached the realms of a humanoid spirit, yet you’re more like a newborn one. Do you even know who you are?” Reiss stared at Aishia as though to ascertain her identity. 

“You don’t seem like a human either... There’s something eerie about your aura. It’s inhuman. Similar to a spirit, but more repulsive than a monster.” 

“Oh? Have you developed a little interest in me, then?” 

“...” A slight discomfort appeared in Aishia’s expression for the first time. Reiss didn’t let that slip past him and grinned arrogantly. 

“Hahaha, so you can express emotions after all.” 

“I’d rather remain the way I am than express emotions like yours.” 

“So you can make self-assertions too. By the way, it seems you have rather sharp senses, but I’m not a spirit,” Reiss boasted with an empty smile. There was no telling how much of his words were true or not. It was a cunning tone. 

“I have no intention of chatting with you any further,” Aishia stated flatly, her magic essence swelling. 

“What if the reason why I bought all this time was because my true aim was to grab Celia Claire?” 

“Celia is with Sara and the others. I can return instantly at this distance too.” Aishia activated her spirit arts in a show of her confidence. Light bullets of magic essence appeared around her, locking their aim onto Reiss. 

“How awfully calm of you. Well, that wasn’t my true aim anyway—really. That’s why I’d like you to let me go... Whoa!” 

“Get over yourself.” Aishia fired the light projectiles with a stern expression, fed up with Reiss’s babbling. Contrary to his joking attitude, Reiss didn’t let down his guard at all, reacting at an incredible speed to leap to the side and avoid the attack. 

However, Aishia had already fired other bullets with trajectories she could freely control, making them aim for Reiss from every angle. 

“Goodness.” Reiss immediately sighed heavily and released an enormous amount of darkness from his entire body. The darkness completely swallowed Aishia’s light and promptly contracted in size. 

“...” Aishia watched on with an extremely wary look. She was concerned about the darkness that had swelled up—it wouldn’t be wise to approach carelessly, she realized. 

“To think I’d have to reveal my abilities for the mere purpose of fleeing...” Reiss said with a sigh. Then, the shadow at his feet expanded rapidly, staining the surrounding ground pitch black. The next moment, minotaurs with massive stone greatswords and several creatures resembling Winged Lizards—a flying subspecies of dragon—appeared. They were all jet black in color. 

“...Monsters?” Minotaurs were naturally categorized as monsters, but Aishia sensed a monster-like aura from the winged creatures as well. 

“I do not wish to be killed, so I’ll be resisting you with everything I have. Well, I’ll do what I can in this situation. It’s a good chance for me to play with my collection as well.” At the same time Reiss finished speaking his words, the minotaurs and winged creatures moved to surround Aishia. 

“MROOOR!” One minotaur took a giant leap, directly attacking Aishia. It moved above her head instantly, carrying the momentum of its fall behind the swing of its stone greatsword. 

A thundering impact echoed. The surrounding ground cracked, and the minotaur was certain it had made contact. However, the stone greatsword hadn’t crushed Aishia’s body. 

“Grah?!” 

In an unexpected turn of events, an invisible wall surrounding Aishia had blocked the minotaur’s greatsword. The minotaur reacted in surprise and placed more weight and strength into pressing the sword forward, but the arm holding the sword merely trembled without moving an inch. 

“Move,” Aishia muttered, placing her hand against the minotaur. 

“Gwoh?!” 

Aishia shot a powerful shock wave from the palm of her hand, blowing away the giant body of the minotaur. It flew through the air and crashed to the ground, skidding a dozen or so meters from where it landed. 

“Gah... ah...” The minotaur had no strength left to stand and turned to ash on the ground, leaving behind a magic gem. 


“Even an enhanced minotaur can’t lift a finger against you, I see. How about an attack from the skies, then?” Reiss said, and the winged creatures in the air opened their mouths. They spewed flaming hot breaths towards Aishia. The breath had enough heat to burn a human into ash, but Aishia easily evaded the fiery downpour with light footwork. 

“Winged Lizards shouldn’t be able to breathe fire...” Once she evaded all the breaths and came to a stop, she looked up at the winged creatures and compared them to the knowledge in her head. 

“Then perhaps they aren’t Winged Lizards,” Reiss said cheerfully, having overheard her voice. Aishia frowned faintly and tried to close in on him, but the other minotaurs stood in her way and rushed at her, attacking in surging waves. 

However, Aishia remained calm. She purposefully leaped towards one of the minotaurs rushing at her and touched its face as she passed, instantly turning its head into a block of ice. The giant minotaur crashed to the ground immediately afterwards. 

“What are you doing?” 

A murky black essence had been flowing out from Reiss’s body for a while now. Aishia realized Reiss was accumulating that strange magic essence and tried to close in to stop him, but— 

“I just want to drive you away and flee from this place safely.” As though to back up Reiss’s words, another breath came raining down from overhead. 

“Then I’ll just reduce their numbers.” 

Aishia summoned countless bullets of light around herself, then turned half of them into beams that spiraled into the skies and shot down the winged creatures. The majority of the beams made direct contact. 

“Guugh?!” 

The winged creatures directly hit by the beams were heavily shaken off balance, but caught themselves without falling out of the sky. It seemed like they hadn’t been damaged by anything other than the impact. 

The skin of dragons and their subspecies can repel ode. Do the ones in the sky also have that characteristic? 

In that case, she could either approach to physically attack them, or use her spirit arts to create a physical phenomenon. With that calm analysis, Aishia flew up and closed in on the winged creatures in the sky. However— 

“I won’t let you!” 

The minotaurs in the area raised their greatswords to attack Aishia as though they were reacting to Reiss’s orders. 

“Doesn’t matter.” Aishia poured more magic essence into the remaining light bullets, transforming them from ten-centimeter-wide bullets to two-meter-wide ones. She then rapidly launched them at the minotaurs approaching from every direction. 

“Gwuh...” 

Unable to evade the shots and lacking magic-resistant skin, the minotaurs received direct damage from the bullets. Their huge bodies weighed in the tonnes, yet they were sent flying easily—some were even hit fatally and died on the spot, disintegrating into magic gems. 

“As expected of a humanoid spirit—what tremendous strength.” Reiss watched Aishia fight and sighed, half in awe and half in exasperation. 

“There are fewer monsters now,” Aishia said, creating several spears of ice two meters in length to snipe down the winged creatures in the sky. The number of monsters had been reduced to half of what Reiss originally summoned. 

“Then let me summon them again.” 

Reiss showed no sign of unease as he enlarged his shadow to call for reinforcements once more. 

“Krrt, krrt...” 

Skeleton warriors newly appeared from the shadow, making a rattling noise resembling chatter. There were easily over a hundred of them. 

Like the minotaurs and winged creatures, they were black and looked as sinister as demons. They each had a jet-black sword and shield in hand, emitting an eerie aura. 

“Are you manipulating space with that ability of yours?” Aishia asked dubiously. 

The phenomenon occurring was extremely similar to space sorcery, but she couldn’t feel any ode or mana surges that normally accompanied space sorcery. 

“Who knows?” 

“The monsters you summon are all strange.” Aishia glanced at the skeleton army Reiss had summoned. Their auras were like monsters, but like the winged creatures, they didn’t exist within Aishia’s knowledge. 

“Well, I still won’t be able to defeat you like this,” Reiss said in a defeated tone. 

“Then stop resisting and give up.” 

Aishia made a light sweeping motion with her arm and created a fierce gale. The wind strike created by magic essence slashed at the skeletons, mowing many of them down. However, Reiss evaded the strike by gently floating into the air. 

“I was aiming for you to run out of magic essence without your contract holder around, but it seems you’re still full of energy,” he said upon landing. 

Scattered around him were the skeletal remains of the warriors Aishia had defeated. 

“My magic won’t run out this easily. The number of your friends has dwindled away again,” Aishia said plainly. 

The minotaurs and winged creatures tried to attack her even as she was speaking, but Aishia activated her spirit arts to accurately fend them off, not even allowing them to approach. 

“Indeed, you’ve reduced them by quite the number. It seems like aiming for your essence to run dry wasn’t the best plan. Which means I’ll have to face you directly from here on...” Reiss muttered with a sigh, raising his right hand into the air. The skeletons scattered around him turned into a murky black mist, gathering around his body. The mist soon changed shape and enlarged itself. 

However, Aishia wasn’t about to watch that happen quietly. She used spirit arts to finish off the remaining monsters that attacked her and launched several light spheres at the black mist. The light spheres all made contact with the mist, but— 

He’s absorbing the spell...? 

The spell had no impact. Aishia could imagine what was happening. Since magic projectiles wouldn’t work, she tried ice spears—but they were also sucked into the mist without any resistance. 

During that time, all the monsters attacking her were eliminated, leaving only the black mist that Reiss was within. 

After some time, a humanoid skeleton appeared from within the mist. It had a similar form to the skeleton warriors Reiss had created earlier. 

However, its size and sinister aura couldn’t be compared to the earlier skeletons. Its body was bigger than the minotaur, and it was equipped with a giant one-handed sword, a sturdy shield, and armor. It even had wings, implying it could fly through the air. It was truly like a demon or fallen angel had descended. 

This is his true form? Aishia tilted her head curiously. 

But just as she did, the enormous skeleton knight closed in on her at a speed surpassing the minotaurs, easily swinging the several-meter-long sword. 

However, Aishia activated her invisible wall and directly caught the attack. At the same time, she fired a shock wave as a counterattack. 

A thundering boom echoed. However, the giant skeleton knight was only knocked back slightly, without being sent flying. It had blocked the shock wave with the shield in its hand. 

He’s much sturdier than the others. 

In that case, she just needed more firepower. Having determined that in an instant, Aishia fired successful powerful shock waves to execute her plan. 

The impact created was visually similar to a sonic boom, the energy gathered together on the skeleton knight releasing at once. 

“...” Without even a groan, the shield in the skeleton knight’s hand disintegrated into dust. As proof of the tremendous force, its large body lifted into the air and flew backwards. The skeleton knight flapped its wings in an attempt to soften the landing, but Aishia fired a further shock wave. This time there was no shield to stop her, and the skeleton knight received the damage directly against its body. Cracks appeared across the entire skeleton. 

Far above in the skies, one figure watched all of it unfold. 

This is the strongest familiar I can create right now. Though it can’t reach the level of the great heroes, it should be able to easily crush several people of the hero class. Even then, the best it can do is buy some time... How truly terrifying, Reiss thought. Well, if she can defeat that and mistakenly assume she’s defeated me, it’d be for the best. I still need to track Lucius’s whereabouts, so I’d better leave before she finds me—otherwise she really will put an end to me. My stock of powerful monsters has been diminished quite a bit too. 

A tactical retreat was the smartest option here. Reiss immediately flew away in an embodiment of that idea; his figure was soon hidden by the clouds and no longer visible. 

“...” 

Meanwhile, the skeleton knight was lying faceup on the ground, silent. Its limbs had been crushed, but it was still struggling to move until Aishia landed on its torso and stomped down. 

She landed with such incredible force, the impact completely crushed the bones of its torso. The energy of the impact carried through to the ground, creating a small crater. 

Then, the eerie light in the skeleton’s eyes faded. One beat later, the body turned into mist and dispersed. There was no magic gem left behind. 

“...Did I defeat him?” Alone in the empty wasteland, Aishia cocked her head. 

“His presence is gone. There’s no magic gem either.” He surely had to be defeated. But for some reason, something didn’t feel right—it was almost like it had been too easy. Why was that? Unsure of the reason, she looked around at her surroundings for a while. But the eerie aura was completely gone. 

I couldn’t find out who Reiss really was in the end... 

If he was going to die this easily, she should have questioned him a bit more, Aishia thought. 

There was nothing to be gained today. That’s why she felt like her efforts were in vain. 

“Do you even know who you are?” 

Aishia suddenly recalled Reiss’s words. 

“...I don’t know who I really am,” Aishia muttered with a slightly saddened expression. Why? For some reason, recalling her conversation with Reiss made her heart stir restlessly. 

Time to return to Celia and the others. 

She wanted to see them immediately. And Rio too... With a final glance around the area, Aishia flew for the stone house. 



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