Heisch woke up after being under a tree for an entire night. His body was aching and he could feel painful stings in his arms and nape because of insects that bit him while he was asleep.
He got out of the pit and he looked around the area.
It was still foggy and the clouds were still gray. Heisch could barely even tell if it's still nighttime or if it's just early in the morning. He didn't dwell on pointless thoughts for long, so he took out a chunk of meat that he stored in his bag and began eating it.
He sat on a fallen tree that was uprooted because of the beast horde last night.
"What the hell happened last night? Why was there a beast horde of that scale?" Heisch couldn't get rid of these thoughts in his mind.
It was just too absurd. He has never heard of a beast horde forming out of nowhere.
And what's even weirder is that the beasts seem to be working together as if they aren't hostile to one another. Heisch could vaguely remember some beasts that aren't normally seen together since some of them are territorial and outright aggressive towards other beasts.
What happened to them? Why were they so riled up?
Heisch kept thinking and reached for another piece of meat but he didn't grab anything. He was too absorbed in his thoughts that he unknowingly ate all of what he had on his hands.
With a soft sigh, he packed up and left the area.
Heisch wanted to go back to the campsite where it's safer, because he isn't really that strong against the beasts of the iron mountains. The terrain was terrible and it was very damaged. There were fallen trees, leaves, and random footprints of beasts everywhere.
Just imagining how many beasts were just here last night sent a chill down Heisch's spine.
He quickened his pace.
Fortunately, he arrived at the campsite with all of the Nacoris guards and carriages still there.
The only problem was that the guards were all dead and the carriages were broken into mere splinters.
Heisch couldn't help but stare at this sight with a blank expression.
"W- What...?" Heisch felt despair in his heart after thinking that he'd find a safe haven for him to stay only to see a devastated land filled with the mutilated dead bodies of the guards that he grew up seeing almost everyday.
He could vaguely recognize the faces of the guards that had their heads half buried into the ground with maggots crawling in them.
A sight like this was too much for him to handle. He clutched his stomach and covered his mouth to prevent himself from vomiting. He knelt down but he couldn't keep it in anymore, he threw up on the ground, vomiting out chunks of food and stomach acid.
"Now what..? What can I do at this point?" Heisch's mind was so shaken that he couldn't even think properly. He couldn't bear to look at the area.
However, this didn't make sense..
"Where is Ythira?" Heisch felt a surge of hope rise from his chest. Ythira was the strongest person here at the moment. If he could find her, then they would be safe.
He steeled himself and looked around the grounds that reeked of death.
At this same moment, somewhere in the mountains…
The scene was different from Heisch's. It was a battle riddle with blood and perseverance between a bull and man.
The man was bloodied up, he wore a pale gray, sharp and lean armor that tightly fit his body. Its design choice was a repeated usage of a four sided diamond shape that formed patterns on the chest, elbows, knees, nape and back.
The bull had golden skin, rubies for eyes, a crooked and sharp tail with a long thorn as its stinger that could inject lethal doses of poison and strong, tough legs with bulging muscles all over its body.
Vesiro wiped the blood off his face. He was still deep in the forest fighting the Scorpion Goldhorn Bull.
MOO!
The already bloodied Goldhorn Bull charged towards Vesiro with a powerful golden aura surrounding it.
"Tch." Vesiro clicked his tongue, jumped up and tried dodging the attack, but the Goldhorn Bull was able to use its Divinious to step on thin air as if it was solid ground.
With a simple pounce, it leapt up and continued rushing to the air as if it stepped on invisible stairs.
Vesiro already knew of this move after fighting it for an entire night without stopping. He was physically exhausted, but his willpower was strong enough to let him go this far. Of course, his body was also being amplified by his Divinious.
Vesiro was a special case because he is a Warborn, but he studies magic for sorcerers even though that isn't his Divine Path or his specialty. He focused on learning magic spells every day and night. He learned theories about Divinious, practical applications of magic, how to incorporate magic with physical mediums etc.
He is a genius and talented warrior. So of course, even though his battle against the Goldhorn bull lasted hours, he wasn't in a losing position.
In fact, he managed to chop off one of the bull's hind legs, cut off its tail, and he even broke its left horn and punctured the bull's left eye.
The man and the bull clashed mid air, creating another powerful sonic boom that spread outwards.
Boom!
Vesiro landed on the ground with even more force and he coughed out blood from the impact.
The Goldhorn Bull wasn't much better. It was also heavily injured and it can't even be considered a scorpion anymore. It was too disfigured and bloody to be called something like it used to be.
Vesiro stood up with great difficulty. His Divinious was about to run out and he didn't know if the Goldhorn Bull would win in a battle of attrition.
He decided to use his last ability that he could think of.
"Goodness me… To think that a golden cow was the only thing to push me to this point. How embarrassing would it be if I were to die here?!" Vesiro laughed as if he was a deranged patient of an asylum.
He took a deep breath, summoned whatever was left in his Divinious Heart and spoke with a face that showed a face filled with confidence and a mindset of losing not being an option.
"Mystical Tier Ability, Thousand Streams of Diamonds."
An aquamarine, crystalline magic circle formed on Vesiro's head as if it were an angel's halo.
If viewed with a microscope, Vesiro's red blood cells could be seen turning into a diamond. Not the 2d diamond with four angles, the diamond crystal to be precise.
They moved wildly and they were fifty times more energetic than how they normally are. Not only that, even their color changed from crimson red, to bright, clear sparkling beads of diamonds.
Vesiro breathed in slowly. His eyes glowed with a bright white light. His blood that spilled everywhere flew and spun around him like planets orbiting a star. He moved as if he wasn't injured at all.
The Goldhorn Bull felt the dangerous aura that Vesiro was emitting. However, it was too weak and it has exhausted all of its abilities. The Godlhorn Bull knew that it can't win, but it continued to charge forward anyways.
"Good! Anything with the strong desire to survive will not take their death lying down! That is true perseverance!" Vesiro found the bull's actions commendable.
Vesiro swung his sword and the stream of diamonds flew towards the bull, shredding it into pieces.
Moo - !
The bull could only release one last mooing noise before dying.
Light and diamonds scattered throughout the area. They slowly lost their vigor and glow as the pieces of the bull rained down on Vesiro.
Vesiro stopped using the ability as his blood lost its diamond luster. He felt excruciating pain taking over his body and tasted the bitter taste of metallic blood on his lips, but his victory made it taste sweeter.
"Finally, it's over..." Vesiro calmed down. His shoulders slumped down, he was ready to go home.
However before Vesiro could rest, he saw an axe coming right for him!
Bang!
The axe struck the empty ground since Vesiro already dodged the strike by rolling to the right. It was excruciating, but pain is nothing if he gets to live.
Vesiro looked at the person who attacked him and his face turned very ugly almost instantly. "Levis, to think that you'd actually go so far to kill me."
Levis smirked in front of him with his bulky, dark orange armor before laughing. He was covered in blood and wasn't in good shape.
Levis smiled menacingly. "Of course, and if anyone tries to find out the truth, you'd be long dead. So it's very convenient for me to do so." Levis coughed out blood after finishing his sentence. He was also not in a good state.
His clothes were torn and he was filled with wounds and blood all over his body. Claw marks of beasts and a bite mark that went to his bones could be seen in his left arm.
Vesiro saw this and said with a taunting tone. "Looks like I'm not the only one who went through some trouble."
Levis angrily stomped his foot. "If it weren't for those damned beasts, I would've never received these injuries."
"Beasts? I thought you were better than this. Who could've thought that my dear brother couldn't even face a few beasts and even fail miserably?" Vesiro laughed mockingly.
But contrary to his expectations, Levis wasn't mad at him. Instead, he scoffed at him as he looked at an ignorant fool. "Let's see if you can stay unharmed after getting ambushed by thousands of beasts. Tsk, that damned scroll must've fallen somewhere and got activated." Levis wiped the corner of his lips with his hand.
"Scroll?" Vesiro frowned. "You mean the beast aggression scroll or something? Don't tell me you planned to use it on me but it backfired?" Vesiro wasn't dumb. He immediately put the clues together when Levis mentioned a scroll and a thousand beasts.
"It's no use talking about that now. What you should worry about is how you will survive." Levis pulled his right arm back, yanking the axe on the ground that was attached to strong black chains.
Catching it, he raised his axe once more and struck down.
Vesiro wasn't a strength based Warborn like what his path was supposed to be. So that meant that he had to dodge the axe. He used what little Divinious he had to fight back.
Vesiro pointed his sword at Levis and casted a rare tier spell called "Night Star Beam." And after doing so, a bright beam of light shot out of the magic circle on his sword towards Levis.
Levis had more Divinious than Vesiro, so the beam was easily blocked by him by using a simple defensive spell.
Vesiro clenched his teeth so hard that one of his front teeth cracked. He kept pouring more and more Divinious that he had left to stop Levis, but he quickly ran out.
Ssssiii-
The tip of his sword hissed from the heat of the spell. Releasing a small streak of steam.
Levis stopped blocking and looked at his axe that had sustained little damage. "Vesiro, just give up. I promise you that it'll be painless."
Vesiro was in a half kneeling position while gripping his sword tightly just to keep himself from falling to the ground.
He saw Levis raise his axe. About to decapitate him.
Instead of lamenting his circumstances, he merely smiled and said to himself. "F#ck my life… honestly."
Vesiro watched his end come, until Levis suddenly stopped and looked at his chest.
Vesiro and Levis were both shocked from what they saw.
There was a sword sticking out of Levis' chest. Levis looked behind him and saw someone that he didn't expect.
It was Scrieno.
"Wha-" Levis said with difficulty.
Scrieno used a spell called "Blossoming Energy Blade." It created a bright pink magic circle on the hilt of his sword, energizing it to the point that it could slice through steel with ease.
His sword glowed with a pink light and illusory petals swirling around it, blowing off a huge portion of Levis' chest away.
Bam!
Small bits of bones, flesh and blood came flying out and landed at Vesiro's face.
Levis dropped his axe and fell down lifelessly on the ground. He died as pathetic as he lived. Unable to achieve anything noteworthy like a sad piece of horseshit.
Vesiro looked at Scrieno and saw that he was holding a scroll in his left hand.
His eyes shrunk to a pin's size.
"You... you were the one who started the beast horde!" Vesiro couldn't believe it. The nice and friendly Scrieno who was filled with sunshine was actually this sinister?
With a curl of his lips, Scrieno replied. "To be fair, Levis was going to use it on you." Scrieno said as if it was a matter of fact. He wiped the blood off his sword before sheathing it back. "Now for helping you, I'll be taking the bull's head as compensation. Thank you very much." Scrieno walked towards the bull's corpse and beheaded it with a hack of his sword. He took the head and stuffed it in a sack.
Vesiro gripped his hands tightly, but couldn't do so completely because of severe blood loss. "You won't get away with this. If you come back alone, the guards will suspect something." Vesiro threatened him.
With a carefree expression, Scrieno touched his chin in a thinking gesture to provoke Vesiro, "The guards? Oh, right... the guards." Scrieno laughed and held his knees. "If I remember correctly, they might be already dead now."
Vesiro couldn't believe his ears. Scrieno didn't spare the guards?
"Then how are you going to explain this all to father? You're still a prime suspect! There's still Ythira after all!" Vesiro spat out with gritted teeth.
"Don't worry, I long planned out how Ythira would impact my plans, and for the witness problem, I have a reliable witness for it." Scrieno took a family picture of the Nacoris family from his right front pocket.
"Ah there's, mother, brother Levis, and you.. I can't believe that the reason for half of the deaths in the Nacoris family would be me.."
Vesiro's eyes widened in rage. "What do you mean by that Scrieno!?"
Scrieno smiled. "That's right... mother's death wasn't an accident because of a fire. It was all me, Lenore." Scrieno spread his arms out, bent his right leg slightly as his left leg positioned behind it, and bowed courteously.
The gray, cloudy sky combined with the eerie mist made Scrieno look more like a monster than a human.
Vesiro has heard of Lenore..
He was the one who killed the husband of the Nacoris family's founder. The one who vowed to never stop until he accomplished his goal. The one who his father, his uncles, his grandfather, and his great grandfather warned them all about.
He was Scrieno all along. Hiding in plain sight. The old demon somehow lived to this day.
"It feels so great to think that all of you believed my lies... I spared our little brother Heisch to testify for me. And I can just blame it all to Levis and it's smooth sailing for me. Of course, I'll make sure to kill our father just before he passes away from old age." Scrieno snickered. "Now, I've told you enough of my secrets. You need to die." Scrieno took out his sword and cut Vesiro's neck off.
Vesiro's body fell down in a pool of his own blood.
He saw his vision slowly dim into pure darkness.
Scrieno, or Lenore, left the scene and went to find Heisch at the campsite.
"..."
But before everything faded, a certain someone finally came out of the shadows.
"What..?" Vesiro could vaguely discern a blurry figure of a person coming out of the mist, slowly walking towards him.
However, he lost too much blood and passed away.
At the same moment…
Scrieno made sure to injure himself on purpose to make it seem believable for Heisch when he sees him.
When Scrieno arrived at the campsite, he saw that Heisch was burying all the corpses and praying to the God of Heroes, Kharuen.
Scrieno found this funny and shook his head. He coughed twice to rehearse his lines and limped forward. He shouted like he was in agony to attract his naive brother. "Heisch! Heisch! It's me!"
Hearing this familiar voice, Heisch turned around and saw Scrieno.
"Brother Scrieno! You're alive!?" Hesich ran towards Scrieno and upon seeing his injuries, he quickly took out bandages and removed the armor and clothes on Scrieno's injuries. "Don't worry, you'll be alright." Heisch said as he wrapped Scrieno's injuries in bandages.
"Thank you..." Heisch coughed twice to pretend that he was truly hurt.
While Heisch was treating Scrieno's wounds, he saw the sack with the bull's head.
"Brother, is that?" Heisch pointed at the sack. A bit surprised seeing it on Scrieno.
"Yes, I managed to kill it before being ambushed by beasts. Thinking back, it was truly a blessing that I was still alive." Scrieno trembled after remembering said ambush. Of course, these were all lies.
"Well, I'm glad that you're alive. Don't worry, you're with me now." Heisch patted his chest.
Scrieno showed a kind smile.
"Thank you Heisch… After this, and once I become the Nacoris family's head, I will make sure you get compensated." His tone was nicely spoken, but it had another hidden meaning.
Heisch took it differently, having not known what Lenore had done to his brothers. "There's no need, all I'm grateful for is that you're still alive."
Scrieno smiled warmly while Lenore laughed mockingly.