Chapter 157

Regressor of the Fallen Family

The last card kept hidden until the very end.

Even while cornered in a crisis, Lux’s time acceleration was unleashed with perfect timing.

Was it self-indulgent to think that even the futile expression of faking suicide played a part?

“Kk, kkurk……”

As blood spat out, the only emotions in Yordan’s snake eyes looking down at him were resentment and rage.

“It’s to be expected.”

The enemy, thought to be drained of energy, had suddenly quickened more than threefold, and they certainly couldn’t have imagined that part of their aura would be severed in the moment of collision.

The attack shining through the exposed flaw shattered the cracked holy sword and became lodged in the neck, which was even less expected.

In fact, it was luck that even Logan who had struck that blow did not foresee.

‘I was lucky. Huh…’

It was a miraculous blow, combined with time acceleration, the Flame Splitting skill, and luck.

With a fleeting sense of relief and a pat on his chest, Logan wasted no time.

He immediately performed a confirmatory kill by completely severing Yordan’s neck.

And then.

“Stay away! How dare you. Do you know who I am!!”

Crunch.

With one swift motion, the neck of the vermin spouting worthless excuses was cut off.

Holding the severed head on his sword tip, Logan then loudly proclaimed,

“All the princes are dead! Cease the battle!!”

The shout echoed across the entire battlefield, swiftly bringing about a drastic change.

“young lord Logan has done it!”

“He killed the prince!”

“We won! We’ve won!”

The McLaine elite, who had been enduring attacks within the firmly established encirclement, reacted first to Logan’s voice, bellowing out loudly in case the enemies hadn’t heard.

Next, the Walthamheim Knights, having confirmed the death of their lord and prince, dropped their swords one by one with expressions of disbelief.

“How can this be…”

“How could His Excellency…”

As the core forces that had built the encirclement ceased their encouragement, the surrounding soldiers also stopped their assault, looking around in bewilderment, trying to grasp the situation.

“What’s going on? Why aren’t we fighting?”

“The war’s over… they said?”

“What nonsense?!”

There were dissenters, but with the 2nd Prince’s main force as the center, soldiers began to lay down their weapons one by one, and the offensive soon came to a halt.

The most distinct change was among the northern cold-hearted nobles who had been driving their troops to face McLaine and the Esperanza Knights.

“Fighting any further…”

“It’s meaningless. I surrender.”

“What, we just followed our lord’s orders.”

Originally, this was a civil war waged to make the prince they served into a king.

But that prince was dead.

The superhumans and faction leaders who were always present to protect a prince who couldn’t be hidden in any haven, just in case.

Furthermore, Yordan Walthamheim, the superhuman protecting the 2nd Prince and the head of the faction, suffered an unexpected and ignominious defeat.

For those left, there was only one choice.

“Baron Fractal has no further intention to continue this battle!”

“Likewise with Viscout Rohan!”

“Anthony Baron’s house will also withdraw the flag!”

The troops, equivalent to the limbs if not the head or body of the faction, laid down their weapons at their master’s command.

As a handful of barons representing their family troops withdrew their flags and retreated, a flood followed suit.

Then, stirred by Juan Douglas’s roaring, those chasing McLaine in the 1st Prince’s army also began to regain their senses.

“Looks like the ducal house went under too?”

“The war…”

“What happens now?”

Murmurs spread.

The fury of the battlefield began to subside rapidly, yet there were those who refused to cease fighting.

“Huh… Such an absurd turn of events…”

With irreversible events having already taken place, it was preferable to drag down a rival rather than to go down alone.

Of course, they never imagined that the rival would not just go down with them but actually perish.

For Juan Douglas, this was an unprecedented disaster.

‘Everything is ruined.’

His previously contorted expression gradually turned emotionless.

It’s said that when someone surpasses the limits of their anger, they become calm – he’d never imagined he’d experience that himself.

‘All of this is because of that wretch.’

From afar, the young one holding the 2nd Prince’s head and shouting had ruined everything.

Fury surged under his expressionless face, aimed solely at one person.

Everything he had dreamed of had crumbled to pieces, with no way to turn it back.

In that case, the least he could do was unleash his rage upon the one who had created this irrevocable situation.

‘I will kill you, Logan McLaine, by any means necessary.’

In the moment Juan decided this, he stopped manipulating the magic that was powering his sword skill.

Then, as if giving up on everything, he raised his hands.

“I surrender, Sword Sage.”

“What?!”

“Your Excellency!!”

Luther and Wicken screamed, unaware of the rapidly changing situation as they furiously pressed on the Sword Sage.

Facing the kingdom’s strongest head-on, they weren’t even properly aware of the evolving circumstances.

“What wisdom, Juan.”

Pale face and the blood dripping from his lips.

His appearance suggested that even for the Sword Sage, touted as the strongest in the kingdom, this close fight was taxing but his free power was formidable.

Rumble.

In an instant, with a thunderclap, the Sword Sage vanished before lightning, and with the cries of the two superhumans, he appeared behind them.

“Ah! Kk, kkurgh!”

“Kkkk… dammit…”

Thud.

The two aura users fell in a moment, but that sight wasn’t surprising to Juan.

The incredible outcome born from that roar came from the Sword Sage’s most powerful secret technique – he knew it well.

‘As if he wasn’t dreadful enough, his techniques have become even more terrifying. Such a monstrous old man.’

His teeth almost gritting, but there was a silver lining.

Both Luther and Wicken had merely lost consciousness from the heavy hits, without any critical life-threatening wounds.

The belief that the Sword Sage had not sought to kill but to capture them made Juan’s heart slightly lighter.

‘I’ll be captured for now. And then, for that boy, I’ll surely…’

Once again glancing at the distant red hair, rage boiled up in his heart.

Juan forced down those feelings and turned to look at the approaching Sword Sage.

“Please ensure my survival and a bare minimum of rights. I concede to all the victor’s rights.”

“That’s right, a predictable thing to say. But…”

“…?”

Grinning, the Sword Sage’s smile felt ominous as Juan was about to object.

Schick.

With an eerily sharp slicing sound, Juan suddenly felt the world tilt.

Soon, he didn’t even have the strength to comprehend what that sensation meant.

His head was severed, and his body collapsed in a fountain of blood.

Thud.

The magic-less sage’s eyes couldn’t even catch the movement of the Sword Sage.

The end for the nobleman who was once boasted as the most powerful in the kingdom was so fleeting.

And the one who brought about that death was none other than the Sword Sage, looking at his disciple organizing the battlefield from afar with a bitter smile.

“You and Yordan were never meant to survive. Let’s meet in hell, Juan.”

If Juan had heard those words, he might have felt even more wronged.

Fortunately, the soul of the mage had already left the frail body.

The refusal to cease was not unique to superhumans.

“Fight to the end! What’s going on! Not moving?!”

Hulio Tritan, the northern border count, incessantly yelled at his troops.

A short distance away, Pamir Cherno, the northwestern border count, also roared angrily.

“By whose will is this stopped! Fight! Fight, I say! Annihilate those McLaine scum!”

As primary actors of the 2nd Prince’s faction who led the civil war, they had nothing to gain by surrendering.

In that position, it was inevitable that they would struggle until the end.

And this was the same for the border counts of the 1st Prince’s faction who were causing disturbances in the south.

Of course, Logan had no intention of just watching them flounder.

“Originators of the civil war! Capture the border counts! Those who capture them will be treated as heroes!”

The booming voice on the battlefield plunged the factional allied forces into deeper confusion.

In that chaos, when a few border counts who had assessed the ruined situation fled with only their loyal knights, a new flow emerged on the battlefield.

“The border counts are fleeing! Capture them!”

The hesitant factional allied forces, originally under the border counts, now chased their ‘former’ lords.

Moreover.

“McLaine troops, capture the fleeing border counts!”

“Esperanza Knights, exterminate the originators of the civil war!”

The heads of the two forces that ended the civil war, Logan and the Sword Sage, issued orders, and encirclements formed instantly from east to west.

“Capture them!”

“They tried to ruin the country!”

“Eradicate them all!”

The loyal knights of the fleeing border counts, totaling barely a hundred, were no match for the McLaine or Esperanza Knights.

Eventually, most of the fleeing border counts were captured on the spot and promptly beheaded.

However, not all border counts met such a powerless end.

“Count Lucen Talos, a key player in the 2nd Prince’s faction, has disappeared without a trace. His knights’ whereabouts are also unknown.”

“A very few, suspected to be from Count Kyron Wolves’s party of the 1st Prince’s faction, managed to escape by deterring the Esperanza Knights with a repeating crossbow.”

Tsk.

Upon hearing the report, Logan clicked his tongue in disappointment.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

However, his next words were resolute.

“Whatever. There’s nothing those two can do now. At best, they’ll flee the country. Just clean up the battlefield.”

* * *

“It seems we’ve just about completed identifying friend and foe.”

At Logan’s comment, the Sword Sage nodded with relief.

Despite numerous sacrifices, the remaining enemy forces numbered nearly 60,000 across both factions.

Considering that the combined force of the Esperanza ducal house and McLaine amounted to around 20,000, the remnants of the defeated army were three times the size of the victorious troops – an abnormal result.

Hence, identifying friend and foe and stripping the weapons from the defeated took considerable time, but it was not tiresome.

After all, every action affirmed the end of this tedious war.

‘It’s over. Truly, it’s over.’

While the Sword Sage breathed a sigh of relief with that thought, Logan unexpectedly spoke up.

“Master. I shall head to the capital first. I ask you to handle the rest here.”

“What?”

“The rest of the faction’s forces remaining in Grandé must also be dealt with. If they have already fled, then there’s nothing to be done, but if they are still there, there’s no telling what kind of scheme they might pull. The clean-up here would surely proceed much faster with you present, Master.”

Given the two captured superhumans, it was only right for the Sword Sage to stay on site.

“…Hmm. Alright.”

Although the two fleeing border counts had their core knight forces mostly trapped here, the Sword Sage acquiesced to his disciple’s precaution, as their interference seemed unlikely.

‘Better to wrap things up cleanly rather than leave loose ends.’

He nodded, and yet…

“The war is not over yet! McLaine Knights! Except the severely wounded, all assemble!”

As Logan, who had quickly mobilized the capable mounted forces to dart away, disappeared into the distance, a sense of unease crept over the Sword Sage.

For some reason, the last image of his disciple seemed alarmingly intense.

‘That lad, could it be…’

With a nagging sense of concern, the Sword Sage resolved to hasten the end of the war, which had already reached its conclusion.