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BELOW the Setrayuan castle was a space large enough that a dragon might be able to sleep there. At the base of the huge, stone dome was a channel of water, an unending vortex from which rose several waterfalls, defying gravity to flow towards the surface. This was the birthplace of all the water that flowed through the capital city.
In the center was a five-tiered dais with lavishly decorated stone carvings.
This was the resting place of the Hurricane of Insight, Setrayu’s dracovitae. Normally. But not now. Ten knights stood in front of the pedestal, one of them wielding the Hurricane as a weapon.
The Hurricane of Insight… It was the dracovitae that calmed the lands in Setrayu.
Dracovitae were capable of changing form for various situations, but currently, the Hurricane of Insight’s weapon form was a mask covering the right half of the knight’s face, along with heavy armor on the same arm, fused with a staff.
The texture brought to mind the overlapping scales of a dragon’s hide, while the color was the blue of a deep, dark ocean.
Julian stood facing the knights, along with a single golem carrying a squirming sack.
“Are you after the dracovitae? Martgarz bastard. Have you lost your mind? That is a one-way trip down a road leading to a precipice. It leads straight to our destruction.”
“Oh really? Perhaps you only see the senile country of old, not me, right here in front of you,” said Julian. “How foolish. But I will let your slight pass as water under the bridge, along with your life.”
He was fully confident, despite having not only this many knights to his single golem, but the dracovitae turned against him, a weapon that could wipe out entire squads of troops.
The commander of the knight unit protecting the dracovitae was a man named Severo. He felt a faint chill seeing Julian like that.
“Honored son of Lord Tobal. If my information is correct, you have a 67 percent compatibility with Setrayu’s Hurricane of Insight on the Morris Scale,” said Julian.
Severo was taken aback.
Anyone born with royal blood was tested the moment they were born to see what their compatibility with the dracovitae was, and that determined the rest of their life. The higher the compatibility, the more power they could draw from the dracovitae’s weapon form, and the more likely they could produce children with high compatibility. Too many and too few dracovitae users were both a problem, meaning they must avoid spreading their bloodline too much, while maintaining its purity.
Managing the bloodline was a duty of the rulers of any country with a dracovitae, and any individual’s compatibility rating was a state secret.
And yet, Julian, the noble of another country, knew that information.
“H-How do you know that…?” stammered Severo.
“The guardian of the dracovitae requires all four of these characteristics: compatibility, high rank, strength, and devotion to their country. One might be selected even if their compatibility is only middling if all the other traits are excellent. And in a small country like this where you can’t even select bloodlines that effectively, perhaps this is the best you can get.” Julian sneered at Severo and waved casually at the golem. “But I have 79 percent compatibility at the ready.”
“What…?”
The golem dropped the sack it carried and pulled out what was inside, a girl in a dark blue dress. Her long, beautiful blonde hair was in disarray, a collar that glinted with a slick evil around her slender neck.
She looked around, frightened, despair filling her eyes as she finally realized what was going on.
“What in the…? Who is that?” asked Severo.
“Now, Monica. Take the dracovitae from him. It is more suited to your hands,” said Julian.
“No!” Severo realized what was happening, remembering having heard Monica’s name at some point. He was hit by a sense of helplessness and loss, like he’d been stripped naked.
The massive power that had been linked to his soul disappeared.
“What in the—?!”
The Hurricane of Insight disassembled into tiny pieces that flew off his body, flowing through the air like iron drawn by a magnet, reforming on Monica, covering her right side from her arm to her face.
“Dracovitae, return to me! Dracovitae!”
“It’s pointless.”
Despite Severo’s cries, the dracovitae didn’t separate from Monica. Of course it wouldn’t. If what Julian said was accurate, then Monica’s blood was more in tune with the dracovitae than Severo’s. There was no opening for him to get in to separate them.
“Hm… This sort of thing can happen during fights over a dracovitae,” said Julian. “This was over the moment you all thought the dracovitae was sealed safely below the castle. Setrayu, dulled by peace, resting on your laurels of domestic stability so that you fail to prepare for this.”
Julian looked down his nose and laughed.
When Martgarz was at peace, its four dracovitae were sealed away in four different strongholds built in the wilderness in the middle of nowhere. Anyone who went near the strongholds was killed with no questions asked, even if they were nobility. Even if they were royalty. The measure was to ensure the entire country didn’t get wiped off the map.
Their dracovitae were currently on the eastern warfront, but even the number of dracovitae users deployed to the area was subject to careful planning.
Severo did know some of that, as the guardian of his country’s dracovitae, but Setrayu wasn’t capable of doing the same thing. It lacked the resources necessary. It didn’t have the money or territory of a large country like Martgarz.
With a lower population, there were fewer nobles to rule over them, and fewer families that could help maintain the dracovitae bloodline. Most importantly, the lower the denominator that is “population,” the lower the number of superhumanly powerful people who could defend things like the dracovitae or the castle.
Severo was a trained warrior, powerful enough to stand toe-to-toe with a pseudo-dragon in fight, but he was one of the few knights of his caliber.
They couldn’t neglect to defend either the castle or the dracovitae, so it made sense considering their lack of manpower to protect them both together. The flip side of that was that they had to carefully maintain internal peace to prevent any noble who might be able to steal the dracovitae from pulling any tricks, but that was a necessary cost to be paid.
But they hadn’t anticipated a situation like this. At least not now, anyway.
Martgarz was the enemy of Setrayu’s ally, and the relationship between the two countries was strained, but there was no way they should have been allowed to go straight for the dracovitae, and certainly not with someone inside Setrayu who carried the blood of a dracovitae user.
This was an absurd rampage of might and decisiveness that passed over the restraints of politics.
Setrayu didn’t have the capacity to prepare for something like that during times of peace.
“This should make a nice warm-up, Monica. Use the power of the dracovitae and kill them,” ordered Julian in a tone that sounded like he was speaking to a child that didn’t understand.
“Ah…” She raised the Hurricane of Insight, though her face was twisted in terror. “Run!” she cried.
The torrent surrounding the dais roiled.
The Hurricane of Insight’s usual duty was to calm the lands of Setrayu of the tyranny of water inherent in the region, allowing humanoids to live there.
But what if that power was used in battle? Indeed, what if it was used for nothing more than a petty battle?
Several rivers of water rose, like gigantic serpents lifting their heads. They turned into torrents rushing into the air, advancing as they spiraled.
And then they closed in on the knights from all sides.