Jubilia sensed the tremendous aura of the royal caliber overflowing from Lernaean. His attack missed by a large margin, however. Jubilia shrieked. Her left leg was missing entirely. She collapsed, but her hand kept a firm grip on her broken sword.
“I missed,” Lernaean muttered, then attacked once more.
This time, it took Jubilia’s right leg. Everything from her knee down was reduced to a bloody mist. He was trifling with her. Tears poured from her eyes. She wanted to scream with every breath. Regardless, her one remaining hand kept its grip on her sword. She was too far gone to explain why.
“I wonder if this will suffice?”
Lernaean gripped Jubilia by the collar and lifted her mangled body into the air like a sack. A small droplet of blood fell from his palm and dripped onto her brow. In that instant, her frozen thoughts began to thaw.
Still aloft in his grip, she swung her broken sword. Lernaean didn’t even try to dodge her feeble blow. At the very least, she wanted to make as large a gash as possible.
Lernaean paid her parting shot no mind.“How futile...” he said. “Excitation.”
The wounded flesh beneath his torn clothes regenerated instantly, yet still left a scar. Seeing that, Jubilia felt a pang of satisfaction.
Lady Saya, please...
She was torn to shreds by Lernaean’s royal caliber. By the time he tossed aside her head like garbage, there was nothing left in her that could feel a thing.
Saya desperately stumbled down the palace corridors toward the exit. Running was no longer an option; it took everything she had just to move. It was like her body didn’t belong to her. Her limbs felt like they were cast from lead. Her joints creaked with every movement.
The time she had once traveled Agartha on foot seemed so long ago. As she approached a staircase, her legs gave out beneath her, depositing her limp form on the polished tiles. This pitiful state of hers was crushing her heart.
Still, Jubilia put her life on the line so I could get away. I can’t possibly give up now.
She placed her hand on a windowsill and mustered the strength to pull herself up. She caught her own reflection in the glass. She had dull white hair, wrinkled skin, and gaunt cheeks. She didn’t recognize her own image. This, she understood, was exactly the same as that chief she saw in Strano Village, and Zamin in Garuga Village. Time was taking hold of her.
“No way...”
She recalled Lernaean’s words. The Sovereign’s Blood had abandoned her. If the Sovereign’s Blood was what granted her eternal life, then it was plain to see what would happen in its absence. The debt of centuries of life was being repaid all at once. She had minutes left, at best.
I have to hurry.
I have to see Nagi before I die.
That’s all I want.
But one step further down the staircase, Saya came to a realization.
I’m not the girl Nagi knows anymore. I’m a shriveled up, dirty, unfamiliar thing. Will he even recognize me?
There was no way he could. The strength left Saya’s legs as she lost her footing once more. She fell from just a little higher this time, but the pain convinced her she’d shattered her bones. Depending on how she landed, if she tumbled down the stairs now, she was liable to die. She couldn’t allow herself to go out in such a pathetic manner, but as she stretched out to reach the handrail, her arm refused to move the way she wanted and grasped at empty air instead.
Lernaean stood still, gazing down at the ruins of his subordinate. It was a depressing sight. Despite being a lower-ranked noble, she had put her blood, sweat, and tears into her pursuit of chivalry. Such people were exactly what the new world needed. But Jubilia had betrayed him. She didn’t even try to understand his ideals. He had no choice but to kill her. It was such a waste.
He could catch up to Saya whenever he wanted to, but Lernaean refrained. The majority of the power of the Sovereign’s Blood had already transferred to him, but the process would only end when Saya died. By his estimate, she had about fifteen minutes. He had no need to go out of his way to chase her.
He had another reason—one he’d be less inclined to admit. The royal caliber’s burden on his body couldn’t be compared to a blood caliber’s. He felt like a moment of laxity would be enough to make him lose consciousness. Lernaean had centuries of training in the mastery of his blood caliber; he knew how to rein in the royal caliber to the bare minimum of its output. It was perfectly natural for Saya to collapse, deploying it at full power every time. He would be the next to be abandoned by the Sovereign’s Blood if he overused it.
Still, Lernaean believed he could remake the world with this power. For that purpose, he had made preparations for this very moment over the centuries. Born as Saya’s twin brother, Lernaean was abducted during the chaos at the time of Agartha’s creation and declared missing. The Granapalt family raised him in secrecy. Eventually, he became their tool to usurp the Sovereign’s throne.
Lernaean had no intentions of being his family’s tool. When he became an adult, he spent two centuries subverting House Granapalt. He murdered everyone in the line of succession to Lord Granapalt, manipulated the current lord to appoint him as his adopted child, then assassinated him a hundred years later. It went off without a hitch. By the time he rose to a position in Congress, no one doubted his identity. Nobody was even aware he was a survivor from the era of creation.
And then the opportunity finally arrived. Saya’s escape was never part of the plan, but besides that, nearly everything went exactly as he hoped. Now, in the culmination of an age’s efforts, the Sovereign’s Blood was his. Lernaean clenched his fist. A crest surfaced. The power within it was a tangible sign of his victory.
His breathing finally steady, Lernaean began to walk. He was headed in a different direction from Saya. There was only one place for him to go: the throne. He had to sit down there and ponder his next move. As always, he had all the time in the world. He had no more enemies, after all.
The path was filled with nobles and menials rendered unconscious by Saya’s royal caliber.
“Like this?”
These were perfect practice targets. His royal caliber tore the fallen nobles to shreds—far from the outcome Lernaean had imagined. His preference was to use his weapon on a far smaller scale, cutting only the vitals. He was having difficulties maintaining any kind of fine manipulation. He didn’t mean to kill Jubilia in such a gruesome manner, even if it was suitable recompense for her betrayal.
Lernaean walked on, cutting apart bodies one after another. The fallen died before they could regain consciousness. These losses wouldn’t be a problem. They were worms who coveted peace within the palace. They weren’t necessary within the proper order Lernaean aspired to build. Only the truly outstanding would remain. Dying for Lernaean’s sake like this was the highest purpose of their lives. In any case, controlling the royal caliber required far more troubleshooting than he imagined.