Mythical Hero's Otherworld Chronicles: Volume 12 (eBook)

Tatematsuri (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
250 Seiten
J-Novel Club (Verlag)
978-1-7183-0352-2 (ISBN)

Infos

Friedhof has fallen, and a horde of monsters bears down on the imperial capital. The Vanir Triumvirate sweeps in from the west under the command of a vengeful princess. The Demiurgos walks Soleil once more, wearing Emperor Artheus's face. As the Grantzian Empire faces its darkest hour, Liz gathers her allies to weather the coming storm. Ancient oaths will be honored and ancient truths revealed as sides are drawn for the final battle. And as Hiro schemes to overthrow the heavens themselves, the Warmaiden prepares for her most audacious coup yet...

Textauszug

She twisted at the waist and whipped her arm out to the side. The blade segments decoupled, extending along a central thread, and bore down on Verona faster than the eye could see. Yet just before they made contact, Vias flicked her wrist, and the blade coiled away like a snake. It was a technique to catch an expectant opponent flat-footed. Their mind would lurch when the blow they anticipated never came, leaving them open—just in time for the whiplike blade to lash out mockingly from the most unexpected angle, impossible for any ordinary combatant to predict.

Verona, however, was no ordinary combatant. She smiled defiantly. “Blind I may be, but I can still sense you.”

Sparks burst in midair, and Vias’s sword bounced away.

Vias frowned. Her attack had been repelled, that much was clear, but how? She had detected no motion from Verona at the moment the sparks appeared. Even now, the woman’s hand rested idly on the hilt of her sword.

“That’s a curious trick.”

Vias kept her distance, lashing at Verona again and again as if probing for answers, but to no avail. All her blows skittered away. It was clear the woman wielded one of the Noble Blades—common steel would have long since shattered beneath Fragarach’s assault—but she denied that it was one of the Dharmic Blades prized by the álfar. Nor was it one of the Dragon Lord’s Drakeblades; Vias knew them all, and none of them matched the sword in Verona’s hands. That left only the human Spiritblade Sovereigns, the zlosta Archfiend’s Fellblades, and the dwarven Supreme Dawnblades.

At that moment, she recalled Verona’s earlier words. “You’re not an álf, you said?”

“Indeed. Although I am often taken for one, an álf I am not.”

“And you sound too clear about that to be a half blood.”

Verona nodded. “There are many among the Free Folk, so it is easy to assume as much, but again, you would be mistaken.”

“Then there’s only one thing you could be.”

“I would have told you, had you asked.” Verona sighed, giving the slightest of shrugs. “You might have saved yourself all these theatrics.”

Vias’s voice hardened. “You’re an auf. A zlosta changeling.”

“Marvelous. And so you reach the truth.” Verona cocked her head. “Ought I give you a round of applause?”

All at once, she surged forward, kicking up a plume of dust behind her. Her every movement radiated impatience. It was odd that she would suddenly let her emotions show, Vias thought. Was she running out of time, or had she simply grown tired of talking? Then again, she supposed, it didn’t really matter either way.

“Now that I know who you really are, I have no reason to hold back.” She snapped her sword back to its original form and reversed her grip. “If only you weren’t a member of Orcus, I would have made your death quick.”

“Truly, I have no secrets from you. Would it please you, then, if I said I was one of the twelve primozlosta?”

A shiver ran through Vias’s body. It was not the trepidation of knowing she faced a mighty warrior, nor was she quaking in terror. She felt only icy fury—a surge of animosity at absolute zero that sliced the air to ribbons.

“Whether or not your words are true, now that you have spoken them, I can’t leave you alive.” She thrust Fragarach into the earth and regarded Verona with cold fire. “You will pay in blood for breaking my lord’s heart.”

* * * * *

Night hung over the world. It was a time for distant howls, for roving brigands, for paranoias born from the worst excesses of the mind. Yet scattered across Soleil were points of light—towns and cities, lit by the warmth of those who dwelled within. Candlelight spilled from thousands of windows to illuminate the dark. High walls engendered security, and a handful of late sleepers scorned the night altogether, stumbling drunk from taverns to collapse in nearby alleyways without regard for their work the next day. Perhaps a few would meet unfortunate fates at the hands of miscreants before the night was through. Yet they were far safer within civilization than without. Even perhaps the most orderly city of all, the imperial capital, afforded little protection beyond the reaches of its walls. Those who set foot outside its gates risked being stripped of their belongings by ne’er-do-wells or being attacked by monsters. It was all too clear which side was heaven and which was hell.

Tonight, however, even the most malign of creatures would not dare walk under the moon.

In a place far from the capital, a battle was joined in darkness. Animals trembled in the undergrowth at its violence. In nearby villages without the luxury of walls, commonfolk abandoned their homes and fled to safety. None dared come to watch, no matter how great their curiosity. This battle was a glimpse of hell, where monsters and men fought with all their might to slay before they were slain. Hopelessness, anger, fear, and confusion swirled over the field, rising into the night in a great, air-shaking maelstrom.

In the eye of the battle was a lull that none of the combatants dared enter. They fought like blood-crazed beasts, but even beasts could sense danger. Every instinct warned them not to approach, and so they kept their distance, creating a dead zone in the heart of the storm. There, two figures faced each other beneath the night sky. Their sheer hatred for one another hung like a weight in the air, further ensuring they were left alone.

One of the figures, a black-haired boy, held a sword that lit the field with its brilliance. Yet while his weapon shone bright and reassuring, his eyes housed a darkness deeper and blacker than the night. His mantle billowed wildly as if to reflect his heart—far wilder than the wind, like it had a mind of its own.

“Such obsession. A lingering curse that yet persists even now, long after the body is gone.”

Opposite Hiro stood a young man with golden hair and golden eyes. He wore the face of Artheus, the first emperor of the Grantzian Empire, but something far more dreadful lurked within. He was the Demiurgos, one of the Five Lords of Heaven—beings who had existed since Aletia’s creation and were worshipped by its people as gods. Once, a thousand years ago, he had led the zlosta to war against the humans in a bid to rule the world. Hiro had thwarted his plans at Artheus’s side, a feat that had earned him a place in the imperial pantheon as Mars, the War God. Yet the Demiurgos’s ambitions had lived on. For a thousand years, he had awaited his chance, steadily undermining imperial rule, until the time was ripe to make his return.

“The Black Camellia,” he said, narrowing his eyes fondly. “Does your hatred still burn so strong, after all these years?”

Hiro only stared back with a lightless gaze.

“To entrust your wishes to another,” the Demiurgos continued, “leaving only the shadow you once cast... How absurd. What vindication is there in that? What satisfaction, when your soul is dust? What curse remains will only burden those you leave behind.”

“Surtr was tired. Of the fighting, of all of it. So he left his mantle to me.”

Hiro patted his chest to reassure the Black Camellia. As if reading his mind, the garment fell still, little different from any other black cape. Yet there was no mistaking the hostility with which it regarded the Demiurgos.

“Tired, you say? Ridiculous. The words of one who failed to understand why we were made at all.”

The Demiurgos spread his arms wide and looked to the sky, like a player on a stage. Though he stood on a battlefield of his own making, he wore the face of a saint who wept to see bloodshed.

“Kings on the earth, yet no god in the heavens.”

Ruefully, bitterly, he closed his fist, lowering his eyes to regard Hiro with a piercing gaze.

“The Lord who claims the Empty Throne will rule this world. They will become the god it has so long lacked, and they will learn why the Great Creator made and abandoned us.”

“And what will you do once you know?” Hiro asked. “What if there isn’t some big, important reason they left? What if they just got bored one day and found something else they cared about more?”

No one had ever met, let alone spoken to, the god who had created Aletia. Its people had turned them into an object of reverence, but as far as Hiro was concerned, their absence had inflated them to greatness they had perhaps never possessed. He was not even sure they had existed at all.

“We don’t even know if there was a Great Creator.” His dismissive snort fell on the Demiurgos’s impassioned speech like cold water. “You’re chasing a ghost, trying to understand something you don’t even know exists. And even if it does, the truth would only disappoint you. What would all this effort be worth then? A thousand years of planning, all for nothing.”

“Then for what do you seek godhood? To what end do you seek power?”

“To prove you wrong. To shatter the dream you and your minions cling to.” Hiro walked softly forward—one step, two steps, three. “To prove the godhood you’re chasing is an illusion. Something any ordinary person could achieve.”

Five steps, and he broke into a sprint. Straight and true he ran, eyes on his foe, swords spread out behind him like a pair of wings.

“To show the Lords are nothing...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 18.9.2025
• Reihe/Serie: The Mythical Hero's Otherworld Chronicles
• Illustrationen: Tatematsuri
• Übersetzer: Tatematsuri
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Fantasy
• Schlagworte: action • High Fantasy • Isekai • Light Novel • Magic • OP Antihero Protagonist • war
• ISBN-10: 1-7183-0352-1 / 1718303521
• ISBN-13: 978-1-7183-0352-2 / 9781718303522