As the valley where the battle against the Sword Emperor had raged faded into nothingness, open plains reclaimed the field. Then came the storm—thunderous black clouds, summoned by the roar of a demon dragon, blotting out the sky as they smashed through city walls and the royal palace.
From the heart of the storm emerged the massive form of a white dragon. Its jaws gaped wide, devouring weapons, corpses, and shattered debris from the fortresses it had destroyed.
Alone, Tenkei Shiomi stood in the downpour, looking as if he might collapse at any moment.
He thrust his crimson spear into the ground to brace himself and attempted to alter the storm with Primordial Runes.
But even when the power of the Sky Rune briefly cleared the skies, the fleeting glimpse of blue was instantly swallowed again by darkness. The storm raged on, relentless, sweeping across the land.
Shiomi didn't recognize the white dragon that had suddenly appeared. He could only scramble to deduce its identity.
Mordred.
Sword Emperor Lucius.
Recalling the foes he had faced in the previous two trials, Shiomi concluded that the Lion King's punishment—and test—was to pit him against the same enemies she herself had once confronted.
So the identity of this demonic white dragon required no further thought.
Vortigern—the Usurper King. The one who summoned foreign invaders and sought to claim all of Britannia. A tyrant so monstrous, not even the Knights of the Round Table could imagine him.
Uther Pendragon had once faced him—and lost, vanishing thereafter.
It was Arthur who had risen after, leading Britannia to victory and ultimately vanquishing the Usurper King.
No wonder this foe exuded a pressure far beyond that of the previous enemies—he felt like the true master of sky and earth.
After all, Vortigern was Britannia itself.
An embodiment of the island, its avatar. A tribal king who drank the blood of dragons—he was never truly human.
Shiomi drew his crimson spear once more and advanced toward the roaring behemoth that loomed between heaven and earth.
Fierce wind lashed at him, and the rain came down in torrents, yet his steps never faltered.
Rain drenched his entire body, streaming down his brow and cheeks, falling so heavily that he could barely see the road ahead.
An enemy unlike any he had ever faced.
Shiomi stared at the white dragon as it descended, its massive form eclipsing the sky.
He remembered the legends left behind by King Arthur—especially the tale of her battle against Vortigern.
It had been Arthur's one and only truly perilous victory.
The Usurper King's power was a darkness so deep, it could even consume the brilliance of two Holy Swords.
The brilliance of the "Excalibur Galatine" had been stolen.
The glow of "Excalibur" now flickered like a dying campfire.
"But unfortunately, I possess neither a Holy Sword nor a Demon Sword. All I have is the crimson spear gifted to me by my master, and the wand passed down from my senior," Shiomi said, his right hand holding the red spear behind him as he slowly raised the wand in his left. "Forgive my poor hospitality—but I don't have the radiance you're so eager to devour."
In an instant, the raging storm changed. No longer a chaotic force battering Shiomi, it transformed into razor-sharp frost-laced windblades, powerful enough to rend the earth.
The battle began.
It was absurdly lopsided—on one side, Vortigern, the island's embodiment; on the other, a lone human.
The white dragon unfurled its claws—claws so massive, Shiomi's body wasn't even the size of one talon. A mere swipe would be enough to reduce him to a smear of blood and flesh.
But it didn't end that easily.
Despite its massive size, Vortigern's speed matched its power. Every strike of its claws tore through the air, whipping up vacuum storms strong enough to shred the battlefield.
Shiomi couldn't meet that force head-on. He had to weave through the air, narrowly evading each strike.
Rain solidified into countless shards of ice that pelted Vortigern's snow-white scales, only to burst into powder on contact.
Winds sharp enough to obliterate castle walls lashed against the dragon, but even they left nothing more than brief sparks across its impossibly hard body.
Not a single scale had been damaged. If anything, the white sheen of its hide looked even more polished than before.
Shiomi circled behind Vortigern, aiming a spell at what seemed to be the thinnest patch of scales. Wide-range attacks were useless—he needed to break through at a single point.
But just as he raised his wand, before he could even unleash his spell, Vortigern's massive tail swept out and struck.
The white dragon slowly turned its head—but there was no blood on its tail. Only shattered ice scattering through the air.
That wasn't Shiomi's true body—it had been an illusion made of crystalized frost.
The dragon let out a roar that shook the heavens, and the storm winds grew fiercer.
Vortigern roared because a dozen identical figures had appeared in the skies around him, each raising a wand in perfect synchrony.
Lightning surged through the blackened clouds, and at that moment, the white dragon spread its vast wings, wide enough to blot out the sun.
With just two beats of its wings, Vortigern soared into the sky, attempting to escape the trap Shiomi had laid.
But lightning moved faster than any flight.
Countless bolts fell from above, enclosing Vortigern like divine punishment. The dragon bellowed in fury.
It wasn't that Shiomi's Grand Magecraft had harmed the dragon. Vortigern hadn't taken flight to flee—but to launch his next attack.
He slowly turned his head and locked eyes with Shiomi's true form.
The clones had been a ruse—just a misdirection to mask the completed spell.
Shiomi now stood with his crimson spear raised, aiming directly at the vulnerable spot behind the dragon's heart.
"Soaring Spear That Strikes with Death—Gae Bolg Alternative!"
He hurled it with such force that his body nearly broke apart.
This was Shiomi's own version of the Mad King's spear throw, inspired by what he had seen in the North American Singularity.
While the Mad King had needed Rune Magecraft to regenerate his ruined body, Shiomi used the power he had just awakened—channeling all his mana and strength into a single throw.
A guaranteed kill. Even the invincible body of the white dragon should have suffered damage from this strike.
But the moment the spear left his hand, Shiomi's eyes caught a fatal flaw.
He had placed too much faith in his own power—he hadn't even tested the dragon's attack patterns before launching his ultimate move.
From Vortigern's jaws surged a torrent of blackness.
The dragon opened its mouth wide, releasing a flood of dark mana that engulfed Shiomi's crimson spear and surged toward him.
Caught in the backlash of the throw, his body already fracturing under the strain, Shiomi was swept up in that dark wave.
This power...
He struggled to resist—but in a single moment, he understood.
It was something like a reversed reflection of the radiance of "Excalibur."
Could it be... the light of the two Holy Swords Vortigern had devoured? A twisted inversion of the Holy Sword's power?!
...
(100 Chapters Ahead)
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