"Hiss!"
The deep spearpoint darted like a viper's tongue, viciously stabbing toward Mira's limp right arm.
In just these few minutes of fighting, Knightwalker had already tried targeting the injury several times.
"You really don't hold back, do you? Going straight for your opponent's wounds."
Mira chuckled, raising her scale-covered left hand. Relying purely on her overwhelming physique, she blocked it as easily as an iron wall with a crisp clang.
The collision between scales and metal sent a string of bright sparks flying, illuminating the eerie markings on the girl's cheeks with sharp clarity.
"I am a hunter," Knightwalker said, pulling back her spear with a frosty expression.
"A hunter does not care what methods are used in the hunt. All that matters is bringing down the prey."
"Is that so…"
Hearing that matter-of-fact reply, Mira instead broke into a smile.
In the next instant, magic erupted around Mira like a volcano.
Using that violent force as propulsion, she closed in, moving so fast not even an afterimage could be caught.
"Bang!"
A solid, straightforward punch slammed into Knightwalker's abdomen without any flourish.
The overwhelming kinetic force exploded instantly. The hunter lady, along with her spear, was blasted like a cannonball into the hard floor, throwing up shattered stone everywhere.
"I've never had such an easy time fighting someone with that face."
Mira hovered in midair, looking down at the crater from above.
"With strength as weak as yours, there's no way you can hunt a 'She-Devil' like me."
"How is that possible… Even Knightwalker using the Ten Commandments Spear can't take her down?"
Not far away, Sugarboy, with his towering pompadour, stared at the scene in disbelief.
There was actually a monster woman in Earth Land comparable to Knightwalker?
And if Knightwalker, the kingdom army's strongest front-line fighter, was defeated this easily, then their side would instantly fall into an absolute disadvantage.
Taking advantage of Sugarboy's stunned pause, Shane turned and quietly asked Mystogan beside him,
"Can the Lacrima piled up in the royal capital's plaza be restored afterward?"
"If we use a reversed Anima spell… it should be possible," Mystogan said after a moment of thought, giving a fairly certain answer.
"That's good."
Hearing that, the tension in Shane's heart loosened slightly.
"Were many people forcibly taken to Edolas by Anima?"
Mystogan sensed the change in Shane's emotions and looked puzzled.
"I've been running around all these years. I should have sealed the vast majority of those newly opened coordinate channels."
He had not returned to this world for a long time, so he truly lacked information on the royal capital's recent actions.
"Yeah. A lot."
Shane recalled what he had seen earlier when he swept his Clairvoyance across the underground plaza, and his tone instantly turned icy.
"Just the outlines visible through the crystal surface alone number nearly several hundred people."
"That large a scale?"
Mystogan's brows furrowed tightly. Rare anger surfaced in his usually calm eyes.
"Why didn't I notice anything? I clearly did everything I could to stop it…"
At that thought, he suddenly realized something.
The royal capital had never been disturbed by the evil dragon over the years. If there was some tacit secret deal between his father and that dragon, then perhaps the dragon had used some unknown method to quietly alter Anima's magical structure and evade his senses.
"It's fine."
Shane reached out and patted Mystogan on the shoulder, reassuring him.
"Once we settle things here, I'll make sure you have time to ask them everything clearly."
Then he turned, his gaze landing on Sugarboy not far away.
That one look was like a dragon's.
"T-this feeling…"
The instant he was locked onto by those eyes, Sugarboy felt as if he had fallen into an ice cellar. Fine cold sweat instantly covered his forehead, and even his breathing froze.
This suffocating sensation of being targeted by a higher predator… it was exactly like being stared down by that damned evil dragon.
Was this really pressure a human could release?
"Sorry for making you nervous."
Carrying the black-blue great spear, Shane stepped slowly forward.
"I'm in a bad mood right now, so I didn't deliberately restrain the dragonized aura around me."
Under that almost tangible pressure, Sugarboy's legs went weak.
He wanted to retreat, but under that fear stemming from a difference in life level, his body could hardly move at all.
Finally, the glowing spear came to rest quietly against his chest, which was rising and falling violently from fear.
At the tip of the spear, an azure beam of magic began gathering and compressing bit by bit, giving off a dangerous hum.
"This is probably the position of the heart you're yearning for," Shane said calmly.
"Rose Sword!"
At the brink of life and death, Sugarboy forced himself to bite through his tongue, using the sharp pain to break through the crushing fear.
With a roar, he swung the magical longsword in his hand, trying to knock away the spear pressed to his chest.
His magic weapon had the special ability to make anything it touched soft and pliable like mud.
It was his trump card, one that had carried him undefeated on the battlefield.
But when the blade finally touched the black-blue spear—
"Good!"
Joy flashed across Sugarboy's face. He thought he was saved.
But in the next second, something happened that plunged him into total despair.
The spear did not change at all. It did not even produce the slightest magical tremor. It remained as indestructible as ever, shining with lethal light.
"This thing is constructed from a concept. It isn't a physical object whose form can be changed so easily."
Seeing the man's ghost-struck expression, Shane kindly offered an explanation.
While restraining the enemy, Shane did not relax his guard. His attention had remained, intentionally or otherwise, on Faust, seated high upon the throne.
He had wanted to see what sort of wonderful expression this arrogant old king would show as the elite subordinates he took such pride in fell into crisis one after another.
But unexpectedly—
Shane found that the old king was strangely calm.
Faust looked coldly at the collapsing situation below. There was even a strange curve hanging at the corner of his mouth.
And Byro, the short chief of staff who had been beside the throne the whole time, had vanished at some point.
"Where did that old man go?"
An ominous premonition suddenly rose in Shane's heart.
No longer hesitating, he swept Sugarboy aside with a backhanded spear strike as if clearing away trash, then abruptly lifted his head and demanded coldly,
"Heh heh… you may wait with great anticipation."
Faust laced his fingers together beneath his chin and pulled out a subtle smile.
He didn't know the true nature of this evil dragon counterpart before him.
But he knew all too well his son's ability to create trouble while working against him in the shadows.
From the moment Mystogan appeared, he had known the situation in the hall would surely change.
And sure enough, everything had gone exactly as he expected.
His captains were unable to withstand the evil dragon counterpart.
Even Knightwalker, the kingdom's strongest warrior, was being beaten helplessly by a girl who should have had no ability to resist.
Once the three of them joined forces, he would likely become their prisoner without resistance, left at their mercy.
Precisely because he had foreseen this disadvantage…
he had used the chaos to send Byro to do that thing.
As the old king's words fell, the stagnant air in the hall suddenly began to tremble violently in a way visible to the naked eye.
"T-this is… magic boiling?"
Mystogan froze.
"That direction is…"
He whipped his head toward the west side of the royal capital. The source of that enormous, heart-shaking magic was coming from there.
"The plaza where the Lacrima are stored!" Shane answered.
"Wait! You activated those Lacrima without authorization? What exactly are you planning to do?!"
Mystogan reacted too, his voice becoming urgent from anxiety.
Unused Lacrima could still be restored to their original form through reversal. But once the magic symbolizing life force was used, then…
"Such abundant, tempting magic… one might even call it the largest reserve of magic in the entire world, suddenly released."
Faust rose from the throne, spreading his arms with a trace of madness.
"What creature do you think will be drawn here by that sweet scent?"
"The evil dragon? You… you actually summoned that evil dragon to the royal capital on purpose?"
Mystogan's eyes widened, and he roared in disbelief.
"Are you insane?! This will destroy the city!"
"It will not harm me. Those Lacrima were originally the 'gift' I prepared for it."
Faust laughed without a care.
"I continuously gather magic for it, and in return, it uses its invincible power to help me suppress all rebellion and solidify my supreme royal authority!"
Hearing that insane declaration, Shane finally understood.
"No wonder that thing, despite being an evil dragon, managed to spread the magic tax system across the entire world so easily."
Shane's face darkened, and his voice went cold.
"So the kingdom's upper ranks were actively cooperating with it from the shadows all along."
He turned to look at Knightwalker, who was still panting heavily in the crater.
"So your so-called Legion patrols were never meant to track the evil dragon's movements or protect the people?"
"Of course not."
Knightwalker wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth, her eyes showing a kind of matter-of-fact indifference.
"That was only to give stubborn warriors like me, who were dissatisfied with the current state of things and wanted to resist the evil dragon, something to do."
"And incidentally, to confirm whether the dragon's behavioral patterns had changed, ensuring that this deal remained stable."
"After all, humans here do not naturally possess magic in their bodies like the Exceeds," Faust added coldly.
"If the dragon that seeks magic ever goes hungry enough to start devouring humans too, that would be troublesome."
In his twisted worldview, magic was the same as power, the most convenient tool for strengthening royal authority.
So if magic disappeared equally from the entire world—
then only he, with the evil dragon's aid, would possess a royal authority that was undoubtedly the most stable and unshakable.
"Wait."
Amid all that nauseating rhetoric, Shane caught a familiar term.
"Exceeds?"
Carla had also mentioned that word back at the guild.
Now that it had come from the mouth of this hostile kingdom as well, Shane couldn't help feeling suspicious.
"Interested?"
Faust gave a sinister smile and raised a hand, pointing far toward the west.
"By now, the outer layer of the Lacrima should have melted enough. If you're curious, you should be able to see what's inside through the shell."
Shane frowned slightly and immediately followed the direction Faust indicated, his distant vision piercing through the buildings along the way.
He saw the enormous Lacrima in the plaza, as huge as a mountain. Its outermost crystal layer was rapidly melting like fresh snow beneath clear sunlight.
And within the crystal, which was gradually becoming transparent, what emerged were not human silhouettes, but small animal shapes with tails.
Those were…
Cats?
Cats like Carla and Happy?
"Those are the race known as Exceeds."
Seeing the shock in Shane's eyes, Faust burst into smug laughter.
"Haha, I put in quite a bit of effort to subjugate those self-proclaimed noble creatures. Though quite a large portion of them are still hiding somewhere, dragging out their pitiful lives."
"So…" Shane understood. "The dense Legion patrols over the royal capital aren't defending against the evil dragon at all, but against counterattacks from these so-called Exceeds?"
Just as Shane was thinking in shock and suspicion—
"Hurry! Stop what's happening over there!"
Mystogan shouted from the side.
"Once the Lacrima are fully consumed and converted, the lives inside will never be restored!"
"What?"
Shane froze for a clear instant.
The curiosity in his eyes instantly sank, turning into bone-chilling coldness.
He no longer had any time to waste arguing with this madman Faust.
Boom!
Black dragon wings spread, and Shane shattered the grand hall's stained-glass window as he shot toward the western plaza.
"Oh? He actually cares that much?"
Watching Shane depart, Faust's mouth curled into a mocking smile.
"Disaster is upon him, and yet he still thinks of saving expendable 'fuel'? Instead of wasting effort, he should first think about how to survive the black dragon's jaws."
"You don't think I'm just going to stand here doing nothing, do you?"
Mystogan stood where he was, his face dark as water. He realized that he had still underestimated how low his father could sink.
On the other side—
Shane drew a sharp sonic boom through the sky above the royal capital, reaching the western underground plaza almost in the blink of an eye.
Lowering his gaze, the first thing he saw was Byro standing in the center of a giant magic circle, his face full of fanaticism.
"How enviable…"
The short old man adjusted the crystal while muttering resentfully.
"To force His Majesty into using this method ahead of time… those people from Earth Land really were born into a fortunate world."
He believed from the bottom of his heart that whether it was that white-haired girl or Shane—
the only reason they could display such overwhelming power was because they were supported by Earth Land's naturally enormous magical environment.
If he had been born in that world, he would absolutely have become the greatest alchemist.
Whoosh—
The sudden sound of air being torn apart interrupted Byro's fantasy.
In midair, Shane's eyes were indifferent. Without a single word of nonsense, he threw the black-blue great spear in his hand like a meteor.
Pshhk!
Byro, still complaining, only felt a chill in his chest.
"?"
He lowered his head in shock and stared at the cold spearpoint piercing through his chest.
He opened his mouth, and blood gushed out in great mouthfuls. He hadn't even understood where the fatal blow had come from.
Shane didn't even glance at the still-twitching body as he walked straight past Byro.
He raised his head and looked at the enormous Lacrima before him, which was radiating intense heat and blinding light while continuously melting.
Then he slowly reached out and pressed his palm to the scorching crystal surface.
Feeling the vast magic inside spreading wildly into the air around them, Shane held his breath, his gaze flickering slightly.
"Using the frequency of the [Dragon Reactor Core]… maybe I can stop it…"
With that thought, he immediately began trying.
His heart beat faster and faster like a drum.
Under its influence, the melting of the Lacrima instantly slowed at a visible rate.