Chapter 3: I Want to Live Too
Time and sound had lost their meaning inside the gray barrier.
The thunder, heavy rain, and screams of the soldiers outside sounded like a distant hum from beyond the barrier.
Inside, there was only the frantic rhythm of beating hearts and the metallic taste of approaching death.
To the Crossbreed, his entire body felt as light as a feather. He opened and closed his fingers as if testing his strength.
Then he turned his single eye back to Korvak standing in front of him.
Dragging his rusty sword through the muddy ground, he began to circle Korvak while maintaining his distance.
The sound of his boots on the muddy ground grated on Korvak's nerves, making him even more tense.
Without any hesitation, the boy suddenly lunged at Korvak with pure killing intent, swinging his sword down from above.
He was so fast that the air whistled from the friction.
Commander Korvak threw himself backward at the last second with a sudden reflex.
However, this was more of a panic filled leap than a conscious dodge.
The Crossbreed's sword landed right on the stone where Korvak had been standing just a moment ago.
BOOM!
The sound echoing inside the barrier was like a deafening explosion.
The force of the impact split the stone perfectly in two, and then, unable to withstand it, shattered into pieces.
As broken shards of stone scattered around, a thick cloud of dust rose from the ground and quickly filled the inside of the barrier.
Coughing, Korvak tried to steady his balance a few meters away.
His eyes were wide open in shock.
He looked in panic at the spot where he had just stood, and now there was only a crater and a dense cloud of dust.
"What is this..." he whispered, his voice trembling. "Did he turn a stone to dust... with that rusty piece of iron?"
A silhouette emerged from within the dust cloud. The Crossbreed was slowly turning toward him.
His wet black hair covered half of his face, but that single pitch black eye... That eye looked as if it were staring into the darkest corners of Korvak's soul.
There was no anger or hatred in that gaze; there was only the cold calculation of a hunter looking at its prey.
Korvak felt a shiver crawl up his spine.
This kid... That loser, that useless crossbreed... What was this power?
"Impossible!" shouted Korvak, as if trying to suppress his own fear. His hand swiftly went to the hilt of the sword at his waist. "A freak like you... How?!"
Korvak tried to draw his sword, but the blade would not budge.
Looking down, he realized in horror that the scabbard and hilt of his sword were covered in a layer of blue white ice.
Korvak's eyes darted back and forth in panic between the crossbreed and his frozen sword.
In that brief moment when the Crossbreed got close, he had frozen Korvak's sword.
Elemental control of this level was only seen in mid to high rank mages.
"Damn you!"
Korvak yanked to pull the sword, but it was useless.
Right at that moment, the Crossbreed lunged forward like a shadow.
The tip of his sword was aimed straight at Korvak's throat.
Korvak felt the cold breath of death on his neck.
Panic gave way to his survival instinct.
He released the mana in his veins explosively.
"BURN!"
The intense fire roaring from his palm vaporized the ice on his sword's hilt in seconds.
The metal heated up, the ice melted, and Korvak managed to draw his sword from its scabbard at the last second, missing by mere millimeters.
CLANG!
The two swords clashed in the air.
Sparks flew everywhere when the rusty iron met Korvak's high quality steel.
However, the force of the clash was much greater than Korvak expected. He felt the bones in his arms ache.
Korvak's stance was broken, his feet were not planted firmly on the ground.
The Crossbreed did not miss this opening.
With his free left foot, he delivered a ruthless kick to the weakest point of Korvak's armor, the pit of his stomach.
The blow hit with the force of a sledgehammer.
Korvak's breath was knocked out of him, his vision went dark, and he was thrown backward, falling hard onto the wet ground.
Muddy water splashed all over his expensive cape.
Coughing and clutching his stomach, Korvak tried to get up.
The taste of blood filling his mouth only worsened his shock.
He raised his head and looked at the crossbreed standing tall in front of him.
"You..." he said with a wheezing voice, pure hatred flaring in his eyes.
"How could you... All this time... Were you hiding your powers, huh!!?"
"Did you trick us, you son of a bitch!"
The Crossbreed did not reply.
There was neither a smile of victory nor arrogance on his face.
He just tilted his head slightly to the side and continued watching Korvak without blinking his single eye.
This silence was the greatest insult aimed at Korvak.
In a fit of rage, Korvak dug his fingers into the wet dirt.
He grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it right at the crossbreed's face, lunging forward at the same time with a tight grip on his sword.
The crossbreed took a step to the side and dodged the mud, then effortlessly spun his sword in his hand with great skill, blocking Korvak's strike.
The crossbreed slightly reduced the pressure in his arms, causing Korvak's sword to keep moving forward due to the sudden shift in force.
Losing his balance, Korvak stumbled forward involuntarily.
At that moment, the crossbreed covered his own elbow in ice and brought it crashing down onto Korvak's face.
Korvak's nose and face were instantly covered in blood as he slammed into the ground.
Clutching his face in pain, Korvak looked up at the crossbreed standing comfortably before him.
His eyes went mad with rage.
Korvak leaped to his feet and channeled his fire element into his sword.
"Die!" he screamed as he swung.
The Crossbreed ducked with a sudden reflex. The flaming sword grazed the very tips of his hair.
Right after, the Crossbreed brought his own sword down in a crescent arc.
Korvak turned his sword sideways to block, but the weight of the blow made his knees buckle.
Every time metal clashed with metal, the sounds echoing inside the gray area vibrated through their bones.
Korvak was experienced, trained, and had seen hundreds of battles.
His techniques were flawless.
However, the Crossbreed's style... it was feral, lawless, and unpredictable. It was too unstable.
The Crossbreed met a horizontal slash coming from Korvak's left by holding his sword in reverse, sliding over the blade to close the distance with his opponent.
He slammed his shoulder into Korvak's chest like a battering ram.
Korvak stumbled but did not fall, spinning around to strike the Crossbreed's face with his elbow.
The Crossbreed pulled his head back to dodge and simultaneously delivered a harsh blow to Korvak's temple with the hilt of his sword.
Outside the barrier, it was as if time had stopped. The rain was pouring down in buckets, and thunder was shaking the world, but none of the soldiers cared.
All of their eyes were fixed on the inside of the gray barrier in the middle of the courtyard.
From the outside, the inside looked just like a movie.
And what they were seeing shook their beliefs to the core.
"Do you see that?" an old demon soldier said, squeezing the arm of the guy next to him. "Commander Korvak... He is losing."
"No way," another whispered.
"That... that Crossbreed. That trash. How can he cross swords with a High Ifrit? I thought he could not use magic? I thought he had no mana?"
A young werewolf rubbed his eyes. "Look at the commander's face... He is terrified. Korvak is scared!"
The whispers among the soldiers gave way to a deep silence followed by a wave of shock.
That "half blood" they had been pushing around for months, throwing food scraps at, and walking all over, was now fighting on equal footing with the strongest in the army.
This sight was completely destroying their understanding of hierarchy and their perception of power.
Fear appeared on some faces, while a strange, indefinable shred of respect showed on others.
The balance inside had slowly started to shift.
The Crossbreed took advantage of Korvak's momentary distraction.
He plunged his sword into the ground and created sharp ice pillars shooting up from the earth.
Korvak tried to jump back but he was not fast enough.
An ice spear grazed Korvak's right shoulder, piercing through his armor and sinking into his flesh.
Instead of blood, thick smoke rose from the wound because Korvak's body heat was boiling his blood.
Groaning in pain, Korvak stumbled backward to put some distance between them.
He was out of breath.
The sweat dripping from his forehead mixed with the blood getting into his eyes.
This crossbreed standing before him was about to defeat him.
This thought shattered Korvak's pride into pieces.
"Enough..." Korvak snarled.
He was gritting his teeth so hard that his gums started to bleed. "You little bug..."
Korvak's eyes turned completely white. "I did not want to use this against a piece of trash like you..."
"But you asked for it. Now face the consequences!"
Korvak threw his arms open and let out a scream. This was not a scream of pain, but an explosion of power.
A massive wave of flames erupted outward from his body.
His armor became incandescent, his skin cracking to reveal lava like energy flowing underneath.
It was as if the gates of hell had opened within Korvak's body.
He was no longer a demon, but a Fiend made of fire, a walking disaster.
The inside of the gray area turned into an oven.
The puddles on the ground instantly evaporated, and the resulting dense steam blocked their vision.
Korvak shot forward like a bullet of fire. His speed was twice what it was moments ago.
The Crossbreed sensed the approaching danger and immediately formed a thick, multi layered ice wall right in front of him.
However, the moment Korvak's sword touched the ice, the ice instantly melted and shattered.
The fire was so intense that the ice had no chance of holding up.
The sword sliced through the ice wall like paper and tore through the Crossbreed's defense.
The Crossbreed lunged backward but could not be fast enough.
Korvak's flaming sword passed right over the Crossbreed's right hand holding his weapon.
Korvak's sword had not touched the crossbreed, but the heat it radiated was so high that the skin on his hand instantly scorched, and the smell of burning flesh filled his nose.
The crossbreed jumped back, placed his good hand over his burned one, and covered it in ice.
Korvak let out a laugh.
His voice now sounded more like the crackling of burning wood than a human voice.
"Hahaha! It hurts, doesn't it? Are you in pain, you little bastard?!"
Korvak conjured a fireball and hurled it at the Crossbreed.
The crossbreed dodged by jumping, but the fireball blew a massive crater where it hit the ground.
"This is just the beginning!" Korvak roared. "I will burn you until not even your ashes remain!"
The Crossbreed wrapped his burned hand tighter around his sword.
His skin was peeling off, exposing the flesh beneath, but he did not let go of the blade.
His single eye locked onto the red stat panel floating above Korvak through the flames.
System Alert:
[ Opponent: Overload Mode ]
[ Weakness Detected: Mental Breakdown and Blind Spots ]
[ Effect of "Curse of Equality" increasing: Opponent is beginning to hallucinate ]
The Crossbreed saw a blurriness behind the crazed glint in Korvak's eyes.
The curse was working.
Korvak had grown stronger physically, but spiritually he was being crushed under the weight of the price paid.
Drunk on the thought of victory, Korvak lunged forward to tear the crossbreed to pieces.
"DIE!"
The Crossbreed's sword hand was trembling and his grip had loosened.
Korvak saw this, completely abandoned his defense, and poured all his strength into the attack. This was his final mistake.
Just as Korvak's sword was about to crash down on his head, the Crossbreed used the extra agility he gained from the "Curse of Equality" down to the very last drop.
He made an illogical move forward, straight into the very heart of the fire.
Korvak's vision blurred for a split second. He did not see the Crossbreed in front of him, but an old friend he had betrayed and killed years ago. This one second of hesitation sealed his fate.
The Crossbreed slid underneath the flames and rose toward Korvak's exposed armpit.
SLASH!
The rusty sword was sharpened so much with the ice element that it severed Korvak's right arm from his shoulder like a knife cutting through butter.
Before Korvak could even realize what happened, he saw his arm and his sword flying through the air.
He did not even feel pain, there was only shock.
But the Crossbreed did not stop. Using his momentum, he got behind Korvak, did a flip in the air, and swung his sword at a reverse angle on the way down.
SLASH!
This time, the left arm.
Korvak's body lost its balance and collapsed to his knees. Both of his arms were severed from the shoulders and lay on the ground.
Blood did not spurt from the severed stumps because the ice on the Crossbreed's sword had instantly frozen the veins, and Korvak's own fire had cauterized the wound.
Korvak was shivering in the mud on his knees.
The hellish fiend from moments ago was gone, replaced by a helpless, crippled, and pathetic creature.
His flames had died out, leaving only smoking embers behind.
He slowly raised his head. The Crossbreed was standing right in front of him.
The tip of his sword rested against Korvak's throat.
There was no pity nor any intoxication of victory in the youth's single eye.
Just the exhaustion of someone who wanted to finish the job.
Tears began to stream from Korvak's eyes, washing away the soot on his cheeks as they flowed down.
"I beg you..." he said, his voice no different from a whisper. Bloody foam bubbled from his mouth. "Do not do this... Do not kill me."
The Crossbreed pressed the sword a little harder.
"I am scared!" cried Korvak, trampling on his own honor in front of the soldiers he once commanded.
"I do not want to die! I just wanted to live... I had no bad intentions... I just wanted to escape... Have mercy!"
The rain was still falling outside the gray barrier, but the silence inside was broken by Korvak's sobs.
The Crossbreed tilted his head slightly to the side. A strange, sorrowful expression appeared on his face.
What Korvak said resonated with the deepest desire within himself.
To live. The most basic, primal right of every living creature in this world.
He parted his lips and spoke with a human tone for the first time since the fight began. His voice was soft but equally resolute.
"I want to live too."
That sentence was not just an answer, it was a verdict.
The Crossbreed swung his sword horizontally.
Metal cut through flesh. Bone separated.
Korvak's head detached from his torso and fell onto the wet ground next to his severed arms. His eyes were still open, frozen in a final expression of fear.
His torso stood upright for another second, then toppled over like a puppet onto the blood soaked muddy ground.
[ SIDE QUEST COMPLETED ]
[ Loading Rewards... ]
While the system notification blinked before his eye, the surrounding gray barrier trembled and cracked like glass.
First came the sounds. The thunder, the howling of the wind, and the sound of the rain.
Then the colors returned to a brighter state.
The Crossbreed found himself standing over the headless corpse with his bloody and rusty sword in hand.
The rain began to wash the sweat and blood from his face. His hair was soaking wet.
He slowly raised his head and turned to the crowd around him.
Hundreds of demons, goblins, orcs, and monsters... They were all frozen in place. No one even dared to breathe.
Their eyes darted back and forth between the corpse of their commander on the ground and the "weak" boy who killed him.
The shock was so immense that not even the sound of the rain was enough to break this silence.
That boy they once called a "crossbreed", whom they humiliated and refused to even look at... Now he was their only reality.
The Crossbreed swept his single eye over the crowd.
No one dared to make eye contact with him anymore. Fear had turned into respect; contempt had turned into terror.
In that moment, the inhabitants of Ashveil Castle were witnessing the bloody birth of a legend.