Rud called his name once more.
There was no possibility that Darren had already forgotten his face.
Rud leaned close enough for Darren to see him clearly and identified himself, but the boy’s unfocused pupils seemed to contain nothing but sightless darkness.
Rud had an ominous feeling.
Fearing the worst, he hurriedly placed a hand on Darren’s head.
“This is…!”
Rud’s words came to an unnatural halt.
It was gone.
He could not sense any trace of the soul that should have been inside Darren’s body.
Someone had extracted Darren’s soul with Dark Magic.
Rud had never expected Shuran to surrender Darren so easily, but he had not imagined that the man would go this far against a child.
With conflicting emotions crossing his face, Rud slowly removed his hand from Darren.
The boy’s life was probably not in danger.
However, a body without a soul was no different from a Vegetative Body. Unless they recovered it, Darren would remain like this for the rest of his life.
“So he intends to use everything at his disposal.”
Rud muttered in disbelief.
As though recognizing his voice, Darren slowly turned his head.
“Voice detected. Who are you?”
An emotionless, mechanical voice struck Rud’s ears.
Shuran appeared to have placed several mechanisms inside Darren in preparation for someone finding him.
‘Shuran probably has Darren’s soul.’
He had done this to lure Rud to him.
Rud briefly closed his eyes before opening them again.
“I am Loeb.”
“No. That is a false name. Tell me your real name. Otherwise, I will make this brat gouge out his own eyes with his hands.”
Darren curled his fingers like hooks and placed them against his pupils.
It was not an empty threat.
Shuran possessed both the will and the ability to force Darren to do it at any moment.
Rud answered.
“Rud. Rud Ren.”
Karte was leaning against a tree and humming idly when Didia emerged from the mansion with Kyria in her arms.
“What? Why did you come out?”
“No matter how many lives I had, they would not be enough to survive in a place like that.”
Her face appeared haggard.
Karte did not know what had happened inside, but considering that the entire mansion had nearly frozen over, her reaction was understandable.
“What about Loeb?”
“He should be here soon… Ah, there he is.”
Loeb walked out of the mansion with Darren following behind him.
A stiff, indescribable atmosphere hung between them.
Karte tilted his head in confusion.
Didia deliberately looked away.
Rud released a deep sigh and spoke.
“I feel as though we are being thoroughly toyed with.”
“Why? Did something happen…?”
Karte cut himself off.
The moment he saw Darren’s unfocused eyes, he roughly understood what had happened.
“Shuran took his soul?”
“You sound as though you expected this.”
“I spent two hundred years under that bastard. If I could not predict something like this, I would be a complete idiot.”
The ease with which Karte said it suggested that he had witnessed such things more than once.
Didia suppressed the rage threatening to erupt from within her and muttered.
“To think he would treat a child’s life like one of his toys. The more I learn about that man, the more unforgivable he becomes.”
“That is what Dark Mages are.”
Karte agreed with her.
“They regard every life but their own as nothing more than a freely available resource. Whether the person is a pregnant woman or an elderly man, they will exploit them thoroughly and discard them as long as they have some use.”
“They deserve to die. Given the opportunity, I would make them suffer the same pain with my own hands.”
“That is enough.”
Rud interrupted their conversation.
He had learned Shuran’s location.
When Rud spoke to Darren inside the mansion, Shuran had ordered him to come alone.
It appeared that Rud would have to part ways with Didia and Karte here.
“Karte, I will dispel the Heros placed on you. Your role ends here.”
“…Are you truly going to do it?”
Karte stared intently at Rud as though he had misheard him.
He had not expected Rud to keep his promise.
Rud extended a hand toward Karte.
Didia silently watched them.
“However…”
Rud suddenly pulled his outstretched arm back.
“You must tell me everything you know about Shuran. You are already dead, so you can at least leave me this much as a final gift, can you not?”
“…I already told you everything I knew at the hotel.”
“That was not enough.”
It would not have been strange for Karte to possess deeper knowledge of a Dark Mage like Shuran.
Karte hesitated slightly.
Eternal rest was within his reach.
Under ordinary circumstances, he would have dismissed Rud’s demand as nonsense.
However, Rud had risked his own life to rescue Darren. That alone proved he was different from other Dark Mages.
“Promise that you will cremate my body properly.”
“Underst—”
Snow fell from the sky.
There was no possibility that they had imagined it.
When they looked up, clusters of snow were falling from beneath thick, pale clouds.
Didia stared at the sky in disbelief.
Rud also frowned as though rejecting the reality before him.
It was the middle of April.
This was not the season for snow.
Even the temperature in the mountains hovered around thirteen degrees Celsius.
Rud held out his palm and caught a snowflake.
As though reacting to the warmth of his body, it melted like a mirage.
There was no question that it was real.
The sight of the mansion freezing over flashed through Rud’s mind.
He glanced to the side.
Karte was staring fixedly at someone with an awkward smile.
“Karte.”
An unfamiliar woman’s voice reached them.
When Rud turned toward it, he saw a woman slowly approaching.
Her pale Sky Blue hair fell to her waist, and her skin possessed the same Gray hue as Karte’s.
She wore a White Mage uniform from two hundred years ago and a pair of thick boots. Judging by the similar design of their clothing, she appeared to be another corpse under the effects of Heros.
“Your mission is over. Why do you not leave this place to me and make your exit?”
“Arsil…”
“Arsil?”
Didia quietly repeated the familiar name.
Keeping a wary eye on Arsil, Rud asked,
“Do you know her?”
“I do not know the details, but she was a fairly renowned Ice Mage two hundred years ago. The last anyone heard of her was that she had died while confronting a Dark Mage.”
“What do you mean, the last anyone heard of her?”
“There were many unanswered questions surrounding her death.”
Karte joined the conversation in a serious tone.
“There were numerous rumors about Arsil’s death at the time. She was considered a capable Mage among those who wielded Ice Magic, but she died so abruptly that the Magic Association hurriedly dispatched an Investigation Unit.”
“You sound as though you hold a considerable grudge against her.”
“That bitch was the one who killed me.”
He still remembered it as vividly as though it had happened yesterday.
He had been walking through the mountains with the Investigation Unit when Arsil suddenly appeared and launched a ferocious attack on him and his companions with Ice Magic.
It had happened in the blink of an eye.
There had been no time to understand the situation.
Protecting his own body had been all Karte could manage.
He had been forced to watch helplessly as his companions froze to death before his eyes.
When he eventually came to his senses, he found himself the only one with his eyes open.
Shuran had been hiding nearby.
He had used Dark Magic on Karte and forcibly bound his separated soul back to his dead body.
All because Karte had appeared useful.
A horrified Didia covered her mouth with one hand.
Keeping his eyes fixed on Arsil, Rud muttered quietly.
“So the trap inside the mansion and the snow falling now are both that woman’s magic.”
The snowfall intensified.
They had barely escaped the cold, only for an even harsher winter to descend upon them.
Her murderous intent was overwhelming.
A chilling sensation swept through Didia, as though every hair on her body had risen rigidly.
Only then did she realize that Arsil might have been the source of the fear Kyria had felt earlier.
“Loeb, what are we going to do? I think it would be better for the three of us to fight together.”
“No.”
Rud rejected the suggestion firmly.
“If something goes wrong, all three of us could be defeated by her. She is also an opponent whom even Karte could not overcome. Didia, take Darren and leave this place immediately.”
“You intend to face her alone? Can you truly do it?”
“Go. This is our best option.”
Once Arsil began moving in earnest, it would become impossible to reverse the situation.
They could not afford to lose Darren again after going through so much to rescue him.
Didia’s hesitation deepened.
She wanted to remain and help Rud, but with her current abilities, she would undoubtedly become a burden.
“U-Understood. I will take Darren and leave.”
“What about me?”
Karte asked Rud.
He already knew that Rud would not ask him to help.
However, Karte would not flee either.
If Rud disappeared, there would be no one left to dispel the Heros placed on him.
Rud pushed Karte to the side and answered.
“You can stand there and watch.”
“Now that is an answer I like.”
“Have you finished discussing your strategy?”
Arsil spoke quietly as she closed the distance.
A cold gleam settled in her eyes.
White ice formed beneath her feet each time they left the ground.
They needed to hurry.
Didia summoned a White wolf approximately three meters tall from a Magic Circle.
Its sharply gleaming Sapphire-Colored Eyes remained fixed solely on Didia.
Taking Darren by the hand, Didia hurriedly climbed onto the wolf’s back.
The wolf immediately displayed its displeasure when a human other than its master climbed on.
Apparently unwilling to tolerate even a child, it shook its body.
Didia gently stroked its back.
“I am sorry, Gaten. Please endure it just this once.”
Amazingly, Gaten’s body immediately became still at her quiet words.
“What an adorable wolf.”
Arsil regarded Gaten with interest and raised an arm high into the sky.
Five Icicle Spears, each approximately two meters long, formed in the empty air.
They appeared to be aimed at Didia.
Sensing the threat to her life, Didia shouted desperately.
“Gaten, run!!”
THUD!!
The moment the command left her lips, Gaten raised his legs, which were as thick as logs, and kicked powerfully against the ground.
The force was so tremendous that the earth trembled slightly beneath him.
“Do you think I will let you escape?”
Arsil always obtained whatever she desired, no matter what it took.
Repeating her personal creed in her mind, she launched the hovering Icicle Spears toward Gaten without hesitation.
WHOOOOSH!
The five Icicle Spears sliced sharply through the air.
A single strike possessed enough force to pierce straight through a person’s torso.
Arsil calmly waited for her ice to impale Gaten.
At that moment—
CRASH!!
The Icicle Spears shattered like glass with a deafening sound.
Rud had destroyed every Icicle Spear flying toward Gaten with a Shockwave.
Didia, who had turned her head halfway to watch, said nothing.
Thud, thud!
Carrying Didia and Darren, Gaten disappeared into the mountains within moments.
The atmosphere rapidly turned hostile.
Rud landed with both feet on the ground and spoke as though lamenting his circumstances.
“Nothing in my life ever goes right, does it?”