Sion slipped into Jeffren's blind spot with nimble movements.
And.
At the decisive moment.
BANG—!
He buried a round in Jeffren's unguarded back.
"GHK!"
But Jeffren took a direct hit from the specialized shotgun and barely flinched.
He didn't seem to wield mana with any particular finesse, yet his physical durability was already beyond anything that could be called human.
'He's strong.'
Sion looked at Rui, Bwindol, and Bil. Talented Knights. But at present, they seemed far from being able to reach Jeffren.
That was why Sion provoked Jeffren even harder.
"Eyes over here! Pathetic fool! In the end, all your men are dead and you're the only one left!"
"......Shut your mouth. You incompetent bloodline that created this hell."
Jeffren's face twisted. But he didn't move rashly.
He'd realized it instinctively. If he allowed another ambush, the Knights' swords were more dangerous than the shotgun.
His expression seemed to say:
'Chasing him is exactly what he wants.'
All the more reason Sion kept the shotgun trained on Jeffren, maintaining the razor-thin tension.
'Look at him. He's not taking the bait.'
Meanwhile. Rui, Bwindol, and Bil recovered and reformed their line. They channeled Aura into their swords.
"Be careful. He is fast. And strong."
Rui warned, and the other two Knights nodded. Seeing this, Jeffren smirked and taunted the Knights.
"Damn. Since when were Knights this cowardly? That is why you people are not enough. The meaning of upholding justice is—!"
BANG—!
Sion fired at the talking Jeffren.
"Shut your mouth. You are not even human anymore."
A vein bulged on Jeffren's forehead. Sion took note.
'He takes the bait from provocation.'
Ammunition was limited, but in a fight like this, providing covering fire with a gun and a sharp tongue could steadily chip away at the enemy's mental fortitude.
And in that particular department, no one could match Sion.
"Jeffren. You are strong. On par with an Intermediate Knight. But you will never reach that level. Do you know why?"
"......What are you trying to say?"
Sion smirked.
"Because a Knight is an exalted being. Not a mongrel like you."
Fury deepened across Jeffren's face. He couldn't refute it. It wasn't wrong. But the truth always stings more.
"You are not a Knight. Just a tangled-up mongrel. All you do is swing a greatsword fast and dumb. Go for the gaps and you'll find them without end. How pitiful. You threw away your pure body and mixed in all sorts of things, and this is all you amount to."
In truth, Sion could see Jeffren's openings with perfect clarity. The problem was that these Novice Knights, whose swordsmanship hadn't yet matured, couldn't see those gaps.
"......You half-wit bastard. You are begging for death."
"Then come and get me. Mongrel. Scared of a half-wit? Need a bathroom break first? Too bad. I won't be giving you the time."
"Fine then! Die!"
With a CRACK, Jeffren launched himself forward. Not toward the Knights—toward Sion.
No matter how threatening the Knights' swords were, leaving Sion's tongue and gun unchecked was worse.
Of course, Sion wasn't about to simply take it. He fired at the charging Jeffren and dodged at high speed.
BANG—! CRASH—!
"......?!"
"Over here, mongrel! Can't even catch a half-wit?!"
Sion was far faster than Jeffren had expected. And so, a chase ensued between the two.
In that gap.
Rui Daiken shouted:
"Bil! Keep him pinned! Bwindol! With me—target the openings!"
Bwindol and Bil understood immediately whose insight those words stemmed from.
Sion Karsen.
The one naturally directing the flow of battle.
'Does this even make sense? Is this really what it means to be from a Grand Duke's house, even in ruin?'
And so the four-on-one battle continued. The Knights drove into Jeffren's gaps and swung their swords, while Jeffren fought the Knights and chased Sion.
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG! CRASH! CLANG! BOOM!
When the Knights' offensive grew too fierce, Jeffren tried to refocus on them. And every time, without fail, a shot came flying.
BANG—!
"GAAAHK!"
Jeffren was bewildered. He'd been winning. How had it come to this? And.
'That shotgun and those rounds belong to one of my officers—were there really this many bullets? I figured I just had to endure a few, but where do they keep coming from?!'
Sion Karsen. The man who'd killed the Hashman brothers and exposed the Red Fang to the world. That goddamn bastard.
Jeffren couldn't comprehend it. Was Sion Karsen really a half-wit?
Doubt bloomed.
As the battle dragged on, Sion and the Knights steadily whittled down Jeffren's strength.
But Jeffren wasn't taking it lying down either.
'At this rate, I lose.'
So.
"......All or nothing."
Jeffren released his greatsword.
HISS— HISS—
Blue steam erupted from his body. A mana overload. Everyone present recognized what the blue steam meant.
Right now, Jeffren was drawing on power beyond his limits. Survive this one attack, and victory was theirs.
But surviving it was far easier said than done.
In a flash, Jeffren vanished from sight.
"Eyes up—where?"
"......!"
Jeffren appeared behind Bwindol and drove his fist forward.
CRACK—!
Bwindol flew into the factory wall. Rui and Bil tried to back him up, but Jeffren had already disappeared.
CRASH—!
Bil's head was slammed into the floor.
"Bil!"
Bil didn't respond to Rui's cry. Unconscious. Rui despaired at the sight.
'Both of them went down in one hit.'
There's no way to win any—
Then. Goosebumps erupted across his body. He whipped his head around and saw Jeffren's fist.
But Rui resisted to the very last. With innate genius, he raised his sword and deflected Jeffren's strike at an angle.
THWACK—!
The impact still shattered his balance. Jeffren didn't miss the opening and moved to finish him.
BANG—!
Sion fired. A searing impact hit Jeffren's back.
"......Right. I forgot about you."
Jeffren looked at Sion. But. Something about the impact site was wrong.
WHOOOOSH—
His body had caught fire.
"......!"
In truth, Sion had stopped using actual rounds three shots ago.
He'd drawn mana from his Star Ring, shaped it into flame, compressed the form to its absolute limit, and fired it as a fireball.
"What in the—"
SQUELCH. Rui drove his blade into the stunned Jeffren's throat. An Aura-laden strike.
"......GRK. GHURK."
Jeffren clutched his bleeding throat with one hand and kicked Rui away.
THWACK—!
"GUH!"
Rui flew into the wall. The wall crumbled, burying him under rubble. He didn't lose consciousness—instead, he was stunned. He'd stabbed the man's throat, and he was still moving. Was this thing really human?
That was when.
SHINK—
Jeffren's shoulder joint was slashed, and blood sprayed. Vermilion sparks burst from the wound.
WHOOSH—
Sion Karsen had stepped in with his sword. Jeffren grabbed at his throat and flailed his limbs, but Sion flowed around him like water, pouring precise slashes into every joint.
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG—!
WHOOOOSH—
Flames ignited at every joint. An unbelievable sight. Was this really the same monster that three Novice Knights couldn't handle?
Sion dealt with him effortlessly.
"You filthy......!"
Jeffren screamed in anguish, but Sion didn't stop. He looked as if he were methodically shredding every one of Jeffren's joints.
HISS— HISS—
Soon the steam billowing from Jeffren's body began to thin. His movements locked up, rigid.
SHRRK—!
As if Sion had completely destroyed Jeffren's joints. Jeffren sank to his knees, powerless.
"This...... is impossible......"
"It's very possible."
Sion cut him off and drove his fist down onto the top of Jeffren's skull.
CRACK—!
"......GHK!"
Jeffren lost consciousness.
Rui Daiken stared at the scene, slack-jawed. What? What did I just see? Was that really Sion Karsen?
It felt unreal. Completely, utterly unreal.
Not only had Sion Karsen taken Jeffren down—he'd captured him alive. Without so much as a scratch on himself.
Meanwhile, Sion was unfazed. He simply went to Bwindol and Bil and administered recovery potions.
Soon the Knights came to and assessed the situation.
Jeffren was fully neutralized and unconscious.
"What happened? Did I dream that?"
"......Same."
"Rui. What the hell? This isn't what you've always been saying."
"I don't know either."
Rui Daiken's mind was chaos incarnate. How? The question kept surfacing, and every time it did, one thing came to mind.
—No matter how hard you try to see clearly, you can't watch a person's every move. So you go and ask. You listen. You look deeper.
Then. The agents who'd been dispatched returned. All three fleeing officers had been captured alive.
The support crew also arrived. They took over the cleanup, and Sion Karsen knelt with his hand on the floor, eyes closed.
"What's he doing?"
"You don't know this time either?"
"......Mana Detection."
"What?"
"What are you talking about? Mana Detection?"
Rui nodded. Once the other Knights realized it wasn't a joke, they swallowed their disbelief.
"Let's go."
Rui Daiken.
Bwindol Riugen.
Bil Holtzman.
The three Knights approached Sion.
The way they looked at him was markedly different from before the operation.
They bowed.
The three Knights bent at the waist and lowered their heads.
"What are you doing?"
"You saved our lives. Lord Sion."
For a Knight to bow was never an easy decision.
It happened in only two circumstances: when swearing loyalty, or when acknowledging a debt of life. And what they were offering Sion now was gratitude for the latter.
Sion watched their salute in silence. The feeling was new.
Before the regression. He remembered the version of himself who'd clung to the empty shell of the Karsen name. Not even properly—just half-heartedly leaning on it. The respect he'd never received back then had come full circle to find him at last.
Sion spoke slowly.
"There is nothing to thank me for. In a one-on-one fight with Jeffren, I would have lost. So this result was made by all of you—who stood your ground and fought instead of running from a powerful enemy."
Sion delivered his thoughts with a voice that carried weight.
"I may not be an official Knight yet, but my father once said this. Knights are exalted beings. Great power may be a Knight's hallmark, but it is not the whole of what a Knight is.
The spirit of endlessly honing one's martial skill and never retreating, even before a stronger foe. That is the meaning of a Knight."
Sion genuinely believed it. Without magic, the fight would have been far harder—he'd won because of these Knights.
But they had no way of knowing what was in Sion's heart. And so, a deep resonance struck the hearts of the three Knights.
"I apologize. I misjudged you all this time."
"You have earned my respect, Lord Sion."
"......I, too, misjudged you."
The Knights suddenly apologized to Sion. Sion stared at them for a moment, then sharply turned his head away. A thought crossed his mind.
'Arrogant bastards. How much did you talk behind my back all this time?'
Of course, the feeling wasn't bad.
No—it felt a little good.
***
While the agents devoted themselves to cleanup at the scene.
I used Mana Detection to scour every inch of the Red Fang's main stronghold.
THUMP, THUMP—
My heart pulsed again. Was this normal? It hadn't done this before. I wasn't sure.
After searching for some time, I finally located their hidden chamber.
RUMBLE—
I opened the entrance to the underground passage through a series of mechanisms and descended with the agents.
A spacious laboratory appeared. Inside, dead bodies were being studied in various ways—but there were no living hostages.
"Research into implanting mana engines into human bodies...... Vile."
I muttered a curse under my breath, then surveyed the laboratory. The research contents, however, were quite crude.
'You couldn't create anything with research like this.'
As I continued investigating, I discovered a single journal.
『J-76_Revenge Journal.』
"......"
I opened it. It began with the story of how a boy named "Bulka," a shepherd from a remote Northern village, became the test subject "Jeffren"—a rather harrowing account.
From the masked men who burst in without warning, brutally murdered his mother and father, beat him and his younger sibling half to death, and dragged them away—to the day he actively cooperated with the experiments to protect his sibling, only to find himself facing his sibling's cold, lifeless remains.
Curses against the researchers.
Vengeance against a specific organization.
The need for power to bring them down—all of it bled through in raw, rough language.
Jeffren.
He was not Post Iron's puppet. He was the opposite—a being who despised them. A test subject who had escaped.
A wretched human who had become a villain to take revenge on a greater evil.
I closed the journal.
And set it down on the desk.
"There will be no forgiveness. But."
To prevent humanity's extinction.
To destroy the absolute evil that was the Demon King.
'I will take your revenge for you.'
The power to do that. The authority.
The Inspectorate's Special Investigation Unit.
The condition for forming the unit.
The Golden Star Tournament was right around the corner.