The Sword Genius of the Magic Empire - Chapter 71



Only Noblemtl

At the chieftain’s question, Leontos staggered but stood up, clutching the saddle that resembled a stone axe.

He said this while wiping his bleeding lip with his fist, as the blood vessel had burst due to the side effect of the magic potion.

“… You asked me why I did this?”

Leontos chuckled for a moment, then chuckled softly.

His long gray hair flowed down like a lion’s mane, casting shadows over his face.

The next moment, he raised his head, spread his arms wide, and roared at all the water people who could hear him.

“─If not me, then no one else will!”

Leontos shouted in a tone of anger.

“You know it too! Our tribe is destined to perish in no time if we continue like this!”

The southern part of Elseid is a barren land made up only of hordes of demons and canyons of rocks.

The situation here was not very good.

The already scarce resources in the surrounding area were being depleted, and the population of the tribesmen was rapidly decreasing over generations.

To begin with, it was a remote land where the ancestors of the past Suin settled as if they were being driven out of the empire. It was not a place where one could settle down and live for a long time.

It’s a miracle that we’ve survived this far.

However, that did not mean that the tribe could be accepted without a hitch.

If we are not accepted by the Empire, all the people in this barren land will just wither and die.

Therefore, there was a need for laws and systems that would allow the people living in the southern part of Elseid to safely advance to the empire.

The chieftain asked him a question without moving an inch.

“Does that mean you really think this is the right way to do it?”

“Me too! I once believed that we could find a peaceful solution by compromising with the Empire’s wizards!”

At one time, Leontus also truly believed so.

I went to see the rulers of the empire one by one.

I wanted to change perceptions through logic and persuasion.

I thought they would understand too.

That we, Suin, are not as dangerous as they think.

Except for their ears and tails, the humans are just like you.

But no one listened to those words.

He is always treated coldly wherever he goes.

Still, I did not lose hope, believing that I could continue to persuade. There was definitely a time like that.

Leontus said, gritting his teeth.

“I wanted to persuade the Empire realistically by offering the superior fighting ability and physical labor of the Suin as terms of negotiation. That was the order you, the chieftain, gave from the beginning!”

“But why did you suddenly change your mind and do this?”

“Are you really asking because you don’t know?”

Leontos spat out a curse to the chieftain.

“Because the Empire killed all my innocent subordinates who came looking for me!”

His subordinates set out to find Leontos, who had not been heard from for a while.

“They said there would be money to be made on the black market! People!”

However, during their journey to meet Leontos, they were brutally murdered within the Empire.

“Since the water race is rare in the Empire, they will be sold at high prices as experimental materials for warlocks! Those arrested murderers said that to my face!”

The murderers were released after paying only a small fine.

That is the reaction of the imperial society to the deaths of innocent people.

It was the only answer the Empire gave him.

“Great Chieftain Lycaon! In the reunited corpses of my men, I saw the future of our tribe!”

That’s why teeth were needed, not a tongue.

To speak to them in a language they can understand.

I will become the fangs that will tear apart the arrogance of the empire.

“If we attack innocent Imperial citizens and draw the attention of the Empire, at least they will pay attention to the voices we shout! At least their sacrifice will draw attention to us, the Suin people!”

The orange glow of dawn gradually fades into the cold blue atmosphere of midnight.

The wizards of Elseid, wearing the black operational robes of their family, silently watched Leontos as he shouted.

“That’s why I did it my way!”

Leontos roared.

“Cooperating with the vendetta is the only way for us, the underdogs, to secure our future!”

But the next moment, Shiroko opened her mouth in front of him.

“The only way?”

Shiroko said, looking straight at the guy.

“You just gave up!”

An exile who once despaired so deeply that he gave up looking for a way out. He simply chose the path that was right in front of him.

To him, the young chieftain’s successor shouted clearly and angrily.

“Vendetta planned to enslave our tribe! And yet he thought it was for the future of the village?”

“In return, Vendetta promised a future for our tribe!”

He shouted, clutching his saddle.

“We will exclude the children of the Suin from the experiments and provide them with a hideout in the Empire with the power of Vendetta! Do you think there is a better future for us who have nothing!”

Leontos stubbornly shouted at Sirocco, as if he was determined to hold on to his end.

“Everything was a choice for the future of the tribe!”

Sirocco, hearing his desperate shout, hesitated for a moment without realizing it, but then shouted at him.

“No! That’s right…!”

“Then deny it! I was wrong! Prove with your own mouth that what I did for the future of the tribe was not right!”

Shiroko clenched both fists.

No, you’re definitely wrong.

The way Leontos shouted was not right.

But for some reason I couldn’t open my mouth.

It wasn’t because I didn’t want to talk. Rather, it was because the mountain of things I wanted to say were unorganized and tangled up inside me.

─No.

For a moment, a memory flashed through her head of the time she had frozen in place before Leontos in the fortress.

‘This time too, I… … .’

Shiroko bit her lip without realizing it and lowered her head slightly.

However, beyond the bowed Sirocco.

“I like the future.”

Enoch approached, staggering slightly, and cut off his horse’s head firmly.

Swish

Shiroko suddenly raised her head at the sound of someone passing by her.

A boy with black hair was reflected above the girl’s ruby-clear eyes.

chuck.

Enoch, standing in front of Leontos, pointed to the side.

At the tip of his fingers, there were young children of the water tribe who had not yet fully regained consciousness from the suppression magic circle, held in the arms of their parents in the village.

Enoch spat out coldly.

“Does that look like the future to you?”

Leontos looked at the direction he was pointing for a while, then finally muttered slowly and blankly in a voice that had lost its strength.

“No way. In exchange for cooperating with Vendetta’s experiments, they promised to spare the lives of the young beastmen…!”

Enoch replied briefly.

“How naive.”

dump.

Those words were the deciding blow, as Leontos, who was barely standing, fell to the floor as if he had collapsed.

Enoch looked at the man, who had now completely lost his energy, for a moment in silence.

There’s a reason why warlocks are ostracized in the Empire.

Not all warlocks are evil, but the fact remains that the majority of them are bad wizards.

Let alone Vendetta, who showed terrible behavior in the original work.

‘Vendetta. It seems like playing with people hasn’t changed since then.’

Even in the original, they were very good at exploiting people’s despair and sense of lack.

But Vendetta was merely a suggestion.

In the end, it was Leontos who took the outstretched hand.

In the original work, because he took such a wrong path, a disaster occurred where all of the Suin tribe were turned into demons.

In the end, Leontos’ actions hastened the destruction of the Aquarius people.

Anyway, it was time to end it.

Enoch looked at Leontos’ condition for a moment.

Wiggle.

Parts of his skin were already turning black and greatly distorted by the magic.

It must have been a side effect of the demonic potion he used in battle earlier. Demonic transformation must already be progressing rapidly inside his body.

If we left it like this, Leontos would completely lose his mind, turn into a test subject, and attack again.

Enoch looked at him and thought for a moment.

‘Before the complete transformation is over, give instructions to the wizards of Elseid….’

Right then.

Thump-

The chieftain of the Suin tribe walked heavily past Enoch, leaning on a large staff.

The chieftain slowly walked up behind Sirocco, who was still wary of Leontos who had fallen.

Then he placed his large hand on Sirocco’s small shoulder, which was still tense.

“Will you please step aside, Shiroko?”

“yes?”

At her slightly puzzled expression, the chieftain looked at Leontos who had fallen before him and spoke quietly.

“Let me do it.”

In front of all the Suin tribe and Elseid’s wizards, the chieftain took a step forward after defeating Sirocco.

Looking at the chieftain standing before him, Leontos muttered slowly.

“…You tell me.”

He asked the chief in a fading voice.

“Do you really believe that there are other paths to survival that we can choose?”

The chieftain of the water tribe looked down at Leontos, whose entire body was gradually turning black and distorted by the demonic spirits.

“Leontos. Even if we are truly nothing more than weaklings that no one cares about.”

Under the starry sky of a clear dawn.

The chieftain of the water people raised his head and looked up at the stars and said.

“We must walk the right path, even if it is difficult, not the easy but wrong path.”

The chieftain looked down at Leontos with his eyes visible through his white hair and spoke.

“Isn’t that the lesson our ancestors left for future generations?”

The distant past.

At a time when the people were living all over the empire.

The majority of beastmen who naturally manifested magic remained silent even though they knew about the miserable treatment of beastmen who were marginalized as non-magicians.

And even when the non-magical beasts who were abandoned by society were driven to their ultimate doom, they simply stood by and watched, not caring about their own business.

like that.

The result of the non-magical water people struggling to survive by joining hands with the warlocks was eventually reflected back on the entire water people who tacitly agreed to reject them.

The beastmen who had naturally developed magic, who had turned a blind eye to those who had been abandoned by the imperial society, also ended up paying the price for their inaction.

Now, standing on a land that holds all that history.

The chieftain slowly aimed the long staff he was holding in his hand at Leontos.

chuck.

In the middle of the square, watched by all the awakened watermen and wizards of Elseid, the tip of the chieftain’s staff was pointed at the tribe’s outcast.

Leontos laughed bitterly.

“In the end, you are the one who finishes it.”

The chieftain answered softly.

“The past must be tied up in the past.”

The chief glanced at Sirocco and added softly.

“Our mistakes are not the responsibility of the future that will go forward, my old friend.”

Leontos smiled and said,

“… I agree. That is.”

The next moment, a small cutting sound echoed throughout the surroundings.

A blade of wind formed from the chieftain’s stables and cut off Leontos’ neck, which was visible as a silhouette in the dawn.

Suddenly a small breeze blew.

As Leontos took his last breath, a gentle breeze blew from somewhere and swept across the sky.

A gust of wind rose.

Someone’s last breath lightly brushed the collars and hair of Elseid’s wizards and watermen.

And then it soon disappeared into the star-filled sky.

Enoch watched the whole scene with his own eyes and quietly meditated in his heart.

‘That’s it, that’s it.’

The masterminds who turned the Suin tribe into beasts. All the incidents that led to their destruction have been sorted out.

And with this, the possibility of the demonic experiment subjects running wild in the original work killing Enoch has been completely blocked from the source.

At least the primary goal of coming here has been achieved.

‘But the most important thing still remains.’

Enoch’s eyes lit up as he remembered that fact.

Of course, there was a different goal from the beginning.

Sirocco Lycaon.

A magician who was originally a Tier 1 dealer and was used as the main character in all routes.

Welcoming her as a follower of Enoch Elseid to prepare for the original!

Just when Enoch was thinking that far.

“excuse me!”

Just then, a scirocco approached from over there.

“Thank you for interfering with me earlier.”

Sirocco, who had been walking steadily, stood next to Enoch. Then he looked at Enoch blankly and spoke.

“I can’t explain it well, but… what Leontos said. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have been able to answer properly this time either.”

Sirocco suddenly glanced around.

And then he looked at the wizards belonging to the Elseid family wandering around in the distance and said with a hint of admiration.

“By the way, Elseid is truly amazing. Our tribe’s warriors are strong, but your group’s warriors are even stronger. It’s so strong that I want to emulate them.”

Sirocco looked up at Enoch and said.

“And… you too, I think.”

Just then, a transparent orange light spread brightly across the blue dawn sky.

Sirocco’s red hair fluttered in the wind.

She looked up at Enoch with a faint smile and a blush on her pale cheeks.

“… … .”

Enoch made no answer.

Shiroko protested, perking up her ears as if slightly annoyed by such a bland response.

“Hey, what is it? Aren’t you happy? This is praise from me, the heir to the patriarch!”

Of course, the reason Enoch didn’t respond was obvious.

‘This is a big deal, I’m losing consciousness more and more!’

The physical condition that allowed me to answer normally has long since passed.

To make matters worse, the very, very familiar ‘swaying shadows’ suddenly began to encroach on the edges of Enoch’s vision.

For a moment, a bad feeling came over me.

‘Could this be, a world without form?’

The moment I realized that it was a trace of the world of nothingness, familiar sentences appeared before my eyes.

? Notification: Current user’s consciousness is unstable

? When the user loses consciousness, he enters the “world of nothing”

Enoch opened his eyes wide at the unexpected message.

‘Hey, wait a minute. What is this…?’

Does that mean that if I faint I’ll be dragged into the inner world?

“Hmm, that’s weird. You?”

Meanwhile, Sirocco tilted her head slightly as if she found it strange when Enoch did not answer and asked again.

“I mean, that huge magic circle that was all over the village earlier. Thanks to you blocking it, didn’t the other bad wizards run away? I thought you’d be happier since you accomplished something so great.”

But Enoch was no longer listening.

Now, if someone even lightly touched me from the side, I would be on the verge of falling over.

Still, Enoch tried to keep his mind sharp by repeating as many positive thoughts as possible.

‘But fortunately, the battle is over. There are no enemies, so there’s no need to worry about someone suddenly striking the last blow…’

And right then.

“Anyway, you worked hard. I mean, you.”

Took.

Sirocco nudged Enoch in the side with his elbow, meaning that he had suffered.

Enoch’s eyes widened in an instant.

An unimaginable final blow.

“Keep going…!”

Enoch let out a gasp as his side was lightly pricked.

At that moment, Sirocco’s dumbfounded voice was heard as he saw it from the side.

“…ah?”

Just before Enoch fell forward, he saw Sirocco’s extremely flustered expression next to him.

“Huh? Hey! Why all of a sudden… .”

Without even a chance to respond, Enoch lost his balance. This time, his face was completely buried in the bare ground.

Heading towards the bare ground, Enoch’s consciousness slowly fades away.

As always, a white message came to mind without me noticing.

? Notification: User loss of consciousness confirmed

“What, what? I, I just tapped it lightly!”

Entering the world of nothingness, beyond the darkened field of vision.

Sirocco’s panicked voice was quickly lost in the distance.

“Don’t die!”

? The World of No-Fullness: Entering the Beginning