Chapter 445

Book 1 Chapter 445

Leo perched on the edge of the hotel rooftop, his gaze fixed on the evening sky.

The constellations scattered across the heavens seemed remarkably brilliant tonight.

After spending a quiet moment observing the stars, Leo cast his eyes downward.

Below, he spotted Chelsea sitting by herself in the courtyard garden, lost in her own thoughts.

Right at that moment.

“Whew! Huff, huff!”

Arion materialized right next to him, panting heavily.

“Did Ard end up hunting you down or something?”

“I-I was terrified!”

Arion shuddered visibly at Leo’s query.

“How long do you plan on shaking like a leaf every single time his gaze goes blank?”

“B-But…! Just a moment ago, it was vastly more terrifying than anything I’ve ever experienced from him before!”

“Well, did you actually inform Ard that you view him as your successor?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Then it makes total sense that he’d fly off the handle.”

Leo clicked his tongue, fully imagining how Ard must have thrown a fit.

Arion, who was still wearing a pathetic, tearful expression while looking at Leo, suddenly caught sight of Chelsea sitting pensively down in the courtyard.

“Oh, is that Chelsea?”

Arion spoke with a pleasant look on his face from his spot on the roof.

“Leo, it looks like Chelsea might…”

“You’re wondering if she has caught onto something?”

“So you were already aware.”

“Her actions have been rather peculiar since earlier this afternoon.”

Leo brought to mind the way Chelsea had abruptly started observing him, and remarked, “I suppose I treated you with far too much familiarity.”

“Do you think it would have turned out better if we had exercised a bit more caution?”

As Arion rubbed his cheek, Leo offered a thoroughly unenthusiastic expression in return.

“Even if you tried to be careful, your acting skills are atrocious. She likely would have looked at you with even greater suspicion because of how forced you would have been, don’t you think?”

Leo was perfectly fine with treating Arion with the respect due to a hero.

However, if Leo actually behaved that way, Arion would undoubtedly slip up.

‘He would have panicked, gotten incredibly flustered, and started rambling nonsense.’

Hearing Leo’s point, Arion could only scratch his head in embarrassment.

Staring back down at Chelsea, he questioned, “Do you believe she has figured out Kyle’s true identity?”

“She most likely isn’t completely certain. From a purely logical standpoint, it should be impossible.”

The deity he had encountered within Luna’s realm.

Even Pivua considered Leo’s reincarnation to be an absolute miracle.

Given how many incredible phenomena were taking place in the world right now, the concept of reincarnation remained far too beyond comprehension.

To this, Arion replied, “Honestly, I’d prefer it if Chelsea managed to deduce that you are Kyle.”

“And why is that?”

“If she discovers you are Kyle, that young lady will undoubtedly become an incredible source of strength for you.”

“A source of strength, you say?”

“The way you are right now, Kyle, you resemble Lysianas.”

“Lysianas?”

“Yes. You are shouldering the entire weight of the world on your own.”

Arion turned his gaze away from Chelsea and looked back up toward the vast night sky.

“But even Lysianas didn’t have to carry the entire burden by himself back then. You, Luna, Dweno. A multitude of individuals who were captivated by Lysianas’s radiance stood by him and held him up.”

“Why are you excluding yourself from that list?”

At Leo’s remark, Arion offered a bittersweet smile before forging ahead.

“Right now, you’re attempting to take responsibility for absolutely everything by yourself, aren’t you? While Melina is aware of your secret, I genuinely feel you require more allies to support you at this stage.”

Arion gave a gentle smile.

“Chelsea is an incredibly intelligent and warmhearted girl. She will unquestionably be a massive asset to you.”

“You’re probably right about that.”

Leo let out a brief, amused snort.

“But the time isn’t right just yet.”

“Why? Do you not place your trust in Chelsea?”

“No, I do trust her. I received some advice from that old man back in Dweno’s world.”

“Dweno told you something?”

“Yeah. He told me to put my faith in the path for the future that I’ve chosen.”

“That sounds exactly like something Dweno would say.”

Arion gave an understanding nod.

“Which is why I chose to believe in it. However, she is still quite young. It won’t be too late for her to learn the truth about me once she is capable of standing on the very same stage.”

Hearing that conclusion, Arion silently stared at Leo for a moment.

“What is it?”

“Nothing, it’s just that Lysianas once told me something remarkably similar.”

“Lysianas did?”

“Yeah. It was on the very night after our first real battle after I joined up with the group.”

“His expression back then was truly something to behold.”

Leo let out a soft laugh.

During that initial conflict, Arion, who was nothing more than a young boy at the time, had been completely paralyzed with fear and sought refuge behind Lysianas.

Despite harboring incredible power, Arion was incredibly raw and immature back then.

“Was Lysianas’s face really that strange at the time?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten?”

Leo smiled wryly.

“Lysianas held incredibly high hopes for you back then. I was already a lost cause before I even joined, so he didn’t expect a single thing from me. And Luna, whom we barely managed to bring on board, was an absolute wild child.”

Lysianas’s expectations for the young boy who had come recommended by none other than the legendary hero, the Guardian of the Blue Sky, were astronomical.

“But the look on his face when you, completely frozen with terror, hid behind his back… He looked as though he was on the absolute verge of breaking down in tears.”

It was an expression Leo had witnessed only that single time.

“That’s precisely why Luna couldn’t stop cackling.”

Arion rubbed his cheek, vividly remembering Luna’s loud, mocking laughter.

“What exactly did you and Lysianas discuss that evening?”

“I offered him an apology. I told him I was deeply sorry for letting fear get the better of me and running away. But Lysianas simply looked at me and said this:”

‘It’s perfectly fine. You are still young. Summoning your courage won’t be too late once you are fully prepared to step onto the stage.’

Arion spoke as he envisioned Lysianas, who had offered him a gentle smile and comforting words.

“Those particular words provided me with an immense amount of bravery.”

“That is classic Lysianas.”

“Isn’t it?”

Arion laughed out loud.

“Even though I never truly felt like I was fully prepared.”

“Come on, Arion. You keep—”

Just as Leo began to speak, his brow furrowing slightly, a voice interrupted.

—Lord Leo. Lord Arion.

Melina’s voice echoed directly inside his mind.

“What’s the matter?”

—A highly unusual situation has manifested at the training grounds.

“An unusual situation? Tell me what’s happening.”

Leo demanded, his eyebrows knitting tightly together.

—A massive horde of magical beasts and monsters has suddenly begun to manifest.

Fwoosh!

Rhys hoisted his blade high into the air.

Fierce, blazing embers erupted along the length of the metal, wrapping around the weapon in spirals.

With his sword still held aloft, Rhys drove the weapon directly into the earth.

Fwoosh!

A localized ring of flames manifested right around Rhys, before expanding outward into an enormous, sweeping shockwave of fire that decimated everything in all directions.

Kwooooh!

Kwaaaah!

The agonized shrieks of the magical beasts resonated through the air.

Rhys, having successfully incinerated every single beast in the immediate vicinity, pulled his blade back out from the dirt.

‘The sheer presence of these magical beasts is still incredibly overwhelming.’

Even after wiping out an immense swarm across a massive radius, the speed at which more creatures materialized showed absolutely no signs of slowing down.

‘What in the world is causing this? Could a Legion Commander be launching an assault?’

The emergence of these creatures was bizarre.

Initially, only low-ranking monsters and basic magical beasts had broken through.

However, the relative strength and rank of the appearing threats were steadily climbing.

The entire environment felt suffocatingly ominous.

‘If this pattern persists, it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if actual demons started showing up.’

The sheer scale was enough to make anyone believe that Tartarus had launched a full-scale deployment.

Yet, despite that, no true demons had made an appearance just yet.

‘Could a Hero Record have gone completely out of control somewhere nearby?’

It hadn’t been that long since a major incident occurred where a massive hero dungeon suffered a berserk outbreak.

That particular memory was why such a thought crossed his mind.

Rhys pondered the theory for a brief second before shaking his head to dismiss it.

‘No, this entire region falls under the direct supervision of the Dragon Lord.’

With Melina present on the grounds, any hero dungeon anomaly would have been flagged a long time ago.

‘Furthermore, Lord Arion is on-site as well.’

Rhys tightened his grip around the hilt of his sword.

‘Regardless of the cause, putting a stop to these magical beasts has to be our main focus right now.’

“Rhys!”

At that precise moment, Torua’s voice cut through the chaos.

“Look up there!”

Torua gestured frantically toward the sky above.

Upon tracking her movement and spotting the wyvern-like entities that had just materialized, Rhys’s eyes twitched in alarm.

It was a draconic magical beast covered entirely in pitch-black scales.

This marked the very first time Rhys had ever laid eyes on one in person.

Even so, he recognized it immediately.

‘Fafnir.’

Arguably the most catastrophic threat to exist throughout the entire Age of Calamity.

A catastrophic creature that had been thoroughly hunted down and pushed into absolute extinction by the legendary heroes of old.

And yet, it was a beast that had begun appearing on multiple occasions in the modern era, turning it into a major subject of academic research.

Even a nightmare like Fafnir had arrived.

“It will be an absolute catastrophe if they manage to descend upon the first-year students! Torua!”

“Leave them to me!”

Torua instantly materialized her magical staff, mounted it, and rocketed directly into the upper atmosphere.

Whoosh!

A cascade of intricate magic circles began to form all around Torua’s body.

Runic incantations poured from her lips without a single moment of hesitation.

Within moments, Torua managed to intercept the vanguard of the Fafnir swarm, unleashing her prepared spell.

“Requiem.”

Flash!

“Requiem?!”

“Could that be the senior graduates who already finished their schooling?”

“To cast a Requiem spell of that sheer magnitude… That is absolutely incredible.”

The Sayrune academy students, who were actively fighting to hold back the advancing monsters, looked on with expressions of pure bewilderment and awe at the magic that illuminated the entire landscape as though the sun had suddenly risen.

Meanwhile, a short distance away.

Juen, who had been systematically taking down magical beasts by discharging rapid volleys of magic bullets, paused his assault to murmur, “That doesn’t quite look like the work of an elf, does it?”

“It definitely isn’t an elf.”

Rea, who was actively channeling her own magic right alongside Juen, twitched her ears slightly.

“That is human-engineered star magic.”

“Hmph, in that case, there is only a single mage capable of executing a spell of that caliber.”

Juen flashed a wide grin.

“It’s Big Sister Torua!”

“That is truly spectacular.”

Rea expressed genuine admiration.

The surrounding Sayrune students also wide-eyed as they overheard the conversation between the two.

“I would absolutely love the opportunity to ask her all about star magic the next time we speak.”

Right as Rea was voicing her admiration, a sudden disturbance cut her off.

Guooh!

An immense, hulking ogre let out a deafening roar and charged directly toward them.

The very second Rea caught sight of the monster and prepared to invoke her magic—

Fwoosh!

Accompanied by a brilliant streak of golden light, Aina sliced through the creature’s neck in a single, fluid motion.

Thwack! The detached head sailed high into the air.

It was a terrifyingly swift and precise display of swordsmanship.

However, the ogre, possessing the legendary resilience of its species, continued to lunge forward toward the freshmen, determined to drag at least one student down with it using its final dying breath.

“As expected of an ogre. Their life force is incredibly stubborn.”

Just as Rea prepared to discharge her magic to finish it off—

Flash!

This time, a brilliant silver streak shot through the air, cleaving the headless ogre completely in half at the waist.

“Wow, that was incredible.”

“He might be pint-sized, but his power is the real deal.”

“He really is the top student representative of Lumern for a reason!”

While the surrounding students showered Luke with praise, a different reaction erupted.

“Luke Elda! Who gave you permission to steal my kill?!”

“Eek?!”

Rea glared at him with wide, furious eyes and let out an intense shriek!

“Why do you lose your mind every single time Luke is involved?”

“Because he had the absolute nerve to secure Leo-sunbaenim as his personal instructor! And he did it before I could!”

“You’re seriously this determined to torment Luke over nothing more than that?”

Just as Juen displayed an incredibly exhausted expression at her antics—

Ku-gu-gu-gu-gu-gu-gu-gu!

The earth underneath their feet began to shudder violently.

The freshman students wobbled, struggling to maintain their footing.

“This particular tremor feels significantly worse than the previous one, doesn’t it?”

Juen noted, a surprised look crossing his features.

Leo, having just stepped through the spatial warp gate that Melina had established to transport them directly into the lands of the Plov family, narrowed his eyes at the scene before him.

Arion offered a casual flick of his wrist toward a group of roaring magical beasts that were actively leaping in their direction.

Fwoosh!

A vibrant golden aura erupted from the tips of Arion’s fingers, instantly tearing the incoming beasts to shreds.

“Arion, do you happen to pick up the scent of any demons nearby?”

In response to Leo’s question, Arion shook his head sideways.

“No. The only scents I’m picking up belong strictly to magical beasts and standard monsters.”

“What exactly is unfolding here?”

‘Based on what Melina communicated, I initially suspected that the Necromancer King might have initiated an operation. However, it looks like that isn’t what’s happening here.’

Furthermore, it wasn’t the work of any other Legion Commander either.

There was absolutely no plausible way for demons to bypass Arion’s highly acute sense of smell or his other sensory capabilities.

Ku-gu-gu-gu-gu-gu-gung!

Right at that moment, the ground beneath them began to heave with immense violence.

‘An earthquake?’

The seismic activity was incredibly powerful.

Crack!

The terrain buckled and heaved with such force that the topsoil began to fracture open.

‘The Plov estate isn’t situated in a region that should ever experience a tremor of this magnitude, is it?’

The geological structure within the Kingdom of Dellard was known for being exceptionally stable.

Even the earth spirits and the fire spirits that inhabited the molten magma deep subterranean channels were historically peaceful.

A tremor like this was highly anomalous.

Ku-ku-gu-gu-gu-gu!

Eventually, the violent shaking of the crust subsided.

‘Could this entire chaotic situation somehow be linked directly to the earthquake?’

Just as Leo’s brow furrowed in deep thought, a sound caught his attention.

“Huh?”

Arion’s voice rang out, sounding thoroughly bewildered.

“What is it?”

“I’m catching a scent.”

“A scent?”

“It’s a foul odor that I have definitely encountered in the past.”

Arion stared directly down at the soil, his facial expression turning completely rigid.

A highly offensive stench was assaulting his sensitive nose.

It carried the distinct odor of incinerated ash.

“…It matches the exact same smell I picked up back in Fairy Land… the signature scent produced by the scattered remnants of Erebus.”

“What did you say?”

Leo’s expression instantly turned dead serious.

“Except… it isn’t merely the scent of ash this time, Kyle.”

Arion’s face drained of color.

“It is actively burning.”