Swordmeister of Rome

Chapter 138: Migration

“Are you all ready?” Lagaope asked his people in front of him. Everyone looked worried. A sharp-looking man that looked uncomfortable asked, “Hey, Lagaope. Are you sure it’s okay this time?”

“Haha, it’s okay for sure, Kiladepal.”

Lagaope reassured him, but Kiladepal remained unconvinced.

“You said that 400 years ago. Everyone died. You would’ve died if it wasn’t for Con-Rad.”

Lagaope then smiled apologetically.

“Haha... but you are all alive here. We had orbs anyway. We have orbs this time also, so don’t worry.”

“Hmph.”

Kiladepal turned away. At least they did have a way to revive if things went south.

“We won’t have another chance. This one is better than 400 years ago.”

“Right.”

A calm woman answered next to him, agreeing with Lagaope.

“Isn’t it? Robanotton, don’t worry. It’ll work out.”

“Yeah, I think it’s better than using an underground tunnel or flying.”

“...”

Among the many things he tried, those were the worst. It was too hard to run through Sky Mountain in a tunnel and there was no way the Seven-Horned would not sense it, so the project was abandoned. The flying plan also turned out to be problematic. As they went to higher altitudes, some unknown force kept dragging them down. They could fly as high as about eight miles, but that was still within range of Chrona or Dragona.

It was a plan that wasted a whole year’s budget from the old Empire. Lagaope grinned.

“But shouldn’t we take that new one and Stantahl with us?” Robanotton asked curiously. The others seemed to share the same idea. They were busy preparing for the plan so they had never met them, except for Liviath.

“Hey, it’s okay. It’s better to avoid such disasters.”

“Why?”

Robanotton turned to Liviath. She’d never seen the always-arrogant Liviath to be scared of a man. He was overbearing to almost anyone except Con-Rad.

“It doesn’t matter and we won’t see him again.”

Liviath avoided the question and Lagaope opened up to answer Robanotton’s question.

“Well, it was their choice. Besides, Mister Sian will live here with no problems. He’s one of a kind.”

Lagaope spoke as he thought about Sian’s love for his family. He was most special kind of ‘Noble’ he’d ever met. If he killed Nekra, it meant he was stronger than Con-Rad. To be that strong when he was just twenty-two years old! Lagaope couldn’t believe it. He created orbs to revive his family in case they got swept up by Lagaope’s plan, so it was going to be okay.

Lagaope then checked the egg going up on the rune through the video.

“Good. <Egg> is up.”

“Can we not hide now?” Kiladepal asked.

“Yes, get ready to jump out.”

Lagaope answered but Liviath asked, “Lagaope, can that really provide energy to the rune? Even I don’t have enough energy to power the rune.”

Liviath asked because he saw the rune’s sheer scale. Even his <Way>, the <Sun>, would not be enough. He couldn’t believe one egg could do such a job.

“Don’t worry. It’s not just some egg. Get ready, it’s going to start.”

“Evacuate! Hurry!”

The steel orb began to shine as soon as it was placed above the rune. The light from the rune shot onto the orb and made it shine. The weak beam of light shone stronger and the orb was now shining as if it was the sun itself. But the light was being swallowed by the rune and then the large rune itself began to shine.

People who were working on it had evacuated and watched from afar. They then felt tremors from the ground.

“Something’s starting!”

A tremor that felt like the pounding of a heart became louder. Then people realized something was wrong. This was not a pulse from the rune. It was more like...

“Isn’t this like a footstep?”

“Huh? No way. It’s not like a mountain’s walking over,” the knight replied. They couldn’t see anything happening nearby. The only thing they saw was Sky Mountain and the Great Forest. If they could feel the tremor so far away that they couldn’t even see the object, then they couldn’t imagine how big it could be.

And there was Sian who was watching it happen. He ran here as his feeling had guided him.

‘I’m not sure if I came to the right place.’

Something ominous was being activated and there was something approaching from the distance.

“Wow... Sian, what is that?”

“I told you not to follow me.”

Sian sighed. But Stiel didn’t care as she had already seen something interesting.

“That’s... probably stronger than the cow.”

It wasn’t visible to the knights but Sian and Stiel saw it perfectly. It was a gigantic monster walking toward this place. It had much thicker horns than the cow monster Sian fought before. After looking at the monster’s angry face, Sian realized what kind of orb was placed on the rune.

“I think that egg belongs to him.”

“Yeah. How did they steal that from him?”

Stiel and Sian looked curiously, but it didn’t seem to be a huge problem. The monster looked stronger than the cow, but it was no match for Sian.

Stiel was more curious about the purpose of the rune. The rune was devouring the energy that was extracted into the egg to help it hatch. It was more than the energy Liviath released last time.

The people below were mindlessly running away as they saw the monster. This place was too far from the Wall so there was no one around to defend against such a monster. Besides, those kinds of monsters were usually handled by Groyn, but he wasn’t here.

When the monster arrived at the rune, it carefully grabbed the egg with its mouth. But the egg had done its job.

As the monster walked in, the rune powering up.

“It’s in!”

Lagaope activated it as soon as <Chromat> walked into the rune. Like Chrona, those monster families did not let their families fall into danger.

“Thank you for bringing the egg, Con-Rad.”

“No, I just did what the window told me to do. This Aksarai is really something.”

The former Kirat, or now Con-Rad, mumbled as he looked through the quest window that showed up in front of him. He just did what it told him to do and it allowed him to steal the egg without getting caught by Chrona or its offspring, Chromat. It would be an impossible job otherwise.

Con-Rad now believed in this quest window 100%. It was best to follow what it ordered him to do, although success wasn’t guaranteed. It would’ve been better if he had the same power 400 years ago.

“Isn’t it great? I was worried that she wasn’t related to you, but I believed in you, Con-Rad. It would not have worked if you didn’t have experience on reviving.”

Reincarnation only worked on descendants because it required the spirit to be similar. But Con-Rad had accidentally reincarnated into Granine in the past so Lagaope used the large number of Talic Stones he had stored to successfully revive Con-Rad.

“Right.”

Con-Rad spoke as he looked upon the status window.

[Status: Kal-Kirat -> Con-Rad]

Man living a third life, Connector of Aksarai, Dual Power User

Level: 399

Bander: ...

Exar: ...

Skills: Explosive Fire, Void, Lasod-Ra, Destruction, Cherubim, Akmasai...

“I think I can beat Nekra with this, but is it true that he died?”

“Yes, he died.”

“Wow, so he really is monstrous.”

If Nekra lost, he would lose too. They were both blocked by the barrier. But it looked like that Sian had passed through.

“He’s one of a kind.”

“Then... isn’t it simpler to ask him to join and try to fight our way in?” Con-Rad answered as he didn’t like the current plan.

“Did you lose memory when you came back? You know it’s not something we can deal with.”

Lagaope answered as he remembered the events of 400 years ago. The plan went well back then. They made the Empire do their bidding and helped Con-Rad to make the Soul Transfer Orb. It was good as they needed insurance for backup. They made the Empire tie down the Kal-Guls and Con-Rad dealt with Nekra so they could kidnap Chrona’s offspring that was trying to lay an egg. They tried their best to not to be captured by Chrona.

Yet, it failed. As the offspring let out a wail, Chrona came in seconds and their plan was over. The one breath that she fired killed everything.

Lagaope survived because he was out of range to do other preparations. Luckily, that allowed Lagaope to revive everyone else.

“Right... I didn’t expect that huge monster to be that fast.”

“You can die alone if you want,” Lagaope answered sarcastically.

Con-Rad smiled.

“Hehe, weren’t you sad when I died? I saw you wailing like a madman before I died.”

“...I wouldn’t have cried like that if I knew you were going to be revived. Besides, how can you not be sad when you lose the first friend you got after coming here? Don’t say I was the only one who was sad.”

As they talked, the rune tied Chromat down.

The plan 400 years ago failed miserably, but they discovered one thing.

Chrona never strayed too far from her offspring. She did stay out of offspring’s range to avoid the offspring going rampant with Chrona pressuring them, but she didn’t stay too far out either.

If she heard the wail of its offspring, she would come rushing in.

And that was when Chromat wailed sadly into the skies.