BXBX NOVEL Chapter 123 - When to Crouch (3)
Chapter 123 - When to Crouch (3)
After returning to his room, Frey immediately drew Asura’s summoning circle.
This was so he could summon him at a moment’s notice.
Then, he immediately began to pay close attention to his surroundings.
“…”
No one had followed him, and there was no one revealing any hostile intentions towards him.
Frey frowned.
“Why did she let me go?”
Leyrin had definitely noticed the divine power hidden within his body.
He had no doubt about that.
Nevertheless, she didn’t attack him but instead sent Frey back upstairs.
Her reaction didn’t make any sense.
There was no trace of hostility at all.
She hadn’t even sent someone to follow him.
‘Is it because she can kill me at any time?’
No.
That wasn’t it.
That wasn’t the feeling he had gotten from her reaction.
But could there be any other reason?
Frey replayed his memory of the scene.
‘Leyrin was surprised to find Indra’s divine power in my body.’
That was understandable.
But then she panicked.
…Why did she panic?
With Leyrin’s power, she should’ve been able to overpower him easily.
It would be even easier for her to kill him.
Even if he had reached 8 stars, it was still impossible for him to win in a head to head clash with an Apocalypse.
‘Did she see my stage?’
Had Leyrin realised that he was also an 8 star Wizard?
No, that wasn’t possible either.
Even if he didn’t know much about divine power, he knew that it was impossible for Leyrin to have sensed the mana he was concealing.
“…”
That was not it either.
Frey kept thinking.
Questions popped up one after another.
All of his previous assumptions were wrong. This meant that he had taken the wrong step from the start.
Frey closed his eyes.
Since he couldn’t reach a conclusion, he needed to change his approach.
He diverted all his energy to thinking.
A drop of sweat rolled down Frey’s face.
If he had the brain of a normal person, this sort of repetitive thinking would have already burnt it out by now.
Since his previous assumptions were incorrect, he relentlessly calculated and narrowed down the possibilities.
After an unknown period of time, there was only one thought left in Frey’s mind.
…What if it wasn’t that she didn’t want to take action but that she couldn’t take action?
“Avatar.”
He opened his eyes.
It was an avatar, not Leyrin’s true body.
A being who only had a small portion of the main body’s power.
It was strong enough to wipe out tens of strong fighters, but it was not strong enough to defeat the current him.
In general, there were only two reasons why a Demigod would use an avatar. When it was trying to hide its power and when it could not move its main body.
Frey believed it was the latter.
It would make the most sense if the Leyrin he had met was just an avatar, not her main body, and it would also mean that her main body was unable to move at that moment.
After all, she was either weakened or had limited strength.
He couldn’t be sure, but Frey believed it had something to do with the other Apocalypses who were fatally injured.
She wasn’t confident.
She wasn’t confident that she could perfectly deal with Frey in her current state.
That was why she sent him back.
She was trying to buy time by pretending she didn’t notice.
“Hmm.”
That last part was particularly important.
Leyrin wanted to buy time.
He didn’t know why, but that fact was obvious.
If so, it meant Frey had to move faster.
‘I have to completely revise my plan.’
Frey left his room.
Before long, the entire Blake family would be overturned.
Probably by his own hands.
Before that, there was a man whose position he had to confirm.
* * *
The Livindak Mountains.
Located near the Silkid Desert, it was one of the most rugged alpine regions on the continent.
Even monsters, known to be able to survive even the harshest of conditions were nowhere to be seen as this place consisted mostly of barren, rocky mountains where vertical cliffs of dizzying heights were endless.
It was a barren land where not even weeds grew.
Atop the mesa(1) on Mount Roxeo, there were transcendent beings.
Kooo.
Not one but four. A skeleton, a ball of flame and a scorpion.
The one thing they shared in common was their enormous size that seemed to surpass imagination.
And standing in the center of these huge beings was one whose body was devoid of any common features.
White light constantly flowed from this featureless figure and illuminated the surroundings.
Lord.
And the three Demigods who had been severely injured by Riki.
[…]
The white light that was exuded from Lord’s body was slowly being absorbed by the other three.
He was sharing his divine power.
An ability that only Lord had among all the Demigods.
Riki.
The power of the sword.
In this world, there was nothing that couldn’t be cut by a sword wielded by him.
This was clear by the fact that he had even been able to cut the barrier Lord had created.
If it wasn’t for Lord’s help, these three would have already died painful deaths.
It was then.
Leyrin appeared beside Lord.
She solemnly watched this scene of divine power being transferred.
‘…if it wasn’t for this, I wouldn’t have had to use my avatar.’
There was only a small amount of divine power left in her body at that moment because Lord had extracted most of it and infused it into the bodies of the other three.
If Leyrin had been at full power, then it would have been a simple task to capture Frey, who she’d found in the family, and extract information.
But it couldn’t be helped.
After all, she couldn’t just ignore her siblings who were on the verge of death.
“Lord.”
[Leyrin, what’s the matter?]
When she heard his words, Leyrin couldn’t help but sigh.
“There’s a problem.”
[Those words aren’t pleasant to hear.]
Especially in the current situation.
[Tell me.]
‘An enemy appeared in my lab.”
[An enemy?]
“A man with Indra’s lightning energy. No other details are known, but he is currently a threat.”
[…Indra’s lightning.]
Indra was one of their kind who had died already.
In fact, Riki had killed him while he was hibernating due to his Apostle’s death.
Lord’s eyes appeared.
[He is connected to Riki.]
“That’s right.”
[Don’t kill him. Capture him.]
“…that would be best, but it’s not as easy as it sounds.”
Leyrin’s grumbling was natural.
The opponent’s strength was unknown, and she was currently in the weakest state she’d been in in centuries.
It was impossible to make a move hastily.
‘If I were to leave this place…’
This was truly an absurd situation that she’d never experienced, even in her thousands of years of life.
She couldn’t make a move.
Lord was also aware of Leyrin’s current crisis
He spoke calmly.
[I will send some of the others.]
Leyrin’s eyes lit up.
“How many will you send?”
[…There are three of our kind near the Kastkau Empire. I will send them.]
Three Demigods.
That way, even if the man with Indra’s lightning could overpower a single Demigod, he would still be captured.
“That’s more than enough. How long will it take them to get there?”
[None of them know how to use Space-Time movement, so it will take about three days.]
“…three days.”
Leyrin’s expression darkened once again.
This was because even three days felt like an eternity for her at that point.
After all, this wasn’t a situation that she could stall by running away.
The Blake family residence was the place where the research on Illuminium was steadily progressing.
If it was destroyed now, it would cause a huge disruption to the mass production of the Illuminium when they were currently only a few steps away from continental domination.
In addition, her own Apostle, Leita, was there.
‘Is he aware that Leita is my Apostle?’
She wasn’t sure, but… the chances were very high.
When Leyrin had grabbed Frey’s arm in the basement and he realised that she had sensed the lightning in his body, the first place he looked was towards Leita.
She was certain that if she made a move at that moment, he would have immediately killed Leita.
‘Did he find out from Riki’s Apostle?’
She thought about the masked man who had been standing behind Riki during the meeting not long ago.
No, now that she thought about it.
Lord himself had gone to kill that man.
After he returned, Lord hadn’t said anything, but Leyrin didn’t believe that a single Apostle would be able to escape from Lord.
Moreover, Demigods’ powers could not be replicated.
Except for Lord, there were no Demigods who could use two powers.
The same was true for Apostles.
That said, it was possible that Frey had learned of Leita’s identity through his own independent investigation.
It was also possible that he was taking a gamble by aiming at Leita.
‘Then is he the one Riki left just in case something happened?’
So he gave him Indra’s crystal.
Leyrin clicked her tongue.
Indra’s main body was dead.
This meant that the lightning power in that man’s body was no longer borrowed power, but it had instead become his own power.
With time and ‘opportunity’, it was possible for his power to go beyond the limits of Apostles.
And because he was a member of the Blake family, he also had the ability to use mana.
‘This is difficult.’
Leyrin never thought that a creature born from her own actions could make her feel such a way.
It wouldn’t be easy to endure the next three days.
(Note:
1. A mesa is an isolated, flat-topped elevation, ridge or hill, which is bounded from all sides by steep escarpments and stands distinctly above a surrounding plain.)