WIEDERGEBURT Chapter 38

I glanced at the sky as I walked back home. The stars hadn’t come out yet, but dusk was upon us. A lot of people were already inside of their homes. When I looked back down, I could see lights being emitted from behind the cracks of closed doors and wooden shutters.

With a small bag in my hand, I increased my pace and reached my house, entered through the door and slipped off my boots. As I locked the door behind me, the sound of something slithering across the floor reached my ears. I turned my head just as someone emerged from the living room.

“You have finally returned home,” Lin said, crossing her arms as she “stood” before me.

“Yeah. I’m sorry for taking so long.” I walked closer to Lin and held up the bag I’d been carrying. “I’ve brought some dinner for us to eat. Would you like to eat with me?”

Lin’s eyes brightened for a moment as her cheeks became stained with a pleasant shade of pink, but she quickly mastered her emotions. She coughed into her hand once. Then she crossed her arms again and looked away.

“This princess is pleased that you thought about her. She will grace you with her presence by eating dinner with you.”

I wanted to chuckle at her words, but I knew she would get upset at me if I did, so instead I gestured for her to follow me into the living room.

After I had gone shopping for furniture, my living room had become a lot fuller. An elegant divan sat against the far wall. It was made from a combination of soft foam and the silk skin of a Demon Beast, though I didn’t know which one. All I knew was that the divan was one of the finest pieces of furniture I currently owned. Aside from the divan, this room also had a long table with two chairs.

“Please sit down while I get the tableware,” I said to Lin, who nodded and took a seat. Being a Lamia, her manner of sitting was a little weird because she had the lower half of a snake. It had taken her a bit of effort to be capable of sitting on a chair without falling off or breaking the chair from her immense weight (Lamia were about four to five times heavier than a human thanks to their tail). I almost smiled at how her tail curled around the chair as the tip softly thumped against the floor.

After setting the bag of food on the table, I went into the kitchen, walked up to the cabinet nearest the door, and grabbed two plates, two forks, and two knives. All of them were made of steel. I could tell at a glance that they were all made using the same mold, too. Everything was identical.

I came back into the living room and paused. Lin’s tongue was flicking out of her mouth as she stared at the bag like it was her prey. From the way her golden pupils flickered between sane and feral, I could only guess that she was extremely hungry.

“Here.” I set a plate, fork, and knife out for her, and then did the same for myself as I sat down. “I’ll cut you a slice.”

I removed the object from the bag. The moment I did, a thick and savory scent filled the air, causing Lin’s stomach to growl. That would have embarrassed most girls. Not Lin. She continued to flick out her tongue and stare at the meat pie, which had been made out of ground beef, ground pork, peeled potatoes, garlic, onions, and several seasonings. All of it was wrapped together in a flakey crust.

After cutting myself a third of the meat pie, I gave the rest to Lin. She looked surprised as I put nearly two times the amount I had on her plate. Her tongue involuntarily emerged out of her lips as she gazed at the pie. It was so much longer than a human tongue that I would have been shocked if I hadn’t already seen it. Then she looked at me, as if asking me whether it was okay for her to eat all that.

“It’s all yours,” I said.

Her normally haughty smile contained an almost childish joy. “Thank you, Darling.”

I felt a little guilty as I watched Lin scarf down the meat pie mere seconds after I gave her the okay. She’d been alone in this house since I left for the tournament, which meant she’d been here without having anything to eat for well over 12 hours. It made me feel like a horrible host. I would need to do better. Regardless of what my relationship with Lin was, I was responsible for her well-being and needed to make sure she wasn’t neglected.

“How did the tournament go?” asked Lin after she finished eating.

I ate far more slowly than her, actually savoring the food instead of scarfing it down. I wondered if Lin had even been able to taste what she had eaten.

“It went well so far,” I answered after swallowing a bite of food. “I won my preliminary match, which means I’ll be fighting in the tournament proper tomorrow. There are 15 other people, so that means there will be four rounds of matches, making for a total of 30 matches.”

“It sounds like you will be fighting against a lot of people.” Lin frowned. “This princess understands that you are strong, but she would like to ask that you don’t overexert yourself. As her husband, you have a duty to bless this princess with children at some point, so you cannot afford to injure yourself.”

It was amazing how Lin could say something so touching one second, and then completely screwed up the next. Had she stuck with that first sentence of hers, I probably would have been touched, but that last one made it sound like all she wanted from me was my sperm.

“You don’t have to worry. Each contender will only fight, at most, four times.”

“This princess understands. So it’s like that.”

I finished eating my slice of the meat pie and frowned as I realized we were missing something.

“Would you like a cup of water?” I asked Lin as I stood up.

Lin’s eyes sparkled just a bit at the mention of water. “This princess would appreciate some water. Thank you very much.”

I grabbed two cups of water from the kitchen, and then went to the backyard. Walking along the grass, I moved past a pair of moderately-sized oak trees. There was a stream just beyond it. It flowed through my yard. The wall had been built further underground, and the area around the stream had grates that let it flow through unobstructed.

Kneeling by the stream, I filled the two cups and prepared to sanitize the water with the water element, but I paused when a fluctuation in foreign Spiritual Power set me off. Someone had used a Spiritual Technique. They weren’t someone I knew. Furthermore, that someone was right behind me.

Dropping the cups into the stream, I rolled across the ground to my left as a swift breeze past me. As I shifted onto my feet, I saw that what had struck the ground was a pair of throwing knives. They were about 

I stood up and moved again as the person, a figure in a cloak, moved to attack me. Several more throwing knives shot out from within their voluminous sleeves. I didn’t bother dodging. I pointed a finger at them and channeled my Spiritual Power, using the lightning element to knock the knives off course. One struck the tree, but the other landed in the stream.

I was about to attack the cloaked individual—when I sensed movement behind me and turned around. There were two other people dressed in the same black cloaks. One of them was wielding a sickle with a chain and the other had a morning star.

Clicking my tongue, I stomped on the ground. The water from the stream rose into the air, transformed into a pair of spears, and shot toward the two new attackers. However, just before it reached them, the pair disappeared into the shadows cast by the wall. Using Spiritual Perception, I tracked waited until I could sense their presence as they appeared again beside the oak trees.

I had been planning to attack them the moment they reappeared, but the first cloaked figure who attacked me threw several more throwing knives. Groaning in annoyance, I waved my hand and created a wall of water that blocked the knives, and then I waved my hand again and the wall suddenly shot forward and slammed into that person with enough force to knock him clean off their feet. He hit the ground several meters away.

The other two figures launched their weapons at me. The sickle came flying in from my left, while the morning star came in from the front.

I used the Flash Step.

I appeared next to the person with the morning star, grabbed their head before they even had time to realize I was there, and slammed it into my knee. There was a mask covering their face. The mask shattered and several pieces fell to the grass as my enemy went flying. That person landed on the ground, but then smoke poured from their body as they evaporated into nothing, just like those people I had fought the night Lin was attacked in my previous residence.

The last cloaked figure was the one with the sickle. He, or maybe she, backed up as though preparing to run. I wouldn’t let that happen.

A surge of Spiritual Power flowed through my arm as I raised my hand and pointed it at the person with my index and middle finger, from which a line of water shot out. The cloaked person tried to dive into a shadow. They never made it. The water stuck to them like a Demon Beast nipping at their heels, and then it overtook them, wrapping around the figure’s body and tightening before it could reach the shadow. Now unable to move, the cloaked figure fell to the ground, though they continued to struggle.

“Too bad for you. Shadow Walking doesn’t work if someone else’s Spiritual Power is disrupting your own,” I said to the figure. “Just give up.”

I walked up to the cloaked figure and looked at them. They tried to attack by launching more throwing knives at me, which I was impressed they could do even when lying down. It must have been a wrist movement that didn’t require the full range of motion for their arms. I rolled my eyes and created a static field with my Spiritual Power. The knives crashed against it and flew off. One struck the ground near the cloaked figure’s head. The other landed in the grass.

“Now let’s see who you are,” I murmured as motioned with my hand. The water whip coiled around the sleeves and also congealed around the figure’s hands to keep them from attacking me again.

I remembered what happened the last time when Lin was attacked by these people. One of them had escaped, and after I killed them, I removed their mask to see who or what it was. However, the moment I did, smoke poured from its body and both figure and mask dissipated into black wisps. I was sure that would happen again if I removed its mask, so instead, I just moved the cloak a bit.

This mask, which had two horns jutting from it and a demonic appearance, was a bit more intricate than the one that the other attackers had been wearing. I wondered if that meant something. Shaking my head, I focused on the figure. Aside from the mask, it looked like this person’s body was pure black and didn’t look at all like skin. It seemed as if the body was made from the very shadows. It certainly wasn’t human.

As I was studying the mask, several Runes suddenly appeared on its surface, glowing a bright blue. Fehu Reversed. Ansuz Merkstave. Nauthiz Merkstave. My eyes widened as these three Runes, which were the inverse of regular Runes, appeared on the mask’s forehead. A second later, one last Rune appeared. Hagalaz.

My eyes widened.

“Shit!”

Leaping backward, I held out my hands and created a powerful water dome around me just as the cloaked figure exploded. Black smoke expanded from the explosion, growing into a large plume that hung in the air for several seconds. I grimaced as I watched a black powdery substance touched my dome. The stuff sank into the water, turning it a murky black, but I channeled more Spiritual Power through the dome and purified the poison before it could become harmful.

The smoke soon vanished. I dropped the dome and looked around. My backyard was a mess. Black powder covered a lot of it, and the powder had a highly poisonous effect. The two oak trees and grass had withered and died already. That made me grimace. I hadn’t done anything with this backyard yet, but I had been thinking about turning it into a meditation garden. Well, that idea had been destroyed before it began.

Channeling the water element through my hands, I knelt on the ground and used the healing properties to clear away the impurities of the poison. It was impossible to restore the grass and tree to life. However, I didn’t want Lin coming out here and accidentally getting herself poisoned. Once that task was done, I returned to the stream, grabbed the cups that I’d thrown in the river, and filled them with water again—purified and sanitized water, of course.

“What took you so long, Darling?” asked Lin as I returned to the living room and set one of the still wet cups on the table in front of her.

“I was attacked by those cloaked people again,” I said just as Lin had raised the cup to her lips.

She paused in her movements, the cup halfway to her lips. I slowly drank from my cup of water as she looked me over as though checking for injuries. Once she had confirmed that I was unharmed, the tension in her shoulders relaxed.

“It seems as though they did not manage to hurt you.” She drank from the cup, and then sighed before setting it back down. “But now this princess is curious about who these people are. It seems as though they are targeting you specifically for some reason.”

“You’re not the only one who is curious,” I admitted. “As far as I am aware, I don’t have that many enemies right now. Really, Grant Leucht is the only person I can think of who is actively antagonistic toward me, but I don’t think he has the ability to command a group of assassins like this. What’s more…”

“What’s more?” Lin stared at me when I trailed off.

My brow furrowed as I replayed the two encounters I had within my mind. “It seemed like those people who attacked me were being controlled—no, it was more like they were puppets instead of people. They wore a mask that had several Runes on them. I’m not sure about their configuration, but judging from what the Runes were and how they were arrayed, I can only assume it is a type of enslavement Rune.”

“So those people were not attacking you of their own free will?” asked Lin.

“Perhaps.” I shrugged. “It is too soon for me to say anything, but it looks like someone was controlling the actions of those cloaked people.”

Lin accepted my explanation with a nod. What I didn’t tell her was that I had seen something vaguely similar to these cloaked individuals before. In my previous timeline. When Kari and I were traveling around the Northern Plain, there had been several cloaked figures who’d gone about kidnapping people and sacrificing them in ancient ruins. The difference between these figures and those ones was three-fold.

First: These people, or creatures, were being controlled by someone. In my previous timeline, the creatures that had sacrificed people in ancient ruins were not being controlled by anyone, though they did have a leader. Judging from the seal these masked people were wearing, they were not in control of their own actions.

Second: It seemed these cloaked figures were being controlled by someone who had a completely different agenda from the leaders who had been controlling the Sekbeists.

Third: These figures appeared to be a different species. Those other cloaked figures had been more demonic and monstrous, while the ones that had attacked me just now were like shadows given a human shape.

“Then we will just have to keep our eyes and ears open,” Lin determined, speaking into the silence. “This princess shall make sure to be extra cautious and protect you in case you are attacked again.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“This princess will not let anyone touch her husband when he hasn’t even given her a child yet.”

“Ugh…”

***

“Hmmm…”

A thoughtful hum escaped the cloaked man’s lips as he stood on a roof several meters from the house where Eryk Veiger lived. He did not move at all. In the still night, where not even a breeze existed, this figure appeared just like a shadow.

“That child destroyed three of my elite puppets,” he murmured. “Not only did he defeat them, but he did so with relative ease. This child is indeed strong. I can now see why Hagen wants me to dispose of him. However, it seems killing this child will not be an easy task. I may have to summon more puppets to get rid of him… but those are quite hard to acquire. Quite hard indeed.”

The cloak over his head shifted as he looked up at the twin moons, which hung in the sky to provide a sparse amount of illumination alongside the stars.

“It seems killing him before tomorrow is not an option. I’ll let Hagen know. It is not like that man can do anything to punish me should I return in failure. Ke ke.” He glanced at the house Eryk had entered one more time, his lips twitching into a smile. “I am actually interested in seeing how that child does in the tournament. Hopefully, he will not disappoint me.”

Nodding to himself, the figure sank into the shadows on the roof, his cackles echoing around the area before even those disappeared.