Ryuu Kusari no Ori -Kokoro no Uchi no 'Kokoro'-

[LN] Volume 1: Chapter 6.5

This chapter was brought to you by the collaboration between PolterGlast and Saekano Translations.

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Volume 1 Chapter 6.5

An Unforgettable Birthday Part 5

Translator : PolterGlast

Nozomu bit his lip.

There were some factors that could have led him to guess that Rugato was a vampire.

But as it turned out, he missed it, and the situation had become irreversible.

In the first place, the Dizard Empire had no contact with other countries, and no one had actually seen a vampire's appearance.

If he had released his [Ability Suppression] as soon as he realized the difference in strength between him and Rugato, neither Tima nor Mars would have suffered unnecessary injuries, and the result might not have been as bad as it was.

And now, Nozomu and his friends were defeated and were now crawling on the floor.

A feeling of deep regret welled up in Nozomu's heart, and his mind began to tense up.

He looked up to see Rugato and his contracted familiar resurrected.

"Stop! Please don't do this! If you want a soul, you can have mine! So please, don't take Somia away from me!"

Irisdina's sorrowful cry, who was being restrained in the same way as Nozomu, further tightened Nozomu's chest.

Meanwhile, the familiar of the contract had pulled out Somia's soul.

The expression on the little girl's face, which had been smiling so cheerfully, drained away, and her previously colorful skin turned pale all at once.

Her face looked the same as the dying face that Shino had on her face when she was about to die.

"Guuuu......!"

Nozomu's mind recalled the sadness that tore his whole body apart.

He could not save the person with whom he had finally opened his heart. Even though he had gained power, that power could not save Shino.

But sadness was not the only thing that welled up in his chest at that time.

Shino was smiling for the last time in the arms of her beloved disciple.

She had passed away with a satisfied smile on her face.

Even now, her death still saddened him, and his eyes would involuntarily moisten whenever he reminisced about it.

Even so, he had no regrets.

He was able to accept his master's heartfelt messages for him in the end.

(Then what about now? Is it alright for me to just sit here and watch Somia-chan die?)

No, definitely not.

At the very least, Nozomu Bountis could not accept this ending.

Nozomu grabbed the invisible chains of [Ability Suppression] that bound him.

Fear, guilt, regret, grief, resentment, anger. The invisible chains creaked and rattled as the various emotions overflowed, one after the other.

Then, Nozomu's ears suddenly heard a voice.

"Someone ...... please. Help ...... me ......"

What he heard was Irisdina's sorrowful plea. Her voice was so weak that it was hard to imagine it from her usual self.

The moment he heard it, Nozomu shrugged off all the anguish he had been feeling, tore off the chains that bound him, and released his [Ability Suppression].

◆

Explosive force ravaged the surroundings.

As if to say, "Don't do whatever you please!", the torrent of Qi swept away Rugato's magic and ran rampant.

"W-, what in the world is this? ......"

Rugato turned his attention to the source of the power that had suddenly begun to rampage and saw a boy standing up, gripping and clutching the chains that wrapped around his body.

The next moment, the boy tore Rugato's restraining magic apart like scraps of paper.

"Wha!?"

While Rugato was letting out a startled voice, Nozomu sprinted and leaped at the familiar of the contract.

The katana at his waist was drawn, and multiple flashes of the strike struck the familiar.

The familiar was cut into tiny pieces and then dispersed once again.

Rugato hastily moved away to reconfirm the boy's appearance.

His outward appearance had not changed, but a visible dense Qi was emanating from his body.

Rugato could not see through Nozomu's movements.

He suppressed the turmoil that welled up in him and glanced sideways at the boy's companions, who were also staring at the boy with astonished expressions on their faces.

(They don't seem to know what is going on either, huh? Certainly, such an amount of Qi is obviously unusual for a human being to possess.)

The familiar of the contract was created by the former head of the Waziart family, whom Rugato once served, and if it were ranked, it would be powerful enough to reach the rank of A.

Rugato, being urged by the sense of danger crawling up his back, used his ten fingers to activate multiple magic spells.

A storm of magic bullets, far denser than ever before, pounced on Nozomu.

Faced with the oncoming storm of magic bullets, Nozomu activated his [Flash Step] to break away.

The magic bullets couldn't even graze his body, but landed on the walls and floor, scattering debris in the air.

Rugato did not seem to be bothered and kept firing magic in rapid succession.

He not only shot magic bullets but also erupted flames from the floor and controlled his floating blood sword to slash at him.

Rugato's attacks, however, failed to inflict even a scratch on Nozomu's body.

Nozomu took a fast and complicated curved motion, dodging all the magic Rugato fired at him and slashing at the oncoming blood sword.

(Wha!? Too fast!)

While moving faster than a vampire's kinetic visual acuity, Nozomu was in full control of all his movements without losing his speed.

Rugato's mind was overshadowed by the drastic change in Nozomu's power, and the accuracy of his magic dulled slightly.

In an instant, Nozomu rushed forward and closed the gap between the two in a flash, as if he was weaving through the gap in Rugato's mind.

"Guuu!"

Rugato managed to parry the blade that was swung sideways at him with the blood sword he had quickly generated.

Along with the impact, both of Rugato's arms were subjected to intense pressure.

He tried to push Nozomu back by putting all his strength into his arms and even using strengthening magic, but the blades, which were firmly locked together, did not move even a muscle.

(Kuh, I'm being pushed!)

Rugato was supposed to be far superior in terms of specs as a vampire race, but on the contrary, Nozomu began to push him back.

Nozomu's blade was closing in on him.

Judging that he would be pushed away at this rate, Rugato began to pour all his magic power into the blade of his blood sword at once.

"Haaaaa!"

The blood sword exploded due to the excessive magic poured into its blade, and Rugato's body was blown away by the impact of the explosion.

The shards of the blood sword scattered by the impact injured his body, but the vampire's regenerative ability healed the wounds in the blink of an eye.

In the gap between the explosions, Rugato jumped to get out of the way as much as possible and activated his magic with his ten fingers.

A huge shadow expanded on the floor of the hall and began to bubble forth.

Nozomu came charging through the smoke of the explosion.

His body was unscathed probably because he had sensed the explosion and managed to leap backward.

The next moment, a black jaw reminiscent of the mouth of a giant lizard sprang out of the shadow and attacked Nozomu.

[The Great Jaw of Moros]

A high-level magic and classified as advanced magic.

A huge mouth, so large that it occupies the entire width of the great hall, comes in to swallow Nozomu from under his feet.

" ~!"

But Nozomu, on the contrary, used the jaw that was trying to chew him up as a foothold to leap. He then kicked the ceiling, closing the gap between himself and Rugato in a flash.

"Kuh!"

Rugato ran while generating blood swords in both hands, trying to keep as much distance from Nozomu as possible.

He also dexterously used his pinky finger to fire a magic bullet as a distraction, but it was easily deflected, finally allowing Nozomu to close in on him.

The two engaged in a high-speed exchange of slashes as they ran around in various directions.

However, Rugato was quickly cornered by Nozomu.

He tried to fend off the oncoming Nozomu by swinging his two blood swords, but the fast and precise katana broke the defense of Rugato's twin swords in just a few strikes, carving lacerations on the vampire's body.

"Guh~, ugh~, gah!"

Nozomu kept slashing at Rugato, coiling around him like a serpent.

Even if Rugato could heal his wounds with the vampire's regenerative abilities, the pain caused by the lacerations was certainly driving him over the edge.

Eventually, Rugato's posture was greatly shaken by a slash to his leg when he tried to break away. Though Rugato managed to regain his posture, his legs were now completely stopped.

"Crap-......"

"Haaaaa!"

And then the battle turned into a standstill exchange of blows.

The speed at which wounds were being carved into Rugato's body increased at an accelerating rate.

"Guh...... -no, not yet."

As Rugato's body was carved with more lacerations, he quickly transformed himself into a swarm of bats.

Nozomu's slashes cut through empty space, not hitting the countless bats.

Rugato then directed the bats toward Nozomu.

Countless fangs and claws were rushing toward Nozomu, but he skillfully used his katana and scabbard to knock them down.

However, the overwhelming number of bats gradually overwhelmed Nozomu, and wounds began to appear on his body.

The bats kept flooding in, trying to swallow Nozomu.

The next moment, however, Nozomu raised his fist and slammed it down on the floor.

[Qi-jutsu?Light of Annihilation]

A burst of light erupted from the floor and incinerated all of the bats that were rushing toward Nozomu.

"Guaaaaaa!"

Literally being burned throughout his body, Rugato was forcibly transformed back to human form from his bats form.

Smoke billowed from his entire body, and the smell of burning flesh filled the hall.

The pain was so intense that Rugato's consciousness became clouded. When he came to, he found that Nozomu had finished preparing for a follow-up attack.

An enormous amount of Qi was sent to the katana that Nozomu was carrying, and it was compressed in the blink of an eye.

The blade, which had been infused with a dense Qi-blade, was sheathed, and a powerful surge of Qi could be felt by Rugato.

Rugato felt a chill like never before at the sight of Nozomu ready to strike, and he deployed his barrier with all his might.

Magic barriers that could withstand even advanced magic were deployed in four layers.

Although these four magic barriers were thin, their durability was comparable to that of the walls of a fortress.

If one were to think about it, the only attack that could break through these barriers would be the largest scale ritual magic.

And then, the blade that had been sheathed was pulled out.

The blade of Qi, compressed and sharpened to an extremely compact thickness, sliced through the four layers of barriers without difficulty at the same time as the blade was drawn, cutting the contract Rugato was carrying as well as his body in two.

◆

The [Qi-jutsu?Phantom] he unleashed severed Rugato's body in two.

The contract he was holding was also cut in two, and the familiar that was about to be resurrected dissipated, along with its black sphere.

The chains restraining Somia also disappeared, and her soul, which was taken out, returned to her body as if pulled by the trail of light.

"Somia!"

Perhaps because Rugato was defeated, Irisdina was also freed from the restraining magic.

She rushed toward Somia in a hurry and lifted her sister's body in her arms.

"Ane......-sama......"

Irisdina, who had been shaking her sister's body repeatedly as she cried out her sister's name, was so relieved when she heard her sister's voice and burst into tears.

"Thank goodness. I'm so glad ...... u, uuuu......"

Seeing Irisdina hugging her sister's body tightly while sobbing, Nozomu breathed a sigh of relief that Somia had regained consciousness and that the battle had been settled before Tiamat's power overwhelmed him.

Nozomu looked down at his arm again and saw that blood was beginning to seep out of the fabric under the uniform.

His body was beginning to suffer lacerations, unable to withstand Tiamat's power that he had unleashed.

His whole body seemed to be screaming in pain and exhaustion.

Time is running out.

Trying not to reveal his wounds and the strain he was currently under, Nozomu slowly turned his gaze back to Rugato.

Rugato had been severed from the left shoulder to the waist, but to his surprise, he was still alive.

He was bleeding profusely from the mouth, but he remained conscious and looked up at the boy who had defeated him.

"Fufu~. A vampire of my caliber won't die ...... unless ...... you destroyed ...... my heart ...... or my head. As long as it's not destroyed, I won't ...... die. And also, your katana wasn't made of mithril either ......."

Nozomu looked surprised, but inwardly felt relieved.

Even if he had to fight for his life, he did not want to be a murderer.

Now the question was whether this old vampire still intended to go after Somia's soul.

Nozomu slowly thrust the tip of his katana in front of the dying Rugato's eyes to ascertain his intentions.

"Rest assured. You have defeated ...... me. That is why ...... I will not ...... take Somia-sama's soul with me."

In order to intimidate him, Nozomu let his Qi exude from his whole body.

"Besides,...... the contract to control the familiar has also been destroyed. Thus, the contract is virtually impossible ...... to be fulfilled. What remains is for the ...... Waziart and Francilt families to discuss the matter and settle it."

Rugato, lying on the floor, was already in no condition to fight.

In the face of the old man's words and his vanished will to fight, Nozomu exhaled heavily, as if it was finally over, and sheathed his katana.

Invisible chains wrapped around his body again, and the immense power that had overflowed vanished as if it had been an illusion.

"Ah-, my legs feel weak ......."

The recoil that followed hit Nozomu along with an intense sense of weariness.

His legs lost their strength and he collapsed to the floor.

He looked up to see the Francilt sisters, holding hands, coming toward him in a panic.

Mars and Tima had also managed to raise their tattered bodies on the ground and were looking at Nozomu and the others while leaning close to each other.

Tima smiled when she noticed Nozomu's gaze, and Mars looked surprised.

The sight of everyone's safe appearance finally relaxed his shoulders, and a breath of relief escaped his lips.

Now, how do I explain my power to them? Exhausted, Nozomu could not think of a way to explain his power.

Putting all the complicated matters aside, he was just happy that he was able to protect everyone's smiling faces.

Perhaps due to the release from the tension, a sudden feeling of drowsiness came over him.

In the blink of an eye, the backlash caused by the release of his [Ability Suppression] quickly dragged his consciousness down into the depths of a dark swamp.

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