Future Knight [EN]: Chapter 40

“You villain! You became a Dark Elf yourself, and now your heart is stained black!”

Blinding flames erupted from the sword of the Gigantes [a large, humanoid war machine] piloted by Eladion.

“Using an Aura Blade [a weapon enhanced with magical energy] with that scrap metal Gigantes… I wonder how long that power will last, but I’ll be looking forward to it.”

Burning Aura Blades erupted from Nemitz’s two daggers as well.

“Aura Blades from daggers!”

The Elven Knights, witnessing Aura Blades erupting from daggers for the first time, widened their eyes in astonishment.

He was the only one on the Erkanndor Continent to have reached Sword Master status with daggers.

With Eladion at the lead, blue Aura Swords erupted from the swords of all the Elven Knights standing behind him.

“Lord Eladion, we are prepared to die.”

At his disciple’s resolute words, all the remaining disciples resolved to die fighting.

“We will fight and die!”

“We won’t die so easily. Watch us.”

Feeling their determination, Eladion adjusted his grip on his sword and said,

“Don’t any of you die. Let’s meet again, alive.”

“Yes, Lord Eladion!”

As the killing intent between the two groups intensified with everyone’s powerful shouts, the tens of thousands of enemies and Elves nearby began to flee in droves.

They couldn’t risk being crushed to death beneath the feet of those giants in a battle between beings eight meters tall.

“Just one question, Nemitz.”

“What is it?”

“Why did you wait until we boarded the Gigantes? You could have easily taken us out before we even got in them, couldn’t you?”

“Heh heh, well, I’ve finally met a worthy opponent after all this time, and it wouldn’t be fun to kill you so easily, would it? Sword Masters and high-performance Gigantes aren’t toys you can easily find, you know.”

Eladion and the Elven Knights felt another surge of fiery rage at Nemitz’s words, as if they were being treated like playthings.

“I curse the childhood I spent with you, Nemitz.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear. Thank you….”

Nemitz’s words held genuine emotion, and with that, a fierce battle that shook the earth began between the two groups.

As Raseion blew the horn, signaling the attack, what looked like a thousand Ents [tree-like beings] engaged the enemies.

And twenty thousand arrows flew into the sky all at once from the Elven Rangers hidden in the forest, raining down on the green Elves.

Numerous green Elves fell, bleeding, amidst the downpour of arrows, but they had sturdy shields made by the green Dwarven blacksmiths, who were as skilled as the Dwarves.

Covering themselves with the shields, they slowly advanced.

But the second volley of arrows never came.

Screams echoed from the forest where the Rangers were hiding.

The green Elves smiled.

Everything was going according to plan.

By now, the forest would be stained with the blood of Elves.

As the green Elves had anticipated, the Elven Rangers were thrown into chaos.

Dark Elf assassins, who had been hiding using Blind Hide [a stealth technique] on the trees, suddenly jumped out and launched a surprise attack.

Even the Rangers, veterans of stealth, couldn’t avoid their swift ambush.

Most of the Rangers were beheaded on the spot and plummeted to the ground below the trees.

The falling Elven Rangers crashed into the ground, their eyes wide as if they couldn’t believe they were dying so futilely.

It was just as difficult for the surviving Rangers.

‘I didn’t even sense the slightest presence… where did all these assassins come from?’

The forest quickly turned into a scene of carnage as enemies and allies became entangled.

The Elven Rangers drew their daggers and resisted the enemy.

But there was no way they could win against those who specialized in close combat with just daggers.

The number of Elven Rangers sacrificed on the trees increased exponentially, and their corpses fell like leaves.

Leision also screamed as she counterattacked against the Dark Elf ambushers who suddenly appeared.

“Damn it! They knew we would use this as an attack point and were lying in ambush!”

As Leision notched five arrows on her bowstring, Aura imbued them, causing them to shine brilliantly.

The five arrows, released from her beautiful hand, flew in different directions, blowing the heads off the Dark Elf assassins who were trying to harm her fellow Rangers.

Leision picked up another handful of arrows and rained them down on the enemies, causing more Dark Elf assassins to fall.

But no matter how many she killed, the number of Dark Elves didn’t decrease.

The situation was already heading towards despair.

Her hands never stopped moving.

She had to kill even one more to save her dying comrades.

But her quiver was empty.

It was a problem that she had used multiple arrows at once in her haste.

‘Oh no!’

Her specialty, the bow, was useless without arrows. She went down to the corpses of her fallen comrades to retrieve arrows.

Then, three assassins rushed at her from behind with strange weapons.

They wore confident expressions, thinking she was an easy target since she had run out of arrows.

But Leision was not as easy a woman as they thought.

She leaped in a completely different direction, stepping on empty air, and drew her bowstring without arrows.

Then, an intangible arrow was created from her bow, and the arrow flew at the speed of light, piercing through the three Dark Elves in an instant.

“Hah… Hah… Hah!”

‘Shooting Aura Arrows without arrows consumes too much mana… I need to get arrows quickly.’

Just as Leision, having dealt with the assassins, hurriedly went down to the ground to collect the arrows from the dead Ranger comrades,

Clap! Clap! Clap!

An untimely applause suddenly echoed in the forest.

Startled by the applause, Leision aimed her arrow in the direction of the sound.

“Who’s there!”

“As I’ve heard, you are indeed impressive, Leision, the Elf Archer.”

A Dark Elf woman was sitting on a tree branch, silhouetted against the waning moonlight.

“Identify yourself!”

“I am Yara, the head of the Blacklion clan, a prestigious family of assassins.”

“You wench! How dare you invade the Elven forest with your cursed body! You’ve got guts!”

“Hahaha! Cursed body? Isn’t that what you call us to belittle us? From our perspective, it seems like you are the cursed race. A filthy race full of hypocrisy and superiority.”

“Silence! How dare you, with your tainted black skin, insult us Elves!”

“Tainted? I was born with black skin. So, does that mean I was born tainted and cursed?”

“Blame your parents for that! Dark Elf.”

“Hmm, I’ve heard that there are humans who are born with black skin as well. Does that mean they are also tainted and have black skin? I’ve also heard that those humans with white skin, like you, capture humans with black skin, don’t treat them as their own kind, and use them as slaves. Well, I guess it’s a bit more humane than just capturing and killing them on sight like you do.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“I’m saying that those humans and you all look the same to me. Foolish beings who judge people based on skin color… Don’t you think that kind of ignorance is the real curse? Am I wrong?”

“Are you saying that you are also Elves like us?”

“Similar, but a little different. It’s true that we are the same Elves, but I don’t want to be in the same group as you. Your filthy hypocrisy and superiority are disgusting. So, I’m sorry, but I want you to disappear from this land as of today. I don’t want to live under the same sky as the likes of you.”

“Don’t spout nonsense just because you have a mouth!”

Leision released the bowstring aimed at her opponent, and her arrow, filled with mana, cut through the air towards Yara.

However, Yara didn’t dodge and threw a throwing knife to counter Leision’s arrow.

Then, Leision’s arrow and Yara’s throwing knife collided in mid-air with pinpoint accuracy.

A huge explosion occurred in an instant.

In the explosion that shone like daylight, Leision widened her eyes in disbelief.

The arrow she had just shot was her full power, but it was stopped by a throwing knife thrown by hand.

It was her arrow that could easily pierce through steel.

She couldn’t have stopped her arrow without the same power.

“I-Impossible… How could a throwing knife…”

“The history of throwing knives, which began from the beginning, is much longer than the history of bows. So, I would appreciate it if you would refrain from saying things like ‘just a throwing knife’.”

As the Dark Elf woman slowly rose from the tree, her cloak fluttered in the wind, revealing numerous throwing knives glistening in the moonlight.

It looked like the scales of a snake.

“I’ll start by fixing your blind superiority about that bow of yours.”

Leision notched another arrow on her bowstring.

She swallowed hard.

The Dark Elf standing in front of her was definitely not an easy opponent.

* * *

Artheon, unaware of what was happening in the forest, became increasingly anxious as there was no supporting fire from the Ranger unit led by Leision.

With a thousand giant Ents and the best archer unit on the continent,

And if he combined the power of the mages and spiritists he led, he had no doubt that he would defeat the enemy in front of him in an instant.

But since there had been no firing from the continent’s best archer unit since the initial barrage, he couldn’t help but feel anxious.

Artheon wanted to run to Leision right away, but he couldn’t leave his position since the Ents had engaged the enemy.

No matter how many Ents there were, the enemy had an army of hundreds of thousands and hundreds of giant centipedes.

Moreover, those giant centipedes were incredibly strong, and no one but Artheon could kill them.

The strong shell, powerful mandibles, and countless blade-like legs destroyed the Ents like rotten pieces of wood.

The troll green Elves finished off the Ents that had been weakened by the giant centipedes with axes.

They chopped the Ents as if they were chopping firewood.

Then, many Ents quickly turned into firewood.

When the Ents gathered to grab the giant centipedes with their numbers, the giant centipedes spewed powerful acidic corrosive liquid.

Then, the Ents covered in the corrosive liquid let out low screams and burned away with black smoke.

In the battle between the Ents and the giant centipedes, hundreds of Ents had already been destroyed, but not a single giant centipede had been killed yet.