I Became the Tyrant of a Defense Game [EN]: Chapter 322

The assassination squad members swiftly infiltrated the detached palace.

Lucas followed slowly behind them.

Walking through the palace corridors, Lucas was momentarily lost in memories.

The beautiful childhood he had spent in this palace with Serenade, Alberto, and many others.

Dustia, who had taken care of him with such kindness after he lost his parents.

Ash, who had called him ‘brother’ and taken an arrow for him.

The days that had sparkled so beautifully.

Now, they were being trampled under the boots of the intruders.

“…”

Lucas stopped in his tracks.

And he drew the sword that was at his waist—a gift from Ash.

Swish-!

The sound of the blade meeting the air made the leader of the assassination squad, who was walking ahead of Lucas, turn around in confusion.

Lucas, with tears streaming down his pale blue eyes, glared at the leader of the assassination squad. The leader clicked his tongue.

“Are you trying to stop us now?”

“…”

“You shouldn’t have opened the door in the first place. You little brat. The knife is already in the belly because you opened the door. What are you trying to do now?”

“That’s not it.”

Lucas spat out fiercely.

“I clearly helped you. I kept my promise to His Highness Fernandez. So, His Highness Fernandez has to spare my family. …And separately, I’m going to die here in an accident.”

If Dustia and Ash were to die today.

Lucas had decided that he would die here as well.

“I, berserk from the side effects of the beastification serum, won’t be able to distinguish friend from foe… and I’ll attack you.”

“Hey, kid, stop talking nonsense. If you just put that sword back, we’ll pretend this never happened-”

But before the leader could say anything, Lucas plunged the syringe containing the beastification serum into his neck.

The serum, as soon as it was injected, triggered a magical chemical reaction and surged into Lucas’s body.

Feeling as if the blood vessels all over his body were swelling, Lucas hunched over and trembled.

“Kuh, aagh…!”

Then, between the boy’s disheveled blond hair, his pale blue eyes blazed like fire.

The tears flowing beneath them looked like flames cascading down.

“I kept my promise, right? So… for the last bit, for His Highness Ash, let me die.”

“…”

The leader clicked his tongue, gestured to his subordinates who were ahead, and then drew two daggers from his own chest.

“You guys take care of the Second Empress and the Prince. I’ll have to deal with this poor kid.”

Lucas, who was exhaling white breath from his open mouth, lowered his stance.

And, with the sword he had received as a gift held out in front of him, he leaped like a beast.

***

The hall at the entrance of the detached palace.

“Mother! Please, come to your senses!”

Standing at the entrance on the first floor, Ash screamed. Ash was looking at Dustia, who was standing on the third-floor railing.

With a noose made of rope around her neck, Dustia was teetering precariously on the third-floor railing.

“It’s dangerous, Mother! Please come down!”

Ash looked around for help, but there was no one there.

As if it were planned—or rather, as if it were meant to be—even Alberto had been forced to take a day off today.

Serenade, who came to care for her every day, was also absent today.

Ash begged with both hands, and then knelt on the floor, pleading with Dustia.

“You said you’d live with me, Mom! Please! Don’t do this, please…!”

“Ash.”

Dustia’s face was serene. As if she were before the madness had taken hold.

“It might sound like nonsense, but listen carefully. I’ve lived through today thousands of times. So, I know everything that’s going to happen.”

“I understand, Mom. I understand, so please, come down and let’s talk…!”

“I have to die for you to inherit the curse of the clan and survive today. Yes. This is the only way.”

With a peaceful and warm smile, she slowly opened her mouth.

“I’m sorry, Ash. I’m so sorry for passing on this curse to you. My son. But this is how you’ll live…”

A tear trickled down her face as she smiled.

“I’ll always be by your side.”

“No, Mom! No!”

“I love you.”

Dustia jumped off the railing.

“Nooooo-!”

With Ash’s scream, Dustia’s withered body hung in the air.

Whether it was fortunate or unfortunate, Dustia’s suicide ended quickly.

The neck bone caught in the rope broke, and her life was cut short before she could even suffocate.

Creak- creak-

Dustia’s corpse, with her neck caught in the rope, swayed like a pendulum.

Faint gray magic flowed out of her body and settled into Ash, who was standing blankly, only shedding tears.

-Click.

With a sound like clockwork gears meshing,

“Cough, cough?! Keuh, cough!”

Ash, who had collapsed on the floor, coughed violently and trembled.

Soon, his trembling body calmed down, and within his disheveled black hair, Ash’s jet-black eyes settled coldly.

“…Ah.”

Ash’s voice, as he slowly rose to his feet, was slightly different from before.

“Damn it. This feeling never gets easier, no matter how many thousands or tens of thousands of times I experience it.”

The refreshing quality unique to a fifteen-year-old boy was nowhere to be found.

His voice was weary and tired, as if it had been worn down by the years.

“You could have set the regression point to a slightly different time… Why is it always this time when I come back?”

Looking up at his mother with eyes full of emptiness instead of sadness, Ash let out a dry sigh.

“Wasn’t there another way, Mother? Please consider how your son feels, having to look at your corpse every time I regress…”

He roughly wiped away the tears that had wet his cheeks, as if they were a nuisance.

And Ash turned his body around.

“And you guys are really tiresome.”

By now, the assassination squad members had poured into the first-floor hall.

There were about twenty of them.

Each one was a killing machine, skilled in the art of taking lives, and they slowly surrounded Ash.

“Haa…”

Ash sighed, swept his hair back, and then extended his hand forward, beckoning.

“Come on, you bastards.”

A bleak sneer hung on the boy’s lips.

“I’m in a bad mood, so let’s take it out on you.”

“…?”

The assassination squad members were rather taken aback.

A young prince with absolutely no combat ability, and who was unarmed, was provoking them.

There was no other way to explain it but that he had gone mad.

But, what did it matter?

They were destined to die here today anyway.

The members simultaneously drew their swords and rushed at the target they had to kill from all directions.

***

The two daggers wielded by the assassination squad leader were both embedded in Lucas’s body.

One in his shoulder, one in his side.

And, Lucas’s sword was also embedded in the assassination squad leader’s body.

His left chest.

His heart.

The leader had tried to subdue Lucas without killing him. Lucas had noticed this and deliberately used it to his advantage.

He had deliberately allowed attacks on areas that were not fatal, and then, in that gap, he had landed a fatal blow.

The leader was strong, but he had failed to properly grasp the boy’s condensed will and determination. And so, he had suffered a fatal wound.

“Cough, cough! …I’ve been properly hit…”

The leader, spitting out blood from his open mouth, smiled bitterly and collapsed.

“So… McGregor is, McGregor after all…”

Thud.

The leader’s body fell limply to the side.

Lucas, with his pale blue eyes blazing, confirmed his death, then staggered towards the detached palace.

He had allowed many attacks besides his shoulder and side. Blood was flowing from all over his body, and he felt like he would lose consciousness at any moment. But Lucas walked on.

He intended to die beside Dustia and Ash.

‘At the very least, let me… die together…’

Lucas gritted his teeth, leaving behind blood-stained footprints.

From the garden to the entrance of the detached palace.

There was no place where memories had not accumulated.

With his face distorted like a beast due to his beastification, Lucas sobbed.

He wanted to go back.

To those days.

To those days that were as beautiful as flowers…

Lucas moved his feet with the last of his strength and entered the first-floor hall of the detached palace.

“…?”

He had to face an incomprehensible sight.

The assassination squad members were all corpses, lying scattered on the floor. Without a single exception, they had all fallen dead.

And on top of that pile of corpses-

“You’re late.”

Ash was sitting there.

As if he were the king of hell sitting on a throne, his whole body was covered in blood. He was smiling leisurely and bleakly. He waved his hand at Lucas as if he were glad to see him.

“You traitorous bastard.”

“Wh, what…? How…?”

Unable to accept the situation, Lucas stammered blankly. Ash shrugged nonchalantly.

“Every time I regress, the same guys attack in the same way. Wouldn’t it be stupid not to win?”

“Your Highness, Prince…? Is that, really you…?”

The atmosphere was different.

Too different.

The usual innocent and kind-hearted boy was nowhere to be seen. What was here now was a gust of cold wind, reeking of blood and dust.

“Your Highness? Yes. I am Your Highness.”

Ash chuckled and slowly rose from the pile of corpses.

“Now, traitor. The prince you have to kill is here. Why don’t you bite me? Or are you so rabid that you can’t even recognize the person you’re supposed to kill?”

Ash’s jet-black, bottomless eyes emitted a clear hostility.

Lucas staggered backward.

“No, I’m not, I’m not trying to kill my brother…”

“Don’t call me brother. Damn it. It makes me break out in hives.”

With his hands in his pockets, Ash strode towards Lucas.

“If you hadn’t opened that door tonight, my mother would still be alive.”

Ash had already collected Dustia’s body and laid it down on the first floor.

Only then did Lucas’s eyes widen as he confirmed Dustia’s death.

“If you hadn’t colluded to save your family, my mother would have lived much longer…! Then I would have started this damn regression a little later!”

Ash, who had walked right up to Lucas, who was trembling, snarled fiercely.

“It’s all your fault, Lucas. All of it.”

“Ah, aah… Ughh…”

Lucas couldn’t understand all of Ash’s words.

But because it was an undeniable truth that he had betrayed him, Lucas ended up trembling without uttering a single word.

Lucas still held the sword in his right hand.

Ash reached out and snatched Lucas’s wrist, then brought the sword in his hand to his own neck.

“You dog who can’t even recognize his master, come on! Stab me! Isn’t that why you came here!”

The tip of Lucas’s sword flew towards Ash’s neck,

Thud!

Lucas hurriedly inserted his left arm between them, blocking the sword.

Blood gushed from Lucas’s left arm where the sword had pierced. Ash glared at Lucas with annoyance, then pushed him away.

Thump!

Lucas’s body rolled limply on the floor,

Clang-!

The sword, which had already been cracked from the fight with the assassination squad leader, finally shattered into pieces.

Amidst the wreckage of the broken sword and the pool of blood he had spilled, Lucas knelt down and buried his head on the floor, sobbing.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

“…”

“Please kill me, Your Highness… Please kill me…”

Due to the backlash of the beastification and excessive blood loss, Lucas’s consciousness gradually faded.

After uttering words of apology until the very end, Lucas finally fainted.

Ash, who had been glaring at Lucas with contempt, let out a long sigh and swept his hair back.

“You’re a consistent idiot from beginning to end…”

Ash took out bandages from a nearby cabinet and then, with surprisingly skilled hands, gave Lucas first aid for his wounds.

After bandaging his own bloodied hands, Ash put a cigarette he found in the cabinet in his mouth and lit it.

Chik-

Even though he had lived a life far removed from smoking, his movements were as natural as someone who had smoked his whole life.

“Hoo…”

As he exhaled a long stream of smoke and turned his body around,

“Well, it seems like the situation is over?”

A mage wearing a gray robe walked into the hall with slow movements.

It was a sudden appearance, but as if he had already expected it, Ash chewed on his cigarette nonchalantly and frowned deeply.

“Well, if it isn’t our great ‘Seer’ of Everblack. You’re always a step late.”

“Haha. Seer, you say. Such a cringeworthy title is unnecessary.”

A mage who had suddenly appeared five hundred years ago and helped Everblack’s revival.

The ‘Seer’ who had transformed a black thorn tree into a magical beacon and led the construction of the empire.

As he slowly took off the hood of his robe, the face of a man with shaggy gray hair and thick glasses that hid his eyes was revealed.

Ash glared at him and blew out smoke.

“It’s good to see you again, you damn Director.”

Then, the Seer—Aider—smiled bashfully and spoke in his characteristic drawling voice.

“Did you enjoy your short vacation, ‘Save Slot’ sir? Then now, let’s begin this round’s ‘game’.”

Immediately after, Aider corrected himself with a bitter tone.

“No… the last round of the game that is permitted to us.”