Lydia Schmitt stared wide-eyed at the sword of Ellen, which was embedded in her chest.
"What... how...?"
Awakening as a Swordmaster during a battle.
It was an unbelievable feat, yet someone had accomplished it right before her eyes.
She hadn't expected an easy fight and had even resorted to using the life-consuming power of Berserk.
Lydia had thought such occurrences only belonged in stories.
But the reality unfolding before her had already pierced her heart.
Shwook!
"Ugh... huff!"
As Ellen withdrew Lament, Lydia's legs gave way, and she slumped to the ground.
The girl wielding two relics had found it difficult to face her opponent and had become a Swordmaster with the power of the relics.
A genius beyond the word genius itself.
What had she been building up to all this time?
Could one truly become a Swordmaster so easily by gritting their teeth and focusing their mind in an unbeatable fight? Why did such beings exist in the world?
Lydia Schmitt was a genius.
She had never thought there would be so many geniuses on her level to trip her up.
Lydia felt a sense of awe.
In that moment, she felt something similar to when she had first seen Olivia Lanze.
A genius who had always been unrivaled, even among the geniuses gathered in the Temple Royal Class, someone she had never dared to approach.
A genius she had ultimately come to revere out of admiration and awe.
Was the girl before her also a genius of that caliber?
She had been born with an absurd talent, but there was something even more absurd about this existence.
Lydia Schmitt had been sacrificed to the absurd.
What would happen when these two visitors returned?
She didn't know the specifics, but she felt that a series of unfortunate events would unfold. That's why she had intended not to let them go.
But she had failed.
Something was bound to happen to Reinhardt and Eleris.
There was no healing power in the divine energy of Als.
Therefore, healing wounds like other Holy Knights was impossible for Lydia Schmitt.
The backlash from using Berserk, and the fatal wound.
Her consciousness was slipping away.
'I had hoped... they would return safely...'
"Cough!"
As she coughed up a mouthful of blood, Lydia Schmitt tried to grasp the fading edges of her consciousness, but it slipped away faster than she could reach.
She had hoped for Eleris's safe return, but instead, this had happened to her.
What would that vampire think of her death?
Lydia didn't know.
But she knew that the gentle vampire would shed tears for her.
The gods were said to plan everything.
Everything in the world was supposed to move according to their plans.
Was her death also part of such a plan?
'I don't know...'
Slowly closing her eyes, Lydia sank ceaselessly into the depths of unconsciousness.
If all of this was indeed the gods' plan.
She could no longer find a reason to love the gods.
—---
Kneeling before the lifeless body of Lydia Schmitt, Ellen silently faced the blizzard.
"What... What have you done?"
Charlotte asked in horror as she approached through the snowstorm.
"I had to win."
Ellen simply said that and unsummoned the Lament.
Awakening in the midst of battle.
It was during the battle that Ellen transitioned from Magic Body Strengthening to becoming a Swordmaster. But this time, she didn't collapse, vomiting blood like before.
Hmmm
Ellen checked the faintly glowing power of Magic Body Strengthening in her right hand.
Crackle!
Then, the mana boiling in her hand surged like flames, towering even higher than Ellen herself.
She couldn't refine it into the shape of a sword, but she could unleash it intensely.
Following partial Magic Body Strengthening came the external release.
Having such power meant she could avoid defeat, but wasn't this level of talent a bit strange?
She knew she wasn't ordinary, but this seemed excessive.
Ellen felt a peculiar sensation of unfamiliarity with herself, even as she was relieved to have escaped death.
Charlotte gazed at Lydia Schmitt's corpse, which was growing colder by the moment in the frigid winter wind.
"So, who was this person?"
Charlotte had watched the tournament but still couldn't identify the opponent even after the battle had ended.
"Sixth-year Royal Class, Lydia Schmitt. Though not a sixth-year anymore, based on last year's records."
"…Lydia Schmitt?"
At this, Charlotte furrowed her brow.
She had heard that name through other channels. She knew Lydia as a missing Temple Royal Class student, and the name of a student presumed dead in the Riverrier Lanze attack.
"I thought this person died during the previous Holy Knights raid. I heard she was suspected to be affiliated with the Nameless Monastery…"
"…Are you sure?"
"…I heard she had extremist tendencies. But how did you find out about the Nameless Monastery?"
"It wasn't difficult to learn."
Reinhardt had taken a black-haired Temple girl to Elena's shop.
There, Lydia Schmitt was with Elena's statue.
It became highly likely that the person accompanying Reinhardt was Lydia Schmitt.
Olivia Lanze had encountered Lydia Schmitt in the Unrestricted Tournament and forfeited.
Reinhardt had gone to watch that match. Afterward, even Olivia didn't know Reinhardt's whereabouts.
Olivia had been lured to the southern monastery of the Imperial Capital by the Nameless Monastery.
So, around that time, Reinhardt and Lydia Schmitt must have visited Elena's shop together.
And Lydia Schmitt wasn't dead during the Holy Knights raid but was in the fortress of Epiax.
Had she been kidnapped?
But they couldn't understand why she had attacked them.
"There's a place we need to go first."
Their original purpose for coming here was to examine Elena's statue.
An unexpected situation had arisen, causing confusion in their deduction of events, but first, they had to verify something.
Part of the fortress of Epiax had collapsed, but only a portion; the rest of the building still stood intact.
"Is this... the place?"
"Yes."
The Pantheon.
Ellen and Charlotte arrived at a space lined with seven statues and looked around. Some of the statues were so weathered that their shapes were nearly unrecognizable, but they soon found themselves standing in front of their target statue.
Out of the seven statues, the only one Ellen and Charlotte could recognize was that of Elena. Some of the statues had been altered in appearance when they fell into human hands.
"It definitely...resembles her."
Charlotte slowly nodded as she compared the picture on Elena's ID card, which she held in her hand, to the statue.
Elena had claimed to be a dragon, and Ellen had vaguely guessed that this place might be something like a dragon lair.
"What is this place for? Why was that person here out of nowhere, and why did she try to kill us?"
Just as Charlotte said, it was all incomprehensible.
What exactly was the fortress of Epiax?
Why did Reinhardt go to Elena's shop with Lydia Schmitt?
Why was Lydia Schmitt, a member of the Nameless Monastery, isolated in a place that seemed to be Elena's base?
Why did she try to kill them?
And.
That night, what did Reinhardt do?
"..."
Ellen silently stared at Elena's statue.
Olivia Lanze, who fell into a trap.
Lydia Schmitt, a member of the Nameless Monastery, must have known about the trap to lure Olivia Lanze out.
Elena was a powerful mage.
Let's assume that Reinhardt somehow learned about the Nameless Monastery's plan.
Then, given his character, Reinhardt would have tried to save Olivia.
Although it was impossible to know what kind of person Reinhardt truly was, it seemed so based on what they had seen so far.
The kidnapped Adriana.
Olivia, lured by using Adriana as bait.
Reinhardt, who learned about it through Lydia Schmitt.
"'...They saved you?'
'Yeah, I don't know why. The winged demon appeared and saved Adriana and me. Then it left us far away and disappeared somewhere. That's it.'
'Why on earth...'
'That's the most curious thing to me.'"
Olivia Lanze, who couldn't understand why the Demon King had saved her.
The Demon King might actually be a benevolent being, rather than one who harbored hatred for humans. No, now she seemed to despise humans.
It wasn't that he saved Olivia by chance while attacking the Holy Knights.
"Did he save her from the beginning...?"
Ellen clenched her teeth.
Dark emotions welled up within her heart.
Anger, betrayal.
And.
A sense of deprivation.
A peculiar emotion, the identity of which she couldn't grasp, began to envelop her entire body.
Regardless of what important secret Reinhardt held.
"So, that happened?"
"Yeah."
"No, why didn't you say it earlier... Sigh, well, it's pointless to argue about it now."
Charlotte, who had heard the inside story of the Holy Knights' raid from Ellen, crossed her arms and fell into deep thought.
Charlotte too followed a similar line of reasoning to Ellen.
Olivia, trapped in a scheme, and Adriana.
The two, who had managed to survive unharmed due to the Demon King's attack, were afraid of being accused of colluding with the Demon King if the world found out, and so kept quiet.
"And Reinhardt, after learning the truth from the two, took care of Adriana at the Rotary Club since it became difficult for her to find a place to stay... Right?"
"Yeah."
It wasn't unreasonable to say that Reinhardt tried to find a way to help in his own way.
However, both of them now knew about the suspicious circumstances that had occurred the previous day.
And the fact that Lydia Schmitt, who was most likely involved in the incident, was present at this location.
Both Adriana and Olivia were clearly unaware of the specifics.
Charlotte quietly sorted out the newly discovered facts. She didn't know about the existence of Lydia Schmitt and whether the Castle Epiax was actually related to the mage Elena.
But one thing was certain.
There was no more room for idle speculation.
It was time to stop thinking that it might not be true out of fear.
Now, they had to investigate Reinhardt.
To investigate Reinhardt, what must they do?
Charlotte's fingertips trembled.
It was not just because of the cold.
As they approached the core of the story and grasped the tip of the truth.
Charlotte found it increasingly difficult to bear the situation.
"..."
And it was no different for Ellen.
