Slowly, the sword piercing the king's heart was pushed even further into his chest. Making the king cough the wine he drank together with hinds of his own blood.
Blood, that none other could see other than himself.
Dozen of questions rose in his mind.
He could see his guard, Lancelot staring at him confused and not even alarmed by the fact someone was piercing his heart!
And he wasn't the only one, the others looked at the king confused and with frowns.
Such a response was natural if they just witness the king drink from the golden cup just for a second and later spit it to the ground. Such action could be independent of the king not taking sensibilities for all the killing the others did up upon his command.
What was abnormal though was that none seemed to care about the king of this kingdom is assassinated right in front of their eyes.
Lowering his gaze towards the sword, he weakly raised his other arm and grabbed the bloodstained sword with shaking eyes.
He tried to look to his side, to see who was the one who was piercing his heart, but then the sword that pierced his heart was drawn out of his body with such force, that forced the king to falter a few steps back.
*Ting!
With the golden cup falling to the ground together with its liquid content, the king grabbed his chest in hopes to lessen the extreme pain.
"Ha~Ha." He started breathing, dizziness plaguing his mind.
"Your majesty~"
Lancelot called from his side, but the king could no longer hear him.
The only sound that he could hear was heavy footsteps from armor.
The king scanned his magic items under his clothes, only to find that none of them had activated. Seeing his wound, he saw a flow of blood coming out of his body, and yet when he touched his chest with his hand, he could feel no opening of a wound.
"H-huh~?"
Confusion befalls him.
He could clearly see his blood and the open wound, but there was no such physical wound.
Raising his head weakly, he stumbled one step forward, almost falling face forward if he didn't catch himself.
And there it was, the one who held the sword seemingly stained in his blood.
A tall figure, wearing a black plated armor, engrossed in a dark green mist that made him seem as if he was ethereal. Each step of his left a crack in the world, making space for some kind of black liquid to surface among those cracks.
"L-Lancelot~" The king mumbled as he stepped a step forward, the pain in his chest increasing.
But the most noticeable feature of this tall figure was that its face was just a skull.
'K-kill him~Lancel-'
Words no longer came out of his mouth even if he tried.
All his strength suddenly left his body, making him fall from the stairs that lead him to the throne.
*Baahm!
"Your Majesty!"
"-Healers! Now!'
Echoes of sound appeared through his mind, sounds that he could not recognize what they were. The king could only see darkness emergy in the world.
He was laying motionless on the ground, unable to move a single muscle. He could only stare as the world crumbled into nothingness.
Except for one thing.
Having fallen with his face looking at the one who did this to him.
The ethereal undead suddenly stopped in front of a kneeling mercenary with identical armor.
The undead turned and faced the dying king, his eyes sockets shaped as if the undead was hiding eternal wrath. An ominous grin appeared on the undead.
And slowly, the ethereal undead slowly sheathed his sword to its scabbard, while bending his knee in the exact manner of the mercenary with the identical armor till those two overlapped completely.
"Ah~" the king let out a whisper of a sound though some kind of miracle.
'That mercenary~! So he was an undead~"
Before he could finish his thoughts, the black liquid filling his vision completely engulfed him.
His cracked soul being unable to sustain itself without a vessel, quickly grumbled, resulting in the king of Ioratal having his soul destroyed.
Snuffing out his very existence for all eternity.
****
[You received 3200 XP]
[You achieved what most couldn't and destroyed a soul!]
[You acquired Bringer of the End].
Danzel silently stared at the ground as a commotion was happening, everyone except for the few raised from their knees and looked at the soulless body of the king in shock.
"Kyaaaa!"
"Shut down the View-See Crystal, now!
"Your Majesty!"
"Where are the healers!? What is taking them long!" The 5th-tier yelled, his aura released to the surroundings, making most shut their mouth while bringing the mercenaries in guard.
"None one leaves this room unless I say so! Till we figured out who it was, everyone one of you is suspect!" Lancelot yelled as a magic caster with white robs came running towards the king.
"Fast! Use your magic! Heal his majesty!" Lancelot yelled at the group of healers.
They instantly went to work, making several magic circles made out of golden light appear around the king's body while using tons of mana for what Danzel guessed was healing magic.
'Healing magic ain't going to work.' Danzel thought with an ominous grin under his helmet.
'You are trying to heal a hollow husk. A body that sustained no physical damage, but instead has lots it's very soul.'
And soon enough, the frowns of the magic caster became apparent to everyone.
"S-Sir Lancelot, his Majesty...has passed away."
"W-What!?" His eyes widen in shock, and out of anger, he grabbed the color of the one who told the bad news.
"How! How did he die!?"
Breaking cold sweat from his back, the magic caster answered with a trembling voice.
"S-Sir, his Majesty's body has suffered no damage and neither poison nor foreign mana was detected. It`s as if his Majesty's body shut down suddenly...We don't know the cause~Ahhh!"
Being sent flying towards a nearby wall, the 5th-tier breathes heavily.
Walking to get the wine from the ground, he bent his knees and touched the spilled wine with his finger, and took a taste.
'The cup wasn't poisoned, then it must be some kind of magical effect. The healers must have missed something!'
Going back to the corpse of the king and examining it, he also found no foreign source of energy, making him glance at his hand hard enough to cut his skin.
'I was constantly on alert for this exact thing to happen, but how did this happen when I was beside him!?'
A sudden wave of guilt and sadness washed in his mind.
How could he, a 5th-tier and the strongest of the Dynasty, not see through an attack on his king!?
"S-Sir Lancelot...we believe that his Majesty had a heart attack, nothing else explains his Majesty's condition-"
Before the magic caster could finish, among the crowd, one of the princes of the Dynasty finished for the healer.
"It's a sign from the Goddess! the Goddess judged the king and deemed his time in among us to have ended! A sign that his majesty fulfilled his purpose in this world and that another one has to step in!" The prince yelled like a fanatic.
His golden and white robs, together with a cross on his neck showed that he believed in the religion of the "Sacred Cross".
Taking the hint of the prince, the other nobles also seemed to become fanatics.
"He is right! Our king has been guided to meet the Goddess!"
Lancelot turned towards the noble's rage.
He could read those nobles' intentions as if they were a blank piece of paper.
With the king now dead, and no heir selected, the fight over the throne has begun. Those nobles who talked about the goddess showing her mercy were merely trying to lick the boots of the fanatic prince of the Sacred Cross.
Most other nobles who didn't support the fanatical prince also began forming plans of who they should support. The soldiers and mercenaries who were raised in glory from the war didn't know what to do except lay silent and digest the meaning behind the king's death.
Of course, among each of those crowds, there was always some exception.
Kingra'mash watched silently from the side while communicating with his colleagues that the mission is called off. He blankly stared at the corpse of the king confused.
How the heck did you die? I didn't even make my move!
As for the Deathfull Skulls group leader, he had a frown on his face, similarly confused by this whole ordeal.
But among this group, Azrael silently stared at the kneeling Danzel with suspicion.
He remembered the day when he met Danzel and fought each other.
In their fight, he experienced an illusion that brought the pain of having once heart pierced by someone.
'The body language of this human indicated that he felt some kind of pain in his chest, could Danzel have...'
And from this day forth, this event became one of the historical moments in the history of the Dynasty of Ioratal.
Some told that the king drank too much of the sins of war, calling this event "The drink of the virtuous king.
Others said that the goddess deemed the king worthy to join in her holy realms, calling the event "Last Blessed Drink".
He was remembered as a great king.
As for the truth of his death, it was far grimmer than others could ever imagine.
