Chapter 79

Bolt.

Bolt was a magic of exceptional reliability. A short casting time, impressive power relative to that brevity, and above-average performance in nearly any situation made it a true all-rounder.

If one were to compare Bolt to modern firearms… yes, it would be like a finely crafted pistol.

Accurate, resistant to malfunction, and easily drawn for immediate use.

In contrast, Lir’s vaunted spell, ‘Lightning Strike,’ suffered from numerous shortcomings compared to Bolt.

A longer casting time, and burdened by various restrictions and conditions.

Where ‘Bolt’ unleashed its power with a simple staff raise and incantation, Lightning Strike demanded considerable preparation to achieve its true potential.

If Bolt was a well-made pistol, then Lightning Strike could be likened to a heavy machine gun, extreme in its firepower. Cumbersome, unwieldy, and presenting various difficulties in urgent situations where every fraction of a second mattered.

“Star’s eye, luminous cloud, scaled sea and salt flower.”

Even so, no electro-mage could afford to disregard Lightning Strike. Even those not naturally gifted with ‘Lightning Strike’ like Lir, most electro-mages possessed considerable knowledge of both ‘Bolt’ and ‘Lightning Strike.’

The reason was simple.

The overwhelming destructive power inherent in the Lightning Strike spell.

“Humidity is agreeable, and the storm clouds are impressively dense.”

Alter chuckled softly, watching Lir, who gripped her staff with both hands, focused and chanting the spell.

Beneath Lir’s feet, covering the floor of the trench, lay a massive parchment. Upon it, elaborate magic circles and runic characters were inscribed, their meaning indecipherable to the uninitiated.

“Can you even imagine how much power lies concealed within those storm clouds?”

Alter stood beside Lir, emanating arcs of electricity, gazing at the sky. He wore a pleased smile, like a father watching his daughter’s talent show.

With each word Lir spat out, the heavens roared. Soon, the only sound was thunder, and everyone, without exception, raised their heads, gazing at the storm clouds threatening to unleash lightning.

Raguel frowned, watching the once-familiar clouds turn unruly.

“Lightning strike.”

He quickly folded his wings, descending as low as possible.

But it was too late. The sky, following Lir’s command, began to unleash its wrath.

Light engulfs the world. The battlefield, stained crimson with blood, turns blindingly white. Eyes are momentarily blinded, and soon, hearing fails as well.

A ringing, high-pitched whine, fills the ears of everyone on the battlefield – humans, orcs, elves, and demons alike.

The orcs were the first to regain their sight, thanks to their inherent resilience. Then came the humans. Though lacking the orcs’ robust recovery, they were quicker than the elves, whose sensitive senses made them vulnerable to the lingering ringing and blinding light.

What those who regained their vision saw… was a scene straight from hell.

Lightning bolts relentlessly struck the ground, and the muddy battlefield churned like a turbulent sea.

An inexplicable metallic tang clung to the nose and mouth, while a prickly, electric sensation lingered on fingertips.

“This…madness!”

A small scream pierced through the air, emanating from the heart of the lightning storm. But it was quickly swallowed by the thunder.

“…General, two o’clock.”

Hundreds of lightning strikes per second hammered the area where Grand Warlord Ariel stood.

Lex, kilometers away, saw the flickering shadow, appearing and disappearing, and let out a hollow laugh.

Lex’s superior, still a boy, had yet to recover his senses from the lightning and thunder.

“Hoo…”

The greatest weakness, and also the greatest strength, of ‘Lightning Strike’ was its extreme dependence on the weather.

Used on a clear day, ‘Lightning Strike’ performed no better than a simple bolt. But used on a humid day, beneath a sky swollen with storm clouds, ‘Lightning Strike’ delivered destructive power that defied belief.

To compensate for this shortcoming, some mages would preemptively conjure storm clouds… but now, there was no need. For the past two weeks, a thick, immense bank of clouds had choked the sunlight from Valoran’s sky.

“I’m reaching… my limit…!”

Lir, who had brought the hell of thunder and light to the battlefield, spoke, her hand trembling around the wand.

Originally, Lir was not a mage strong enough to leave such an impressive mark on the Valoran battlefield.

She had become the youngest Fifth Circle mage in the history of the Lightning School, but that was it.

Infinite potential, yes, but her current skills were still sorely lacking. That was Lir.

Yet, Lir’s lightning had, in a single instant, completely seized control of the field.

The cloud-choked sky, an elaborately woven plan, an innate talent for lightning, and a blessing bestowed by a spirit.

These four elements combined to create a variable the warlords had not even imagined: her.

“Phwaaah…!”

Making a sound like air escaping a balloon, Lir dropped her wand.

“Relieve Lir to the rear, Lieutenant. She has depleted her mana.”

The white-haired boy spoke, still covering his ears with both hands, as if his hearing was clouded with tinnitus.

“Huh…? Ah, yes! Understood. Sergeant Handel, Sergeant, and Corporal Sith! Escort the mage to the rear!”

The lieutenant, whose clothes were comparatively cleaner than the soldiers, shouted immediately upon hearing Bean’s order.

Frankly, the lieutenant, too, didn’t quite comprehend what had just happened on the battlefield, but he quickly regained his composure.

He had experienced incomprehensible situations countless times on this battlefield. In these situations, clumsily racking one’s brain and agonizing over understanding was poison. The lieutenant knew from long battlefield experience that the best thing to do was to execute the superior’s orders as they were.

“…Geez, it’s gotten awfully sunny.”

Lir, like the boy, was a mage who had received the ‘Spirit’s Blessing’ from Dajin. As a result, she had no limit to her mana storage, and Lir was even a Circle higher than Bean.

The result of that mage pouring out all the mana she had been hoarding within her body for the past two weeks without wasting it was, for one minute, that which unfolded before their eyes.

The sky, after vomiting forth tens of thousands of thunderbolts, was as fair as the morning in an unnamed country village. The humidity and fog that had blanketed everything were completely gone. The dark clouds that had veiled the sunlight had also vanished, leaving only a stark blue sky and the sun’s rays suspended above them.

Some soldiers felt a strange unease at this sudden shift in the battlefield.

The nearby hills and the remains of corpses had disappeared. Before the white-haired boy now stood an enormous crater, a product of the tens of thousands of thunderbolts, and within that crater, only a writhing, black shadow, crying out in agony.

“…It truly appears that its form is indiscernible, just as reported. Finding the Archlord under conditions like the storm we just faced would have been impossible.”

“Some kind of camouflage magic, perhaps? Bizarre.”

Two orcs, tasked with escorting Veen, exchanged hushed words as they watched the shadow, billowing smoke from deep within the crater, slowly stir. Ignorant of magic, they tended to attribute any phenomenon they didn’t understand to it.

“Less like magic, I believe… and closer to the realm of biology. Think of it like a chameleon, changing its colors to match its surroundings.”

Alter slowly climbed from the trench, interjecting into their conversation.

In Alter’s hand rested a staff as tall as he was. Adorned with symbols of profound magical significance and covered in densely packed runes, it bore the scars of years spent weathering battlefields.

“A… chameleon? What’s that?”

“…Never mind. Let’s just say it’s magic.”

Alter, sensing a long explanation brewing, waved off Lex’s question with a vague answer.

As the old man with snow-white hair and beard cautiously walked onto the battlefield, two soldiers carrying a stretcher emerged from the trenches below, carefully lifting Lirr and laying her gently upon it.

“Good work. Go and rest.”

The white-haired boy watched Lirr depart the battlefield with a wistful look. Those who saw his gaze assumed he held some special affection for the elven mage, but in truth, the boy was simply envious that Lirr was leaving the battlefield first.

“Heh… I get to go and eat some of the chocolate Master brought. This is such a sugar crash.”

“Aren’t you worried about me?”

The boy, facing a life-or-death situation, asked with a touch of woundedness, watching Lirr casually talk about eating chocolate.

“Nope, not at all?”

Lirr replied with a carefree smile.

It was never that she was indifferent to the boy, nor that she disliked him.

Quite the opposite, in truth.

Lier believed in the boy with an unwavering certainty. She knew that Bin was not the sort to collapse on such a battlefield, that the true potential and talent he possessed would not crumble in a place as insignificant as this.

“… “

But the two soldiers who had lifted Lier onto the stretcher regarded Bin with something akin to pity.

To an outsider’s eye, it simply looked like a human boy gazing adoringly at an elf, and an elf responding to such affections with brusque indifference.

‘…Bin-nim, you have… room for improvement in the art of romance.’

‘An elf… he’s chosen a difficult one.’

Such lighthearted, ill-timed thoughts flickered through the minds of the nearby soldiers.

Perhaps it was the weather.

The tension that had clenched their shoulders with the pressure of survival and death had begun to dissipate under the gentle caress of the bright sun and a moderately dry breeze.

Some might criticize it as a lapse in discipline before the enemy, but for those who had endured the daily terror of death, raising swords and shields time and again, such absurd levity was a necessity.

Perhaps this relaxed atmosphere was infectious. The soldiers, as if drawn by an unseen force, tentatively peeked over the edge of the trenches. A few even gingerly placed their hands on the ground, now hardened and brittle from the strange lightning, and pulled themselves out into the no-man’s land. The officers, observing this, did not stop them.

“…Is it a full-scale engagement?”

The lieutenant, still hidden within the trench, did not rebuke the soldiers for their unauthorized excursion. Instead, he addressed the white-haired boy.

Against Bell, the Overlords had only revealed themselves one at a time. Yet against Bin, two had appeared on the battlefield simultaneously.

Furthermore, one of these Overlords was writhing in agony at the bottom of a vast, unprotected crater, while the other seemed wary, fearful that the devastating magic from before might strike again.

Even the fog that had obscured their vision was gone. The bright sunlight illuminated the battlefield, allowing for swift reactions to enemy ambushes or assaults. The ground, hardened into a ceramic-like surface by the strange lightning, prevented their boots from sinking into the mud, preserving their mobility.

And above all, the eyes of the soldiers, who had previously stared only at the ground in fear, now shone with a spark of life and determination.

Their morale was not sky-high, but… even this was a welcome improvement.

If the soldiers of old were cattle and swine led to slaughter, these now were warriors prepared to meet death for hearth and homeland.

“It’s a total war.”

The young general’s declaration brought forth small, wry laughs and single-word pronouncements from the ranks.

“Finally, this goddamn attrition war ends. Damn… dragged on long enough.”

“Enough. Whether I die or they die, it ends today.”

“Hoo, damn it! Let’s do this.”

More and more soldiers began to emerge from the trenches. The clatter of armor spurred a sense of exaltation in their hearts.

“…Prepare for total war!”

The officer’s belated cry reverberated in their ears.

Mud-caked swords and shields slowly formed ranks, surrounding the white-haired boy.

“This… this is the real reason our mages are treated like nobility.”

Alter said with a smile, watching the white-haired boy.

“…You, moronic b*stards! Finally lost your minds, have you!”

Raguel, repairing his lightning-scorched wings, mocked the soldiers who took up sword and shield with burning resolve.

Coldly assessed, the continental army remained at a disadvantage. Two of the four archdemons had yet to reveal themselves, and considering the other high-ranking demons and their spawned aberrations, they were outnumbered and outmatched.

Yet, strangely, an inexplicable confidence surged within each soldier.

Perhaps it was from having witnessed the massive cascade of lightning that blanketed the heavens.

‘A mage who casts magic like that fights alongside us.’

‘If we protect Master Bean, everything will somehow work out.’

Foolish in one sense, lacking reason in another, those simple, unrefined thoughts gave strength to the soldiers’ legs.

The magician’s lightning wasn’t just blooming from the bodies of enemies.