The wind was howling.
Endless, awe-inspiring winds layered over one another, wrapping around him as if condensing into solid matter.
A figure walked slowly across the earth.
His green cloak fluttered in the wind. The majestic gales bowed before him like commoners welcoming their king.
Ade stared straight ahead, looking into that suffocating darkness.
“...You must be cut down.”
He nudged Cloud Slicer out of its sheath by an inch.
Sshing—
The endless wild winds scattered and swirled around him, howling and shrieking, cheering for the arrival of their king.
The Storm King, the Skull Hunter Knight, Ade.
A knight walking the earth, one of the legendary Six Heroes recorded in history.
He had come for a single purpose.
“The Storm King? Mmhmm~ You're an old guy~”
Beyond the endless darkness, another ruler revealed herself before the king.
Her cherry-blossom hair fell loose, and her heart-shaped pupils narrowed slightly, as if sizing him up.
The Demon King, Ellie.
“So, did you come all this way just to kill me?”
Ade said nothing. He simply drew his blade.
Cloud Slicer cleared its sheath, and even the clouds at the very edge of the sky were sliced apart.
They scattered like falling petals.
“How terrifying~”
Ellie chuckled softly. She tapped the surrounding darkness with her fingertip, staining her slender finger like a brush dipping into ink.
She flicked her finger, splashing the ink to form a pitch-black river in front of her.
The Demon King plunged her hand into the river.
“『By the skeletal blood of the Ten Courts, crown me.』”
She whispered.
“『Cardinal Unleashed: Demon Realm Manifestation.』”
A miniature, simplified Demon Realm expanded outward.
Within this pitch-black, lightless domain, relief carvings of the ten first-generation Court Heads surrounded them, gazing upon the figure of the Demon Realm's king.
Ade felt the Demon King's pressure bearing down on him. He focused, searching for the slightest flaw to slash into that single crack within her imposing aura.
Sshing—
The Demon King looked up, staring at the sword light that cleaved the clouds.
Miles of cloud seas parted to both sides under this single strike, revealing the azure sky above like a scar.
Before Cloud Slicer's edge could even arrive, the sword qi alone was already cracking the ground beneath her feet.
She raised her left hand, lightly curling her fingers.
The sword light ground to a halt three inches from her palm.
When the sword light capable of splitting the sky touched the boundary of the invisible darkness surrounding her, it was like a trickle of pure water falling into an ink pool—silently swallowed, diluted, and reduced to nothing.
Within ten paces of her, light did not exist, wind did not exist, and even the air ceased to flow.
Then she swung the sword in her right hand. The blade of Skeletal Crown dragged a pitch-black trail through the air.
Ade's Cloud Slicer was already blocking that trajectory at the exact same moment.
The two swords clashed. Pitch-black and azure light exploded outward from the point of impact. Wild winds and shadows tangled as they surged into the sky, tearing the newly closed clouds to shreds once more.
Ellie used the momentum to drift backward, her boot heels stepping out ink-colored ripples in the empty air. She tilted her head, her heart-shaped pupils brimming with amusement.
“Oh my, your sword is even faster than I thought, old guy~”
Ade did not answer.
He raised his left hand.
Wild winds gathered there, condensing onto Moon Shooter.
The wind, solidified into physical form, wrapped around his hand like a gauntlet. It made Ade's hand look as if it were swallowed by light, radiating a pure, flawless glow.
The Emperor's majestic wind pressed lightly onto the blade, coating it.
“『Terminal Spiral』”
Thunder plummeted from the sky, crashing heavily onto Cloud Slicer.
Wild winds and thunder danced together as the spiral announcing the end began to coalesce at this very moment.
“This is getting troublesome~”
Ellie flicked her wrist, and the skeletal blood of the Ten Courts instantly covered Skeletal Crown.
The keratin of demons, the blood of vampires, the magic of liches, the lava of flame demons, the mist of nightmares, the patterns of succubi, the runes of gargoyles, the shadows of shadow demons, the phosphorescence of wraiths, and the rot of scavengers.
The skeletal blood, filled with ten different properties, overlapped and fused on the blade, resembling a sheet of stained glass that had been shattered and pieced back together.
“『The Sword that Cleaves the Twilight』”
...
“What kind of ridiculous unofficial history is this?”
Esper slammed the book shut. Staring at the bold title, The Secret, Impossible-to-Reveal Epic of the Storm King and the Demon King: Volume I, her brow furrowed into a tight knot.
“How is this unofficial history? This is literary and artistic creation!”
Noelle, who had voluntarily worked overtime to write the draft, yawned and retorted weakly.
“Setting aside all that nonsense, why are the main characters Ade and Ellie?”
“Huh? That kind of thing... I don't know.”
“Why don't you know?!”
“Maybe I dreamed it... Yawn... I'm going back to sleep...”
“Don't fall asleep so fast!”
Rate on N.U.
