Chapter 59 - The Darkness Of Salasma (6)

Azadine may have claimed he would spare him, but Kervin didn’t seem to believe it, which was a natural response. After all, having mercy on a wererat made no sense. He would either prey on humans again or spawn more of his own kind, a pain in the neck either way.

Mezerry possessed their souls. Unless they had a strong will, they had no choice but to live their lives as beasts.

“The thing is… I told you to run, but I didn’t say I wouldn’t catch you, did I?”

Azadine raised and flung the sword in his hand at the fleeing Kirven.

-Bam!

The sword that Azadine threw flew with a spin and slashed through Kirven’s calf.

“Aaack!”

A huge chunk of flesh was chopped off, and blood gushed heavily from the wound. Kirven slipped in his own blood and fell.

“You, you bastard! You said you’d let me live!”

“I told you I’d let you run, not that I’d spare you if you did.”

“Telling me to run and then attacking me from behind, shame on you as a messenger! You’re cursed indeed!!”

“I’m sorry about that, but I didn’t lie to you, did I?”

Azadine trudged up to him and retrieved his sword from the ground.

“Ah, I lied just now… honestly, I’m not sorry at all.”

He plunged the blade into Kirven’s throat, ending his life.

Azadine’s original plan was to draw out the enemies singly and eliminate them in isolation. Unfortunately, one unfaithful member of the Messenger Clan, Kirven, complicated everything. He had now trodden on his opponents’ shoes and lost his chance to retreat.

Had he made his way to the hideout to get the help of Mediam, Ismail, and the others, the wererats would have disappeared long before they returned. Not to mention that there were clear signs of several humans being kept inside the underground cellar. If he didn’t eliminate all of Mezerry’s followers now, their numbers would only increase again.

“I don’t have much choice. If only I had the Emperor’s Voice… I could use it to call others.”

He had been dismissed from his position as a messenger, so he couldn’t get in touch with the Emperor’s Voice for now…. Their fighting force became unnecessarily scattered as they attempted to lure and beat their enemies one by one.

Azadine stepped into the cellar. Inside was a gut-churning slaughterhouse designed to dismember humans, butcher them, eat them, and give unto them the blessings of Mezerry to turn them into wererats.

Inside a large, spacious operating room, a few wererats clutched surgical scalpels and saws as they wildly stabbed into a human strapped to an operating table. They then spotted Azadine in the doorway.

“Is everyone okay?”

When Azadine yelled that out loud, the wererats caught onto his identity.

“An intruder!”

Sacrifices would only scream. They would never ask such a calm and composed question as Azadine did.

“Kill him!”

A wererat wielding a surgical bone saw lunged at Azadine.

“With those skills?”

Azadine ducked, supporting himself with his hands on the floor, and countered with a kick.

-Thud! Rattle!

A single strike sent the wererat’s body piercing through the air and crashing into the operating table.

“You bastard!”

Another wererat dashed towards Azadine with surgical scalpels in both hands.

-Thwack!

Azadine split his opponent’s jaw, splitting it open from bottom to top with his sword. However…

-Snap!

The sword shattered in Azadine’s hand.

‘Damn it. I was thoughtless waving around a weapon this long.’

The blade tip was crushed after being caught at a nearby operating table.

“It’s our chance!”

Seeing this, another wererat charged at him. However, Azadine simply parried this attack with the halberd head in his hand.

-Thud!

The wererat’s forearm disappeared at his elbow. Azadine threw a straight punch using the halberd in his hand and hacked off the wererat’s forearm. He also slammed the wererat’s head, but his long, hideous teeth caused some trouble to the wererat.

Azadine’s attack had snapped the wererat’s teeth, curling them inward, piercing through the roof of its mouth into its brain. The wererat collapsed in a grotesque state.

“Urgh!”

It was difficult for Azadine to use his sword due to the operating tables. At the same time, the wererats were having difficulty surrounding him.

“Damn it, they were making noise upstairs, so I thought it was just rough play again. I can’t believe it was an intruder.”

“Luh-let’s run around here and surround him.”

“Who’s going to do that?”

“You first?”

One of the wererats hastily leaped over the table to attack. In return, Azadine launched a fierce kick.

As soon as the wererat tumbled on the operation table due to Azadine’s kick, the halberd head slammed down onto the table. Azadine wielded the blade in his hand like a seasoned martial artist smashing a brick. The halberd head smashed onto the wererat’s neck, resulting in a clean decapitation.

“Squeal?!”

“Krr uhh….”

The scene in front of them finally made it dawn on the wererats that Azadine was not a normal opponent. They realized that they were not the hunters. Rather, they were the prey.

Eliminating the wererats in the operating room didn’t take long, yet Azadine leaned against the wall and gasped for air.

“Pant… pant….”

His body was overworked.

Even Azadine wasn’t invincible. The ‘Flower, Bird, Wind, Moon’ from the Kazas Grimoire mimicked magic through the power of martial arts. The chaotic magic of his own shattered, incomplete grimoire and the strength of his trained muscles combined for a formidable force but cost him a large amount of stamina.

He feigned nonchalance in the face of his enemies, but now that he had slain them all, he no longer needed to bluff. Azadine gasped for breath and struggled to regain his strength.

“Pl-please save me!”

“Hic!”

As Azadine was catching his breath, the refugees who were strapped to the operating table squirmed and asked for help.

“Ah, yes. Okay.”

Azadine cut the ropes bound around the table and let the refugees loose. He then looked for the bone saw and scalpels the wererats used earlier and handed them to the refugees.

“For now, use these to defend yourself. Also, did you see a noblewoman in a red satin dress?”

“A-a woman?”

“I’m not sure, but if you’re looking for the women, they’re further inside…”

The people he rescued were speaking gibberish. It looked like there were probably even more spine-chilling acts being committed inside.

“Hmm. Wait!”

Azadin twisted the wood of the operating table to rip up the long wooden shafts.

“Tie a scalpel or a saw with a rope to this to make a polearm weapon. You won’t be able to take on a wererat with a short weapon. The ones around here are dead, but there’s no telling where else they might pop up from.”

“Oh, okay….”

“Wait right here! I’ll look further inside.”

“B-be careful. There are even more vile monsters inside!”

“Ex-excuse me, but who are you?”

“I’m one of the Emperor’s messengers.”

“Huh?!”

“A me-messenger?”

The rescued individuals were dumbfounded at finding out that Azadine was a member of the Messenger Clan. A soulless blasphemer, a Heavenly King Slayer with the Yaegas Gods’ blood on his hands, was considered an ominous omen, regardless of how much help he was to them.

“You’re okay. I’m not trying to hurt you.”

Azadine ignored their cold reactions and walked inside.

Deeper inside the cellar were giant rats the size of calves and the meat storage. These rats had saddles on their backs and were being ridden by deformed wererats. The deformed rats were their kith and kin, blessed by Mezerry, and had been mutated inside the womb.

“Squeak!”

“Kill.”

Women were tied to the wall, seemingly used as breeding sows, and were on the verge of death. Azadine drew a cross at the grisly of sight.

“The Trinity of Archangels… Please guide these poor souls.”

The one called a soulless blasphemer stepped forward in pity for their souls. Mezerry’s kin charged toward him while riding their giant rats.

As they glared at Azadine, Mezerry’s kins wielded large butchering hooks and leaped at him with their giant rats. Their small build hid an unimaginable jumping strength.

However….

-Snap!

Azadine flung scalpels from the operating room at them. These scalpels pierced through the eyes and face of the deformed wererats, allowing Azadine to dash in with the halberd head in his hand and use something from the Grimoire of Kazas.

-Dusk!

Azadine’s body passed through the kin of Mezerry and their rats.

-Autumn wind!

He launched a fierce horizontal attack. His hands were planted on the ground, supporting his entire body as he rotated, striking the smaller Mezerry kin and rats with his feet. He then retracted his swinging foot, reducing the angle of his spin and increasing his speed.

All the mutated wererats within Azadine’s attack radius were sent flying into the walls. Azadine’s Autumn Wind had blown them away like autumn leaves.

“Squeal…eek!”

The kin of Mezerry sprang back up with surprising vigor but instantly began gushing blood. The scalpel that Azadine had thrown at them had flown with the Autumn Wind and tumbled around before stabbing their prone bodies.

“Aargh!”

The kin of Mezerry collapsed. Their rats pounced on Azadine, but they, too, had scalpels rammed into their torsos. When Azadine kicked them away with a light kick, their wounds became too severe to survive.

After dealing with all of Mezerry’s kin, Azadine then approached the women chained to the wall.

“Are you all right?”

“Ugh….”

“Ah….”

Half of them were already dead from exhaustion. Of those who were alive, only a few were in good shape. However, he spotted no women wearing satin dresses.

‘She was just kidnapped last night, so she wouldn’t be here. Oh, my God, this is horrifying.’

After cutting the ropes that bound the survivors, he called for the people outside to help them escape. Those who had been tied to the operating tables had made weapons according to his instruction but panicked when Azadine called out to them.

“Wh-what is it, messenger?”

“Take the living women out of here and protect them.”

“Wh-what about you?”

“I’ll go look further inside.”

“…….”

Azadine’s actions stunned them.

‘They call the Messenger Clan’s people the slayers of god or as soulless blasphemers but-’

‘Is he going to take on the demons of the Kurt Clan like this?’

‘To save people?’

‘Is this a trick?’

But their instincts told them that Azadine’s actions were borne out of genuine concern as they could not sense any pretense about him. All they could see was a thorough determination to accomplish a goal.

It wasn’t something that could be mimicked by acting.

And what if it was acting?

Their lives had been saved after all.

Within the deepest recesses of the cellar were large barrels of wine with countless rats gnawing at corpses beneath them. At the same time, men hung chained by ropes above the barrels.

It was a dark cellar, save for a light that shone in the center of the room. It was a glowing piece of paper, a copy of the Heavenly King’s Grimoire that radiated its own light.

“Hm.”

A knight wearing plate armor and a surcoat bearing the seal of the Rescue Knights Order began to break into a cold sweat as he approached the copy of the Heavenly King’s Grimoire while making intricate signs using his hands.