At the same time, the faces of the exhausted knights lit up brightly.

Looking down from the castle walls, they saw a man standing there, just as they had expected.

Their lord, who they had been waiting for, alive.

Sched raised his head, confirming the intact castle walls.

His violet eyes shone vividly in the rain.

“My lord!”

Those who spotted him cheered joyfully as if they had already won.

Such was the existence of Sched Lester.

The invincible hero who boosted the morale of all living beings.

“Defend the castle as you are now.”

Sched reminded those who had fallen into a sense of relief of the situation once again.

Before their eyes, a massive skeleton was still moving and clacking ceaselessly.

Moreover, the undead that had risen again at some point began to surround Sched.

Sched gripped his sword and leaped, kicking off the ground.

At the same time, he swung his sword greatly, and the skeletons around him collapsed to the ground as if a huge wave had swept over them.

With a thud, he crushed a skeleton under his feet as he landed, and it shattered cleanly, losing its breath.

Then, a Leviathan that had lost one arm swung its other arm down at him.

Kwang−!

A thunderous roar echoed, enough to reverberate even in the rain.

“Sir Lester!”

The startled priests called out to him.

But the knights of the Lester family, without any hesitation, dealt with the other undead climbing the castle walls.

And as they had long believed, Sched, who easily avoided the attack, stepped on a shattered skull and leaped into the sky where rain poured down once again.

The sharp sword drew a long trajectory from the ground to the sky.

Crack! Sharp winds clung to the tip of his blade, slicing through the center of the huge mass of death.

The sound of the wind created by the single strike sounded like a scream let out by the skeleton.

Thud, as Sched landed and thrust his sword into a skeleton’s head, the massive swarm collapsed with a thunderous sound.

The bones crumbled down like an avalanche.

“Haha, really… you’re still the same even without an Ora.”

Hedric laughed emptily as he pulled the sword out of the skull.

It seemed like even a catastrophe that could shatter the world would not be feared if it was Sched Lester.

“Hold on just a little longer! High Priestess Giselle will arrive soon!”

Sched shouted to the soldiers.

Yes, she said she would come around today.

She may not be a welcome woman, but perhaps she is the person most needed in Parallel right now.

However…

Sched stood on the bone fragments and gazed at the distant watchtower where dark energy flowed.

“Carlyle, Hedric! I entrust you with the defense.”

Leaving the remaining undead to his subordinates, he penetrated through the split skeletons.

In the distant old watchtower was Dietrich.

To end the war where pitch-black death swarmed, he had to strike that head.

No. In fact, the armistice was just a good cause…

He simply wanted to kill Dietrich.

Dietrich stood on the watchtower and watched the approaching whirlwind.

Among the countless undead, ‘his’ presence clearly stood out.

Wherever he swept through, the undead lay cut down like weeds.

The piled-up white bones revealed the path Sched Lester had walked.

“I really don’t like him.”

Dietrich muttered as he watched the man disrespectfully destroying the bodies of the dead.

He had disliked Sched for a long time.

Ever since his brother, Joseph Lester, adopted the grown-up Sched.

Yes, Joseph Lester. His half-brother.

A great man who had been revered by people from a young age.

Joseph was often praised for having an exceptionally keen eye for people.

But in Dietrich’s eyes, his brother was just a tyrant who judged people with a selfish gaze.

“Brother must have been out of his mind to make Lupus, who doesn’t even carry the Lester family bloodline, the successor.”

Knowing full well that Dietrich was there, Joseph deliberately took Lupus as his son.

Well, Joseph had long been dissatisfied with Dietrich, his half-brother.

He often scolded him with a stern face, and Dietrich had no choice but to grow up under the watchful eyes of his half-brother, who was more than ten years older than him.

It was the same when he achieved excellent grades at the monastery.

“He told me to stop researching black magic too…”

Dietrich twisted the corners of his mouth upward, recalling old memories he had forgotten for a long time.

Joseph got angry at Dietrich and demanded that he stop his ongoing research immediately.

“Your research is going too far, Dietrich!”

When Dietrich gained recognition for his research on black magic and ancient languages, Joseph even threatened to burn his research materials.

“Did you hate it so much that I was being acknowledged at the monastery?”

Perhaps that’s why he hastily brought in a son to pass on the succession.

“But Lupus was too much…?”

Dietrich had no great desire for the position of duke.

Of course, if he were given the position, he would have been willing to give up his position as a priest, but… even if he had no ambition, bringing in a grown-up slave like Lupus and passing on the succession to him was a wound.

It was an act that completely ignored Dietrich.

“Dietrich!”

While he was momentarily lost in memories of the past, Sched had reached the front of the watchtower.

To break through that path and arrive so quickly, he was truly a monstrous human being.

“Sched Lester.”

Dietrich looked down at his nephew.

Steam was rising faintly from his rain-soaked body.

His thin shirt, drenched by the rain, revealed his firm body.

The shirt was stained with blood here and there.

It was unlikely that the skeletons would bleed, and it didn’t seem to be blood from Sched’s wounds either.

Dietrich saw the burning anger and hatred reflected in Sched’s eyes and laughed.

“…You met Louise, I suppose?”

Dietrich asked, inferring the owner of the blood staining his clothes.

Sched didn’t answer and tightly gripped his sword.

Dietrich nodded his head, seeing Sched suppressing his surging excitement.

“As I thought, you were the one who attempted to lift the barrier on the lab, Sched.”

He had wondered who was tampering with the barrier at the entrance of the lab, and it was indeed him.

But Dietrich no longer cared if his research materials were exposed.

As a demon, he had no intention of hiding his sins.

Black mist swirled around Dietrich’s body.

“In the end, you resorted to the power of heresy…”

Sched muttered, looking at the dark energy.

A transcendental power, different from the energy he felt from Parmen.

As he had expected, Dietrich had become a complete ‘demon’.

“Heresy… What is the standard for defining heresy? Isn’t it just the church branding what doesn’t suit their taste? Unquestioning, blind laws only hinder the progress of humanity.”

Dietrich spoke fluently, unlike his usual self.

Sched frowned at his eloquent speech, and Dietrich laughed, seeing that expression.

“Oh, are you surprised that I’m not stuttering, Sched?”

He burst into laughter and exaggeratedly stuttered.

“Was that all an act too?”

“You could say that…! When I talk like this, people don’t bother me. Moreover… they look down on me. Not realizing that they’re the ones being foolishly deceived.”

Dietrich casually adjusted his collar.

Pretending to be clumsy was a meticulous disguise to avoid people’s eyes.

When he stuttered, many people somehow viewed him as innocent and pitiful.

People didn’t seriously suspect that he, a stutterer, would be researching black magic that only those with ambition or interest would pursue.

Even when an awkward question came in occasionally, he could brush it off by stuttering.

It was also convenient for focusing on research, as not many people approached him or bothered him first.

It was a convenient device in many ways.

“Where is Eve?”

Sched raised his sword towards Dietrich.

“Don’t tell me you came to rescue the child Louise had with another man?”

Dietrich clicked his tongue, mocking the man looking up at him.

But even at his provocation, Sched’s eyes remained unwavering.

Yes, he disliked those eyes of Sched.

For a slave, his eyes were so dignified, and his head was so stiff.

Even though he was born to kneel, bow, and lower himself, he acted as if he were born with the blood of those who rule.

An arrogant, unwavering, and cold-hearted person.

Dietrich always found such a Sched distasteful.

Lupus in the clothes of a duke.

Wasn’t it like a weed growing among lilies, pretending to be a lily?

Lupus, who was no different from a dog in heat, what was so great about him to be so stiff?

Lupus should just be leashed and submit.

Such an arrogant and disrespectful person was not worthy of receiving the blessing of eternity.

“You need to learn to submit before death, Sched.”

As Dietrich raised his black hand, the undead rose from the ground once again.

Even the undead at the rear attacking the castle all turned their bodies towards where Sched was.

Their pitch-black eyes were all staring at him.

Dietrich, with a satisfied smile, flicked his fingertips downward.

At the small signal, the dead charged towards the one living being.

Sched gritted his teeth.

As Sched quickly spun his body, water droplets flew from his hair and clothes.

The wet shirt made a threatening flapping sound.

At the same time, the blade that flashed white sliced through the head of the moving corpse.

“Kwaaak!”

While sweeping away the enemies in the front, a skeleton leaped from behind, aiming for the nape of his neck.

Thwack! He instantly swung his long leg and shattered the solid mass of bones.

Even though he must have expended a lot of energy coming from the castle walls to the watchtower, his movements were as stable and graceful as someone who had just finished warming up.

With his flawless movements, the rampaging dead returned to their places one by one, turning back into soil.

Soil-stained bones piled up under Sched’s feet once again.

Dietrich’s eyes narrowed as he watched the collapsing undead.

“Those things are worthless even in death.”

A sneer twisted from his lips.

Sched leisurely raised his head to stare at the demon and pulled out the sword that had pierced the skull.

Annihilated bone fragments lay like a carpet on the mud.

Before he knew it, the path leading to the watchtower was open.

But there was not a hint of urgency on Dietrich’s face.

His expression, as if he had something to believe in, was somehow suspicious.

At that moment, Sched felt a chilling sensation brushing against the nape of his neck.

Sched instantly twisted his body and diagonally slashed his sword upward.

However, the sword that was drawing an arc stopped before completing half of it.

The cold blade, wet with rainwater, was stopped in front of a white nape.

“…Eve!”

A child holding a sword as long as her small body.

The eyes that always sparkled with curiosity now stared at him, clouded as if filled with fog.