Blood poured from the great elder’s mouth and dyed his white beard red. His eyes shook unsettlingly until they lost their glint.
“Kuh…uh…” These were the last words the great elder muttered before he left the world.
The elder’s body became limp. His body couldn’t collapse onto the ground with the sword penetrating his heart, making the scene appear even more appalling.
“Y-You bastard!” one of the elders shrieked. Stunned by the unrealistic scene before them, the others also began to move. Simultaneously, they cast magic attacks towards the robed figure.
As expected of elves titled as the elders among the Iron Tribe, the magic they shot complemented each other perfectly and increased their overall effect. However, the robed figure’s response to these attacks was simple: he threw the great elder’s corpse at the magic attacks.
Craaash!
The magic attacks exploded when they collided against the greatest elder’s corpse; the corpse burst and scattered its remains all over the place. Even a person with great resistance to gore and violence would have grimaced, and the sight was gruesome enough to turn most people’s faces pale.
However, the robed figure didn’t seem to care whether or not blood or flesh landed onto his robe and used the chance when the magic disappeared to make his next move.
“This bastard…!” An elder raised his fist at the robed figure who was within his reach in an instant. However, since the elder didn’t hold any weapons and lacked physical abilities due to his old age, his punch was pitifully weak.
Slam! The elder’s body split into two with a punch. Blood scattered on the bottom of the tree of fire. The robed figure moved to look for his next prey and saw an elder beside the previous one hurriedly back away. His sword cruelly pierced the elder.
Slice! A red horizontal line marked the elder’s neck; it expanded rapidly, and in the end, the head fell away from the body.
“Gather up! Gather to one side for now!”
“Protect His Majesty! Your Majesty, come to this side!” The elders quickly assessed the situation with their decision-making skills honed by decades of experience, and guarded against the robed figure. In the meantime, the robed figure had killed three elders.
As if he also couldn’t move hastily, the robed figure stopped moving. This was because the elders were preparing high-level magic instead of quickly casting silent incantation spells; it seemed even the robed figure had a difficult time handling elder-level elf magic prepared by not just one elder, but multiple.
As they entered a confrontation, Renu shouted, “Y-You damn fucking bastard!” He gritted his teeth and glared at the robed figure, clearly exuding his desire to shred his opponent’s body into pieces.
The great elder and several elders died under the robed figure’s hands. Of course, Renu didn’t have an ounce of mourning in his heart about their deaths. These elders were, at most, tools; he might have felt pitiful about his tools being destroyed, but didn’t feel any emotions like sadness. However, the problem was that it had been a tool that gave him enormous power.
Furthermore, it was the fact that his accomplice—even if it was made through a temporary alliance—had stabbed him in the back and landed a heavy blow on him. It wasn’t because Renu trusted the robed figure. He should have been the one to backstab instead of getting backstabbed. After all, Renu was the type of elf who thought being tricked was substantial evidence for one’s stupidity. Therefore, this situation proved his own stupidity.
“How dare you betray me! What’s your goal!” All kinds of thoughts swirled inside Renu’s head—was the robed figure planning to save their lives by handing them over to the allied forces, or had this been their plan all along? Renu continued, “I don’t know what you are thinking, but don’t think everything will go according to plan! Neither you nor your organization will achieve your goal! Never!” Renu strained his throat to spew out curses.
The fact that the robed figure backstabbed him in an unfavorable situation enraged Renu to the max. However, this was only the beginning, and there were many more infuriating things to come.
“…Ha!” The robed figure had been silently swinging his sword until now, but he began to laugh.
“Heeheehee!” A stream of low mocking laughs seeped out. It was the sort of laughter that agitated Renu’s nerves even more than an outright one. As if he knew this, the sound of the robed figure’s laughter grew even louder.
“Ha, hahahahahaha!”
The robed figure clutched his stomach in heavy laughter and stopped.
“An organization?” A voice filled with light-hearted laughter rang out, and Renu scowled.
Renu no longer heard the robed figure’s rough voice that was raspy enough to scratch an iron surface. It was a normal, clear voice that wasn’t uncomfortable to listen to.
“What is this organization you are talking about? Is it the kind where its members wear gloomy, black robes and plot evil schemes from the back?”
“What are you say—" Although Renu imagined many different reasons for the robed figure’s betrayal, he didn’t expect the figure to say these words.
“You know, the types who go around crawling for things to prey upon under people’s noses like cockroaches. If you think about that, I bet they matched really well with you guys.”
“Then, no way...!” Renu began to grasp the situation. It wasn’t that the organization had betrayed him. The guy who collaborated with him wasn’t from the organization in the first place.
The mysterious figure continued, “You are the kind that eats these dirty and sickening cockroaches and acts like you have the whole world within your grasp. So, you seem like—um, something below it. How should I describe you? A cricket? A maggot? Even I—with my colorful language to describe my opponents—am struggling to find the right comparison for you.”
Renu realized that he had heard this voice before. As the burn under his bandages began to hurt him once more, Renu stuttered, “You…You…!”
Swish! The dagger that the robed figure was holding changed shape; multiple sides sprouted out from the top to make it look like a tree branch. How could Renu forget such a unique-looking sword? It was also the same strangely-shaped sword that opened the wall of the fire tree.
“Yooooooouu!” Renu shouted in despair.
Zich extravagantly threw away the robe he was wearing. “Hey, it’s so nice to meet you, Renu Ent Dras. Haven’t we met before?”
In sharp contrast to the anguished Renu and the elders who had their eyes wide open in surprise, Zich flashed a bright and refreshing smile. “The room that I saw last time left such a deep impression on me that I pretended to be a different person to come again. Won’t you forgive me for this once? Weren’t we comrades working together to fight against the allied forces just recently?” Zich said with his usual easygoing and joking tone; of course, the content of his words was anything but that.
The elders who heard Zich’s mockery turned bright red. Their king was being insulted and mocked. However, surprisingly, Renu didn’t show much reaction. He merely hung his head low, but judging by his trembling fists, his heart seemed far from peaceful.
“…Since when?” Renu did not specify his question, but Zich was easily able to understand what Renu was asking about.
“The last human from the assassin organization was probably the one you killed. After that, all the robed figures were me.”
“Then, was that guy who came to confirm my betrayal…!”
“Yeah, I thought you and the assassin organization would be connected. While confirming that though, I also thought I could get more information from you by dressing up as one of them. Really, I was so thankful that you spilled information just like I wanted you to. Ah, to think about it, I haven’t expressed my gratitude.”
Zich threw something, and Renu and the elders instantly grew tense. However, Zich didn’t throw a dangerous item. It was human money, and the lowest value at that.
“Buy something tasty with that instead of trapping yourself in a stuffy place like this and doing weird things. That’s why you have no friends and your personality is twisted. This advice is really coming from my heart, so make sure to engrave it deeply in your mind.”
Renu and the elders’ gaze were stuck on the coin rolling on the floor. They also knew how much that money was worth.
“Are you guys that fascinated by human money? That’s the reason why you guys can’t make it. You have to try going out to the human world once in a while and see how the world is moving along. Since you don’t do that, you spout out stupid nonsense like how you are going to rule over the elves and humans. Don’t you think it’s important for humans and elves to know their place?”
“…Hey.” Without responding to Zich, Renu turned to the elders. His voice was flat and calm, and it completely contrasted the shouting and angry sounds he made so far. This was also an indication of how angry he really was. “Immediately continue with the ritual and make the fire tree go berserk.”
“Your Majesty, that will…!” An elder who was about to make a contrasting opinion swallowed his words; it was because he saw Renu’s eyes. Even though Renu had an awful personality, this was the first time his eyes looked as if they could kill someone with just a gaze.
“It doesn’t matter if you blow up this whole area. I no longer care about the aftermath.” Renu stared directly at Zich.
Zich calmly accepted the murderous gaze that could have even made the strongest hero take a step back. On the other hand, Zich seemed to think Renu’s hatred funny, as he began agitating Renu more by laughing.
“First, kill that bastard!”
The elders met each other's gazes. They wondered if they should follow Renu’s order or not. Anyone could see that the king was not in his right state of mind. He was so consumed by anger and hatred that he was unable to make a rational decision. However, they obediently brought out their mana. In the end, they decided to follow their master’s command.
Of course, they didn’t obey just because their king commanded them to. Since they were only focused on the ritual, they didn’t know the situation upstairs, but they could clearly see that the current situation was not favorable for their tribe. If that was the case, it was not a bad idea to make a last gamble for their tribe’s fate.
Ziiiing! The elders’ mana reached the fire tree. In an instant, flames danced around them. Zich swung his sword.
Swish!
Mana sharply exuded out from Zich’s sword and darted towards the elders.
Crash!
However, the mana from the sword was not able to reach its goal. The dancing flames around them completely erased Zich’s mana.
“Stupid fool!” Renu mocked Zich. “Did you think that I will continue the ritual in front of my enemy with zero preparation!”
Renu seemed happy that he was able to finally retaliate against Zich. It had been a long while since he had shouted with glee. “This ritual is different from a normal ritual! The fire tree that went berserk automatically protects us. Your pathetic skill won’t work on us!”
Zich sent multiple mana attacks from his sword, but they also all disappeared into the flames.
“Desperately try all you want! In the end, you will fall into despair at your own lack of ability! The only thing you can hope is for us to fail now. If our ritual is successful, I’m going to wipe you guys out of this world! And especially you, I won’t let you die a peaceful death! I’m going to take my time playing with you and then kill you!”
“Ah, is that so?” Zich was indifferent to Renu’s curse. The sight of him cleaning out his ears with his fingers made him look very carefree.