One man's pain means another one's gain

(Third POV)

The Holy Sword Highway.

A road that has historical value to the history of the Millis Religion.

Starting from the edge of the capital, Millishion, going through a gap of the Blue Dragon Mountain Range and through the Great Forest, shows the trajectory of Saint Millis's attack used by his Holy Sword to wipe out the Demon army along with the Demon King.

For the distance and the power to kill a Demon King, much time was required to prepare. Time that the army of the human side provided for Millis.

Even after all those centuries, evidential remains are bound on the road itself.

The mysterious power from the Holy Sword made the road one of the safest in the world, promising anyone who goes through it not to encounter any monsters.

Even with the floods coming down from the Great Forest during the Rainy Season, the road stays dry, promising little to no complications. Even after the expansion from the first [Bright Sky Wave] incident, the road became dry days after.

But even the safest of roads in this world cannot prevent the danger that lies with people plagued with greed for money or the lack of sympathy for another one's life.

Such unfortunate bad luck has befallen the Greyrat family during their journey to the World Power Monument to allow them to seek refuge in the Armorsd Dragon King's flying castle.

But their fate was cast upon by the corrupted society of politicians who only go by assumptions and superstitions.

Paul Greyrat was one of those individuals who tried to defy such misfortune, running with the images in his head of his nightmares prior to his squabble with Rudeus. It was the one thing that fueled his determination to run forward.

The massive boost in Touki he achieved helped him clear the distance in mere minutes, reaching the crashed sight of one of the carriages.

It wasn't in clear view because of the slowly diminishing darkness, but it was clear that the fighters of the group were holding back the remaining assassins.

Between the two groups was another person who exuded the aura of pure might.

Paul didn't bother with him. His targets were the three black-cloaked assassins who were aiming their weapons at his family.

With no hesitation, he gripped his sheathed sword and executed a [Longsword of Light] against the assassin closest to him. Hearing Paul's groundbreaking dash, the instincts of said assassin were to evade, but it was too late.

Along with his already powerful swing, the white flames were on the edge of his sword.

Slashing through even the man's sword, the tip of his own sword slashed across the man's chest without killing him.

With no hesitation, Paul grabbed the short sword hanging from the assassin's waist and used it to throw it towards the other man furthest away, who had earlier wanted to run away.

The short sword was coated with the same white fire as well, boosting the velocity it had before plunging into the man's abdomen, reaching the spine with its edge, ultimately paralyzing him from the waist and below.

With a slight pause for Paul to breathe, the two men fell. The last one of them, horrified upon this sight, especially when he saw that Paul was alive.

He theorized that he escaped the other and their leader and came running to them, not even doubting for a second that he had defeated them all.

And yet Paul was not done yet. He readied his sword by holding it at his left side, tightening his pain screaming legs one last time.

The assassin saw no other escape than to make his move as well, holding his long sword with his left hand and a short sword with his right. He plans to redirect Paul's attack to slip through it and stab him with his poison-coated short sword at an opening.

Both dashed forward, clashing with their sword and the assassin to pary Paul.

Paul himself did the same thing, but using [Flow] while doing a 360-degree rotation counterclockwise and completely put the assassin off guard. With the momentum of his spin, Paul used a [Longsword of Silence] and slashed the his back, another coating of white fire added into it.

With the last of the eight assassins down, Paul was momentarily relieved but then realized that there was another person standing a bit further away from his family.

Wearing a white coat adorned with fur, silver hair and golden eyes with slit pupils, having a overpowering look on them, two scars that went across his face and an expression of pure bewilderment that locked on to the knight.

It was none other than Dragon God Orsted, the number two of the Seven Great World Powers.

It was thanks to him that Perugius allowed Paul and his family to take refuge on [Chaos Breaker], suspecting that Hitogami may have something to do with it in this already bizarre loop.

He had followed them from the side of the road this entire time, watching as he became aware of the assassin's group keeping track of them as well.

When Paul got left behind to deal with the majority of them, Orsted, prioritizing the life of a major person in his mission, followed the others to eliminate the three men who went around on the other side of the road.

He knew that Paul had no chance of survival, since in any of the prior loops he wasted his talent his entire life, the only purpose he had for Orsted was bringing one of his important allies to the world.

Never in his imagination had he thought that even Paul would be different in this loop to survive Millishion's strongest assassin group in this era, but to use the same bizarre Magic Rudeus had used before was even more surprising.

Orsted looked at Paul's eyes, the same golden iris with slit pupils as his, with the addition of his hair getting silver for a moment, before vanishing as soon as Paul blinked, his eyes back to green and his hair now slightly white on the tips.

'Was Paul secretly a member of the Dragon race? Is the survival of his son the cause of this? And then… how… how can he look at me in the eyes after changing back into a human?'

None of it made sense to Orsted. Too many factors in this loop are making it hard for him to predict further changes.

Nanahoshi Shizuka and Rudeus Greyrat having an immunity to his curse was already too big of a first experience, but now the same Paul Orsted had met many times before has immunity to Orsted as well.

"Daddy!"

Working against her initial fear of Orsted, thanks to his curse, Norn ran up to her father, the latter breaking eye contact with the mysterious man in front of him.

"Norn! Thank goodness, you're alright."

Keeping his sword in his right hand, he embraced his daughter. In the next second, he was yelled at by his sister-in-law.

"For crying out loud, Paul, do something!"

"Huh? Do what?" Paul asked, a bit perplexed as he looked around to see no other assassin roaming around.

"Him!"

Paul looked at the silver-haired man Therese was pointing at, but he didn't understand what could be wrong with the guy. He was just stood there, still looking puzzled as to how Paul is secretly became a Dragon.

Orsted was intrigued, so he looked at Aisha first, who hid behind her equally terrified mother, and then at Norn, who clutched harder on Paul, to which her father became concerned and readied his sword at Orsted.

'It doesn't seem like they inherited any immunity to my curse. But his supposed son has been open to me without any sign of fear. How odd.'

Having had enough of the fiasco, Orsted decided to end the silence to confirm some things. He originally planned to do so through the means of when Perugius talked to Paul, but now that has changed after this discovery.

"Paul Greyrat. Is Rudeus Greyrat your actual son in flesh and blood?"

It was a out-of-the-blue question for Paul that he didn't know how to to understand his question.

The three women, consisting of Therese, Ginger, and Lilia, had a bad feeling that the man was someone Rudeus may have pissed off. And they aren't wrong.

Soon Paul came to that conclusion as well, hesitant to even ask what had happened between him and his son, so he went back into keeping his sword aimed at Orsted.

As socially awkward as Orsted sometimes is on the outside (if not even most of the time), he had enough tact to know that now may not have been the right moment to interrogate them about Rudeus.

After heaving a sigh, he gave Paul one final glance before turning around.

"We will talk again another time. Head to the monument and rest on [Chaos Breaker]."

With those last words, Orsted ran off to the direction they were heading to, his silhouette vanishing in the distance. And with each passing moment, the tense air began to diminish, getting everyone to calm down.

Falling on his butt after finally noticing his body aching in pain, he let go of his sword and let out an exhausted sigh.

The rest of the group came after him, checking if he was alright.

But as things started to cool down, a surge of rage rose, making him scream the name of the presumed perpetrator up at the lightening up sky, signaling that the next day is about to embark already.

"God dammit, Claire, you witch!"

"What? Mother? Did she send them after us?"

"That's what their leader said anyway. And all in return for-"

Paul paused. He hesitated to tell them about Claire's intention with Norn being around.

Instead, he got up again and surveyed their state as of now.

"Where are your friends, Therese?"

"They were killed before that man with the scars on his face arrived."

"I see."

It didn't pose a problem for themselves, but rather

"Father?" Aisha asked. "Since when can you use Fire Magic?"

"I-I was wondering that as well." Vierra stammered, terrified of Paul for a slight moment.

"What? I don't know a single spell, so how would…"

For the second time, Paul's nature made him process such things at a later point.

But instead of remembering he used it himself, he remembered its possible origins as he looked down on his hands, bowling them into fists.

'Those flames. Did Rudy give me this? Does that mean the dream was real all along? And this coating… is this my… Touki?'

For the first time in his training, or his entire life in general, Paul became consciously aware of the mana coating his body, also known as Touki.

He felt the layers covering each part of his body individually, from the bottom of his feet, going up to his head and fingertips.

With such a milestone now unlocked, he may very well catch up to the potential he wasted upon all those years ago.

"Husband? Your shoulder."

Lilia unintentionally broke that little daze hot himself into as she noticed the bloodied part of Paul's armor. She came up to him only to see that there was no wound to be found.

But then Ginger called everyone's attention to something.

"They are all dead."

While the others were inversed with Paul's new strength, Ginger and Shierra attempted to apprehend the assassins, but it was already too late. None of them took another breath.

"What? Did I cut them too deep?"

Besides the guy who he threw the so word into his abdomen, he was sure the other two wouldn't die right away.

As he slipped through Lilia and Therese, he approached the one he defeated first, laying on his back with the wound still open. It was clear that the cause of death wasn't blood loss since no puddle of blood was to be found around the body. The eyes of the man were wide open with a redness to them as if he were screaming, or at least trying to.

"Those flames… did those do that?"

Talking under his breath, he came up with that suspicion right after. It was the only obvious thing that could have explained it.

"Rudy…"

He remembered the dream he had. The one where his arms suddenly caught on fire before Rudeus vanished into thin air.

'Perugius… I need to ask him to let me talk to Rudeus. If Arumanfi can come across anyone in the world, then he has to be able to get in touch with Rudy. I need to… I want to see him.'

"Let's just burn these bodies and rest for a bit before we keep going. It was a rough start to the day."

No one objected to it. The abrupt wake-up call put everyone in a state of panic while trying to collect themselves.

Therese, Vierra, and Ginger removed the gears from the bodies before carrying them to a single spot before Shierra used Fire Magic to put them on fire.

Lilia went with Aisha and Norn to get their things from the broken carriage. The horses ran off after Orsted had come close enough for his Curse to set in, so the group could only take what was essential to keep with them.

Meanwhile, Paul went to grab the sword he dropped earlier, about to put it into its sheath, until yet another thing happened.

*Badump*

A loud, audible heartbeat eroded the ears of everyone around.

"Was that a heartbeat?" Therese asked out loud.

"I think it came from Paul?" Ginger pointed out, the aforementioned person frozen in place as he was about to grab the hilt of his sword.

But in the next second, he continued moving and putting his sword back into its sheath.

Looking around himself, he saw that all eyes were set on him.

"Is something wrong?" He asked, playing as if he didn't know what they were all looking at him.

Seeing as he wasn't harmed by anything, everyone continued what they were doing.

Only Lilia kept her eyes on him to see him put his hand on his mouth to cough lightly.

In reality, Paul wanted to shout out in pain the moment he felt like his entire body's fibers were fighting against each other, but because it only lasted a second, he was able to keep his mouth shut and not worry everyone more than he already has, spitting only a little bit of blood.

But unbeknownst to anyone around, the power Paul had used came with a cost. Something that not he himself would suffer from, but in fact, the person on the other side of the world map.

***

(Sharia, three day after Rudeus's first talk with Ariel)

In the middle of the night, Rudeus received a wake-up call from within himself. He was asleep in his room at his inn, exhausted after teaching more than a dozen Magicians how to use their awakened Chantless Magic.

As he was lying in bed, a burning sensation befell his body, the heartbeat missing but the scar on his chest glowing up brightly.

He rolled around with the urge to scream in pain but suppressed it while putting his hands on his mouth.

If one were to hear his thoughts, they would have to be censored fully into the sound of a Morse code if they were to be revealed on any platform.

After a few minutes, he fell down his bed, on his knees, with his hands now occupied gripping the ground and leaving scratch marks.

The glowing scar began to expand via his veins, going up his neck and then to his face and reaching both of his closed eyes.

The process that was commenced is something that brings forth improvements in Rudeus he never expected.

Once it was done, he sprang his tears-filled eyes open, seeing the world with new eyes. Quite literally.

His eyes constantly changed between colors as they swapped between six different kinds of Demon Eyes.

Because of his lack of control over which eye to use, Rudeus fell to the side as he went unconscious, waking up the next morning trying to figure out what he had done to go through such a torturous night.

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