Free Web NovelWhen Aurora was sixteen, she had already grown three years past her age. Before the Captain left the Western Territories to temper his swordsmanship in other regions, she boarded a great ship with him toward the Southern Territories. On the night of departure, as the ship set sail, the Captain took her onto the deck to gaze at the vast ocean, at the homeland growing ever more distant.
“How is it? First time leaving home, leaving your sister. Feeling reluctant? Sad?”
“No.” She shook her head, because she knew she would have a chance to return.
And also—
Those years were the most beautiful time of her short life. Her sole regret was that she wasn’t the Captain’s first teammate... but neither was she the last.
Yet she understood the Captain. Because... the Captain was someone who could change the world.
At the very least, he had already changed hers.
She originally thought such days would last forever—until the day the Captain shaped the world into the one he envisioned.
But then their small party welcomed its final member, and with her arrival, everything beautiful in Aurora’s heart began to rot.
That woman was the most beautiful woman Aurora had ever seen. Reputedly a world-famous, all-round Archmage.
A jack-of-all-trades type, and also literally that. The woman could do everything—every type of magic, every life skill. The entire party’s quality of living rose by a huge margin because of her. ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom
A character like that is only needed once in a party. Yes. Once. And the Captain already filled the role of “all-rounder.”
Yet the Captain spoke in a half-joking, half-serious tone:
“I’m not good at magic. Now that we’ve got this magic big-president here, things will be easier. You all better get along with her. Don’t scare her off.”
By logic, Aurora should have hated that woman. But... she knew she had no reason to.
Well—if she viewed that woman as the party’s logistics-and-cooking auntie, then she didn’t hate her.
Aurora’s consciousness grew more and more muddled. She could no longer control her body.
Cold raindrops struck her scales, but she felt nothing—as if it wasn’t her body but a cold stone.
In the ruins, the thousand-meter serpent was shrouded in blood, bleeding from its seven orifices, and even its fine scales seeped red. The rain falling on those scales tinted scarlet. This was the price of the monster fusion surgery.
She didn’t know how long she could hold on.
BOOM——!
A mountain-like blow crashed down near Vieya, the flying gravel cutting her cheek painfully.
After such prolonged deadlock, the giant serpent finally lost control and turned on her.
“—Aurora!”
Vieya dodged the attacks while trying to call her teammate’s consciousness back.
This kind of encounter made even her feel troubled. In all these years, she had never seen a case like this—a girl whose monster bloodline was so thin it was nearly negligible had undergone a complete atavistic metamorphosis. This wasn’t ordinary fusion surgery.
She didn’t know how they had done it.
But the best method now was to use the Holy Sword on Aurora—
except... Maybe she should try something other than violence first.
Vieya began calculating ways to counterattack while minimizing losses.
She could not keep fighting here. She needed to lure Aurora elsewhere.
The people trapped in the ruins still had hope, but if the serpent rampaged further, even that sliver of hope would vanish.
CRACK!
With authority empowering her, Vieya exploded with monstrous strength far beyond her body’s natural limit and punched the biting serpent head into the ground!
Booming impact—ground fracturing—dust erupting!
This level of attack could only knock the serpent unconscious for fractions of a second—but that was enough. Enough to provoke its instinctual hatred.
Vieya led the giant serpent toward the empty forest nearby. Whether she’d hit the serpent silly with that punch or whether a fragment of Aurora still remained—the serpent cooperated unusually well, writhing after her obediently.
Once they left the Tribunal’s perimeter, Vieya kept her rhythm of attacking while retreating.
In the forest, the serpent suddenly halted. It had lost sight of its target. After a brief daze, impatience overtook it and it began attacking wildly. Trees fell in swaths, birds scattering.
At that moment Vieya appeared atop its head, extending tendrils to anchor herself firmly while pulling off clumps of fine scales. Then she pressed her tentacles directly onto the exposed flesh.
...
Aurora lay quietly in the darkness, lifting her head for one last look at the Captain. Once she lost control of her body, she had fallen into this swamp-like black void.
Like someone sitting alone in a movie theater, all the seats around her empty, looking up at the distant screen.
The Captain was still trying to awaken her consciousness. A little girl’s voice sounded by her ear—familiar yet foreign, filled with a fury she didn’t dare face.
But the voices drifted farther and farther away. The world grew silent.
The final scene flashing in Aurora’s mind was from the day their Hero Squad disbanded. The Captain and Vice-Captain were both gone. Oh—the Vice-Captain was the woman she “ought” to hate.
That woman was the Demon King of Pride, first among the Seven Demon Kings. She was also the target the Hero Squad was meant to defeat.
The woman betrayed the Captain. In the final battle before their party collapsed, Aurora had become a machine obeying commands—go block, she blocked; fall back, she retreated. Not just her—every member was the same. Foggy, lost, unaware of passing days.
Only when both Captain and Vice-Captain shouted “Retreat!” did they wake as if from a dream. A massive black barrier flashed across heaven and earth, everything in ruins—the soldiers who had followed were gone—along with the Captain and that Demon King.
At twenty-four, after the Hero Squad disbanded, Aurora spent two muddled years before meeting Ghost, joining Ghost.
Because someone told her:
“Miss Aurora, aren’t you curious about the real cause of your Captain’s death?”
Cause? Aurora had frozen—hooked instantly.
...
Ghost—the organization that also wanted to change the world like her Captain. Except through darkness and blood. They erased every newly emerged Hero, and the old Heroes deemed obstacles.
Aurora learned this very early.
But she didn’t care. She wasn’t close to other Heroes... except the Captain’s student. But she had only met that one a few times—a stubborn brat.
Later, the Holy Sword chose its new master. Aurora discovered that the new wielder was the white-haired girl who had once spared her life. And then, in the battle at Fengxiang Town—
She saw that familiar sword strike. A horizontal slash spanning a thousand miles—godlike, devil-like. For a moment she thought the Captain had returned.
But the wielder was just a girl.
Aurora learned Ghost was researching the girl, so she—publicly and privately—copied the files to research on her own.
And what she saw shocked her. This girl—was practically the Captain’s copy. But more useless. Lacking ideals. Spacing out daily or teasing her daughter, and sometimes lying alone on the rooftop all day.
Like... like a turtle hiding inside its shell, content to soak in a puddle.
Someone like that couldn’t possibly be the Captain.
She dismissed her suspicion—but the girl was oddly close with Rania, the Captain’s student, and with Lilian as well. Suspiciously close.
Meanwhile, with monster fusion surgery giving her higher rank, she gained access to more intel.
She saw records of communications between Ghost and the Human Alliance’s Empress. She also saw the old records of that black magic formation—the Heaven-Network Phantom Diagram.
She shifted her focus from the Captain-like girl back to investigating that old incident. And she learned that the one who invited her into Ghost was one of the Nine Dealers—one of the Upper Three—Youze.
Aurora realized that on the day the Captain died, Ghost very likely had a hand in it. So, when submitting intel on the white-haired girl, she intentionally hid parts of the truth.
She pushed the girl’s identity toward that of “independent new Holy Sword wielder,” severing all implied ties between her and the Captain.
...
What followed needs no elaboration.
Vieya went to Talin. Ghost naturally issued a new mission investigating the Holy Sword’s recent awakening.
Aurora accepted it as usual. But she didn’t know another Upper Three had shadowed her.
After leaving the underground dungeon, her stabilizing medicine was cut off.
Reason: suspicion her intel was too watered down; re-evaluation required.
Youze disguised himself as Lilian and brought her into the Tribunal, took the emerald of the All-Seeing Eye, then left her waiting—waiting for the great revival beneath the lake to reach its critical moment—then she was to self-detonate inside the Tribunal to draw attention.
If this mission succeeded, she would regain Ghost’s trust and her stabilizer medicine.
But the white-haired girl somehow came here. Perfect. Aurora decided to self-detonate early—to tell the girl everything... and gamble everything to force the girl to admit her true identity, to admit she was Aurora’s Captain!
To force her to take up the Holy Sword—to become once more the person Aurora worshipped.
“I’m sorry... but please take up the Holy Sword. Do it.”
My Captain.
Then her consciousness sank fully into darkness. She sat alone in the movie theater—even the screen «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» went dark.
She could no longer see anything outside.
“So this is death?”
Aurora sighed lightly. She was a failed Hero’s follower—not even worthy of returning her life to her Captain. Everything now—her fault. She ruined everything. As an assassin, she hadn’t even noticed someone tailing her.
A failed life. A failed career.
Perhaps the tribe’s priest had been right. She was an ill-omened child, cursed to be followed by misfortune, dragging down those she cared for.
The Captain should never have saved her. She should’ve died with that disgusting slaver, rotting together in the soil of her homeland.
Maybe this was her retribution.
Aurora lay across the bright-red seat of the empty theater, closing her eyes. Sleepiness washed over her.
Her faint consciousness slid toward the abyss. But the two most important people in her life... were still alive. Living well...
How nice.
How nice...
Aurora finally broke. She curled into herself, hugging her knees, sobbing loudly. As long as she could still cry, she didn’t fear the loneliness, the darkness. The theater lights went out one by one.
The vast theater fell into total darkness—only her faint, broken sobs remained.
Until even those faded.
“—Aurora!”
“...?”
Who’s calling me?
Is it... the Captain’s voice? So warm...
She wanted to smile and comfort the Captain—like the Captain had once comforted her.
But she couldn’t even open her eyes. She heard that hearing was the last sense to fade before death. That was probably what she was experiencing now.
“Don’t you dare die. The last promise—Aurora, don’t you dare die!”
The voice grew clearer, as if someone was running toward her, shouting her name with all their strength.
It granted her fading mind a flicker of clarity.
But suddenly—fear struck her again.
Enough. She didn’t want to keep living as this half-human, half-monster thing. Let it end. Please.
Captain, please. Stop wasting time on me...
She despaired.
Then—she felt something cool wrap around her hand.
A cool sensation—like tentacles—coiling around her entire body. Warm currents seeped into her, helping her regain the sense of her own body.
Who?
Aurora panicked. She could tell the warmth flowing into her was important—very important. She tried to resist, but the tentacles bound her tightly.
“—Aurora!”
A furious voice came from above. Suddenly—Aurora felt terrified. Another thicker tentacle wrapped around her waist!
A massive force pulled on her waist—she felt herself being lifted!
But countless small black hands reached from the sticky darkness, gripping her limbs, trying to drag her back down!
Aurora realized—
This was a struggle. A battle over life and death.
Someone stood behind her, holding her, trying to pull her back from the reaper’s grasp!
The tiny black hands snapped under the overwhelming force. The darkness howled in rage, chilling her to the bone.
Then—she felt herself rising.
Dragged from the endless dark by unmatched strength, ascending toward a light that had long become unreachable.
“—Aurora!”
Her body lightened—and she fell into a warm embrace.
Billions of raindrops fell from the sky. Sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste returned one after another.
Aurora opened her eyes and saw a girl covered in blood and grime looking down at her.
Amid the pale-blue magic, the girl’s form seemed slightly shrunken. Moon-white hair stained with blood and dust, she looked miserably bedraggled—like a kitten that had accidentally fallen into a muddy puddle.
Magic overflowed from the girl’s entire being, so much that her skin emitted a faint glow, even her hair shining brighter.
“How is it? Told you I could save you.”
The girl smiled down at Aurora, slowly retracting her tentacles.
Aurora stared blankly at the girl before her. Her gaze shifted—subtle, soft—as if countless memories surged up in her heart all at once.
In the misty drizzle, it was as if an angel had descended to shield her from the cold rain.
...
...
