By Zephyria 
I narrowed my eyes to slits.
As unlikely as I thought it was, this guy really was a high-ranking Balkan.
“Where to?”
“That is….”
Balkan hesitated at my retort, pondering.
Though his expression showed no change at all, his hesitant actions and gestures made it clear he was struggling.
Though it was an incomprehensible situation, he was having difficulty dealing with me. As if I were some honored guest. I intended to use that to buy a little more time.
“It would be better to say what you can. Then I might follow quietly. You wouldn’t welcome the time wasted on my resistance either, would you?”
But since he wasn’t completely foolish either, he let out a small sigh and glanced sideways at me. Instead of answering, he slowly approached, as if cornering prey.
One way or another, it seemed he properly recognized that he held a more advantageous position than me.
‘Tch.’
If I stayed like this, it was obvious I’d be captured without even putting up a proper fight, so the moment he took one step closer and narrowed the distance, I quickly pressed my hand to the ground.
Keeeng!
A Magic Circle appeared, drawing a Formula.
Several sharply rising mounds of earth assaulted Balkan from all directions.
While our views were blocked from each other, I unfolded another Magic Circle.
Immediately after, pale gray smoke spreading in all directions caused secondary interference. This smoke created by magic contained components that confused the opponent’s five senses, potentially causing hallucinations or auditory illusions. Since I used it with triple overlap to deliberately induce strong side effects, it should have had some effect.
After enveloping myself with the Eight-sided Command, I suppressed my presence as much as possible. I planned to escape this place while he was disoriented by the sensory disruption.
But it seemed even triple overlap wasn’t enough.
Before I could even create distance to run away, a hand abruptly stretched out, shaking off the earth mounds, and grabbed me by the scruff of the neck.
“Kkh…!”
I struggled to break free from his grasp, but it didn’t budge an inch. His hand, thick and large enough to grab my nape in one grasp, was like a rock, unmoving.
Frowning, I gave up on freeing his hand and used my feet.
When I raised my knee and struck between his legs, even the sturdy high-ranking Balkan seemed to feel pain in his sensitive spot as his eyebrows twitched.
“Let, go! You damn….”
I tried pushing his abdomen with all my might with my foot, but it was effortlessly restrained by Balkan, who held my ankle.
As if thoroughly annoyed by my rough resistance, he laid me flat on the ground and pressed down on my thigh with his knee to prevent me from moving.
“Please remain still.”
A low voice, as if burrowing into the ground, growled right in front of me. In my eyes, his appearance looked like he was irritated because he wanted to kill me but couldn’t.
Around the time I was racking my brains on how to escape from here.
Suddenly, a sharp wind blew.
Not even a few seconds after perceiving it. Balkan’s clothes fluttered from the wind that brushed past. Balkan, noticing the anomaly, widened his eyes, released me and moved away while grabbing his opposite arm.
A glance downward showed the area below his arm was empty. It had been severed. The arm, having lost its owner, was rolling in the corner.
All of that happened in a single moment.
‘What….’
As I coughed, hacking, and was about to get up.
I felt something lightly land on my shoulder.
Something with a warm body heat.
A glance back revealed it was someone’s hand. I looked up directly. The man above was both a familiar face to me and the person I had been waiting to appear promptly.
“Why are you so late?”
I glared at the man, Cloud, and reproached him.
Then, Cloud let out a small, incredulous laugh and clumsily tucked me under his arm.
As he swiftly stepped back, the ground where we originally were turned black and caved in at a perilously close timing.
Balkan, pressing the ground with his intact hand, was activating magic.
“Do you know how many times I used Space Transition because it was hard to locate your position? That guy was using a Sense Perception interference magic… This is still relatively fast.”
Cloud continuously moved positions, avoiding the caving ground. Stretching his hand toward Balkan, multiple Magic Circles created in an instant chained together, producing crystalline shards of light like a Meteor Shower, and with flashes, destructive roars came from below.
Despite his grumbling, he seemed to have enough Mana reserves to freely unleash such a high-level wide-area magic.
‘Sense Perception interference magic, huh….’
So that’s why he could appear so boldly after Cloud disappeared.
In other words, it could also be interpreted that he didn’t want to deal with someone as strong as Cloud.
Around that time, Balkan, who had narrowly saved his life using defensive magic, immediately used healing magic, and his body was quickly restored.
“……!”
Even if he used the Comforter, the highest intensity healing magic, that was an abnormally fast recovery speed.
Originally, Fiends had excellent regenerative abilities, but since he was a high-ranking Balkan who knew how to use magic, adding healing magic seemed to create synergy.
A true monster….
To kill that guy, I had to destroy his core in an instant.
“High-rankers really are different.”
Cloud, briefly impressed, lightly landed on a tree. Only then could I, who had been clumsily tucked under his arm and carried around like luggage, finally set my feet down.
“By the way… why is that guy targeting you, young master?”
“How should I know?”
Immediately after, guided attacks flew toward us.
He tucked me under his arm again and narrowly dodged, making the guided attacks hit a tree trunk, then moved positions. Following fireballs mercilessly burned the forest and targeted us. It was a style of combat that seemed not to care about any collateral damage.
Cloud, while fleeing, clicked his tongue lightly.
“It seems we need to capture him to find out the reason.”
Not kill, but capture.
I know that’s harder than simply killing. So I could fully understand why he was troubled and why he couldn’t boldly counter while testing the waters.
Soon, as the attacks subsided, Cloud, who had stopped, set me down on the ground and whispered.
“Stay here. That way I can protect you.”
Then he stepped forward a little and faced Balkan, who was approaching.
Balkan, who let out a rough breath, seemed to realize he could no longer avoid fighting Cloud and unfolded a Magic Circle.
As he said, I moved away only to a distance where I wouldn’t be too far but also wouldn’t get caught up in the fight.
Anyway, right now I’m under his protection, and if I don’t stay still, I’ll just be luggage. There was no benefit for me in stubbornly asserting my pride here. It was wiser to obediently follow, thinking of using him.
Immediately after, the Magic Circle activated by Balkan executed a Mana Formula, and the earth began to shake.
Kwaadududdeuk…!
Trees on the ground were crushed, and the revealed earth surged as if alive, then shot toward Cloud like a mad rush.
It seemed he intended to crush and kill him with a weight difficult for a human body to withstand.
But Cloud didn’t dodge. Even without dodging, there was no damage. Because around Cloud, a Magic Circle created through Instant Cast drew a complex Formula, then reversed it as if destroying Balkan’s Magic Circle and restoring the surroundings.
Then, as if realizing he couldn’t win with magic, Balkan greatly inflated his own thighs, then kicked off the ground and dashed toward Cloud like an arrow.
An astonishingly fast speed. That was also an ability possible for a Balkan capable of ‘body transformation.’
Of course, Cloud didn’t lose either. As an 8-star, he could apply the power of magic to his body for auxiliary use. And it seemed he knew that well, too.
“Rae Shin Cho Rae.”
The moment Cloud softly recited the Magic Phrase.
Pachuchut!
With a fierce sound, the sparks coiling around Cloud’s body scattered like lightning, then his body flashed white.
Balkan swung the sharp nails he had drawn toward him, but only left shallow traces of electricity, and Cloud, who had disappeared in the blink of an eye, appeared behind Balkan. Balkan, completely unable to keep up with Cloud’s movements, was grabbed by the nape and thrown to the opposite side.
Cloud, glowing white and emitting the noise of electrical discharge as if he had become the god of lightning, vanished again.
No, it only seemed like he vanished because I couldn’t keep up with his speed with my eyes or senses.
I had to infer that the battle continued only through the terrible impact sounds and sporadically appearing traces of electricity.
And it really wasn’t long after.
At the point when several dozen minutes had passed, the electrical energy surrounding Cloud dissipated, and in his hand, he held a Balkan who had been torn to a pitifully tattered state.
It was overwhelmingly one-sided for someone who had been troubled.
Cloud roughly threw Balkan down onto the ground.
Whether he had consumed Mana to the point of being unable to use healing magic anymore, Balkan, covered in blood with his limbs broken as they were, only rolled his eyes to look.
“Kill me.”
It was Balkan saying that to Cloud, who approached while catching his breath. He seemed to have no attachment to life; rather, he looked like he wished to be killed.
But Cloud wouldn’t grant what he wanted.
“You can’t die yet. Sorry.”
If there was something ‘he wanted to hide,’ then all the more reason to take that guy alive and uncover many things.
Cloud stretched his hand toward Balkan. A long thread made of Mana tightly bound his body. Using levitation magic in that state, Cloud floated him in the air, then wiped his forehead with a pained expression and let out a sigh.
He had used Mana-consuming magic multiple times, so it was understandable. Especially the magic called Rae Shin Cho Rae used at the end must have been decisive. Magic that alters the body’s composition consumes an enormous amount of Mana.
‘It’s impressive you didn’t collapse.’
As I, who had been watching the situation, approached, Cloud, who was resting with a hand on his waist, looked at me. His eyes sparkled playfully and narrowed slightly.
“Why are you looking at me like that? Are you worried?”
“No.”
“Ahaha. How resolute.”
He soon reached out his hand to me and said.
“Shall we head back now?”