Future Knight

Chapter 44

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When Kang Chan arrived at the top of the hill on his air bike, he was greeted by an unbelievable sight.

A giant ball of fire, in the form of a bird, was flapping its wings, illuminating the dark night sky with intense heat.

Arteon was being brutally beaten by a green elf.

Despite the numerous elves surrounding her, they were only wailing.

Paralyzed by fear, they couldn’t offer any resistance.

Just then, Jaina approached Arteon and the Green through the crowd.

“No! Jaina!”

Kang Chan, who had finally spotted Jaina, screamed.

Behind Jaina, Jerenis was also crying out.

“Jaina! No! Don’t go, Jaina!”

As someone approached the Green again, she stopped her merciless beating of Arteon and turned her gaze.

Her face was splattered with blood, presumably from Arteon, making her look even more terrifying.

“Do you want to die, kid?”

“Please stop. I’m begging you…”

Jaina, with tears streaming down her face, was trembling with fear, but her desperate desire to save Arteon made her grit her teeth and step forward.

Before meeting Kang Chan, Arteon had been Jaina’s only companion among the elves, making her incredibly precious and the most respected elf in Jaina’s life.

Jaina couldn’t bear to see Arteon being beaten so mercilessly.

Despite the many terrified elves who couldn’t even think of rescuing Arteon, only Jaina risked her life to approach her.

Whether it was childishness or foolishness, her actions were enough to astonish all the elves present, including the Green and Kang Chan.

“Stop? Hahaha.”

The Green, who was clutching the collar of the seemingly unconscious Arteon, began to laugh quietly.

“Please, I’m begging you…”

Jaina’s earnest plea erased the Green’s laughter, her voice turning cold and harsh.

“I never intended to let anyone live, but if you don’t want to die right now, get lost.”

Her mood was at its worst.

No matter how much she beat Arteon, whom she had considered a lifelong enemy, she didn’t feel any better.

In fact, she felt dirtier.

Then, the sudden earnest plea from a young girl reminded her of her own childhood.

“There will be no second mercy. This is your last warning. Disappear…”

Her voice trembled with anger, but Jaina didn’t think of moving from her spot.

Or rather, she couldn’t.

Paralyzed with fear, Jaina’s legs refused to obey her.

“Defying my final warning… Then die.”

As soon as the Green finished speaking, her red whip lashed out at Jaina.

At that moment, a black shadow appeared like lightning and blocked the Green’s whip.

The formidable whip of the Green sliced through the black object, but the black figure, having leapt from the object, grabbed Jaina and began to flee.

The black object that blocked the whip was an air bike, and Kang Chan, who had abandoned the bike, picked up Jaina and started running desperately.

The Green, watching this, spoke with a look of disbelief.

“Phoenix! Kill them both.”

The Phoenix, receiving the command, flew at an incredible speed, cutting off Kang Chan’s escape.

No matter how fast Kang Chan was, he couldn’t outrun the fiery spirit king, the Phoenix.

Seeing the massive Phoenix blocking his path, Kang Chan felt a sense of despair.

Realizing from the Phoenix’s speed that he couldn’t escape on foot, he sensed that it was impossible to outrun it.

The massive firebird.

From a distance, it seemed mysterious, but up close, it was truly imposing, enough to make his hair stand on end.

Jaina, held in Kang Chan’s arms, was bewildered by the situation.

Just as she thought she was doomed, someone had grabbed her and was fleeing madly.

The rescue was so rough that she didn’t even realize she had been saved.

When she finally came to her senses and realized it was Kang Chan who saved her, she burst into tears.

“Mister!”

“Jaina, I missed you.”

“I thought I’d never see you again. Waaaah!”

Jaina said, struggling to hold back her tears.

But their emotional reunion didn’t last long.

A massive flame from the Phoenix’s mouth engulfed them.

The breath of the fire spirit king Phoenix boasted an immense power comparable to the breath of a red dragon, and Kang Chan instinctively knew that his suit couldn’t withstand such furnace-like flames.

There seemed to be no place to escape the flames.

“I love you, Jaina.”

“I love you too, Mister.”

Kang Chan and Jaina prepared for death, and Kang Chan removed his helmet and kissed Jaina on the lips.

As they kissed, the Phoenix’s breath swallowed them.

Whoooosh!

In an instant, the surrounding area became a lava field spanning a hundred meters.

The incredible power of the Phoenix, capable of turning an intact forest into a volcanic area, left all the onlookers shaking their heads in disbelief.

However, they witnessed an even more astounding scene.

“H-How is this possible!”

In the lava field where no one could survive, they saw the two still kissing.

“What? Phoenix, what’s going on?”

“I want to kill that girl too. But she is a chosen one. Chosen by Naiad, the water spirit king whom I despise…”

The Green couldn’t believe what the Phoenix was saying about Jaina being chosen by Naiad.

“Impossible! Naiad has a contract with me! And normally, contracts with spirits are only possible with dragons!”

“That’s true. But there are exceptions. We are not exclusive to dragons. Why do you think we only make contracts with dragons? The only reason dragons and spirit kings can easily form spirit pacts is because of their attributes. They are a race with clear elemental attributes like us.

But it doesn’t mean we only form spirit pacts with dragons. We, too, have personal wills. It was our will that made a pact with you, who had no power, and it is Naiad’s will that chose that girl. Her spirit affinity is valuable enough. It is at a level that appears once in thousands of years.”

“Once in thousands of years? That’s ridiculous! Does that mean I can’t kill her?”

Fearing the emergence of another spirit king’s contractor besides herself, the Green became anxious.

Although she had a pact with Naiad, spirit pacts were not exclusive to one person but shared among those chosen by the spirit.

“That’s not the case. The girl hasn’t come of age and hasn’t formed an official spirit pact with Naiad. So she can’t summon Naiad. Naiad merely blocked my attack of his own will from the spirit realm. As long as Naiad interferes, I can’t kill her. We, as equal spirit kings, cannot harm each other. So kill her with your own hands. That will do.”

“With my own hands?”

“Yes.”

Hearing that she could kill with her own hands, the Green smirked.

Having an enemy with the power of a spirit king would be a great threat.

She knew this well, having wielded Naiad’s power herself.

She absolutely couldn’t let that young girl live.

“Leave only Arteon alive and take care of the rest, Phoenix.”

“Understood. And I will return to the spirit realm. I have matters to discuss with Naiad. Do you agree?”

Knowing the reason for the Phoenix’s return, the Green didn’t stop it.

“Alright. I’ll leave the rest to you.”

With the summoner’s consent, the Phoenix soared into the sky, arrogantly looking down at the elves before diving towards them.

Then, thousands of elves screamed and began to flee in all directions.

“Aaaaah!”

“Save me!”

As the Phoenix scattered small flames across the ground, the earth turned into a lava field, and countless elves were burned to ashes.

Their agonized screams filled the dark night sky.

The Green, leaving this sight behind, took the blood-stained whip from her waist and approached Kang Chan and Jaina.

She stepped onto the ground, now a lava field due to the Phoenix’s breath, and crossed it as if it were nothing.

Those who summoned the Fire Spirit King seemed unaffected by fire.

Kang Chan, trapped in the lava with no escape for himself and Jaina, watched the Green approach with her white teeth bared, and tensed up.

Her walking across the lava as if it were nothing made her seem like a gatekeeper of hell coming to meet them.

“Are you the Green?”

“It’s not my real name, but that’s what people call me.”

“Can’t you just let us go? I will never forget your mercy.”

“Is that all you have to say? You filthy human.”

Kang Chan knew well that she wouldn’t let them go peacefully, but he still pleaded for mercy, holding onto a slim hope. Trapped in this situation with lava boiling all around, he thought and thought about what to do.

As Kang Chan was racking his brain, the Green’s whip came flying from the side with a tremendous crack.

Kang Chan attempted to cut her whip with his aura sword in one go.

But her whip was no ordinary whip.

She was a whip master.

Kang Chan underestimated her whip, thinking he could easily cut it down with a strong slash.

However, the whip had a characteristic of generating centrifugal force and coiling inward if not severed, so when Kang Chan’s attack struck it, it lashed back at his back with even greater force.