I Became a Genius Mechanic at the Academy

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Chapter

“Dagran!”

Nothing else registered in her mind.

Reina dashed toward him and embraced her precious one.

“Grrr! Grr!”

But there was no time to indulge in the joy of reunion.

Monsters surrounded them from all sides.

Only about 40 soldiers remained to fight.

Dagran and Reina stood with their backs to the entrance of the underground passage with the few survivors.

After entrusting the repairs of the controller to a skilled blacksmith, they began to fight to protect their people.

Though Reina was pregnant and could not exert her full strength, the intense emotion of needing to protect Dagran infused her sacred sword with tremendous power.

“Kyaaaaaaaaaah!”

But Ekayan was an anomaly.

As the most powerful beast of the Shadow Woods, fused with an evil spirit and genetically altered, a single holy sword was not enough to contend with it.

“Wh-What on earth…”

To make matters worse, zombie dwarves appeared before them.

For Reina, who was witnessing zombies for the first time, this scene was sheer shock.

Former friends and subordinates of Dagran.

All of them, with expressions like evil spirits, lunged at the remaining survivors and began to bite them.

Those bitten soon turned into zombies, attacking other survivors again, creating a vicious cycle of attacks.

“Reina!”

At that moment, Dagran shook Reina, who appeared dazed.

Then he spoke urgently.

“Reina! There’s no time to explain! We must kill all the infected! If such a plague spreads to the city or the capital, then—”

But at that moment.

Suddenly, Dagran snatched Reina and pulled her into his embrace.

At the same time, Reina collapsed into the snow.

“Dagran…?”

A burning smell filled the air.

The acidic fluid shot by Ekayan had corroded Dagran’s back.

Seeing the trajectory of the acidic liquid aimed at Reina, Dagran hastily knocked her down, taking the acidic fluid in her place.

Dagran spoke softly.

“…I will be infected soon.”

“W-What is this… Your wound…!”

“You must survive. A man’s dream continues eternally, even with closed eyes.”

With those words, Dagran took a dagger from within his cloak.

Reina, startled, quickly swatted it away.

The dagger fell onto the snowy ground.

“Hah… Hah… Hah…”

Furious, Reina exhaled roughly while looking at Dagran.

Dagran’s expression remained calm.

Suddenly, the image of zombie dwarves flashed through her mind.

Understanding why Dagran had tried to stab himself, an overwhelming emotion surged forth.

“Heal! Healing will surely work!”

Reina cried anxiously as she checked Dagran’s back.

Tears poured down her face.

Gathering all the mana she could muster, she began to heal his wound.

Though the injury was closing, the parasites that had invaded Dagran’s body could not be removed.

Reina did not even know of the parasites’ existence.

“Reina.”

At that moment.

Dagran grasped Reina’s hand.

Looking at her tear-streaked face, he spoke.

“I will soon become… like them. As a monster, I will attack my most precious person… the one I love…”

With half-lidded eyes, Dagran delivered his last words.

As the parasites began to take over his brain, agonizing groans escaped him.

“Let me… remain as I am… ugh… please… and be sure to survive… live…”

Dagran began to twist grotesquely.

He fumbled for the dagger that had fallen to the ground.

“Ugh… ugh…”

Reina was at a loss.

She could only watch her husband convulse while shedding tears.

Then, at that moment.

“Y-Your… child… was not… no… I… truly… loved you.”

Squeezing out every last bit of his strength, he managed a final smile.

Then, he stabbed his own neck.

Blood gushed forth like a fountain, staining Reina’s white garment red.

Yet, she wept as she prepared to heal him.

She reached out to Dagran’s neck to mend the wound, but…

“Ughhhh… ugh…”

In the end, she was unable to heal him.

In that moment, Dagran faced his greatest fear.

Becoming one of those monsters and attacking his beloved wife.

Reina understood this.

She could read that emotion in his gaze that was fixed determinedly on her.

Thus, Dagran took his last breath in her arms.

“Gyaaaaaaaaaah!!!! Gyaaaaaaaaaah!!!! Aaaaaaaaaah…”

Reina wailed.

She held tightly to her dead husband’s body, feeling the warmth that had not yet left him.

Repeatedly calling his name, she expressed her remorse for not being able to protect him.

“….”

And then, silence.

When her cries ceased, the world also stopped.

All who could make human sounds were dead.

“Grrrrr!”

“Grrgrr… Grr…”

“Cough! Grrr!”

Only monsters remained.

They surrounded Reina, stealthily watching her with eyes full of caution.

They were afraid of her.

“Gukuku…”

But suddenly, Reina burst into laughter.

Because she felt warmth trickling down her lower body.

Hot blood flowed down her thighs.

It was a miscarriage.

“I’m sorry, my love.”

Reina gently laid her dead husband’s body down and stood up.

Thick, red mist began to swirl around her, emanating from her body.

“I don’t think I can keep my promise. Our child just left your side.”

Muttering these words softly, Reina grasped her sacred sword.

The sword began to absorb all her hatred and resentment, generating black mana.

– Whooosh!

She swung the weapon with all her might.

With that alone, countless monsters were swept away.

Truly overwhelming destructive power.

The rage of a lost wife.

Also the fury of a mother who lost her child.

The grief of a friend who lost a beloved neighbor, and the scream of one who had lost everything.

“Uwaaaaaah!!!”

Thus, she fought her impossible battle.

Charging into the midst of monsters, she set her sights on Ekayan.

She had to kill the monster that had forced her husband to take his own life.

“Kyaah!”

However, countless monsters stood in her way.

Among them were the zombified forms of her former neighbors.

It mattered not.

She cut them all down.

As the sword absorbed Reina’s endless rage, it unleashed black mana that tore through the monsters.

‘If only I could devour everything here!’

Having lost everything.

Reina thought she did not care if she died.

If she could wipe out this disgusting horde with her life force.

Then, she felt it was acceptable for her to die here.

“Die! Dieeeeeee!!!”

Thus, the sacred sword began to heed its master’s will.

The blade, having absorbed all her rage, began to turn black.

It was becoming a dark sword.

Moreover, the sacred sword that had fallen into corruption as a cursed sword began to take her vitality.

Yet, in this fight, it granted her infinite regeneration.

Providing her with boundless energy to combat the weariness of her body from pregnancy and miscarriage.

And so, Reina laughed like a madwoman as she devoured her enemies.

After slaying countless monsters, she finally reached Ekayan.

The enemy that killed her husband.

They engaged in a fierce battle.

The master of the cursed sword, and the monster strengthened by the absorption of countless parasites engaged in a bloody brawl.

The result was Reina’s victory.

The more she was wounded, the stronger she grew, and her rage knew no bounds.

In the end, the black mana engulfed Ekayan, tearing apart every last piece of flesh.

“Grrrrr… Grrrr…”

But when she butchered Ekayan, Reina had already lost her sanity.

Unexplainable rage consumed her.

There was still someone who needed to be punished aside from Ekayan, but she could not remember who.

“Uwaaaaaah!!! Aaaaaah!!!”

And so she swung her sword.

She chased down the fleeing dwarven zombies, beheading them.

“Damn… is it over?”

As Reina faded into the distance, the hiding Kroto and his party revealed themselves.

The situation seemed to have settled somewhat.

– Thud, thud… thud, thud… thud, thud thud…

At that moment, the ground began to tremble.

The sound of countless hooves echoed.

The reinforcements requested by Dagran were arriving.

“Hey, damn it! Hurry, wound yourselves! Make it look like you fought fiercely!”

Kroto schemed.

Knowing that they could be discovered hiding in the underground passage if they remained unharmed, he began to scratch himself with a monster’s talon, smeared blood on his body.

As a result, he looked quite the part.

To anyone else’s eye, he appeared to be a fierce warrior.

“…What happened? What about the other survivors?”

Finally, the commander who led the troops inquired.

Kroto quickly spun a tale on the spot.

He explained that in the course of fighting, the controller at the entrance of the underground passage had been destroyed, compelling them to engage in a desperate last stand.

In the midst of it all, Reina had suddenly gone insane, slaughtering both friend and foe until everyone was decimated.

“…”

The commander did not believe him.

No, he couldn’t believe it.

That wise, beautiful woman could be capable of such deeds.

“Go over there! That damned girl fled in that direction!”

When Reina was fighting fiercely, Kroto and his group had slightly opened the door to peek at her.

Thus, they realized she had lost her sanity.

When she had defeated Ekayan, she was almost more beast than human.

If this commander were to witness such a sight, he believed he would accept his words.

“Follow me.”

And so the reinforcements chased after Reina.

Eventually, they managed to spot her, slaughtering the fleeing dwarves turned zombies.

At the same time, she was massacring monsters that attempted to escape, pouring all her hatred and resentment into the fight.

“…”

But the commander was horrified.

Even after witnessing it firsthand, he still struggled to believe it.

That beautiful woman was rampaging like a beast, devoid of sanity.

And the sight of her kin, who fled in fear only to have their throats severed by her blade.

“L-Look! That girl suddenly went completely nuts! Doesn’t that sword seem strange? Yes? Then, it must be that her husband committed suicide due to shock!”

“Shut up!”

Yet the commander still could not believe it.

Moreover, he could not trust the words of that cowardly human.

‘But… surely she…’

Yet, according to his words, it was true that she was not in her right mind.

Wasn’t she currently beheading fleeing kin?

“There, among those monsters! There was one that could drive people insane! That girl must’ve been affected! All the other dwarves were too!”

“…”

Certainly, the sight of fleeing kin was strange.

None of them appeared sane.

But at that moment.

“Grrrrr…”

Reina’s gaze turned in their direction.

She spotted Kroto beside the commander.

Black mist surged explosively from her.

“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!”

In a rage, she began dashing toward them.

The frightened soldiers recoiled in terror.

“Damn it!”

There was no way he could sit idly by and let more blood be shed.

The commander quickly took the elite guard and charged at her to intercept.

“Get a grip!”

Wielding a massive shield, the commander pushed her back.

Simultaneously, the guards drew their shields to block her charge.

“Graaah!!!”

However, upon spotting Kroto, Reina could not stop.

He was the enemy she needed to kill.

Finally recalling that target she had momentarily forgotten in her frenzy.

“Stop! Please stop!”

But the commander could not know this.

There was no choice but to block the raging Reina to prevent further casualties.

“Grr… Grrr…”

In the end, Reina’s life force began to wane.

It was already a miracle that she had single-handedly defeated the mutated Ekayan, which had approached the level of low-grade demon.

She had expended far too much life energy coming this far in her weakened state due to the miscarriage.

– Thud.

Eventually, Reina collapsed.

The white snow was stained with her blood.

As the fury dissipated, her mind began to return to normal.

‘Dagran…’

As Reina lay dying, she recalled Dagran’s face.

The image of her husband sitting beside her when she had been abandoned on the snowy peak, talking with her came to mind.

The one who had rescued her, Dagran.

All the moments spent together flashed by like lightning.

His boisterous laughter as he told her he would make her smile danced in her vision.

“I’m sorry… I couldn’t avenge you.”

Resentment.

The overwhelming longing and hatred had transformed into sorrow.

She held her sacred sword, now a cursed sword, and closed her eyes.

Yet even if her flesh died, her spirit clung to the cursed sword, constantly urging its wielder.

Rage.

Kill all those who come into your sight.

Until I can reach ‘them’, swing your sword endlessly.

Then I shall grant you infinite power…

***

Afterward, Kroto and his party returned to the Empire.

Though there were many doubts, their testimonies somewhat matched.

However, the dwarves could not accept it.

Dagran and Reina were the lovers they had cherished.

A trustworthy leader and friend who would one day lead the Dwarf Kingdom.

Yet, such a couple had met such a tragic end.

“…You plan to settle this matter with money?”

The Empire promised a massive compensation for this incident.

A sum that would be enough to build a city.

But what the dwarves had lost could not be replaced with money.

The love between Dagran and Reina, which had thrilled the entire nation, had been tarnished.

The woman who had been saved and the man who had saved himself had their values thrown into the dirt.

As evidence of that, the sacred sword they had proudly cherished had also fallen into a disgraceful object that drove its wielder insane.

“It hurts too much to look at… put that sword away…”

The dwarves handed the cursed sword over to an Empire merchant.

They dumped the sword that drove its wielder mad into the human world they despised.

After that, the cursed sword, Black Obsidian, roamed within the Empire.

Its wielders always met tragic ends.

Obtaining immense power, they instead became murderous fiends, consumed by rage, slashing down whoever came in their way.

Yet, the Zigmund family was an exception.

They were a noble family, specialized in handling ‘objects’ since ancient times.

Regardless of how powerful the thoughts within the cursed sword were, they could control it.

This powerful cursed sword allowed them to perform greatly in the Great War.

From that moment, the cursed sword became their family heirloom.

***

“…”

Silence hung in the research lab.

After visualizing the memories of the thoughts and seeing the shocking content, the atmosphere became tense.

Elena wept, her face twisted in rage.

“Right now! We must capture that bastard and make him pay! Even now, he must face justice—!”

“Just a moment.”

But at that moment, Edgar grabbed Elena, who was about to leave.

Seeing her furious expression, he spoke softly.

“Oh, that won’t do. I will personally escort him.”

“…What?”

“To the Dwarf Alliance Kingdom. He is a hero who fought for the dwarves 40 years ago. I believe many dwarves will be delighted if he attends the festivities.”

“….”

Elena read the chilling emotion that flickered across Edgar’s face.

She thought she understood what he was plotting.

“…Right. I had misunderstood. The senior heroes who bravely fought against the massive monster invasion 40 years ago… They must lead the celebrations to normalize relations between our countries.”

“Yes, precisely.”

“Then I will go convey this news to the senior heroes. Can you handle the rest of the preparations?”

“Hahaha. Of course. I will make sure the senior heroes get the love they deserve.”

“Alright. Count on you.”

Elena finished speaking and vanished like blue smoke.

As soon as she disappeared, Edgar’s face began to harden coldly.

The time had come to uncover the truth.