We had almost reached the camp again when suddenly a loud cry echoed through the relative silence of the forest. My expression immediately fell as I realized that it was Ilea’s voice. Another panicked shout was followed by the sound of a small explosion.

“Shi-“, I didn’t even worry about what had happened before beginning to sprint towards the location of the camp. Riina and Enri, both also clearly disturbed by the sudden cries, followed close behind me.

I broke through the thick foliage of the shrubs, ignoring the small cuts and bruises caused by the broken twigs.

Another shout resounded, this times it was Maira’s voice. She sounded panicked and fearful, saying something I couldn’t understand due to the distance. I accelerated even faster mumbling an incarnation before reaching another layer of shrubs. A fireball bursted right in front of me and destroyed most of the plants.

My body cried in pain as I ran through the flames and finally reached the clearing where our camp was set up. The sight in front of me made my eyes widen and my face contort in livid anger.

Sir Mellen was wielding his sword, vigorously attacking Ilea as she tried to defend herself while also protecting Maira behind her. The elvea girl was at a complete disadvantage as her bow was little help in fighting a knight in close combat. Luckily Maira was continuously casting magic spells, barely holding up against the onslaughter of the mad knight.

“Why do you protect him?”, his maddened voice rang in my ears.

“He made both of you slaves, how can you defend a vile being like him? I will fucking KILL this bastard!”, regardless of his words he was clearly holding back as he attacked the two girls. It was obvious that he didn’t want to harm them, only seeking to disarm and subdue the duo. Most likely he wanted to take them back to the capital and figure out a way to break the slave seal.

There were a bunch of questions floating around my mind at that moment.

How had he found out about the slave seal on Maira’s lower stomach?

Was this another plot against me?

Would I have to kill the man who had personally taught me how to wield the sword?

All of them became meaningless though as Sir Mellen soon spotted my shabby figure at the rim of the forest. His angry eyes flashed with unrelenting ire and a crazy smile appeared on his lips. Realizing that the person who you taught how to fight turned your first love into a slave was apparently something that drove him to near insanity.

“Found you.”, he exclaimed.

“Now die you traitor!”, he completely ignored Ilea and Maira who were desperately trying to knock him out while he was distracted with me. Then his body blurred as he used a familiar martial skill. He shot towards me, his sword catching on fire as Sir Mellen used the ridiculous amount of the mana within his body to build up a strong momentum.

It seemed like he wanted to take my head with a single swing of his blade.

The domineering aura exploding off him suppressed me to the point that I couldn’t even breath, not to speak of flee. I was entirely incapable of doing anything as he came for me. My powerless self could only stare in fight as the sword descended upon my neck. Fear took over my mind, blocking out any sort of constructive thought and leaving me powerless to react.

Then another explosion rang out as the sword was stopped right in front of me and Sir Mellen was pushed back by a small figure wielding a massive sword.

“You want to kill my owner?”, Enri asked while burning bloodlust mirrored in her red eyes. She chuckled with a cold voice and showed her little white teeth.

“Dream on!”, her little body exploded with wild and chaotic power as she engaged into a fight with the surprised knight.

“Why???? Why do all these pretty girls defend you?!”, he howled in anger while being on the retreat. Enri’s sudden advance forced him to back off and focus completely on defending himself. After all the two of them were basically on the same level of power.

Despite the graveness of the situation his question made me chuckle.

“I’m the main character after all.”, I seemed amused, but the truth was that my entire body was shaking. Fear had completely overwhelmed my mind as I realized that I was simply just a bug compared to the likes of Enri and Sir Mellen. Fuck it, I wasn’t even able to EVADE once he attacked me!

While I was caught up in my insecurities a foreign voice suddenly rang in my ears.

“This is unexpected, I didn’t expect to be forced to act myself in order to kill the hero.”, an unknown man had suddenly appeared next to me and his two cold, indifferent eyes looked down on me as if I was just a simple insect. He wore beautifully decorated plate armor with a certain royal crest being engraved onto the golden chest plate, a long sword rested in his hand as he lifted it above my head.

“It cannot be helped. After all it was his majesties or.der…”, he sighed as if he felt sad about my approaching premature death

Once again, I was paralysed with fear as I felt my doom approach. The feeling of deadly crisis almost made me faint, but this time I managed to somewhat pull myself together and gather mana into my feet.

The sword descended with the momentum of a falling meteorite while I pushed my feet into the ground and catapulted myself towards the side. A brief, hot pain shot through my leg as he cut deep into the flesh. The bone was fractured, and the cheap leather armor did nothing to lessen the damage to my leg. Then I was already rolling over the ground, trying to get back onto my feet.

Adrenalin was being pumped through my body and immediately suppressed the pain that threatened to overwhelm me. My head cleared up a little and I began to recite a spell.

“…M’reanis accult’nis.”, as I finished the incarnation the ground behind me erupted as a sword slashed into the ground, kicking up earth and creating a small crater. The unknown knight unhurriedly followed me, occasionally slashing with his sword. It seemed like he was totally unworried that I might get away.

A fireball appeared and shot towards him, but he simple blocked it with his sword while continuing his stride as if nothing had happened. My magic was nothing but a joke to him.

Despair overwhelmed me, and I recited another spell. Mana began to flow according to the patterns inside my mind and took the form of a bolt of lightning. Then suddenly I lost control of the mana and almost collapsed onto the ground. With trouble I managed to keep limping away while blood was running down my nose and accumulating in my throat.

“Stop trying.”, the knight said with a cruel smile.

“It has already been decided that you will die today. Though I originally planed to simply enjoy the show and let my dear fellow knight Sir Mellen do the job. Where the check did you pick that dragon girl up?”, he chuckled coldly.

“Well it doesn’t really matter now, does it?”, with that he abruptly accelerated, charging towards me at a speed that could easily outrun a horse. There was no way for me to evade this attack. My mana was almost completely exhausted as was my body. And even if I somehow did evade this attack, the following would still claim my life.

I finally gave up. Closing my eyes, I accepted that I had no chance to get away from this crazily powerful knight. He was even stronger than Sir Mellen whom I couldn’t fight for even a single round. I was completely powerless against an enemy like him. Even struggling was worthless as it would only prolong my misery until I died under his sword.

“Run!”, Maira’s voice rang in my ears and I noticed something brushing by my side followed by the sound of metal striking against metal. My eyes opened, and I saw Riina who was attacking the knight with everything she had. Her small body flashed around as she whirled around, using her twin daggers to aim for the knight’s weak spots.

It did nothing good and after a few moments she barely managed to defend against a slash of the knights sword, being blown away by the impact. As soon as that happened a hail of arrows descended upon the knight, each of them emblemed with magic. Three fireballs and a whole storm of wind shot towards the enemy as Maira and Ilea combined their efforts in order to stop this overpowered stranger.

“Run already!”, Riina shouted again, before once again pouncing onto the knight.

My eyes widened as I realized what was going on. They were trying to hold him off in order to allow me to flee. More importantly, they were trying to sacrifice themselves in order to let me survive. I began to shake as I felt an even more unbearable feeling of despair.

I couldn’t do anything about it. The only options I had were to either flee and safe my life or to watch them die followed by my own death.

I was so powerless that I could only watch Riina being flung away again, followed by an enraged roar. The knight, obviously angered by the pesky girls who were attacking him, charged towards Ilea and Maira while completely ignoring the little damage done by the arrows and magic.

Then-

His sword pierced through Illea’s stomach. Blood splattered, and I heard myself cry out in an inhumane voice.

I was weak. So pathetically weak that I could only watch as others died because of me.

The realization burned itself into my mind as I saw the knight pull out his sword out of Ilea’s limb body and it began to eat away my sanity as I saw her lifeless body fall to the ground.