The Baby Bear of the Black Fox Mansion - Chapter 16

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 16
Beneath the rough stone, a soft green light seeped through.
And then.
Whoosh.
The tree binding the Demon crumbled to dust and scattered, and the creature sank to the ground.
In succession, the light pouring from Miel’s forehead took on a form like characters, crawling in twisted patterns across the Demon’s body.
The shape bore a striking resemblance to the Demon’s own language.
The luminous script-like form read through the Demon slowly, then suddenly poured downward in a rush, seeping into the earth.
At once, a vast Magic Circle bloomed into being.
“……!”
The Demon’s eyes widened.
A Magic Circle.
‘A Reverse Summoning Magic Circle……?’
A Reverse Summoning Magic Circle—the kind that could only be activated if the summoner drew it in exact opposition…….
“How could you…….”
The Demon stared at Miel, unable to hide its shock.
Golden eyes met the creature’s gaze.
“You can go home.”
“……!”
The Demon’s eyes flew wide.
With a bewildered expression, it drew in a sharp breath. Its face was one of disbelief.
“I won’t forgive them.”
After staring at Miel for a long moment, the Demon looked toward Jerpheon.
In truth, now that the Reverse Summoning had begun, there was nothing the Demon could do.
“I can never forgive those creatures, but it’s unjust for the generations that follow to pay the price of their sins.”
The Demon watched its own body beginning to fade and continued speaking.
“And the Curse is already half-fulfilled. He lost everything he’d built—stolen by the black fox he so desperately wanted to bury and forget.”
The Demon burst into bitter laughter, then lifted its gaze toward Jerpheon.
“……But keep your promise.”
“I will.”
At Jerpheon’s answer, the creature smiled faintly.
“Good.”
The Demon nodded, smiling.
It lowered its gaze slowly to look at Miel.
“…Mother once told me that when crisis befalls the world, a powerful being is born. You……resembled a human hero from the old tales I once heard.”
“Hmm?”
Miel tilted her head in confusion.
But the Demon offered no further words, closing its eyes slowly instead.
Boom—!
A small tremor rippled through the earth as a pillar of light surged upward, and soon the Demon and the Magic Circle vanished.
The Guardian Tree, the Demon, the food Miel had brought—all of it disappeared.
In its place remained only an empty mat.
A stunned silence descended.
None of them could find words to speak.
Whoosh—!
Wind came.
Unlike usual, it carried no chill—impossibly warm spring air instead.
“Warm…….”
As Miel murmured softly, her body swayed violently and collapsed forward.
Jerpheon rushed forward, gathering the child into his arms with strength.
“Miel?”
He quickly placed a hand on the back of her neck, then hesitated.
“Right…….”
He’d only just confirmed, a beat too late, that she was peacefully asleep, her face relaxed.
He let out a small sigh.
Holding the child in his embrace, he slowly looked up, then furrowed his brow.
The pouring sunlight was blinding.
‘…Sunlight?’
As he tilted his head back further, the snow clouds that had always covered the sky were slowly beginning to disperse.
“…….”
Jerpheon stared blankly at it before slowly closing his eyes and opening them again.
“Master, the sky…….”
“The sun is… rising.”
The Butler and Head Maid murmured in a daze, their voices hollow.
“……Yes. So it is.”
It seemed like a dream—too surreal to be real.
* * *
Thump!
A man lounging lazily in his chair, tilting a wine glass with the faint tremor of earth beneath him, slowly opened his eyes.
“…….”
The golden-haired, handsome middle-aged man’s gaze narrowed.
“It’s finally been born.”
He exhaled sharply.
From the moment cracks and ripples first appeared in the sky, he’d harbored a grim suspicion.
He’d simply hoped it wouldn’t be his era.
“My luck truly is abysmal.”
The man clicked his tongue and released a long, weary breath.
‘First, I need to know who it is.’
More precisely, it wasn’t so much born as awakened.
“In that direction, then…….”
Where an unnatural winter had settled upon the place that should be warmest.
“Noctis?”
So it was resolved from there.
Each of the great houses that form the Empire’s core carries its own burden.
And one of those chronic problems has finally been solved.
‘……Is it beginning?’
The nightmare from a thousand years ago.
Which would come faster—the nightmare taking hold, or them restoring the Barrier again?
“It seems I’ll need to call an assembly after all.”
* * *
“The time has come at last.”
Hee-hee-hee.
Someone let out a thin, trembling laugh.
“The time when he shall descend upon this land once more.”
The man, hands clasped together, twisted his body in ecstatic rapture and exhaled deeply.
“Ah, finally. The time when darkness shall drape this land again is upon us.”
“Kugh…….”
Beneath the man’s feet lay someone not yet dead, trampled into the ground.
Standing upon a person sprawled across a Magic Circle drawn in blood, the man recited with utmost reverence.
“His descent upon this land is glory beyond measure. Before, we failed because of those so-called heroes…….”
But what is the world now?
So peaceful, so comfortable, so utterly still.
A world too boring to stomach.
And therefore, is it not beautiful to crush such a world?
“This time, surely…….”
The man laughed, hee-hee-hee, his ecstasy mounting as he stood atop his mountains of corpses.
His snow-white garments were drenched crimson, their true color lost beyond recognition.
* * *
“Ha…… What is this place?”
A snow-white beast that had been bounding down the mountain gradually slowed as it entered the southern Noctis Territory.
The Noctis Territory he remembered was buried deep beneath pristine snow.
The sun rarely shone there, bitter north winds and heavy snow fell often, and it was colder even than the northern lands.
It was a climate made for him.
But now…….
“Damn it, where did all the snow go?”
Forget snow—the blazing sun beat down so fiercely he thought he’d die of heat.
His form began slowly shifting into human shape.
Zelos Nordik.
The man who had rushed here at the call of someone he couldn’t quite call a friend grimaced slightly as he did some light stretching.
Shirtless but wearing trousers, his arms and face were covered in tattoos.
He exhaled slowly.
“What in the world is this.”
The man who clicked his tongue strode across the Noctis Territory.
The inhabitants, without exception, had come outside and were sprawled across grasslands, terraces, and rooftops, luxuriating in the blazing sun and rolling about in delight.
“Squeak, squeal…”
“Yelp!”
Several of them had undergone full beast-form transformations—something they rarely did in public.
The foxes bounding playfully seemed perfectly content.
Watching them stretch out languidly beneath the merciless sun with obvious distaste, Zelos clicked his tongue and headed straight for the Noctis Ducal Residence.
“Hah.”
Upon reaching the manor, he let out a hollow laugh.
What was all this.
“Where did… bamboo come from?”
Staring at the bamboo stalks that had sprouted incongruously in one corner of the garden, Zelos’s face contorted grotesquely.
Bamboo instead of flourishing garden trees in this classical garden—it made no sense.
“Has she finally lost her mind.”
Zelos let out another hollow laugh and strode toward the bamboo.
He wondered if his wife’s mysterious illness had driven her to cultivate such peculiar things.
‘I told her not to bring in just anything.’
Tsk.
The moment Zelos stepped toward the cluster of upright bamboo stalks, he froze.
Rustle, rustle.
“Uuu…”
A sound came from within.
Small, thin, and threaded with crying.
Zelos turned his head toward the sound and stopped short.
“…A child?”
Perk, perk.
A little one with perked-up rounded ears sat crouched between the bamboo stalks, eating them.
“Bwahhh…”
Their eyes met.
The child, who had been eagerly gnawing at bamboo with both hands, burst into tears the instant their gazes locked.
“What—why are you suddenly crying?”
Zelos took an awkward step backward, bewildered.
Something so impossibly small—not even reaching his knees—was streaming fat tears, and there was no way he wouldn’t be caught off guard.
He rolled his eyes about.
A large man with his shirt removed.
A little girl crouched on the ground, tearing off bamboo and crying.
No matter how he looked at it, the scene was hardly innocent.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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