The Last Place Hero’s Return - Chapter 137

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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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Chapter 137. The Archbishop of Desire, Lactasia (3)
Whoosh!
Ash-colored flames ignited and engulfed my body.
Dense gray smoke poured through my pores, swirling violently around me.
“You….”
Lactasia narrowed her eyes, watching me engulfed in the inferno.
“Hmph. So you do know a few parlor tricks?”
She crossed her arms and let out a scornful laugh.
“But….”
Her voice dripped with bitter mockery.
“Do you really think you can defeat me with that?”
Despite the overwhelming aura I was projecting, the magical power she sensed from this “Dale” was far from impressive.
At best, the level of magical power possessed by a hero ranked around the top hundred.
While not insignificant when considering all heroes, it was utterly contemptible from the perspective of an “Archbishop” like herself.
“Didn’t they teach you this back at the Academy during the Candidate Program? Never draw your blade before an Archbishop unless you’re ranked in the top five heroes.”
“Guess I didn’t learn that lesson.”
I suppressed a smirk and raised my sword.
“My grades weren’t exactly stellar, you see.”
Boom!
I kicked off the ground and charged forward.
“Is that so? Then your big sister will have to give you some remedial lessons!”
Lactasia swung the whip she held in her hand.
The whip, wrapped in violet magical energy, tore through the air with a vicious whistle, aiming for my neck.
Blade and whip collided.
Clang!
A deafening metallic ring echoed out, louder than before.
Crack!
The sword I held shattered into fragments and scattered.
“Oh my~ What should we do? Your sword broke?”
Lactasia seized the opportunity and swung her whip again.
Screech!
The sharp thorns sprouting from the whip’s end targeted my neck.
I reached out toward the whip hurtling at me at tremendous speed.
Berald martial arts.
Blade breaking technique.
Snap!
With my magically-infused hand, I grasped and snapped the thorns protruding from the whip’s end.
Fragments of the broken thorns pierced into my palm.
I slowly raised my bleeding hand and let out a quiet chuckle.
“If it breaks, I’ll just make a new one.”
Drip. Drip.
Blood trickling down my palm transformed into the shape of a blade.
The Demonic Sword Beskal.
The cursed weapon, which granted tremendous power in exchange for its owner’s blood, radiated an eerie luminescence.
“Huh… is it really okay for a hero to use something like that?”
Lactasia’s eyes narrowed as she sensed the familiar aura emanating from the demonic blade.
“The weapon you wield doesn’t determine whether you’re a hero.”
“This brat really can’t keep his mouth shut, can he?”
Lactasia clicked her tongue in disapproval.
“Let’s see how long that smart mouth of yours can keep running!”
Lactasia drew upon her magical power.
A deep violet aura rippled across the whip clasped in her hand.
“Hyah!”
The whip surged forward with a savage cry.
Crackle!
The sound of the whip tearing through the air echoed through the cavern like thunder.
Clang! Clang-clang-clang!
Blade and whip collided once more.
With each exchange, the smile at the corners of Lactasia’s mouth deepened.
‘Her magical power should be running out soon.’
The magical energy I’d already stolen through the Blessing of Exploitation far exceeded what any mid-tier ranked hero possessed.
If my earlier assessment was correct, her reserves should be depleting any moment now….
Whoosh!
“Tch…!”
The blade, wreathed in flames, barely grazed past her.
Lactasia’s eyes narrowed as she looked at Dale.
‘Why is he still so unscathed?’
The magical power flowing from Dale showed no signs of depletion—it remained at roughly the same level as before.
No.
It even seemed to have increased slightly compared to the beginning.
“How is his magical power not decreasing….”
“About five minutes have passed?”
“What?”
Dale activated his Hero Watch to check the time.
“At Yuren’s speed, he should be reaching outside the Ruins soon.”
“…Now isn’t the time to be thinking about that, is it?”
“No, I have to think about it.”
Dale placed his hand over his left chest, a deep smile spreading across his face.
“Otherwise, I might get caught up in it.”
Ignite.
With a final murmur.
Whoooosh!
Like a spark falling onto dry kindling.
The ashen flames enveloping Dale’s body erupted with ferocious intensity.
“What…!”
Lactasia’s eyes widened in shock.
Whatever magic he’d cast, the mana radiating from him exploded exponentially—doubling, no, nearly tripling in an instant.
‘What the hell is this bastard?’
Her Blessing of Exploitation was draining his mana, so why wasn’t it diminishing? Why was it increasing instead?
“Hah…! All this does is give me more nutrients to ‘exploit’!”
Lactasia snarled and lashed her whip with savage fury.
The whip, imbued with the Blessing of Exploitation, cut sharply toward Dale.
Crack! Crack! Craaack!
Mana continued to pour in through the Blessing of Exploitation.
With each successive attack, her stigma swelled with mana until it felt ready to burst.
“Huff, huff!”
Ragged breaths escaped Lactasia’s lips.
Though mana overflowed from her stigma to the point of rupture, the magical essence she could actually wield was depleting at an alarming rate.
Mana and magical essence were fundamentally derived from the same source—the Tree of Creation—so a simple conversion would allow her to use it, but.
In this brutal, split-second battle, she didn’t have the luxury of performing even that ‘simple’ conversion.
‘Why… why isn’t it decreasing?!’
Despite absorbing such a staggering amount of mana through her stigma, the mana flowing from Dale showed no signs of diminishing.
If anything, the longer the battle dragged on, the more it continued to increase.
Yes, as if.
“Ah, ugh.”
Like an inexhaustible sea.
Like an endless sky stretching forever.
Like eternal flames burning without end.
“Where in the hell did this monster crawl out from?!”
Lactasia shrieked in desperation.
Some might say she’d been careless.
‘How was I supposed to prepare for a monster to fall from the sky?’
It was like telling someone to never leave their house for fear of earthquakes.
How could anyone have predicted that such a monster would be lurking among some unknown hero Party that didn’t even have a name in the Three Nations rankings?
A natural disaster.
Yes, to her, Dale was nothing less than a natural disaster encountered on the road.
“You damned bastard!”
Lactasia spat a vicious curse and swung her whip.
“Heh.”
Dale smirked and caught the whip mid-air with his bare hand.
I yanked the whip with brutal force, and her body was dragged along with it.
Gack!
As Lactasia was pulled forward, Dale delivered a refreshing punch straight across her face.
Cough!
Lactasia was hurled backward, gasping for breath in broken gasps.
You… you… you…! This…!
She clutched her cheek, her expression twisting in rage.
How dare you scar my beautiful face?!
Grind.
Lactasia gnashed her teeth savagely and extended her hand.
A violent purple mana erupted from Lactasia’s body, swirling through the air and conjuring razor-sharp thorns from nothingness.
I’ll tear you to shreds and kill you!
Whoosh-whoosh-whoosh-whoosh!
Purple thorns rained down from all directions like a downpour.
Dale gazed calmly at the cascading thorns and let out a soft chuckle.
What, you’re not even that beautiful, so why are you throwing such a tantrum?
I slowly raised my sword to meet the descending thorns.
Blazing cinders ran along the blade and gathered at its tip.
The cinders condensed into a massive spherical form, greedily devouring everything around it.
Cinder Sword Third Form.
Flame Halberd.
Whoooosh!
The blazing sphere of cinders shot toward Lactasia.
Kyaaaaaaah!
Engulfed by the inferno, Lactasia shrieked and was hurled backward.
Ah… ugh…
Lactasia clutched her tattered body and stared at Dale with trembling eyes.
You… what exactly are you?
Even if she was the weakest Archbishop in terms of raw power, that was only in comparison to other Archbishops of the same rank.
She was confident she could handle any hero ranked outside the top five without difficulty.
How could an unknown nobody she’d never heard of possess such absurd power?!
She never imagined she’d be overwhelmed so thoroughly by an unnamed hero who didn’t even rank in the top hundred.
Hiss!
She desperately squeezed out her mana and swung her whip, but…
Whoooosh!
The blazing cinders greedily consumed her whip.
The whip, now reduced to ash, scattered across the ground in a fine powder.
Ah…
Lactasia stared at Dale with trembling eyes.
Step, step.
Dale takes his final step forward.
Gray smoke billows like fog, thick and suffocating.
Flames flicker with savage intensity.
A sickly green gaze gleams with an eerie sheen.
“Ah, ugh.”
Clatter, clatter, clatter.
Her shoulders tremble uncontrollably.
A slimy revulsion coils around her.
A burning thirst, as if her throat were scorching, consumes her.
‘I cannot win.’
I could sense it instinctively.
That creature was fundamentally different from any hero I had ever encountered.
Like a seven suddenly appearing on a die that only goes from one to six.
Dale’s very existence negated everything I understood.
The moment I grasped this truth.
An abyss of terror consumed me.
“P-please… save me.”
I pleaded with a trembling voice.
Thirst, hunger, lust, sleep, vanity, possessiveness—and countless others.
The varieties of desire are too numerous to count.
Yet among them all, the most fundamental and intense desire was the will to survive.
The yearning to live.
That fierce hunger for life trampled my pride underfoot.
“I-I’ll do anything you command!”
I clung to Dale’s legs, crying out with a pitiful expression.
Still.
Dale stood motionless, gazing down at Lactasia prostrated before him.
“I’ll become your woman… wait, aren’t you dating that girl Iris right now? I’ll give you pleasures that don’t even compare to her.”
“….”
Lactasia glanced up at Dale, who had stopped moving, a seductive smile playing on her lips.
Good, he’s taken the bait.
Hope flickered in Lactasia’s eyes, which had been drowning in terror.
“What do you think? Not a bad offer….”
“I don’t like it.”
“…What?”
Lactasia’s expression twisted in confusion.
“Oh, are you worried I might betray you or something? In that case, I could cast a binding spell separately….”
“No, it’s not that reason.”
Dale examined Lactasia’s face carefully.
Well, to be honest, she wasn’t someone whose looks would embarrass me anywhere.
“It’s just… how do I put this?”
The faces of Iris and Yurina materialized beside hers.
Lined up like that, the comparison became unmistakably clear.
“Your appearance simply isn’t worth coveting, it seems.”
“…What, what did you just say?”
I’d softened the blow with indirection.
But stripped of its euphemism, wasn’t I essentially saying her looks fell short of my desires?
The Archbishop of Lust… no, the lofty pride Lactasia had cultivated crumbled to dust.
“You, you, you bastard…!”
Whoosh.
My blade, wreathed in ashen flames, pierced through Lactasia as she lunged at me in a convulsive frenzy.
“Gack, hack!”
Lactasia’s body scattered into black ash.
“Phew.”
I gazed down at her transformed form and slowly extinguished the ashen flames.
Unlike the rampage from before, the fierce inferno now subsided gradually under my will.
‘It was petty revenge, admittedly.’
Recalling Lactasia’s final twisted expression, a faint laugh escaped me.
According to what Iris had told me once, the Seven Star Church’s scriptures contained such teachings.
That vengeance is a dark cloud obscuring the heart, while forgiveness is sunlight illuminating it.
“What nonsense.”
Nothing’s ever felt more satisfying.

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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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