The Strongest in Our Neighborhood - Chapter 53

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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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Our Neighborhood’s Strongest (53)
“After living so long, I’ve developed an eye for reading people’s nature. Looking at his character, even if things don’t work out with Violet, he’ll show goodwill toward our family.”
“Father, our family is still counted among the top five powers in the homeland. Isn’t it excessive to bow so deeply to Jang Gain, no matter how Master-class a knight he is?”
“Excessive bowing, you say? Does your pride hurt?”
“I can’t deny it, sir.”
“I myself wonder if it’s truly necessary to go this far. But some feeling—or perhaps intuition—keeps warning me.”
“Could it be that your excessive fondness arose simply because he lifted the Demon Restriction that was binding you in a single stroke?”
“Perhaps. There’s certainly that element. But I sense something more beyond even that.”
……
“In any case, thank you for following my wishes.”
“When Father was bound by the Demon Restriction and issuing absurd commands, this is comparatively merciful.”
“Ahem, my apologies.”
“Now that you’re free from the Demon Restriction, that’s what matters. Going forward, I plan to regularly summon priests to prevent demons from scheming again, and we’ll also conduct purification work by sprinkling holy water in the main residence and the administrative offices.”
“Well considered. I shall treat all of you better from now on.”
……
“But will Jang Gain truly fall for Violet?”
“He seemed quite surprised seeing her earlier—there’s certainly some possibility, isn’t there? And not merely because she’s my daughter: there’s no woman more beautiful than Violet in this entire domain.”
“But according to Laila, Jang Gain lives in a Druid Tribe village. I must confess, that worries me somewhat.”
Yure’a’s eyes widened suddenly.
His third wife, Stranda, was a woman of the Druid Tribe, which was why his daughter had inherited her mother’s exceptional beauty.
“The Druid Tribe members receive the blessings of spirits—they must all be remarkably beautiful people.”
A shadow of concern fell across the face of Yure’a Millay, who moments before had brimmed with confidence.
* * *
When traveling to Greywan, he had crossed the mountains riding Sabel Tiger, but on the return journey with twenty-two carriages, there was no way to cross the mountains, so he had no choice but to pass through Gorgovan, which was governed by Baron Isop Jarban.
With the Johansen Family’s banner planted on the carriage and Bayona the steward and Violet present, the checkpoint waved them through with salutes, and when departing, the lord Isop Jarban himself saw them off.
Grrrrrrr……
Jang Gain, who had been sitting on Sabel Tiger’s back performing Qi Circulation Cultivation, opened his eyes at the warning sound the beast was sending.
“We haven’t been gone from the baron’s castle long—what’s worth warning about? Wait, what is that?”
Opening his eyes, Jang Gain first expanded the range of his Qi Sense, scanning the surroundings.
Expanding his Qi Sense range, he spotted something enormous like a bird approaching rapidly from far above, heading straight toward them.
“What is that? Is it the Wyvern monster the elder mentioned?”
Though the distance was considerable, the shape and size told him everything.
The wings spread on both sides looked to be over ten meters, the sharp beak seemed capable of piercing rock, and the enormous claws appeared strong enough to tear through oxen.
“Oh no! A, a Wyvern!”
While Jang Gain was tilting his head, one of the wagon drivers who spotted the flying creature in the sky cried out loudly, and everyone who looked up afterward gasped in terror.
“Drivers, halt the carriages at once! Once they’re stopped, laborers and commoners—get beneath the carriages, all of you!”
As people fell into chaos and horses reared, Bayona the steward was the first to compose himself and issue orders.
Then he turned urgently to Jang Gain.
“Can you handle a Wyvern, Jang Gain? If you cannot, we must hide beneath the carriages until the Wyvern has passed.”
Jang Gain watched the Wyvern grow larger as it approached and nodded.
“I’ve never faced a Wyvern before, but I believe I can certainly kill it.”
Jang Gain raised his right index finger, pointing it at the Wyvern, and starlight blossomed from the fingertip, streaking toward the creature.
Flash. Boom.
A massive hole opened through the Wyvern’s head where the starlight struck.
“Gasp!”
In that instant, both Bayona the steward and Violet drew sharp intakes of breath nearly simultaneously.
By their understanding, a Wyvern was a formidable and difficult monster that required a 4-star Mage to magically impede its flight and multiple knights capable of wielding Aura to hurl spears and shoot arrows at it before it could be taken down.
Yet he had killed such a creature with a mere flick of his finger.
Violet had inwardly resented her grandfather for having her participate in this procession to win Jang Gain’s heart. But the moment she witnessed him kill the Wyvern, that resentment vanished completely.
“Sabel, go fetch that Wyvern for me……”
“Ahhhhh…… Master! The Chimera Wyvern’s head burst!”
“Huh?! W-what in the world is happening?”
Just as Jang Gain was about to give Sabel Tiger a command, a familiar voice came from the direction of the falling Wyvern, and he turned his gaze skyward in confusion.
Hanging onto something like reins on the back of the descending Wyvern was someone, while another figure was falling away from the creature toward the ground.
“Wait! Aren’t those Laila and his master? Why are they there? Oh! Could it be that my master created a Chimera containing a Wyvern?”
Jang Gain’s mind flooded with questions, but first he needed to save the falling person, so he prepared to dash from Sabel Tiger’s back.
Whoooosh……
At that moment, wind stirred around Laila’s master, Aleingde Mir, noticeably slowing his descent. The wind extended to Laila as well, cradling his body.
Jang Gain stopped in his tracks upon seeing this and watched the two of them descend safely.
“Ah, right—those two can both cast Flight Magic.”
A deep, resonant thrum echoed across the sky.
The Wyvern, a watermelon-sized hole torn clean through its skull, plummeted to the ground with a heavy crash some ten seconds later, and the two figures descended on the wind, touching down lightly upon the earth.
* * *
Jang Gain approached Aleingde Mir, who stood staring at the Wyvern—now collapsed with an equally massive crater bored through its head—with eyes that held neither comprehension nor belief.
“Aleingde Mir, my sincerest apologies. Had I known this was the Chimera Wyvern you’d created, I would never have struck. I thought it a wild beast that had appeared without warning.”
“What? How—how is this possible? What just happened? For a moment something cold, something dreadfully unsettling, passed right through me. Then this creature’s head simply exploded, and all I saw was a single beam of light. It happened in an instant—I couldn’t track it at all.”
Jang Gain scratched his head as he watched the tremor in Aleingde Mir’s eyes.
There was good reason the Kanggi Martial Arts were called a path to the Absolute Realm. Even the Strong Thread—a technique one could only deploy in the earliest stages of Kanggi Martial Arts—belonged to that absolute tier, and its speed was nearly imperceptible to human perception.
“When I saw the Wyvern appear so suddenly, I feared the people would panic and hide beneath the carriages, and the horses would bolt. I thought to end it swiftly, perhaps… more swiftly than necessary.”
“I’d cast protective magic on this Chimera’s head and heart. The magic should activate if it senses danger—but it didn’t activate at all.”
……
“Could you show me how you killed the Wyvern? Just once?”
“The Aura expenditure is too great. It’s not a technique I can use frequently. I’m sorry.”
“I see… Well, I’ve watched you capture hundreds of Demonic Beasts and Magical Creatures from beyond the Demon Gate, but I thought I could at least comprehend what you were doing. Now I realize I’ve been laboring under a grave misunderstanding.”
“By the way—what brings you here? Didn’t you say you were returning to your laboratory to use those Demonic Beast and Magical Creature corpses I purchased to craft a new Chimera?”
Aleingde Mir examined the punctured skull for a long moment, then folded the Wyvern’s wings with magic and tucked the creature into his Robe.
“Laila mentioned that you first encountered a high-ranking Demonic Being in a deep forest within the Crerarion Mountain Range.”
“Ah, yes.”
“I’d arrived at my laboratory and laid out the corpses, trying to decide what sort of Chimera to create, when I received word from an acquaintance at the Mage Tower. Apparently, a Gate opened at Sapphire Castle on the outskirts of the Cram Empire roughly a month ago.”
Jang Gain’s eyes widened.
“A Gate opened? If they don’t close it quickly in those early stages, the damage could be catastrophic.”
“Despite swift action in the beginning, most of the inhabitants—the lord Orphien, his knights, soldiers, and nearly all the inner-city residents—were killed. The outer-city inhabitants fled to neighboring territories in panic. By now, Sapphire Castle has become a hellscape crawling with Demonic Beasts and Magical Creatures.”
“It seems they couldn’t close the Gate.”
“Not yet. But the Cram Empire has three Master-class knights and several mages equal to myself, so eventually they’ll seal it. The damage is severe, but they’ll manage somehow.”
“I see.”
“Sapphire Castle lies in Cram Empire territory beyond the Crerarion Mountain Range, and Greywan is also near those mountains. An acquaintance asked me to investigate whether any Demon Gates might have opened in the Crerarion range itself—given its proximity to Greywan. That’s why I’ve come.”
“Ah, so that’s why you intended to travel to the Crerarion Mountain Range with me.”
“Precisely. But now that the head of my Chimera Wyvern has been destroyed, I’m afraid I won’t be able to fulfill my acquaintance’s request.”
“Must that Wyvern be discarded, then?”
“No, there’s a high-ranking Demonic Being’s corpse available. I can simply replace the head with one from another Wyvern and restore it to use.”
“Then, if I happen to see a Wyvern in the Crerarion Mountain Range, I’ll capture it and bring you its head.”
“That’s the spirit! If you do that, I won’t need to return. I’ll come with you, restore the Wyvern, and investigate whether any Demon Gates have opened.”
“But I’m not familiar with where Wyverns make their lairs.”
“Don’t worry about that. I know the valleys and peaks where the Wyverns nest quite well.”
* * *
“Lord Gain, this is Pudding I made myself. Won’t you try some?”
After lunch, as Jang Gain set a kettle over the fire to brew the Flower Tea that Elena the elder had given him, he exhaled softly at the sight of the yellow, jelly-like substance Violet had brought on a plate.
“So the task you had the servants working on earlier was making this Pudding?”
“Yes. I noticed that you enjoy tea after meals, so I thought Pudding would pair well with it. I wanted to make something nice for you.”
The reason Jang Gain sighed was that Violet had been playing the role of a princess ever since they’d arrived at this place.
He’d understood she was supposed to assist the steward Bayona, yet instead Bayona had been assisting her while handling trivial tasks, and this had led to minor friction between her handmaidens and the free workers on several occasions.
“Violet.”
“Yes?”
“I’ll eat this Pudding out of respect for the people who worked hard to make it.”
“Yes? Oh, I see.”
“And I’d prefer it if you’d return to your family’s estate now. Actually, I’m asking you to leave.”
Violet’s eyes widened in an instant—she’d been expecting praise for the dish.
“What? Why are you saying this so suddenly?”
“I permitted you to join us because I was told you’d help Bayona. But after watching you these past few days, you can’t even dress yourself without attendants. You’re far more trouble than assistance on this journey—you and your handmaidens have become nothing but dead weight. I need you to go back.”
Violet, startled for a moment, now tilted her head in confusion.
“Dead weight? Me and the handmaidens? In what way are we dead weight? It’s only natural that they help me dress.”

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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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