Chapter 41
Zeke’s request caught Cliff off guard.
“A job…? Are you saying you want to work at our company?”
He said to Cliff.
“If you’re dealing with the First Princess, you must have a branch in the southern continent. I need a cover identity to travel there.”
Being meticulous in nature, Cliff carefully considered whether Zeke’s request violated their contract terms.
“Do you just need a cover identity created?”
“I’d like to know the regular transportation routes to the south, and secure a safe house like this one for field operations. Preferably with a warehouse large enough to store cargo.”
Though not an easy task, it wasn’t beyond Linehart Company’s capabilities.
Cliff nodded.
“Understood.”
“Good. I’ll tell you the other two requests later. There was no time limit on making requests, after all.”
Saying this, Zeke picked up one of the papers Cliff brought and quickly wrote something down.
Then he handed it to Cliff.
“Make this medicine and take it for about two months, and she’ll recover soon. The princess is young, so she might recover even faster.”
Cliff reached for the document with trembling hands.
At that moment, Zeke held the document firmly.
“As stated in the contract, remember this treatment can only be used for Princess Melissa. If you give this to anyone else, I won’t let it slide.”
Cliff nodded.
“Understood.”
Only then did Zeke hand over the document.
He quickly rose from his seat.
“I truly apologize for today’s events. I will formally invite you soon to make amends.”
“Skip that and just handle what I requested. Give me a horse to return on.”
Cliff nodded and left first.
After he left, Zeke looked at the Gorka Ranger who had been guarding him.
He spoke to him in Gorkan.
“You have good skills. When does your contract with Cliff end? If it ends soon, I’d like to make a contract too.”
The Ranger was surprised when Zeke spoke in Gorkan.
“Where did you learn Gorkan?”
“I picked it up here and there before.”
“So Draker teaches things like this too.”
“Not exactly… let’s just say it’s a hobby.”
In his previous life, Zeke had acquired various languages while traveling across the continent, even though he hadn’t intended to.
Just then, another Gorka Ranger came inside and gestured to Zeke.
Zeke followed the Rangers outside the warehouse.
The Ranger handed Zeke a horse.
“Take this.”
Zeke swiftly mounted the horse.
Then he addressed the Rangers.
“Hey!”
Zeke threw something toward the Rangers from atop the horse.
“This is payment for kidnapping me.”
The Rangers instinctively caught what he threw, startled. When they checked what it was, they realized Zeke had taken their Kukri swords and thrown them back.
The Kukri sword was a symbol as precious as life itself to Gorka Rangers.
The fact that it was taken without their knowledge meant Zeke could have subdued them at any time.
Seeing the stunned Rangers, Zeke grinned and said.
“What I said earlier – I meant it, so contact me anytime. Hya!”
Zeke rode the horse out of the warehouse and returned to the mansion.
* * *
After meeting with Cliff, Zeke quietly spent time adjusting to life at Valhalla.
Unlike the Academy, Valhalla allowed students to take classes they needed at times they wanted.
Once they completed the required basic courses, everything else was left to the students’ discretion.
More interested in gathering talented individuals at Valhalla than the classes themselves, Zeke searched for classes where other Five-Star Knights besides Diego might be.
But the timing wasn’t quite right.
Jeffrik Solma, the Knight of Mist, was a senior currently away on field training, and Bishop Castic, the Knight of Silence, had already graduated and joined the Thebea Kingdom’s Knights.
Only Aster Aladov, the Knight of Illusion, remained as a student, but for some reason, though enrolled in classes, he never showed up.
Zeke had no choice but to first try recruiting Diego Villa, the Knight of Rhythm, with whom he was somewhat acquainted.
“Yo bro! Welcome to our club.”
That’s why Zeke was visiting the Southern Fusion New Age Music Research Club where Diego Villa served as president.
“Wow, it’s really Zeke Draker.”
“Amazing!”
As rumors about Zeke had already spread widely through Valhalla, club members looked at him with curiosity.
After calming the members down, Diego said he would play music they created in the club for Zeke.
Though Zeke had no appreciation for music, he endured and listened intently to Diego and the club members’ performance.
‘What is this?’
As a former southern hitman, Zeke had been forced to listen to southern music daily because of Don Juan, the boss of Mekein, whether he liked it or not.
As a result, he unwillingly knew quite a bit about southern music.
To Zeke’s ears, trained in traditional southern music, the rhythm Diego played didn’t sound very good.
“Here!”
After finishing the performance, Diego approached Zeke with a smile.
“Hey bro, how’s our performance?!”
Zeke clicked his tongue while looking at Diego.
“Diego, have you ever properly listened to Southern music?”
“What? Hey bro, I’m from the South. I’m full of South soul!”
“You keep talking about South soul. Southern rhythm is basically… ah, move aside.”
Zeke shook his head and jumped up from his seat.
Then he sat down in front of the Southern instrument where Diego had been sitting.
He picked up the stick lying next to it and started beating the drum.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Zeke with the drumstick created a simple but passionate rhythm.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BOOM!
“Wow! Amazing rhythm!”
Following Zeke’s Southern rhythm, other members started adding melodies with their instruments.
Diego added improvised lyrics to the rhythm that made everyone move naturally.
“Yo! I’m a Southern swordsman! You’re all Central idiots! Northern guys are just stupid!”
Before they knew it, fusion music was created with Southern rhythm as the base and Central Continent melody on top.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BOON!
Zeke ended the rhythm.
The other members were entranced by the rhythm Zeke created and their own melodies.
Diego was moved by this new sensation.
“What the…?! Bro Zeke! You’re a genius not just in swordsmanship but also in music, yo!”
Other club members also looked at Zeke with emotional eyes.
“He is the god of rhythm.”
“This will be a hit. Definitely a hit.”
Zeke was flustered by this reaction when he had just played something simple since Diego’s rhythm was so messy.
‘Seems like I did something unnecessary.’
Feeling like he might get caught up in this if he stayed longer, Zeke hurriedly got up.
Then Diego grabbed Zeke’s legs and clung on.
“No, bro! It’s a continental disaster for someone talented like you to not do music! You must do music!”
“Diego. Why did you come to Valhalla anyway?”
“Bro, I came to bring South soul to the bleak Valhalla!”
“…”
Zeke returned to the mansion after fending off Diego and the fusion music club members who were trying to keep him.
“Phew, almost got caught up in a strange place.”
Being talented in many ways was also a problem.
Zeke smirked at the irony of trying to hook Diego but almost getting caught himself, then decided to focus on personal training with renewed determination.
He turned on Terakan’s Secure archive and opened the True Dragon Sword Technique manual to read.
“Hmm… no matter how many times I look at it, the content is really difficult.”
The Elemental Sword was also difficult, but since Kaisir was there to explain everything one by one, there weren’t any parts that remained unclear for long.
But the True Dragon Sword Technique had too many expressions that were incomprehensible.
“Circulate aura through the microcosmic orbit to open the meridians, then progress from the lower Diantan circulation to Middle Diantan circulation… what does this even mean?”
Although he was reading it translated from ancient Chronos language to Central common language through system correction, the expressions themselves were not used in modern times, making it very difficult to understand.
Zeke decided to first learn the sword forms, setting aside what he didn’t understand.
Originally, since Terakan Draker created the Dragon Slaying Technique based on the forms of the True Dragon Sword Technique, they shared the same basic roots.
“The True Dragon Sword Technique has many more forms and is more complex. Must have been tough organizing it into the Dragon Slaying Technique.”
Zeke practiced each form of the True Dragon Sword Technique while referencing the Dragon Slaying Technique.
Although the Dragon Slaying Technique had big movements, it was still possible to use in actual combat since it was created with human opponents in mind.
But the True Dragon Sword Technique truly felt like a swordsmanship created to face dragons, as its name suggested.
Each strike had to be executed with full power to be able to cut enormous dragons.
Whoosh!
Zeke quickly grasped and internalized the sword forms of the True Dragon Sword Technique that even Terakan Draker had given up on due to its difficulty.
Ok… so move like this. Turn and cut. Jump… and cut again.’
Zeke practiced the forms while raising his aura blade.
There was one fact that Zeke overlooked here.
The actual True Dragon Sword Technique was meant to raise aura from the lower Diantan to open all meridians in the body, then strengthen the entire body to release powerful force at once.
But since Zeke didn’t have a lower Diantan, he used Bahamut’s heart to convert mana power raised from the middle Diantan into aura for his swordsmanship.
The technique’s instructions about the lower Diantan and middle Diantan were essentially unnecessary for Zeke who didn’t raise aura through them in the first place.
Woong!
His exceptional physical sensing ability naturally guided him on how the sword’s flow should move just from the forms alone.
Before he knew it, Zeke had mastered not only the forms but also the application of the True Dragon Sword Technique on his own.:
Whoosh!
The more he repeated the sword technique, the sharper his sword became.
As Zeke wielded the Dragon Sword technique and became more proficient, he felt a wall that seemed just out of reach.
‘Could I already be reaching the wall of a Black Knight? That’s too early.’
It didn’t make sense that he had grown enough to reach the Black Knight’s wall when it hadn’t been long since he overcame the Red Knight’s wall.
Zeke continued swinging his sword with a calm mind.
Before he knew it, the mana flowing from his Diantan became more focused on Bahamut.
Thump!
At the same time, Bahamut’s heart, sealed within Zeke’s diantan began to beat.
Then Bahamut’s heart started beating in sync with Zeke’s Dragon Sword technique.
‘What is this?’
The more he swung his sword, the stranger the feeling became.
His solar plexus was pounding, and a part of his brain felt tingly.
Still, he didn’t stop and continued swinging his sword again and again.
It felt like he shouldn’t let go of this feeling.
Thump thump thump!
Bahamut’s heart beat even more intensely.
And at some point, light burst forth from the inscription carved on Zeke’s solar plexus.
“What, what’s happening?”
Suddenly, everything before Zeke’s eyes turned completely black.
He had experienced this before.
A situation where reality seemed to unfold vividly even though it clearly wasn’t happening in the real world.
Zeke’s perspective changed.
He was curled up sleeping in the world of the abyss, placed within a wide and massive cavern.
Then he felt someone approaching him.
Zeke gradually rose from the submerged world of the abyss and opened his eyes.
A human who looked as small as an ant.
A man with his face hidden beneath a deeply pulled hood spoke to Zeke.
“Ruler of Twilight, Bahamut”
Only then did Zeke realize that he had become a dragon, not a human.
And as a dragon, he opened his mouth toward the human.
“Sethon Draker. How brazen. What business do you have here?”
Surprisingly, the human before him was Sethon Draker, the King of Chronos known as the Sword Saint. He spoke to Bahamut.
“Ruler of Twilight, I have a favor to ask of you.”
Then Bahamut extended his head toward Sethon.
An overwhelming dragon’s dignity and killing intent stronger than anything else poured toward Sethon.
“You dare ask me for a favor? Damn human. If it weren’t for Chronos, I would have wiped all of you out right now.”
Then Sethon said to Bahamut.
“Ruler of Twilight, I understand your anger. That is precisely why I want to ask this favor of you.”
Sethon pulled something out from within his garments.
“The Dragon-Slaying Sword technique that I created, the True Dragon Sword technique. I would like you to take custody of this.”
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