Erika’s sacred sword, incomparable to his own stained with the blood of monsters and bounty criminals, felt purifying just to look at.

‘Until the day I can exchange swords with you as an equal, I won’t stop.’

Ion turned away each time with this pledge, forced to watch her only from hiding.

※※※

“Hold your positions! Don’t scatter!”

Three years had already passed since Ion began wandering as a mercenary.

His mercenary life, which he had been able to start at a young age due to his larger build compared to others, was nearing its end.

If only he could catch that Tiger rampaging right in front of him.

Gulp.

Ion swallowed dryly as he exchanged glances with his companions.

The Tiger they encountered by chance while returning from their mission.

Among monsters, it was a high-tier species, extremely difficult to catch, but if they managed to capture it, they could end their mercenary lives overnight.

From its hide to bones, heart, tendons, blood, teeth, and claws—not a single part was useless.

In particular, the magic stone it carried near its heart held infinite power, enough to drive anyone who craved it to madness.

Ion infused his sword with aura to pierce the Tiger’s hide, which was difficult to wound with ordinary swords.

His companions, all aura users, tensely surrounded their swords with aura as well.

Fortunately, the arrogant Tiger wouldn’t flee.

It was confident it could tear out the throats of all the humans surrounding it.

This made sense, as it had encountered human groups many times before but none had ever managed to properly scratch it.

The Tiger let out a loud roar, mocking the humans surrounding it.

GRRRAAAAAAAARRR.

It was using fear—making human hearts shrink and causing them to wet themselves in terror.

Ion and his companions gripped their swords tightly, prepared for the Tiger’s fear tactic.

They needed to catch the moment when the Tiger lowered its guard after using fear.

“Now!”

Ion led the charge toward the Tiger.

Aura swords stabbed at the Tiger simultaneously from all directions.

The Tiger, catching its breath after releasing fear, flinched in surprise, but that was all.

“Archers!”

At Ion’s shout, the archers aiming at the Tiger from behind released their tightly drawn bows.

Several arrows pierced the Tiger’s left eye.

GRAAAAAGH—

Several companions were sent flying after colliding with the Tiger as it writhed in agony.

Ion tried to find the beast’s weakness while avoiding the Tiger as it jumped up and down with its front paws raised.

Throughout his life, he had faced more life-threatening moments than not, but today truly seemed like a day to risk his life.

‘Erika, give me strength.’

Ion closed his eyes and recalled Erika training.

Each movement of her swinging and thrusting her sword flashed vividly through his mind.

Suddenly, he remembered how Erika used her aura.

Ion typically surrounded his entire sword evenly with aura.

But Erika used aura in various ways.

She played with aura in ways Ion couldn’t dare to imitate.

One of the scenes he had only marveled at while secretly watching suddenly captivated him.

‘If that works……’

Ion opened his eyes and looked at the Tiger still jumping up and down, threatening his companions.

Not only was imitating Erika’s aura challenging, but catching this one opportunity was no easy task.

It truly required risking his life for even a slight chance of success.

Nevertheless, Ion had no choice but to grasp at that small possibility.

‘How did Erika gather aura at the tip of her sword?’

Recalling how Erika gathered aura at her sword’s tip, he summoned all the aura within himself.

Woooom—

Sweat dripped from his forehead, but Ion maintained his concentration.

He had to succeed.

Finally, as aura began to gather at the tip of his sword, Ion opened his eyes and charged toward the Tiger.

The Tiger, spotting Ion as the only human charging toward it among those fleeing, rushed at him.

Ion slid under the Tiger as it pounced on him.

Then he thr*st his aura-filled sword into the Tiger’s throat below its jaw.

It was a vital point where the carotid artery would flow in humans.

As the Tiger paused in surprise, Ion withdrew his sword.

Blood gushed like a fountain from the Tiger’s neck.

Ion seized the moment and stabbed the Tiger’s neck repeatedly.

The neck was so thick that even Ion’s longsword couldn’t penetrate it completely.

However, it was enough to sever one of the vital blood vessels.

Strength gradually drained from the Tiger’s body.

Ion pulled himself away to avoid the Tiger collapsing on top of him.

“Huff, huff……”

As Ion sat down beside the Tiger’s corpse, breathing heavily, his companions slowly gathered around him.

They couldn’t believe they had caught the Tiger.

“Is it dead?”

Ion nodded slowly at his companion’s question.

As Ion made eye contact with his companions and slowly raised the corners of his mouth, cheers erupted from them.

“Wooooooo, we’re rich now!”

“This miserable life is finally over.”

Unlike his excited companions, Alex had a different interest. He asked Ion:

“How did you catch it? Does the Tiger have a weakness or something?”

“Just got lucky.”

“Don’t want to tell me?”

Alex pouted.

Though one might encounter a Tiger once in a lifetime if at all, the curious Alex wanted to know Ion’s secret for catching it.

But Ion just shrugged and smiled.

‘Even if I told you it was thanks to Erika, would any of you believe me?’

Ion gazed at the distant sky where Erika would be.

‘Erika, I miss you.’

※※※

The processing of the Tiger’s byproducts went smoothly.

The problem was the magic stone.

From Ion’s perspective, he wanted to sell it to whoever offered the highest price.

But as luck would have it, the highest bidder was a mage from the Cairo Empire.

Somehow hearing the news, he wanted to buy the Tiger’s magic stone at a price three times higher than others.

The Tiger’s magic stone, said to provide unlimited magical power.

No mage could resist coveting it.

Though mages were supposed to maintain neutrality and not get involved in disputes between countries, not all of them did so.

The mage who requested the deal with Ion was also a court mage of the Cairo Empire.

If he sold the magic stone, Ion might have to bear a significant risk.

If the Cairo Empire created an unmanageable weapon with the Tiger’s magic stone and invaded, it could be troublesome even with twice as many Sword Masters.

Although his country had given him nothing, and the Emperor had not shown him even the slightest favor, Ion couldn’t help but worry if he didn’t plan to leave this country where Erika resided.

‘What would Erika do? Erika wouldn’t need to worry about this since she’s not short on money, right?’

Lost in thought, Ion decided to go see Erika before making his decision.

Even without directly conversing with her, he felt Erika could somehow provide an answer.

“Ha, haha, hahahahahaha.”

Ion, who secretly visited Erika’s training ground, found it difficult to suppress his laughter.

‘Erika has become a Sword Master!’

Unlike usual, Erika was quite conscious of her surroundings.

With Erika’s sensing ability, she could locate people around her with her eyes closed.

Of course, Erika didn’t mind people watching her train.

There were several people who watched her training from a distance without disturbing her, so she was used to it.

But that day, she had deployed a sound barrier.

At first, Ion wondered what was the point of preventing sound from leaking when training alone.

But after watching for a while, he noticed something different from usual.

The output of her aura was different from other times.

Erika made her aura’s length and shape similar to hide it from others, but Ion could tell.

The intensity and density of her aura were different.

This was why Erika had deployed the sound barrier.

Although the shape of the aura might be similar, different intensity and density produced different sounds.

As the intensity of aura output increases and density becomes more refined, the sound becomes more majestic and heavy.

Consequently, the sound a Sword Master makes when wielding aura differs dramatically from that of ordinary aura users.

Erika was only fourteen years old.

She wanted to hide that she had become a Sword Master.