If heavy stones were like this, how much more so would light arrows be? The rain of arrows couldn’t even graze the wyverns and poured down to the ground.

Of course, for the pro-marquis faction army, it was an attack they knew would fail. They were trying to buy time for Magnus to cast magic.

Bang!

It was the moment when Magnus had finished reciting all the complex dark magic spells and was about to pour his magic power toward the sky. An explosion occurred. However, it wasn’t the wyvern that exploded, but his magic power that burst in mid-air. There was an invisible barrier of holy power stretched across the sky.

Magnus looked around at the wyverns in five directions. The holy knights had put up a barrier of holy power. They had blocked his ability from being used outside this barrier. At that moment, some intuition flashed through his mind.

“Those guys didn’t come in a hurry after receiving contact from Eberstadt! This is a trap!”

To think they had been lying in ambush above the sky. As soon as he looked up in fear, four more wyverns that had been hiding above the clouds came down and joined them.

Screech!

A cold streak of death poured down from the sky. Where the cold air breathed out by the wyvern had crossed the corps diagonally, soldiers stood tall, frozen solid like statues as they died.

“Aaaah!”

Terrified soldiers frantically tried to avoid the wyverns flying overhead again.

“Maintain formation!”

“Aim! Fire!”

The voices of commanders trying to maintain the soldiers’ composure mixed with screams and echoed. Stones and arrows rained toward the sky again. Some dwarves threw axes toward the wyverns in what seemed like bravado. The heavy axes naturally couldn’t reach the wyverns and fell onto their own allies’ heads, creating an even worse hell.

“Get out of the way right now!”

Magnus clung desperately to the back of his horse that reared up in surprise and savagely shouted at the soldiers blocking his path. To break through this situation, he had no choice but to escape outside the holy power barrier.

Magnus spurred his horse toward what seemed like the nearest end of the formation. It was the moment when he was about to barely escape from the group, even trampling fallen soldiers.

Rumble.

The ground shook greatly and a huge earthen wall rose up before his eyes. It was the work of earth spirits controlled by elves.

“D*mn elves!”

Changing terrain on a large scale. This was something that would require dozens of human spirit masters, but nine elves would be sufficient.

The steep earthen wall that easily exceeded three times the height of an adult man was impassable. As soon as he turned his horse’s head back, dust rose greatly from the far opposite end of the group and an identical earthen wall rose up. The ground rose up from all directions like this, trapping the army of several thousand with no way to go forward or back.

“Mage! Do something right now! Where the hell are the spirit masters!”

“Grand Mage!”

“Sir Magnus!”

While commanders, sensing the enemy’s full-scale attack that would soon come after being trapped, shouted names looking for those who could save them from this place, someone’s scream mixed in and echoed.

“Wh-what is that!”

Blue snake-like water currents came over the high earthen walls and poured in.

“A wa-waterfall!”

No. That was the river they had crossed. The elves were using water spirits to bring the river and fill it into the basin created by the earthen walls. The enemies intended to drown them.

“Teleport!”

I don’t care about the army or the princess or whatever. I have to save myself first. I have to survive and immediately inform the marquis that Hilda is a spy. However, even after shouting teleport, Magnus remained sitting on his horse trapped in the snare.

“D*mn it!”

He had stupidly forgotten for a moment that he was still trapped in the holy power barrier.

“Dig the earth!”

“Bring the catapults!”

There was an uproar from all directions as they tried to dig out or climb over the earthen walls. Roderick was watching from above as thousands of dwarves and humans struggled tangled together trying to escape.

Bang!

Once again, magic power collided with holy power and exploded in mid-air. The only one down there who could use that level of power right now was Magnus.

‘He must know it won’t break……’

Even knowing this, he might be doing it to gauge the strength and position of the holy power barrier. Before Magnus could use cunning to escape, Roderick decided to bestow mercy.

The mercy of a quick death, that is.

A wyvern flew around breathing cold air over the plain that had become a lake in an instant. The army that had been struggling below became trapped and dead in the frozen lake in the blink of an eye.

‘The Grand Mage is indeed using his cunning.’

Magic power was strongly felt from beneath the frozen surface. Roderick pointed at the lake and gave Hildeon a meaningful look.

‘This is your share.’

Understanding what was said with his eyes about the chance to take revenge, Hildeon properly gripped the spear he had been carrying under his arm and drove the wyvern toward the lake.

“Here.”

Hildeon thr*st his spear firmly into the surface where magic power was felt most strongly.

“Ugh!”

With a single scream, air bubbles rose up into the water that hadn’t been completely frozen, and soon red blood bloomed up like smoke. Magnus, who had been defending against Roderick’s cold air with magic and maintaining his breath, was pierced through by Hildeon’s spear and met his death so futilely.

A few lucky soldiers escaped death by climbing over the earthen walls. Roderick didn’t chase after them. Those guys would be taken care of by Eberstadt’s guard unit that was running toward them as promised in advance. Or they would become good food for trolls.

“Hah……”

Roderick wiped his face that had quickly become tired. Although the ice wyvern amplified Winterborn’s abilities, freezing an entire huge lake required consuming tremendous magic power.

Roderick gestured toward the north to the wyvern unit and took out magic stones he had prepared from his bag. There was no time to rest.

It was finally time to go rescue Erica.

* * *

At that moment, the marquis was pathetically tilting his wine glass in the garden pavilion where rain was falling.

“You should have a drink too.”

The marquis gestured toward the empty glass placed in front of Erica and the servant standing beside him holding a wine bottle, offering her a drink. Erica didn’t hide her troubled expression.

“Ah, my stomach isn’t feeling well, so I’m afraid I’ll have to decline regrettably. Wouldn’t it be a waste if I vomited up this precious wine?”

Whether the last words worked on that miser, the marquis didn’t offer her more wine.

“The medicine the court physician gave you doesn’t seem to be working?”

Well, since she wasn’t taking it.

Erica smiled bitterly and crumpled the fabric covering her belly even more loosely and baggily. Three months had already passed and her belly was starting to show. Unless it was tight-fitting clothing, it wouldn’t be noticeable, and even if it was noticeable, if she said it was a pot belly, those who didn’t know would be fooled, but anyway, it would be best if it wasn’t noticed as much as possible.

‘I wonder how things went at Eberstadt. Is it over?’

Erica kept smiling to hide her anxiety. The marquis would never dream that behind this good-natured smile was hidden the murderous thought ‘I really want to kill that bastard.’

Erica had to stay with Grandma Greta until the annihilation operation at Eberstadt was over and the royal palace was recaptured, but suddenly the marquis had called for her. She had been pretending to sleep all day today to avoid being called. However, the marquis now seemed to think prophetic dreams were no longer necessary and told them to wake up the sleeping Erica and bring her. This time Grandma Greta blocked with this excuse and that excuse, but it was useless.

‘Could it be that the Eberstadt operation is already over and the marquis who heard the news realized I’m in league with them and called me for retaliation?’

However, the atmosphere didn’t seem like that at all. She couldn’t block anymore for fear of arousing the marquis’s suspicion, and Erica had no choice but to be obediently dragged along and play the role of the marquis’s drinking companion.

“Whew……”

The marquis, who had drained his wine glass to the end, set it down with a thud. He even tapped the edge of the table frantically.

The marquis seemed anxious too. He was drinking to soothe his anxiety while waiting for contact that Eberstadt had been captured and the princess taken prisoner. Erica also wanted to drink because she was anxious, but it was frustrating that she couldn’t.

‘I need to stay close to Grandma right now……’

If someone suddenly burst through the door here and reported that Eberstadt was a trap, Erica’s neck would immediately go flying.

‘If all the mages are dead so contact can’t be made……’

It was when she was calmly playing the role of drinking companion while being anxious inside. The marquis poured another drink into his mouth, let out a deep sigh, and said.

“You and I are in similar situations.”

Just when she wondered why he was suddenly linking her and himself, the marquis began lamenting his own circumstances as if drunk.

“Actually, I used to serve as a slave to a great merchant who controlled the country.”

A story from a past life. He must be quite drunk.

After that, the marquis went on and on about what kind of humiliation he had endured under the great merchant, that is, Erica’s father from her past life, and how much credit he had stolen while serving as a slave.

‘Well, that father had to be a bit of a bastard for this to make sense.’

Since Erica also extremely hated her father from her past life, she couldn’t help but strangely empathize with her enemy’s lament.

“That guy…… kept stealing my things, stealing and stealing, and finally even stole my woman……”

Only when the marquis confessed with his tongue twisted from drunkenness did Erica finally understand why he had planted his child as the father’s child. When her father stole his lover, he took revenge through brood parasitism.

‘So what?’

Learning the story behind the revenge didn’t make her feel sympathy or think of stopping her revenge. Not everyone who suffered injustice lived by creating other innocent victims like him.

Erica, who had been the daughter of the revenge target, and the former king and former queen who had done nothing wrong but were subjected to brood parasitism and had their things stolen, and even Elodie. They were all innocent victims created by him under the pretext of retaliation. In the end, he was just a perpetrator who created other victims while using the excuse of being a victim.

“But now there’s no one to steal my things.”

Erica, who had been lost in thought, raised her gaze at the marquis’s strange tone. At that moment, she met eyes with the guy who was looking at her with suggestive eyes. She almost failed to manage her expression.

‘Ugh, this bastard isn’t keeping his eyes in check properly? I want to poke his eyes with my fingers.’

What kind of delusions had he been drinking alone all this time? The drunken marquis began saying strange things.

“If things go as you dreamed, I’ll let you live without worry for life.”

“Ah, yes. Thank you.”

She tried to just answer perfunctorily and move on, but the marquis came out with even stranger words.

“Then how about becoming my marchioness?”

Had he told the story about having his lover stolen by his father to gain sympathy while saying such things? Even the tiny bit of pity she had felt disappeared as if the hair had been plucked out.

‘This filthy perverted bastard…… What’s the age difference between you and me!’

Even if there was no age difference, even if he wasn’t an enemy, such a guy would be headed straight to the garbage incinerator. Erica barely hid her disgust and bowed her head to hide her expression that was becoming increasingly difficult to manage.

“How could a commoner like me dare to covet such a precious position?”

When Erica refused while holding back her desire to vomit on that face, an even more insane proposal came back.

“That’s true…… Then how about being my mistress?”

Should I castrate him before killing him?

There was a minor change in Erica’s plan.

“Hm? How about it? No need to be modest.”

It was when the marquis was tactlessly forcing an answer.

“Marquis.”

A servant who had entered the garden quickly approached while calling the marquis. Thanks to this, she temporarily avoided the difficult situation. And only then did Erica notice an important fact.