Chapter 57: The God-Slaying Sword’s Path

Xigelili Plains.

“The last one…”

Blue sword light flashed. Anna, her clothes stained with blood, put away the cucumber in her hand.

The pack of demon wolves, witnessing the bipedal creature that had invaded their den and seemed a god of slaughter, cowered on the ground, emitting pitiful, helpless whimpers.

They had utterly abandoned all resistance, their minds filled only with the thought of surrender.

‘How could they not cower? Their own Wolf King boss had been instantly dispatched with a single cucumber upon meeting this foe!’

‘Now, he was nothing but slices of meat!’

‘Every single one of their kin who had dared to roar at this person had been sliced to pieces with a single strike!’

‘How could they possibly fight? This was an existence on a completely different level!’

‘Besides, this wasn’t cowardice; it was simply knowing when to be prudent.’

Anna ignored the trembling demon wolf pack. She approached the demon wolf she had just split in half, and without a thought for the gore, plunged her hand directly into its body, rummaging through a mass of bloody organs.

This brutal sight made the demon wolf pack bury their heads even lower.

‘They feared they might be the next to have their insides ripped out.’

“Ah, found it.”

Anna’s eyes brightened, and she exerted force with her hand.

Another chilling ‘rip’ sound echoed, striking fear into the wolves. The blue-haired girl’s hand now held a blood-stained purple crystal.

“Twenty demon wolf cores collected.”

“Finally, I can return to Xielan!”

“I need to hurry back. If I submit the materials late, someone else will complete the quest before me again.”

Anna gripped the crystal, shaking off the blood and excess organ residue. She hastily tucked it into the small pouch strapped to her leg, then ran towards the deeper parts of the demon wolf den.

Reaching the end, Anna found herself facing a dead end, a look of utter confusion on her face.

“Huh, wasn’t this the way I came?”

Indeed, the blue-haired girl had gotten lost again, managing to find the only dead end in a den that essentially had but one path.

The remaining demon wolves watched the powerful bipedal creature wander around the den. They huddled fearfully in what they hoped were safe corners, convinced that she was merely choosing her next unfortunate victim.

After wandering for an entire day, Anna grew both hungry and weary, a sense of urgency beginning to gnaw at her.

“I’m doomed, I can’t get out…”

“If I waste any more time here, my commission will be ruined…”

“No, Anna, calm down, calm down…”

“The more desperate the situation, the calmer one must be…”

She recalled her father’s words before her departure.

Anna shook her head, took a deep breath, and offered herself a word of comfort, readjusting her mindset.

Simultaneously, her mind raced, searching through her father’s sayings for a method to break the current stalemate.

!

Anna remembered that night when she had proposed leaving the family to become an adventurer in the outside world, to fulfill her childhood dream.

Her father, chopsticks in hand, had remained silent at the dinner table for a long time.

Finally, he let out a long sigh.

“Anna, you’ve grown up. I won’t oppose your choice. The path ahead is one you must forge yourself, just as I did.”

“But remember, when you’re alone outside, it’s different from being within the family. You will inevitably encounter extremely difficult and trying times.”

“At such times, don’t tense up. There’s no one out there constantly pushing you forward like I do. So, when you’re tired, embrace yourself. When you cry, comfort yourself. Expressing your emotions is also a part of growth.”

“After exhaustion, continue forward. After tears, continue striving. That’s when you’ll realize that everything that happened before can no longer be an obstacle…”

‘Father, Anna will always remember your teachings…’

Anna drew the cucumber from behind her back.

“Father was right. The path ahead must be forged by oneself!”

“If I can’t find an exit, then I’ll carve a new path myself!”

Blue currents of magical energy, flowing like water, rose and encircled Anna. The whites of the girl’s eyes gradually took on a deep blue hue, until her originally azure eyes became entirely dark blue. The smile that usually graced her lips vanished. Gripping her sword, she seemed devoid of all emotion, transformed into a frigid, unfeeling blade.

The wolf pack trembled violently, the escalating, terrifying pressure making it impossible for them to even lift their heads.

The girl flicked the cucumber held tightly in her hand, and a deep sword mark instantly appeared on the ground.

“Twilight has fallen…”

A clear, cold chant echoed through the cave. The blue magical currents around the girl paused, then surged into a furious frenzy, continuously pouring into her slender, delicate arm.

In mere moments, the hand gripping the cucumber was gone, replaced by a blue crystalline blade of magical energy extending from her elbow.

Anna held her sword-transformed arm horizontally before her, then stepped forward. The ground, unable to bear the weight, bore the imprint of her foot, from which spiderweb cracks spread.

“Let this God-Slaying Sword judge all gods!”

“Break!”

The girl let out a soft cry, her entire body rocketing towards the cave wall at an imperceptible speed.

A brilliant azure sword light, with unparalleled force, sliced through the rock wall, splitting the small cave in two.

The dim cave was now completely exposed to the desolate moonlight.

“Awooo—”

After a long while, it was unclear which ‘husky’ among them first howled at the moon, but soon, the demon wolves collectively raised their heads, wailing and shedding tears of relief for having survived.

‘Excellent! The plague god has finally left!’

‘A home can be found again, a king can be chosen again, but if life is lost, then truly everything is gone.’

Meanwhile, Anna, the instigator, propelled by the momentum of her ultimate sword technique, flew a considerable distance after breaching the cave, ultimately plummeting with precise aim into a chasm.

Bang—

A certain elf, curled up by the rock wall, stared blankly at the girl who had fallen from the sky and crashed into their world, their thoughts momentarily seizing up.

‘That blue thing half-buried in the ground, was it an ice cream bar?’

Yulim Wilivia snapped back to reality. Whatever this thing was, the commotion it caused was enough to draw significant attention at night, attracting *their* notice!

“No… I must… I must leave here quickly…”

Yulim leaned against the rock wall, trying to stand, but suddenly her body trembled. She staggered, collapsing onto one knee.

She looked back at her right leg, which was trembling uncontrollably and had gone numb.

A thin line of blood marked the spot, the wound already cracked and blackened, oozing a mix of black and red foul blood. This dark stain stood out sharply against her pale white thigh.

Yulim’s heart turned to ashes.

The wound there had been inflicted during her escape, when she failed to dodge a flying leaf dart, a unique projectile of the elven race.

‘She hadn’t expected it to be poisoned…’

‘No, it would be abnormal if it wasn’t poisoned…’

With her already dwindling stamina, attempting to escape her pursuers with a poisoned body was nothing short of a pipe dream.

Despair enveloped the girl’s heart.

Just then, the ‘ice cream bar’ she had ignored earlier shifted, splitting open.

The blue skirt, like a ‘wrapper’, finally succumbed to gravity, falling away and revealing everything.

Yulim, kneeling as she was, happened to be facing that direction, looking directly forward.

Right before Yulim, a cute blue and white bowl-shaped object was displayed.

It was within arm’s reach, almost touching.

Yulim: ?!

In that moment, even her physical pain could not outweigh the intense shame that surged within Yulim.

“Ah—!”

Yulim covered her eyes, crying out in alarm, and hastily tried to retreat backward.

Unfortunately, she forgot that the rock wall was directly behind her, leaving her no escape.

Under Yulim’s horrified gaze, the ‘ice cream bar’ topped with a woman’s blue and white bowl-shaped undergarment began to twist and squirm erratically, while eerie whispers emanated from the earth.

“Damn it—why am I stuck in the dirt—I need—to hurry—! Hurry! Get out—! If I don’t get out, someone else will take my commission—!”

Anna, stuck in the dirt, finally recovered her senses. Realizing her predicament, she began to cheer herself on while attempting to free herself.

But to Yulim’s ears, Anna’s voice sounded as if it were saying, ‘Delicious, juicy little elf, I, this underwear demon, am about to emerge from the dirt! Run, quickly, or I’ll take your share too, hehehe!’

“No… don’t… don’t come closer…”

Yulim pressed herself against the rock wall, trembling with fear and curling into a ball, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face.

‘At the last moment, not only would her life be lost, but her chastity would also be stolen by a demon?’

“Move… please move,呜呜…”

Yulim repeatedly thumped her right leg, hoping the pain would restore sensation.

‘Even if just for a moment, to regain even a tiny bit of mobility!’

Alas, it was all in vain.

Not only was her right leg still numb, but Yulim also saw countless tiny figures appearing in her vision, holding hands and dancing in a circle.

There were only two possibilities for such a phenomenon.

The unluckiest scenario was that the toxin had already permeated her nerves, causing hallucinations.

A slightly better possibility was that the poison in her leg also contained the psychotropic toxins of red umbrella mushrooms.

However, neither situation boded well.

Especially then, faint, tumultuous footsteps drifted from above.

Yulim was utterly consumed by despair.

She slumped against the rock wall, casting a final, reluctant glance at the night sky visible through the fissure above, before closing her eyes. “Goodbye, beautiful world…”

Though unwilling, fate was thus, and Yulim eventually accepted her impending death with resignation.

Yulim had initially believed her life would end there, but then a miracle occurred.

Unbeknownst to her, terrifying blue currents of magical energy began to swirl, and a clear, cold murmur echoed from deep within the earth.

“Twilight has fallen…”

The next moment, the earth wailed, and the chasm began to tremble.

That night, everyone near the chasm witnessed the blue sword light erupting from the earth, illuminating the dark sky.

Bang—

Anna burst out from the pile of rocks, covered in dirt, yet she let out an incredibly loud laugh. “Hahaha! I’m out! I’m truly a genius!”

Yulim, who had cowered in a corner and thus escaped the flying debris, now stared blankly at Anna, who was scurrying about excitedly like a monkey king.

‘Who could tell her what had just happened?’

Her increasingly swollen brain and blurring vision made it impossible for Yulim to discern whether what she saw was a pre-death fantasy or a hallucination induced by the poison.

Just then, Yulim heard a voice of surprise and doubt from the other person.

“Huh? Why is there someone here?”

“Oh no! I hope I didn’t accidentally hurt them just now!”

“Hey, hey?”

“Little sister, are you alright?”

“Hiss… why are you bleeding so much!”

“No, I need to bandage it quickly!”

The person jogged over, hastily pulling a roll of bandages from the small pouch strapped to their leg, intending to stop the bleeding.

Only then did Yulim realize that this was neither illusion nor fantasy; someone was genuinely trying to save her!

The hope for life reignited within her.

Yulim weakly raised a hand to stop Anna, who was about to bandage her thigh.

Meeting Anna’s bewildered gaze, Yulim’s trembling, pale lips struggled to utter a single word: “Poison…”

“Poison?”

Anna heard her, and upon closer inspection, saw that black blood was indeed oozing from the other girl’s wound.

The blue-haired girl immediately let out a sigh of relief. “Phew… what the—so it wasn’t me who accidentally hurt her. You scared me to death…”

Yulim: …?

‘Why did she sound relieved, hey!’

‘Is she not going to save me now that she knows it wasn’t her fault?’

Fortunately, Anna did not abandon her as Yulim had feared; instead, she offered a comforting remark.

“Don’t worry, little sister. It’s just a tiny bit of poison. Watch me suck it out!”

With that, Anna directly knelt on Yulim’s thigh and began to suck, much like one would slurp jelly.

She even made “slurping” sounds.

Yulim’s face grew even paler.

‘No, had she encountered a vampire princess?!’

‘Who extracts poison like this?!’

‘She was going to bleed out!’

“Gulp…”

Suddenly, Yulim heard a swallowing sound, and her heart and lungs seized up.

‘Why did she swallow it?!’

‘Shouldn’t she spit out the poison?!’

Anna sucked for a while longer, then suddenly looked up, smacked her lips, and squinted her eyes. “Hmm, why are there so many little people popping up around here?” she murmured.

‘It’s over…’

‘She’s poisoned too…’

Hearing Anna’s murmuring, Yulim’s heart sank to its lowest point once more.

Anna, wanting to see clearly what those little people were, reached up to rub her eyes. But with that rub, the whites of her eyes were once again covered in deep blue, and the tiny figures in her vision vanished without a trace after she blinked.

Anna had once again entered the Judgment Form for wielding the God-Slaying Sword!

After wiping away the overflowing crimson blood from Yulim’s thigh and deeming it sufficient, Anna began bandaging the wound with the bandages in her hand.

“Stay awake. Don’t fall asleep. Hold on, I’ll take you back to Xielan to find a priest immediately.”

A cold, emotionless voice emanated from before her. Yulim looked up blankly, realizing the girl in front of her seemed to have suddenly transformed.

The other’s face was devoid of superfluous expression, her deep blue eyes like mirrors, clearly reflecting Yulim’s face.

Yulim had no doubt that no joy or sorrow in this world could stir the girl before her.

“Look! That hateful dark elf is there!”

“Vile, detestable dark elf! Die!”

Just then, an angry shout came from above them, followed immediately by the sound of hurried footsteps.

Anna completely disregarded the commotion above. She put away the bandages, dropped the cucumber in her hand, and bent down to scoop Yulim into a princess carry.

An arrow grazed Anna’s hair, flying past and embedding itself in the rock wall.

“Are you an elf? Such a large target, and you still miss?”

“Your Royal Highness, wasn’t I just giving them a warning… We’ve never seen that blue-haired woman before, who knows which faction she belongs to…”

“Nonsense! I am the Prince of the Elven Lands! Who dares to disrespect me?! Stop worrying about this and that, give me the bow!”

*Creak—*

The sound of a bow being drawn and an arrow nocked echoed once more.

Yulim saw the bow and arrow aimed at Anna, and anxiously warned in a weak voice, “Be… careful…”

Only when a sense of danger arose did Anna slightly raise her head.

*Whoosh—*

An arrow, stained with green liquid, grew larger and larger in her vision.

But that was all it amounted to.

Visible blue magical currents once again encircled Anna. The arrow, the instant it touched the magical flow, was shredded into fragments.

If one looked closely, they would notice that every fragment of the arrow had edges as smooth and uniform as if cut by a sharp blade.

“Wh-what?!”

At that moment, Anna also clearly saw the person who had shot the arrow at her.

It was a golden-haired man wearing a wooden crown, his distinctive pointed ears, unlike those of ordinary people, already betraying his identity.

Like the girl in her arms, he was also an elf.

Then, recalling the girl’s leg wound and the poison…

‘Kin fighting kin?’

‘A pursuit?’

In that moment, Anna’s mind was exceptionally clear, and she almost instantly understood everything that was unfolding before her.

However, she did not abandon the girl in her arms. Anna had only one thought in her mind at that moment.

Anna looked directly at the elf above and declared, “She’s injured. I’m taking her back to Xielan for treatment.”

The other party only just snapped out of his shock. Hearing her words, he angrily yelled, “What kind of joke are you playing?!”

“Leave her here, and you can leave. This prince will pretend you were never here!”

“Otherwise, don’t blame us for attacking you too!”

Anna’s expression remained unchanged. She glanced at the pale-faced, very weak girl in her arms.

Then, she parted her thin lips, her clear, cold voice enunciating each word: “Today, I am taking her with me. Let’s see who can stop me.”

“…Damn it! This prince has never seen such an arrogant fool!”

“We have fifty people surrounding the only exit here. With just you alone, do you really think you can get out?”

“Fire! Fire!”

“Shoot this b*tch dead!”

The crowned elf leading them stomped his foot in anger, issuing commands to his subordinates.

Above the chasm, countless longbows began to be drawn, while those without bows took out flying darts from their waists.

Anna ignored the insults. She stepped forward, crouching slightly into a starting position, preparing to burst out of the chasm in one go.

Above her, an arrow rain poured down.

The blue-haired girl murmured softly.

“Twilight has fallen…”

“Let this God-Slaying Sword judge all gods!”

Disordered magical energy surged into Anna’s back leg, transforming it into a sharp blade.

Bang—

A blue afterimage flashed. The chasm wall was now etched with a series of sword marks and footprints of varying depths.

Countless arrows and darts flew past, hitting nothing.

“Where did she go?”

“I don’t know!”

“No, everyone, look up!”

Someone yelled, and the elves on the chasm cliff all looked up, discovering the girl’s figure high in the chasm’s air.

Anna’s azure eyes flickered with cold light. Her leg, transformed into a crystalline blue blade, shimmered under the moonlight.

At this moment, the girl was like a deity!

Anna paid no mind to the stunned elves below. Without further delay, or rather, unable to delay, she transformed into a dazzling blue meteor, streaking across the sky and vanishing into the night.

At this point, the elven prince finally snapped back to his senses, furiously shouting in the direction where the two girls had vanished, “She’s a dark elf! Her inherently inferior bloodline makes her a remnant of the Demon King’s army! And you’re taking her back to Xielan, where humans live?”

“Fine, fine! Just wait until the Holy Church finds her! She’ll be publicly executed in the square!”

His words echoed across the plains, though it was unclear if they reached Anna’s ears.

In the night sky, Anna tightly shielded the girl in her arms, who had already fainted. The deep blue in her eyes had long since receded.

This time, luck favored Anna.

The direction they flew was directly towards Xielan, and they landed without incident.

Even more fortunately, the potion shop Anna knew was still open late at night.

As for why she didn’t seek a priest…

Anna wasn’t so foolish as to take Yulim to the Church to be handed over after hearing the elven prince’s enraged words.

Thankfully, Yulim no longer had any poison in her system, only unconsciousness and weakness from excessive blood loss. A few expensive healing potions were enough to nearly fully restore her.

Seeing Yulim’s condition improve, Anna considered for a moment, then bought a cloak from Kamil, the potion shop owner, and draped it over Yulim, covering her distinctive elven ears.

Unfortunately, when it came time to pay, she didn’t have enough money, and ultimately had to sign an IOU.

After leaving the potion shop, Anna carried Yulim all the way to an inn. After another IOU was tucked into the small pouch on her leg, they finally checked into a room.

After settling Yulim onto the soft, large bed, Anna swayed a couple of times, then slumped against the bed frame onto the floor, breathing weakly and exhaustedly.

Even for her, unleashing three of her family’s ultimate sword techniques in such a short time had drained nearly all her magical energy.

Not only that, after protecting Yulim and taking the impact of their landing on her back, she had then rushed all the way to the inn, leaving Anna utterly exhausted and devoid of stamina.

However, Anna remained unconcerned.

When encountering someone in danger who needs help, extend a hand!

Since embarking on her adventure, Anna had helped and rescued many people, not just the girl in her arms.

As for the faction or race of those she rescued, it wasn’t particularly important to Anna.

Her father had said that no one is born evil, not even the Demon King.

Thus, Anna always firmly believed that this world was inherently beautiful.

Even though she had grown accustomed to seeing evil…

Many people she helped didn’t even offer a word of thanks, and some even tried to swindle her out of her money…

But what did it matter?

Her money could be earned again, while helping others could sometimes save a person’s entire life!

Just like this time, she had saved Yulim. Anna felt it was the most correct choice she had ever made in her life.

She had saved a girl’s life.

And she had saved her own life.

The weak blue-haired girl’s lips curved into a satisfied smile. The day’s fatigue allowed her to lean against the bed and quietly drift off to sleep.

In that moment, though disheveled, she was breathtakingly beautiful.