Miss Hebe Is Charging Through the Lostbelts! [3]

It was dawn again. A biting north wind swept across the battlefield beyond London, carrying the smell of blood, earth, and metal.

The banners of the Red Dragon and the Lion stood in stark opposition on either side of a tower black as obsidian.

No matter which side they belonged to, soldiers could not help but hold their breath and fall silent whenever they passed that sky-piercing tower, casting reverent looks toward it.

After all, they had seen it with their own eyes—the veiled woman had come gliding forth, and even the two kings, exalted as they were, had served merely as her attendants.

With a casual touch to the ground, she had made that tower rise before everyone’s eyes.

After that, rumors began to spread through the army: the veiled woman was none other than Morgan the Enchantress, who had once nearly destroyed Albion by her own hand. She had slipped out of the Tower of London in secret, all for the sake of taking revenge on Arthur and Merlin once again.

Neither Red Dragon Duke Edward nor Lionheart King Alistair denied the rumor.

And ever since that tower rose from the earth, the temperature had fallen lower day by day. The sky had congealed into an icy gloom, the north wind circled and howled without end, and white frost gathered on weapons and dead grass.

Every sign pointed to the same conclusion: Morgan the Enchantress was ready to avenge her hatred in full.

But on this day, a sudden terror began to spread through the army.

One of the Knights of the Round Table under Red Dragon Duke Edward was found dead in his own tent.

When he was discovered, he was lying peacefully on his camp bed, looking for all the world as though he were fast asleep. But both of his eyes had been gouged out by his own hand and cast onto the ground.

The title that knight had inherited was “Gawain.”

With the abrupt death of the valiant Gawain of the present age, fear swiftly spread through the army, and little by little the blame began to settle on Morgan’s head.

Red Dragon Duke Edward quickly punished those spreading rumors and tightened the night patrols.

That night, nothing unusual happened in the Red Dragon camp.

But when the sun rose the next day, Knights of the Round Table in the Lion’s army died sudden deaths as well.

The current “Lancelot,” “Agravain,” and “Tristan.”

They too were found dead on their camp beds, each with a death more gruesome than the last.

The seats of the Round Table were not always filled to capacity. After four Round Table knights died one after another, even the survivors began to think of retreat. They did not fear dying honorably on the battlefield, but they had no wish to die in such a disgraceful way.

The Knights of the Round Table were the core of the entire army. Once they wavered, the structure of the whole force began to stir with unrest.

The Red Dragon Duke could not stop the trend. After a violent quarrel, two Round Table knights left together with their attendants.

They planned to fall back and camp at a safe distance.

Those two knights were “Ector” and “Lamorak.” They believed that if they put enough distance between themselves, the battlefield, and the witch’s tower, they would be safe. But when night fell and the army began serving supper, the cooks let out shrill screams of terror.

When the junior officers came to see what had happened, the color drained from every face.

Boiling in the great pot were the heads of the present-day “Ector” and “Lamorak.”

Their features had long since been ruined by the boiling water, but the coronets of the Round Table proved their identities.

That unbroken chain of terror completely seized the minds of soldiers and officers alike, and a full-blown camp panic erupted. The night was still far from over, and the killing was never going to end so simply.

…

Using Gareth’s lance, Hebe pinned her to the barracks doorpost.

The Round Table knight’s hand curled weakly as she tried to pull the spear from her chest, but in the end it only fell limp, leaving her bulging eyes fixed on the ground.

With that, Hebe had slaughtered all nine of the current Knights of the Round Table.

It would take at least twenty years for the next generation of Round Table knights to grow into their roles. One could easily imagine that, for at least that long, every seat on the Round Table Council would stand empty.

“Compared to your forebears, you really are pathetic.” Hebe walked calmly out of the barracks. “Then again, that makes sense. You’re nothing more than ‘politicians’ who inherited your seats through factional struggle and power games. You were neither true to your own desires nor able to walk the Paths your ancestors once walked.”

The Knights of the Round Table of old had all, without exception, established great accomplishments of their own. Every one of them had climbed to the second Rank on the road of ascension—[Daylight].

Their wills, tempered through countless trials, had reforged their weapons and armor. Even after a hundred years, the brilliance of their Great Deeds still imbued those relics with tremendous power.

So even if these successor Round Table knights were merely ordinary mortals who had only just barely reached the first stage, [Dawn], once fully armed they could briefly reproduce the might of the [Daylight] Rank and become slaughter-gods on the battlefield, each worth a thousand men.

That was why, in the epics and tales of the world, [Daylight] was also known as the “Hero” Rank.

They were the prototypes of the “Heroic Spirits” sung of by bards.

And yet the court sage Merlin, the role Hebe was playing, stood at the third Rank—[Dusk].

Every [Dusk] had endured in the world for at least two hundred years. They were living legends, even living myths.

—Child of God, angel upon the earth, saint, devil, banished immortal, dragon… any of those legendary titles could just as easily be used to describe beings of the [Dusk] Rank.

The Great Deeds they had accomplished allowed them to perform miracles that mortals could hardly imagine, and to do so with ease.

Even the Great Deeds Hebe possessed, which leaned toward transformation, support, and protection and had no large-scale destructive power whatsoever, were still enough to destroy an entire army through the terror of dreams and illusions.

Once fear had shattered mortal minds, all it took to claim their lives was the swing of a blade.

It was nothing more than a little tedious.

Hebe felt neither disgust nor fear. Whenever she was clearing a Lostbelt, she always maintained an objective, detached perspective—she experienced everything personally, yet could pull herself free of it at any moment.

When the time came, what did it matter if this body had to be sacrificed? So long as she could clear this Lostbelt, that was enough.

“All right. The Round Table knights who might have become complications are all dead. Now it’s your turn…”

Terrified soldiers and junior officers ran past Hebe. Mud splashed up and struck even the hem of her robe, yet they paid her no heed at all, as though she were nothing more than a reflection in a mirror, or the moon’s illusion on water.

[First Mark]: ILLUSION ARTS.

The foundation of a Great Deed was a sacred brand known as a Mark.

This was the earliest Mark Hebe had formed, the innate gift of the Merlin she was playing.

This body had been born with incubus blood running through it.

Incubi were not creatures of reality. They dwelled in the “Wasteland,” a dream-realm above reality that could only be reached through sleep.

Half-illusory pansies sprouted beneath Hebe’s slender feet, then swiftly spread across the entire battlefield. Red Dragon and Lion alike sank into the mire of illusion without ever realizing it.

When did you start imagining that I hadn’t been using illusions all along?

She clapped her hands softly.

Clap.

And in that instant, everyone trapped in the illusion felt their thoughts slip free of their bodies, then tangle together until they could no longer tell self from other, inner from outer.

One after another, they collapsed into the mud—not dead, but unable to wake.

This is a fan translation of 赫柏小姐正在杀出异闻带！ by 青散人 Rights to the original work belong to the creator. Please support them by exploring their original work or sharing it with others if you can. Thank you for reading and supporting my efforts to bring this story to a wider audience!