A smile appeared.

Like a flower petal holding a drop of blood, it was utterly chilling—and all the more beautiful and seductive for it. As Rose froze at the sight, Li Qingyu spoke softly.

“And Rose, you still have a chance.”

“... A chance to do what?”

“To kill me, bury every secret, and have the Sword Lord all to yourself without anyone knowing.”

“...!”

Rose caught her breath, perhaps because she had heard something she had never imagined.

But Li Qingyu did not miss the sudden contraction of her pupils, or the faint tremor in the droplets of blood flowing along the blade. Her smile grew still more bewitching as she added another remark.

“Or you could become my accomplice, like Ainsha.”

“Your accomplice?”

“Yes. She declared war on me, offering as much as forty-nine percent of Tiamat’s shares to take my place as the Sword Lord’s fiancée.”

Rose was dumbfounded.

She had expected Ainsha to have seen through this. After all, she had even performed with Limon before. But she had never imagined that that White Dragon Princess would become Li Qingyu’s accomplice, much less do something like that.

“This is why you can never let your guard down around the White Dragon Clan. They always defy your expectations and exploit your blind spots.”

Li Qingyu chuckled.

It was precisely the sort of foolishness one expected from the White Dragon Clan, yet also the shrewdest possible choice. Ainsha had pushed the risks onto Li Qingyu, his fiancée, while gaining a head start over the other princesses in the race to claim Limon.

“Especially Ainsha as she is now.”

It probably had not been calculated. Like Limon, she must have been acting under the influence of the White Dragon Clan’s psionics on her intuition and premonitions.

Normally overshadowed by her precognition, those faculties rarely had a chance to manifest. Now that she was acting in outright disregard of her visions, they were simply manifesting more prominently.

“But if we truly competed fairly, you would have the greatest advantage of any of us, Rose.”

Li Qingyu smiled, then moved her finger along the blade and whispered softly.

“The Sword Lord has always been friendly toward the Blue Dragon Clan. I also hear that the two of you got along quite well while he was in London.”

Like a snake coiling around its prey—or a hand caressing a lover—her finger stroked the blade with exquisite gentleness, slowly and leisurely.

“If you showed him your sincere affection, Rose, might his heart not waver?”

Yet it was not her finger that made the sword tremble most, but the barely audible whisper seeping in.

“Perhaps he might seriously consider breaking off his engagement to me and taking you as his new fiancée.”

Rose’s throat grew dry.

What she felt was thirst. A hotter, more primal desire that mere water could never satisfy made her swallow dryly.

“Tell me, Rose.”

As though she had read Rose’s heart from the movement of her throat, Li Qingyu asked with an even deeper smile.

“Don’t you want a chance to win the Sword Lord from me, fair and square?”

Humanity’s last Sword Master, who had proved he still deserved to be called an absolute being by defeating even a Monarch.

At the same time, he was the sole means and object through which the Seven Dragons Society could fulfill its long-cherished wish.

Even he, whose very existence profoundly affected the struggle for supremacy over the world, could be hers alone.

Like the whisper of a demon offering to grant wishes, that voice was so sweet, so utterly tempting, that Rose gazed as though enchanted into Li Qingyu’s eyes, beautiful as obsidian...

SLASH!

Then she cut Li Qingyu down.

She glared fiercely at the figure dispersing into black mist, then turned around and spoke in a rigid voice.

“Stop playing games.”

“Games? How unkind. I only wanted an honest answer.”

How long had she been an illusion?

The black-haired girl, Li Qingyu, stepped lightly out of the shadows and posed her question with a smile.

“So, Rose, what is your choice?”

Rose stared hard at Li Qingyu for a long time. At last, she sheathed her sword and turned away.

“... In consideration of what I owe the Sword Lord, I will not go out of my way to reveal this.”

Not for the Seven Dragons Society. Not for Li Qingyu.

Solely out of regard for Limon, who had saved London’s citizens, she would keep the matter of his Dragon Psionics buried for now. Likewise, she would pretend she had never heard of the opportunity Li Qingyu had offered.

Having made that unequivocally clear, Rose turned her head slightly to glare at her.

“But Li Qingyu, do not imagine you can keep walking this tightrope forever.”

ZING.

That was the end of it.

Rose vanished across space as though she had never been there at all. Li Qingyu gazed at the empty spot, then spoke.

“... You’ve changed too, Rose.”

The old Rose would ultimately have chosen to inform the other princesses, no matter what Li Qingyu said. She was the Blue Dragon Princess, after all.

If she had nevertheless decided to bury the truth, there could be only one reason. The desire someone had planted in her heart must have made the righteous, inflexible Rose a little more selfish—and a little more adaptable.

That was why Li Qingyu could be certain: Rose’s decision to pretend she had heard nothing was itself as good as an answer.

“In any case, it’s fortunate she didn’t notice.”

Perhaps she had heard too many shocking things.

Li Qingyu chuckled at how Rose had left without recognizing the most important point of all. If she had noticed the one lie mixed into Li Qingyu’s account, she might truly have fought her to the death right there.

That was why Li Qingyu had deliberately provoked her to cloud her thoughts. In that sense, she had cleared a truly critical hurdle.

“Though I’m nearing the limit of how long I can hide it.”

But Li Qingyu had not forgotten that, just as Rose had warned, this tightrope act would soon reach its limit. With fragments of information about Limon already leaking out, it was only a matter of time before the remaining princesses realized the truth.

And when that happened, she would never be able to get through it as she had now.

Rose, noble enough to suppress even her instincts, and Ainsha, accustomed to controlling her emotions as a precognitive, were exceptions. Unlike those two, the other princesses would neither be able nor willing to control their instincts.

Even Rose and Ainsha were threats all the same.

Ainsha’s intuition and premonitions had grown sharper now that she had stopped relying on precognition. Rose had stopped playing the noble princess and fallen far enough to compromise even with injustice.

Whether as enemies or allies, they were unquestionably several times more difficult to deal with than before.

Thinking of the man responsible for changing them, Li Qingyu could only smile wryly.

“Really, Sword Lord. I wish you would limit your teaching to Sword Masters.”

Perhaps it was because he had lived so long as the master of the Sword Tower, raising seven Sword Masters. Or perhaps it was simply his nature as an old fogey.

Li Qingyu shook her head lightly at Limon’s habit of imparting lessons whenever he found a slow-witted student.

“Having such an excessively capable fiancé is difficult too.”

She sighed once, then glanced at the finger Rose’s sword had cut.

After admiring the blood still welling out drop by drop as though it were a work of art, she rubbed her fingers together and murmured softly.

“The eighth Dragon Psionics...”

What the Seven Dragons Society had sought for centuries.

An indispensable means of fulfilling their long-cherished wish, and a goal every princess of the Society could only crave instinctively.

Thinking of it, Li Qingyu continued languidly.

“We would have been better off without that damned thing.”

* * *

BOOM! KA-BOOM! BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!

As he stepped forward, his body was pushed backward instead, and chains bursting from the shadows knocked his sword aside.

The feathers pouring from the eagle-headed demon became flames that filled the air, while snakes and scorpions spewed from the serpent demon’s enormous mouth surged across the floor like a wave.

On top of that, the six blades wielded by the three-headed, six-armed demon barred his path, slicing even the walls and floor like sheets of paper.

The combined assault of five demons, each surpassing a duke-class player, was a veritable storm of death.

There was just one problem.

Their opponent happened to be Limon.

SWISH-SWISH-SWISH!

Limon spun like a top and swung his sword, filling the surroundings with sword light like fluttering flower petals.

The flaming feathers rebounded the instant they touched his blade. Suddenly engulfed in flames, the snakes and scorpions were roasted whole.

His counterattack did not end there. As the three-headed, six-armed demon faltered before the rebounding feathers, he slipped inside its reach and promptly lopped off one of its heads.

Perhaps it was living up to its name as a demon. Now reduced to two heads and six arms, it neither died nor cowered, but rampaged still more fiercely, swinging its swords.

Yet its attacks only sliced futilely through empty air. All six blades missed again and again, failing to cut even the edge of Limon’s clothing.

He was so close that the demon’s comparatively massive body actually made attacking him difficult.

“Tsk, tsk. Your swordsmanship isn’t bad... but why do you lug around six arms? No wonder your blind spots are so big.”

SLASH!

In the end, less than a minute passed before the three-headed, six-armed demon lost its remaining two heads and collapsed.

Four demons remained.

Glancing at their positions, Limon flicked up the swords the six-armed demon had held with the tip of his foot, then struck them lightly with his own sword.

『Demon-Cleaving Dragon-Slaying Sword, Deflecting Strike

Demon-Cleaving Dragon-Slaying Sword, Deflecting Strike

My Blade Is Faster Than a Bullet.

My Blade Is Faster Than a Bullet.』

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!

It took Limon only an instant to send all six blades flying.

And in a moment faster even than that instant, the blades streaking out like rays of light split the heads of the eagle demon and serpent demon.

Two remained: the shadow demon, which spread its chains to block the blades, and the puppet demon, which inverted space to send them flying sideways.

CLATTER-RATTLE.

‘Hmm. These two seem to be demigod-class, at least.’

The shadow demon wielded chains that could not be cut. The puppet demon changed the direction of Limon’s movement whenever it twisted its fingers grotesquely.

He narrowed his eyes at the two demons, whose power approached that of avatars. If they were this powerful even after degenerating into demons, he could roughly imagine how formidable their original divine stature must have been.

‘Not that it makes any difference.’

In the end, they were remnants of gods defeated by dragons.

And the Sword Master who had cut down even those dragons stepped lightly forward.

One step to evade the chains.

One step past the magic.

One step to cut down the puppet demon.

Perhaps only after seeing the puppet demon tumble to the floor, its body cut diagonally in two, did it realize there was no hope of victory.

The last remaining shadow demon spread its chains like a net to hold Limon back and tried to flee.

But it was futile. Before it could even retreat, Limon’s sword shot out like lightning, passing through a gap in the densely woven chains to pierce the shadow demon.

“You can come out now.”

[“... You’re already finished?”]

“Yes.”

[“I think this sometimes, but traveling with you really makes me feel like reality needs a balance patch too, Team Leader.”]

Yu Na-gyeong poked her head out of the basket Limon had held in one hand throughout the fight and clicked her tongue at the demons’ remains, reduced to souls departed beneath his sword.

They had once been gods, after all, and even now possessed more power than most duke-class players. Seeing them chopped into pieces in mere minutes was simply absurd.

As Limon let her grumbling go in one ear and out the other and returned his sword to its sheath...

STEP, STEP.

Quiet footsteps sounded from farther down the passage.

Yu Na-gyeong flinched, wondering whether another demon or monster was about to emerge. Limon, however, folded his arms and waited at ease. He had known who it was from the moment he heard the footsteps.

Flowing clothes. Hair as white as snow. A face as expressionless as a doll’s.

Holding a lamp in one hand, a girl with unmistakable features calmly emerged from the passage.

Ainsha showed no surprise at finding Limon standing among the demons’ corpses. She merely asked in her usual blunt voice:

“Lee, I would like to know whether you brought Tata’s krembo.”