Swordmeister of Rome

Warrior Larune, the person in charge of protecting Ra-Shar-Loa No. 7 of the Kukutaran Empire was chatting with a friend. Ra-Shar-Loa was in one piece. There would have been horrific danger or other attacks from other countries in the past, but there were no threats like that anymore.

Larune yawned out of boredom.

"It's quiet today too."

"It's better that way. I love working here."

"It's too quiet though. It's boring. I want a fight!"

Larune loved to fight; peacefulness was too boring for him. This place was too dull compared to his days at the Great North Wall.

"Don't say that, Larune. It's a bad omen."

"No way. Stop believing in superstition. There's no such thing as an omen."

"Hah. Don't show off because you did some studies."

"Haha. I'm a graduate of Gron-Pilah, remember?... Huh?"

Larune turned back as he heard some strange sound coming from behind.

The Ra-Shar-Loa was collapsing. The dimensional warp gate was now crushing inward, creating a new blue sphere from within. The sphere became bigger as it raged with lightning shooting out from it.

"Dammit! Run!"

Larune began to escape. The energy that was being formed from within wasn't normal.

'Is it a Resistance army? What is going on!'

Larune thought as he ran, but the expected explosion didn't happen. The sphere began to subside without doing anything. As it disappeared, two figures were standing within.

"Wow, it's prickly."

"Right. I don't think it's a normal Ra-Shar-Loa."

"Yeah… maybe it's because we didn't use Exar on that. Or maybe because it was a one-time use. Oh, by the way, it's nice to smell familiar air."

"Right. We're home."

Sian and Stiel took a deep breath as they glanced around. They were home.

Larune and his friend looked at them.

'Who are they?'

Two figures appearing through a powerful torrent of energy. One beautiful woman and a well-built man.

"So, is this place really safe?"

Stiel ignored Larune and the man and spoke to Sian. Stiel was terrified as she felt the presence of three Drakuns flying at them before they teleported away. Lagaope reassured them, but they couldn't believe him after all lies he gave to them.

Sian answered, "If what Lagaope spoke is true… I guess it is. And I have a feeling that it is true. It should be okay as long as I hide my power. If those Alphas could come over, they would have come already."

Sian was concealing his power just in case. It was time to train to become much stronger. He was strong, but the land was still filled with dangerous beings. Besides, Sian now knew that he was too unlucky to think that he would not have to fight.

"If you need to hide… can you use the power? Can't you even fight back even when a guy like Lagaope comes to beat you up?"

Sian frowned and shook his head.

"Don't say it like that. If I don't have to fight an Alpha, it will be okay. It's a different level of strength."

"And that's what you call hiding? What if you destroy a mountain like before?"

Sian laughed. "It won't matter. Destroying a mountain isn't much anyway. It's wide, but it's not that hard."

"…"

'It's not that hard?'

Stiel looked at Sian weirdly but Sian continued.

"The energy that radiates from a fight between Alphas is not like that. It might have a similar range of destruction but the power is entirely different. I just need to be careful to not use such power. If I were to draw attention for breaking a mountain, Chrona or Dragona would have come for me already."

"You're right."

Sian then glanced around.

"We should return home and rest for now. It's been five years. But I'm not sure where we're at."

Stiel also glanced around at that word.

"We can ask. Hey, you two."

Stiel then asked the warriors at a distance. Larune looked around and found no one other than them so he pointed at himself.

"M-me?"

Stiel nodded.

"Yeah, you. Come here."

"Y-yes."

Larune was terrified at the power coming from the woman.

"Hm… what year is it right now?"

Larune was confused at the question, but he quickly answered as the woman narrowed her eyes.

"I-it's the 3rd year of Kukutaran."

"Huh?"

"3rd year of Kukutaran… is there something wrong?" Larune shivered as he answered.

"What the heck is Kukutaran? Is this place Ra-Sian? Hey, Sian."

Sian nodded.

"Yeah… Lagaope told me that. Is this place Ra-Sian?" Sian asked Larune.

Larune became suspicious.

"Don't make that face."

"Of course. It is Ra-Sian. Is there another continent?"

Sian then became confused.

"Then what is Kukutaran? Where did the Continental Year calculation disappear to?"

It was year 1017 in Continental Year before Sian left the place. He assumed it would be around 1022, give or take, but it was shocking to hear.

Then Larune answered.

"Oh… it is 1022 in Continental Years. But you should be careful. No one uses that anymore."

Sian frowned.

"Huh? What in the world…"

"Looks like we came to the right place."

"Yeah. Seems like a lot of things changed."

They did come to the right place, but things had changed a bit.

Stiel laughed.

"We can ask again."

"Oh, right."

"Hey, you got time, right? What's your name?"

Larune quickly answered, "I am Larune!"

"Right. We've been on traveling for… about five years. Can you tell us what happened while we were away?"

Stiel asked and Larune began searching through his memories.

"Five… five years. I can probably start from the Attack of Harijans."

"Yeah. We have nothing but time so take it slow."

The Giant Harijan appeared at the Great North Wall five years ago.

It seemed that something happened to the Giant Defensive Rune <Lu-Sara> that the Magical Council was working on, and it was destroyed; then it was attacked by a Six-Horned Harijan.

People became frantic as only the superhumans could handle them.

Guards of the Great North Wall frantically searched for Groyn while the Magical Council tried to contact Takion. King Naraha also seemed to be looking for someone. But it was all useless. They were all gone. All superhumans that existed within the land were gone.

However, they could not give up yet so they brought all the forces they could muster and advanced toward the Great North Wall.

However, the Six-Horned Harijan disappeared magically, leaving only the ruined trace of Lu-Sara behind. Bringing the forces up north wasn't a bad choice, as Harijans began rushing out from the forest in massive numbers.