As we left the realm, Maria rejoined us in Zeldia after some moments. Though I understood what was going on inside her, I pretended to be ignorant about that as Maria didn't show any reaction in front of us, keeping herself empty with a blank expression like earlier.
I had decided to follow Rayan, who was on his way to murder Mister Rionel. After teleporting away from the Supreme realm all the way to Zeldia, I lost my trace of Rayan, who had removed his presence.
But I knew that he would be around in Zeldia. I was sure about his goal; it's not really hard for me to figure it out from his expression.
While we were searching for him all around Zeldia without leaving a single part of the land, Rayan appeared to be standing on the hill that was placed a bit away from the main realm of Zeldia. The gentle and mysterious smile appeared on his face as his eyes were pretty much downcast and nearly closed. He widely opened his eyes toward the main land of the realm and said with a smile, "The realm isn't something that deserves a leader like you."
Rayan closed his eyes once again and then again, he opened them back widely. "Was their previous ruler not worthy of being the ruler? Was he sinful?" He yelled. Unlike his gentle and calm voice, his voice appeared extremely hostile and blood-lusting this time.
Rayan took a casual breath and kept his gaze toward the ground for a few seconds. Then he slowly lifted his sight toward behind, toward Rionel, who appeared to have fallen to the ground. He was conscious but appeared to be exhausted as he was taking fast breaths and kept his face down toward the ground while kneeling a bit away from Rayan.
"You could've won this if not for your stupidity and overconfidence." Rayan said with a smile toward Rionel.
"Or I can say, you are just too ignorant and weak to be my opponent."
"You can be the strongest, the smartest, or the greatest foe ever, but when you decided to go up against me, you've became weak and stupid, the worst possible existence ever." Rayan added calmly as he smiled toward Rionel intently and said while keeping his smile, "Simply because you are my opponent. No, you are fated to be a victim of my destruction."
Rionel continued sweating without saying a word. And then he shouted suddenly, "You bastard, I curse you."
Rayan laughed a bit loudly and glared at Rionel narrowly, "Unfortunately, I'm a curse myself; I'm a flaw; I can't be cursed." Rayan said casually.
"Let's see how I will play out the game, that certain game." Rayan added pretty indifferently, glared more intently toward Rionel afterward.
As the four of us kept looking for Rayan all over the realm, it appeared to be a worthless effort. No matter how deeply we searched, we couldn't find Rayan's presence anywhere. Following the search, Marco and Maria reached the hill placed a bit away from the realm.
Marco and Maria stood in front of the hill and looked to the top of the hill. The presence of a certain entity appeared in front of them; it was a familiar figure. A person with dark hair and an innocent face, wearing a dark long coat and a dark red cape like a magician. It was Rayan all along, with his casual appearance.
As soon as Rayan's appearance caught Marco's sight, he enraged and instantly flew toward Rayan and stopped in front of him. Following him, Maria also stepped onto the top of the hill behind Marco.
"Welcome, Marco and Maria." Rayan said with a smile, "Perhaps, should I call you guys with a different name? A different title?" Rayan said with a narrow glance toward them, and smiled a bit.
"Whatever may please you for the last time, on the moment of your conclusion." Marco replied without showing any expression. Even though I could see his eagerness to destroy Rayan right at that very moment, he was trying his best to hold himself back.
"Oh my dear friend, how can you be so sure about that? How can you be confident in your words? Perhaps, you are overconfident in your victory over me?" Rayan replied calmly. He appeared to be extremely sincere as his tone of voice was extremely gentle, out of the ordinary.
"Because, I'm going to destroy you, right now and here." Marco replied and instantly flew toward Rayan.
Rayan smirked a bit and glared intently toward the incoming Marco. Rayan lifted his left hand up toward Marco and prepared his entire body for a strike while amplifying shadow-like magic power throughout his entire body.
Marco brought out his magic sword from a magic circle and struck, pointing at Rayan's chest. As for Rayan, he clenched his right fist and threw a punch toward Marco's fist.
However, it was like a meaningless effort. Without even a single moment mattering, Marco's sword penetrate through Rayan's right fist and instantly cut his left hand like a piece of paper. Marco's sword strike landed in Rayan's chest and pierced it. Rayan fell to the ground as his entire body filled with deep red blood that came out from his chest unstoppably. His entire body began to tremble out of pain as his voice was muttering something, totally unclear due to his broken voice.
Within seconds, his soul left his body as his body concluded the muttering and tremble, removing the presence of an existence, leaving it as a soulless piece of doll.
Marco kept his gaze toward the dead body for some moments and then he looked at his sword while lifting it up toward his sight.
"Even though I reduced the magic power to stop the destruction of the 7th layer, it was still more than enough to kill him. I wonder how." Marco thought to himself.
Maria flew toward Marco and asked while looking toward Rayan's body, "Is he dead?"
"I believe so; his soul left his body as well, so." Marco replied casually.
While they were chattering, I joined them along with Elesia while searching all around there. While searching, I was thinking about something, about the things happening right now. I was trying to figure out everything that was happening and the reason behind the event. It wasn't some casual event that's supposed to happen following causality. If a different world wants to take over this world, they would emerge with their entire army of magic users. But a solo person wanting to destroy the world without showing a clear reason sounded pretty strange to me.
I flew toward them and stopped myself along with Elesia behind Marco and Maria. As we landed there, they narrowly looked at us and brought their gaze toward us.
As I stopped there, my gaze instantly detected the dead body of Rayan. I instantly threw a question toward Marco, "Was it you who killed him?"
Marco nodded casually.
I began to think even more deeply as some strange thoughts began to taunt me.
"How long has it been since he got to Zeldia?" I asked immediately.
"Not less than 10 minutes. I believe it could be a bit more than that." Maria replied quickly.
"Wait! If so then…how did he come to be here….why is he here?" I shouted a bit out of my frustrations.
"What are you talking about?" Elesia asked.
Some pieces of sweat began to fall from my forehead as my eyes were trembling.
"If he came here 10 minutes ago, then he could surely murder Mister Rionel and leave without leaving a single chance for us to stop him. So how did he come to stay on the top of the hill? Why is he here? Why would he let himself be trapped in the game of his own death?" I muttered while taking consistently fast breaths.
"According to the elders, Mister Rionel is missing as well, so even if he murdered him and took him away somewhere else, why is he here?" I continued muttering.
"Don't tell me!" I said while suddenly lifting my gaze toward the dead body. I ran toward it and grabbed the face of the dead body.
"I can sense the presence of some magic in his body. It's not something that anyone from even the 6th layer can sense. The layered barrier over the magic is more than enough to hide it." I said calmly, keeping thinking.
A bit of brimming magic power covered my hand along with the dead body and instantly absorbed out a worm of magic power. As I removed the hidden magic along with its barriers, Rayan's face began to change along with his entire appearance itself. In a matter of seconds, Rayan's face changed into Rionel's face, as did his entire appearance. A piece of shadow magic came out of his body and vanished away from there like a piece of mist.
As his appearance changed, all of our expressions instantly changed as we were massively surprised.
"As I thought, he tricked us." I said, expressionless.
"This is insane. How in the world did he do all this?" Marco said a bit loudly, shocked as his expression was filled with pieces of surprise scattering across his entire face.
"He planned this from the beginning; I can't believe this." Maria said as she covered her face out of self-annoyance.
Elesia kept her eyes closed for a moment, took a breath, and then opened them again.
"It could be that he can't kill him for some reason, and that's why Rayan planned this game to be here. Not only was Rayan controlling him, but he also put his shadow magic core itself in Mister Rionel's body just to keep us away from any sort of confusion over that." I explained calmly.
Suddenly, I felt a magic wave from the west. All of us instantly looked toward the west, surprised a bit by such a massive and incredible magic pressure.
Without spending even a single moment there, I flew toward it as the others began to follow right then. We set our foot in front of a cave after flying for a few seconds. As soon as we stepped there, we heard the sound of a piano. The sound of the piano wasn't music of happiness, but rather a calm and heart-breaking music of endless sorrow.
We slowly opened the door of the cave and entered inside. It was Rayan who was using the piano to create the music.
We kept our gaze toward him without any expression as he didn't look toward us even for once and continued his piano music. After some moments, he stopped the piano music and spoke calmly without moving his gaze from the piano, "I don't understand the meaning of this music. But someone taught me this music once, a long time ago."
I kept my gaze down toward the ground without saying a word. Rayan smiled a bit and continued, "Wasn't that person you, Aizis?" Rayan narrowly looked toward me without moving his face even a bit.