Chapter 67: The Name of the Tyrant
Hearing Ren's cold, emotionless, and utterly bored words, the bodies of the remaining Eisenwald mages trembled uncontrollably. The air, which had been filled with their defiant rage, was now thick with a new, suffocating terror.
It was as if they had been targeted by a primordial monster, a being that looked at them not as fighters, but as meat.
"Don't... don't let him scare you!" one of the men shouted, his voice cracking, trying to convince himself as much as his comrades. "Attack! He's only one person! There are so many of us, I don't believe we can't take him down!"
"That's right!" another yelled, finding a sliver of courage in their numbers. "He's just one man! How dare he provoke Eisenwald! We'll make him pay a bloody price!"
"Kill him! For the guild!"
With a ragged, desperate war cry, a group of about twenty men rushed towards Ren, their weapons and magic flaring to life.
Ren's lips, set in Fushiguro Toji's scarred face, curled slightly. "That's more like it."
As soon as Ren finished speaking, his figure instantly vanished from the spot. There was no magical shimmer, no blur of motion. He was there, and then he was not.
"Where is he?!" the lead mage shouted, skidding to a halt and looking around wildly.
Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!
The sounds were wet, sickening, like a knife plunging into soft fruit.
"Ugh ah ah ah ah!"
"My arm! He cut my arm off!"
"Wah ah ah ah ah!"
The mages who had charged began to drop, letting out choked screams of agony. They could hear the sound of someone walking, a calm, unhurried footstep pacing through their ranks, but they couldn't see anyone. They only saw their companions suddenly clutch their throats, their chests, their legs, as deep, bloody wounds appeared from nowhere.
An indescribable, primal fear rose in everyone's hearts. This wasn't a fight. This was a culling. They didn't know if they would be the next to be taken down, only that the monster was walking among them, invisible.
Swoosh!
As the last of the charging group fell, gurgling in their own blood, Ren's figure reappeared, standing exactly where he had been, not a single drop of blood on his black T-shirt. The stolen sword in his hand, however, was now dripping crimson.
"So weak," he said, his voice laced with genuine disappointment. He flicked the blade, sending a spray of blood onto the dirt. "Is this all the Dark Guilds are capable of? It's really not satisfying at all."
"You bastard!" a large, muscular man roared, his body glowing with a golden, magical light. "I'll fight you!"
Unable to stand Ren's contemptuous words, this mage, Byard, pushed off with his feet, leaping high into the air. His hands gathered a dense, golden magic as he charged towards Ren like a meteor. "Golden Crash!"
[Akarin's Note: Byard is a member of the Eisenwald Guild. His magic, Golden Magic, allows him to create and manipulate a golden light that he can use for attacks.]
"What an idiot," Ren drawled, not even looking up completely.
As Byard descended, Ren's lips curled up. He didn't bother to move, but instead threw the bloody sword in his hand. The blade spun end-over-end, a silver blur flying straight at Byard's face.
"What?!"
Seeing the incoming blade, Byard was forced to redirect his powerful, diving attack. He quickly swung his fist, shattering the blade with his golden magic. "You missed, fool!"
The moment he knocked the knife away, destroying his own momentum, Ren's figure, which had been on the ground, appeared directly in front of him, in mid-air. His right hand, a blur of motion, directly gripped Byard's face.
Byard's eyes widened in terror. He couldn't even process the speed.
"Going up?" Ren's voice was a low growl in his ear.
Then, Byard felt an irresistible, purely physical force. Ren, still holding his face, pushed him forward.
Boom—!
"Wah ah ah ah!"
Byard's body was slammed through the solid metal wall of the upright train car, creating a large, man-shaped hole in it. He fell inside the dark car, his eyes rolled back, unconscious before he even stopped moving.
"What?!"
"Byard... Byard was taken down in one hit!"
Everyone from Eisenwald was startled. Byard's strength was ranked among the top five experts in their entire guild, yet he was taken down so easily, so... casually... by the opponent. Who exactly was this guy?
At this moment, Karacka, a corpulent man with a distinctive face, looked at Ren's appearance. He stared at the black T-shirt, the gray pants, the scar, and the overwhelming, non-magical physical power... as if he had just thought of something.
His face suddenly changed drastically, going from rage to a pale, sickly white. Cold sweat uncontrollably broke out all over his body.
"Black hair... black T-shirt... gray pants and black flat shoes... monstrous physical fitness... No... No, it can't be... Ye... yes!"
A nearby guild member, seeing his terror, couldn't help but ask, "What? Karacka, what is it? Do you know him?!"
Karacka didn't reply. He was shaking, his teeth chattering. "It's him! It must be him!" he whispered, his voice trembling.
"It's over! We're finished! We're all dead!"
"What's over, man?! Who the hell is he?!" the other mage shouted, shaking him.
"Do you... do you still remember what happened two months ago? In the Kingdom of Somalia?"
"Ah! What about it?" the man asked, confused.
Somalia was originally just an ordinary country. But because of frequent banditry, which robbed villagers of their food and money, the villagers themselves gradually became bandits just to survive. Later, more and more bandit groups were attracted to the lawless land, and that country eventually became known as a "kingdom of bandits."
And two months ago, Somalia's largest bandit group, the Rocas Bandit Group—a group that numbered in the tens of thousands—was suddenly, and completely, wiped out. By one person.
This incident immediately caused a huge sensation across the continent. After all, it was a super-large bandit group, one that even the country's own army couldn't deal with.
And that person, the one-man army, was given a title by the survivors and the press.
They called him the 'Tyrant'.
Because that person's methods were extremely brutal. Tens of thousands of people... a full tens of thousands... all of them were either dead or crippled. According to the rumors, when the regular army finally arrived, the scene was simply a vision of hell.
Karacka pointed a trembling finger at Ren. "It's him... It's him who annihilated the Rocas Bandit Group! He is... he is that 'Tyrant'!"
"'TYRANT'!!!"
The name echoed through the wreckage, and every single member of Eisenwald was startled, their hearts stopping in their chests.
'Tyrant' is one of the most famous and feared names on the Ishgar continent today. The others included the 'Black-Winged Great Demon' who sank an island, the 'Flame Emperor' who destroyed a pirate armada, and the 'Sword God' who had left behind the legend of dragon-slaying half a year ago.
These four people were the new four legendary, monstrous figures of the Ishgar continent.
"Ho... how could this be?!"
"Wh... why would such a legendary figure... why would the Tyrant come to trouble our small Eisenwald?!"
Everyone else panicked. Their previous anger was gone, replaced by a cold, numbing dread.
One person wiped out a bandit group of tens of thousands of people. That group had many Mages, possibly even thousands of them. Such a guy was no longer an ordinary Mage. He was a Great Mage, a monster. Aside from not having the title of Ten Wizard Saints issued by the Magic Council, his strength was already considered to be on their level.
Even Erigor's expression, high in the air, turned ugly, his grip on his scythe tightening. He had, of course, also heard of the 'Tyrant's' great name.
"'Tyrant'," Erigor called out, his voice strained, trying to sound reasonable. "Our Eisenwald has no grievances with you. Why are you coming to trouble us? Did someone pay you to cause us trouble?!"
"Paid?"
Ren, still standing on the ground, shook his head. Then, he slowly held up his right hand, showing the back of it to the crowd.
On it, in a bright, vivid red, was the mark of the Fairy Tail Guild.
"That's... Fairy Tail?!"
"'Tyrant'... is actually a Mage... from Fairy Tail?!"
Everyone in Eisenwald was stunned when they saw the mark on the back of Ren's hand. Their minds simply couldn't comprehend it.
According to everyone's previous guesses, the 'Tyrant' was either an independent Great Mage or, more likely, a member of a powerful Dark Guild. After all, his methods were famously cruel and did not conform to the style of people from "legitimate" guilds.
But who would have thought that the legendary, brutal 'Tyrant' was actually a member of the Fairy Tail Guild.
Immediately after, everyone's faces turned pale, a dawning, horrifying realization hitting them.
Fairy Tail. The 'Tyrant' is a member of Fairy Tail.
They finally understood why he had come looking for them. Because they... they were on their way to kill his Guild Master. He naturally wouldn't let them off. But they didn't know how the news had leaked out.
Erigor, his back now covered in a cold sweat, knew that diplomacy was over. He shouted, his expression ugly. "Attack! Kill him! If we don't kill him, we'll be the ones who are killed! We have no retreat!"
The other members of Eisenwald also thought the same. The opponent was the legendary 'Tyrant', and he knew that they intended to harm his Guild Master. He would certainly not let them go.
Since that was the case, the only way to survive was to kill him.
"Shadow Magic!"
At this moment, a mass of shadow on the ground, unnoticed in the chaos, quietly slithered and approached Ren. Then, the shadow quickly solidified, forming a pair of large, dark hands that shot up and tightly grabbed Ren's ankles.
Kageyama, his eyes wide with desperate effort, shouted from the back of the crowd, "I've got him! His feet are bound!"
Ren's most troublesome aspect was his terrifying, inhuman speed. As long as they restrained his feet, preventing him from utilizing that speed, they could take him down!
[Akarin Note:
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