Repeat Vice - The Villainous Noble Doesn't Want to Die, So He Swore to Not Die As One of The Four Heavenly Kings

Chapter 59: Killing Wings

Lukui Despia felt a strange sense of unease.

He had certainly obliterated the airship.

The black mage who used annoying dark magic—Rofus—was reduced to less than even a shred of flesh.

It should have been a victory, yet Despia couldn’t shake off the gritty feeling.

Despia couldn’t use magic detection.

Instead, he had a highly developed sense of a particular feeling.

That feeling was the sensation of air currents.

It was because this sense was so refined that he was able to locate the airship concealed by invisibility and magic suppression so quickly.

The invisible intruder had torn through the atmosphere, stepping brazenly into his territory.

That intruder was the arch-nemesis known as the “Red Iron Bird.”

Despia occasionally heard the voice of the heavens.

The heavenly voice taught Despia where to find his prey.

The heavenly voice bestowed powerful “powers” upon Despia.

And the heavenly voice warned Despia.

It warned that the “Red Iron Bird” was targeting his nest.

The sky castle where Despia had lived since he was a chick.

There were those who sought it.

Despia seethed with rage at the unseen “Red Iron Bird.”

The heavenly voice gave Despia wisdom.

The techniques to control wild birds and how to handle them.

Through the “power” bestowed by the heavenly voice, Despia gained an unparalleled ultra-wide-area scouting capability by controlling countless wild birds.

This allowed him to keep constant tabs on the “Red Iron Bird” as it flew around the world.

If it ever dared approach his nest, he would tear it apart with his proud talons.

That was Despia’s resolve, but no matter how long he waited, he never saw the “Red Iron Bird.”

It was as if the sky castle, his nest, was moving to avoid the “Red Iron Bird.”

Despia thought.

Surely the heavenly voice must be the voice of the god residing in the sky castle.

Then one day, some of the wild birds under his command suddenly disappeared.

Among them were several that had been tracking the “Red Iron Bird.”

Surely the “Red Iron Bird” had done something.

While continuing his reconnaissance through the wild birds, Despia remained on high alert.

Amid this vigilance appeared the invisible intruder.

Approaching through concealment magic, Despia tried to crush it in one fell swoop but failed.

On the back of the now-visible “Red Iron Bird” was the black mage.

As soon as their eyes met, Despia’s instincts screamed a maximum warning.

This human was dangerous.

The black mage was indeed strong.

Despia’s body was slashed to pieces without understanding how.

However, the “power” given by the heavenly voice surpassed even the power of the black mage.

With a serious blow from Despia, the black mage and the “Red Iron Bird” were both obliterated.

By striking with highly compressed air, he leveled the mountains and changed the terrain to flat land.

It was Despia’s lethal blow, with no room for escape or means of defense.

He dedicated a victory roar to the sky castle, but Despia’s mood did not clear.

The still-lingering dark mist, the gritty sensation in the mixed air, greatly bothered Despia.

And somehow, his instincts told him it wasn’t over yet.

Suddenly, Despia sensed a disturbance in the air currents and looked up.

There was Rofus, the black mage, gathering dark mist as his foothold.

Rofus smiled combatively, lifting the corners of his mouth.

Despia let out an unprecedented roar of anger.

His eyes were filled with clear hostility, and his wings were clad in emerald magic.

This time, it wasn’t both wings, but a single wing.

Despia’s special move using one wing, something Rofus knew well.

“Nagi-dachi.”

A technique that releases a colossal wind slash.

While its range was less than “Tengai-Otoshi,” its concentrated power made it the most destructive technique Despia possessed.

If it contained power comparable to the white-hot beam of the demon whale, it would become the strongest blade capable of cutting through all creation.

Rofus, still calm, pondered while touching his chin, tilting his head.

“At worst, I have the ‘Divine Work,’ but that’s technically forbidden. Using it every time a creature like you appears would be a hassle. Besides, this is the land of the Holy Dragon Kingdom. Mishandling it could cause international problems.”

Currently, Rofus’s magical reserves were below ninety percent.

Even if he used the “Divine Work,” which consumed about fifty percent of his total magic, he wouldn’t suffer magical depletion as before.

However, Rofus preferred not to use the “Divine Work,” the secret art of the Lightrus family, even as a last resort.

He had no choice but to use it against the demon whale because he was severely injured and couldn’t find a way to overcome it.

But this time was different.

With the precedent of the demon whale and enough magic power, Rofus had both time and information.

The demon whale and Despia posed several threats.

Sturdy magic barriers, extensive and highly powerful unique abilities.

All of these were powerful, but the most significant force was their near-immortal rapid healing.

Even fatal wounds were quickly healed, with no visible limit to their regeneration.

However, no matter how seemingly immortal their regeneration, the fact that he killed the demon whale proved they were not truly immortal.

Just because the regeneration limit wasn’t visible didn’t mean there was no limit.

“In other words, I just have to break through the magic barrier and keep killing until it reaches its regeneration limit, right?”

Despia didn’t understand what Rofus was saying.

But he sensed it was something terribly ominous.

Despia’s instincts screamed at him to flee immediately.

But Despia brushed aside that fear and swung down his emerald-magicked wing.

The attack was a super-dense compressed air slash aimed at the sky where Rofus stood.

It was a blade so sharp that nothing in this world could withstand it.

The massive destructive power that leveled mountains was condensed into a single slash.

Rofus, facing it, looked bored, not changing his expression, and gazed at the slash.

“How disappointing… While your magic power is impressive, the embedded technique is terribly sloppy. It’s merely a crude magic whose power has been boosted by its magic. It’s the work of a mere beast.”

Muttering in disappointment, he let blood drip from the finger cut by the hidden blade of his ring.

“——《Gate of Purification that Rejects the Living》.”

Rofus activated an ancient magic through chant termination.

A jet-black gate, wrapped in ominous dark miasma, appeared in mid-air.

The horizontally aligned black gate began to fall towards Despia as if drawn by gravity.

The “Nagi-dachi” unleashed from below and the falling 《Gate of Purification that Rejects the Living》 collided.

A resounding clash, a surge of shock.

The air slash and the black gate were in balance for a moment less than an instant.

Immediately after, a tremendous magical explosion occurred, with magical waves racing through the mountains.

The magic formula was burnt out, and magic turned into countless bands of light, raining down on the ground.

Sparkling magical light.

Breaking through those bands of light, the black gate fell.

Despia, who was simply staring in astonishment, was soon crushed by the black gate.

“The Gate of Purification that Rejects the Living” is the most superior defensive magic Rofus knows, unmatched by any other.

Due to its dark attribute, it has many weaknesses against attributes like light, fire, and lightning, but it remains the top-tier defensive magic among various attribute magics.

The dark matter, a pseudo-substance created by magic, is compressed to an extremely high density, achieving an extraordinary hardness.

Given the high-density compression of the dark matter, its mass and weight are far greater than they appear.

It has enough weight to easily crush the giant griffon, Despia.

Despia was slammed to the ground, caught under the falling gate.

Under the constant crushing weight from above, Despia’s extraordinary regenerative power allowed it to repeatedly heal the crushed parts, barely maintaining its original form.

Even with its immense magical power, Despia couldn’t muster the strength to push away the ultra-heavy black gate, pinned to the ground, unable to move.

Yet, despite its predicament, Despia didn’t lose its fighting spirit and let out a high-pitched roar that echoed through the mountains.

This roar, imbued with magic, wasn’t a desperate cry.

Echoing back from the mountains, countless roars responded like a reverberation.

From the surrounding mountains, the sounds of flapping wings and numerous flying shadows covered the sky.

These were wyverns, a multitude of lesser dragon species inhabiting the mountainous regions of the Holy Dragon Kingdom.

A vast horde of dragons, as far as the eye could see, approached in response to Despia’s call.

Rofus widened his eyes slightly in surprise at this sight.

“You can control dragon species as well…”

In the story, it controlled flocks of bird-type monsters, but now it’s controlling dragon species.

Whether it originally had such power or was strengthened by jade magic remains uncertain.

Regardless, the fact remains that it has the dragons under its control.

Even though there are no higher-ranked dragon species visible, dragon species are powerful monsters.

Even lesser dragons possess power far beyond ordinary monsters.

Such dragons approached in a dauntingly large horde, too numerous to count.

It was truly a sheer force of numbers.

Rofus clicked his tongue and deployed numerous magic circles in response to the dragon horde.

These were the preparatory steps for a barrage of dark magic such as Dark Balls and Dark Lances.

However, the opponent was a horde of dragons with high magic resistance.

It would be difficult to wipe them all out, but reducing their numbers by half would be a significant gain.

Thinking this, Rofus prepared to unleash his barrage on the dragon horde.

But before he could, a wave of magical power erupted from the airship.

——”Twisted Tempest… Extermination Wave”

From the center of the airship, countless wind blades—possibly numbering in the billions—swirled, filling the sky.

These wind blades cut through the approaching dragon horde one after another.

This was an advanced, large-scale wind magic for mass destruction—modified by Riruka’s unique interpretation, significantly increasing its scale and lethality.

It was an advanced technique far superior to the one Despia had used earlier.

Rofus was stunned by the sophisticated magic, watching in amazement.

Rofus met Riruka’s eyes as she stood on the airship’s deck.

Exhausted from the immense consumption of magic power, Riruka wiped the sweat from her brow and gave Rofus a thumbs-up.

——”Leave this to me.”

Although they were too far apart for her voice to reach, Rofus felt as if he heard her.

Rofus smirked with amusement.

“Ha! Well done, Riruka. I must commend you. As expected of one of the party members who killed the ‘God of Darkness’ in the future.”

With Riruka holding off the dragon horde, Rofus could now focus on Despia.

Despia, pinned under the black gate and writhing to escape, was looked down upon by Rofus.

“If you can’t be killed, then I’ll just keep killing you. Despia, you are weak against fire, aren’t you?”

Rofus descended onto the black gate, recalling how Despia had taken significant damage from Abel’s fire attacks in the story.

Though Despia wasn’t particularly weak against fire, it also had no resistance to it.

From Rofus’s shadow emerged a giant skeleton engulfed in black flames—the Guardian Ignis Corona, a familiar he had acquired in the Dungeon “Spectral Hollow.”

“Ignis, do it.”

At Rofus’s command, the flame-wrapped skeleton clattered its jaws and unleashed high-powered black flames towards the black gate.

The black flames enveloped the entire gate, reaching the trapped Despia beneath it.

From beneath the gate, a scream of agony echoed.

Crushed by the gate and burned by the black flames, Despia’s regenerative abilities kept healing the wounds automatically.

Despia was subjected to continuous pain, unable to die due to its near-immortal regenerative power, suffering endlessly.

For what seemed like an eternity to Despia, it was crushed by the gate and burned by the black flames.

The extraordinary regenerative power finally reached its limit about five minutes after being exposed to the black flames.

No more screams came from under the gate, and Despia was completely crushed.

This was the limit of Despia’s seemingly immortal regeneration.

With its role fulfilled, “The Gate of Purification that Rejects the Living” dispersed and vanished, and Rofus landed on the crushed Despia.

Despia’s eyes, buried into the ground and charred black, showed no signs of life, and the presence of jade magic was gone.

“You really did it… as expected, Rofus.”

Riruka, who had teleported from the airship unnoticed, said this.

Rofus glanced at her without much surprise.

“Thanks for dealing with the dragons. That was impressive magic.”

“Impressive? Coming from you, Rofus, it sounds like sarcasm.”

“What do you take me for?”

Though Rofus’s praise was sincere, Riruka, knowing Rofus’s tendency to wield superior magic with ease, couldn’t help but feel it was insincere, and she smiled wryly.

She laughed merrily at Rofus, who glared at her half-closed eyes.

“…But, wow. You really defeated it.”

“I told you I had a plan. However, you used some quite advanced magic this time. Was it okay? You haven’t told the others, right?”

Riruka hasn’t informed the “Crimson Wind” party that she retains knowledge from the previous timeline.

The magic she used earlier was clearly advanced, even to an amateur.

It was strange for Riruka to be able to use such magic at this point.

She used it in front of the “Crimson Wind” members this time.

This could potentially cause them to have doubts or suspicions.

Riruka closed one eye and tilted her head.

“…Yeah, it might be hard to explain this one away. Since it’s wind magic, saying I learned it from you might be a stretch.”

“…Those dragons could have been dealt with by me alone. Though it might have been a bit troublesome.”

“Well, I knew that… but even so, I didn’t want you to fight alone.”