The Adventures of an Overpowered Knight in Another World Chapter 596- A Knight Till The End (4)
Previously on The Adventures of an Overpowered Knight in Another World...
"I hoped... to test your limits. To gauge the true might of the Goddess's so-called chosen champion."
His gaze lifted toward Reinhardt, dim eyes gleaming with a mix of satisfaction and amusement.
"Yet it appears... my power fell short."
No trace of resentment colored his words—just pure acceptance.
As Reinhardt had suspected, Giacomo sought a path to death. Spotting Reinhardt's arrival, he inevitably challenged him to a duel.
To him, turning into a demon was utter shame. He yearned to battle and perish as a knight to the very last.
Reinhardt stayed quiet briefly. Then he advanced, halting mere steps from the downed knight.
"Why? Why take the demon heart? Why slaughter everyone here?"
Giacomo leaned against the broken stone, his grim gaze sweeping the palace ruins.
"Very well, you've bested me, so I'll reveal it all."
His tone suggested he'd planned to carry those secrets to the grave.
Yet, with Reinhardt as his victor and questioner, knightly honor compelled him to respond.
.
.
Demons continued surging from the Hollow Earth, prompting Giacomo to arrange the king's escape along with his family and vital nobles.
The secret tunnel under the palace activated, elite knights dispatched at once.
The strategy was straightforward.
Giacomo himself would guide the royal family to security. The remaining two Paragons of Lunaris would plunge into the Hollow Earth entrance, stalling the demons.
These three Paragons of Lunaris stood as humanity's pinnacles for decades, true heroes.
Though outright victory against the demonic horde eluded them, buying time for evacuation remained feasible.
That optimism crumbled when the real foe unveiled itself.
The demons assailing Lunaris formed no mere raiding party. A ruler from the Abyss commanded them.
The Eighth Heavenly King, Astaroth.
The other two Paragons descended into the Hollow Earth to face him.
But disaster struck as hundreds of thousands of demons erupted from level two.
Myriad mid- and high-tier demons, spearheaded by elite Demon Generals.
The battlefield descended into pure horror.
Paragons may rank as humanity's mightiest, the Heroes themselves.
Yet even Heroes weary in time.
Surrounded by endless demons and a Heavenly King, they slipped into peril.
Still, utter hopelessness hadn't gripped the scene yet.
Against the odds, humanity's Heroes clung on desperately. The muster call rang out, drawing Lunaris's full forces to the capital soon.
Had those two Paragons endured a bit more...
Then, mocking their frail defiance, the heavens ripped open, birthing two more silhouettes.
Two extra foes alone wouldn't shift the tide.
These newcomers bore no ordinary status.
Their auras crushed so heavily that even demons bowed low.
They were the Ninth and Tenth Heavenly Kings.
Here, Reinhardt's stoic facade fractured at last, his eyes narrowing gradually.
Three Heavenly Kings!
That revelation hit like a thunderbolt.
Having clashed with three Heavenly Kings previously, he knew their arrival spelled doom.
Despair!
Two more Heavenly Kings didn't just add numbers.
No—their mere presence exponentially boosted the demons' already crushing might.
Even without direct combat, their titles and auras empowered every demon vastly.
Thus, learning from Giacomo that Lunaris faced three Heavenly Kings simultaneously, Reinhardt's thoughts drifted elsewhere.
To incidents in a distant realm.
Aetherion had endured a parallel demonic onslaught recently.
The kingdom teetered on ruin amid a holy civil strife and outer demonic strike, both demon-plotted in shadows.
Only Reinhardt and sundry knight orders' timely presence averted total despair there.
Absent them, titans like Vaerion and Hell Marshal might not have quelled it swiftly.
That crisis alone exposed the demons' fiendish cunning.
When they struck, all expectations toppled.
Post-Aetherion, Lunaris fell into their crosshairs.
Yet unlike Aetherion, Lunaris lacked such fortune.
No Divine Paladin.
Moreover, the Heavenly Kings who emerged were utterly unlike those that assaulted Aetherion. The Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Heavenly Kings ranked among the craftiest of their kind.
In particular, the Ninth Heavenly King.
A shadow fell over Reinhardt’s face as recollections surfaced of how this shadowy figure, amid the Battle of Black Tide, deceived all of Solaris and seized its Supreme Divine Treasure.
Beyond that, she orchestrated the assault on Aetherion from the shadows and almost claimed yet another Divine Relic.
Without the repeated alerts from his Divine Trait [Celestial Harmony] signaling danger, even he could have fallen for her ruse.
Her escape, despite his pursuit via the teleportation of [Aetherial Stride], underscored the grave threat posed by the Ninth Heavenly King.
Even the nightmarish shroud that swallowed Solaris’s capital bore her mark.
Reinhardt harbored deep hatred for the Ninth Heavenly King.
Yet, he wasn’t alone in such fierce animosity.
"The Ninth Heavenly King Duvessa."
Volcanic fury erupted within Giacomo the instant he spoke her name.
"She... orchestrated countless tragedies that plagued Lunaris."
He pressed on.
Once the clash ignited deep within the Hollow Earth, Giacomo hurried to execute the evacuation strategy.
He escorted the king, his kin, and Lunaris’s key officials through a hidden passage known solely to Paragons and the royals.
Yet, Giacomo never foresaw the demons’ ambush awaiting them there.
As the royal family arrived at the escape route’s entrance, the Queen abruptly grinned.
Before reactions could form, she clutched her face and tore it away.
The Queen’s skin sloughed off like a shed mask, unveiling a visage entirely alien to the one they knew.
Crimson eyes and citrine hair defined the features of the Ninth Heavenly King Duvessa herself.
"The knights and I stood stunned. We couldn’t comprehend the sight before us."
Seeing the familiar Queen exposed as a demon would stun anyone.
Still, as a level 10 knight, Giacomo’s instincts surged, propelling him toward action—until a chilling insight struck.
For decades, he had watched Lunaris veer into darkness, its decrees growing savage and merciless.
Years back, Giacomo had challenged the king directly on these shifts.
From that exchange, one truth emerged: the king never intended to steer the realm this way.
Though the king withheld the influencer’s identity, he admitted inability to refuse them.
What if the Queen was that force?
What if those ruthless policies stemmed from her?
And... what if the true Queen had long perished, replaced by this demon?
That epiphany rocked Giacomo to his soul.
It seemed absurd, yet all too credible.
For years upon endless years... that demon had dwelled in the palace. Observing, scheming, twisting their council.
Clad in the Queen’s flesh, she eroded the kingdom from within.
That horrifying truth could paralyze anyone, but Giacomo compelled himself forward.
His duty as a knight came first.
Yet, facing his sword, the Ninth Heavenly King merely smirked.
"Evading my strike, she gazed at us all with mocking delight and burst into laughter. Then, she spilled it all—how she’d posed as family for over fifteen years, undetected."
The Ninth Heavenly King gleefully confessed amid their mounting horror.
"And the worst of it?"
Giacomo’s mouth contorted in grim bitterness.
"She didn’t even fight me."
With a flick of her finger, sinister marks bloomed on the king, his family, and every vital figure.
Duvessa disclosed these as the Curse Marks she’d embedded in their bodies long ago.
