To go back a little while.
Rei and Seto had taken flight from the grove, soaring higher and higher into the sky.
They climbed to an altitude that would have been impossible for any ordinary flying monster to reach, yet they continued upward, as if even that were not enough.
As they ascended, the atmospheric pressure and temperature plummeted. Under normal circumstances, the environment would have been lethal, but Rei possessed a body created by Zephyle and wore the Dragon Robe. Furthermore, Seto was a Gryphon brought into existence by Rei’s own immense magic power. Together, they managed to maintain consciousness despite the extreme conditions.
Even so, they eventually reached a height where the luxury of speech was lost to them. Rei communicated his will by stroking Seto’s neck as they drifted through the freezing void.
(Now then, even if we’re going to create the Firestorm, our combined technique, we’ll have to descend to the ground first. If Seto’s skills were higher level, we might have been able to trigger this with more range... but there’s no point complaining about that now.)
Putting aside the magic Rei could cast, his current level of the Death Scythe skill Wind Hand was Lv 2, giving it an effective range of about 150 meters. In contrast, Seto’s Tornado—the very key to igniting a Firestorm—was only Lv 1, capable of producing a whirlwind barely a meter in size.
Because that small tornado served as the base, the core, and the center of the Firestorm, Rei’s plan necessitated whipping up the winds right on the battlefield. To do that, they had to dive.
(Of course, that’s exactly why we climbed this high in the first place. Not even a Dragon Knight could spot Seto at this altitude. Still, we’ll only get away with this once.)
A high-altitude surprise attack from a position far above the normal flight paths of Dragon Knights and monsters was devastatingly effective, but once the enemy knew such a tactic existed, they would surely be on guard for it in the future. Coincidentally, the surprise attacks chosen by Rei and Theoreme were similar; both were overwhelmingly powerful on the first attempt but easily countered once discovered.
In truth, Rei’s high-altitude surprise attack was only possible because of his and Seto’s unique natures. In terms of sheer versatility, its applications were far narrower than Theoreme’s ambush, which anyone could perform as long as they possessed a Teleportation Stone.
「Guruuu.」
Seto’s cry reached Rei’s ears, proving it had no trouble acting even in the thin air.
Rei looked down and saw Seto give a small, firm nod. Following the Gryphon’s gaze, Rei observed the two figures in the center of the opposing armies—the representatives of each side—parting ways and returning to their respective forces.
The meaning was clear.
(Which means... the war has begun!)
Rei recalled the explanations he had received from Luno, the knights, and the Nobles of the Neutral Faction. A battle officially commenced once the representatives delivered their final demand for surrender, and both sides refused, returning to their lines. That meant...
(It’s starting, right now!)
The moment that thought crossed Rei’s mind, the clash began on the ground below. The lead units of the Kingdom of Mireana Army and the Bestia Imperial Army surged forward.
In terms of raw numbers, the Kingdom of Mireana fielded 100,000 soldiers against the Bestia Empire’s 150,000. However, the King’s Faction—the main body of the Mireana force—remained in the rear, showing no sign of advancing. Nevertheless, they maintained a tight formation, ready to fill any gaps if the vanguard buckled. This was proof that Alius, the Supreme Commander of the Kingdom of Mireana Army, was not entirely the incompetent fool his reputation suggested.
By contrast, the Bestia Imperial Army’s main force followed immediately behind its lead unit. They had anticipated the sluggishness of the Mireana main camp and moved to exploit it from the very first breath of the war.
As they watched the unfolding chaos, Seto tucked its wings and dove like a falling star, aiming straight for the heart of the Bestia Imperial Army’s lead unit. Upon its back, Rei drew the Death Scythe from the Misty Ring, his grip tightening as he prepared to strike.
The Bestia Imperial Army couldn't fail to notice such a flashy approach, but Seto was moving far too fast for them to react.
Rei had identified the Dragon Knights as troublesome opponents, and indeed they were. However, the majority of them were held with the main force as trump cards meant to decide the war's outcome. Since the battle had only just begun, most were still on the ground, making it impossible for them to intercept Seto’s descent.
Even the few Dragon Knights assigned to the vanguard had no way to counter a Gryphon plummeting from the heavens. A few wyverns managed to spit Fire Bullets, but that was the extent of their resistance.
Had they been true dragons instead of wyverns, they might have countered with a broad Fire Breath, but there were no Dragon Knights on this field capable of taming such creatures. The Fire Bullets cut through the air like stray sparks, failing to touch Seto as it streaked toward the earth like a meteor.
In fact, the stray shots were the lucky ones. Some wyverns, agitated by their riders' panic, fired blindly and struck their own lead unit.
Amidst the initial confusion of the battle, Seto used its momentum—accelerating even further with a powerful beat of its wings—to slam into the center of the Bestia Imperial Army’s lead unit.
「W-Waaaaaaaah!」
Soldiers of the Bestia Empire shrieked, scrambling away from the impact zone as they realized something was falling toward them at a terrifying speed. They knew instinctively that a direct hit meant instant death.
Their fears proved unnecessary. Just before hitting the ground, the Gryphon spread its massive wings, shedding most of its momentum and parrying the remaining shock with the grace of a cat landing on its paws.
For a heartbeat, silence fell as the soldiers stared at a scene they couldn't believe. It was only a few seconds, but for Rei, it was all the time he needed.
「Haaaaaaah!」
Rei rolled off Seto’s back and hit the ground, simultaneously channeling magic power into the Death Scythe and swinging it in a massive horizontal slash.
The blade whistled through the air.
With that single swing, nearly five soldiers and adventurers were cleaved in half at the waist, their blood and entrails spraying across the dirt.
As the heavy scent of iron rust filled the air, Rei pulled the blade back for a follow-up and shouted.
「Flying Slash!」
It was one of the Death Scythe’s most versatile skills. A shockwave of force erupted from the blade as it swept through the air, severing the torsos of soldiers and adventurers well beyond Rei’s physical reach, cutting through their armor as if it were parchment.
In a single instant, the lives of more than ten men were snuffed out.
The surrounding soldiers, adventurers, and knights finally began to snap out of their shock, but Rei was already moving.
「Seto!」
Seto understood the command instinctively and let out a deafening roar.
「Guruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!」
The sound forced everyone in the vicinity to a dead halt.
King’s Intimidation. While it lacked direct offensive power, it was peerless in its ability to paralyze an enemy’s movements. Best of all, unlike a Fire Breath or a Wind Arrow, its effect was invisible. It was simply the roar of an A-Rank Gryphon; it was only natural for men to freeze in the presence of a bird-and-beast king. It was the perfect move to use without revealing Seto’s unique nature, and in this moment, it provided the opening Rei required.
The Bestia soldiers were frozen. That split second was the window Rei needed to unleash his trump card.
Rei exchanged a silent look with Seto, confirming their coordination, and then began to weave his magic power into a spell.
『Flame, manifest your power like a blazing scorch as a vortex.』
The spell rewrote the laws of the world, gathering fire at the butt end of the Death Scythe until it formed a dense sphere of heat. Rei swung the weapon, launching the compressed mass of fire into the densest cluster of Bestia Imperial Army soldiers.
『Swirling Hellfire!』
The magic flared to life, manifesting as a towering tornado of flame.
Soldiers, adventurers, and knights were incinerated without distinction. Those near the vortex had their limbs charred instantly; their armor grew white-hot, branding the flesh beneath, and their eyes clouded over as the heat turned their corneas milky white. It was a scene of scorching hell, with men being burned alive, but it was still localized. If an ordinary mage had cast it, the destruction would have been limited to the vortex’s immediate path. But Rei wasn’t finished.
Following Rei’s lead, Seto roared again toward the heart of the fire.
「Guruuuu!」
Rei swung the Death Scythe once more.
A second tornado—this one made of wind—manifested and overlapped with the flames. Seeing the spell take hold, Rei vaulted back onto Seto’s back. Without a moment’s delay, the Gryphon kicked off, knocking aside several more soldiers as it soared back into the air.
Once they reached the safety of the sky, Rei activated Wind Hand. A translucent tentacle of wind extended from the Death Scythe’s shaft and reached down toward the twin tornadoes. Below, the Bestia Imperial Army had finally regained its senses, launching a hail of arrows and magic toward the sky. Seto danced through the air, its wings carrying it in graceful, evasive arcs that left every projectile chasing shadows.
Rei’s magic was inherently stronger than Seto’s skill, and the flames were already beginning to consume the wind. However, as the Wind Hand made contact with the two vortexes, Rei poured his own magic power into Seto’s tornado through the skill. The wind whirlwind, which had been on the verge of being swallowed, suddenly surged in power, growing until it matched the flame tornado in size. The two forces merged, transforming into a single, terrifying pillar of wind clad in hellish fire.
Just as Rei had planned, they had created a Firestorm. At that exact moment...
「Tch, Seto!」
「Guruuu!」
Even Seto couldn't dodge everything perfectly forever. An arrow hissed through the air, aimed squarely at the Gryphon’s torso. Reacting to Rei’s warning, Seto activated the Bracelet of Wind Manipulation, and a sudden gust of wind deflected the arrow harmlessly.
「Climb!」
By the time Seto reached an altitude where ground fire could no longer reach them, the battlefield below had become a landscape of nightmares.
The Firestorm was a magical disaster, with wind speeds exceeding hundreds of meters per second and temperatures climbing above 1,000°C. It devoured every life it touched.
Those who had somehow survived the initial magic were incinerated the moment they were sucked into the Firestorm’s vacuum, their bodies carbonizing instantly into charcoal before being pulverized by the wind. Even those further away were not spared; the superheated gases and flames they inhaled scorched their respiratory tracts, causing them to suffocate as their internal organs burned from the inside out.
It was a catastrophe on the scale of a natural disaster. Surpassing the destructive power of any individual mage, the Firestorm reigned over the plain, a pillar of death piercing the heavens.
The carnage was amplified by the Bestia Empire’s own formation. The lead unit had been densely packed to intercept the Kingdom of Mireana Army; with the Firestorm manifesting in their very center, the soldiers were so crowded they had nowhere to run.
Between the incinerating heat and the razor-sharp wind blades thrown off by the vortex, the Bestia Imperial Army’s lead unit suffered thousands of deaths and many times that in wounded in mere seconds.
And Rei wasn't done yet.
「Seto, higher! Get above the Firestorm’s influence and put some distance between us!」
「Guru... Guruuuuuuuuu!」
Seto nodded, but as it prepared to climb, it sensed hostile presences approaching and let out a roar of defiance.
The Dragon Knights from the Bestia Imperial Army’s main camp had finally taken to the skies, determined not to let the Gryphon responsible for this massacre escape.
Most of the vanguard’s Dragon Knights had been lost to the Firestorm, burned alongside their wyverns. These new arrivals from the rear were the only forces left capable of contesting the sky.
「Ignore them for now. We’re going to finish the final touch first! Once that’s done, they won’t be able to do a thing about it.」
「Guruuu!」
Seto gave a low rumble in its throat. It cast a single, fleeting glance at the approaching Dragon Knights before flapping its wings once more, carrying Rei even higher into the heavens.