A small wooden boat drifted lazily across the deep-blue ocean.
The sky was clear, and a warm breeze carried the scent of salt and sunshine.
On deck, two men and two women lounged under the golden light, gazing at the endless horizon.
"We should reach the Heart Kingdom's border in about half a day…" Mimosa said with a relaxed smile, her voice carrying a note of nostalgia.
Asta's eyes lit up with excitement. "Half a day, huh? But—what's the Heart Kingdom actually like?"
"It's beautiful. Incredibly beautiful," Mimosa said, her tone warm. "When I studied abroad there, I was restricted in where I could go, but even from that small glimpse, I could see how full of life the whole country was."
Compared to her own homeland, the Heart Kingdom felt like a hidden natural paradise—a place where the rhythm of nature soothed you from the inside out.
But at that moment, Ethan stepped to the bow of the boat and waved his hand.
Creak—
The entire vessel jolted to a stop.
The sudden halt made Asta and the others wobble unsteadily. "Huh? What's going on, Ethan? Why'd you stop the boat?"
Ethan didn't answer. His eyes were fixed ahead at the seemingly empty sea. Then he raised his voice:
"Come on out! Air's free, you know. Why hide in the water? Or do you want me to invite you up?"
Hearing that, Asta and the others instantly tensed, summoning their grimoires on instinct.
"Enemies?"
"Yeah… there are a few living presences in the water."
Most couldn't sense it, but Asta could feel it clearly through his ability to read ki.
"Hmph. Cowards. Fine—then I'll drag you out myself!"
Magic flared. The sea around them erupted into massive waves, one after another.
The deck tilted wildly, forcing the others to grab hold of whatever they could. But Ethan stood unmoving—solid as a mountain.
From the depths, enormous whirlpools began to churn.
Boom!
Like a bursting geyser, columns of water shot into the sky, scattering droplets that caught the sunlight and painted a rainbow. From within those streams, several figures dropped toward the deck.
"Water Magic—Water Arrows!"
"Water Magic—Water Pillar!"
"Water Magic—"
"Hmph."
Ethan didn't even glance at them. He simply extended his hand. "Petty tricks."
Time Magic—Moment Stasis.
In an instant, both the spells and their casters froze, locked inside glowing spheres of temporal light.
Though their bodies were immobilized, their eyes still betrayed shock and disbelief.
"Spade Kingdom soldiers, huh?" Ethan muttered. "What is this—are they underestimating me? Sending small fry for an ambush?"
He didn't need to ask questions; their uniforms told him everything.
The Diamond Kingdom might have fallen, but the Spade Kingdom's ambitions didn't stop there. The next targets would inevitably be the Clover Kingdom… or the Heart Kingdom.
Either one alone might be able to resist—but if the two united, they would be a dangerous problem. Sending people to intercept him fit their political motives perfectly.
But this? This was laughable.
"One's Fourth Domain, the rest Fifth Domain… What, is your boss cutting payroll and sending you here to die?"
Noelle and Mimosa couldn't help but smile at his mockery.
Truthfully, this wasn't a weak ambush—by Clover Kingdom standards, these were high-level fighters.
But they'd chosen the wrong target. Spectacularly wrong.
Even if the two women didn't know whether Ethan was stronger than the late Wizard King, they were certain the gap couldn't be that large. And sending Fourth and Fifth Domain mages to kill a Wizard King? That was beyond foolish.
"Ethan, what do we do with them? Should we contact the capital and have them taken in?" Noelle asked.
"No need."
The moment his words fell, the frozen attackers began to age at a terrifying rate—skin shriveling, bodies withering. Within mere seconds, they were nothing but brittle skeletons, lifeless and silent.
Ethan casually tossed the remains back into the sea and glanced up at the sky. "They were clearly sacrificial pawns. Even if I questioned them, they'd have nothing useful to say. Let's keep moving—the Heart Kingdom is our priority."
Far away, thousands of kilometers across the ocean, a massive ship sailed under the Spade Kingdom's banner.
On its deck, a magical projection displayed everything that had just happened.
"Lady Vanica," said a man named Diyule, bowing respectfully, "the eight operatives we sent were killed instantly. This Ethan is far more troublesome than expected."
Beside him, a woman sat upon a throne, clad in furs. An eyepatch with the Spade Kingdom's emblem covered her right eye. Her expression was unreadable as she gazed toward the horizon.
Around her stood rows of armored soldiers, each bearing the black spade insignia on their backs.
"Yes… troublesome indeed," Vanica said calmly. "It seems Saint Mage Colin was telling the truth—this Ethan has inherited Julius's Time Magic."
A faint smile touched her lips. "Still, I suppose I should thank him. Without Ethan, we wouldn't have taken the Diamond Kingdom so easily."
After all, even during their war with the Clover Kingdom, the true deciding factors had never been the soldiers at the front lines.
The Diamond Kingdom had Colin, and the Clover Kingdom had Julius.
Fortunately for Vanica, by the time her forces arrived, Colin was already gravely wounded—making their conquest almost effortless.
"Lady Vanica, since Ethan is heading to the Heart Kingdom, should we—"
"Relax," she cut him off. "Zenon will handle the other side. All we need to do is keep our eyes on Ethan. Striking together would only tarnish the name of the Dark Triad."
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