Chapter 1

The entire ordeal had begun roughly two weeks prior, with Leonhardt offering his final prayers at the temple before departure.

“I pray that no one suffers injury in this coming battle…”

His low, resonant voice filled the space with a profound reverence. Eyes squeezed shut, the Knight Commander continued his devotions before a solitary candle illuminating the darkness.

“Watch over the children, that none may go hungry or fall ill. Bestow Your mercy, that all things may proceed down the righteous path…”

The metallic clank of armor shattered the silence—Leonhardt, kneeling before the altar in deep prayer, opened his eyes at the sound of footsteps against the marble floor.

“You’re still praying, Father. Everything is ready. We just need to depart.”

A young man with striking, bright yellow eyes that contrasted sharply with his dark skin stood before him. Noting the young knight’s resolute expression and immaculate gear, Leonhardt clicked his tongue softly.

“…Alec, I recall telling you to address me as Commander when you are in uniform.”

“Ahaha… ‘Commander’ just doesn’t roll off the tongue naturally when it’s just the two of us. Anyway, were you praying for the children at the orphanage again today?”

“Indeed. The priests will care for them well enough in my absence… but ultimately, such things are only possible if God grants His mercy.”

Leonhardt replied as though the answer were self-evident. While he never skipped a single day of prayer, he was particularly devoted to praying for the children whenever his duties called him away.

At the Commander’s stiff, textbook response, the young knight offered a faint smile.

“Don’t worry so much. Neither I nor the other knights are the same rookies we used to be. It’s just a few monsters; we’ll wipe them out quickly and come right back.”

“Hush, arrogance is forbidden. Have I not taught you that you must give your absolute best in every battle?”

Looking up at Alec’s boastful face, Leonhardt slowly shook his head; though he knew that picking apart every little thing would sound like nagging, as the young man’s long-time mentor and sponsor, he couldn’t help but add a word of caution. Put nicely, Alec was brimming with confidence—put bluntly, he occasionally fell prey to reckless bravado.

When dawn broke, the dark interior of the temple was bathed in light. Faint rays poured through the high windows near the ceiling, enveloping the space in an even deeper sense of the divine. Exchanging a glance with Alec’s gleaming golden eyes, Leonhardt clasped his hands together once more and began a silent prayer for the young man.

The sight of the Knight Commander—eyes closed in prayer for another’s safety—was sacred, yet undeniably stirring. The contrast of his red lips against his pale skin, or perhaps the neat row of eyelashes resting against his lower lids, was particularly striking.

Alec quietly watched him pray. Leonhardt’s large, sturdy hands appeared smooth, without a single scratch, yet the calluses hardened in various places proudly declared their presence.

Devout and fiercely hardworking, the Commander never skipped his sword training even after attaining his position as the kingdom’s greatest swordsman. Each day, he finished his dawn prayers and threw himself into morning practice, spent the afternoons sparring with his knights to assess their skills, and occasionally visited the temple-run orphanage to distribute bread and sweets to the children.

Alec, too, had been one of those children eating the bread Leonhardt handed out. Eventually, he had followed the Knight Commander he so deeply revered and joined the order. Now a full-fledged knight himself, he served right by Leonhardt’s side, viewing him almost as a surrogate father.

While he deeply respected Leonhardt for always displaying such an upright, exemplary demeanor, there were times Alec felt the man lived a life too diligent, too devoid of any release. Watching his back, Alec often worried that Leonhardt might push himself until he simply snapped. He was a reliable Commander, but he had a tendency to shoulder everything alone, rarely sharing his inner thoughts.

Even now, Alec had no idea what Leonhardt was feeling as he prayed, or what thoughts occupied his mind before embarking on an expedition to a place so cold and distant. Suppressing his complicated emotions, Alec committed the sight of that quietly meditating face to memory.

Leonhardt opened his eyes, the desperate expression of a man praying for the safety of a youth he considered a son vanishing in an instant, replaced by the stoic face of the Knight Commander.

“Let us go.”

“Yes, sir.”

Before they left the temple, Alec fell into step beside Leonhardt’s heavy footsteps.

“…Commander, if you ever face a difficult burden, please tell us. We knights want to be a source of strength for you.”

Leonhardt stopped and turned. Catching a flicker of anxiety in Alec’s eyes, he shook his head slightly.

“I don’t know why you’re saying such a thing so suddenly… My greatest concern right now is for the people of the North, who must be suffering even at this moment. We must hurry, for their sake.”

“…Yes. I suppose I’m just worrying over nothing. Let’s go.”

Alec waved off his own words as nonsense, and the two walked in silence until they reached the assembly point.

So began a new journey.

Standing under the morning sun, the Knight Commander exuded nobility tinged with an air of tragic resolve. While every expedition brought a mix of excitement and trepidation, Leonhardt had a premonition that this one would be particularly arduous. Nevertheless, he encouraged the knights following him and set out on the long road.

He set out completely oblivious to the misfortune that awaited him.

The further north they traveled, the faster the sun seemed to set. Noting that the sky was already darkening despite it barely being past noon, Leonhardt shouted to his men.

“All halt! We make camp here for the night!”

Someone, utterly sick of sitting on a horse for over eight hours, cheered. Others, having hoped for a shabby but warm inn, let out a small sigh at the realization they would be sleeping rough once again.

They called it making camp, but this was already their third day sleeping outdoors. The closer they got to the border, the more desolate it became—only a few scattered houses along the river, barely enough to be embarrassingly called a village. Naturally, there was no inn large enough to accommodate the entire knight order.

Leonhardt was also concerned about the knights’ declining morale, but he couldn’t conjure an inn out of thin air. Fortunately, they had packed ample provisions, so food was still plentiful, though the faster-than-expected drop in temperature was somewhat worrying.

They needed to conclude the battle as swiftly as possible. Considering the return journey, they were not exactly overflowing with time or stamina.

Deciding to camp by a lake beside the forest, the knights dismounted and busied themselves preparing dinner. Leonhardt, having seen to his beloved steed first, turned as Alec approached.

“Are you holding up alright? It must be exhausting traversing these mountain paths.”

“You’re in the same boat, Commander… How much further do we have to go?”

“We should reach our destination within two days. While there isn’t even a decent village around here… there’s a fairly large mining town near the Corin Mines. If we just make it there, we can at least rest in proper beds.”

“I wonder about that…”

A bitter expression crossed Alec’s face as he caught the faint self-deprecation underlying Leonhardt’s words. It wasn’t just because this wasn’t a pleasure trip—it was because the closer they got to their destination, the more intensely he could feel the stinging demonic energy clinging to his skin.

The knights with weaker divine auras still drank and chatted to keep their spirits up, but those born with strong holy power were different—they could sense the faint demonic energy permeating the air, and they grew increasingly grim the further north they traveled.

“…I won’t deny it. It could be quite a difficult battle.”

Leonhardt’s gaze remained fixed across the lake. As the unparalleled wielder of divine power within the order, he had realized long ago that the very soil of the North was saturated with a faint demonic taint. Not only were the forests and trees corrupted, but the very air hung thick and heavy with it. Drinking from the lake before them wouldn’t kill them instantly, but the unpredictable consequences of long-term consumption made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

“Perhaps, what awaits us there won’t be the villagers at all.”

“…”

A shadow fell over Alec’s face at those words. Having served as a Holy Knight for a long time, he knew all too well what became of humans consumed by demonic energy.

The Corin Mines had long been famous for producing mana stones. After a massive vein was discovered, the small frontier village had exploded into a wealthy mining town, and because mana stones could be acquired easily and cheaply, countless scholars had flocked there as well.

But that was all in the past—once the harvestable ore was nearly depleted, the town’s prestige waned and its decline was swift. The once-booming mining town seemed destined to fade into obscurity.

Then, without warning, reports of monsters near the abandoned mines began trickling in, followed eventually by rumors that the forest itself had become corrupted. People fell ill with an unknown disease, languished, and died. Some vanished, never to return.

Word was that the mood in the village had soured drastically. Wild rumors circulated that those who ventured into the forest to find their missing families had gone mad and turned into monsters themselves. Believing the town doomed, people were abandoning their homes and fleeing in droves.

And even that was news from several months ago. Now, even those rumors had practically ceased, making it impossible to know what was actually happening in the town.

Leonhardt forced himself to focus on the immediate reality, refusing to dwell on such dark thoughts.

“Worrying won’t accomplish anything. Let’s go eat.”

The only thing they could do now was hope the situation wasn’t as horrific as they feared. Resolving to banish such useless thoughts, he turned away from the lake.

“…Father.”

Alec, who had been silent for a moment, lowered his voice in the darkness.

Realizing the young man was tense, Leonhardt didn’t reprimand him for the breach of knightly etiquette.

“…What is it? Are you afraid?”

“It would be a lie to say I wasn’t. But that’s not it… I just, I have a question.”

As Alec’s voice dropped to a near whisper, Leonhardt stepped closer. They were close enough to hear each other breathe, and Alec, unable to hide a hint of anxiety, asked carefully.

“Is it true… that a disaster-class monster’s sealing stone is buried in that forest…?”

It wasn’t uncommon for monsters to appear without warning, but it was decidedly rare for such a vast area to become corrupted so quickly. Alec also knew that an argument had broken out between the ministers and Leonhardt before they set out, and given that their destination had once been a mecca for scholars, he knew that someone long ago had indulged a forbidden curiosity, resulting in a horrific tragedy.

A low groan escaped Leonhardt at the accuracy of the question. It was a difficult one to answer. For one thing, it wasn’t even certain that a disaster-class monster’s sealing stone was buried there. Moreover, the matter involved sharp political sensitivities, so he couldn’t speak freely.

Before their departure, scholars had warned that something might have gone wrong with the sealing stone of a disaster-class monster buried in the forest. The story went that in ancient times, someone blinded by greed had summoned a disaster-class monster and simply buried the sealing stone containing it near the mana stone mines.

Normally, the stronger the demonic energy a sealing stone possessed, the further away it should be buried from mana currents. But given the urgency of the situation back then, it was highly likely it had been buried nearby to save on transportation costs. The problem was that the danger of this act was only now coming to light.

If the seal remained intact, there would be no problem—but if, by some tragic accident, the sealing stone was damaged, it was glaringly obvious that the demonic energy would spread through the surrounding veins. The frantic voice of the Tower Master, pleading in the council chamber, still rang in Leonhardt’s ears; shaking like a leaf, the man had loudly proclaimed that the karma of ignoring safety protocols had finally caught up with them.

‘Your Majesty, it is utter madness to leave a sealing stone containing such a powerful monster right next to a mana stone vein…! If we do not act immediately while there is still time…’

The nobles from the northern regions, however, had completely dismissed the Tower Master’s claims. Having enjoyed their status all their lives, they refused to accept that their vast territories could turn into rotting wastelands overnight.

‘What absolute nonsense! Do not make such a fuss over something that happened nearly a thousand years ago. Do you even realize that the combat power back then was pathetic compared to now? It was merely an exaggeration by cowardly ancient mages calling it a highly dangerous monster!’

‘Exactly, exactly. You must remember that in our great-grandfathers’ time, it took ten knights to kill a single orc.’

With the power brokers in an uproar, everyone else kept their mouths shut, merely watching the king and weighing which argument was more advantageous to support.

‘Silence. The scholars have a point. Regardless of the monster’s level, if the sealing stone is damaged, we must deal with it.’

After much deliberation, the king arrived at the most sensible solution. Since they couldn’t simply leave the corrupted forest and the sealing stone as they were, he decided to dispatch the Holy Knights, who possessed strong resistance to demonic energy.

Ostensibly, the knights’ mission was to subjugate the low-level monsters appearing in the forest and purify the spreading demonic energy. Their true objective, however, was to eliminate the source of the corruption. If their investigation revealed that only low-level monsters were sealed, as the nobles claimed, they were to handle it on the spot. If not, they were to request reinforcements immediately.

Until the cause and extent of the corruption were confirmed, they were absolutely forbidden from voicing any speculations. That was the direct order Knight Commander Leonhardt had received from the king.

Leonhardt chose his words carefully.

“…We cannot know if a disaster-class monster is sealed there. Do not jump to conclusions. You must only believe what you see with your own eyes.”

That was all he could tell Alec. Before leaving, Leonhardt had resolved countless times never to make rash judgments until he verified things himself. If the Commander began to waver, it was inevitable that the rest of the knights would fall into anxiety.

Yet Alec stubbornly refused to back down.

“Everyone is keeping quiet about it, but we all have a general idea. We know this isn’t an ordinary incident, and we know what kind of accident happened there in the past… I’m asking because I’m genuinely worried if this is a problem our forces can handle.”

“Do not concern yourself with that. We have agreed to contact the royal capital immediately upon reaching the village. His Majesty has promised to send reinforcements without delay if, by chance, the situation is dire and communications are cut off. Right now, reserve forces should be stationed at a distance, ready for any emergency.”

“…I see.”

“What happened to the Alec who boasted to the others to just trust him? This expedition will undoubtedly be a great experience for you. Just focus on moving forward.”

“…”

“Did you not swear you would succeed me as Knight Commander? We will return safely. If we trust and rely on each other, God will surely watch over us.”

Leonhardt focused divine energy into his fingertips. Though Alec didn’t have a single scratch on him, nothing was quite as effective at soothing anxiety as the warmth of healing magic.

Feeling the touch caressing his cheek, Alec closed his eyes against the flickering light instead of answering. Leonhardt always nagged him to treat him as a Commander, not a father, yet whenever he did something like this—treating him like a son—it made it incredibly difficult to maintain a professional distance.

Even so, he surrendered to the comfort of that touch. Basking in the warm glow, a faint sense of hope began to bloom, making him feel as though he could accomplish anything. Finally pulling himself out of the swamp of doubt, the young knight’s tone had lightened considerably.

“I’m going to become the Knight Commander just to prove you right, so let’s really go eat now. I hope they saved some for us, but I wonder if we’re too late.”

“They’re loyal lads, they’ll have set some aside. You must be hungry, so eat quickly and get some rest. We have to set out early tomorrow morning.”

The two figures moved away from the lakeside. The somewhat gloomy and frigid weather seemed to perfectly mirror the underlying anxiety felt by the entire knight order.

***

“Hah… Kugh…! Ugh…”

Where did it all go wrong?

Leonhardt struggled to keep his footing, gasping for breath as he fought to remain conscious, though his physical and mental endurance had surpassed their limits long ago.

“Hold the line! Stay calm! We will make it out of here alive…”

“Aaaargh—!”

Before the Knight Commander could finish his command, a sharp scream tore through the air—a low-ranking knight, his chest pierced by a dark-red tentacle, slumped lifelessly to the ground.

“Damn it…!”

Stay calm. Think. Find a way to break through this.

Swallowing dryly, Leonhardt scanned their surroundings. The clearing, suspected to be the burial site of the sealing stone, was utterly desolate—not a single blade of grass grew within a ten-meter radius, and the soil, corrupted by demonic energy, lay black as charcoal. The only thing drenching the barren earth was the dark blood of his fallen men; in less than half a day of combat, half the knights were either dead or incapacitated.

Truthfully, simply surviving this long was a commendable feat. An ordinary person without the protection of divine power would lose consciousness just by stepping on this heavily concentrated, corrupted soil. The rotting forest was practically a reflection of hell itself.

Leonhardt wasn’t faring much better, maintaining his sanity only thanks to his innate, overwhelming holy power; even so, his recovery rate had slowed significantly, making it difficult to fight at full strength. In a normal battle, he would have healed the injured and bought time, but in this cursed forest, even that was impossible.

A blade flashed. A tentacle whipped past, narrowly missing Leonhardt’s cheek. Dodging the monster’s attack with fluid agility, the Knight Commander raised his sword and severed the appendage in a single stroke.

“Kuhk…! Form a defensive perimeter! Respond calmly to the attacks!”

“God is watching over us! Do not falter!”

Alec joined in boosting morale, and moving with disciplined precision, the knights sliced through the endless barrage of tentacles, the severed pieces quickly dissolving into a viscous, foul-smelling liquid. The horrifying reality was that the sludgy remains would simply flow back to their source and regenerate; no matter how powerful their sword strikes, the monster recovered its original form as if mocking them, launching another wave of attacks.

Worse yet, the creature possessed a cunning intelligence, having cornered the knights in the center of the clearing and employed a tactic of picking off the exhausted ones first. The fact that a seemingly simple, low-level monster behaved with such calculated strategy was the true source of their terror.

Driven into a corner, the knights’ morale plummeted.

“Hah… haah… Commander, what do we do?” Alec barely managed to right his stance, his chest heaving. “If this continues, we’ll be wiped out. Shouldn’t we send at least one person out to call for reinforcements!”

Fighting a monster that regenerated endlessly meant certain defeat for humans with finite stamina; unless they could devise a brilliant countermeasure, it was only a matter of time before everyone lost their lives.

“Its encirclement is too strong for that! We’re struggling just to handle this single entity—how could anyone possibly make it back to the village?”

Despair clouded Leonhardt’s eyes as he spoke. In truth, for a creature with such overwhelming regenerative abilities, the monster’s limitations were quite clear—perhaps the seal wasn’t completely broken yet, as it seemed unable to exert its power far from the sealing stone. If they could just escape this land of death, they could recover and launch a counterattack.

However, the monster seemed fully aware of its own limitations, fighting desperately to ensure that the knights who had stepped into its territory could not leave. Forget a full retreat; ensuring even a single person escaped alive would require the rest of them to risk their lives.

“You could do it, Commander! You can endure the corruption and heal yourself the moment you get out…”

Steel rang out. Even as he exchanged tactical opinions with Alec, the monster’s attacks didn’t cease.

“Are you telling me to use the entire order as a meat shield to escape?” Leonhardt’s face contorted as he blocked a massive tentacle hurtling toward him. “Alec, is that how I taught you!”

“Ugh…! Then what are we supposed to do! There’s no other way! We’re already finished, Commander. Even if we send someone else, they’ll die before they can recover outside the forest…”

Alec let out a hollow laugh, turning his head to reveal his neck, where a shallow scrape from a tentacle had already festered into a black, rotting wound.

“…Do not speak such cowardly words. I will never leave you behind!”

Alec wasn’t entirely wrong. No one else in the order could endure the corruption as well as he could, and if only one person could escape, it was logical that the one with the highest chance of survival should leave to bring help. Nevertheless, as the Knight Commander, Leonhardt had no choice but to order them to fight on and not lose hope; if he abandoned the formation to save himself, as Alec suggested, the fate of those left behind was obvious.

Gripping his sword hilt so tightly it threatened to shatter, the Knight Commander corrected his stance.

“If you have time to think such things, swing your sword one more—”

But the newly regenerated tentacle was far swifter than the sluggish Alec. The monster thrust straight for Alec’s heart, and Leonhardt threw himself into its path without hesitation.

“Alec!”

“Ugh…!”

Shoved aside by the Commander, Alec lost his balance and rolled across the ground; as his cheek hit the corrupted soil, a stinging sensation spread across his skin like a lash. But far more shocking than the pain was the sight of Leonhardt—the man he had followed like a father all his life—hoisted by the neck by a tentacle.

“Commander…!”

“Keuk, heuuuk…”

The monster wrapped a tentacle around Leonhardt’s neck and hoisted him into the air, constricting with enough force to crush his windpipe at any moment as it flooded his mind with telepathic thoughts.

“Foolish knight, do you hear my words?”

“Kuh, hng…”

Unable to answer, Leonhardt could only roll his eyes downward to glare at the monster’s distorted form, his face already turning purplish-red. He desperately clawed at the tentacle choking him, channeling his holy power into it, but the creature only tightened its grip.

“In truth, I have been watching you for quite some time. A body that does not melt upon touching my true form is quite rare.”

The monster writhed as if preparing to shove a wet tentacle down Leonhardt’s throat, continuing to project its thoughts. It found the notion of a Holy Knight who relied solely on his god repulsive, but the realization that this body could provide the turning point needed to shatter the infernal seal sparked a surge of dark excitement.

“It would be effortless for me to kill every last one of you, so I shall grant you a special mercy: a choice.”

“Hng… haah, a choice… what ridiculous… ugh!”

As the tentacle loosened slightly, Leonhardt spat back, making clear that the creature’s words weren’t worth hearing. In response, the monster tightened its grip punishingly and projected its thoughts once more.

“Insolent. Listen until the end before you decide. We are making a deal, human.”

“Keuhk…”

“Surrender your body to me, and I shall spare the lives of the remaining weaklings. I consider this a rather merciful offer, so you had better decide quickly.”

“Surrender… my body? What… do you mean…?”

“Does it matter? Seeing you weigh the options, it seems your subordinates aren’t that important to you after all. And here I thought they would make excellent bargaining chips.”

“Khaaaak—!”

The monster shot a tentacle toward Alec, who was just beginning to stagger to his feet; as the appendage slithered under his armor, Alec let out a sharp cry of agony, his body trembling violently.

“You despicable wretch, you said you would spare…”

“That is only if you agree to the deal. If you wish to save even one more of them, decide quickly.”

“Heuk…! Ah, aaaah…!”

Alec’s agonizing screams clouded Leonhardt’s judgment—truthfully, from the moment he was hoisted by the neck, he had known this monster was an entity far beyond human capability. He had never even heard of a monster that exuded demonic energy so potent it could melt flesh on contact. It wasn’t venom; if its raw demonic energy alone was enough to destroy human tissue, it truly deserved the title of disaster-class. What was even more terrifying was that the creature’s seal wasn’t even completely broken yet.

“Hah, haah…”

Leonhardt gasped for air, his mind racing as he desperately tried to find a way out.

Alec’s plan was wrong—anyone who tried to escape using a cheap trick would have been killed instantly.

This thing… it’s been toying with us from the beginning. It could have slaughtered us all, but it dragged it out to get what it wants…

The moment he realized the sheer disparity in their power, Leonhardt understood that the monster had intentionally driven them into a corner, merely stalling for time to drain their strength and plunge them into despair.

“If you refuse, then so be it.”

“Keuk…! I, I’ll do it, so stop. Leave Alec alone…”

Leonhardt forced the words out through a strangled voice. The mere thought of striking a bargain with an evil fiend was deeply disturbing, but he had no other choice; his immediate priority was to save at least one person. They had to survive—whether to wait for reinforcements or to recover their strength and find a way to turn the tables.

“You’re not entirely brainless, I like that… Very well. In exchange for your body, I shall spare the rest.”

No, let me correct that. I’ll “let” them live.

Keeping its dark intentions hidden, the monster tapped Leonhardt’s cheek with a tentacle. Despite being held captive for so long, the human hadn’t lost consciousness—he continued to resist. He seemed a bit old, but as long as he served well as a breeding sow, it didn’t matter; in fact, the monster found his sturdy physique and wide hips—perfect for bearing young—quite appealing. As long as he tasted good when taken, that was all that mattered.

The tentacles that had been roving across Leonhardt’s body as if assessing his quality scattered away in satisfaction—there was no need to continue the standoff now that the deal was struck.

“Ugh!”

Plummeting to the ground, Leonhardt grabbed his throat and channeled his weakened holy power into the skin that burned as if scorched. He had only been left with red marks because of who he was; Alec, struck directly by the demonic energy, seemed far worse off.

“Alec, are you alright? Show me your wound. We have a temporary truce with the monster… Ugh, keuk…!”

The liquefied tentacles began to coalesce into a squishy mass once more—horrifyingly, forming inside his armor, directly against the bare skin beneath his undergarments. Flattening itself against Leonhardt’s chest, a small piece of tentacle continuously projected its thoughts into his mind.

“Insolent. Who said you could act as you please? Stand up. And follow me.”

Before they knew it, the area around the corrupted forest was surrounded by other monsters—notorious, high-level Orcs who began hoisting the injured knights over their shoulders like spoils of war.

“Wait, didn’t you say you would spare the rest of the order?”

Leonhardt demanded in dismay, and the monster writhed on his chest in response, mocking the foolish human.

“Yes, I said I would spare them. But did I ever say I would let them go? Unless you want them to be dismembered and stored alive in my larder, I suggest you follow me obediently.”

“…”

Leonhardt clenched his fists and glared at his own chest, the slimy sensation vile, the realization that the creature was treating humans like mere playthings filling him with disgust.

“C-Commander…? What is this…”

Unable to hear the monster’s telepathic communication, Alec looked at Leonhardt in confusion, unable to tell whether he should be grateful they were still alive or horrified by the seemingly worsening situation.

“Alec… I struck a deal for a truce. We’ve taken heavy losses, but we survived. For now, let’s wait for support. If we wait, reinforcements will surely come…”

Even as he spoke, Leonhardt couldn’t tear his eyes away from his chest; the thought that this wet, leech-like thing was eavesdropping on every word he exchanged with Alec was deeply unsettling, and he was still struggling to grasp the reality of the situation himself.

Since when had this horde of monsters been hiding, and where were they taking the knights?

Unable to even begin to predict what lay ahead, Leonhardt and his knights were dragged deeper into the forest.

This was the first encounter between the disaster-class monster, Kelles, and the Holy Knight Commander, Leonhardt.