Witchbound Villain: Infinite Loop
218 – No Way Out

"So, thou already knowest whither to go." Isaiah said, his tone carrying a dry sort of amusement as he followed Burn’s supersonic speed, his own dragon wings slicing effortlessly through the sky. In this world, there were few—if any—who could keep up with this man. He, perhaps, was the only one.

Burn didn’t so much as glance at the abandoned carriage—the last place the royals had been before they were taken. He didn’t need to. He already knew where they were. Isaiah took note but said nothing.

Something was off about Burn today. The man, usually full of sharp remarks and easy sarcasm, had gone near silent. No biting jokes. No unnecessary chatter. Even his usual smirk had been replaced with something harder, colder. As expected, even the strongest had their weak spots—just as dragons had their fatal scale.

"Let me handle Aroche myself, as agreed. The others are yours."

Isaiah let out a hum, granting his approval. "I shall be here shouldst thou have need of aught, Brother. And should folly tempt thee into some most reckless deed, be thou assured—I am more than able to stay thy hand."

That word—Brother.

He had heard it from this man’s lips before, but only in the context of a disguise. It meant nothing then. But now? Now, it carried a different weight entirely.

When was the last time someone had called him that and meant it?

One brother had died by betrayal. Another had died by his own hand. And now, a man from his wife’s ‘family’ had come along and called him the same.

It seemed he owed Morgan yet another debt.

***

Failed.

Morgan spun just in time as the dark tendrils shot toward her heart. But this time—this loop—she was ready.

A pulse of holy light flared from her fingertips, golden runes snapping into existence around her. The curse, a writhing mass of living shadows, slammed into the radiant barrier with a hiss, its momentum halting inches from her chest.

BLAST!

The force of impact sent a shockwave rippling through the battlefield, kicking up dust and scattering embers in the air.

"Master!" Yvain's voice rang out, but not in despair—this time, in relief.

Morgan gritted her teeth, hands trembling as she pushed back against the festering corruption trying to invade her body. The shadows clawed and shrieked, seeking a vessel, but she would not let them through.

Holy glyphs spiraled from her palms, weaving tighter and tighter as she forced the curse to the surface, preventing it from sinking into her soul.

Then, just as the dark magic threatened to lash out again—

"Allow me."

A powerful surge of mana flooded the air, cold and commanding.

Vlad raised a single gloved hand, fingers tracing an arcane sigil in the air. In an instant, his mana wrapped around the cursed tendrils, freezing them midair.

The blackened mass struggled violently, twisting against the invisible chains that now bound it, but between Morgan's holy light and Vlad’s refined control, the curse had nowhere left to go.

“These crazy bastards,” the demon lord’s voice rasped, thick with amusement despite the blood bubbling up his throat.

His body convulsed, petrified hands crumbling into dust as the last remnants of holy judgment burned through him.

“It… wasn’t me!” Blair’s voice cracked, hoarse with desperation. “It flew out of me, but it wasn’t… me!”

Morgan’s hands tightened, her magic sealing the last remnants of the curse into the glowing runes between her palms. This time, she did not fall. She did not bleed. She did not die.

Lance watched it all unfold, his power stretching across the battlefield like an all-seeing eye. Morgan Le Fay, stabilizing Blair. Burn, hunting down Locan and Nahwu and him like wolves to wounded prey.

It couldn't be just that they were strong, right? There had to be something else, some trick, some oversight in his calculations. But no matter how he turned it over in his mind, how else could he explain it?

Morgan Le Fay—the so-called Original Saint—had just stopped his surprise attack. The curse he had painstakingly woven into the greatest masterpiece he had ever created—neutralized. Blocked. Denied.

Granted, it might had taken most of her power to pull off, but still.

Blair screamed, a sound that cut through the air like glass shattering. She convulsed, twisting and writhing as though her very soul was being flayed from the inside out. And, in a way, it was. The curse hadn’t left her cleanly—it had ripped its way out, taking pieces of her with it. Again, it was withdrawal syndrome.

Yvain caught her before she crumpled completely, his grip steady even as raw panic flickered across his features. No holy energy to speak of, yet he poured healing spell after healing spell into her, as if sheer desperation could override reality.

"Stay with me, Your Highness. Stay with me!"

Lance exhaled through his nose, his amusement tempered with something dangerously close to pity. "Give up," he drawled, voice curling through the air like smoke. "Without my influence, she’ll never control her soul. You can’t save her, Original Saint."

Morgan Le Fay—devastatingly beautiful and even more devastatingly unimpressed—let out a slow, deliberate sneer. "Don’t worry about her, Lance Inkor." Her voice caressed his name like a blade against silk. "You need to worry about yourself."

She tilted her head ever so slightly, as if considering whether or not to feel sorry for him. She didn’t.

"My husband is coming for you."

Lance let out a slow breath. She brought out the big gun right away.

His knees buckled, and he hit the ground hard, barely catching himself as his own body betrayed him. His hands—no, his arms—were disintegrating, the ash of his existence peeling away bit by bit.

That spell. That spell. The one that had nearly wiped out the first Demon Lord five centuries ago. Not just a weapon—the weapon. A spell so massive it should have taken days, maybe weeks, to prepare.

She had unleashed it in under a minute.

Beside him, a woman trembled, eyes wide with something between terror and disbelief. She looked at him.

Her voice, when it came, was barely more than a whisper.

“…Lance… are they going to kill us?”

And wasn’t that just the question of the hour?

Lance’s eyes snapped to Burn, tracking his every move. The bastard had come straight here, to his base, faster than he should have been able to—as if he already knew exactly where to find him.

There was no time.

The body possession spell required more preparation than this. There was no way he could—

BLAAAAAAAST!

The impact shook the very foundation of the base.

He was here.

“Bring everyone to hold him back!” Lance barked, watching as his henchmen scrambled to intercept the incoming force.

If it had been anyone else, he might have risked a direct confrontation. He might have bluffed, maneuvered, schemed his way to victory.

But this man?

This man was like the Original Saint—someone he couldn’t afford to face head-on, even if he wanted to.

This man was the reason he became Lance Inkor.

The reason he had to hide his identity.

The reason his grand plan to openly seize this world had been forced into the shadows, delayed and disrupted at every turn.

How? How did one man—a man with Soulnaught Syndrome, no less—become a force equivalent to a demigod?

Lance had spent years twisting the political landscape of the continent into his palm. He had manipulated, killed, and maneuvered his way into the upper echelons of nearly every nation.

And yet, no matter how carefully he wove his schemes, no matter how thoroughly he planned—

Soulnaught kept getting in his way. Over and over again.

And that wasn’t even the worst of it.

Not after what he had seen five years ago at the Wall of Logres.

A chill ran down his spine at the memory, but he pushed it aside. Focus. He had to focus.

Ahlgrath, the only subordinate still at his side, spoke, voice tight with unease. “Sir, I don’t think just us can stop him.”

Lance’s jaw clenched. No, of course not.

“Use Aroche Leodegrance to distract him,” he said coldly. “He won’t be reckless if it comes to him. Go.”

He couldn’t waste any more time. He had to leave.

He had to take Evere, Nahwu, and Locan and get them out before it was too late.

Before he lost everything.

“Let’s go, my love, we must leave now—”

RUMBLE—CRASH!

The ceiling shattered.

Dust and debris rained down around him, the force of the collapse sending a deep tremor through the floor beneath his feet.

And from the settling wreckage, from the choking cloud of dust—

A shadow emerged.

A towering figure, seven feet tall, his long black hair whipping in the wake of his descent. A massive spear rested in his grip, its edge gleaming even through the haze.

And atop his head—one broken horn, the remnant of a once-proud pair.

SWISH!

The spear sliced through the lingering dust with ease, revealing the man beneath it.

A legend. A nightmare.

Isaiah, the Dragon of the East.

His golden eyes fixed on Lance, unreadable yet piercing.

“…Verily, he spoke true,” Isaiah murmured, his voice a low rumble, steady as the turning of fate itself. “Had I heeded his counsel, I wouldst find mine path to this very chamber.”

Then, those eyes narrowed.

“Thou,” he intoned, voice cutting through the air like a blade, “art he who hath taken up mine father’s cursed throne.

The second demon lord.”

His voice was steady. Inevitable.

And Lance—Lance found himself standing at the precipice of something far worse than failure.

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They ain't wasting time :'v

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