Episode 115 — The Trap of Commitment, and the Silence on the

"A Magic Race member?! Gustav, have you lost your mind?!"

"We came for a contest of intellect! We did not expect you to seat an inhuman creature among the ranks of nobility!"

An uproar bordering on a collective scream erupted from the nobles filling the hall.

Argo’s dusky skin—to the humans of this world, his very existence was not that of a "partner for equal dialogue," but a symbol of fear and repulsion.

"This is an insult of the highest order! The pride of the nobility will not allow us to sit at the same table as such an unclean being!"

"Are you telling us Felsen has tamed a demon? This is madness!"

One of the invited lords kicked back his chair and made to leave the hall. Following his lead, other nobles began to stand one after another. To them, engaging in the same game as a member of a Magic Race was nothing less than a fundamental defilement of their social status.

Amidst the storm of insults and vitriol, Argo stood quietly.

He did not so much as twitch an eyebrow or adjust his robes; he simply stared at Duke Daryl with inorganic eyes. His presence was like a fortified rampart, utterly impenetrable to the emotional noise surrounding him.

"Everyone... return to your seats."

Gustav’s sharp voice cut through the chaos of the hall.

He remained poised on the dais, casting a piercing gaze over the departing nobles—and most importantly, at Duke Daryl, who was staring at Argo in a daze.

"The Felsen Cup is a 'Battlefield of Intellect' stripped of all impurities. To bring matters of race—circumstances outside the board—into this space... is that not the greatest insult to the game itself?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Gustav! We were never told we would be competing against a Magic Race!"

Gustav offered a cold glance to one of the snapping counts, then walked slowly forward to stand directly before Duke Daryl.

"Your Grace... I trust you haven't forgotten. The words you presented to me once before."

Daryl let out a sharp gasp. Gustav spoke clearly, his words holding the sharpness of a blade as he threw Daryl’s own commitment back in his face.

"‘Then bring this monster of intellect. I’ll crush him too with the sheer force of my will’... I believe those were your words, were they not?"

"That was..."

"You said you would crush them 'along with everything else.' You claimed that no matter who the opponent was, you would surpass their intellect. ...To flee now simply because his skin is a different color... is that not a defilement of your own word? In fact, is it not synonymous with a military retreat?"

Gustav’s words completely blocked Daryl’s path of escape.

The surrounding nobles had expected Daryl, their representative, to reject the Magic Race. However, at the core of Duke Daryl was the pride of a soldier and an abnormal obsession with facing the strong.

Daryl stared at Argo, who was about to take his seat.

Even under a barrage of insults, that overwhelming aura of intellect remained unshaken. Daryl instinctively felt that the abyss of "Logic"—which he had spent the last few months frantically honing—existed deep within the eyes of the man before him.

"Silence!"

Daryl’s roar silenced the bickering nobles. With a trembling hand, he grabbed the back of his chair and pulled it forward with force.

"Who among you dares order me to turn my back and run? ...I came to fight the 'strongest.' Whether the opponent is a god or a devil, if they sit across these sixty-four squares, they are simply a player."

At Daryl’s declaration, the hall fell into a graveyard-like silence. The nobles who had been trying to leave were suppressed by his overwhelming pressure, forced to hold their breath and watch as events unfolded.

As Daryl sat heavily, Argo also took his seat without making a sound.

"Come then, Abyss of Felsen. Let us see if your logic can surpass my obsession. I shall judge it here and now."

"I accept, Your Grace."

Argo’s inorganic voice signaled the start of the match. Daryl made the first move with trembling fingertips.

In response, Argo replied without a single second of delay, as if the concept of "deliberation time" simply did not exist for him.

*Click. Click.* The sound of pieces hitting the wooden board was the only thing echoing in the eerily quiet hall.

The spectators forgot their previous anger; they forgot even to breathe under the strange, crushing pressure.

Duke Daryl was trembling.

It wasn't that Argo’s hands were fast. It was that every time he made a move, a "correct answer" was returned in a fluid, waste-free motion, as if it had been decided from the very beginning.

It felt less like a match and more like his very thoughts were being dismantled by a precision machine.

The cold, clinical violence of the calculation constructed by Felsen had finally begun to erode the "common sense" of the neighboring lords.

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