novelraw Chapter 35 : Mage Hunting (1)
Chapter 35 : Mage Hunting (1)
Chapter 35: Mage Hunting (1)
This place is a basement constructed in a natural cave.
Rough, untouched stone walls enclosed the area on all sides, but the gneiss slabs fitted tightly across the floor proved this wasn't entirely nature's work. The air hung thick and damp, almost like wading through water, yet the space was bright as midday thanks to countless candles of various colors burning in wall niches.
Drawn on the polished stone floor was a complex magic circle.
The outer circles contain a bunch of smaller circles inside. Within those circles, mysterious-looking symbols that no normal person could read were all twisted yet connected to each other all over the place and created intricate patterns. Whatever material had been used to draw it made each thick line glow with a subtle crimson light.
And off to one side of the circle was an iron cage.
The cage was far larger than what you'd use for ordinary beasts. Inside were three trolls huddled together.
—Grrrk...
—Grrrk, grrrrlk...
Trolls typically possessed enough strength to snap thick iron bars like a child's fingers. But these trolls showed no interest in touching the bars at all. They simply crouched there with their beady eyes half-closed with exhausted breaths escaping their lungs.
For a moment, all you could hear was their breathing.
Then, from somewhere in the distance came the faint clinking of chains and the sound of humming.
Clink, clank...
‘Hm, hmm, hmm~♪’
The sounds grew closer.
The sounds got louder. What looked like a solid rock wall suddenly crumbled away, and a man stepped out. As he and the people behind him walked in, the wall magically put itself back together again as if it had never fallen.
The man gave off a peculiar atmosphere.
Gray-streaked hair, thick-lensed glasses, gentle-looking eyes, and pale skin gave him a scholarly appearance. But his eyes had this cold, unnatural shine to them, and the chains gripped in his hands had people covered in blood bound to them.
Other than being covered in bruises, the prisoners didn't seem to have much in common.
One is a young woman in the prime of her youth; the other is two able-bodied men.
They just shuffled along where he pulled them, their eyes completely blank.
Thud!
But the moment the woman bumped into a section of wall, her eyes suddenly snapped back into focus.
She furrowed her brow and parted her cracked lips.
"...Sir Advisor? Ugh, what is this... Wh-where am I? And these chains, what on earth..."
The man's facial muscles twisted violently. But he quickly suppressed his irritation and looked back at the woman with a bright smile plastered on his face.
"Nothing to worry about, Miss Scribe. But could you take a look at this for me?"
"Sir Ad-Advisor? What do you mean..."
The man snapped his fingers with a snap and the woman's eyes clouded over again. She lost her words and followed like a puppet on strings.
The man yanked the chains, seating the people in another empty spot of the magic circle. They lay down obediently on the floor like slaughtered livestock.
In magic circles, the empty spots are typically where you position either the target of the magic or the sacrifice. That meant either the trolls were the target and the people were the sacrifice, or vice-versa.
The man stood in the center of the circle and placed his hands on the floor. The circle's glow flared, and the three people floated up into the air.
This time, it was the people who would be offered as sacrifices.
CRUNCH—
The chains wrapped around the three of them and squeezed hard. In an instant, they weren't people anymore. Bones shattered, muscles were pulped, skin was twisted. Their bodies were crushed together into one giant meatball, with blood and other fluids dripping onto the floor.
The chains squeezed even tighter.
Blood flowed down in torrents, forming a damp pool on the stone floor. That pool suddenly turned pitch black, then instantly vaporized into a dark, smoky residue that hung in the air.
The rising residue split in two. One half settled into the candle wicks, while the other half seeped into the trolls' bodies.
The moment the candles lit, the eyes of the caged trolls snapped wide open.
The man commanded the trolls.
"Come out from there. And kneel before your master."
—Grroooo.
—Kuooooo...
The trolls bent the iron bars like they were nothing and stepped out of the cage. Then, as commanded, they knelt before the man. You couldn't tell just by looking at them that they were being mind-controlled.
The man gave a satisfied nod, then put the lit candle on a shelf in the wall.
It was a comforting sight to behold for him.
Every single candle on those shelves was linked to the mind of a monster he controlled. Most of them were still waiting down here in the dark, but he knew the day would come when he'd lead his army of monsters and take over the world.
But as he scanned the shelves, his eyes flickered.
"Hm?"
The candles linked to the two trolls from the Twin Gorges that he’d let loose a few months ago as an experiment had gone out.
The man narrowed his eyes.
He'd done plenty of behind-the-scenes work to ensure the Consul couldn't deal with those trolls. So what the hell had happened? Had he actually managed to get help from the Council or one of the noble families?
‘I need to check on this.’
He snapped his fingers again and a tiny shadow came down from the ceiling.
It was a Monoeye, a monster with a single eye for a body and the wings of a bat.
"Go scout the Twin Gorges and the area around it. Come back and tell me everything you find."
—Screech
The stone wall crumbled open like before, and the Monoeye flew through.
Ymir Demir, Advisor to the Consul of Remtana, adjusted his glasses as his colorless eyes gleamed.
***
Thwack—!
—Squeak!
The throwing axe tore apart something mid-flight. The sound of a dying rodent rang out as blood sprayed.
The soldiers slowly got to their feet.
They'd all hit the dirt when Kadim suddenly chucked his axe at thin air. A few of them coughed awkwardly as Duncan walked up to him.
"Wh-what did you hit, my lord? Why did you suddenly throw your axe..."
"I don't know either. We'll have to go check."
When they went to look, the body's torso was obliterated, with only two bat-like wings remaining intact. Judging by how the blood was thin and mixed with vitreous fluid, this was no ordinary bat. More importantly, it gave off a faint aura similar to the trolls.
Kadim finished his inspection and walked to Enrico.
"I thought you said all the monsters around here were wiped out, Consul."
"I did...?"
"Well, it looks like your wizard is controlling more than just trolls. He just sent a little spy monster after us."
"...Are you certain about this?"
Kadim held up the mangled Monoeye corpse.
It seemed best to pass through the gorge area as quickly as possible. The soldiers did not understand why and simply followed the Consul's orders and quickened their march.
The group had been on their way from Ekul and was heading to Remtana.
They were returning to their base after finishing their recuperation. There was no real reason to hurry before, but now they couldn't afford to take their time.
Kadim had accepted the Consul's proposal to kill the mage.
He'd wanted to meet the mage at least once anyway, if only to figure out the true nature of the aura dwelling within the trolls. On top of that, he could clear himself of suspicion for killing the Archpaladin and even get paid for it.
It was an offer too good to refuse.
But there was one big problem with the plan.
'In the end, my job is still to kill a mage from the Mage Tower, am I right, Consul?’'
'...That's correct.'
'That's problematic. My destination is the Mage Tower. My goal is to find records left by the Tower's founding Master. If word gets out that I killed a mage, it could interfere with my plans.'
Enrico was momentarily flustered. But like the seasoned politician he was, he deftly addressed the concern.
'The mages of the Tower value knowledge above gold and jewels. A record from the founding Tower Master would be practically a sacred relic to them. I don't know why you're seeking it, but... unless you have some major connection inside, you wouldn't have been able to access it.'
'...'
'How about this instead? If you accept the proposal, I'll do everything in my power to find a way for you to access it. It won't be easy, but it'll be far better than trying to find it on your own. And I'll ensure that no one ever knows you killed the mage. I'll cover it up thoroughly, so don't worry.'
Well, he'd expected that finding the records wouldn't be easy even after reaching the Tower. He'd originally planned to just cut down any mages who got in his way, but there was nothing wrong with using a gentler solution if one was available. That's when Kadim finally accepted the Consul's proposal.
The advisor was currently in hiding, his exact location unknown. Still, he was definitely somewhere around Remtana, so they decided to stay there for a while and search the vicinity. Kadim quickened his pace, lost in thought for a moment.
'Mage, mage...'
From what he remembered from the game and his first life, wizards were basically humans trying to copy the Spirits.
Spirits were the ones who originally figured out how to pull mana from the air and use it to manifest magical phenomena. Humans whose mana sensitivity was extraordinarily high enough to imitate that method called themselves 'mages' and performed miracles that defied common sense.
But now something had changed.
Kadim's mana sensitivity had been the worst among the Hero's party.
He couldn't feel ambient mana, and he wouldn't even have noticed if a mage was charging up a massive spell right in front of his face.
Of course, he rarely got hurt by mages since he'd always cut their throats before they could finish chanting or just smash their spells with brute force. But still, when it came to magic and mana, Kadim was basically blind and deaf.
But now... now he could sense 'magic.'
It was faint and hard to pin down, but he could feel that sinister aura, and when he killed monsters, he could see the dark residue.
There seemed to be three possible explanations.
Either he'd gained some new Unique Trait related to magic as a second playthrough perk, or the advisor's magic was something special, or for some reason, the principles of 'magic' had changed significantly over the past 300 years...
'Hmm, well... should I just build a tower to teach mages or something?'
Melissa's words from the first playthrough suddenly flashed through his mind again.
"..."
Kadim shook his head. Whatever it was, there was no solid proof yet. Once he found and killed the mage, the truth would reveal itself naturally. For now, getting ready for that fight was more important.
"Ah, careful, careful!"
"Ugh, watch it!"
"Hey, grab it again! Grab it again!"
The soldiers were struggling to carry the Archpaladin's plate armor, which they'd wrapped in a tarp. The fragments of the Divine Armament kept rolling around inside, so they had to keep it level at all times, which clearly wasn't easy.
Kadim watched their pitiful display with indifference before asking the Consul.
"Consul, is there a tight-lipped, skilled blacksmith in Remtana? If we could forge those things into weapons, it'd make catching the mage a lot easier."
Enrico slowly stroked his beard.
He furrowed his brow as if something made him uncomfortable, then hesitantly opened his mouth.
"There is one. There is, but... Haaa..."
He just sighed instead of finishing.
***
Remtana was a fairly small city.
Still, a city was a city.
Right at its center, you had the main street, with houses and shops all clustered around the Consul’s estate. That area was neatly paved with brick buildings and stone slabs, and the faces of people walking the streets brimmed with vitality, making it look like a scene from a painting. It was an unwritten rule here that whenever distinguished guests visited from outside, they were only ever shown the main street.
But venture just a bit toward the outskirts, and the city's true face revealed itself.
Dirt roads instead of pavement, excrement piled everywhere, with people lying in the filth like it was their bedroom. Dilapidated buildings grew clustered together like deformed mushrooms, with spiderweb-like alleys stretching between them. This was the actual appearance of cities in this world, but being right next to the pristine main street made the contrast feel even more jarring.
And Kadim's destination was in the worst corner of this slum.
A crumbling brick house where the sun never reached.
Knock, knock, knock.
Kadim rapped on the rusty iron door. He could smell that sharp, coppery scent of metal dust, but there was no heat at all. The furnace had been cold for quite some time, it seemed.
BANG, BANG, BANG!
When there was no response, Kadim pounded harder on the door. The hinge screws popped out, and the door's corners dented inward. The iron door let out a precarious groan, as if it would collapse at any moment.
This time there was a response. He heard a bunch of crashing and clattering from inside. Then, after another long wait, the door finally opened.
"Dammit, is that any way to knock on a door! Who the hell are you! Who's making all this noise at this hour!"
A wild mane of hair blended right into his white beard, and his clothes had more holes than fabric. He limped on his right foot but moved without hesitation, and his voice rang out strong and clear. You could tell just by looking at him that he was one stubborn old coot.
"Are you that Old Man Ironhammer?"
"...What? Yeah, so what? Who the hell are you?"
"I was told you're the best blacksmith in town. I've got a special job for you."
The old man felt a jolt of fear looking at the sheer size of the barbarian. But he was used to dealing with tough customers. He spat out some phlegm and quickly put on a sneer as if nothing bothered him.
"Atalan mercenary, huh? Heh... I don't know who fed you that bullshit, but I put down the hammer a long time ago. If you need some metalwork done, go check out the smithy over on the main street."
"A regular blacksmith can't do this job. I have money. I'll pay you whatever you want."
"Money? Do I look like some beggar scraping by without a coin to his name?"
He did.
Kadim stared at the old man in silence.
The old man erupted like boiling water.
"You uneducated barbarian bastard! You primitive dirt-eaters from beyond the mountains come to other people's lands, you get rich killing people, and you think you can throw your money around like you're some big shot! Goddammit, this is why you don't talk to idiots... I don't want your stinking blood money, so just get the hell out of..."
"Do you have any soft food at home, old man?"
"...What?"
"If you don't, you'd better go buy some. It's going to be tough to chew once I smash all your teeth in."
The old man froze.
He looked at Kadim's eyes, which were like black pits, and his fists, which were clenched like rocks. This guy wasn't bluffing.
He took a step back, his voice a lot smaller than before.
"A-anyway, I can't take the job. I'm retired. You could be the Consul himself, here begging me, and I still wouldn't do it. So just give up and go..."
"...Is that really true, Gulak?"
A middle-aged man who'd been eavesdropping from the alley casually emerged and interjected. The old man's eyes flew wide open as if he'd seen a ghost.
"Huh? C-Consul, sir...?"
"I asked if it's true that you wouldn't take the job even if I came and begged on my knees, Gulak."
"..."
The old man was at a loss for words, his mouth hanging open.
He did not manage any reply until a fly had zipped right into his mouth.