Ch.23Black Mage (2)

The dark mage was plotting something.

All this dark mage needed to know was whether the interfering black knight was truly a black knight or not.

All preparations were complete. After sensing this, my actions were simple.

I recalled faces in my mind.

My sister’s face, already beginning to fade.

The Blade of Stars, who breathed her last while leaning on my shoulder.

The Cannibal Baron who closed his eyes, asking to be killed.

People trembling in fear trying to escape, or those who steeled their resolve to avenge those I had killed, thrusting their weapons at me.

[Mourning]

I mourned them. Those who had no choice but to fight me. In the wake of their passing faces, strength remained.

How could such power come from one person mourning another?

I did not know. It wasn’t important to begin with.

What mattered was that something was happening, slipping from my grasp.

But it was still within my reach.

So I turned to Isla.

“Isla!”

Isla turned to me, startled. I ignored the dark mage’s illusion, who wore an equally puzzled expression.

“Everyone evacuate!”

Though brief, my words made Isla’s expression harden. I immediately launched myself forward.

CRASH!

I broke through the wall and went outside. On my way out, I grabbed my cloak.

There was a sense of burden in my hand, but I paid it no mind.

I moved forward in a straight line, breaking through wall after wall.

Walls shattered against my body, sending violent impacts through me. It was because I wasn’t wearing my armor.

But I couldn’t spend 10 minutes putting it on. I just ran, quickly donning the helmet from my cloak and strapping on vambraces.

“What, what’s happening!”

“The wall…!”

I heard shocked voices from afar but didn’t care.

“What are you doing? Suddenly…”

The dark mage’s illusion followed me. Despite being a shadow, its confusion was clearly visible.

But I charged right through that stain-like shadow. It regathered like dispersing fog condensing again, but I paid no attention.

I’ve always hated such things.

When clever individuals or capable mages plot something that can’t be prevented in advance, resulting in irreversible damage.

I never believed that nothing could be done when such things happened.

I had power. I was a monster, and my body was that of a monster.

Though my soul might still be human, there were things I could do because of this monstrous body.

BOOM, BOOM, CRASH!

Walls shattered against my body, and as the 60 seconds gradually ticked down, I made my way to the first floor.

I had no knowledge of architecture. Similarly, I didn’t know how much I needed to destroy.

I just knew I had to destroy a lot.

CRASH!

“My lord! What on earth is happening?!”

As I broke through the wall and slid across the ground outside, the mayor called out to me.

There was no time to explain to him. The duration of Mourning wasn’t very long.

“The dark mage is casting a spell.”

“A spell…?! But the fingers to form seals…!”

The tortured dark mage with severed fingers certainly seemed incapable of forming magical seals.

Given that the components of magic are gesture, voice, and catalyst, a major spell missing one of these three wouldn’t function properly.

But dark mages are exceptions. They use even their own bodies as catalysts, twisting their innards to form seals.

Self-proclaimed as the School of Exploration. They don’t hesitate to burn their insignificant lives for their research. I knew this well.

“Bury them alive. Help me.”

I explained as briefly as possible. Whether to follow or not was up to the mayor.

“…Get pickaxes from the armory! Bring farming tools if you must!”

He sharply ordered his subordinates. No need to worry about this. I made the most of the time they bought me.

I went back inside, breaking through walls, ramming into every pillar I saw, kicking them, and smashing them with my fists.

I rammed my shoulder into load-bearing walls, crushing them, and told those who hadn’t escaped yet to go outside through the path I had created.

[Time remaining: 12 seconds]

Still, not much time left. I couldn’t use Mourning again. So then.

I gripped the longsword at my waist.

Knowledge of armor and techniques that had flowed into my mind manifested in my body. I held the tilted scabbard almost straight up and drew the longsword upward.

The blade, freed from its enchanted scabbard, glowed red-hot and then burst into flame. The steel, glowing with heat rather than fire, had someone’s soul dwelling within it.

A burning soul. Not heat that mere wood could withstand. Without hesitation, I swung the longsword held in both hands using the technique inscribed in my body.

Extending my right leg forward, I slashed diagonally downward. Swoosh, flames spread along the path of the blade.

At the center of it, I executed as many movements as possible.

Slashing from left to right, cutting upward diagonally, thrusting and twisting the blade to spread the fire.

In the spreading flames, I immersed myself in my movements.

The feeling that my body wasn’t my own lasted only for the first few swings. With each strike, I understood those movements better.

At the same time, I recalled someone. The movements of the lion beastkin called the Blade of Stars and the blood knight who fought me while wearing the armor I once used.

[Time remaining: 1 second]

Those agile yet skilled footwork and blade trajectories. Red trajectories like blood along the burning path. I followed the phantasmal trajectories, overlapping my body with those shadows.

It was immensely enjoyable.

The joy of learning. I was learning my body, learning swordsmanship.

From none other than my enemies.

WHOOSH!

Following my final slash, great flames billowed and spread. The building was collapsing from within.

There were no signs of people left inside. Despite taking just over a minute, everyone seemed to have evacuated.

I suppressed my racing heart, sheathed my sword, and went outside.

Avoiding the holes I had made and the ceilings collapsing from spreading flames, I emerged to find people surrounding the town hall, staring at the burning building with bewildered expressions.

Prisoners were mixed among them. Perhaps almost everyone except the dark mage who would be in the deepest part.

With relief, I looked for Isla. She was not far away, staring at me with a blank expression.

An expression as if seeing something wrong. When I came to my senses, I realized everyone was looking at me that way.

“My lord, the fire…”

Only then did I notice that my left arm was on fire. After waving it out, my skin was darkly stained.

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

Still, people couldn’t easily look away.

Their gazes changed. Seeing their expressions close to shock, I absent-mindedly took out my armor from my cloak and put it on.

Just then, the town hall collapsed.

As planned.

The best way to counter a powerful spell or a well-prepared plan was simple, brutal, and irresistible violence.

In this case, it was collapsing a six-story town hall to bury someone alive.

Considering the labor and resources that went into building that structure, it was painful, but better than facing a fully completed dark magic spell.

The mayor seemed to think so too. He opened his mouth but then closed it.

As the collapsed building burned fiercely, consuming its surroundings, and the heavy weight of the six-story building pressed down on where the mage would be.

“How annoying.”

I saw the shadow standing behind me.

It was the shadow of a beautiful woman.

Her flowing hair was dark red. The way it cascaded down in curls made me realize that this dark mage once took great care in maintaining her hair.

Even though this was an illusion that could be created at will.

I intuitively knew this was once the dark mage’s form.

The woman now buried alive in the town hall because of me glared at me with a slightly frowning expression.

Whatever she had been plotting, I was able to stop it in time. She was angry at being thwarted.

Then what remained was obvious. Just as she had sent illusions to me, I needed to prevent her from sending illusions to her subordinates to attack.

To stop the School of Exploration’s servants from rescuing her, and ultimately to leave the dark mage to die.

Surely that would happen, but the illusion soon relaxed her frown.

As if she could still do something even in this situation.

And as if confirming my suspicions, the dark mage spoke.

“Thanks to you, things have become a bit troublesome and difficult… but it can’t be helped.”

Words suggesting she could still use magic. Before I could even react to those words.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, vibrations spread through the ground.

It was a violent shock that seemed to rise from deep underground. Untrained ordinary servants tilted and collapsed to the ground.

Though certainly an intense shock, it didn’t feel like the mage’s ploy.

Yes, this was the aftershock.

The effect of some magic, and the result of the pressure from the burial I had caused.

As if to prove my intuition, something overflowed from the debris.

Amid the resounding roar and fragments flying in all directions, with bricks mixed with burning wood sharply bouncing in every direction.

I saw something writhing in that volcano-like torrent.

It wasn’t something clearly recognizable at first glance.

Rather the opposite. It was something anyone would tilt their head at upon seeing.

Something of a faint color with spreading dark green. Something like a cloud, or perhaps like muddy water drawn up from a swamp.

The moment I saw it, I recalled a memory.

A memory from when I still played the game. Among various events and quests, one that was quite memorable.

Just like what I was seeing now, boiling blood surging upward like waves.

Bone fragments originating from countless graves.

To make sure, I opened my mouth.

“What was beneath this place?”

“The ossuary…”

With the mayor’s blank answer, I was certain.

Inside the coffin of the town hall I had sealed, death was wailing.