Ch.302Episode 12 – The Strongest Mage in History

As soon as I received the call from Lyudmila Superior, I woke everyone up and headed straight to headquarters. Thanks to the timely support of mages from the Imperial Army, it took less than 20 minutes to arrive.

The first words from the military administration headquarters officer who greeted us after we flew through the December’s biting wind between cities were brief and intense.

“A demon has appeared.”

I asked him.

“When and where?”

“Around 23:39, the first alarm sounded in Orbentsk. Communication is poor, so we can’t contact the units on site, but we definitely received reports that the alarm went off.”

Orbentsk. A familiar name. It was the place where Lucia and I had fought a demon.

A talisman that rang in a sealed city.

There’s no time for lengthy deliberation.

“Let’s depart immediately.”

We need to go catch it.

Episode 12 – The Strongest Mage in History

Orbentsk is a massive metropolis in the north. Five years ago, it was home to 330,000 residents, with an area comparable to Goyang City in Gyeonggi Province.

The problem is the distance.

Orbentsk is about 380km northeast of Novo Nikolayevsk, the northern administrative capital where military headquarters is located. Simply calculated, even driving at 100km/h would take a solid three to four hours of non-stop travel to reach it.

In this race against time, there couldn’t be a worse situation.

However, the military administration headquarters solved the problem by installing an instantaneous teleportation magic circle connecting Novo Nikolayevsk and Orbentsk.

Normally, regulations prohibit installing teleportation magic circles in military facilities, but this was no time to worry about regulations.

Commander Mikhail used his authority to connect Novo Nikolayevsk and Orbentsk, and…

“We’ve arrived.”

We instantly traveled 380km and entered Orbentsk.

“Did all four arrive safely?”

“Lucia and Francesca made it! And Saint Veronica too!”

Unlike warp gates, teleportation magic circles by their nature cannot transport many people at once. So only five of us could use the teleportation magic circle: myself, Camilla, Lucia, Francesca, and Veronica.

But there’s no problem.

The military administration headquarters has positioned troops between cities, coordinating them to provide support whenever a radio call comes in.

Moreover, Orbentsk, under lockdown orders, has military forces stationed along the city’s perimeter. Since it’s a city where battles with demons have occurred, Veronica specially dispatched Inquisition forces, and the Magic Tower sent combat mages here as well.

In other words,

“Let’s gather our forces first. Go and call everyone from the Order and the Magic Tower!”

“What about you, Major?”

“I’ll open the checkpoint first. I’ll meet with the commander there.”

Fortunately, the troops were already combat-ready before we arrived. The Imperial Army battalion commander I met at the checkpoint entrance was fully equipped and sitting in his vehicle.

“We prepared immediately when the alarm sounded. The residents living around the collapse site have all been evacuated by the division, so there won’t be any issues if combat breaks out.”

“You haven’t deployed yet?”

“The unit responsible for initial response entered 20 minutes ago. Some holy knights and mages accompanied them. They should have reached the site by now, so we’ll receive radio contact soon.”

*

The strange coalition of Imperial forces, the Order, and the Magic Tower entered the city to hunt down the demon.

I crammed my companions into a spare vehicle and took the wheel.

“According to the battalion commander, the advance team that departed first is handling the initial response. We haven’t received radio contact yet, but some holy knights and combat mages went with them, so there shouldn’t be any major issues. Division forces stationed on the outskirts are also moving in.”

Due to the north’s hellish weather, radio communications were particularly poor today. As snow fell from the sky onto the windows, our convoy of vehicles traversed the dark city.

“The radio’s completely dead?”

Camilla, lying down, frowned.

According to the original plan, she should have been resting at the cathedral by now, but somehow she ended up coming along. Actually, I brought her, but everyone else was in such a rush to depart that they assumed she just joined on impulse. Besides, the situation was too urgent to question such oddities.

Since the space was too cramped for five people, Camilla was lying across the laps of Lucia and Francesca in the back seat.

“Something feels off.”

“Please stop saying things like that. I’m anxious enough already.”

I pressed the accelerator, shaking my leg like a sick dog due to an inexplicable sense of foreboding.

Speak of the devil.

The moment we arrived at the collapse site, plowing through the snow, I instantly knew my ominous premonition had come true.

Imperial Army vehicles were parked throughout the collapse site.

The engines were still running, but the driver’s side windows were stained red.

The soldiers, clergy, and mages who had been deployed to the scene for initial response lay in the snow with their eyes open, staring at the night sky.

Around the collapse site, unidentifiable fragments were scattered everywhere.

“…”

Only after crossing through the corpses and approaching the collapse site did I realize what those fragments were.

Dozens of broken silver stakes and shattered magical tools.

*

“Establish communications! Report to the regiment, damn it!”

“Disembark and secure the perimeter. Report immediately if you find survivors.”

“Where are the mages? Find out when combat mages from the division will arrive. Hurry!”

Those facing the carnage at the scene fell into confusion. Reactions varied, but everyone was half out of their minds in similar ways.

Despite badgering the communications squad leader, the radio showed no signs of working.

Not entirely good news, but fortunately, the clergy and mages were relatively composed.

However, the real problem lay elsewhere.

“Why is everything completely destroyed?”

“…”

“Veronica?”

“…Damn it.”

The demon-sealing formation was shattered to pieces. The Magic Tower’s secondary barriers, totems, and rune stones were all completely destroyed.

Hard to believe, but it was reality.

And reality was cruel.

Now we had to accept it. The seal was broken and the demon had escaped. The situation was already heading toward the worst-case scenario, though the extent remained unclear.

“Veronica, Francesca.”

I quickly regained my composure and called the two.

“Deploy people to search the surroundings. Right now.”

The Saint and the Alchemist mobilized forces from the Order and the Magic Tower to begin tracking.

Holy knights and inquisitors kicked down doors of surrounding buildings, while mages took to the night sky searching for traces of the demon. Thanks to the military evacuating all residents in the area, there were no civilian casualties yet.

With the situation this dire, the Imperial Army also came to their senses and began responding. The battalion commander immediately sent messengers to relay the situation to the regiment and nearby battalions, then moved his troops to track the demon. The heavily armed Imperial forces advanced northward.

Meanwhile, Veronica took a shotgun from the passenger seat and slung it over her shoulder, then pulled out a revolver and examined its cylinder.

“Let’s split up. I’ll go east with the holy knights. Major, take our siblings and the Hero and go west.”

She was saying she could kill the demon alone, so we should stick together.

She added that if anyone found traces of the demon, they should shoot magic or holy power high into the sky as a signal.

“What if something goes wrong?”

“Then you’ll die by my hand, Major.”

“Be careful, Veronica.”

Veronica nodded.

“You too, Major.”

*

The forces of the Empire, the Order, and the Magic Tower scattered in all directions to search for traces of the demon. Combat mages from the Empire and the Magic Tower monitored the alleys and spaces between buildings from the air, while soldiers and holy knights burst into buildings to thoroughly search their interiors.

“The demon seems stronger than we thought.”

The demon-sealing formation and barrier were broken. From the circumstances, it appears the demon broke the seal itself, emerged, killed all the surrounding forces, and escaped.

Francesca assessed the demon’s power in a calm tone. Despite her plain evaluation, a slightly tense voice escaped from between her lips.

Lucia added:

“It’s strong. And cunning too.”

“Can we catch it?”

“I can’t be certain. But with people’s lives at stake, we can’t just stand by.”

Orbentsk, a forest of buildings under the dark blue sky.

We began racing through the gray city shrouded in darkness. I drove silently down the road with my companions in the vehicle.

Even divided into four sections, searching a city the size of Goyang is no easy task. Moreover, our opponent is a demon. No one knows or can predict what means it will use to evade surveillance.

“Have none of the talismans in this area activated?”

“No.”

Lucia answered from the back seat while examining a map. The discolored parchment map was one of the Order’s holy relics, the Navigator’s Map—the very same map we had used to find demons along with St. Balthasar’s remains.

“Not just nearby, but all the talismans throughout the city are quiet.”

“…”

While the map was quiet, the city was the opposite.

The sudden appearance of military forces was enough to wake the sleeping citizens. Despite the lockdown orders and blackout regulations, Orbentsk residents gradually began coming outside or opening their windows to check what was happening.

To control the citizens, soldiers repeatedly broadcast instructions to refrain from going outside through speakers mounted on armored vehicles.

The military’s street broadcasts echoed throughout Orbentsk. Citizens awakened in the middle of the night returned to their homes in confusion.

When are these people going to evacuate? Surely they’re not planning to fight in this state?

As I turned the steering wheel and sped down the road, Camilla, sitting in the passenger seat and staring tensely out the window, suddenly muttered in surprise.

“Huh?”

“What? What’s wrong?”

“No, that person seems a bit strange… I have a weird feeling about them.”

“Who?”

“That person over there.”

A slender finger pointed at the window. The direction it indicated was the pitch-black night sky, and a certain mage flying through it.

The mage was riding a broomstick.

“What’s strange about—”

At that moment, the flying mage suddenly changed direction.

The figure, which had been flying smoothly in a straight line while scanning left and right, abruptly stopped in mid-air, then changed direction and began to glide. It looked like someone riding a bicycle down a steep slope with both feet off the pedals.

In other words, they were descending.

For some reason, the mage who had sharply changed direction lowered their altitude while riding the broomstick.

Gaining speed and rapidly losing altitude, the mage did not stop.

Even passing the tops of buildings,

Even passing the middle floors of apartments,

They did not stop descending.

The mage, who had appeared as a small dot, gradually came closer. The small dot transformed into the silhouette of a person and a long broomstick, showed the movement of a fluttering cape, and eventually grew large enough to make out the mage’s appearance and features.

The mage clinging to the broomstick raced through the city against the backdrop of the dark night sky.

Finally, when the figure on the broomstick disappeared between the concrete jungle—

-THUD!

The mage, who painted the asphalt red, was finally able to stop flying. It was on the sidewalk just a dozen meters away from where we had parked.

“…”

Silence descended.

Lucia stared wide-eyed with both hands covering her mouth. Francesca carefully gripped the handle of her rune sword without making even a breath sound, and Camilla gulped dryly.

The awkward silence was broken by the click of a bolt being cocked.

“Get out of the car right now.”

I grabbed my rifle and opened the driver’s door.