Ch.56Decision (1)

“…I didn’t see the power of the Ten Towers.”

On the way out of the promotion examination hall, Kine muttered quietly.

Fair enough. The reason Carisia brought Kine to Elysion was to confirm whether she truly had the will to cooperate with Hydra Company and stand against the Ten Towers.

Would her desire for revenge remain unbroken even after witnessing the immense power of the Ten Towers?

But the Ten Towers didn’t intervene in this terrorist attack. Blasphemia could be considered a power of the Ten Towers, but Kine hadn’t witnessed a moment when the true mysteries preserved by the Ten Towers were wielded.

I nodded.

“That’s certainly true. I thought the Ten Towers would step in and crush Arguirion’s attack in one go, but surprisingly, it turned into a confrontation with Blasphemia.”

“From the Ten Towers’ perspective, do they think there’s no need for them to intervene? Do they consider their subcontractor Blasphemia sufficient?”

I couldn’t possibly know what the Ten Towers’ leadership was thinking.

As we arrived at the magical train station, the loudspeaker crackled to life once again.

“Attention all mages of Elysion. Extra-dimensional infectious entities dispersed by the terrorist organization are still lurking throughout Elysion.”

“Special personnel have been dispatched to handle these infectious entities. If you spot one, please refrain from approaching and contact the Elysion Safety and Disaster Department.”

“The infectious entities appear to have been dispersed in areas with high foot traffic, including infrastructure facilities—”

Kine visibly tensed. The magical train station was indeed an ideal place for silver sand hosts to hide.

“Don’t worry, Miss Kine. We have the boss with us.”

“Ortes, are you planning to dump this on the boss?”

Carisia took my words as a joke. But I wasn’t joking. Honestly, I doubted whether any number of silver sand hosts could even scratch Carisia.

“No. That’s not it. Something ominous…”

In the distance, I could see a unit approaching, wearing visors. I could sense the dark attribute mana swirling around them.

Carisia quickly identified them.

“They’re undead soldiers from the Dark Abyss Tower. Well, I figured either Silver Iron or Dark Abyss would step in.”

***

Even after the situation was resolved with the Arguirion mage’s self-destruction, the Ten Towers didn’t take their eyes off Elysion.

This was based on the inference that Arguirion couldn’t have sent just one terrorist. If the main perpetrator was killed before achieving all objectives, Arguirion would have wasted their personnel for nothing.

Under the assumption that there must be at least one backup operative to continue the plan even if the main perpetrator was eliminated early, the Ten Towers initiated additional search operations.

Of course, that backup operative had long since died with their brain fried by Carisia’s magic, but the Ten Towers hadn’t yet received information about who attacked the promotion examination hall.

The Silver Iron Tower and Dark Abyss Tower were at odds over the composition of the search team. Silver sand—which infects mages and uses mana as a power source for replication.

Everyone agreed that to minimize damage from silver sand infection, either Silver Iron’s automatons or Dark Abyss’s undead were suitable. After all, they were tools that could be reproduced even if destroyed.

“Can’t you see when looking at the silver sand? It seems to have poor compatibility with automatons that belong to the same metallic category. Sending out undead would be the approach with the fewest variables.”

“On the contrary, because they’re of the same category, there might be methods we can try. Silver Iron’s secret techniques might be able to control that silver sand as well.”

It went without saying that both sides felt greed for this extra-dimensional product.

In principle, extra-dimensional products were supposed to be jointly sealed and monitored by all Ten Towers.

But the Towers knew. Behind the scenes, everyone was studying extra-dimensions in search of clues for ascension.

This time, only the two towers most suitable for dealing with silver sand were showing obvious greed, but depending on what secrets Arguirion held, the attention of all Ten Towers might be drawn.

The two towers, unwilling to give up new clues, agreed to dispatch their respective forces without interfering with each other.

The battalions of automatons and undead that descended upon Elysion scattered according to their masters’ orders. Under the pretext of eliminating remaining silver sand hosts, a paranoid search operation began.

It was mere chance that Kine encountered Dark Abyss’s undead rather than Silver Iron’s automatons.

***

Kine sensed a familiar power within the undead. At the same time, confusion overwhelmed her.

This power shouldn’t exist in Elysion, the sacred land of magic.

Divine power. The power of those who believe in gods.

The undead battalion slowly dismantling the silver sand hosts looked very different from the skeletal soldiers typically associated with undead in old tales.

Giants covered from head to toe in black reinforced fiber artificial muscles. Their faces were concealed by helmets with a dark luster, their visors allowing no visibility from the outside. Metal plates attached around the heart area suggested that the undead cores were installed inside.

Ortes whispered to Kine, who sensed divine power from the undead.

“Don’t be too tense. It raises suspicion.”

“How…!”

“The undead handled by the Dark Abyss Tower are different from conventional undead. Don’t mages who become liches achieve near-immortality by storing their souls in reliquaries? They’ve simply improved upon that method.”

They create a type of pseudo-reliquary by binding the souls of those they’ve killed into magic stones. Then they construct artificial bodies to install these cores.

The skeletons are manufactured from reinforced alloys, and each fiber of the specially woven muscles is inscribed with the highest-grade enhancement magic typically engraved on Blasphemia. As a result, the durability of Dark Abyss Tower’s undead battalion is on a completely different level from conventional undead.

The culmination of capital that only the Ten Towers could realize.

They were called Spartoi (Σπαρτοί), meaning “the sown ones,” because installing soul-bound magic stones into artificial bodies resembled planting seeds.

These special undead, continuously improved by the Dark Abyss Tower throughout history, could use the power of the souls while maintaining absolute safety by disconnecting the magic stone from the body the moment a soul rebelled.

“There’s one problem with this method. Using ordinary souls as cores would result in just slightly tougher undead. To make Spartoi cost-effective, you need souls that accumulate power, namely mages or…”

Ortes deliberately let his words trail off. That was enough for Kine to understand.

Mages, or priests’ souls.

Kine tried to count the Spartoi that had descended upon Elysion. At a glance, there seemed to be several hundred, possibly reaching a thousand.

In terms of simple believers, there might still be tens of thousands, perhaps even a hundred thousand.

But how many priests who could accumulate divine power in their souls and manifest miracles?

Even if priests were gathered from all religious orders, it was questionable whether they could reach ten thousand.

Kine asked in astonishment:

“How could there be so many?”

Ortes gestured. Carisia deployed a sound-blocking barrier. Moving slowly out of sight of the mage controlling the Spartoi, Ortes murmured:

“Ah, it’s a simple story, Miss Kine.”

Originally, this world was ruled by priests. They could be considered equivalent to the position of today’s mages, both in status and numbers.

“Where do you think all those priestly classes went?”

The magic stones embedded in the Spartoi were evidence of massacres accumulated over thousands of years.

“Well. They probably wouldn’t put souls that truly survived over a thousand years into such mass-produced weapons. Souls that endured for so long without deteriorating are precious. Considering the compatibility of magic stones from different eras, perhaps one or two centuries?”

“…Can enemy souls be made to obey so easily?”

“A soul’s will to resist and the use of its abilities should be viewed separately. The artificial bodies of the Spartoi are completely under the control of the Dark Abyss Tower. Forcibly suppressing resistance and extracting power would accelerate the soul’s consumption, though.”

How many magic stones do you think the Ten Towers have accumulated?

Ortes’s whisper ended with that question. Kine realized that the Ten Towers truly regarded believers’ souls as consumables.

They were no different from batteries to operate the Spartoi. Or perhaps they should be compared to magic inscription drives, given that the abilities available varied depending on the installed soul.

It was a horrific fate. The Ten Towers’ attitude of using humans as literal disposables.

Kine saw not the power of the Ten Towers, but their ugliness.

Her vague desire for revenge took concrete form.

‘My talent is…’

Coincidentally, Kine’s mana was of the dark attribute. The attribute of the Dark Abyss Tower that controlled the Spartoi.

Kine realized what she needed to do.

Ortes had made her learn dark attribute magic, using reunion with her family as hostage. Claiming that with dark magic’s necromancy, she could meet her family’s souls.

Necromancy was magic that dealt with both summoning and banishing souls. Ortes had been preparing her from the beginning to face these Spartoi.

It was an offer she couldn’t refuse, even knowing she was being used.

Not just for the calculated reason that she needed to obey Ortes to get her family’s remains back.

Having seen souls being exploited by the Dark Abyss Tower like this, Kine couldn’t ignore their misfortune and misery.

She had to send the captured souls back to where they belonged.

Surely every moment from Arguirion’s terror attack to witnessing the Spartoi had been within Ortes’s foresight.

Facing an inevitable fate, Kine spoke with a grave expression.

“…I’ve decided, Ortes.”

***

“I’ll join Hydra Company. You really are cunning.”

…?

Suddenly?

What did I do to deserve that? I scratched my head and replied:

“Please discuss employment contracts with the boss. I’m not in charge of personnel matters.”