Ch.9191. Necromancer (3)

The necromancer, Sebast Commitor, was once a mage of the Magic Tower.

Born as the son of a laborer’s family in the Holy Empire, he showed magical aptitude at the age of eight and was practically sold to the Magic Tower. Once there… he surprisingly enjoyed a comfortable childhood.

Within the Tower, he was assigned to the “Attack School,” which focused on offensive magic, and as if blessed by the heavens, Sebast’s magical aptitude was perfectly suited for the aggressive “Fire Magic.”

In this chaotic world of endless wars, the demand for attack magic only ever increased, never decreased, which meant Sebast’s future was all but guaranteed.

Fire Magic, in particular, was a highly lethal form of magic that satisfied both area attacks and anti-personnel combat. Even at the lower ranks, one could be treated as an officer in the Holy Empire’s army, and at the intermediate level, one could live comfortably respected wherever they went.

Considering Sebast’s abundant magical talent, his life had essentially been set on a path to success.

Indeed, at the young age of thirty, he had broken through two barriers to reach the realm of an intermediate mage. Had things continued this way, his life would have concluded successfully with nothing to envy.

However… problems always tend to arise from unexpected places.

Just as druids undergo physical changes through their communion with nature, Sebast, who repeatedly contacted the mysteries of flame, experienced changes in both body and mind due to this influence.

Like most fire magic users, he became fearless and bold, his beard blazed like flames, and his personality turned aggressive and passionate.

And gradually, Sebast began to change in concerning ways.

While passion and boldness might be good qualities in terms of developing drive and decisiveness, they come with the fatal flaw of lacking prudence and composure.

To make matters worse, Sebast, who had always craved power, was not satisfied with his current status (intermediate attack school mage), and eventually, like typical fallen mages, he reached for the forbidden knowledge of the Magic Tower.

Of course, Sebast, though imprudent, was no fool—he avoided making contracts with demons or outer gods where he would inevitably lose out.

Instead, Sebast immersed himself deeply in the path of necromancy, relying on his own research and capabilities.

It began simply as a way to supplement the lacking utility of fire magic, but as time passed, he became increasingly influenced by necromantic energy and gradually fell into corruption.

Initially only using bone creation magic, he soon became interested in commanding undead through necromancy, and eventually fell completely into necromancy when he began manipulating corpses to create advanced undead.

While outwardly maintaining his position as vice dean of the Attack School and quietly biding his time, he finally committed his crime.

After grave-robbing two knights’ corpses from a massive cemetery in a margraviate capital, he faked his own death and disappeared without a trace.

Though the Inquisition of the Pantheon eventually tried to track him down with suspicions about his activities, by then Sebast had long erased all traces and vanished.

Thus, Necromancer Sebast began to roam the world.

Certain that he would be hunted down if he operated openly, he targeted particularly desolate and remote villages in the frontier margraviates, regions already overwhelmed with defending against regular foreign invasions.

He would devastate entire villages, raising their residents and cemetery corpses as undead servants.

He never forgot to leave false evidence making it appear as though monsters had attacked, just in case.

If these had been prosperous farming villages, investigations would have begun immediately after such incidents, but these remote mountain villages, barely able to sustain themselves and receiving minimal administrative attention from the margraviate, were different.

In this way, the necromancer strategically targeted isolated villages that no outsiders visited except tax collectors, and built an undead army numbering one thousand.

And then…

“Guh, guuuuhhh…!”

Now, Necromancer Sebast could not comprehend how the situation had deteriorated so drastically.

Noticing powerful magical reactions equivalent to several intermediate-level mages approaching his hideout, Sebast, realizing they would soon discover his location, led his army out to confront them.

And what entered Sebast’s eyes was…

A bargain sale of intermediate-level mages demolishing everything he had carefully built over nearly ten years in an instant.

A priest-like holy magic collapsed Sebast’s skeleton legion. The skeleton knights he had meticulously modified were crushed by two intermediate magical beasts that appeared out of nowhere.

In this chaos, Sebast himself could not escape unscathed.

“…!!!”

Lightning struck from above as Sebast desperately engaged in magical combat. The “Divine Retribution” spell inflicted tremendous pain throughout his entire body.

The caster merely designates the target of divine punishment.

The actual attack comes directly from celestial will through this high-level celestial magic, and as a result, Sebast’s physical body was completely devastated.

His frail body, already corrupted by necromantic energy, could not withstand the lightning composed of holy energy, and thus Sebast’s body was damaged beyond any hope of recovery.

The neural pathways in his body used for casting necromantic magic were completely burned to shreds.

His muscles, already gradually withering, were reduced to practically nothing, and the holy power invaded his major organs through his nervous system.

Of course, the life force of a human who had reached the intermediate level could survive even this… but that didn’t guarantee Sebast’s future.

“…What should we do with him?”

“How about throwing him in the underground prison?”

“Good. Let’s do that.”

And so, Sebast’s residence was transferred from his hideout to a special underground prison beneath the Tarasque.

※ ※ ※

Inside the Tarasque, there is an underground prison designed to hold captives.

Though the prison materials are all natural substances and might not look particularly sturdy, the prison—reinforced with various druidic secrets—is the most effective facility for isolating prisoners.

The necromancer was tightly bound with ropes made from “blood-sucking vines,” plants that absorb the vitality and magical power of any living being they touch.

His limbs were petrified using magical tools based on the principles of basilisks’ petrifying evil eyes, and additionally, each cell was transformed into an independent mini-dimension.

Thanks to these measures, the prison was nearly escape-proof, but until now, it had been neglected due to the lack of humans who needed to be imprisoned. After throwing the necromancer in there…

“I’m really, really sorry!”

“It’s fine, it could be considered a way to ward off bad luck. Besides, if you warned me in advance, it wouldn’t serve that purpose, right?”

“…That’s true.”

“See? Then it’s settled. This matter is closed! Let’s eat. I’m hungry.”

“…Thank you, Gregory.”

The two of us, having neatly wrapped up this incident, reached an agreement and… decided to eat first.

No matter how much I had mastered magic in this reincarnation, I couldn’t overcome my past life’s memories. Still feeling like Korean blood flowed through my veins, I felt somehow empty if I didn’t eat meals on time.

Anyway. The two of us continued our conversation while enjoying the beef cream stew we had prepared earlier…

“So, Gregory, what are you going to do with that necromancer?”

“The necromancer, huh…”

Naturally, the central topic of our mealtime conversation was about the captured necromancer.

The necromancer, now worse than crippled due to the effects of Divine Retribution.

At this point, his treatment was essentially inconsequential.

Having lost his ability to cast magic, he was useless, so we could just kill him, or since he was no different from a pre-corpse, we could discard him without worrying about future consequences.

Now that we had completely destroyed the magical power in his body using hydra poison magic, the best use we could make of him was…

“Should we just hand him over to a temple?”

“Like the Temple of the War God or the Temple of Justice?”

“Yeah. It wouldn’t hurt to be on good terms with them.”

Perhaps the best approach would be to hand this necromancer over to an appropriate pantheon temple to build reputation and connections.

Due to the nature of pantheon religious orders, where power is immediately revoked if one violates the norms established by the god, most of them hold considerable social influence and are respected.

So, with the opinion that it wouldn’t hurt to be friendly with them, our conversation was about to conclude when…

The Tarasque we were riding finally arrived near the free city of “Venice.”