episode_0013

In the city, those who cannot create value are called bugs.

It could mean homeless people, vagrants, or people who are not in good health.

He was a worthless insect born among such insects.

Because I can’t do anything properly, I depend on the goodwill and kindness of others to survive… I’m a bug that could disappear at any moment.

Just as someone tramples on an ant, no one notices because its very existence is meaningless.

Even though he was kidnapped by a wizard and imprisoned in a huge cave, no one noticed his disappearance.

-If you survive this experiment, I will spare your life.

In a cave reminiscent of a giant jar, the warlocks gave hope to those trapped in the cave and then tortured them.

The reason was unknown.

Because they just kept causing pain to many people without even explaining anything to them.

That is why this place was like a place of solitude (蠱毒) where all kinds of insects that could not survive in the world were gathered together.

It was also the only place where all bugs could prove their worth.

*

Siren was lucky to survive in such a place.

I wondered if it was really luck that I had survived for so long in that hellish place.

… and yet he survived.

The reason was unknown.

Occasionally, I see warlocks repeating to themselves the phrase ‘perfect vessel’.

I could only guess that it just happened to fit some conditions they had set.

-The number of sacrifices is insufficient… If I want to create more sacrifices, I have to do it myself, but if I do that, I might get caught by Carsarilga, so it’s a headache.

-Then it would be better to arrange for the Karsarilga to cooperate with black magic…

As I was spending my days enduring the pain, hearing all sorts of stories and groans of pain from countless people,

In the vast open space, someone’s voice calling out for his family echoed in my ears.

It was a cry that I would not normally have paid attention to.

Could it be because I kept lying down on the floor where there was no warmth at all?

Suddenly, I started to wonder what a normal family was, and I started thinking about this over and over again.

‘They said that family is a group that embraces each other. And they said that family is a group that supports each other.’

I thought about the stories about families I had heard while begging on the street and pictured the ideal family in my mind.

A father who is a bit patriarchal, but is always the first to come running when a problem arises.

A mother who comforts herself in detail every time.

My brother who always jokes around but still always helps me.

As I was smiling softly, dreaming of the ideal family I could never have, the black magician spoke to me.

It was time to start experimenting again.

So I ended up feeding on the despair of so many people.

In fact, it would be more accurate to say that it was injected into my head rather than that I ate it.

Every time these came in, it was like they were forcing food in, and the disgusting feeling kept rising, so it was similar to eating.

For so long, I lived in denial, thinking about a family that could never be formed.

There was no big reason.

After the pain of eating negativity was over, there was nothing else to do, and it was the only way to escape the pain, even if only for a little while.

So, by the time we create the ideal family and complete it by adding settings to each of them.

I began to feel more clearly the loneliness that I had not felt before, and I felt a terrible cold.

So he became trapped in a loneliness that reminded him of poison and became trapped in despair.

The next day, and the day after that, and the day after that…

I couldn’t tell what had happened or how much time had passed, and I was just feeling hopeless as I watched the deaths of countless people.

I felt warmth from far away.

I didn’t know why, but just by him approaching, warmth spread everywhere and my whole body became warm.

It had been so long since I had felt this way that I was frozen in place and just stared at him.

The man who approached her looked at her silently, then slowly extended his hand and spoke.

“Want to go together?”

I don’t know why, but I had a strong intuition that I shouldn’t miss it.

As I was hastily wrapping my arms around him as if I was grabbing hold of a lifeline, he lifted me up easily and spoke.

“Is this a cat or a person?”

“… … ?”

For some unknown reason, he lifted himself up and let out a sigh.

He held me in his arms and helped me escape from the bitterly cold and dark loneliness.

*****

I looked at the siren holding me and smiled awkwardly.

The original plan was to find out who was behind Sister Lilian’s assassination, but instead of finding the mastermind, we only ended up picking up a strange girl.

I don’t know for sure, but since he will become a great wizard in the future, I think it would be better to take him with me for now, so I am walking while holding him in my arms.

Lorraine, who was watching this, spoke to me with a puzzled expression.

“… Little Master, are you going to leave like that?”

I wanted to just put the siren on the ground and tell it to follow me.

It was so tightly clinging to me as if it would never let me go that it was difficult to get it off, so I just gave up and kept walking.

‘In any case, I think it would be good to become friends with Siren, the next great magician.’

I decided to leave it alone for a while to build up my feelings and arrived at the mansion.

I sighed as I saw that numerous maids were looking at me, and asked the nearest maid for a favor.

“Can you give this guy a wash, feed him something, and then let him rest in the guest room?”

“Oh, I understand, Your Majesty.”

The maid lowered her eyes to the floor and trembled as if she was afraid of the very act of talking to me.

I decided to quickly make way for the maid and spoke to Lorraine.

“Get this guy off me.”

“Yes.”

Lorraine lightly picked up Siren, then carried her struggling away in her arms and dragged her to the maid.

I rubbed my shoulders, sighed, and walked to the park inside the mansion to take a short break.

‘First of all, it seems certain that dark magic is involved in the assassination of Sister Lilian…’

It is somewhat puzzling that there is no significant connection between the assassination case and the sewer discovered this time.

As I was worrying about whether I was missing something, a question suddenly popped into my head.

‘Now that I think about it, that black magician guy was pretending to be close to Damian.’

It wasn’t enough to pretend to know, but when I blatantly ignored him, he kept mumbling and talking as if it were natural.

Since I knew there was a high probability that this would happen, I thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea to focus on digging into it.

I’ll have to investigate further to find out, but I think the warlocks might have infiltrated the city more deeply than I thought.

First, I decided to go to Gaju to report this incident.

*

That’s all I know about Dominic Carsaril, the lord of Carsaril.

All he knows is that he is a sword master who can cut down anything with just a thought, and that he is the head of the Karsaril family, a family with strong political influence.

Because I didn’t know exactly what kind of person he was, or what his thoughts were toward Damian.

I decided to take a closer look and decide my attitude, so I knocked on the door of the head of the household’s office.

“Come in.”

A deep, indifferent voice is heard from the other side.

I carefully opened the door and went in. I saw the owner working at an antique desk that looked like it had been made by a craftsman for a long time.

As I greeted him, he looked at me and spoke briefly.

“So what happened?”

I really wanted to tell you that Sister Lilian was assassinated.

Rather than saying it directly, there was a high probability that problems would arise regarding the ‘source of information’.

It would have been right to throw out some bait based on what we have just discovered.

So I tried my best to calm my mind and briefly explained what had happened.

Traces of human experiments and traces of numerous sacrifices were found there.

And let’s look at the family tree, adding that these experiments have been going on longer than expected.

The man looked at me silently, surprised that I had brought up this information, and nodded his head as he continued talking.

“Send investigators and knights to check immediately.”

“Yes.”

There was a sense of tension because there was no evidence and it could have been dismissed as a false report or an unimportant factor.

Contrary to my expectations, I feel relieved when he takes this seriously and says he will look into it.

I was just about to express my gratitude to the Lord.

“And thank you for your hard work. You did a great job.”

An unexpected compliment came to my ear.

I thought he would be stingy with compliments because he seemed so authoritative, but I was surprised that he gave it to me so easily.

It seemed awkward for the teacher to compliment me, so he suddenly looked down at the report without saying anything and shut his mouth.

“… … ”

I was laughing awkwardly because I was a little embarrassed by this situation, and at that moment, I was thinking that it would be a good time to go back.

As he was looking at the report, something occurred to him, so he calmly raised his face and spoke to me indifferently.

“Oh, I forgot to mention that. The negotiations with Wintraven have concluded and the engagement date has been set. The event will be held in ten days in the central city. ”