episode_0164

I woke up suddenly with the intention of giving them a surprise, but they all fixed their eyes on me without making a sound or making a single gesture. Feeling embarrassed for no reason, I stuck out my tongue and tasted it.

“Tsk. Why are these guys so cautious when they catch people and draw their blood? Wouldn’t it be good if there was one more person caught?”

I glanced around, hoping that someone would accept what I said, but no one made even a movement and remained silent. In some ways, the appearance creates a quite scary atmosphere, but it would have been better if at least some of his personal characteristics had stood out.

However, the people glaring at me all looked the same, with their faces covered except for their eyes, and they were all wearing slightly baggy black cloth clothes that made it difficult to discern their body shape.

Another feature that is the same is the sword worn at the waist. Unlike regular swords, the body of the sword was not straight but twisted here and there, so it seemed like it might be the magic sword people were talking about.

“Is it all you seven?”

“…….”

“Wow, who on earth am I talking to?”

Maybe he’s doing that because he doesn’t want to give me even the slightest bit of information. As I said before, it was possible to read people’s minds if you wanted to, so it was a meaningless thing to do.

While I was contemplating whether or not to use my faith to read their inner thoughts, one of them lunged at me. The sight of him holding out a dark red, messily distorted sword towards the solar plexus without hesitation was a display of skill beyond that of stabbing a person once or twice.

Naturally, his attack had little effect. This is because a sudden gust of wind widened the distance between me and him. Even though there was a strong wind that could blow away a person’s body, the other person spoke calmly without any sign of surprise.

“He is an elementalist.”

“Could it be magic?”

“No, I didn’t see anything resembling a magic trick. It is a natural phenomenon.”

“They talk nicely among themselves. Bad guys.”

Feeling shameful, I gave a suppression order through Sirocco. The wind was so strong that it was difficult to breathe, so everyone ducked down to prepare for being blown away. In other words, it means that they were suppressed so that they could not move.

“Hmm… what happens now?”

No matter how I looked at it, it seemed difficult to get anything from them through conversation. However, it’s not like they have a knack for threatening others, so after much deliberation, I decided to look into their heads.

“Where… How did you do it?”

It is no exaggeration to say that the power of faith is truly omnipotent, but that does not mean it is a power that can be easily used. It was not a power I could use without hesitation unless it was my ability to conceive right now.

Of course, I received a lot of advice from Stella and Prinia in preparation for situations like this, but this was my first time actually managing my faith in a complex way, and as it happened, the loophole that arose for that reason brought about unexpected variables.

“Ugh!”

Something suddenly thrown through the wind grazed my cheek. Along with a burning sensation, warm liquid flows down my face and drips onto my chin. The bleeding itself wasn’t a problem, but the first thought that crossed my mind was ‘how’.

“Throwing a knife through the wind that you can’t even control?”

The words were uttered out of pure curiosity, but as expected, none of them opened their mouths. Rather, except for the person who threw the knife at me first, the rest of the people somehow raised their knives and swung them at me.

It was an action that was literally a meaningless struggle, but surprisingly, the magic sword that left their hands rushed towards me like a javelin thrown with proper aim.

At a glance, it was clear that the magic sword itself had some kind of ability, so I quickly flew upward. I don’t know exactly what kind of power they had, but those magic swords had enough power to break through Sirocco’s wind and pierce me.

There is one more shocking fact: the magic sword that failed to hit me and was thrown away began to return to its original owners’ hands. Those ominous things that did not fly normally and did not resemble a sword that twisted intermittently as if crawling on the ground were able to target me once again.

“…That’s strange. He was clearly cut by a magic sword, but he looked unharmed.”

“As expected, he is an unexpected enemy in many ways.”

“I suggest changing the plan into the fifth.”

“I agree.”

They are talking among themselves again. No matter how much I eavesdropped, I still didn’t learn any information and my curiosity only increased. If I dare to guess, it seems that the average person loses all their strength if they are even slightly cut by a magic sword.

“No, so what are you guys, what is that magic sword, and who is behind you? I keep asking questions, why do you keep talking about things that only you know?”

Out of anger, I sent overly strong thoughts to Sirocco, and Sirocco, who accepted them as his will, just crushed them. Pressed here means that since Sirocco is a wind spirit, he pressed using air. I don’t know how hard he pressed, but his entire body was twisted and the magic sword fell to the ground.

“Uh, oh my.”

It may be obvious, but if you die, your thoughts cannot be read. Fortunately, it was only an instant, so no one died immediately, but it still seemed like everyone would die soon. I immediately moved to the center of where they fell and raised their faith.

‘So… how did you do it?’

Although time was tight, perhaps because there were no interruptions, I was able to safely access their heads as I had learned.

“Um…?”

The approach itself was clearly successful, but the memory could not be read due to the intervention of a completely unexpected person. It was as if someone from the outside had put a lock on their heads, preventing them from looking inside.

“This is….”

Normally, when you see magic you’ve never heard of before, it’s normal to not be able to guess whose magic it is, but for some reason, I felt like I knew the identity of the person who took these measures. This is because I felt a familiar energy from the remnants of magical power.

“Phew… I felt a strange sense of déjà vu ever since I heard about the magic sword…”

Since it was a technique that blocked not only magical power but also the power of faith, the suspect had already been identified. Akasha. A name you never want to think of again, and a name you should never forget. The only one who could do something like this was a dragon, a supreme being from the beginning, and one who had repeatedly studied gods.

“Oh, let’s give it a try, right…?”

For no reason, I felt embarrassed. This is because I was reminded of the fact that when we met in the past, I suffered without even trying. Of course, it couldn’t be proper revenge since he wasn’t actually here and would only destroy the magic he had designed and left behind, but on the other hand, if he couldn’t even do this, the day of revenge on Akasha would never come.

The vital signs of the dying people were gradually weakening, but they paid it no mind and focused on Akasha’s technique. Looking at it this way, it seems like I too have abandoned my human sensibilities.

By leisurely analyzing Akasha’s magic without interference from those around me, what I learned was how Akasha neutralizes faith. Basically, the power of faith, which operates based on the strong faith of an unspecified number of people, is suppressed by the corresponding ‘disbelief’.

This method, which is very simple in words, was truly possible because of Akasha. It was necessary to build sufficient knowledge about God and faith, and to have the ability to apply the intangible concepts of faith and disbelief to objects other than oneself.

I wondered how the former would have worked out well since it was a dragon, but I had no idea how on earth they made it happen for the latter. I thought it was probably an extension of the ability to use the corridor of memories I had experienced in the past or something.

“…Oh, then it’s a bit dangerous.”

Akasha has already acquired the landscape and information about the Earth where I lived through me. From his perspective, it was just the right thing to neutralize the power of God. Compared to this place, faith on Earth was very shallow.

Somehow, he read my memories and really liked it…

One more bad news is that, despite my eagerness to unlock the magic just a moment ago, I have no way of doing anything about the lock. I don’t know if it was because of truly acquiring information about the Earth, but it was because Akasha’s power had become one level stronger.

“Damn.”

All I could do was grunt and retrieve the magic sword used by this unidentified group and collect the kidnapped people.

Of course, that alone was enough to earn the church’s gratitude, but now that they had figured out that Akasha was behind these kidnappers, it was uncomfortable to let things go like this.

Fortunately, I had the magic sword, so now it was time to figure out what Akasha was planning to do with it.