Chapter 38
He, too, had recently begun to harbor considerable doubts about Cheyan’s behavior.
Lately, almost everything coming from his mouth was the same story.
“Ceres treated me like a beggar at first. Even now… well, I don’t think she really sees me as the head of the magic tower or anything.”
“Is that something to say with a smile? After being treated like a beggar!”
Or:
“Luca! Ceres gave me an extra piece of meat today!”
“You usually don’t eat much meat, though.”
And:
“You know, Ceres, today…”
In any case, Cheyan had been visiting the stew shop every single day recently. Whenever someone tried to accompany him, he would raise his fur and become immediately wary.
“I thought it was because of the magic stone.”
At first, when he heard that the shop’s owner possessed the magic stone Cheyan had been desperately searching for, he assumed Cheyan’s behavior was part of a calculated plan to obtain it.
“But that wasn’t it.”
It seemed the magic stone had already fallen out of his interest.
Instead, something else in the shop had captured his attention.
“Could it be… that woman?”
He had always been the type to fall for things easily and just as easily lose interest, so he assumed it would be the same this time.
He didn’t know exactly what it was, but he was sure that, as always, he would soon lose interest and move on to something new.
“But this time… it feels different.”
Watching Cheyan suddenly vanish after casting magic in an uncharacteristically urgent manner, he sensed that something unusual was going on.
“What’s going on?”
Slowly, Luca too began to wonder what exactly was in that shop and what kind of person the shop’s owner was.
[Squeeeeak!]
Bang!
[Gurgle!]
“If you’re a rat, then play in the gutter like a rat. Why the hell are you gnawing on buildings?”
The head of a massive rat, gnawing voraciously on the wall of a building, exploded in an instant and fell to the ground.
“Long time no see, Vacula.”
Vacula.
It looked like a rat—exactly like one.
Except its size was bigger than that of an average adult human.
It even ate humans and destroyed buildings indiscriminately.
Nothing survived in regions where these creatures appeared. The saliva from a Vacula’s mouth was extremely poisonous.
A poison strong enough to even corrode iron.
“Nice to see you too, huh.”
Ceres clicked his tongue and dashed toward the Vacula that was chewing through another building with great enthusiasm.
[Screeeee!]
Upon spotting Ceres, the Vacula swung its sharp claws and spat its venom.
Splut!
[Craaak!]
“Filthy. How old are you, drooling like that?”
But the stick Ceres wielded struck the head faster than its saliva could reach him.
“Have you guys even changed?”
Watching the other Vaculas, who were busy chewing on buildings oblivious to whether their comrades were dead or alive, Ceres shook his head slightly.
The Black Forest.
When he lived as Grace, he had entered countless times.
Not merely as a healer, but as the head of the Ellesia Count family—called the Sword of the Empire—he could never ignore the forest’s happenings.
“You gotta stretch your legs where you lie. Do you have any idea how many of your ancestors I sent to the heavens? There’s no one who’s entered the Black Forest as much as I have.”
Ah, well, there was one.
“Kai.”
There was no place where the Black Forest appeared as frequently as in the Persha Duchy.
As a result, Kainel also had to deal with the forest so often that he grew utterly fed up with it.
“To kill all of you would take forever.”
Unlike the others, it would be easier if they all attacked at once—but these ones had to be hunted and killed one by one.
There were two ways to escape the Black Forest.
One: kill all the monsters inside it.
The other…
“Where’s the boss?”
Deal with the final boss of this area.
Then the Black Forest would disappear without having to kill each rat individually.
“Here it is.”
Ceres’ gaze, scanning the surroundings, stopped at a single point.
In the distance, he sensed an unusually strong presence.
Clutching a wooden rod untouched by the blood of monsters, Ceres quickly vanished from the spot.
“Vacula?”
“Whoa, damn.”
“Hah, this is driving me crazy.”
“Why does it have to be these things!”
The mercenaries muttered curses one after another upon realizing the identity of the monsters tearing through buildings and attacking people in the darkness.
“How are we supposed to catch all of them?”
Individually, Vaculas weren’t that much of a problem.
They were big and their saliva was deadly, but they weren’t super monsters that couldn’t be handled.
The real problem was their sheer numbers.
To leave the Black Forest, they had to deal with every last one of them.
“Or should we just go after the boss?”
Who? How?
“Are you crazy? That’s a death sentence for all of us!”
The boss of the Vaculas was so powerful that ordinary mercenaries wouldn’t dare approach.
Its entire body exuded venom, and its enormous size alone was terrifying.
Attacking it with the current number of people would be pure suicide.
“The guild master should come.”
At the very least, someone like the Black Guild Master, Skal, would be needed to match it.
Dozens of mercenaries like them wouldn’t even scratch it.
“Let’s just handle these ones until reinforcements arrive.”
“Yeah.”
[Squeeeeak!]
Sensing hostility, the Vaculas glanced at the mercenaries while continuing to gnaw.
Inside the Black Forest’s darkness, dozens of giant rats with red eyes stared back at the mercenaries, who swallowed nervously.
Vrrroooom-
“…?!”
At that moment, the mercenaries who had drawn their swords were dumbfounded. The Vaculas suddenly lifted off the ground simultaneously as if ready to charge.
[Squeee?]
Flame burst!
[Craaack!]
A huge burst of fire struck the Vaculas’ bodies!
With terrible screams, the Vaculas burned in midair.
“What… what is that?”
Watching them vanish in an instant, the mercenaries’ faces went blank.
Were Vaculas really so easy to deal with?
“Excuse me.”
“…!”
A bright voice reached their ears.
Turning their heads, they saw a young man walking casually toward them.
“Isn’t that the guy? The young man I’ve been seeing at the stew shop recently?”
“Yeah, I think so… That sly guy who jokes around but quietly looks for chances to cut in.”
“Seems like it’s him.”
The familiar face made the mercenaries whisper among themselves.
They had vaguely heard he was a magician… Could that magic just now have been his doing?
“Excuse me, have you seen the stew shop owner?”
At Cheyan’s question, the mercenaries slowly shook their heads in a daze.
A long sigh escaped Cheyan’s lips.
“Where on earth did that girl go?”
Earlier, where he had paused, Cheyan had seen only Ceres’ younger sister and the shop staff huddled together.
He had hurried out when he heard Ceres had gone out to take care of something, but no matter how much he searched, he could not find her.
“What is she, really?”
Cheyan’s gaze fell to his hands.
He held a small black stone.
“What’s that?”
“Miss Ceres gave it to me. She said it’s a defense stone.”
“…”
The black stone held by Colin.
Seeing the stone, imbued with protective magic, Cheyan could not speak for a while.
He had to resist the urge to rush to his lab and analyze the stone immediately.
“How could such a formula exist…”
It was astonishing.
Examining the magical formula within the small stone, he felt as if he had been struck hard on the head with a blunt weapon.
“And this powerful mana…”
It would last only about three hours, but it had incredible defensive power, enough to even block a dragon’s breath.
“To use something like this just to block minor threats… that’s too much.”
So he had begged and finally received it.
After the shop was surrounded by several layers of magical protection, Cheyan took the defense stone and immediately set out to find Ceres.
“How does she even have something like this?”
After the magic stone, now a defense stone with a formula he had never seen before.
Everything Ceres possessed was extraordinary.
What on earth was that woman?
