WFLRN Chapter 38

Chapter 38

“Who the hell are you!”

“Can you shut that trap? You’ll wake the baby!”

Uh, your voice is actually louder, you know?

Watching Ron yell even louder than the furious Baldini, Bendia pressed her forehead.

“If you wake him up after I finally got him to sleep, you’re dead.”

Ron’s voice carried a lethal warning.

“Regen!”

Kate hurriedly approached Ron.

Ron carefully handed Regen, who was in his arms, over to Kate. The reluctance on his face was obvious.

“Kate. Stay inside. We’ll call you once it’s settled.”

“I’m sorry…”

At Bendia’s words, Kate apologized and went inside.

“Who are you people! You can’t just use violence like this!”

“Oh yeah? And what that bastard was about to do to her—was that supposed to be a compliment?”

At Gregory’s absurd remark, Ron snorted with a mocking laugh.

Noticing Ron’s fine clothes, Gregory at least refrained from speaking informally to him—
even though he had been using casual, dismissive speech with Bendia. A typical bully who’s strong to the weak and weak to the strong. It was laughable.

“B-blood…!”

Feeling something warm, Baldini wiped under his nose and turned pale when he saw blood on his hand.

Apparently, he was the type to care far too much about his own body. One nosebleed, and he was trembling all over.

“Seize that bastard! Assaulting someone right in front of the police? Throw him in jail—!”

As Baldini flailed around in rage, he suddenly froze mid-sentence.

“Yes. I’ll place him under arrest immediately.”

“Wait!”

Baldini instantly grabbed Gregory by the scruff before he could step forward. His wide, quivering eyes locked on Ron’s fiery red hair.

“Could it be… Sean…?”

CRASH!

“Argh!”

A tray came flying again and struck Baldini squarely. He screamed in pain.

Being hit in the same spot again made it hurt twice as much.

“Buzz off, fly. Stop getting in the way of business.”

Ron’s blood-red eyes gleamed with menace. The chilling warning made everyone’s skin crawl.

“Mr. Baldini, this time I really will—”

“L-let’s go! Now!”

Dragging Gregory with him, Baldini bolted from the shop, looking pale as if he had just seen a ghost.

“What’s that about? Why’d he run like that?”

“Guess he realized everyone just saw what an idiot he is.”

Ron shrugged slyly at Bendia’s question.

But she still didn’t look convinced and tilted her head.

“This is all a lie. Everything was fabricated…”

Charles, collapsed on the floor, muttered in despair.

Bendia leaned in close to him, shoving her face near his.

“Pulling a stunt like this means you haven’t been beaten enough yet. Should I call Peter to—”

“Aaahhh!”

Charles sprang up and ran off in terror.

“Always getting his ass kicked and still acting cocky.”

With a satisfied sigh, Bendia dusted off her hands and looked back at Ron standing behind her.

“But hey, Tenant.”

“H-huh? Y-yeah?”

Ron, who had just started to relax, flinched nervously. He worried she had noticed something—maybe overheard something.

“How do you do that?”

“…Do what?”

“Kick objects into the air with your foot like that.”

Her question was so absentminded that his nervousness instantly felt pointless.

“Think you can pull it off? If someone comes at you, just punch them in the face.”

“Tch.”

“We… we can’t delay this any longer.”

“Who said you should? Go ahead and announce it.”

Unlike the priest trembling in fear, the man before him was calm and unhurried.

In broad daylight, inside a chamber deep within the temple, four people were present.

At the head seat sat Apriest, the man expected to become the next High Priest.

Two priests stood behind him, hands clasped, shaking visibly.

“The oracle must be revealed to the world exactly as it is, with complete transparency!”

Apriest finally raised his voice, refusing to back down.

Smuggling away a divine oracle before it was proclaimed was an act of betrayal against the gods themselves. Overcome by fear, he had broken that sacred taboo.

“Good grief. What part of our conversation did you not understand?”

The man resting a fearsome sword on his shoulder glared with wild eyes, his voice edged with irritation.

“This is the will and voice of the gods. We humans—especially heretics like you—have no right to conceal it… guh!”

In a flash, the man swung his blade, then casually rested the bloodied sword back on his shoulder.

A beat later, Apriest’s body collapsed lifelessly to the side.

“…”

“…”

The two priests behind him were struck dumb, their faces pale, trembling violently while splattered with blood.

“Click. And who do you think raised you up to that position? Can’t serve the gods, can’t serve our master’s grace either?”

The man muttered irritably, his face showing not the slightest hint of remorse for killing someone. He even spat beside Apriest’s still-open eyes.

“So. Who’s next?”

He looked at the two priests and asked in a tone as casual as if assigning cleaning duty.

The priests trembled like leaves, unable to speak, still in shock from what they had just witnessed.

“Don’t want to?”

His pressing tone made it clear—it wasn’t a question. Refuse, and they’d meet the same fate.

“I-I… I’ll do it.”

At last, the senior priest, who had joined a year earlier than the other, raised his hand.

The man beckoned him forward with a flick of his finger.

Shaking violently, the priest stepped up before him.

“Name.”

“J-Jamie Efron.”

“Good. Jamie. So what should we do now?”

“I-I will… proclaim the oracle.”

“How?”

“O-only the portion you told me will be proclaimed in the name of the gods.”

“And the rest?”

“I… I’ll burn it.”

“That’s it! See? You can do it. Why make me repeat myself two or three times?”

The man snapped his fingers with a bright grin.

“Well done.”

Then he roughly tousled Jamie’s hair like he would a beast.

“Alright, I’m counting on you, Jamie.”

“Y-yes…”

Jamie bowed unconsciously, as if to a superior. The man laughed arrogantly and tore the scroll apart.

“How’d it go?”

At his next stop, the man asked the one before him.

“We’ve retrieved them, Lord Monsen.”

The staff member bowed his head at once.

Satisfied, Monsen grinned from ear to ear. It had taken longer than expected, but the job was done.

He tossed his bloodstained sword carelessly aside and walked up to the desk.

Stacks of confiscated reports were piled high.

“Damn, they really spread this crap everywhere.”

Monsen clicked his tongue at the stack, nearly a handspan tall.

Thinking of the trouble this mess had caused him, his anger flared all over again.

“To commit this kind of act and still hold a funeral? Should’ve made him die in agony.”

Still dissatisfied, Monsen picked up the reports himself.

“Wait.”

His face suddenly hardened.

Counting the bundles, there should have been seven in total. But one was missing.

“One’s missing.”

“T-the thing is… we couldn’t find the last one no matter what we tried…”

The staffer stammered, sweating bullets.

“Are you kidding me?!”

“Ugh!”

Monsen hurled him aside in an instant.

“Bring me the last one! Right now!”

Knowing exactly what happened when Monsen’s anger boiled over, the others bolted out of the room.

“Damn it, damn it! How am I supposed to explain this to my master…!”

Fuming, Monsen flung the pile of reports into the ever-burning blue flames at the chamber’s rear.

Whoosh.

The reports, once so numerous, were engulfed in fire and gone in an instant.

He had expected to finish cleanly and be praised by his master, but now everything was tangled up.

“I won’t let this slide.”

Unable to hold back his rage, he stormed out after the staff.

Behind him, the ashes of a paper vanished into nothing. The words on it had read:
“Research results on the effects of magic-tool production on the environment.”