BXBX NOVEL Chapter 38 – Descent of Evil (2)
Chapter 38 – Descent of Evil (2)
Chapter 38 – Descent of Evil (2)
They left the estate and began walking towards their destination.
The distance wasn’t exactly close; it would take them half a day even if they walked continuously.
When they reached the halfway point, the guard captain suggested taking a break, and the guards began to remove their armor and rest.
Ketal also sat down by a tree, closed his eyes, and leisurely enjoyed the scent of the grass and the breeze.
At that moment, he sensed someone approaching.
The presence hesitated, trembling as if contemplating something, but eventually moved closer to him.
It was an unfamiliar presence.
It was the first time a stranger had approached him first.
Ketal opened his eyes.
“Eek!”
A startled cry escaped as the person realized Ketal was looking at him.
“Hello?”
“Nice to meet you.”
The man had an intellectual look.
He cautiously began to speak.
“Are you… Mr. Ketal by any chance?”
“That’s right.”
“Oh, it really is you.”
The man bowed respectfully.
“Thank you. You saved my life.”
“Hmm?”
Ketal tilted his head in confusion.
The man spoke carefully.
“Um… the recent dungeon incident.”
“Ah!”
Ketal understood.
Karthos had taken about nine hostages.
The man in front of him must have been one of them.
Now that he thought about it, he remembered seeing this face, though at the time, it had been too dazed for him to recognize immediately.
“So you were one of those captured. I’m glad you’re safe.”
“Haha, thanks to you.”
The man scratched his head.
“You saved my life, Mr. Ketal, so I felt I had to thank you properly at least once. Thank you very much for saving me.”
The man bowed deeply.
If it weren’t for Ketal, he would have died and become a plaything for the lich.
It wasn’t an exaggeration to say he owed his life to Ketal.
Ketal felt pleased.
It meant lives had been saved because of his actions.
“By the way, what should I call you?”
“Oh, I haven’t introduced myself yet.”
The man straightened his simple clothing and spoke.
“My name is Guraisan. I’m a mage. Though I’m still a temporary one without even the apprentice title.”
“A mage!”
Ketal’s eyes widened.
The man flinched at his gaze.
‘Did I say something wrong?’
The relationship between barbarians and mages wasn’t great.
Barbarians despised mages for relying on something they considered weak, while mages mocked barbarians as brutes.
However, Ketal was the one who saved him.
That’s why Guraisan explained, but he began to regret it.
Ketal leaned in with an intrigued expression.
“Does that mean you can use magic?”
“Uh, no. Not yet. I’m still a temporary one.”
“Temporary?”
Guraisan explained slowly.
He was an ordinary village youth.
But a passing mage recognized his talent for handling mana and allowed him to walk the path of a mage.
The mage had taken him as a temporary apprentice.
“Wow, does that happen often?”
“Rarely, but there are cases like mine. They say magical talent can appear quite unexpectedly.”
“So you already understood the mysteries from the beginning?”
“Not really, but the potential was there, according to my master. They said the mystery was the path of magic.”
“That’s quite something.”
It was impressive.
It was also a classic fantasy trope.
But it made him feel a bit sad too.
‘I couldn’t even confirm that.’
He quickly shook off the brief sadness.
A village youth recognized by a wandering genius and taken as an apprentice.
It was like the case of a protagonist.
It was time to satisfy his curiosity and interest.
“Why are you here?”
“My master’s first command was to reach the magic tower on my own.”
“The magic tower!”
Ketal’s eyes sparkled.
Among the information he’d gathered from the library, there was some about the magic tower.
The place with the most mages in the world.
Home to various schools of magic and great archmages conducting research.
The magic tower.
“So you’re on your way to the magic tower now.”
“Yes. Unfortunately, I got caught up in that mess. Karthos… ugh.”
Guraisan shuddered.
It had been a terrifying experience.
He now had something to complain to his master about.
“The magic tower! I’d like to visit it someday.”
“What?”
Guraisan was a bit surprised.
A barbarian and the magic tower were about as mismatched as anything could be.
But Ketal’s expression was very serious.
So, Guraisan cautiously said,
“If you ever visit the magic tower, mention that you were introduced by Guraisan of the Shadow School. I’m just an apprentice, so I don’t have much influence, but… I’ll welcome you as best as I can.”
“I’ll remember that.”
Ketal said with a broad grin.
Guraisan, however, didn’t take it too seriously.
It was unthinkable for a barbarian to visit the magic tower, like a fish trying to live out of water.
“So, is this mission to cover your travel expenses to the magic tower?”
“Ah, yes. The job is simple and the pay is good, so I had no reason to refuse.”
“There were some unlucky rumors about this job.”
“I heard them too, but come on, what are the chances?”
Guraisan shook his head.
“The unluckiest thing in my life has already happened. There’s no way I’d get caught up in something like that again.”
Ketal smiled silently.
* * *
A few hours later, they arrived at a village.
It was already early evening, and the sun was setting.
As they entered the village, their faces tensed, gripping their weapons tightly.
“What do you think?”
“I don’t sense anything,”
Aquaz said quietly.
The guard captain frowned.
“Then they might have just fled.”
The guard captain gestured with his chin, and the guards quickly began searching the village.
“Mercenaries, it’s your turn. Find any traces.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Understood.”
Ketal looked around the village.
It wasn’t large.
At most, about a hundred people could barely live there.
But it wasn’t a number that could disappear without a trace.
So, the guard captain thought they would find some clues.
However, the more they searched, the stranger things seemed.
One guard approached with a puzzled expression.
“The food is still here.”
“They might have left it behind while fleeing.”
“No, that’s not it. There’s freshly cooked food still warm.”
“What?”
“Come and see.”
The guard captain followed the guard into a small house.
On the table were potatoes and coffee, still steaming as if they had been cooked just before they arrived.
The guard captain’s face showed his bewilderment.
“What is this?”
The village had lost contact several days ago.
Since then, many people had come, but none had returned.
The guard captain considered two possibilities: one, someone had taken over the village and overpowered anyone who approached, or two, the evil Aquaz mentioned had descended.
But now both possibilities seemed unlikely.
If there was evil present, there wouldn’t be freshly cooked food.
However, if someone had taken over the village, there would be people around, and there were none.
“What about traces?”
“None.”
The guard shook his head, bewildered.
“There’s no sign of anyone leaving or hiding. Not even a single footprint.”
The last possibility, that they had seen the group coming and fled, also seemed impossible now.
“Continue searching.”
“Yes, sir.”
The others were also puzzled.
There were clear signs of life, but no people, and no signs of escape.
It was a very strange situation.
The searchers felt a strong sense of unease.
An hour later, they gathered in the village center.
“What did you find?”
“Everywhere is the same. There’s evidence that people were here recently, but no one is around, and there are no traces.”
“Aquaz, do you know anything?”
“…I have no idea.”
Aquaz was also baffled.
If the evil she anticipated had descended, the land would already be shrouded in darkness.
But the place was completely normal, as if nothing had happened.
Yet the village’s situation suggested otherwise.
They were confused and murmuring among themselves.
Aquaz couldn’t find an answer either.
The guard captain, biting his lip in thought, looked at Ketal.
“Do you have any idea?”
Ketal was strong enough to defeat a Swordmaster.
He might have found something.
But Ketal shook his head.
“I couldn’t find any specific traces either. There are signs of life, but no evidence of anyone leaving the village. I don’t sense any presence either.”
“This is driving me crazy.”
Even with two superhumanly strong individuals, they couldn’t find anything.
As the guard captain grumbled, Ketal spoke up.
“Why not ask someone who might know something?”
“Even Lady Aquaz doesn’t know.”
“No, I’m not talking about her. There’s someone else, isn’t there?”
“…What?”
The guard captain looked up, and Ketal tilted his head in confusion.
“What? You didn’t notice?”
“Wait, what do you mean?”
“I mean exactly what I said. Didn’t you find someone in the village?”
“…”
Someone else.
That meant someone who wasn’t there when they initially arrived.
The guard captain swallowed hard and scanned the faces of the people.
And then he found her.
A woman whose face he hadn’t seen when they first set out.
She had blended in so naturally that he hadn’t noticed her.
No, that wasn’t right.
It was impossible not to notice her.
She was stunningly beautiful, unnaturally so.
How had such a beautiful woman suddenly appeared without anyone, except Ketal, noticing?
“Oh?”
The woman looked at Ketal with curiosity.
“How interesting. I disguised myself perfectly, so how did you notice me?”
“The number of people suddenly increased, and a face we hadn’t seen before appeared. How could I not notice?”
“No, that’s not what I mean. You shouldn’t have been aware of that fact at all. Even the great Inquisitor of the Sun God didn’t notice.”
The woman smiled brightly.
Her eyes gleamed with interest in Ketal.
“It doesn’t seem like you’ve grasped the mysteries… Who are you? This is an unexpected find.”
“Everyone! Step back!”
The guard captain finally shouted.
The people gasped and quickly distanced themselves from the woman, forming a large circle around her.
“Lady Aquaz?”
“…I can’t sense anything.”
Aquaz groaned.
She was an inquisitor of the Sun God, with one of the highest abilities in detecting evil and dark magic in the entire order.
That she couldn’t sense the woman’s presence meant one of two things: either the woman wasn’t evil, or she was such a high-level evil that even Aquaz couldn’t detect her.
The woman muttered, sounding bored.
“Ah, what a waste. I wanted to follow you to your territory.”
“Sorry about that.”
“No worries. This is fun too, so I’ll forgive you.”
The woman giggled, but her form began to melt away, like a bug shedding its skin.
The human shape crumbled, and then they felt it—the overwhelming evil.
The people’s faces turned pale, and Aquaz was horrified.
[I’ve made up my mind.]
The voice of evil echoed, shaking hearts and seeping into minds.
[Interesting barbarian. I’ll take you to hell as my slave.]
“That sounds fun.”
Ketal laughed heartily, the only one seemingly unfazed.