## Chapter 189 – 189. Border (3)
#189. Border (3)
The civil war in the Principality of Orsia had thrown the political situation in the southern continent into disarray.
The prices of all kinds of weapons, armor, and food had skyrocketed, and some people were crossing borders, fearing the aftermath of the war would spread.
In particular, an exodus was underway within the Kingdom of Nibia, fueled by rumors of conscription orders in the east.
Those who didn’t want to be dragged onto the battlefield had no choice but to abandon their homes and flee to other countries, however reluctantly.
Of course, it wasn’t just those who feared war that were crossing the border.
“Zenith-nim!”
Unlike ordinary people, a woman with horns and ears sprouting from her head called out urgently.
She was a Roein, a deer beastkin.
Her gaze was fixed on a man with an androgynous appearance, wearing an apathetic expression.
“Hurry up and get over here.”
“It’s because you’re too fast, Zenith-nim!”
At the man’s words, the woman puffed out her cheeks and glared at him.
“What?”
But the man responded with cold eyes, as if it were a familiar occurrence.
Faced with his cynical reaction, the Roein woman sighed inwardly and forced a smile.
However dirty and unfair it might be, the relationship between the man and the woman was that of master and slave.
“It doesn’t make sense that beastkins are physically weaker than mages in the first place. Are those horns and ears fake?”
But even a slave’s patience has its limits.
“…Master is such an idiot!!”
A voice filled with magical power echoed loudly throughout the mountains.
Startled wild animals fled, and the trees shook as if an earthquake had struck.
Amidst the chaos, the man stood with his arms crossed, as if nothing was amiss.
“Fake horns and ears?! How could you say such a thing?! You’re the worst! A personality failure! Not even human…”
“I heard deer beastkin horns are selling for a high price these days.”
“…”
The woman’s attempt to vent her frustration was cut short as the man swiftly suppressed her rebellion, as if it were a familiar occurrence.
“Anything else to say?”
“Hehe… Master is so cool.”
“Nonsense.”
Of course, the horns would grow back even if they were cut off, but she couldn’t help but feel a visceral aversion to the idea.
As the Roein woman accumulated another stack of anger towards her master, the man exhaled a breath into the cold wind blowing through the mountains.
‘An emergency summons, huh…’
The continent was currently engulfed in a sense of impending war.
Not only was there the war between the Yusterv Empire, the hegemon of the north, and the Kingdom of Pelledia in the Great Forest, but the entire south was also in turmoil due to the civil war in the Principality of Orsia.
In this situation, the Continental Mage Association had declared a summons for its affiliated mages.
This was like a bolt from the blue for him, who had been conducting magical research in southern Orsia, but he couldn’t simply ignore the summons.
‘Haa… Just thinking about suffering among those incompetent old men already gives me a headache.’
Zenith Carl Huerencia.
He was one of the mages representing the next generation that the Mage Association boasted about, a genius who had reached the 5th Circle at a young age.
Having fallen into a rut in recent years and making little progress in his magical research, he had left the Mage Association and headed to the Principality of Orsia, where remnants of the Mythic Era were occasionally discovered.
‘Well, I was planning to return soon anyway.’
He had been spending his own money to explore dungeons and buy and research artifacts from the Mythic Era, but there had been no noticeable gains.
If he didn’t want to eat hard bread with watery soup, he had to return to the Association soon.
In some ways, it could be seen as good timing.
“By the way, where is the checkpoint…”
Just as he was about to gather his magical power to ask for directions from any passersby who might be around…
Woooooooong!!
Ooo-
A powerful wave of magical power, echoing through the Gallian Mountains, washed over him.
It goes without saying that mages are more sensitive to magical power than knights.
Zenith immediately rushed towards the source of the magical power, which was mixed with an intense bloodlust that made his skin crawl.
No, he flew.
“…Ugh, really!!”
The Roein woman, who had been blankly watching his figure disappear into the sky, burst into frustration.
***
He was born in the barony of a humble rural territory of the Kingdom of Nibia.
As the third son among four children, his future was as good as decided.
To leave the family and stand on his own.
He would not inherit the title, nor would he inherit any property.
Therefore, he had left the family early and joined the military, engaging in various corrupt activities to amass wealth.
But as the saying goes, a long tail gets stepped on.
Eventually, he was court-martialed and exiled to the obscure position of chief of a border checkpoint.
Of course, all the wealth he had accumulated was also confiscated, but he didn’t care.
He could always amass wealth again.
Moreover, the position of border checkpoint chief was surprisingly lucrative, with frequent opportunities to receive bribes.
Especially in times like these, when there were so many foolish commoners desperate to cross the border.
The amounts weren’t huge, but he was able to accumulate a decent amount of wealth. At this rate, he would be able to apply for discharge in a few years, move to a suitable rural area, and live a life of luxury.
He firmly believed that would be the case, until today.
“What did you just say?”
No matter how hard he tried, his eyes couldn’t focus.
His hands and feet were colder than ice, and his teeth were chattering as if his jaw was about to fall off.
He felt as if his body wasn’t his own.
Amidst the anxiety that his heart would burst at any moment, he realized that his lighthearted intention to extort money from a commoner who dared to flaunt beautiful women had determined his fate.
“Haa, haa, haaack…!”
Raw, unrefined bloodlust and magical power were like poison to ordinary people.
The chief’s face turned pale with extreme fear.
“What’s going on?!”
Bang!
The deputy chief, having noticed the anomaly, burst into the room.
Unlike the chief, who was from a lower noble family, the deputy chief was a commoner and a mid-level Aura user. He was able to immediately sense the dense bloodlust and magical power filling the room.
“W,what is this…”
He instinctively tried to gather his magical power and resist, but it was impossible.
Just as fish are swept away by the waves created by a whale.
“Kugh…!”
The deputy chief knelt under the oppressive pressure that seemed to crush the space. Soon, even lifting his head became too much.
The absolute presence reminded him of a certain knight he had seen from afar.
“C,could it be a mage…?”
But he instinctively realized that the opponent’s essence was somehow different from that of a knight.
“M,mage?!”
The chief, who had been almost a living corpse just moments ago, opened his mouth with difficulty, but it was closer to a shriek of terror.
Even if they had never met a mage before, everyone knew how arrogant and shameless they were.
Above all, it was common knowledge that their eccentric personalities were proportional to their abilities.
Even those who had no knowledge of magic couldn’t possibly fail to realize that their opponent was no ordinary mage.
Clutching his heart, which felt like it would stop at any moment, the chief shouted.
“I, I didn’t recognize the great mage and committed an act of disrespect!! If you would please forgive me just this once, my descendants will be forever grateful for the mage’s grace—”
“Too late.”
A hand, stained black, grabbed the chief’s face.
Sizzle-
“Keeeeaaaaaaak!!!”
It was a curse.
“You will slowly die in a terrible hallucination.”
The Curse of Dreams.
That was the name of the curse I had cast on the chief.
The cursed person would be forced to dream. In that dream, all the fears that the subject imagined would be visualized, and the body, affected by the collapsing mind, would gradually cease its activity.
It sounded like an absurdly overpowered curse, but it was strictly a curse with several prerequisites.
The target had to be an ordinary person who couldn’t resist magical power, and the target had to be feeling fear towards the caster.
Moreover, it was a curse that priests could easily purify, so it had many ways to be broken.
I looked around the disheveled reception room.
The chief seemed to have fainted from the overwhelming pain. Even if he hadn’t fainted, he would have soon lost consciousness due to the aftereffects of the curse.
Unless a priest happened to pass by, he would never wake up again.
“You’re the deputy chief, right?”
“Y,yes…!”
I called out to the man who was prostrating himself at my feet.
He was a strange guy. Why was he doing this when he hadn’t done anything wrong?
“I just killed a soldier of the Kingdom of Nibia. Shouldn’t you arrest me according to the law?”
“T,there’s no way I could do that! That guy was just a criminal who had been unfairly profiting from bribes! The mage has done our job for us, so we should be thanking you instead!”
“…Is that so?”
“Yes!”
I was relieved by the deputy chief’s words, who was as stiff as a private in the army.
I had killed the chief without thinking, due to a sudden rush of anger, so I thought I would be wanted by the kingdom and hunted down.
But fortunately, the deputy chief was quite quick-witted.
‘I don’t need to get rid of all the witnesses.’
Of course, I wasn’t so mentally deranged as to kill someone who had done nothing wrong.
I was just going to give him a few gold coins and silence him with a curse.
“Then what about the pass?”
“R,right away! I’ll issue it right away!”
“Wait.”
I stopped the deputy chief, who was about to run out of the room.
“I,is there a problem…?”
I put a few gold coins in his front pocket as he sweated profusely.
I had to give him enough to prevent him from changing his mind later.
“You’ve worked hard.”
“…Thank you.”
Having received the bribe, the deputy chief carried the chief out of the reception room.
Silence fell in the room.
Amelia, who had been fidgeting with her teacup and watching my every move, spoke first.
“Hyun-woo-nim, are you really a mage?”
“I told you, that’s my job.”
“But I’ve never seen a mage use curse magic before.”
“…Is that so?”
“Yes, it’s a magic that’s almost extinct because it’s often treated as black magic.”
“Well… that’s true.”
That’s why I don’t plan to use it as much as possible back on Earth.
I’m using curse magic because this is another world; if I did that in front of other mages, it would be like pressing their berserk button.
If I’m not careful, I might even be disciplined by the Magic Tower.
As I was distracted by other thoughts for a moment…
Thud-
I felt a familiar and heavy sensation as someone hugged my arm.
“Iris?”
Iris, with a light blush on her face, was hugging me.
“To get so angry for my sake…”
Iris buried her face in my arms and mumbled something.
When I listened closely, she was repeating embarrassing words like “I love you, I like you” like a parrot.
It was a little overwhelming, but I felt good.
‘Hmm?’
Then I made eye contact with Sylvia. Surprisingly, she didn’t seem to mind.
Normally, she would have looked at me with a displeased expression or questioned my use of curse magic.
In fact, even if I hadn’t intervened, the chief’s head would have been split in two by Sylvia’s swordsmanship.
I could feel an intense bloodlust from Sylvia that rivaled my own.
‘If Sylvia hadn’t hesitated for a moment, I wouldn’t have had a chance to step in.’
Anyway, as I spent time in the chaotic atmosphere, the deputy chief soon returned.
“H,here’s your pass!”
Having received the pass in exactly 10 minutes, we were able to leave the checkpoint smoothly.
There was one problem in the middle, but it didn’t seem likely that the royal army would come after me just for killing a corrupt official who took bribes.
I thought that all I had to do now was go to my next destination without any more trouble.
“…Found you.”
Until I saw the purple-haired man smiling at me from beyond the checkpoint.
“What’s that?”
The smile on the man’s lips was disturbingly unpleasant.
