Chapter 197 – #43_Festival(3)
#195
1.
Around the 16th century, when people firmly believed they could explore new continents and conquer nature with the power of science.
Witches were also interested in combining science and magic.
They believed that even if it was a humble human technology, if the great magic of a witch was added, a plausible result would come out.
It was the era of magical engineering, when witches who were well-versed in alchemy, as well as witches from other disciplines, were engrossed in the possibilities of magical engineering.
Of course, its popularity waned in less than 100 years, and now most witches only regard magical engineering as a means, but the ‘Janissary,’ which was lavishly decorated for ceremonial purposes, was also an offensive artifact created at that time.
This gun does not require gunpowder or lead bullets.
It is an artifact that molds magic into bullets, then fires them with several times the power.
The magic formula engraved on the oak gun body takes in magic power.
The magic power sucked in passes through the powder pan and creates a single bullet.
The moment the trigger is pulled, the special rifling engraved inside the barrel amplifies and compresses its power several times.
-Bang! Bang! Bang!
The magic bullets, fired in an instant, drew orange trails and exploded the piranhas.
“Sister!”
“I know!”
The twins didn’t need to exchange complicated signals with each other, and they supported each other’s gaps and relentlessly eliminated the piranhas.
It was much easier than hitting a clay disc or a flying duck.
This is because the distance to the target, the size of the target, and even the movement were simple.
The bullet tears through the smooth scales.
It breaks the teeth and digs into the eyes that are looking crookedly this way.
In the thick smoke of magic, instead of the acrid gunpowder smoke, the twins fired their muskets to their hearts’ content.
When the piranhas, which numbered in the dozens, perhaps even a hundred, had dwindled to a number that could be counted by eye, a blue light flashed behind them and a large surge of magic was felt.
Siwoo had succeeded in getting the citizens out.
“Thank you. Thanks to you, we finished well.”
“As expected of my assistant, you’re awesome!”
“We’ll take care of the rest!”
Sweat was dripping from Siwoo’s chin.
It was the first time he had moved this many people with coordinate teleportation.
Moreover, the magic flowing inside was different from the usual.
It was as if it was interfering with the activation of magic, or perhaps it was sticking to it.
It changed slowly like flowing mud, interfering with calculations, so he had to forcibly perform twice as many calculations as usual.
In the process of mentally calculating complex calculations, he felt a throbbing headache and nausea.
“Hoo….”
“Assistant, are you okay?”
“A-Are you alright?”
The twins, who had neatly finished off the last piranha, asked, noticing that Siwoo’s complexion looked quite bad.
He roughly wiped the sweat off with his palm and then nodded.
“Yes, it’s not unbearable.”
“Assistant, we have something to tell you.”
“What is it?”
“I just felt it while catching those fish… I think I remember reading about the ‘ceremonial artifact’ that causes this phenomenon.”
“Huh? Y-Yeah, that’s right!”
Odette’s words made Odile exclaim as if she had suddenly realized something.
The library that the Count had gifted to the twins was filled with all sorts of miscellaneous books, and some of them dealt with various ceremonial artifacts and artifacts that had existed in history.
“Those monsters aren’t homunculi. They look completely different from homunculi, and above all, they don’t have a core.”
Come to think of it, that’s right.
All the homunculi that Siwoo had faced so far were animal-type, but they had a bizarre appearance with almost none of their original form remaining.
In comparison, those piranhas have a very intact form, as if they were taken out of an aquarium and enlarged.
Well, that’s why they’re even more unpleasant.
“So, what is it?”
“I think it’s a ceremonial artifact called ‘Dagon’s Flute.’ I heard that it was an item owned by a witch five hundred years ago… It’s a ceremonial artifact that turns the surroundings into another world and makes it a hunting ground for familiars….”
“So, that means those aren’t homunculi created by the Witch of Creation, but familiars. Since the medium that allows the familiars to exist is the ceremonial artifact, it means that if that disappears, this mess will also disappear.”
How many people died in this mess?
How many people are alive?
If they are alive, they are probably hiding in various places to avoid the monsters’ eyes.
Ending this situation will be a fundamental solution rather than finding survivors one by one and sending them out.
“We’ll find the location of the ceremonial artifact.”
“Can you do that?”
“If it’s the type that’s always activated, it won’t be difficult.”
“Then, the goal is set.”
Odile and Odette clasped hands.
A beautiful melody that doesn’t suit the department store where the tragedy occurred harmonizes.
The mysterious tone, which is clearly different from human vocalization, is closer to the melody of a stringed instrument.
The magic around them pulsed and began to spread in all directions in gentle waves.
The super-perception through sound waves did not stay nearby.
If there was even a tiny gap, it stretched deep into any part of the building and began mapping.
About two to three minutes passed like that.
“I found it.”
“We found it.”
The twins stopped singing and opened their eyes.
“It’s on the roof of this building.”
“Let’s go together, Assistant! We can be helpful now too!”
The twins, who had only trembled when they clashed with Aea before, seemed to have grown even more through that incident.
There was no way they wouldn’t feel the countless corpses and the smell of blood that stung their noses, but they suppressed their fear and stepped forward to help Siwoo.
They were admirable and commendable.
That’s why they couldn’t go together even more.
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
“Yes?”
The twins looked down at Siwoo’s answer.
The coordinate teleportation formula that had evacuated the citizens was spread out under their feet.
While the two were diligently searching for the flute, Siwoo had completed the calculations to move them to the officetel.
When the twins, who belatedly grasped the situation, hurriedly moved their bodies to get out of the magic circle.
“Wait! We didn’t say anything like this…!”
“No! We want to fight with you, Assistant…!”
A bluish light flashed, and the twins’ noisy voices disappeared.
“Hoo….”
Magic power was sucked out of the brand on his left eye.
This time, he had set the distance much longer, so it was quite a strain even though it was only two people.
Perhaps it was because it was right after evacuating ten citizens.
“I’ll apologize later.”
Siwoo muttered an apology that wouldn’t be heard.
He was grateful for the twins’ desire to unite and help Siwoo.
But it was still dangerous to leave them here.
If they had just focused on hunting the small fry and helping people, the risk wouldn’t have been that great.
The piranhas that Siwoo faced were so weak that it was embarrassing to call them homunculi, and the twins’ musket guns were enough to defeat them.
However, if someone intentionally caused this hell using a ‘ceremonial artifact’ called Dagon’s Flute, then that identity was probably an enemy.
Naturally, the closer they got to the ceremonial artifact, the more thorough the defenses would be, and therefore the higher the risk.
It wasn’t that Siwoo wasn’t afraid of facing an enemy.
The witches who had grasped the situation would soon come running.
In other words, Siwoo didn’t have to do anything.
But…
Siwoo looked around.
A terrible tragedy that resembled a scene of slaughter.
Looking at it, he felt a bubbling anger rising from his chest.
He had never thought of himself as a righteous person, but he couldn’t stand idly by.
They were just ordinary people living their daily lives.
Good-hearted citizens who didn’t even know about the existence of magic, let alone witches.
They were probably dying in various parts of the building even at this moment.
He didn’t want to stand by and watch while saving his own skin.
He was going to move forward so that even one more survivor could be saved, and so that no more victims would be created.
“Let’s see what kind of crazy bitch it is.”
Siwoo once again wrapped his body in shadow and held swords in both hands.
He put on his helmet and rushed into the darkness where blood flowed like a valley.
2.
“Did I hear you correctly…?”
Soo-ah, sitting in the branch manager’s office at Witch Point Seoul Gwanghwamun branch, enjoying her leisurely afternoon green tea, widened her eyes.
It was because of the report from a witch who had rushed in.
“Are you saying that Dagon’s Flute was activated in the middle of downtown Gangnam?”
“That’s right.”
It was a major incident that even a witch who had encountered and heard about numerous casualties caused by homunculi or enemies would turn pale.
Dagon’s Flute is one of the ceremonial artifacts used by the ‘Witch of the Deep Sea,’ who was killed by Duke Keter.
In fact, it was not a very dangerous ceremonial artifact for a witch.
Even if it turned an area into another world and released familiars, the fish-like monsters, weaker than homunculi, were not threatening to a witch.
The essence of Dagon’s Flute was geared towards massacring humans.
The life force of humans hunted by the fish-like monsters in the other world summoned by the flute is converted into enormous magic power and stored in the flute.
In other words, it is not an artifact for combat, but an item for collecting magic power.
Soo-ah shook her head.
There was no need to think complicatedly about things that had not yet happened.
What was important now was that an inhuman hell had opened up in the middle of Gangnam.
And the duty as a human to stop it was on her shoulders.
“Please summon the witches who are on the contact list immediately.”
“Yes!”
Soo-ah prepared to move to the location of the flute while contacting Tiferet.
“Can you hear me, my lord?”
The earring that Soo-ah was wearing around her neck vibrated with a buzzing sound.
Communication using radio waves becomes impossible inside the otherworld barrier.
This earring was a magical tool made to enable communication even in such otherworld barriers.
[I’m listening. I’m almost there]
“The main cause of the chaos is Dagon’s Flute. The owner and purpose are unknown. Please leave the task of rescuing survivors and preventing damage to me and the other witches, and may I ask you to secure the culprit, my lord?”
[What about Duke Keter?]
“…There is no movement.”
[I understand]
The communication, which only exchanged necessary information, was cut off.
A witch used magic to massacre hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of civilians.
Even so, Duke Keter did not move.
Even though she must already know.
If it was an incident of this magnitude, it would be enough for her to move her own body directly.
But this time too, she did not move.
“What on earth are you thinking…”
A person whose thoughts cannot be known.
Soo-ah muttered.
3.
Eloa was running as fast as she could towards COEX, where the incident had occurred.
She kicked off the outer walls of the building and flew from the top of one tall building to the top of another.
In the distance, she could see a building wrapped in a huge spherical barrier.
The sharp sound of sirens and evacuation orders could be heard across the river.
Seoul’s air was not good due to smog, but that part was uniquely dyed a deep blue color, as if it had been eaten away by mold.
It was evidence that the otherworldification was progressing.
If it was eroded to that extent, it would be impossible to cover it with an otherworld barrier.
There had been no accident of that magnitude in modern times.
“I have to go quickly and save people….”
Eloa, who was muttering as a habit, realized.
As surprising as it was, she felt no emotion.
Neither the righteous indignation that should have risen from her chest, nor the mourning for the victims and their bereaved families who had been sacrificed inside.
It just swept through her heart as if it had become empty and disappeared.
Now, Eloa was only performing what she had defined as duty and atonement in a sense of emptiness as if all her energy had been exhausted.
“…….”
There was no purpose in life.
There was no reason.
Only an empty duty remained.
Revenge.
It was ridiculous that as soon as that driving force disappeared, all the hypocrisy was stripped away.
Eloa, with a nonchalant expression, bit her lip, but still ran like she was flying towards the accident area.
