City ​​of Witches 1219

Chapter 1219 – #286_For The Witch (2)

#1213

1.
Perhaps a great war that will never again occur in the history of witches.

Despite knowing the dangers of humans, the Gehenna witches, with their pride and honor at stake, rose up in indignation to confront the wicked Hexennacht.

However, among them, there were witches who, despite their fervent desire to help, could not participate in the war due to unavoidable circumstances.

These witches, who had provided generous assistance in preparing war materials and projects but were unable to stand on the battlefield, were none other than the mother witches with apprentice witches.

While the most important thing for a witch is to continue the path of magic, their own children are equally important.

Even if they are not related by blood, they are raised with care from infancy, mostly after being chosen by the prophecy institution, making them no different from blood relatives.

If the mother dies alone, what will become of the apprentice witch who has not received proper succession?

Tia Cagliostro, the new Duchess of Gehenna, who officially announced her succession as a result of this incident, felt the same way.

However, they couldn’t just sit idly by.

The witches belonging to the offline mom cafe ‘Leto’ salon, a community for witches with apprentice witches, gathered around Duchess Cagliostro and were waiting at the rear of the battlefield.

They were something like a reserve-reserve-reserve unit, to be deployed in the event of a one-in-a-million situation.

“Please, we have to win…”
“At this rate, Hexennacht will…”
“What on earth is Duchess Erelim thinking?”

While everyone was dwelling on their unease and doubts, there was a practical reason for them to stay in their positions, besides a sense of duty.

After all, if Hexennacht became the top dog in the world, a world of reversed status would unfold.

Gehenna would naturally be devastated, and the witches would scatter into the mortal realm, living in hiding like the current public enemies and exiles.

The hardships of witches with apprentice witches would be particularly great.

As they imagined all sorts of ominous futures without being able to do anything, a name naturally came up.

“What on earth is Duchess Erelim… thinking? How could the great sage who has protected Gehenna for hundreds of years suddenly…”
“Don’t even mention that traitor. It makes my blood boil and my heart ache.”
“It’s true that the Duchess repeatedly emphasized the dangers of humans, and that has been proven, but what’s with siding with those detestable public enemies?”
“She was always someone whose true feelings were hard to read.”

And then, their gaze turned towards Countess Cagliostro.

The reason was simple.

Although they were now from different factions and the heads of each large academy, treating each other as public figures, Countess Cagliostro had been friends with Blanche Erelim, an early member of Gehenna’s founding, for hundreds of years.

“……”

However, Tia Cagliostro calmly ignored the gazes that hoped she would explain something clearly.

She did not show her usual exaggerated fuss, but silently observed the battlefield situation.

“Huh?”

And then, a twist occurred.

Duchess Erelim summoned the elite members of the Truth and True Name Academic Society to the enemy’s rear.

Gehenna joined them and launched a counterattack all at once.

“Now is the time. Shall we go too?”

At Duchess Cagliostro’s command, who spoke as if she had been waiting for this, the witches of the Leto salon, who had been wearing expressions that seemed to say, ‘What on earth is going on?’, also seized the opportunity and began to expand their gains.

They had been suppressing their desire to participate in the war with maternal love, and now that a golden opportunity had arrived, their momentum was like a tidal wave.

“Duchess Cagliostro, did you know from the beginning?”
“If you did, it would have been nice if you had told us.”

Albiereo and Deneb, who had been closely observing Duchess Cagliostro, approached and expressed their discomfort.

Throughout the war, she had been calmly observing the battlefield.

It was as if she was waiting for the right moment, ignoring the petitions of other witches who were urging her to join in right now.

A witch of Cagliostro’s caliber would not do that because she was afraid for her life, so they figured she must have something in mind, and now that the situation had turned out like this, they could roughly see the picture.

Ah, the story between Duchess Cagliostro and Duchess Erelim had been discussed from the beginning, and this situation was a secret operation planned from the start.

“Many witches have already lost their lives.”
“If we had informed the allied forces of the academy from the beginning, we could have prevented unnecessary sacrifices. I will bring this matter up at the general assembly later.”

Countess Geminai might be a scary mother-in-law to Siwoo, but her influence in Gehenna could not be ignored.

Even for Duchess Cagliostro, it would not be easy to get away with it if she was determined to hold her accountable.

“Countess, now is the time to do more important things. And I swear on my witch’s name, there was no separate discussion. I only guessed that it could be possible.”

Neither Albiereo nor Deneb pressed further.

As she said, what was important now was to end the ongoing war.

Also, her son-in-law, whom she wanted to give a good smack on the head right now, was also suffering.

“…Blanche, what on earth are you thinking…”

Tia Cagliostro, left alone, called out the unseen name of Erelim.

Cagliostro was a close friend of Erelim.

Even when everyone was shocked by Erelim’s betrayal, she had doubts about her betrayal.

To Cagliostro, Erelim was a witch who had devoted herself to Gehenna more than anyone else.

She had cared for Gehenna so much that it sometimes felt like a pathological obsession, and she had followed Keter so much that it seemed foolish. Cagliostro could not even imagine that she would completely betray them.

While she could not be certain of Blanche’s intentions, she believed that there was definitely a plan beyond what was visible.

So, let’s summarize.

This war ultimately started from the revelation of the truth of this world.

From the truth that the Witch of Creation had escaped from a worldline where she was dominated by humans.

And from the video of the Neo Great War, which depicted that terrible worldline.

The hostility towards humans was enough to ignite Hexennacht and gave them the justification for war.

Conversely, Gehenna, which had been pursuing a Keter-style human appeasement policy, was greatly shocked and faltered.

If the public enemies had been just a little less bitchy, Gehenna and Hexennacht might have joined hands and started a human purge.

However, Gehenna and Hexennacht were irreconcilable enemies, so war was inevitable.

However, if it had been as it was originally, the war would probably have been dirty and messy.

Although there was a considerable gap between the two groups, weren’t the public enemy bitches originally war machines skilled in guerrilla warfare?

The reason why Gehenna had left the public enemies scattered before the formation of Hexennacht was not simply because they lacked the will.

In a muddy fight where they would strike and retreat across the vast mortal realm, Gehenna’s damage would have been extreme, and the mortal realm would have been devastated.

Just look at the state of the desert now.

Lava flows, a sea suddenly appears, vegetation grows and forms a lush forest, and there are places where the ground is gouged out by several kilometers as if a meteorite had struck.

The humans caught up in it would have been massacred over decades.

Hexennacht, who would have dragged out the fight and accumulated damage, declared an all-out war with a declaration of war.

The fact that the location was in the middle of a large desert, where there was no escape.

It was all because Erelim had betrayed Gehenna, or rather, pretended to betray them.

She had induced Hexennacht, who were already full of hot air, to declare an all-out war.

After that, she struck the enemy’s rear with the Truth and True Name Academic Society.

In this process, the Academic Society was closed to maintain secrecy.

They thoroughly deceived both the enemy and their allies.

Now that it had come to this, it was safe to say that the war was over.

The enemy’s will to fight was broken beyond repair, and a bunch of enemies were already surrendering, sensing their defeat.

Gehenna would win the war, and the public enemies, who had been a headache for a long time, would be cleanly purged.

The Gehenna witches who would later learn of this fact would exclaim, ‘As expected of Gehenna’s great sage!’ ‘Not only is her magic powerful, but she also has such a deep mind!’…

But Cagliostro’s heart was not at ease.

It wasn’t because she felt resentful that she hadn’t been given a heads-up about such an important plan.

It was because she felt a fundamental change in her actions.

Blanche’s self-nature magic was the Heavenly Void Record.

This Void Record originates from the mausoleums that commemorate the witches who have inherited it.

The mausoleums contain the unfulfilled dreams and wishes, and the regrets held at the last moment, and this also affects Blanche, who records all of this.

Therefore, Erelim could not help but be a witch who cared for witches more than anyone else.

Her essence was to protect and commemorate the obsessions of witches.

Cagliostro knew well that Blanche was more confused than anyone else when Keter created the exile system and established the order of the world through a massive purge.

It was hard to imagine now, but at one time, she would come to Cagliostro drunk almost every night and ask, ‘Why did Keter make such a choice?’, taking away all of Cagliostro’s precious sleep time.

“Blanche… are you really okay?”

That Blanche had chosen to eliminate about half of the witches with her own hands.

Tia Cagliostro could not shake off the feeling that her actions were somehow similar to Keter’s.