Chapter 159 – #34_Redcliff(3)
#157
1.
Shiwoo woke up from a deep sleep.
As expected, people need to sleep, even if they are spirits; sleep improves the quality of life.
As soon as he got up, he rubbed his sleepy eyes and went to the living room, but Sharon was nowhere to be seen.
“Sharon?”
Sharon always woke up earlier than Shiwoo.
Usually, at this time, she would be sitting on the sofa, scrolling through delivery apps, choosing a breakfast menu.
He called out, but there was no answer, and he even knocked on her room, but she was nowhere to be found.
“What? Where did she go?”
Her phone was also neatly placed on the table, so it seemed she had gone out for a bit.
Shiwoo went into the bathroom, quickly washed his hair, and changed his clothes.
“…It feels kind of like a couple.”
Sitting on the sofa, thinking about where she might have gone, he was struck by a strange feeling.
Waking up and looking for his housemate as if it were natural.
Moreover, that housemate was a stunningly beautiful mixed-race woman.
It felt like a fantasy of a high school boy in the middle of puberty.
Well, even though they were living together, they were far from being lovers, and there wasn’t even a single suggestive episode.
“No, come to think of it, there are a few?”
If he thought about it, there were some.
Like how Sharon would walk around the house braless right before going to bed (and right after waking up), making it difficult for him to know where to look.
Or when he found Sharon’s underwear while taking laundry out of the washing machine to dry it at the laundromat on the first floor, making him feel awkward (for the record, Shiwoo learned that Sharon’s bra size was an E cup that day).
Or when he could hear Sharon humming while showering or bathing, making him feel embarrassed for no reason.
If he thought about it more, there were a few other incidents.
However, the reason Shiwoo didn’t classify these as ‘suggestive episodes’ was because these incidents stemmed from ‘Sharon not really seeing Shiwoo as a man.’
“It’s ridiculous to give it any meaning…”
Anyway, he drank a glass of water and cleaned his room thoroughly for the first time in a while.
For the record, cleaning was part of his training.
For some reason, the ribbon of Aea Sadalmelik, the Maiden’s Loom, was mixed in with Shiwoo’s brand.
It was a kind of training to freely manipulate it.
Shiwoo, with the concealment effect of the music box maximized, fluttered the four ribbons extending from his back while cleaning the room.
With four ribbons that could be used like hands, it was like having two people helping, but the cleaning was incredibly slow.
Manipulating one ribbon was not difficult, like having a third arm, but when the number became two or more, the ribbons started to tangle, like arms getting tangled when juggling.
It was a reminder of how terrifying Aea was, who had freely used dozens of ribbons as if it were natural.
After cleaning for a very long time, it was almost time for magic class to start, but Sharon had not returned.
“Did she go to the location point?”
Sharon was diligent and always kept the class start time like clockwork.
She probably wouldn’t be late… she’d be back in 30 minutes, right?
If so, he couldn’t just do nothing, so he thought about buying her bubble tea.
Sharon had been obsessed with bubble tea lately.
“Should I go for a walk and get it?”
Sharon wasn’t the type to teach carelessly, but who knew, if he offered her a tribute, she might give him a special magic lecture that she wouldn’t even give to her daughter-in-law.
He put his hands in his pockets and went outside.
In fact, Shiwoo didn’t really like bubble tea.
During his slave life in Gehenna, where he ate hard bread that could be used as a weapon and whitish soup, he had undergone a miraculous taste bud modification that allowed him to eat almost anything with gratitude, but the texture of bubble tea was a no-go.
The squishy texture like frog eggs.
He couldn’t understand why college girls, who would hate frogs, liked to drink that.
Anyway, he searched on his phone and walked quite a distance to a cafe that was famous for bubble tea in the area.
He put a bubble tea in the cup holder and walked while sipping an iced Americano.
“It’s hot….”
Maybe he should have just ordered delivery.
At this distance, the ice might melt completely by the time he got back.
-Thump!
While walking on the hot sidewalk, Shiwoo felt a sudden wave.
He immediately realized the identity of the great tremor that felt like his heart was tightening and then releasing.
It was a wave of magical power.
But it wasn’t just any wave.
It was as if it were wrapped in thick cotton, the waveform itself wasn’t large, but it was a deep vibration that made his body tremble subtly.
Something had happened.
“What is it now?”
It felt like trouble was drawn to him just by walking around.
Shiwoo quickly put on his eyepatch.
He scanned his surroundings with his golden eyes that read the flow of magic.
If a shock of this magnitude had occurred in the real world, the surroundings wouldn’t be this quiet.
At least there would be an uproar somewhere, as if there had been a bombing.
However, unlike Shiwoo, who was sweating profusely and had a stiff expression, there was no change in the expressions of the passersby.
In other words, it was highly likely that this wave of magical power had come through the otherworld barrier.
Even though the otherworld barrier was a structure that copied and pasted another world, it was ultimately a space that was in contact with the surface of the water and its illusion.
Within a minute of looking around, he was able to find a place where the flow of magic was subtly cut off.
It was under an old underpass that was made for cars and people to pass under the train tracks.
“Damn it.”
Shiwoo hesitated.
He couldn’t help but hesitate.
It was clear that something had happened, and Shiwoo wanted to avoid any unexpected accidents.
Also, the whereabouts of Sharon, who should be his strongest protector, were unknown.
Therefore, a rational way of thinking would be to run back home without looking back.
He could come out with Sharon, who would have arrived home by now, and there was no need to step into the vortex of the incident.
Nevertheless, there was a reason why Shiwoo was hesitating about whether to go to the underpass or not.
The timing of Sharon’s sudden disappearance this morning and this incident occurring nearby was quite coincidental.
In other words, he thought there was a very, very high probability that Sharon was there.
“Why does this kind of thing happen to me so much….”
He seriously considered getting his fortune told at a fortune teller in the university district as soon as this was over.
Shiwoo took out the music box from his pocket.
He would just take a quick peek and come out.
If Sharon wasn’t there or if it seemed like an overwhelming danger, he would run away immediately.
“Bloom.”
Shiwoo chanted and kicked off the guardrail at the same time.
And when he entered the otherworld barrier, what Shiwoo saw was a world that was entirely red, as if engulfed in flames, and a sky that had turned black.
2.
Sensing an unusual atmosphere, Shiwoo looked around through the gaps in his helmet.
Tall buildings were all on fire.
If this had happened in reality, it would be a front-page headline in the newspaper as the biggest fire in decades.
The center of the destruction, which was reminiscent of hell, was, of course, the underpass.
It was as if a volcano had erupted under the underpass, with the top blown open, spewing red light and high heat as if it were a blast furnace.
“Cough! Cough! This is crazy….”
Shiwoo coughed violently, having inhaled the heat without thinking.
It was because a heat wave of high temperature, incomparable to when he entered a sauna, had hit him.
It was this hot even though he was at least 100 meters away.
If he went any further, he would surely burn to death before he could even figure out what was wrong.
But that was only for a moment.
The flames that had been licking in all directions went to sleep.
The hot air was also calm, as if it had been blown away somewhere.
Only then could Shiwoo cautiously move forward.
He covered his whole body in armor in preparation for a possible battle.
He maximized the output of the music box to suppress his presence while securing physical enhancement and minimal defense.
The melted asphalt that had not yet hardened stuck to his feet.
The heat haze rising from the hot ground made it difficult to see the scene under the underpass.
And when he approached within 20 meters, he found it.
A witch dressed in red was forcibly carrying Sharon.
It was dangerous to encounter a witch.
Judging from the circumstances, that witch had defeated Sharon.
Then she might be a public enemy, beyond just a banished one.
Moreover, the fact that she had made Sharon, who was of a higher rank than Shiwoo, look like that meant that she was probably a formidable enemy that Shiwoo could not handle.
“Bloom!”
However, Shiwoo did not hesitate or waver for a moment.
Sharon was down.
Judging by the self-defense system that was barely working, she had not lost her life, but she was on the verge of being kidnapped.
Shiwoo was not smart enough to weigh the conditions in such an urgent situation.
The only condition he needed to consider was how to rescue Sharon.
Throwing a shadow spear was dangerous for Sharon, and running directly to shake off the red witch was dangerous for Sharon to be taken hostage.
Since the music box was working, he could attempt a surprise attack with a single blow.
Then, what was a means to flexibly attack ‘only’ the enemy according to the situation?
A ribbon woven by mixing shadow particles into the Maiden’s Loom.
The ribbon, which had grown in an instant, wrapped around the red witch’s wrist.
And he flung the witch to the opposite side of Sharon.
He had only tied a thin ribbon around her wrist and swung it, but the result exceeded Shiwoo’s expectations.
-KWA-A-A-A-ANG!!!!
As soon as her body flew through the air and crashed with a fierce sound, sparks fell from the wall that had been heated red by the blazing flames.
The sound of the collision, which echoed several times in the narrow underpass, made his ears ring.
“What….”
Was she this strong?
It wasn’t like Shiwoo had injected a large amount of magical power.
If he had to describe the feeling, it was like he had just swung his arm casually.
But with that much power, the witch’s body had flown away at an invisible speed, as if she had been caught in heavy equipment.
“Are you okay?”
Shiwoo immediately ran to Sharon, who had fallen weakly on the ground, and checked her breathing.
Sharon’s eyes, which were slowly opening with difficulty, slowly followed Shiwoo.
“Run… away….”
“Run away, my foot… come here.”
Without asking for more details, he immediately began to deploy a coordinate transfer.
The magic of teleportation was not easy.
To escape to the desired location, he needed to buy at least 10 seconds.
So, the time until the witch, who had crashed into the wall, reorganized herself was the only golden time to avoid the battle and run away.
-Whirr!
However, Shiwoo’s wish was thwarted by the flames that erupted from the road surface where the coordinate transfer was being engraved.
“How impudent, how impudent.”
The red witch began to walk leisurely from the opposite side of the underpass.
Even though she had made such a loud noise, there was not a single scratch on her body.
No, there wasn’t even a single part of her clothes that was wrinkled.
Autonomous defense.
An automatic defense system that naturally manifests after passing the 15th level of merging the mind and magic.
Shiwoo knew that the autonomous defense, which could block even the main gun of a battleship in perfect condition, would not collapse just by being thrown against a wall.
“Who are you? I’ve never seen magic like that before.”
The red witch looked down at Shiwoo with her red eyes.
This was familiar.
It was a similar situation when he faced Aea Sadalmelik for the twins.
Praying that he wouldn’t repeat the same mistakes as then, Shiwoo amplified his magical power.
