City ​​of Witches 630

Chapter 630 – #128_Maze

#630

1.
First, I carefully drove the car back to the camp, making sure not to wake my sleeping master.
As soon as I got out of the jeep, I felt a lot of eyes on me, which was quite a burden.
Fortunately, everyone was focused on their own tasks without actively trying to talk to me.

Among witches, there are quite a few who need to sleep.

However, this is the mortal realm, in the middle of a desert with exiles camped just 100 meters away.
They don’t have the guts to sleep peacefully in such a place, so they were either poking at the campfire with a twig or reading books, spending their time leisurely.

If the maze demon appears, my master will play the role of judge as planned.
The rest of us will have to compete with the witches here.

“Well, it’ll work out.”

I can’t confidently say I’m sure, but I’m not pessimistic that I won’t be able to compete at all.
I’ve been working hard to grow in my own way.

My master has acknowledged that I can easily handle a 20th-tier Great Witch, so I think Dela here and the ‘Mercury Witch’ over there are the only serious competitors.

Of course, since the maze demon’s ability is to create a maze, as its name suggests, there will be an element of luck depending on how well you can navigate the maze.

Anyway, I was maintaining a moderate level of tension and trying to control my mind by thinking, ‘It’s okay,’ but the real problem popped up from a completely unexpected place.

Dawn broke, the day brightened, everyone took shelter in the shade to avoid the hot sun, and then evening came again.
But nothing changed.

At this point, voices began to emerge among the witches who had been preparing for battle in a state of tension.

“Hasn’t time passed?”
“Wait a little longer. The prophecy time was quite vague.”
“It’s not even night yet. It’ll come out if we wait a bit.”

According to the prophecy, the maze demon was supposed to appear between evening and night today.
However, even after night fell and midnight passed, the maze demon did not appear.

“Could it be that the numerology faction misinterpreted it?”
“Ha… nothing’s going right.”
“Check the original prophecy again.”

It’s always the vaguely promised wait that gnaws at your nerves more than waiting without a deadline.

The witches, who had come here excited at the thought of getting all the benefits for themselves, were starting to get annoyed by the sudden confrontation with rivals and the anxiety that the prophecy might have been wrong.

Since it was such a remote place, just getting here had cost them a considerable opportunity cost.
In that situation, when things started to go wrong, they naturally became frustrated.
There was a stir among both the Gehenna and the exile sides.

“I’m leaving.”
“I’ll never trust a prophecy again.”

Eventually, when the prophesied date had passed by more than three days, about a third of them packed their bags and left.

Dela was among them.
From the start, she had been traveling around the world, moving from one location point branch to another on a tight and hard schedule, handling requests to subjugate homunculi.

She had stayed here, knowing that her presence was overkill, only to act as a counterweight. Now that Tiferet had taken over that role, she left to fulfill her next schedule.

“I’m sorry for passing on this troublesome role to Duke Tiferet.”
“There’s no need to apologize. I had business here anyway. Leave the rest to me.”
“May you have good fortune.”

Dela bowed her head and left after giving Siwoo a casual greeting.
It wasn’t that she disliked him, but rather that she clearly didn’t know how to treat him.

However, that was only Siwoo’s perspective, who knew the whole story. My master seemed to find it quite strange.

“Did something happen?”
“We had a fight a while ago.”
“Is that so? But you didn’t seem so awkward the day before yesterday.”
“Haha…”

Siwoo glossed over the answer for the sake of his master’s honor.
She tilted her head slightly but soon accepted it and asked.

“What are you going to do?”

It was unclear whether a homunculus would even appear.
Siwoo, who had stayed here to repay his debt, had no reason to stay any longer.

“I have to stay here if my master is here.”

However, Eloa couldn’t leave this place for the safety of the witches, and Siwoo didn’t have any other options.

“If this situation continues for a day or two, won’t the other witches disband?”
“That’s true… I feel sorry for wasting your time.”
“Wasting time? It’s time spent with my master.”

Unlike the day of arrival, Eloa and Siwoo hadn’t had time to be intimate.
There was also the possibility that a homunculus could suddenly appear.

Therefore, they had been on edge for three days without even getting proper rest.
Nevertheless, Eloa felt grateful to her disciple for saying that and held his hand tightly.

“Siwoo, may I kiss you now?”
“Master? If other people see…”
“It’s okay. No one will see us here.”
“If you insist… Uup!”

Hiding in the shadow of the jeep, the two shared a quiet kiss.

2.
Around that time, there were three public enemies on a sand dune overlooking the camp.

Linne, the ‘Sword Witch’ from Qliphoth, who was having a meeting with Dorothy, Bianca, and Klehr.
Ea Sadalmelik, the ‘Aquarius Witch,’ who killed Bianca and offered the Alcoriza family to the lotus to regain her power.
And Lilith, the ‘Whispering Witch,’ who had arranged all of this.

Ea was smoking a cigarette with a cold gaze, deeply engrossed in planning something.

Her black bob cut fell straight down her shoulders.
Her sharp eyes, reminiscent of a bird of prey, and her cursed, glowing red eyes.

Wearing a black dress and casually flicking ashes, she no longer looked like the defeated loser who had fallen so low that she couldn’t fulfill her role as a witch.

“Hmm… is this a bust now?”

In her hand, a transparent lotus made of carved glass was shining with a desperate red light.
It was originally a lotus that shone with beautiful rainbow colors like a prism, but after offering various sacrifices, it was now emitting only ominous blood-red streaks, as if it were saturated.

It was a shame.
If they had worked a little harder, it wouldn’t have been a dream to reach the same level as Duke Erilim.

Ea had not only regained her power.

By sacrificing Bianca’s brand and 10,000 members of the organization, she recovered to her original 21st tier and even broke through to the 22nd tier.
Considering that Ea was on the verge of the 22nd tier before her rank dropped due to the price of the cocoon of rebirth, it wasn’t that surprising.

But this lotus was no ordinary object.
It was a miracle built on obsession and deep-seated determination.

It was an object that far surpassed the realm of ordinary artifacts and even the realm of ceremonial attire, and even Ea herself could not fully grasp its potential.

By sacrificing just a few hundred minor witches and five Great Witches, it had allowed her to easily overcome the wall of the 23rd tier, which she had thought she would never be able to cross in her entire life.

Of course, it wasn’t just the existence of the lotus that had achieved this.
The chaos of the mortal realm, the absence of Keter, and the cooperation of the Whispering Witch were all part of this golden opportunity.

It was the Whispering Witch who reached out to Ea, who had regained some of her power.

Lilith was certainly not to be trusted, but she was a master of concealment and deception, having survived for over a thousand years despite incurring the resentment of many.

With her help, Ea had destroyed five location point branches and hunted down and killed witches hiding in various parts of the mortal realm, without ever being caught in a serious pursuit.

Also, Keter, who would have come to punish such unreasonable human sacrifices, was absent, allowing her to run rampant.

“What do you think? Are you still going to wait?”

Ea was sitting leisurely under the shade, and Lilith was snuggling up next to her.
Unfortunately, she had taken on Bianca’s exact appearance.
She even perfectly imitated her minor habits and speech patterns, which often made Ea’s stomach churn.

“If you keep causing trouble like that, will you get free food while you sleep?”
“What are you talking about? I’ve set the table for you like this. I’m just asking if you’re ready to put your spoon on it yet. At this rate, the prey will keep running away.”

At Lilith’s words, Ea scanned the camp again.

This was entirely a picture created by Lilith.

She had interpreted the prophecy before anyone else and planned to subjugate the maze demon.
She would seize the maze demon’s magnetic magic, ‘Maze,’ which would allow her to freely deploy complex dimensional barriers like a maze.

She would spread a false prophecy to gather the witches in one place.
After that, she would isolate the witches who had taken the bait in the maze and eat them one by one. It was a very plausible plan.

Ea’s biggest concern recently was that her prey had decreased.
With Ea and many other public enemies and exiles running rampant, witches without citizenship had hidden themselves even more, and witches with citizenship were all holed up in Gehenna.

But with this method, it was possible to gather dozens of witches in one place and defeat them one by one over time.
The level of witches who would come to this desolate desert for subjugation was obvious, so it could be seen as quite stable.

Therefore, Ea and Linne, who was caressing her sword with a fierce expression next to her, had willingly followed along, hadn’t they?

“A table…”

But this was a beautiful but useless thing.
At least, it was clear from the moment Duke Tiferet joined.

“Isn’t Tiferet, who used to bully you, over there? You’ve gained power, so how about a revenge story? Or maybe her disciple next to her. The first male witch, that’s a good catch, isn’t it?”

Tiferet was clearly a hateful opponent who had chased after Ea like she was going to kill her for the sake of a novice witch’s revenge.
Also, Shin Siwoo, the first male witch of Gehenna, was the bastard who had raped her and taken her loom.

And Ea Sadalmelik was now able to wield more power than ever before.

She was feeling a burning desire in front of the people she wanted to chew up and spit out several times.
How could she not be tempted by the sweet fruit of revenge dripping honey right in front of her?

“Tiferet is going to be dealt with by Linne anyway. You just have to take care of the disciple. You can do it easily if you just manipulate the maze, right? Linne, right?”
“……”

But this method didn’t suit the ‘hunter’ Ea Sadalmelik.

Ea chuckled and shook off her thoughts.
She calmly got up from her chair, slung her travel bag over her shoulder, and turned her back to Lilith.

“I’m going. You guys have fun with your party.”
“What are you doing?”
“Huh? I’m sure I said it clearly. I said you guys have fun, I’m leaving.”
“This is different from what we agreed on. Do you know who you’ve been able to do all this because of?”
“That’s why I’m not trying to kill you right now.”

Turning around, Lilith, who looked exactly like that bitch Bianca, was standing there with a stiff face.

“Whispering Witch. I hate old stories because they’re boring, but I’ve heard and seen a lot of the tedious stories about you. The witches who get involved with you always end up screwed.
I didn’t understand it before, but after working with you directly, I understand.”

Lilith was a surprisingly skilled person.
Just having her help made a difference between walking and riding a train in every task.

It wasn’t that the witches who had been played by her tricks were stupid.
They had simply missed the timing to jump off the train, lured by the sweetness of the whispers.
But at the end of that, there would surely be a cliff where the tracks were cut off.

“But at the crucial moment, you play a very nasty trick. I just thought that moment was now.”

As soon as Ea finished speaking, Lilith smiled.

“I thought we were good partners… It seems we have a difference of opinion on this.”

Her smile, which was as bright as if all her previous embarrassment had been an act, paradoxically felt devoid of any emotion.

“I’ll kill you with my own hands someday too. Lilith, the one with many secrets.”

Ea gave Lilith the middle finger, who was chuckling as if even this reaction was part of her plan, and turned her back.