WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 91: Yellow Crystal Rank

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I looked down at Kim Gicheol, reduced to a lump of charcoal.

"Urrgh... uuuugh..."

He was still alive.

But he showed no sign of recovering, as though he no longer had the strength to absorb evil spirits.

"Capture him alive, huh..."

The Mystic Association had hoped to bring Kim Gicheol in alive if possible.

They probably intended to bind a Black Knot sorcerer with restriction seals and chains, then use him like a convict soldier.

After fighting Kim Gicheol myself, I couldn't say I didn't understand their reasoning.

A sorcerer this powerful would make an excellent weapon if used properly.

"..."

I looked at the evil spirits drifting through the chapel.

【Our Cult Leader...】

【We have to... save our Cult Leader.】

【I'm scared. The monster defeated our Cult Leader.】

【We'll be eaten. Burned alive...】

Their souls were grotesquely twisted.

They were souls full of grief, murdered by their own parents at the Cult Leader's command, yet still bound to Kim Gicheol and unable to attain passage to the afterlife.

Kim Gicheol must have created souls murdered by their parents to make Soul-Devouring Sorcery more effective.

A massive amount of spiritual power could produce effects that bordered on miracles.

He'd used it to deceive people, invoking the name of a God he did not believe in and Abraham's faith for his own purposes.

They were victims created for his sake.

"Seriously, how many people had to die because of that thing pretending to be human?"

Reuse someone like him?

Put restriction seals on him and make him work?

I knew it was rational, but...

"Urrgh... S-save... save me..."

"Just go already, you bastard. Why are you trying so desperately to cling to life?"

"Uuugh..."

The light faded from Kim Gicheol's eyes.

I could save him if I wanted to, but I didn't.

Chomp! Chomp!

"What? You think I should forgive him because I believe in God too?"

Chomp?

Gari cocked their head.

Yeah. Angels were beings who judged, not beings who forgave.

If angels prioritized forgiveness, they wouldn't have turned Sodom and Gomorrah into ash.

"Okay. Glad we're on the same page."

Now, for the remaining cleanup...

"It's time for love to step in."

I looked at the confused evil spirits.

Kim Gicheol's death seemed to have left them even more confused.

He was dead, so his binding should have vanished. Yet instead of becoming feral evil spirits and attacking everyone nearby, they only drifted around aimlessly.

It was proof they weren't evil by nature.

Their resentment had been forcibly piled up until they became evil spirits. What they needed was a requiem.

"Hoo...!"

I prayed for them.

"Lord, merciful God of love, my God who opens the way and opens the door for those who are lost."

"Please watch over the souls who sinned unknowingly after being deceived by a false prophet. Look upon them, and take away their lingering regrets, pain, fear, and resentment."

They had been deceived by misguided adults.

Abandoned by their parents.

Used by evil people.

"Lead them upon a peaceful path. Leave them only with the memories they loved, so that they may truly knock upon the door of God's kingdom."

Have mercy on them. Do not hold their sins against them, but embrace them with love and send them where they belong.

"May you find rest and peace in the Father's embrace."

Amen.

* * *

Only after Kim Gicheol's death was confirmed and the evil spirits had attained passage to the afterlife did I notice the Eden Salvation Church believers gathered nearby.

The people who had fled in terror from the Hybrid Beasts had somehow returned. They were kneeling in the ruined chapel, praying.

What was this?

Kim Gicheol was dead, so who were they praying to now?

Cults really were something else.

I knew they were pitiful people who had been deceived by Kim Gicheol, but the Christian ideal inside me couldn't hide its disgust toward them.

Phew, no. This won't do.

My inner agape.

Jesus said to always love your neighbor.

But did heretical cultists count as neighbors? Weren't they antichrists?

Calm down, inner agape.

I might not be able to love them, but I could at least ignore them and walk past.

Just as I was about to leave them to sort themselves out...

"Y-you... are you Jesus of the Second Coming?"

At someone's words, I frowned hard.

"What Christian would impersonate Jesus? Anyone who does that is a heretical cultist, so get a grip."

"Ah..."

Looking for Jesus of the Second Coming at a time like this.

Korean cults had really ruined Christianity's image.

I might be a descendant of Solomon, but I was nowhere near Jesus.

Craaaack!

The building's inner wall crumbled.

At this rate, the whole place was going to collapse.

"Everyone, stand up! The building's about to come down, so get out of here!"

"..."

The believers stared blankly at my words, then awkwardly got to their feet.

It looked like it would take too long to get them all moving, so I had to call in WaeWae and Quackquack.

Whaaaaaa!

Quaaaaaack!

"Good heavens!"

The believers hurried out of the chapel under the Hybrid Beasts' fierce threats.

I was about to leave too when Gagaram and Kohaku came running over.

"Gari Bodhisattva!"

"My lord~!"

"Are you two okay?"

"We were close to dying."

Neither of them looked injured.

"How did you get dragged here?"

"They said they sensed good energy, so I figured they were obviously cultists. I was going to contact you, but they took my phone right away. Still, it looks like the familiar found its way here."

I'd already told Gagaram that I'd assign him a new familiar.

"Anyway, good work. Now we just need to report this to the Mystic Association."

"Wait, there's something we need to do first."

Gagaram snapped his fingers and grinned.

"While I was locked up, the fox lady scoped the place out."

"My lord! Let's collect the spoils!"

"Spoils?"

Did Kim Gicheol have hidden assets or something?

"We should hurry. Kim Gicheol's dead now, so don't you think his underlings will get greedy?"

Just as Gagaram said, someone had already beaten us to Kim Gicheol's room.

"Eek! H-how did you get in here?!"

"WaeWae, take them away."

Whaaaaaaa!

An Eden Salvation Church executive who'd been trying to take Kim Gicheol's safe was dragged out by WaeWae.

With Kim Gicheol dead, they must have gone straight for the safe. Apparently, they hadn't found a way to open it.

"That's sturdy."

"When I checked it before, there was an evil spirit attached to it. If someone had tried to rob it normally, the evil spirit probably would've attacked."

But the evil spirit was gone now.

A safe that was merely tough wasn't much of an obstacle.

"Gari, just bite open the door without damaging what's inside."

Chomp! Chomp!

Gari bit down with a sharp snap, and the safe door tore right off.

Inside was a considerable amount of gold bullion and cash.

"Bingo~"

"Wow, gold bars again? Everyone sure loves gold bars."

"You have a lot of gold bars, Gari Bodhisattva?"

"Too many. That's the problem."

I'd received gold bars from Japan's version of the Mystic Association in Kyoto as payment for making holy artifacts.

There had been around 1.2 tons of it. Even if I added up all the gold here, there probably wasn't more than five kilograms.

About ten billion won, maybe.

Not exactly a huge fortune...

"No, has my sense of monetary scale become completely warped? This is bad. Really bad."

Look at me saying ten billion won wasn't a huge fortune because I'd made too much money. Was I insane?

"Should we split the cash and gold first? There's probably a few hundred million won in cash too."

"I didn't do much, so I'll just take ten percent. But isn't this the real prize?"

Gagaram pointed to an old book.

"The name is... Ghost...?"

"It's the Ghost Soul Compendium. Looks like a secret text about ghosts and souls."

"I think it might be the secret art that that Cult Leader bastard used to command evil spirits."

"What, so it's black magic? We should burn it."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Gari Bodhisattva, wait!!"

Gagaram hurriedly stopped me as I was about to set it on fire.

"What's wrong?"

"Gari Bodhisattva, do you know how valuable this secret art is? It belonged to Kim Gicheol, a Black Knot sorcerer! If you sold it under Kim Gicheol's name, it could fetch tens of billions... no, even a hundred billion won!"

"It's better for black magic that commands evil spirits to disappear. Keeping something like that around will only get people hurt."

"...You're serious."

Gagaram's eyes widened as he blinked rapidly.

"To think you'd just burn a secret manual this valuable... That isn't something most people would even consider."

"Then our share of the spoils will be a little smaller."

From Gagaram's perspective, it probably felt unfair, since it meant less money for him.

"Do you want all the cash and gold? I'll be satisfied with burning this one book."

"Man... if you're this free of greed, you're making me feel ashamed."

Gagaram scratched his head, then took only the gold and cash.

"I'm satisfied with this. And about that manual, don't burn it right away. At least read it once."

"Do I have to?"

"Handling souls isn't my specialty, but it isn't necessarily an evil art. In the end, it depends on the person using the tool, doesn't it?"

"..."

He wasn't wrong.

* * *

Kim Gicheol was dead.

The Eden Salvation Church had been disbanded, and its believers scattered in every direction.

Once the Mystic Association received word, it immediately dispatched Review Division agents.

"So Kim Gicheol had been hiding in a place like this."

It was a prayer retreat deep in the mountains between Pocheon and Yangju in northern Gyeonggi Province.

The building had been constructed by a legitimate church according to the registry, but ownership had changed hands after the church went bankrupt around fifteen years ago.

The Eden Salvation Church had likely begun occupying the area around then.

"It seems their following was fairly large. Apparently, they gathered believers through front churches in the city."

"Those cult bastards breed where nobody can see them, like rats. What about the believers?"

"It looks like they all ran away. The executives would know they'd be dead if caught, so they've probably gone into hiding. As for the ordinary believers... well, they've scattered everywhere, so tracking them down won't be easy."

Either way, it was safe to say that the heretical cult known as the Eden Salvation Church had suffered a serious blow.

"Do you think someone will claim to be the successor? Well, they won't be able to do it as well as Kim Gicheol."

"Still... this place really got wrecked."

They sighed as they looked over the prayer retreat's miserable state.

The main chapel where the battle took place had burned down completely, while the annex had been trampled and destroyed.

Such thorough destruction...

If it hadn't even been deliberately set on fire and this was only the aftermath of the battle...

"A battle between Black Knots is incredible. It's a fight beyond human limits."

"Come to think of it, Gari Bodhisattva was a Black Knot too, right?"

At the subordinate's words, the Review Division team leader nodded.

"Kim Gicheol practiced Soul-Devouring Sorcery, and Gari Bodhisattva commanded familiars. Their specialties were somewhat similar."

"Did you hear Eom Honggeun's testimony? He said Kim Gicheol also controlled chimeras."

"Chimeras?"

A chimera referred to the broader methodology of creating monsters.

It used animal souls or living animals as materials. The secret arts behind it were so evil and bizarre that demonic magic was one of its most famous examples.

"Kim Gicheol... created chimeras too."

"That's not all. Even when Eom Honggeun used a Berserk Talisman... it supposedly didn't leave a single scratch."

"What? Is that possible?"

Chimeras were fundamentally based on evil magic.

Soul-Devouring Sorcery could depend on how it was used, but forcibly combining and twisting forms was bound to involve malice.

That was why chimeras were highly vulnerable to holy power or light, yet one hadn't received so much as a scratch from a Berserk Talisman used by Eom Honggeun, an Azure Knot sorcerer?

"Kim Gicheol... just how much power had he stored up?"

"...The Mystic Association was planning to put restriction seals on him and use him. If this is true, that would've been impossible."

If he had reached that level, he had already gone beyond the category of Black Knot.

Yellow Knot.

A kind of honorary position that was nearly impossible to receive unless someone was a Mystic Association chairman-level executive or the head of one of the Five Great Lineages.

Still, there were people recognized as Yellow Knot sorcerers through pure skill alone.

Park Bokrye, the head of the Special Task Division, and Pastor Park and Pastor Kim of Holy Temple Church.

They were the pinnacle of sorcerers, irregulars among irregulars who could receive that rank.

At that level, they could overcome unfavorable compatibility and fight a demon one-on-one.

"Wait. Gari Bodhisattva killed Kim Gicheol, right? That means..."

There was no doubt Gari Bodhisattva was above Black Knot level.

It was the moment Gari Bodhisattva was suspected of being an unofficial Yellow Knot sorcerer.

Footnotes:

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