I'm the Only Wizard Climbing the Tower - Chapter 123

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B.

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 123: 123

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“You. You've already set foot on the same path as me. Yet you're still sane... How very interesting.”

“?”

At the Sect Leader's sudden remark, I tilted my head.

What the hell was this guy talking about all of a sudden?

Either way... no questions asked!

“Ha! Die!”

I fired a Railgun.

-KWAAAAANG⸻!

A flash of electric light.

A blue trail pierced through the air.

I nodded to myself in satisfaction.

‘I’m not some idiot who waits while the enemy transforms!’

This guy was performing some ominous ritual while sucking in an enormous amount of black mana.

Why would I wait for him?

So I immediately blasted him with a Railgun.

But...

-TWANG!

A black curtain had somehow formed around the Sect Leader and easily deflected the projectile.

I was stunned.

He blocked my Railgun?

“Ghk...! AT Shield?!”

The moment the Sect Leader spotted me, he activated defensive magic!

From within the barrier, the Sect Leader muttered quietly.

“It's useless. This continent is my shield. Did you truly think such insignificant magic could harm me?”

-Splat. Splat. Splatter.

The old man's body melted away, chunks of flesh dropping to the ground.

Fragments of human flesh lay scattered across the earth, along with melted pieces of organs.

The Sect Leader continued.

“But... those eyes that yearn for magic, power that is unbelievable without chanting, and even the spiritual presence I can faintly sense from you... I'm certain. You are already walking the path of Transcendence.”

“?”

“Yet how are you still retaining a human mind? I am deeply curious.”

“What the hell are you talking about? Have you lost your mind?”

I half ignored the Sect Leader's words and immediately attempted Dispel.

I intended to break through the black curtain around his body and drive a Railgun into him.

But...

“No, what the hell? Why does he have so much black mana?! Dispel isn't working!”

I failed.

He had drawn an overwhelming amount of black mana from an enormous area, making the barrier far too sturdy.

Like the barrier I had seen in Beijing before.

No, because it covered a smaller area, it was packed even more densely than that one.

I couldn't break it easily.

Even while I was attempting Dispel...

-Splat. Splatter. Splash.

The Sect Leader's body continued to melt apart.

His eyes fell out, chunks of flesh dropped away, and his pulped organs spilled out...

He gradually became a skeleton.

Then, inside the empty eye sockets of the man, who now had nothing but bare bones left...

-Whoooosh!

Crimson ghost fire burned.

The moment I saw it, I couldn't contain my admiration.

“Whoa!!! Sans!!!”

“...Do not interrupt me. I will soon reach the Seventh Tier... the realm of Transcendence.”

The Sect Leader spoke in a calm, languid voice from inside the barrier.

But all I could see were bones.

How the hell was he even talking?

He continued.

“It has been one hundred years. A time spent pursuing truth, craving power, and sacrificing countless things in preparation. And at last. Finally. At long last. Finally... I shall set foot in the realm of ‘Transcendence.’”

He rambled in a strangely emotional voice. I couldn't see his expression, since all he had left were bones.

Watching Sans talk was so fascinating that I quietly listened.

No, seriously, how was I supposed to resist watching a skeleton talk?

“Sect Leader, can you repeat exactly what I say? Here, say this. ‘What a beautiful day. Birds are singing, flowers are blooming.’”

“You are irritating.”

“Do you wanna have a bad time?”

The Sect Leader clicked his tongue.

Amazingly, I could hear it even though he didn't have a tongue!

Anyway, even then...

-Rumbleeeeeee⸻...!

An enormous amount of mana continued flowing into him.

Mana gathered from a vast area, its phase reversed and converted into black mana before pouring into his heart.

Then...

-Crack. Creak. Crack.

His body and soul slowly began tearing apart.

Of course, I couldn't see souls with my naked eye.

But through the strange spiritual presence I felt, I could tell that his soul was separating from that skeletal body.

I slowly took stock of the situation.

A Black Mage whose entire body had suddenly melted away until only bones remained.

A massive ritual that was draining all the mana from a vast area.

And on top of that, his babbling about Transcendence.

No matter how I looked at it...

This looked an awful lot like...

‘Could this be Lichification?’

What was a Lich, after all?

Wasn't it the villainous wizard character that appeared in every fantasy novel until you got sick of them?

An advanced Black Mage who had fallen due to a desire for immortality and eternal life.

Their body died, but their soul survived, forcing them to continue living.

And the guy in front of me looked exactly like the Liches from fiction.

A body with nothing but bones left, a soul separating from its body, and his increasingly powerful presence.

Right now, he was gathering mana on a continental scale, separating his soul from his body, and evolving himself into a living undead!

I nodded in satisfaction.

“Heh. I knew this guy had taste. That's right. The final boss of Black Mages has to be a Lich! Damn right! Clichés never let you down!”

“No, Jiho! Do something! That obviously looks dangerous!”

-Iing...!

Hyeji stamped her feet anxiously, while Iing Iing clung tightly to my shoulder with a tense expression.

Why was everyone making such a fuss?

“Your Railgun didn't even scratch that barrier, and you just said Dispel failed! We have no way to stop him! That thing clearly isn't normal...! What if you can't beat him once he finishes?!”

“Come on, what do you take me for? Can't you see he's hiding inside that barrier because he's scared of me? The moment he drops it and comes out, I can kill him. If I hit him with a Railgun, he won't be able to move!”

“Stop joking around! I have a really bad feeling about this...!”

-Iing...!

Apparently, Hyeji and Iing Iing were genuinely afraid of the Sans in front of us.

Fair enough.

A person had suddenly melted into a skeleton, mana from an enormous area was flowing into him, an ominous presence was rising from him, and cool ghost fire was even flickering where his eyes should have been.

Ordinary people couldn't help but feel overwhelmed.

But for some reason, I...

‘Hmm... Is he really that dangerous? He just looks fucking weak to me.’

That Sect Leader Lich still looked pathetic.

Sure, the total amount of energy he controlled was enormous.

The size of his soul also felt larger than the others.

My spiritual senses told me that the force of life he possessed, along with the ‘rank’ of his soul, was rising in real time.

Even so, how should I put it?

It felt like looking at a slightly larger ant.

I had a strong intuition that even if he reached the Seventh Tier or attained Transcendence, he wouldn't be a match for me.

It wasn't baseless confidence.

At least when it came to magic, my intuition was absolute.

But...

“J-Jiho! Run while you still can! While he's like this, Iing Iing can use telekinetic flight to take us far away!”

-Iingiiiiiiiiing!!!

“Iing Iing says we should go too! Hurry...!”

Hyeji and Iing Iing seemed really scared.

Ah, I wanted to let that guy become a real Lich, attain Transcendence or whatever, and fight him once.

Should I just deal with him now?

What a shame.

‘Still, it would be a little cold to kill him just like that. I'll ask him one thing first, then kill him.’

There was something I'd always wondered about.

This seemed like the perfect chance to find out.

I politely knocked on his barrier.

Knock, knock, knock.

Anyone home?

“...What are you doing? Wait quietly. Once I complete the ritual, I shall use you as a test subject.”

“It's Old and Rich, not Young and Rich. I have something to ask.”

“What is it? If you do not flee, then a trivial exchange of questions and answers would not be so bad. What are you curious about? Are you perhaps wondering how I acquired such vast mana? Heh heh. It is a magic circle prepared over several decades. I established my base at this Black Mage Tower in the very center of the continent, then used the war between the Federation and the Empire to construct magic circles across the entire continent. It was preparation spanning decades. Neither those fools in the Empire nor those fools in the Federation knew, and they stupidly-”

“No, not that. Can you see Blue Motes too?”

“?”

The crimson ghost fire flickered in confusion.

I asked again.

“Blue Motes. Mana. Can you see mana too? Didn't you just reach the Seventh Tier or attain Transcendence or whatever?”

“You can see mana? What do you...”

“Ah. So you're just another ordinary person with their eyes closed. Fine. What a letdown.”

“You can see mana?! What do you mean?! What the hell do you mean?!”

“I'll kill you.”

For the record, I didn't have much mana right now.

I had used it all up causing chaos in China yesterday, and I spent the little that remained killing Ghouls earlier.

The mana remaining in my heart was only enough for around three hundred Fireballs.

But this place was filled with mana.

The Sect Leader in front of me had activated some continental-scale mana-draining ritual to become a Lich.

An overwhelming amount.

No, an unimaginably overwhelming torrent of mana swirled all around us.

Then...

Wouldn't it be enough to just steal it and use it?

“I'll borrow your mana for a moment.”

“You can see mana?! What the hell do you mean by that?!”

I let the Sect Leader's screaming from within the magic circle go in one ear and out the other.

Then I raised my staff.

And spread out my spiritual senses.

‘Come.’

What I wanted was to tune the flow.

And steal the mana.

I guided the vast amount of mana that was being drawn toward that Black Mage through the magic circle.

Toward myself.

-KWOOOOOOOOO⸻!

In that instant, the world shook.

The torrential flow of mana spiraling toward the Black Mage Tower lost its direction and swayed.

Then it began pouring toward my staff.

“...What?”

Inside the barrier, the Sect Leader's crimson ghost fire shook uneasily.

“What...”

-Rumbleeeeeee...!

From beyond the horizon.

From the edge of that dead earth.

An overwhelming amount of mana drawn from hundreds of kilometers away changed direction.

It was like an entire great river twisting.

All of it rushed toward me.

“Th-That is impossible! This is my magic circle! I spent decades constructing it...!”

“Yeah. You made it well.”

I admitted it readily.

It really was a well-made mana array.

He had linked the entire continent into a single spell.

The scale, precision, and persistence it took to complete over decades were worthy of admiration.

Honestly, if it were me, I probably would've tried for a few days and given up.

Still...

“But Sans, I can see the entire mana array.”

If I could see it, I could change it.

I didn't need to alter the entire mana array hundreds of kilometers away.

I only had to reverse a few lines at the terminal point near the Black Mage Tower, where the mana finally gathered.

It was like turning a single floodgate at the end of a waterway.

Then all the mana drawn from the continent began flowing obediently into me.

“Impossible! To interfere with my spell so directly! What realm have you reached-”

“Mmm, yummy~”

-KWOOOOOOOOOO⸻!

My heart had initially held only enough mana for three hundred Fireballs.

But a huge number of Blue Motes poured into it.

Three hundred Fireballs became five hundred, then passed one thousand, two thousand, and reached three thousand.

It even exceeded my full capacity of four thousand.

Yet the torrent of mana still didn't stop pouring in.

Five thousand, ten thousand...

“Ooooh...! My mana pool is packed full...!”

This was a little...

No, this was seriously something else.

“This tastes fucking amazing?!”

I had never had this much mana in my life.

My heart swelled as if it would burst.

Blue radiance flowed through the veins of my entire body.

A sense of omnipotence surged madly within me.

Was this what it felt like to drink an entire continent?

I could understand, at least a little, why this bastard Sect Leader had done all this.

Of course...

“But this was originally mana you were going to devour, right? I feel bad, but what can I do? The world of stealing is ruthless! This mana is mine now!”

“What the hell are you?! What the hell are you?!”

-Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

The Sect Leader desperately slammed his staff into the ground.

He was making such a scene just because I stole a little mana.

It hadn't been his to begin with, yet he acted like he owned it.

I continued sucking up the mana that was meant for him.

Then the black barrier around him...

-Crumble...

Began fading weakly.

Naturally.

The fuel for that barrier was now entirely inside my heart.

“You said this continent was your shield.”