WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 550: Sacrifice and Fortune

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The Kingdom of Ten Thousand had bone altars.

Terrible sins committed by savage humans in the distant past. Traces of routine, unending slaughter too horrific to dismiss as mere massacres. Hideous altars made by neatly stacking the bones left behind after humans had been eaten.

Most traces of those atrocities still remaining in the Kingdom of Ten Thousand had been erased, but people could not bring themselves to destroy a few, which were sometimes used as makeshift graves. Mugul, a black mage and priest of an evil god, stood at one such bone altar.

Hide drums echoed as sacrifices who had lost their minds shuffled forward. Mugul directed servants and puppets while preparing the forbidden ritual.

Even as Mugul prepared the long-awaited ritual, they could not rest easy. Leaning on a staff topped with a skull, they muttered in displeasure.

"...A ritual performed while being chased is unlikely to succeed."

Still, there was no other choice. Someone from beyond the Great Steppe was coming for Mugul.

Civilized people feared the barbarians beyond the steppe, while barbarians revered those who came from beyond it. Civilization's people arrived in this land carrying unheard-of weapons and tools, shocking concepts and ideas, then transformed it beyond recognition. Their arrival rebuilt lives too quickly, irreversibly, and in ways no one could resist.

The strongest and most shocking of them all had been Queen Agartha. A heroine who united countless tribes that could never have come together and founded the Kingdom of Ten Thousand.

Though her bloodline had ended because of some incident, a strange reverence for her still lurked throughout the dark jungle.

Even Mugul, who ruled over the jungles of the Kingdom of Ten Thousand, could not shake that unease.

"There were good omens. The crows circling the sky, the waning moon, the rising blood, all foretold the ritual's success. It would be foolish not to perform it."

After speaking to nobody in particular, Mugul raised his staff and steeled his resolve. Then even this obstacle that had appeared must be a good omen. Once they overcame this trial, the result they desired would surely follow.

"It was something that had to be done anyway. The timing has only moved forward a little."

Mugul waved his staff. Something enormous stirred at the bone altar.

"Come whenever you wish. I will deal with you personally."

By then, though, the regressor and I had already infiltrated the sacrifices' prison.

The bone altar was visible in the distance. Rather than attack the black mage at once, the regressor suggested we sneak in. She said there were probably people the black mage had captured somewhere around here.

The easiest way to deal with a black mage was an ambush. That was true of all mages, but an unprepared black mage was especially weak.

The wisest method, however, was to free the sacrifices before attacking.

"This is why I hate black mages. We didn't come here specifically to save these people, but we end up saving them anyway."

The regressor grumbled as she casually cut through the iron bars with Skywarbler.

Just as a rich man piled cash in a vault, black mages always kept sacrifices ready for immediate use. The black mage had hidden these sacrifices, both assets and weaknesses, carefully away, but the moment the regressor looked around with her Seven-Colored Eyes, they were exposed.

Unless someone was cruel enough not to care whether innocent people lived or died, they had no choice but to prioritize freeing the sacrifices. It was not only a matter of justice.

"That's a reasonable decision. A black mage's power depends on the number of sacrifices. The more we save, the more of their strength we take away."

"I hate being forced into this situation. A black mage must have prepared countermeasures too."

The regressor called to the people inside.

"Everyone, come out. Unless you want to die."

The people trapped in the prison hesitated for a long time. Such unexpected salvation was too unfamiliar to them.

"I'm saved!"

At least one person still had her wits about her. A frail barbarian woman in tattered leather clothes approached us.

"We're finally saved! Queen, great spirit, Mother of All Trees! You have sent an incarnation to save us from that wicked sorcerer!"

She approached in a voice full of emotion, then looked back and shouted.

"Everyone, come out! Otherwise, that sorcerer will quench his thirst with your blood and flesh!"

The people who had been lying around listlessly staggered into motion. As if she were their leader, the potential sacrifices followed her out of the prison.

After cutting through every rope and chain, the regressor pointed behind us.

"There. Go outside somewhere and hide for now. You'll get caught up in the fight and die if you stay here."

"Where should we go?"

"Anywhere but here."

"Understood. Everyone, keep going. We have to move, even if it's hard..."

The woman led the sacrifices who had lost their minds. She looked remarkably resolute and brave.

It was hard to believe she had been a sacrifice waiting to die.

'Just as Master said. They came looking for the sacrifices first.'

The black mage Ramnu concealed her intentions as she guided the sacrifices.

To a black mage, sacrifices were both assets and risks. Unlike money, they had legs and could run away on their own. In severe cases, they might even take up weapons and attack.

That was why black mages broke their will with terror when storing sacrifices, then clouded their minds with drugs and incense. That way, the sacrifices would offer up their lives on the altar when needed.

Of course, if they were damaged too badly, they lost their value as sacrifices, so they had to be maintained in moderation. Yet tending to humans was so bothersome that black mages usually made their disciples handle such chores in the name of training.

'I hid my true intentions even from that nasty master and acted like a diligent, devoted disciple completely smitten with them. Tricking fools who came to save sacrifices will be much easier.'

Unaware that every thought was being read, Ramnu laughed inwardly.

'Master ordered me to report this immediately, but there's no need. With this many sacrifices, I can perform the ritual myself. While they fight Master, I'll seize the ritual for myself. I will become Ankra's incarnation!'

It was quite an ambitious plan, but Ramnu had one piece of bad luck.

Was it that I had telepathy? Of course not.

It was that the regressor had grown suspicious.

"Hm. People listen to you very well..."

The regressor's eyes flashed through seven colors for an instant. Her Green Eye saw through grass and rocks, finding the steel key hidden inside Ramnu's clothes.

A prison key made of steel. A sacrifice should not have had one. If Ramnu had possessed a key, she should have escaped long ago.

"Pardon?"

"For now."

"Kyyaaaaaah!"

Ramnu was cut down by the regressor's sword and sprayed blood. It would be unfair to say Ramnu had been careless. Who could have expected someone with the power to see through things to find the key at that exact moment?

"The air is full of foul incense. A narcotic? An anesthetic? Something like that. The effect isn't very strong."

"Yes. That must be why people won't move easily even when we tell them to."

"I'll blow away the incense with wind, so take the people somewhere. A black mage is nothing without sacrifices."

"Kekeke. Nothing?"

At that moment, Ramnu, who had bled to death, slowly rose in the exact same position. Without bracing herself against the ground or stopping the blood pouring out. Ramnu straightened up as if being rewound, then spoke with no life in her face.

"You are in the palm of my hand. Did you think I would not have prepared even for this much?"

"What, is this puppetry?"

"Kekeke. Of course. This puppet swallowed one of my fingers. If I wasn't going to use disciples as puppets, there would be no reason to take them."

Puppetry, a technique that planted a piece of one's own body inside someone and seized control through a spell. An extra life purchased with one sacrifice and a piece of the body.

Mugul must have turned their disciple into a puppet and been watching us from the beginning.

"So what?"

Though the ambush had been exposed, the regressor did not care and severed the puppet's limbs. No matter how powerful the real body was, a puppet was still only a puppet. Breaking it was enough.

Ramnu's body, stripped of its limbs, quickly became useless. Yet the black mage beyond did not care much about the puppet's damage. To them, it was only a puppet.

"No hesitation, I see... But how about this!"

The black mage scattered even more blood and chanted a spell. Closer to a primal howl than language, the chant turned the spilled blood into a red mist.

The red mist surged in. The regressor lightly slashed the air with Skywarbler, stopping the mist with wind.

"Is that all?"

"I wasn't targeting you!"

At the same time, the sacrifices' eyes turned bloodshot as they began screaming. A frenzy curse. The sacrifices, stripped of reason and soaked in drugs, could no longer tell one another apart and began rampaging.

The regressor clicked her tongue.

"Tch. Should I have attacked the black mage directly? They're more perceptive than I expected."

"They must have known we were coming and prepared for us. What do we do? Kill them?"

"Even if we kill them, they'll become sacrifices for the black mage. I'll go kill the black mage's real body right now! You handle this place!"

"What? You're leaving me alone among all these berserkers?"

"You can do it, can't you? You won't die."

"That doesn't mean I have to!"

"We don't have time!"

Ignoring my protest, the regressor immediately raised Jizan overhead. Jizan's sword energy split the ceiling in half, and starlight seeped into the dim underground prison.

"Do it!"

The regressor shot upward, leaving me alone among the countless berserkers. The sacrifices affected by the frenzy curse approached as I stared blankly at the sky.

"Haaah. Why are all my opponents like this...?"

They drooled, their minds filled only with the urge to tear me apart with teeth and nails. No, not even thoughts. Hostility and instinct that had not developed into thought swirled within them.

"Dealing with them isn't the problem."

The problem was that I could not kill these berserkers, while leaving them alive meant they would attack me. What was I supposed to do?

"...I still have to, don't I?"

One berserker bared their teeth at me. Click, click. Their teeth clacked together as they tried to tear into my body. Scratches and claw marks covered me. The berserkers rushed at me like mad dogs, eager to drink my blood and take my flesh.

Rather than push them away, I let blood flow from my body.

Life naturally resisted outside interference, but black magic blurred that boundary and interfered with another human's body and mind. Broadly speaking, it resembled vampirism. Vampirism forced upon someone else, perhaps.

In any case, black magic was still a human technique. I let the berserkers drink my blood. Since I had regenerative abilities, I could afford to do so.

The blood I shed slowly flowed into the berserkers' bodies.

Footnotes:

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