WETRIED TRANSLATIONS

Wizard of the Abyss

[Translator – Aren]

Chapter 199 - Journey (5)

"We knew from the beginning that esteemed people like you would eventually arrive.”

After coming into contact with my Abyssal Sea, the leader had become as meek as a lamb, lying flat on the ground.

"Of course, the history of our group is rather short, not even 50 years, but even so, when the Empire first shed blood, we were able to understand what it was we needed to do…”

"Not even 50 years?”

"Ah, yes. Our former leader deciphered ancient documents and gathered us together around that time.”

"And what happened to that leader?”

"Unfortunately, he passed away before witnessing the arrival of the promised day. But when that destined time comes, the boundary between life and death will become meaningless, so it’s alright!”

In other words…

Listening to this guy speak with a bright smile, it sounded like some historian who had accidentally discovered that Scarlet Abyss actually existed, then used that knowledge to found a cult.

These guys were a byproduct of that. And by sheer coincidence, their faith seemed to have grown strong enough to the point that they started acting when Scarlet Abyss’ real invasion attempts happened.

What a bizarre situation. After roughly grasping their circumstances, I moved straight to the point.

"I see. Well done. So what exactly is this relic you mentioned?”

Whatever the case, it was clear these guys knew something I didn’t.

The leader looked puzzled, asking,

"You can’t possibly mean you truly don’t know what it is, right…?”

"I really don’t. I’m a newcomer who joined Scarlet Abyss not long ago. I’d appreciate it if you explained.”

"Th-that world…"

He hesitated, as if he couldn’t quite believe I was a newbie, but then he hurriedly nodded and eagerly rubbed his hands.

"Of course! After the Snow Disaster began approaching, we were seized by a certain anxiety.”

"Anxiety?”

"Yes. We, of course, worship all of you, but…our history is short and we’ve never received recognition. We feared that if we actually met one of you, it would be difficult to prove our worth.”

The leader spoke nervously, but ironically, he was telling the truth.

These guys really were useless.

"Therefore, using the information we had, we tried to handle even the smallest matters so that we might earn just the slightest bit of favor!”

He proudly pointed at the severed water pipes.

"Our ultimate goal was to eliminate everyone in this city. If we temporarily cut off the water supply and poisoned the water source with enough toxin, then once the pipes were reconnected it would all be over in an instant!”

"...To protect the relic?”

"Yes! Exactly. The people living in this city keep digging deeper underground! If this continues, those hateful imperial dogs will soon uncover the relic. So we have been doing everything we can to stall for time until all of you from the main organization arrive!”

The fact that he proudly declared a plan to murder everyone in the city reminded me once again that lunatics tended to gravitate toward other lunatics.

I stood up, sighing, to which those guys flinched.

"Lead the way. Let’s take a look at this relic. If you went to this much trouble, you must have already figured out where it is, right?”

"Or course! I will guide you immediately!”

Following the excited man, I headed deeper underground.

And as we walked, I couldn’t help tilting my head.

'Are they trying to betray me?’

The place they were heading toward was the very end of the tunnel, the deepest part of this underground system. The only thing I encountered there was a mound of packed dirt. With no relic anywhere in sight, my first thought was that they were planning to ambush me the moment we arrived.

But after experiencing my strength, most of them, their leader included, were all visibly terrified. They didn’t look remotely capable of trying to fight back.

Swallowing my suspicion, I followed them to the end of the tunnel.

The leader proudly presented the mound of dirt to me.

"Here it is! This is the relic that our Martial Order has been guarding!”

Damn it. Had I overlooked the possibility that these guys were simply a group of lunatics?

As my expression gradually twisted, the man hurriedly added an explanation.

"N-No, to be precise, it’s this root!”

"...A root?"

Only then did I notice a tiny tree root, no thicker than a fighter, sticking out from the dirt pile.

It looked completely ordinary. I stared at it in disbelief.

"How is this a relic?”

"Wait, I’ll need to use something sharp.”

Saying that, he pulled a small pair of scissors from his pocket and carefully cut the tip of the root.

-...Snip!

A red liquid instantly burst out.

"?"

The tree root began gushing out red liquid as if it were part of a living creature’s body.

And it wasn't just red-colored water. In an instant, the cramped tunnel filled with such a thick smell of blood that it made my head ache.

An unbelievable amount of blood poured out from that tiny root, gradually pooling across the floor until it finally touched the hem of my robe.

-Gulp.

"O-ooh…”

"The…r-ritual!”

And then something even stranger happened.

The hem of my robe began to greedily absorb that blood, as if it were alive.

At least the tree root could be considered a living organism, but the robe I was wearing was just a piece of clothing. A robe I had found buried in Aletus’ treasury.

'Ah.’

Come to think of it, I had been told that this was supposed to be the robe of the First Mage. It had even reduced the burdens pressing down on my body to some extent.

[M-mo-more...]

"What in the—”

[M-more...]

The robe that had begun drinking the blood even started making strange noises.

It was so bizarre that I couldn't tell whether it was asking for more or if it was simply the sound of it sucking in the liquid.

As I hesitated over whether I should stop it or not, the leader suddenly dropped to his knees with tears streaming down his face.

"To think that someone as insignificant as me could witness even a fragment of the ritual…I am deeply moved…Sob, sob…"

"What ritual? And is this even safe?”

"The r-ritual, sniff, sob.”

The man, practically wailing right now, finally continued.

"It refers to gathering all the sacred relics in one place and resurrecting the First Mage.”

"Resurrection?"

Yet another ridiculous statement.

Scarlet Abyss absolutely hated the First Mage.

He was the one who destroyed all worlds and erased everything except Heaven, the world we currently lived in.

And yet Scarlet Abyss wanted to resurrect their mortal enemy? I couldn't understand the logic behind that at all.

"Why the hell would you want to resurrect that bastard?”

"That’s the only way to kill him!”

"...What?"

The leader, seemingly overwhelmed with emotion, continued speaking without even noticing how strange my question sounded for someone supposedly from Scarlet Abyss.

"Resurrect the First Mage after killing all the mages to rob him of all his power, and then kill him again. That is the true salvation we long for!”

* * *

"Wait, how did those vagrants even sneak into the sewers…?”

"They must have been eating and relieving themselves down there the whole time. I wonder if the water quality’s been affected.”

Iavon.

Standing in the middle of the city, I sighed as I watched the members of the Martial Order being led away in chains.

Even while being arrested, they still seemed convinced that this was all part of some sort of plan. Some of them were even trying to wink at me. It was honestly quite pitiful.

"Who do you think you're smiling toward, you punks? Line up properly!”

"Tsk, idiots.”

"What?”

"The prophecy is still moving forward! I saw it with my own eyes! The savior has arrived, so the days of your pitiful lives are numbered. Enjoy them while you still can, so you won’t regret anything when the day comes!”

"...Are they insane?”

"Looks like it.”

While the guards escorted the Martial Order away, several others kept bowing to me repeatedly.

"We truly don’t know how to thank you. Even though you’re a guest here, you went so far as to deal with those troublemakers…”

"It’s fine. Just make sure those guys never get out of prison.”

"Are you concerned about that? They will absolutely never see sunlight again.”

With that firm assurance from the guard, I turned away. Evening had already arrived.

Watching the slowly setting sun, I sank into thought.

'So they didn’t tell me everything…'

Scarlet Abyss, and Great Void, had told me that once all mages were dead, the world itself would immediately collapse.

But it seemed this world, Heaven, wouldn’t fall apart so easily.

In the end, the true collapse, the end, the rapture, whatever you wanted to call it, would only happen after the First Mage, the true owner of this world, was completely destroyed.

So killing all mages was meant to weaken the resurrected First Mage, huh…

"Did this thing change?”

If that was the case, then this robe must have advanced a step after merging with another relic. But for now, it still was the same dull color, and its ability to reduce my burdens didn’t seem that different. Its texture did feel slightly softer though.

It even stopped making those eerie sounds it let out earlier.

Just as I was about to conclude that nothing had really changed, a thought suddenly flashed through my mind.

"...Huh?”

If Scarlet Abyss’ goal was to resurrect the First Mage…

Why weren’t they collecting the sacred relics themselves?

'If gathering them was useless to them right now that would explain it…’

That was the most likely answer.

From what I had seen, sacred relics seemed to suddenly fuse together automatically when brought close enough.

Or perhaps there was another reason besides its supposed ‘uselessness’ why they shouldn’t be brought together.

"...So they don’t want the First Mage to resurrect right now.”

If I thought about it that way, most of my questions were answered.

If the real problem was the First Mage, they could simply resurrect him and kill him right away without the tedious work of eliminating all other wizards first.

The fact that they weren’t doing that meant… that if the First Mage were resurrected while the mages were still alive, Scarlet Abyss wasn’t confident they could defeat him.

In other words, Scarlet Abyss had every reason not to fuse the sacred relics. It was better to leave them separated and abandoned.

...Hidden away somewhere, as they were now, where sacred relics no one knew about would remain undiscovered forever.

So then…

What if I resurrected him first—

"Jern?”

That was as far as my thought got.

A familiar high-pitched voice came from behind me, and when I turned around, Elisia was standing there with her head tilted.

"Where were you? I woke up and couldn’t find you anywhere, so I spent forever looking for you!”

"I had something I needed to take care of for a bit. You’re not tired anymore?”

"Nope. Ah! Right, come with me, hurry! There’s something I want to show you!”

"Something you want to show me?”

Without giving me any chance to react, Elisia grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the center of the city.

"The prettiest thing here is the fireworks at night! I really wanted to show them to you!”

"...Really?”

Fireworks? So they had stuff like that in this world as well?

...Apparently they did. But in the city square, disappointed people and flustered guards were gathered together, trying to explain something.

"We’re truly sorry. Tonight's event can’t be held.”

"All the trees on the mountain behind the city have dried out completely, so even a single spark could set everything on fire…”

"??"

Wondering what they meant, I extended my Tide Sense toward the mountain behind the city.

It was the same mountain where the hot spring I had visited earlier was located. And sure enough, all the trees there were now dried out. It definitely looked like even a tiny spark could start a wildfire.

...Could this be related to the blood that root released? As I stood there puzzled by the sudden change, Elisia lowered her head sadly.

"...Hnng."

"...”

She must have been looking forward to it a lot. More precisely, not the fireworks themselves, but seeing them with me.

"It’s okay. We can see them another time.”

"But you won’t be there next time..."

"...I’ll come with you.”

After spending a while trying to comfort her, I happened to think of something while spreading out my Tide Sense again.

"By the way, that magic of yours that suppresses worlds.”

"Huh?”

"You said it works better the more you know about the world, right?”

"Yeah! Actually, I was going to ask you to tell me more about the kind of world you live in!”

"How about seeing it for yourself?”

"Huh?"

I had already tried this experiment on the leader of the Martial Order.

Gently holding Elisia’s shoulder, I wrapped her in the water barrier and pulled her into the Abyssal Sea.

This time, having learned from the results of my previous experiments, I created a glowing light in my hand beforehand.

"Wh-what…?”

As the world flipped upside down and everything around us was suddenly submerged in seawater, she grabbed my hand tightly, feeling anxious. Then her mouth slowly fell open as she saw a galaxy spread out before her eyes.

"Whoa...!"

"How is it? Pretty, right?”

"Y-yeah!”

Of course, in the dark depths of the Abyssal Sea, where neither the sky nor the ocean’s surface could be seen, there were no real stars.

The moving lights she was seeing right now were actually bioluminescent squids drifting somewhere in the distance. But from afar, they looked like jewels scattered across a dark night sky.

I watched Elisia quietly enjoying the Abyssal Sea for a while, smiling faintly. Then she looked at me with sparkling eyes and asked,

"Jern, why do you want to leave this place?”

"..."

"Can’t you just stay here?”

"No."

Strangely enough, even that foolish question was enough to make my heart feel calm right now.

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