Chapter 517
Chapter 517
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 517
Chapter Title: Disappearance (4)
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Gehenna's nameless no-man's-land.
Clech, who had slipped into the heart of the maple forest, ground her teeth while holding her breath.
The plan had succeeded.
But it was impossible to call it a perfect success—it was a half-baked victory at best.
For starters, after sneaking across the border, she had easily pinpointed Shin Si-woo's location using her bats.
The fish tank's usage was simple.
Infuse it with mana and toss it; anyone within a five-meter radius gets sucked inside.
So, rather than risk getting spotted while tailing him, Clech opted to deploy her familiars like drones dropping bombs.
In theory, it should have been the perfect crime: stuff Shin Si-woo into the tank and vanish without a trace.
But that's where things went wrong.
He wasn't alone—Deneb Jemernai was with him.
That halved the tank's effectiveness right there.
She could have handled some half-baked male witch claiming to be one of them without breaking a sweat, but a count was a different story.
Even if the twins weren't both present, making it less than her full strength.
By the time Clech belatedly issued the abort command mid-drop, the bat had already hurled the tank.
As a result, after the grueling crawl all the way into Gehenna, she faced the possibility of leaving empty-handed.
Truth be told, it was entirely Clech's fault.
She had suppressed her presence to hide her aura, then layered on concealment spells to block tracking, which tanked her familiars' responsiveness.
But Clech was the type to blame her familiars rather than own up to it.
"You stupid bat-brained idiot!"
(For the record, bats are mammals.)
But the arrow had already flown and struck the target.
Along with an innocent count caught in the crossfire.
There was nothing to gain by lingering, so her only thought was slipping out of Gehenna unscathed.
The plan had half-failed, but her caution meant the odds of anyone spotting her illegal entry were near zero.
The smuggler she had enchanted in advance with illusion magic informed her the next departure was in three days.
Three days had passed smoothly since the incident, so once night fell, she could head straight for Border Town and escape this wretched hole.
Clech grumbled as she rolled around inside the burrow.
"Bianca..."
Suddenly, the object of her love-hate obsession flashed in her mind.
If it had been that colder, more meticulous, and ruthless woman, she would have pulled this off effortlessly.
She could almost hear the dry, mocking whisper: 'See? That's all you're capable of.'
"Shut up. I've got my own way of doing things."
Clech shook her head to clear the intrusive thoughts and crawled out of her temporary burrow.
After three days crammed in that narrow tunnel, she brushed the dirt from her blood-red hair, looking almost comical.
In truth, Clech ranked among the stronger public enemies.
21st Hierarchy, with autonomic magic specialized for combat.
She might not admit it herself, but her sloppy demeanor drew plenty of hunters her way.
Yet Clech had survived, walking the bloody path since her inheritance, amassing vast combat experience.
That's why she resorted to such convoluted methods for infiltration and hiding—because this was the witches' city.
Witches revered and obsessed over magic.
They devoted generations to it, even staking their lives.
So no one would ever suspect a public enemy sneaking in would dig a burrow and hole up like a mole.
The best hiding spot was no hiding spot at all.
As expected, after three days, the crisp air carried no hint of human presence.
Caw!
The sudden cry made Clech, who had been cautiously scanning her surroundings, whip her head around.
A large crow perched on a maple branch, tilting its head this way and that.
"Fuck, you scared me..."
Her nerves frayed, Clech spat a curse and patted her chest.
But only for a moment.
She noticed its unblinking, pitch-black eyes staring right at her.
Unnervingly so.
Flap! Flap! Flap!
One, then two.
Crows began swarming in around it, and Clech instantly sensed something was off.
Crows traveled in flocks, were curious, and highly intelligent.
But they didn't swarm silently like this when their territory was invaded—not without warning cries.
This was blatantly abnormal.
"Damn it...!"
All of them were familiars.
Someone had spotted her.
The moment she realized it, Clech flicked blood droplets from her fingertips like shotgun pellets, blasting the crows away.
Caw! Caw! Caw!
Dozens of crows were massacred by the magic, black feathers fluttering down like snow onto the forest floor.
In response to their screams, flocks of crows darkened the sky visible through the branches above.
"This is insane..."
But what left Clech stunned wasn't just the crows pouring in from across Gehenna.
Something approached amid the chaotic winds.
A massive presence, palpable even from afar, like sensing a distant storm without seeing it.
An overwhelming aura cloaked in immense mana drew near without any attempt at concealment.
The forest groaned from the mere backlash of the savage gusts.
A lone witch landed lightly before Clech, who was gathering her mana amid the howling gale.
"......"
Just facing her made the hairs on Clech's body stand on end.
This sensation was like the one she'd felt spying on Duke Tiphereth's merciless hunt before.
An unattainable chasm, no matter what trick she pulled.
Bright golden blonde hair and sky-blue eyes.
Her eerily beautiful features evoked a fairy, but her expression was chillingly blank.
No words exchanged yet, but the seething rage was palpable.
Clech knew her identity.
One of the people around Shin Si-woo from Bianca's collected intel.
The Perfume Witch, Amelia Merigold.
Still, one thing puzzled Clech.
Bianca's files mentioned her, but not in any great detail.
Rumors Clech had overheard were more substantial—like how the Perfume Witch had caused a ruckus in Gehenna and lost her baron's rank.
So why was she showing up now, primed for battle like she'd been waiting for this?
"What's this about?"
Clech rattled off possibilities she hadn't considered.
A closer bond with Shin Si-woo than expected.
Shin Si-woo and Deneb Jemernai breaking free from the tank and reporting the incident.
But there wasn't enough info to grasp the situation this thoroughly.
"I don't know what your deal is..."
No battle had started yet, so she needed to stall with talk and find an opening to flee.
"Wail."
Shattering her hopes, the Perfume Witch asked nothing, demanded no explanations.
Instead, with her incantation, faint blue mana reflections gathered at her eyes, and rain poured down like a sudden downpour.
"You bitch! Use your words! Overflow, blood of the vanguard!"
She couldn't just take this lying down.
Clech immediately released the seals on her mana blood coursing through her body.
The blood, suppressed to hide her presence, went berserk, flooding her limbs with power.
True to her title as a pure-blood witch, Clech's autonomic magic channeled through blood.
Thus, her mana blood was no ordinary fluid.
It was blood essence, distilled from hundreds of lives per drop.
Infused with condensed power and vitality, it could reinforce her body beyond what any spirit form could endure.
Her accelerating blood flow made veins bulge blue across her skin, her eyes turning a deeper crimson, perceiving everything in slow motion.
In that brief instant as she lunged like a beast, Clech formed a dagger.
This slender, blood-red blade was forged from her own blood.
Anxiety and fear of a formidable foe flickered briefly; she had seized the initiative.
Perfect distance.
A clean, unadorned strike hurtled toward the exposed nape.
In this moment charging at an apparently defenseless enemy, victory felt certain.
She had pierced countless witches' hearts with weapons as lethal as this poison-coated one.
"Die!"
When the dagger viciously sank into the slender neck...
Clech realized her assumption had been premature.
The figure shattered like mist.
The enemy she'd targeted wasn't the real body but an exquisitely crafted clone of fine particles.
Attack failed, yet Clech didn't panic, preparing to disengage from the battlefield.
Boom!!!
The moment superhuman legs compressed against the ground like mining TNT detonating.
A sonic boom from rupturing air shook the forest violently.
This was mere recoil from pure movement, not an attack.
"That was close!"
Not fully escaped yet, but she could breathe.
If she could just hide, suppressing her presence would let her slip out of Gehenna.
Snap!
"What...?"
But as Clech streaked through the forest at supersonic speed, she heard a clear, crisp snap from her fingertips.
Impossible.
She was moving faster than sound.
Soon, she realized the ominous sound originated from inside her own body.
"Kahk!"
A clean wave rocked her body, stripping her speed; she crashed into the forest's center.
For an instant, she lost all control over her mana.
"Kuhk... Kuugh...!"
No matter how she summoned mana, it leaked away like pouring water into a bottomless jar.
Only then did Clech realize the Perfume Witch had already cast her spell.
The rain that poured the moment she appeared.
It seemed inert at first glance, evading notice, but upon contact, Clech had been ensnared.
To wield such potent magic so stealthily...
The Perfume Witch finally revealed her true form before the aghast Clech.
Mired in mud, Clech looked up at her with trembling eyes.
Locking gazes sent chills down her spine.
A contemptuous, merciless glare devoid of mercy or forgiveness.
The dignity of a queen who would crush body and mind at their limits without pity.
"Wail."
The Perfume Witch's lips moved without hesitation.
With the second incantation, wildflowers sprouted wherever the rain touched.
Beautiful.
So breathtakingly beautiful.
That was Clech's final thought as her consciousness snapped away.