Chapter 739
Chapter 739
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 739
Chapter Title: Escape Drama (2)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Who's the Black Witch?"
A puzzled remark slipped from Zlata's lips.
The moment Si-woo heard it, an inexplicable chill ran through him.
It was closer to raw instinct than rational thought—the kind of spine-tingling cold that made his hair stand on end.
Because there wasn't the slightest trace of a joke on Zlata's face.
Even someone as playful as her wouldn't joke about a witch who'd lost her apprentice and spent the whole day in mourning, would she?
From everything he'd observed so far, Zlata wasn't that cruel.
If anything, she seemed the type to keep things proper.
"...You're really asking because you don't know?"
Si-woo turned to Linne, hoping to deny that gut feeling.
He prayed the now fully dressed girl could provide a clear explanation for this bizarre phenomenon.
"......"
But Linne just frowned, as if she couldn't comprehend Si-woo's words either.
Unlike Zlata, she seemed to sense something ominous—her hand poised to draw her sword at any moment.
"Step aside for a second."
The red branch, propped against the wardrobe until now, flew into Si-woo's hand like it was magnetized.
He bolted down the stairs to the room where Mama and Pina had been staying.
Something was going terribly wrong.
That thought flashed in his mind like an alarm bell.
-Crash!
"......"
A shabby interior in what was originally a storage room.
Inside, Mama cradled Pina, endlessly stroking her cheek.
She ignored the commotion around her, just as always.
Mama had been like that the entire time she'd stayed in Zlata's mansion.
Consumed by grief and sorrow, locked in her own world—even when Si-woo peeked in to check on her, proper communication was impossible.
"W-What's going on? Who's that?"
"......"
Zlata and Linne, who'd chased after Si-woo's frantic dash, looked stunned.
As if a presence that hadn't existed before had suddenly appeared.
That was the weird part.
Zlata herself had given them the room.
And Linne was the one who'd painstakingly removed Mama's collar and brought her here.
In that instant, static crackled in Si-woo's mind.
No.
Was it really that painstaking?
The stealthy trek from Logi's mansion to Zlata's apothecary had been grueling, almost reliant on sheer luck.
Si-woo had been too busy tending to Linne on his back and maintaining their concealment spell to notice much else.
Manya and Malisha had struggled just to keep up.
But the details of how Mama had accompanied them? They were gone, sliced clean out of his memory.
"What are you?"
Si-woo leveled his spear and demanded.
Mama didn't even glance his way.
She merely stroked Pina's hair and spoke.
"Truth and lies are like the two sides of a thin card."
The languid tone was unmistakably Mama's, yet it sounded like someone else's voice entirely.
The color was different.
A fresh, poisonous vitality lingered in what had been a frayed, threadbare timbre, like worn-out cloth.
"Is what you're seeing the truth?"
The unidentified witch met Si-woo's eyes.
Her previously opaque, mirror-like pupils now gleamed with eerie transparency.
But that wasn't the biggest change.
Without so much as a blink, the Pina in Mama's arms had become a doll as pretty as any child could want.
The doll wore clothes identical to what Pina had been dressed in.
"Or is it a shallow lie?"
Si-woo's gaze lifted from the doll that had stolen his attention, only to find the pitch-black witch gone.
Lush golden blonde hair and a cruel smile.
It was Bianca Bellili—the public enemy who'd cornered Si-woo using every artifact at her disposal.
"Fun, right?"
She tossed the doll aside carelessly and crossed her legs leisurely.
Her smile, speech, gestures—every bit a perfect transformation into Bianca.
-Whoosh!
Si-woo didn't hesitate any longer.
He'd already vaguely grasped her identity.
The witch responsible for more chaos and ruin in history than any other.
The Witch of Whispers.
Lilith.
Whatever scheme she was pulling, it clearly wasn't born of goodwill.
Linne moved in perfect sync without a word.
She drew her sword from her waist in a flash and swung for Lilith's throat.
The situation didn't allow for flashy magic that might leak outside.
Even so, the sword and spear strikes raining from both sides were razor-sharp.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk."
Yet Lilith's head never took to the air.
Si-woo couldn't even pinpoint what had happened.
But Linne's sword and Si-woo's spear had sliced through empty air, and Lilith slowly clicked her tongue without so much as adjusting her seat.
"What's your game, Lilith?"
"Sorry, Linne, but I don't have business with you this time."
Lilith showed no sign of intimidation, even under Linne's piercing, hostile glare.
"Where's the Pitch-Black Witch?"
His thoughts grew jumbled.
Since when had the Black Witch been Lilith?
Since when had Pina been a doll?
"Wanna know?"
Lilith, wearing a sly smile, lightly snapped her fingers.
At that moment, his memories began to rewind.
As if he'd stepped into a theater.
The memory of entering Logi's collection room replayed, observed from a third-person viewpoint.
'Come on in already? I don't show this to just anyone.'
Logi beckoned with an excited lilt.
It wasn't appealing.
But with Logi nagging that she wouldn't leave the room until Si-woo entered, he reluctantly stepped forward.
'What do you think of our Mama? Pretty, right?'
Logi hugged the witch from behind, rubbing her cheek against her like she was clutching a giant teddy bear.
No.
Logi wasn't hugging her 'like' a giant teddy bear.
She was hugging an actual giant teddy bear.
"What the..."
The next memory hit from Si-woo's shocked perspective, realizing the truth of Logi's final collection.
'Pina, have you been well? Must've been lonely without me to play with lately, huh?'
Like a child scooping up a discarded doll, Logi sat Pina upright, straightened her clothes, and combed her tousled hair.
The doll's appearance was identical to the one now rolling on the floor.
To the most bewildered of all, Si-woo, Lilith drove the wedge home with a gentle smile.
"The Black Witch and her apprentice died long ago. Two hundred years ago, to be exact."
So Logi's decade of abuse toward mother and daughter had just been doll play?
Was Lilith the one who'd fooled Logi?
How had she so easily deceived four great witches?
It was all incomprehensible.
But Lilith offered no further explanation.
She simply savored the chaos she'd created, observing Si-woo's bewildered face.
"I really hate Keter. But you... you're quite intriguing."
To the wary Si-woo, Lilith tossed out friendly words.
"So I'll let you go after a simple test."
Lilith raised her hand toward the sky.
Nothing seemed to happen at first glance, but the vibration humming in Si-woo's ears stirred a sense of déjà vu.
-Creaaaaak!
It sounded like a massive bowstring being drawn.
Bianca's harbinger—the sky-shooting 'Arkhat's Bow'.
Too vast a spell to observe from inside the narrow mansion, but the bowstring was undoubtedly pulled taut toward the heavens.
"Shoot."
"Shoot."
⟨ Arkhat's Bow ⟩
—————!!!!!
A roar bordering on shockwave rattled his lungs.
After the earth-shaking tremor, the mansion's second floor had vanished cleanly, revealing the sky.
From the depths of the vertical city Hexennacht, Arkhat's Bow erupted in a massive straight line of destruction, piercing the city and soaring into the heavens.
Several witches from the upper hierarchies, caught in the sudden strike, were shredded before they could even scream.
"So run away good and fast."
"You crazy bitch."
This was a signal shot.
A flare announcing that the source of the city's recent turmoil was right here—come and get it.
-Crack, crack!
Less than ten seconds later, palm-sized marionette dolls flew in through the gaps in the shattered roof.
The monkey-like dolls' red eyes fixed on Linne and Si-woo.
Si-woo swung the red branch, smashing the ear-piercing puppets with a sharp crack.
But it was already too late.
They'd been desperate to capture Linne and the male witch anyway.
Destroying one puppet wouldn't hide their presence amid so many watchful eyes.
Exposed by specters and ghosts, bats, invisible threads, elementals, compasses, clairvoyance, dolls, prophecies, demon eyes, shikigami, familiars.
Linne and Si-woo's position was pinpointed instantly.
Eyes from all directions flashed and converged, gazing down at their prey with palpable presence.
"Then do your best."
Like an eclipse, shadows cloaked her form, and Lilith vanished like an illusion.
-Rooooaaar!!!
Si-woo peered up through the hole in the roof.
Through his magic eyes that intuitively read mana flows, he could see the multicolored mana fields pouring from witches gearing up for battle.
Judging by the density and precision of those fields, dozens of them—all hierarchy 20th rank or higher.
They surged toward Si-woo and Linne like a cluster of stars heralding doom and apocalypse.