Chapter 36
Chapter 36
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 36
Chapter Title: The Book of the Black Goat
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* * *
The grimoire, *The Book of Carnage*.
The place Dale now found himself was a world within the book. A mindscape, reflecting the profane thoughts and malice of the book's author, the blood mage Dushang.
—Will you refuse my contract, only to be reduced to another piece of meat in this place?
The grimoire's avatar, the Executioner, spoke again. Behind him, mountains of corpses and a sea of blood stretched endlessly beyond the horizon.
Dale paid it no heed. A world within a book. In other words, this was not the real world. Therefore, he could not subdue the Executioner before him—that is, *The Book of Carnage*—with physical force or attack magic.
And so, a chilling cold and refined dark magic simply began to swirl at his feet. As the frost and darkness mixed and churned like a vortex, the surrounding landscape twisted once more.
*The Book of Carnage* was showing him the mindscape of the blood mage Dushang, and Dale, in response, drew forth a world of his own.
Wisps of ashen sleet began to scatter. At his feet, a blank, empty horizon unfolded.
“Your world cannot invade mine.”
It was a mental barrier to protect himself from *The Book of Carnage*, and an abyss of thought from which even Dale himself could not escape.
A clash of ideologies, a clash of worlds. It was, without a doubt, the very essence of a battle between high-level mages.
And the world of emptiness, forged from cold and darkness, began to swallow the surroundings—the world of carnage made of mountains of corpses and a sea of blood.
“But the same cannot be said for my world.”
A world was devouring a world.
—How…!
A grimoire was the culmination of a mage's lifelong ideology, achieved after reaching a high level of mastery. In that sense, *The Book of Carnage* was the blood mage Dushang himself.
A 6th-circle red mage, a heinous war criminal who had created countless victims with forbidden mass-destruction magic. The world of such a high-level mage was being devoured by the world of a mere eleven-year-old boy.
—You think I will be devoured so meekly!
The grimoire's avatar, the Executioner who could be called Dushang himself, kicked off the ground, charging toward the world of emptiness where Dale stood.
The sea of blood around them churned, forming a great wave.
A crimson tsunami.
In response, the Shadow Cloak Dale wore began to flutter.
A tidal wave of shadows.
It was an ability he could only unleash because this was ‘a world within a book.’
This was not the real world, and the only measure of power here was the strength of one’s ideology, the depth of the abyss held within their mindscape.
Dale, commanding endless emptiness, nothingness, and an army of shadows, took a step forward, the landscape he would one day cast over the Empire at his back.
This was not a domain a mere 6th-circle psychopathic mage could ever hope to breach.
The world was engulfed in darkness.
*SHATTER!*
With a sound like breaking glass, the surrounding scenery crumbled away.
‘Am I back?’
Finally free from the world within the book, Dale looked around. He was in a place shrouded in darkness.
“—Brother.”
Just then, a voice spoke, without a hint of presence, from right behind him.
It was the voice of a pure, innocent girl. He turned his head. A young girl, wrapped in a jet-black dress, stood there.
“You called for me, Brother?”
Her eyes were filled with a curiosity that knew nothing of the world. From between her locks of hair, the horns of a black goat… two horns, rose sharply.
* * *
At that same moment, in a room in the Apostolic Palace.
Cardinal Nikolai bit his lip, his insides burning with impatience.
Even if the eldest son of House Sachsen was a genius with the greatest talent in the Empire, he was still just an eleven-year-old boy. A young mage who was merely at the level of a 3rd-circle Expert. No matter if he was the ‘Black Prince,’ his chances of returning alive from the Library of Hell were close to zero.
—The Church will bear no responsibility for what happens in Hell.
That was the deal struck through a Geas, a pact of binding, and initially, Nikolai hadn't thought Dale would return alive. Furthermore, as long as proof of the contract remained, House Sachsen would not be able to act rashly.
And yet, would the infamous ‘Black Prince’ truly have entered the Library of Hell without any countermeasures?
The son of the Master of the Black Magic Tower, said to be the greatest black mage on the continent?
If the eldest son of House Sachsen were to acquire *The Book of the Black Goat*, just as he claimed, Nikolai couldn't even begin to imagine the ensuing fallout.
It was then that something flashed through Nikolai’s mind.
“The Church will bear no responsibility for what happens in Hell…”
A clause in the contract the two had made through the pact of binding. In other words, ‘no matter what happened’ there, it would not be Nikolai’s responsibility.
“...I suppose I’ll need to make things certain.”
With his own hands as a 6th-circle white mage and an elder of the White Magic Tower who pursued the light of wisdom. Having made his decision, Cardinal Nikolai rose from his seat without hesitation.
* * *
“You know, Brother, it’s so boring here.”
The girl with the horns of a black goat spoke.
“And it’s so lonely.”
She clung to Dale, appearing as a frail little girl.
“It’s so lonely, and cold, and desolate here.”
“…”
But Dale was not swayed by her innocent facade. He understood the weight of the being before him more clearly than anyone.
*The Book of the Black Goat*.
A grimoire written by the Immortal Duke, Frederick, who sacrificed his own young daughter to reach the truth beyond death. That was likely why the grimoire’s avatar took the form of a young girl.
But that girl was by no means the Immortal Duke's young daughter.
“Make a contract with me,”
Dale said.
“O Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young.”
He spoke to the girl with the horns of a black goat.
“You want to play with me too, Brother?”
The girl smiled innocently. Dale gave a silent nod.
“Then show me your world.”
Simultaneously, the landscape beneath their feet began to warp rapidly. A blank horizon, where ashen sleet scattered, unfolded. An abyss of thought, filled with cold and darkness.
The girl skipped and hopped across the chilling ground as if she were on a spring outing. The sleet scattering from all directions settled upon her shoulders.
“So this is your world, Brother.”
After playing for a while, the girl finally turned around. Dale nodded silently.
“It’s a very beautiful world.”
The girl with the goat horns smiled in satisfaction, a multitude of ‘tentacle bundles’ writhing beneath the hem of her dress.
“I like you very much, Brother.”
It was an incredibly dark, cold, and twisted smile.
* * *
“Ah, ahhh.”
When Nikolai, an elder of the White Magic Tower and a 6th-circle white mage, entered Hell to silence his target…
In that hell, twisted by profane thoughts and wicked ideologies, Cardinal Nikolai and the church knights he led were left speechless.
The eldest son of House Sachsen, the Black Prince, was there.
He stood with ‘the most terrifying being in the world’ by his side.
How could one even begin to describe such a being?
A colony of writhing tentacles, grotesque teeth sprouting along them, a proliferating mass of flesh. An otherworldly horror.
An Abomination was there.
An indescribably terrifying being whose very sight induced madness.
* * *
“Hey, Brother.”
The girl with the horns of a black goat was by Dale’s side.
A ‘girl’ dressed in a jet-black dress, as pure and clean as a treasured daughter of a noble house.
“What are those things?”
she asked, as countless bundles of tentacles writhed beneath her dress.
“Wait.”
Dale calmly reached out a hand to stop the girl.
“Your Eminence, Cardinal Nikolai.”
After stopping her, Dale spoke. He addressed the Cardinal and his retinue, who were staring in terror as if they had seen ‘the most loathsome thing in the world.’
“What brings you here?”
“I-I was just…”
As Nikolai stammered, unable to form a coherent sentence, Dale spoke again.
“The parties to the contract shall bear no responsibility for what happens in Hell.”
He spoke as if he had seen through Nikolai’s scheme from the very beginning.
The terms of the deal struck between them through the Geas. What Nikolai had aimed for was a loophole in that very pact. Even Dale, at his current level, would not be able to win against an elder of the White Magic Tower and the knights he commanded.
“They say the darkest place is under the candlestick.”
Just as holding the high ground was advantageous in a battle between foot soldiers, the advantage of terrain was no exception in the world of magic.
And this place was a hell where all sorts of profane thoughts and wicked ideologies had festered to the point of encroaching upon reality. A world without light. For Dale, who wielded the power of darkness, it was the perfect stage to exert his greatest strength, but for those who used the power of light, it was no different from a death trap.
“You’ve chosen the wrong place.”
Moreover, the one they had to face was not Dale.
It was the most terrifying grimoire in the world, created long ago by the founder of House Sachsen.
How an eleven-year-old boy could control *The Book of the Black Goat* was, at least for them, not a particularly important fact at that moment.
“I-It’s a misunderstanding! I was just, I was only worried about you…”
Just as Cardinal Nikolai was about to say something more in his bewilderment, the girl spoke.
“Hey, Brother.”
She spoke, countless bundles of tentacles writhing beneath her black dress.
“—Can I eat them?”
“I’m not responsible if you get a stomachache.”
Dale nodded as well, as if Cardinal Nikolai’s intentions were of no concern.
“Okay, good.”
The girl smiled, and the ground beneath her feet turned black. Magic was the power to turn thought into reality, and a grimoire was a book that housed such ‘a mage's ideology.’
The forbidden grimoire that contained the world of the founder of House Sachsen, the Immortal Duke, Frederick.
“...Have mercy upon us (Eleison).”
Simultaneously, the elder of the White Magic Tower, ‘Cardinal Nikolai,’ made the sign of the cross.
It was by no means an act of resignation.
The title of 6th-circle white mage was not just for show. Furthermore, Dale was not the only mage in this world who possessed a grimoire.
*The Book of Gospels*.
A light spread out, centered on Cardinal Nikolai and the church knights under his command.
“Grant us your mercy (Miserere nobis).”
Following Nikolai’s invocation, the consciousness of the church knights protecting him began to heighten.
“God wills it…”
“May the mercy and love of the Sister Goddess be with us.”
It was not merely a spiritual uplift. Their bodies, their swords, their armor—all began to be reborn as separate entities amidst a brilliant light. Soon, they were no longer mere church knights. They were ‘angels of the battlefield’ with six wings and flaming swords.
The Hymnal Magic the White Magic Tower prided itself on. An aria filled with light and holy resonance, countering Dale's darkness.
Nikolai, too, was a practitioner of the arcane arts before he was a priest. The ‘Celestial Hymn’ sung by the 6th-circle white mage, Cardinal Nikolai, continued to resound.
His full power, unleashed as an elder of the White Magic Tower who pursued the light (wisdom).
‘He’s not going down easily, as expected.’
Watching the scene, Dale thought to himself.
Light and darkness. A clash of ideologies, a clash of worlds.
What was unfolding here was, without a doubt, a battle between high-level mages.