Chapter 110
Chapter 110
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 110
Chapter Title: Poison for Poison
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Tatiana gently caressed the necklace hanging around her neck with careful fingers.
Before her eyes was Allan's body, writhing with tentacles embedded all over it. The more the turquoise light seeped from the necklace, the more violently those tentacles squirmed.
A voice echoed from beneath the sea. A bewitching tone reverberated in her ears.
‘A little further now.’
It wouldn't be long before she summoned the being she served.
With that thought, Tatiana panted as she accelerated the ‘ritual’.
Considering the promised one-day grace period, this was tantamount to striking them from behind.
But.
‘...If I don’t do this.’
She couldn't be certain she could definitively kill that man.
As much as she hated to admit it, Dawood Campbell was terrifyingly competent.
Even if she hadn't fully committed to killing him yet, that man was the one who had clashed with and defeated ‘that’ boy king.
In terms of sheer power, he ranked among the top fingers of the ‘Enlightened Ones’, the strongest devil worshippers.
Few could win a head-on fight against him.
[Apostle.]
“...”
But.
They say even a tiger comes if you speak of it.
The man who could almost always hold his own against that boy king in direct combat was now communicating with her.
Tatiana strained to lift her eyes and gazed at the screen floating beside her.
A man draped in all sorts of gaudy jewelry from head to toe. He looked like some parvenu at first glance, but to Tatiana, who knew his true nature, it was laughably shallow camouflage.
[Struggling? Need help?]
His flippant tone was utterly irreverent.
It dripped with the sense that he viewed her desperate ritual as utterly pathetic.
As if asking why she was wasting so much energy on such menial work.
“...”
But instead of snapping at him, Tatiana clamped her mouth shut.
The man even the Pioneer himself acknowledged as the ‘world’s worst’.
A villain who made even the Pioneer—who dreamed of exterminating humanity and reviving the devil to end the world—shake his head in dismay.
That was the man before her, forged from such ‘evil’ and ‘karma’.
In other words.
He was a being with absurd power, strong enough to survive unscathed until earning all those titles.
The strongest tongue mage in history.
The mastermind who had forced the boy king, bearing the weight of an entire kingdom, to drift for so long.
“...What is it, Talker.”
[Just a message from the boss.]
Talker grinned as he replied.
[Do whatever scheming you want, but don’t forget the original goal, he says.]
“...”
[Killing that guy is fine and all, but we didn’t hand over the ‘seal’ to you just for that. You know that, right?]
At those words, Tatiana turned her head to glance at Allan.
Even if the devil rampaged, there was a means to ‘control’ it temporarily.
The relic that had replaced the man’s heart.
It was probably single-use at best, and wouldn’t last long even then.
But it was powerful enough to ‘hold onto’ the Gray Devil inside the Tristan Duchess even if it went berserk.
And she clearly remembered what the Pioneer had entrusted to her when handing it over.
[Just play your water ghost role properly.]
Talker chuckled as he continued.
[The real important stuff, me and the boss will handle. Got it?]
Tatiana bit her lip until it bled.
The Pioneer had instructed her to merely ‘hold onto’ that man.
It was as if he were saying that even if she poured all her strength into trying to ‘kill’ him, that would be the expected outcome at best.
Tatiana, Apostle of the Inverted Tidal Wave, could never kill that man no matter what she did. That’s what it felt like.
Almost as if he trusted the man to that extent.
“...”
The Pioneer regarded that man as suspiciously... ‘important’.
Even though they’d barely met face-to-face.
As if he’d known him for a very long time.
‘...Originally.’
She should have been the one receiving that attention.
She should have earned that level of trust from him.
Such thoughts pounded madly in her mind, but Tatiana’s voice remained emotionless.
“I know, Talker.”
[Hey, that’s it? It’s been a while—can’t we at least greet each other warmly—]
“If you’re just going to spout nonsense, then goodbye.”
With that, Tatiana cut off the communication.
This flippant man had a strange habit of getting even more clingy around women. As if he were trying to live up to his reputation.
There were more pressing matters than chatting with him right now.
She formed a curse seal with her hand.
A spell displaying footage from predetermined locations.
Surely, the cursed kraken—the vanguard of the Deep Spawn that would soon assault the academy and sow chaos—would appear there any moment—
“...?”
—It did appear.
The problem was that it had been reduced to massive chunks of shredded flesh nearby.
Tatiana’s expression went blank in an instant.
“...”
What the hell.
What is this?
Those things should have been powerful enough to breech the academy’s defenses with ease.
At the very least, no one currently inside the academy could handle them easily.
Not unless it was Casa Garda at her peak, but that woman had long since had her limbs severed on the Pioneer’s orders, preventing her from wielding her full power.
Who the hell did this?
“...”
Fortunately, the mystery didn’t last long.
As she scanned the screens, a figure running across the sea surface soon came into view.
And upon seeing the ‘blue aura’ emanating from his entire body, Tatiana’s eyes widened.
She knew exactly what that signified.
Demonic energy so vicious it could only be seen from a devil’s vessel on the verge of rampage.
‘...Dawood Campbell.’
This crazy bastard...!
Tatiana ground her teeth.
Of course, she knew there were more devil vessels in the academy besides the Tristan Duchess.
But she hadn’t imagined he’d lay hands on them.
After all, wasn’t survival his goal too?
‘How the hell does he plan to clean this up...!’
If the ‘Demon of Wrath’ was that enraged, the survival rate of whoever triggered it was effectively zero.
There were limits to reckless desperation. Unleashing a devil just to block an assault?!
‘...Damn it.’
If he pulled such a mad stunt, it would only make her side anxious.
At the very least, that man had to stay alive until she killed him herself.
Only then could she fulfill the Pioneer’s mission. Only then could she properly demonstrate her ‘abilities’ to him.
‘...Don’t die, Dawood Campbell.’
Tatiana gritted her teeth and began dismantling the formation she’d been refining through the ritual.
Instead of summoning the demonic beasts to encircle the academy from all sides as planned, she concentrated them all in one spot.
She had to slow him down, even a little.
‘Stay alive until I kill you!’
...She definitely felt something was off.
But it was inevitable.
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-They’re probably thinking the same thing.
So the summoning paths for the demonic beasts would likely concentrate massively on the side Liru was approaching now.
If I died within the grace period they gave me, it would mean they failed the mission the Pioneer assigned.
[Quest Info]
[ Main Quest ] 〖 Chapter 3 – Apostle of the Inverted Tidal Wave 〗
[ 15H until the ‘Grand Duel’ event! ]
[ Boss battle follows immediately after the event! ]
As proof, this window wasn’t flashing urgent warnings or shrinking its timer.
At the very least, during this time, Tatiana would pour everything into blocking Liru for me.
What a steal.
[...You’re truly devious.]
“...”
[Is it because they’re women, enemy or not, so you can just toy with them however you want—]
Shut up.
I sent that into the Soul Linker, then continued.
“...And that concludes it.”
I finished the explanation I’d been stringing along and stopped manipulating the simulation.
The chiefs nearby had all fallen silent.
They looked unsure how to react to what I’d just laid out.
“You crazy bastard?”
“...”
No, it wasn’t uncertainty—it was sheer disbelief keeping their mouths shut.
Hatan’s incredulous scoff drew nods from the others, confirming it.
“The plan itself seems quite sound.”
“Yeah. Honestly, it’s impressive how an outsider figured out every function of our academy inside and out. But.”
Hatan sighed as he continued.
“You called those wrecked krakens the ‘first wave,’ right?”
“Yes.”
As I’d said earlier, the Apostle of the Inverted Tidal Wave boss battle was defense-oriented.
More demonic beasts would follow, swarming the academy.
“Yeah. And I get that even stronger ones than those ‘pests’ are coming.”
Hatan’s voice dripped with disbelief as he went on.
“But how many are you assigning to that front?”
“Five.”
Me. Eliya. Yuria. The Lucien Saintess. And Talion.
Elnor was out. They’d surely prepared countermeasures for her.
Better to leave her for... after the boss battle.
“...Five students to handle that.”
“Yes.”
“You joking? With just five, what the—”
“No, that’s not it.”
I cut off Hatan’s doubt sharply.
“Not just five. Five is enough, so it’s five.”
“...”
My confident reply plunged the surroundings into silence again.
[...Now I see why Luca went around saying that.]
Breaking the long quiet was Utad’s sentence.
“Huh?”
[He told us to keep an eye on you. That you’re no ordinary madman, but watching you would reveal something insightful.]
“...”
Did he really say that?
“...Any insights?”
[Plenty. I’ll tell you later.]
Utad grinned as he continued.
[For now, I’m in favor. We don’t have the right to refuse anyway.]
“Utad. You serious?”
[Dead serious, Hatan. I want to bet on this brash young man once.]
“...Tch.”
Hatan clicked his tongue and scratched his head.
“Do whatever. I’m out.”
That marked the turning point.
The other chiefs followed with sighs or whatever, showing their assent one by one.
Barol alone stayed silent throughout, but whatever.
He’d already lost a bet to me, so he had no say.
“But we just follow your plan. What about you during that time?”
Hatan’s question made my face sour reflexively.
“...I have things to do.”
“Like what.”
“Finding a way to survive.”
Even if Tatiana slowed her approach here.
Liru was still charging full speed to smash my head in.
I had to figure out how to counter that.
“...Uh, what.”
I continued in a grave tone.
“There’s someone I need to chew out until they’re furious.”
“...What?”
Hatan’s baffled echo aside.
I meant it.
I needed someone as angry as Liru—no.
Even angrier, charging to kill me.
[System Log]
[ Target ‘Yuria’ grows more adept with the devil’s power. ]
[ Target’s Stage 1 fusion rate has reached 99%. ]
[ The White Devil’s second fragment will appear soon. Related event updated! ]
Yeah.
I’m coming to you now, kid.
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