Chapter 26
Chapter 26
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 26
Chapter Title: Joseph (3)
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Is that why you killed him...?
Oliver asked as he gently lifted Andrew's upper body.
Maggots writhed and spilled out from the cross-section of his severed waist.
Joseph fell silent for a moment before opening his mouth.
"...You're curious about that?"
"Well... yes. But if you don't want to talk about it, Master, that's fine too."
Joseph chuckled soundlessly at Oliver's words, which didn't fit the situation at all. Then he said,
"Half right, half wrong. It's true I killed Andrew to receive a blessing from the demon, but that wasn't the only reason. The bastard... he pissed me off."
"Pissed you off?"
"Yeah, pissed me off. Even with me around, he thought my organization was his, and that wasn't enough—he started building his own people and dared to challenge my authority. Utterly infuriating."
Oliver nodded. Well, he had some idea that Andrew harbored those feelings.
"I see."
Oliver placed Andrew's corpse back on the altar. The maggots writhed even more from the impact.
"Um... if it's okay, could I say something?"
Joseph pulled out a Filterette, put it in his mouth, and said,
"Go ahead."
"Have I ever pissed you off, Master?"
"...No. You did point at Marie on your own, but it was to learn letters, so I get it. Besides, that's not your style."
"Phew... glad you understand."
"But I can't let you live."
"I don't get it. Why not?"
"No personal grudge. It's just for a greater goal... Tell me. What is my goal?"
Oliver recalled the first time he met Joseph.
"...You said it's to raise an exceptional black mage... To survive, to grow strong. Ah..."
Oliver let out a sound. He understood Joseph's true meaning.
"Exactly. My goal is to grow stronger, and for that, I need to offer greater sacrifices to the demon. Like you."
Oliver raised his hand.
"Just out of curiosity—how did you end up meeting the demon?"
Joseph stared at Oliver, then glanced at his half-smoked Filterette and said,
"Back when I wasn't even a third-rate black mage. The demon whispered to me. It said it'd give power to someone talentless like me if I did as it asked. I built this altar as it commanded and sacrificed my master and fellow disciples."
Ah. Oliver looked around again.
No wonder this place felt familiar—it was the black magic organization Joseph once belonged to.
Oliver wanted to ask what he'd done here or what his master was like, but he suppressed his curiosity and focused on the situation at hand.
"Could you grant me one more word?"
"One more. It's fully lit now."
"Thank you. Could you possibly spare my life? I have personal things I want to do, and I'm grateful to you, Master. You've taught me so much. If you let me live, I'll serve you faithfully for life."
Joseph tossed the fully smoked Filterette to the floor, crushed it underfoot, and said,
"You're sincere, and it's a good offer. But I refuse. I can't even imagine what reward I'd get for offering someone as talented as you, and besides..."
"Besides?"
"...If not now, I don't think I'll ever be able to take you down."
With those words, Oliver caught a flash of killing intent.
He rolled sideways on instinct, and shadow tentacles burst from where he'd been standing.
Parrrruk—!
A split-second slower, and he'd have been caught for sure.
"Even when I hid my emotions, you saw through it. Sharp eyes indeed. Sharper than anyone I've seen."
Hate Bullet
Extracted emotions fired as bullets
Joseph extracted emotions from a vial with that and fired Hate Bullets.
Oliver pulled out his own vial and deployed Black Shield to block the attack.
Black Shield
Barrier of condensed shadows
But it was just a delay tactic.
While Oliver paused, Joseph pulled a vial of Life Force from his pocket and chanted loudly.
"[Revive]"
⟨ Necromancy: Reviver ⟩
The Life Force in the vial tore into dozens of strands at the spell's command, flowing into the scattered corpses and skeletons.
Oliver watched the scene silently.
Turbid lights flickered in the corpses' eyes one by one, and they began to stagger to their feet.
Their long-stiffened joints and muscles creaked with gruesome crack-crack sounds echoing through the room. Amid the eerie horror, Oliver asked,
"This is..."
"Manipulation black magic. Reviver. It revives corpses instantly and makes them move. Not my specialty, but I can manage."
"Doesn't... seem very threatening."
Oliver said, looking at the mindless revived corpses.
"True. Not yet."
With that, Joseph opened a vial infused with emotions and cast new black magic.
"[Object Hate]"
⟨ Hatred Infusion ⟩
The hatred from the vial split into dozens in the air, just like the Life Force, and entered the revived corpses.
Their blank faces twisted with rising hatred. They turned to Oliver and charged with metallic roars.
"Kuuuaaaah!!!"
"Uuuooaaargh!!!"
"Kyahaha!!"
At least thirty zombie-like horde.
Oliver confirmed the approaching zombies, extracted minimal emotions from his vial, and applied them to his shadow.
The black magic Joseph had used first. Oliver mimicked it, but not exactly—he made far thinner tendrils that simultaneously ensnared the zombies pouring in from all sides.
The zombies couldn't move an inch.
They thrashed and screamed to break free, but as Oliver pulled both hands like garroting, the shadow tendrils dug into their flesh and sliced them apart like cheese.
Their Life Force scattered into the air from the massive damage. Joseph didn't miss the timing and launched a fierce assault.
"Impressive! I've picked up something truly amazing!!"
A barrage of Hate Bullets. Oliver extracted minimal emotions to deploy Black Shield.
But Joseph, as if anticipating it, fired Hate Bullets of varying emotional densities to force attrition. He even attacked from different angles, amplifying Oliver's emotional consumption.
Quiet Snake
Venomous serpents from the ground
Four poison-fanged snakes appeared at Joseph's feet and slithered silently toward Oliver.
While blocking Joseph's attacks, Oliver spotted the snakes and fired single Hate Bullets to eliminate them.
Anyone watching would have been amazed.
He was holding off Joseph's relentless barrage from countless vials with just one.
But that was it.
Joseph still had overflowing emotions, while Oliver's dwindled from half to a third, then nearly bottomed out.
A black javelin incomparable to Andrew's pierced Oliver's Black Shield.
The shattered shield and spent javelin vanished like mist.
Oliver, barely avoiding a penetrating wound, observed silently, as if time had stopped.
"It's over now."
Joseph said, eyeing Oliver's nearly empty vial. Enough for one Hate Bullet, maybe?
Oliver stared at his vial wordlessly, then suddenly reached out to extract Joseph's emotions.
For a moment, it seemed to pull, but Joseph swung his hand forcefully, breaking the extraction. Attacks flew again.
His last hope of extraction failed.
But Oliver didn't give up. He scraped together his last drops of emotion into a Hate Bullet and fired it at Joseph's incoming one.
The hatred bullets collided and vanished in midair.
In that instant, Oliver reached out, focusing all his nerves.
Time seemed to slow, but he ignored it.
He heightened his concentration further.
What mattered was his hand and the dissipating emotions in the air.
Surprisingly, with extreme focus, the smoke-like emotions condensed slightly and flowed into his hand in small amounts.
The moment he had them, Oliver shouted.
Black Shield
Minimal barrier - razor thin
A thin black veil formed.
It barely blocked Joseph's attack.
Of course, lacking enough emotion, it shattered at the end, but no one could deny Oliver had saved his skin.
And that was just the start.
Having tasted the emotions, Oliver re-extracted the remnants from the shattered Black Shield and blocked Hate Bullet in the air, stabilizing them in his hand.
Joseph watched silently.
"...What the hell are you?"
Oliver feigned exhaustion while manipulating the emotions in his hand.
Joseph noticed and emptied his vial entirely, unleashing a torrent of attacks.
Hate Bullets, black javelins, venom snakes, black flames rained down.
Oliver fired Hate Bullets to intercept in sequence, deployed Black Shields to desperately block, and re-extracted dissipating emotions to gather more.
A perilously precarious task.
Missing a single beat meant death, yet strangely, Oliver felt joy in that moment.
Even he thought it odd.
If he died here, he'd never see that beautiful light again or uncover its secrets.
Yet Oliver reveled in it, and his mind raced at full speed.
While blocking attacks, Oliver chanted.
Shadow spikes erupted beneath Joseph's feet, distracted by his onslaught. It tore a deep gash across half his face.
A bit faster, and it might have impaled him from below.
"Th-this... you...!"
Joseph panicked, losing composure. That alone showed how devastating it was, but there was no time for regret.
The real attack was yet to come.
"Huh?"
Joseph yelled upon seeing dartboards appear on his body.
Black Darts curved sideways toward them.
"B-Black Shield!"
Joseph deployed his shield in panic.
The improved Black Javelin variant—Black Dart—couldn't pierce but embedded itself. That was enough.
"What?"
Joseph eyed the Black Dart, sensing something off.
True to a family head, he pinpointed the cause instantly.
"Son of a—!"
Boom—!!!!
The Wrath Boom planted inside detonated.
Not overwhelmingly powerful, but the surprise timing shattered the Black Shield and blew off Joseph's shoulder.
The vials in his pocket shattered on the floor. Clutching his severed arm, Joseph screamed as if the world were ending.
"Gaaaaah—! Gaaak—! You fuuuck—!!!"
Red blood pooled on the floor amid the searing meat smell.
Joseph's emotions destabilized and scattered into the air.
Oliver re-extracted even those and approached. Wracked by pain and terror, Joseph crawled away, bleeding and screaming toward the opposite side.
"Fuck! Fuck!! Fuuuuck—!! Stay back! Don't come! Stay away!!!"
Oliver observed Joseph.
Beyond simple fear and pain, a tenacious emotion burned.
Something more than mere survival instinct—Oliver couldn't name it yet.
One thing was clear: that light grew ever more beautiful.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Feeling his heart pulse faintly, Oliver searched the floor for an intact vial.
"Master. Just a moment, please wait. I beg you."
Joseph felt even greater terror toward such Oliver and crawled faster.
His blood trail slimed like a snail. Oliver found an intact vial.
"Ah!"
Oliver approached with the vial. Joseph muttered while crawling away.
"Me... dying here like this..."
Then, an ominous aura emanated from somewhere.
An unsettling energy that startled even anticipatory Oliver and doomed Joseph.
Turning, they saw corpses grotesquely merging.
The mass formed a crude shape.
Oliver instinctively sensed it resembled black magic but was far more advanced.
"Ha... haha... hahahahaha! Of course! It wouldn't abandon me like this!!"
Joseph laughed maniacally, forgetting his missing arm.
No metaphor—pure madman, erupting in frenzied cackles, pain and fear forgotten.
Oliver saw relief and near-faith in Joseph.
Turning back, the meat lump took a more defined form, resembling...
"An old man... on a horse?"
Oliver muttered, tilting his head.
Zombie rotten flesh and skulls formed a small horse; arms, legs, entrails shaped an old man.
Especially the guts-made beard and hair—luxuriantly bushy.
Normally, attack immediately, but Oliver knew instinctively it was futile.
Joseph suddenly yelled at the monstrosity.
"Spare me! Horseman Elder!! Help me just once! I'll offer more sacrifices! To you...!"
Did his plea reach it?
The corpse-horseman clopped toward Oliver.
Oliver watched silently as it slowly raised a hand to its chest and bowed politely to him.
Unmistakably courteous.
Joseph, shocked more than by his arm loss, tried to protest, but before words formed, the mass collapsed and vanished.
Spilled guts and maggots soiled Oliver's shoes and half of Joseph's face.
Oliver politely asked Joseph,
"Master... what was that just now?"
But Joseph muttered despairingly, as if deaf.
"This can't be... can't be... I won't accept it...! My life...!! Won't... accept...!!!"
His voice rose like a demon possessed.
His emotions shone beautifully, and Oliver excitedly extracted them.
Not much quantity, but pure bliss.
To prove it, Oliver warmly patted his master's chest in thanks.
Even though Joseph had already breathed his last.
"Well, all things considered... thank you so much. Master."