The Black Hand
“Ugh, what’s that smell?” The stench from all directions assaulted my nose. Even someone as good-natured as me couldn’t help but grimace. It was the kind of reek that would’ve sent any dog beastman with a sensitive nose running without a second glance.
“Smells like rotting wood and rat droppings… Yep, classic slum odor.”
“Still, this area is particularly bad. It must be quite difficult for you, Luna, as a beastman.”
“Thanks for worrying, Claire. It’s rough, but I can still manage.”
We chatted as we made our way toward the black mages’ hideout hidden somewhere in the slums. From what we’d heard, corpses smuggled out of the Underground Colosseum were stockpiled here before regular transporters came to collect them.
The closer we got, the worse the stench became. Just as I was seriously considering ditching the whole thing and turning back, the hideout finally came into view.
“There it is.”
Theo pointed toward the very edge of the slums, right next to the sewage treatment plant. Claire nodded in understanding.
“Sewage treatment plants with their foul odors are a favorite hiding spot for criminals. No one wants to approach them.”
“Makes sense. With a smell this strong, it’d be easy to mask the scent of corpses.”
“Theo. What are your orders?”
“From what that guy told us earlier, there’s only one entrance anyway. Let’s all go in together.”
“Understood. Then, as usual, I’ll take the lead.”
“You sure? You’re not even in armor today.”
Claire had followed us straight from her volunteer work, so she wasn’t wearing her usual dungeon gear. She was in plain clothes, carrying only her shield and mace.
“It’s fine. None of us are armored. If anything, it makes more sense for me to lead since I at least have a shield.”
We weren’t exactly prepared for a fight either. At least I’d come expecting to handle the event myself, so I was somewhat equipped—though I wasn’t the type to lug around heavy gear in the first place. Ah, but I had brought plenty of consumables.
I handed out the supplies I’d been carrying, and we descended into the sewage treatment plant.
“I sense black magic energy ahead! Stay behind me!”
Black mist that came flying through the air dissolved the moment it touched the light wrapped around Claire’s shield. From that first attack, all sorts of spells began pouring down on us—fireballs, razor-sharp blades of ice, and bubbling blobs of poison.
The spells themselves looked almost identical to what academy mages used, except each one was cloaked in a murky, ominous aura.
“That’s the nature of black mana. Even without using black magic directly, simply mixing black mana into ordinary spells greatly increases their power.”
Yet not a single one of those spells managed to get past Claire’s shield. She even had the composure to explain things to us while the magic kept hammering against her defense.
“But the moment you mix black mana into a spell, you can no longer use ordinary magic without it. It’s no different from a mage dying.”
Whether the black mages heard Claire’s calm voice or not, an angry retort came flying back.
“What nonsense! Dying as a mage? No! We’ve become able to use even stronger magic! We’ve stepped into a higher realm as mages!”
Claire scoffed at the black mage’s shout.
“So that higher realm is this stinking sewage treatment plant? If you’d said a lower realm, I might’ve agreed. You gathered like insects just to obtain power that can’t even break through one shield, and this is how far you’ve fallen?”
“You little…!”
Properly provoked, the black mages unleashed an even fiercer barrage of spells. Some attacks weren’t aimed directly at Claire but swept across a wide area or tried to circle around to hit us in the back.
But we weren’t just sitting ducks either. Theo’s defensive magic blocked the flanking spells, and a few area attacks that exploded after failing to pierce his barrier even caught some of the black mages themselves.
“As expected, nothing but small fry here too. Claire, let’s move in.”
“Yes!”
A single exchange of spells had made the gap in strength painfully clear. Following Theo’s order, Claire advanced step by step toward the black mages with her shield raised.
“S-Stop her! Stop her! Summon the undead!”
They hadn’t been able to take down even Claire with their spells, so the outcome of close combat was obvious. The black mages tried to hinder her advance, but their spells only grew weaker and weaker. They’d wasted too much mana after being riled up by Claire’s words earlier.
Of course, even with mana left, they wouldn’t have stood a chance.
“Undead! That one’s mine!”
Whenever a black mage with any mana left managed to summon something, Faye and I immediately smashed it. The undead they could call were nothing more than low-grade skeletons with creaky joints—easy work.
“Those bastards came out from behind the shield! Attack them!”
“Then what about the holy knight?! If we let her get close, we’re all dead!”
“If we attack from behind, she’ll try to block it! Just attack already, you idiot!”
“Fuck, if you’re so smart, why don’t you cast a spell?! You premature ejaculator with no mana left!”
With every step Claire took, the black mages grew more panicked until they finally started fighting among themselves. They couldn’t handle us even when united, so once they split apart, the rest was inevitable. It was only a matter of time.
……
The ones who actually handled corpses in the sewage treatment plant were the lowest of the low among black mages. Anyone with even a shred of status had immediately passed the job down. It was ironic—black mages who needed corpses and sacrifices to use magic, yet hated touching them.
We steadily worked our way up from the bottom, crushing every black mage who had infiltrated the Underground Colosseum. The black mages we encountered grew stronger, and the fighting drew closer to the colosseum itself.
Finally, we reached the place where the leader of the black mages in the Underground Colosseum—the one called the “Black Hand”—was waiting.
“‘Black Hand’?”
“Apparently that’s what they call her because her specialty is a black magic that drains life force. They say if her hand touches you, your life force gets sucked out in an instant.”
“I’m not sure if it’s the same black magic, but if it’s the kind I know, it shouldn’t require direct contact with the hand. Be careful—she might be able to use it from elsewhere too.”
Theo shared the information he’d extracted from a black mage, and Claire, an expert on dealing with them, added her own insights. A strategy was quickly formed.
While listening to their discussion, another thought crossed my mind.
From the moment we entered until we reached the Black Hand—the so-called boss of the colosseum’s black mages—there hadn’t been any real problems. That wasn’t strange in itself. I’d originally planned to handle the colosseum event alone. Of course, if I’d come by myself, I wouldn’t have charged straight in smashing everything, but the difficulty was still something I could clear solo.
With a full party of four here, it was only natural that no unexpected situations had arisen. But was our gathering really just a coincidence? Had I been reading too much into something that was purely accidental? Or was this the world telling me to clear an easy event even more easily?
I couldn’t tell. What I did know was that if nothing had gone wrong so far, the only place left for trouble to appear was the boss fight.
“Let’s be careful. Just in case.”
Whether something would actually happen, or what that something might be—I had no way of knowing, so all I could offer were the usual words. Still, everyone seemed to pick up on the weight behind them and nodded, gripping their weapons tighter.
“Let’s go.”
At Theo’s single command, the party moved out.
In the passage connecting the Underground Colosseum to the sewers, about fifty meters away from the arena, we encountered the Black Hand.
Claire, who had been leading the charge, spotted them first.
“I see her. The woman called the ‘Black Hand.’ But…”
“What’s wrong?”
“She’s with a man. From the way she’s bowing her head, it looks like he outranks her.”
“What? Theo, didn’t you say the Black Hand was the leader of the black mages here?”
“That’s what my information said. Either the underlings had bad intel, or that man is a higher-ranking black mage who came from outside the colosseum. One of the two.”
We didn’t have time to ponder it further. Around the same moment we discovered them, they discovered us.
“Dogs who followed the scent have arrived. Couldn’t even clean up properly here?”
“I-I’m sorry! I gave orders to the subordinates, but…”
The Black Hand lowered her head even further, looking ashamed under the man’s scolding. Their hierarchy was crystal clear.
“I don’t care what the underlings did. If they couldn’t handle it, you should’ve stepped in yourself. Did you really think having a flashy name like ‘Black Hand’ made you something special?”
The man only glanced at us briefly before continuing to berate the Black Hand, who kept bowing subserviently. Whether it was confidence or something else, they weren’t focused on us right now—this was our chance to strike.
“Theo, now’s the time for magic… Theo?”
But Theo, our only ranged attacker, was acting strangely.
— Creak.
Theo gripped his staff so tightly his knuckles turned white. Even so, he couldn’t hide his emotions—his arms were trembling. With rage.
“This black mana… sticky and nauseating… There’s no mistaking it. I could never forget.”
“…Theo?”
“I finally caught his tail. I won’t let him get away! —Ice Spear!”
“Ah, seriously, what the hell?! When did you even chant that?!”
I had no idea why Theo was acting like this, but since he’d cast the spell like I wanted, it was time to focus on the fight.
We charged straight toward the Black Hand and the man.