Chapter 69
Chapter 69
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 68
Chapter Title: Third-Rate
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[A mutt that’s never seen a real tiger thinks it’s a tiger itself.]
A giggling black face.
And so, as the evil ghost named Griffin cackled, Orpheus’s body began to move.
“Protect the king, you fools.”
Now speaking through Orpheus’s mouth, the evil ghost of Griffin issued his command. The moment it did, the many servants around them sprang to their feet and charged forward.
“Fuu.”
However, my mana surged, shoving them back. It was a type of black magic I had learned from the Black Necromancer—one that didn’t involve handling souls.
A pattern made of rippling mana at my feet. It was one of the few defensive spells available to necromancers, designed to keep powerful evil spirits from possessing their bodies.
It wouldn’t have worked on ordinary servants under normal circumstances, but those corrupted by the evil ghost’s power couldn’t approach me recklessly.
“G-Get behind me, Deia!”
“Sorry, but I won’t hold back if you’re being controlled!”
Bang! Bang!
Of course, it wasn’t just me—the servants were also rushing at Darius and Deia near the entrance.
Darius swung his sheathed sword like a club to drive them off, while Deia embedded magic bullets into their thighs or soles to restrict their movements.
“Go help them.”
[What? What about you?]
The startled Black Necromancer looked at me worriedly, but my gaze was fixed solely on the evil ghost of Griffin and King Orpheus.
“I can handle it alone.”
[…….]
“Trust me.”
[Really……!]
The Black Necromancer wrapped her arms around me once with her hands and whispered.
[You have to see the pinnacle of necromancy, so don’t die! That’s an order from your master.]
Even though I felt no texture, warmth, or weight, it strangely felt like something had touched me.
“Yeah.”
I gave a slight nod and sent her off.
“You two are alike.”
Watching us, the evil ghost possessing the king clicked his tongue.
“To cling to each other and put on a melodrama over a threat like this.”
He hadn’t even used a fraction of his immense power. It was pure entertainment for him.
Gripping Remegaton, I channeled mana into it and asked.
“There’s one thing I want to know.”
“Ha! Begging already?”
The overwhelming pressure nearly made me lose consciousness for a moment. If I hadn’t protected myself with magic, defeat would have been inevitable.
“If you want to trade words, show me you’re worth it.”
The pressure intensified.
Even so, I kept my back straight and gripped Remegaton even tighter.
“Why did you persecute black mages?”
The current Griffin Kingdom didn’t just disdain black mages—it treated them like enemies of the state.
And the one who had made it that way was the evil ghost of Griffin standing before me.
He had changed Luanes Luden Griffin’s name to Heralhazard and carried out demonic massacres.
The bastard cackled in delight.
“How hilarious! Don’t you find it absurd? That massacre only solidified my position even more.”
“…….”
“You couldn’t see it from your perch below the throne! The black mage they pointed at as the worst was actually their king!”
“…….”
“It was a masterpiece! Utterly delightful! Thanks to it, the kingdom began strictly regulating black magic, and they even welcomed the complete blockade of all related books and information.”
And that was the Griffin Kingdom of today.
Utterly ignorant of evil spirits to an extreme degree.
Just look at the premier academy, Robern. When Setima’s angel caused an incident, they couldn’t even mount a proper resistance.
Because no one was allowed to be a black mage.
The kingdom had grown ignorant of black magic itself.
Amid the mounting pressure, I gritted my teeth and took a deep breath.
A faint light emanated from Remegaton, aiding me.
Killing countless lives just to hide his identity.
Turning the entire kingdom into ignorant fools just so no one would notice him.
It was absurd in scale, but it had succeeded.
But.
“That’s not all, is it.”
“…….”
Griffin’s eyebrow twitched slightly. A tiny gap, but it meant I had struck true.
“You’d held the throne for ages. Why suddenly unleash massacres two hundred years ago?”
It would have been easier if he’d done it from the start. Why risk massive bloodshed to reinforce a throne he’d securely held for centuries?
I had one answer.
Because he needed to.
“You must have feared another black mage.”
“…….”
“Two hundred years ago, there was an exceptional black mage who discovered your secret and could threaten you. That’s my reasoning.”
Strengthening his position so fiercely meant, conversely, that he was under threat from someone.
“Fear must have been the added reason.”
Even under the pressure, the corner of my mouth curled up slightly. It wasn’t intentional—more instinctive—and it seemed to irk him greatly.
His expression soured most satisfactorily.
“You babble fittingly when given an ear. I’ll admit you have a talent for being utterly repulsive.”
A massive clump of raw mana began gathering above the king’s head. Even a slight movement from that colossal power could obliterate the entire audience chamber.
“Thanks to you, the kingdom’s restrictions on black mages will tighten even further. Yes, I’ll concede you bear a resemblance to that slippery bastard who came to me two hundred years ago.”
“…….”
“You threatened me, the king, and part of the palace was half-destroyed by you, but I survived by a miracle and slew you.”
This king seemed to have settled on quite the heroic narrative.
“Did you wander searching for the spirits I killed with Remegaton?”
The bastard laughed uproariously.
Remegaton’s light felt all the sadder because of his words.
“Do you know why I’ve been watching you? Because in the end, you’re no different from all the other necromancers scattered about.”
“…….”
“You, who tried to forcibly awaken and enslave spirits with that stone! Who tried to drag them from their repose and use them against their will!”
“…….”
“What? Third-rate necromancy? Mediocre rabble? Hilarious! In the end, you’re just like me—someone who saw the dead as mere tools, no different from any necromancer!”
“…….”
“I’ll waste no more of the king’s time on a loudmouthed fool. Die.”
The evil ghost of Griffin reached out his hand.
The mana sphere writhed, attempting to move.
But its form began to crumble.
It rippled violently, and at the same time, screams of people echoed from within.
“……?!”
I shook my head in disbelief at the bastard’s sudden confusion.
“Unfortunately.”
The heavy pressure weighing me down gradually faded.
Slack returned to my rigidly tense waist. Pain lingered in my trembling lips and clenched teeth like marks, but it was bearable.
“That’s exactly why you’re third-rate—because you don’t even grasp the basics.”
“What?!”
It was the concept I’d once explained to Pindenai and Deia. I’d never given a proper lecture to academy students.
But I never imagined I’d be lecturing a demonic tongue in the royal palace.
“All souls contain mana.”
The amount varied wildly, but for a soul to wield mana, it needed emotions thick enough to substitute for a body.
“Conversely.”
My fingertip pointed at the massive sphere. Within the vast mana, people’s faces protruded jaggedly, struggling and raging to break free.
“The vast mana you’re using means it contains that many souls.”
Because he was a necromancer.
If souls dissipated, so would that mana. Yet this black mage wielded such immense power, which meant.
Souls were dormant—or absorbed—within that evil ghost.
Remegaton awakened dormant souls.
It simply shone its light, rousing the souls slumbering inside the evil ghost.
The consciousnesses of those whose souls had been stolen by the evil ghost returned.
“Truly ironic.”
Two months ago.
When I met Emily, exterminated the bone centipedes, and enabled her revenge on Maalks Research Director.
One question had lingered in my mind.
A soul’s repose and its dissipation were strictly different concepts.
When a person dies, their soul seeps into the earth and closes its eyes.
Dissipation meant the soul itself vanished entirely.
It was also exceedingly difficult, impossible with my magic at the time.
Yet Emily had single-handedly dissipated Maalks Research Director while underground.
My magic definitely couldn’t do it.
I had been the one converting her mana into spells, so it was certain.
In the end, I reached one conclusion.
The grudge Emily harbored had amplified my magic.
Her desire for vengeance had granted the girl near-impossible power.
And that was an emotion born after her death.
“The dead have will, too. Emotions exist. Even the reverse of what we normally know as cause and effect holds true.”
Not grudge leading to death.
But grudge arising even after death.
[Kuaaaaaagh!]
[Save meeeee!]
[Demon! Cursed demon!]
[Freedom! Give me repose!]
[Rather make me dissipate!]
Souls trapped for centuries, unconscious while their mana was used at will, awoke.
Awakened with thick, deep, sticky grudges toward the evil ghost.
“Kuuh!”
The evil ghost of Griffin desperately tried to recapture the fleeing souls.
Necromancers had long practiced binding and tormenting souls for servitude, so he was skilled at it.
But Remegaton shone even brighter.
The stone’s property of granting awakened souls excessive power overwhelmed even the evil ghost.
“A necromancer merely borrows the power of the dead.”
That was what I’d said when I first met King Orpheus in the prison.
“Perhaps because you became an evil ghost.”
I sneered at the writhing bastard.
“Perhaps because you forgot you were human.”
What good were diverse techniques and advanced spells?
“While borrowing their power.”
If the roots supporting everything below were rotten, the branches would inevitably be frail.
“You forgot respect for them. Forgot their greatness.”
Those lacking such fundamentals—we call them third-rate.