Veritas Descends
The sword swept through the old men's necks.
Their faces had worn the look of surrender—yet threaded through that resignation was a strange ecstasy, a glimmer of hope.
"Fools, the lot of them."
"They believed the Heavenly Demon would one day come to lead them, yet deluded themselves into thinking he would lead them to paradise. Every last thing they did, they did believing the Heavenly Demon would spare them."
Heukcheon and Yeongcheon sneered.
"Most who carry the Heavenly Demon's name on their backs commit deeds fouler than any beast. Pay them no mind."
Heukcheon took her place at my side.
I looked down at them. Setting demons aside, this was my first kill of a human being—and yet my mind lay perfectly calm. Was it my Talent, the Tranquil Mind skill of the Heukcheon Demonic Sword, or the Poisoned Soul? Or was it simply that I felt nothing at all at the taking of a human life?
I closed my eyes for a moment, then rose. The Little Heavenly Demon stood there, her face blank with shock.
"Erciel."
"Y-yes~!"
Erciel answered in a cheerful lilt.
"I have a favor to ask."
"Oh, come on—since when do you and I need to ask favors of each other, Seoha?"
Erciel said with a lazy grin.
"The Villains ran wild this time, so I couldn't host you properly. And my guests even came to my aid. I'll repay you all in grand fashion someday, so brace yourself."
"What's to brace for, getting a thank-you gift?"
I gave a hollow laugh at her tone. Then again, a Villain terror attack at a ball hosted by your own family would be a genuine catastrophe.
"How are the guests?"
"No one was hurt. They were after the warehouse from the start. Something called the Heavenly Demon's Legacy, apparently."
"The Heavenly Demon's Legacy?"
"Do you want it?"
Erciel looked at me, eyes crinkling into a smile.
"...I'll pay for it."
"Between the two of us? Please. More importantly, you helped at the ball, so take it as a parting gift before you go."
I left the Little Heavenly Demon in Erciel's care and turned to Seol Hwaryeon, who was wearing a peculiar expression.
She was looking at me, too—with the face of someone lost deep in thought.
"Shall we have a word?"
"Yes~!"
Seol Hwaryeon followed me. We found a spot where few footsteps passed, and I leaned my back against a pillar, sinking into thought.
Maybe I should have cleared this up sooner. I'd done her a disservice.
"Elder, you..."
"?"
"You infiltrated Korea Hero Academy!"
Seol Hwaryeon's voice rang out, bright with excitement.
"No wonder something always felt off. Lee Seoha, a mere student? But if it was you, Elder, then the story finally holds together!"
Her voice trembled with excitement.
"Someone like you could smash the trials of the Tower of Ordeals in a single stroke, and even without a drop of mana, you bested Park Unhyeok in a sparring match!"
"......"
"And if you infiltrated the academy, you must have had a purpose—and that's how our paths crossed, isn't it?"
"...................................................................................Yes."
"Just as I thought!"
Seol Hwaryeon beamed.
Watching her, I found myself utterly unable to speak.
After Erciel had secured the Little Heavenly Demon, she reported:
"It's certain they came for the Heavenly Demon's Legacy. That heir fellow's mind was so weak, I pried it out of him with ease."
The Little Heavenly Demon's mind was hardly that fragile. It was simply that Erciel's illusion arts were too formidable—that alone explained it.
"But is this truly worth the Villains staking their lives on? I find it a touch strange."
I managed to lay eyes on the Heavenly Demon's Legacy.
A black cloth, shaped something like a handkerchief. Yet within it lingered a faint trace of Defying Heaven energy.
I appraised it with my Talent, Appraisal(-).
[Black Cloth (B+)]
A cloth imbued with someone's power.
An ordinary cloth—yet because its wielder was anything but ordinary, it has been elevated into an artifact.
: Adds +3 to the conceptual stat Defying Heaven.
: If the holder is a mana user, working magic becomes considerably more difficult.
"...Oh."
A modest little boon. Bonus points for it working even while tucked away in a pocket.
"Judging by that expression, you're quite pleased."
"Yeah. Better haul than I expected."
"Also, those men are wanted by the Association, so there's a bounty on their heads. Shall I hand the whole sum over to you?"
"...Then I'd have a target on my back, wouldn't I."
"That's why I'm asking first."
Erciel giggled.
"Then I'll tell them the Merhen family will handle it."
"Sure. Appreciate it."
There was still far too much standing in the way of revealing me to the world. And it wasn't as if I was short on money.
I made my way toward the room assigned to me in Erciel's mansion.
Not bad at all.
Deeper inside, I found a virtual reality machine. Staring at it, I had the odd feeling something was about to surface in my memory.
...Ah.
Come to think of it, the Alchemy Guild meeting was today. A glance at the clock said I was cutting it close. It was eleven at night.
Might as well hurry over and back.
I climbed into the capsule and connected.
"Did you hear? They say a great many will be attending this alchemy conference."
"Those reclusive bastards?"
"They say someone enormous is joining this time. Word is the artisans—Grandmaster title and above—are turning out in force."
The world was abuzz.
Grandmaster. A title reserved for creators who numbered fewer than a hundred in the entire world. Alchemy was an especially insular craft, and fewer than ten held it.
And now, in the virtual world, every last one of them had gathered.
"Never thought these antisocial bastards would assemble in one place."
"Can't be helped. His name aside, the recipes are the real deal."
Al Magnus said with a snicker.
"Have you seen the recipe he practically handed out as charity? Downright absurd, that one."
"Guiding herbs brimming with venom through an exquisitely precise mana framework to distill an elixir. The concept itself is simple, but the work of refining it down is anything but easy... His skill stands plainly above ours. Show the man a bare minimum of respect, you fool."
"Tch. What are you, one of those Veritas worshippers now?"
Al Magnus sighed.
Alchemists were a closed lot. Yet a single rumor had drawn every one of them here.
A hall within the virtual world, built to seat a thousand. By rights it should have stood empty; instead it was packed beyond capacity, crammed with people clawing their way inside.
All because of one rumor—the rumor that a figure of tremendous consequence to the discipline of alchemy might appear here.
"He's on the roster, isn't he?"
"He is. He said he would give the lecture himself."
"But I still can't bring myself to believe it. Veritas, coming here? When even the men called Grandmasters can't keep pace with a single one of his recipes?"
"......"
Zermeng shut his mouth.
Truth be told, Zermeng still had no idea what the man wanted.
Veritas.
With his arrival, the alchemy world had split in two: before the recipes he shared, and after. The recipes he flung out like alms carried exactly that much weight.
And so alchemists divided into two camps over the existence called Veritas. One camp hailed the rise of an arrogant genius of the century.
The other camp deified him outright, worshipping him as a living god.
"We will now commence the alchemy gathering. First, we begin with Mr. Heine of the Nakamura school, the master renowned throughout Japan!"
"And so it begins."
The alchemy gathering resembled an academic conference. Over the hours, members boasted of recipes they had crafted and picked one another's work apart.
Recipes that passed judgment earned prizes and publicity within the circle, which was why so many had staked their livelihoods on this place.
The presentations were fairly entertaining, too—unlike the usual tame fare, many had taken up the radical methods Veritas favored.
...And before long, they sank into disappointment.
"So you take the tongue of a red venom lizard, mix in three leaves of the kerosene tree, and..."
"Combine poison with poison and you generally get one of two outcomes: a venom so thoroughly fused that no antidote can touch it, or a strange reaction that tangles the two together..."
"This one and that one—all of them thrashing about, desperate to become Veritas."
Tedious time crawled past. Ten minutes. Thirty. An hour. Then two hours had gone by.
The gathering had exceeded expectations. Perhaps because of the rumor that Veritas might come, everyone had dug out the elixirs they'd kept hidden away.
But Zermeng's expression was grim. It was painfully obvious that every last presentation fell short of even one of the recipes that man had left behind.
"And now, the one so many of you have been waiting for has joined us at today's gathering."
The moderator's voice trembled.
"Veritas is now entering."
Tap, tap.
A tall frame, a good 185 centimeters. A crisp, immaculately tailored suit. But here, outward appearance meant little—after all, that Al Magnus fellow was a man wearing a girlish avatar.
Tap, tap.
His stride was arrogant. And yet... he was a man who could carry that stride.
An aura, perhaps. He carried an air that could steal the soul right out of a person.
Hm.
Chin lifted in arrogance, he swept his gaze across the hall.
"An alchemy gathering, is it? And this pitiful level is what claims to represent alchemy?"
He had dropped a bomb.
With that arrogant voice, he denied the life's work of every soul in the room.