The Crow on Roke Island
Kwa-r-r-r-rung!
Kazhan had the fanatic pinned, and the Chaos Spear Simon had conjured tore through the air toward her with ferocious speed.
"Ghhk!"
Wildly thrashing to break free, the fanatic stomped hard against the ground in place. Two arms of pure ability erupted from the earth and seized the onrushing Chaos Spear.
Kagagagak!
But the Chaos Spear did not stop.
Only after the fanatic pulled two more arms from the ground to help hold it did its output gradually weaken—and then all four arms crumbled to dust as the spear twisted free of their grip.
"Annoying little pests!"
Bam!
The fanatic hammered her elbow into Kazhan's chest. He staggered back, spitting blood, and another arm sprouted behind him, grabbing his head and slamming it into the ground.
"Kazhan!"
Simon rushed forward—
"You'd best stop."
At her sharp warning, Simon slammed on the brakes and looked up at the sky.
Hwaaaaaaaak!
At some point, an enormous moon of divinity had risen overhead. Its radius was so vast that even if both of them started running right now, there would be no escaping it.
When did she even have time to—
Simon's head snapped back toward her. Ten arms of ability fanned out behind her back, swaying as each one traced the elements of a magic circle.
That had to be how she could cast high-tier magic mid-melee, all at once.
"I don't know why divinity refuses to work on you necromancers."
The fanatic drew her arms down in a smooth arc.
"But brute force is another matter, isn't it?"
The warped white moon came crashing down from the sky with a deafening roar. Rather than dodge, Simon fixed his eyes on the arms of ability forming the spell.
If I break those arms, it should affect the magic too.
The moment Simon touched his waistband and reached for a fresh Chaos Spear—
Crunch!
A bite mark appeared on one of the ability arms.
Crunch! Snap!
One after another, wounds like the bites of some savage beast tore across the once-pristine arm structure.
And then it was over. The mountain of ten arms collapsed, and the divine moon of pure force vanished with it.
"What the—?"
Every head turned.
Through the cloud of dust billowing up from the collapsing arms, the figure of a young man draped in a crow-feather mantle came into view.
"That's some set of teeth you've got. Genuinely impressive."
He was strolling toward them with both hands jammed in his pockets and the loose, insolent gait of a street thug.
"A Priest, wandering around in the middle of Roke Island. How does that make any sense?"
His hair bristled outward in an uncanny shape, like the leaves of some strange plant, and a tree branch—looking as though he'd idly scooped it off a roadside—was wedged between his teeth, which he chewed with slow deliberation.
A Crow Agent!
Simon let out a breath of relief. Kazhan, on the other hand, still pinned to the ground, wore an expression that curdled with distaste.
"Stay back!"
Priest gestured frantically, backing away. Hands of ability rose from the ground once more.
"I am warning you! If you have any concern for the students' safety, you will withdra—"
The Crow Agent simply chewed the branch in his mouth.
Crunch!
A sickeningly raw sound, and droplets of blood spattered down. A few landed on Simon's cheek and slid off.
Priest tilted her creaking neck downward and looked at her own body.
A wound like the maw of some beast had opened across her waist, gaping wide. Bone and organs were visible; blood poured out in sheets.
"The activation condition for my curse was already met."
The Crow Agent grinned.
Thud!
The fanatic dropped to her knees. Shaking all over in disbelief, she moved both hands toward the wound.
Crunch!
Crack!
This time both wrists burst open, punctured clean through with tooth marks. She let out a scream like something being torn apart.
"You think I'm just going to stand here and watch you cast Healing? Cockroaches, the lot of you."
The Crow Agent strode over with that peculiar bowlegged walk, knees swinging up high with each step, and ground his foot ruthlessly into her head.
Bam!
The fanatic's face was driven into the dirt.
"What nerve, setting foot on this island? If you want to fight me, at least bring a Saintess or an Arch Paladin along—"
"Enough."
The Crow Agent turned around with an exaggerated Huh? sound. Kazhan was staggering to his feet.
"What? She's literally just a student? How does a student survive a fight with a Priest?"
"Save the commentary."
Kazhan glared at him, breath ragged.
"Move your foot. She has information we need. Killing her here would be a problem."
"Stu-dent."
The Crow Agent chuckled.
"Students don't have the authority to order agents around. Got it? Students just need to study hard, listen to their professors, and that's that."
Creak. Pop.
Gradually, weight gathered on the Crow Agent's foot. The fanatic's face threatened to cave in at any moment.
"You see, Priests are nothing but vermin. Why should we hang on a vermin's every word? When bugs crawl into your house, you just squash them. Who's going to complain?"
Wham!
At that moment, the leg pinning the fanatic down was swept sideways.
Simon had kicked it away with a roundhouse. In the same motion, he stepped forward and shoved his palm flat against the man's chest.
"Student Council President, Simon Polentia."
Simon was privately startled. He'd meant to knock the man over—yet even with one leg lifted off the ground, the man's body didn't budge an inch.
"My apologies. I was concerned about evidence being destroyed."
"Oh, right."
Unexpectedly, the Crow Agent didn't get angry. He just smiled.
"So you're this year's Student Council President? Impressive."
"You're too kind."
"Wait, though—what was your name again?"
"Simon Polentia."
"Simon Polentia. Simon Polentia. Simon Polentia. Now where have I heard that name before... Ah!"
The Crow Agent, who had been murmuring the name absently, clapped his hands together with a crack.
"That's it, I remember now! The student my old classmate Bahil is absolutely obsessed with! Right, right!"
Simon's eyes went wide.
Bahil's classmate? This man?
"Our good friend Simon Polentia! As it happens, this uncle of yours has a little worry weighing on him. Care to hear it?"
The Crow Agent rested a hand on Simon's shoulder.
"My dear classmate Bahil won't play with me anymore. That's my problem."
A nameless curse unfolded across Simon's entire body in an instant.
Kajak! Kajak! Kajak! Kajak!
Simon felt red flags screaming across every inch of his body. All at once, a sensation like insects crawling over his skin swept through him from head to toe.
"You see, Bahil is several times the genius I am, and several dozen times more unhinged. But lately he seems so focused on his professor's work that this poor uncle is feeling neglected."
A bleak, joyless fire kindled in his pupils.
"The field is where Bahil belongs. Even if a genius like that teaches, ordinary people won't grasp half of half of it. That genius of his should be spent entirely on killing Priests. And yet that boy is fixated on a single student, and he won't so much as listen when I speak."
Eyes hollowed to an utter emptiness turned toward Simon.
"If that student were to disappear... do you suppose he'd come back to us?"
Dangerous.
Every cell in his body was screaming it.
[Pull me out, boy!]
Even Pier's fragment was shouting it.
The instant Simon opened a subspace at an angle the man couldn't see—
"What exactly do you think you're doing, Quinter?"
A heavy voice shook the air.
Simon froze at once, and the Crow Agent called Quinter turned around.
A middle-aged man, likewise draped in a crow robe, stood there with his expression hardened into something menacing. Several necromancer combat operatives flanked him.
"Aha."
Quinter lifted his hand from Simon's shoulder and pivoted around.
"I merely met a junior of mine from Kizen and gave him a bit of friendly counseling. Senior."
"Step away, Quinter. Unless you'd like to find yourself under unnecessary suspicion."
At the senior Crow Agent's gesture, the other necromancers dashed over and caught the unconscious fanatic by both arms, hauling her upright.
"Severe blood loss."
"Administering emergency treatment first."
The Priest was quickly wrapped in bandages and carried off through a teleportation circle. The senior Crow Agent approached Quinter.
"Why are you here?"
"Why does anyone come anywhere?"
Quinter chewed the branch in his mouth with a crunch and shrugged.
"Guarding Roke Island and Lady Nephthys is our duty as Crows, is it not? I happened to sense divinity while making my rounds, so I came to check. And here we are."
"Quinter!"
"More to the point—who are all these people?"
Quinter cut his senior off, turning to look over the surrounding necromancer agents.
"No alarm went off at Headquarters, and yet you'd already strung up a perimeter as if you knew a Priest had entered Roke Island."
His senior said nothing.
"And then, oh so naturally, you swept the Priest away too. Haha."
Quinter spat the branch from his mouth with a phut. It bounced off his senior's chest, tumbled to the ground, and rolled away.
"This is exactly what's wrong with the Dark Alliance. We're supposedly on the same team, yet everyone hoards secrets from everyone else. How's any of this supposed to work?"
The senior Crow Agent let out a long, deep sigh.
"Classified. Once this is over, I'll explain."
"Yeah, yeah. I'm sure you will."
Tap.
Quinter stopped mid-step, glanced back toward Simon, and smirked. An inexplicable chill ran down Simon's spine.
"Let's meet again sometime, Bahil's disciple."
Parararararak!
His body burst apart into a swarm of crows that wheeled up into the sky.
Once the incident was squared away, Simon helped treat Kazhan's wounds.
A special potion that worked only on Kazhan's body, doused over him several times, was enough to restore him to his feet. All that remained were the deep scars carved into his flesh.
"Kazhan, are you really okay?"
"I'm fine."
Kazhan swung his aching arms in wide circles and rolled his head from side to side. Each time, the sound of bones snapping back into place clicked through the air.
"Well done, both of you."
The senior Crow Agent—the one who had driven Quinter off—approached. Kazhan tilted his head slightly and murmured to Simon.
"This one can be trusted. He's Lady Nephthys's man."
"Ah."
Quinter, Bahil's classmate, had been one thing, but this man looked every bit as formidable.
His hair, mustache, and beard were all the same auburn shade, flowing into one another. His features were firm and solidly built, his physique imposing—Simon caught himself wondering for a moment whether he was a Battle Arts major.
Simon shook the Crow Agent's hand.
"Student Council President, Simon Polentia."
"Call me by my codename, 'Aleister.' I've heard quite a lot about you from Lady Nephthys."
"An honor, sir."
Aleister nodded and sighed.
"Thank goodness we arrested the fanatic before the Dark Festival begins in earnest—"
"Is the Priest you just captured definitively Ever Kire?"
Kazhan cut in abruptly. Though his sentence had been clipped short, Aleister showed no trace of offense and simply smiled.
"She's receiving treatment as we speak. We won't know details until she wakes and we interrogate her. Her appearance differs somewhat from the photographs—but if it's her ability, swapping out her face and strolling about would be child's play for her."
He turned his head.
"We owe a great debt to the Saintess of the Holy Sea. Where is she now?"
"Resting, after casting her detection magic."
"Then let's go see her."
Simon, Kazhan, and the Crow Agent made their way to the beach together.
There she was, sitting with perfect composure, apparently resting in the shade of a beach chair.
"Saintess! Sorry to keep you waiting—!"
Simon shouted as he hurried over, then stopped mid-sentence.
Something.
Something was wrong.
"...Damn it all."
Kazhan spat a curse. Simon dropped to one knee, his face going blank with disbelief.
The Saintess of the Harvest sat at the table with her legs crossed.
All that remained of her head was her lower lip and chin.
Her even row of gleaming red teeth smiled out from it.
And the severed upper half of her face lay fallen in the sand a short distance away.
The cut was unnervingly, impossibly clean. This was the trace of an ability.
The Saintess—
The Saintess had been murdered.