Chapter 166: Sculptor of Chaos (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 166: Sculptor of Chaos (1)
Splash!
A bucket of cold water splashed across the face of the sleeping man. Tied to a chair, the fake Orton jolted awake, his body trembling.
“Ugh…”
Sitting before him was Alisa, calmly filing her nails with a metal rasp. The member of the Seven-Colored Bird who had thrown the water gave a crisp salute, stepped out, and locked the door behind him.
As the door clicked shut, the light from the hallway vanished, plunging the underground interrogation room into darkness. Only the fake Orton and Alisa remained, facing each other.
“Dealing with scum like you brings back memories I’d rather forget.”
Scrape, scrape. Scrape-scrape-scrape.
In the darkness, the sound of the rasp against her nails was unnervingly loud. Alisa’s expressionless face was briefly revealed whenever the metal tool caught a stray glint of light.
She had opposed Latri’s plan to use Enya’s ‘Resonance’ ability. Instead, she had volunteered to handle the interrogation herself. She feared that if Latri made a mistake during the resonance, this bleak scene—and the face of this villain—might be shared through her daughter’s Absolute Eye.
These days, she was the strong, capable, and cheerful Captain of the Tikan Guard.
Her past self, however, was a member of the Viment Special Task Force, Unit 2. Their primary mission was the protection of the imperial family, but ‘protection’ was a term that carried far more weight than one might imagine.
It involved uncovering the masterminds behind captured assassins, conducting interrogations, and, when necessary, torture.
Among her companions in Tikan, Alisa was the one most accustomed to screams. In fact, there were likely few people in the entire world more familiar with them.
“Damn it, what is the meaning of this…?”
Phew.
Alisa stopped filing and lightly blew on her nails.
“Let me… write a letter. If you’re doing this for a ransom, I’ll request it from the main branch. Who are you people? For a disciple of Kidad Hall to attack us, there must be some mistake.”
The fake Orton still mistakenly believed Jin was a disciple of Kidad Hall. Unlike the deceased Rolt, he hadn’t heard the truth directly from Jin.
“There is no mistake. From now on, that chair you’re sitting in is your entire world.”
“Ha! Do you intend to torture me? What do you want?”
“Information on the Dark Magic Association. Everything you know.”
“It seems Kidad Hall’s disciple is quite ignorant. Digging into us won’t do you any good. Even Kidad Hall himself maintained a cautious relationship with us. If word that you tortured me reaches the main branch—”
“You must be dying of curiosity to know just how many ways this rasp can be used, aren’t you? Mato Backer, the Butcher of Haesum.”
“How… do you know my name?”
The fake Orton—no, Mato Backer, the Butcher of Haesum—widened his eyes.
During the four days Mato had been unconscious from the mana backflow, Alisa had used the Seven-Colored Bird to gather information on him. Once she confirmed when the real Orton Melson, a known vegetarian, had disappeared and tracked the activities of the man posing as him, uncovering his identity hadn’t been difficult.
Mato was a mage notorious for his love of murder, a long-standing headache for the small Kingdom of Haesum.
Scrape, scrape…
The rasp once again grated against Alisa’s nails.
“I was the Vice Captain of Special Task Force Unit 2. And the person you crossed isn’t a disciple of Kidad Hall. He is the Eighth Prince of Viment.”
“Wh-what…?”
“Hard to believe, isn’t it? Honestly, I find it hard to believe myself—how a rotten old monster from the Haesum Kingdom managed to transform into Orton Melson, a high-level mage from the Academy. Let’s spend some time building trust with each other, shall we?”
“The Eighth… the Eighth Prince? What on earth… Ah… wait, was it the Viment Imperial Family that killed Kidad of the Reverse Flow…?”
“Shh. If you want to end your life even slightly more comfortably, that’s not the story you should be babbling about right now.”
“AAAAAAARGH!”
Mato Backer screamed before Alisa had even begun. He could see no way out—no hole through which he could escape this alive.
*
An hour later, Alisa emerged from the underground interrogation room.
“You worked hard, Alisa.”
“Young Master Jin, Enya.”
The two had been waiting for Alisa in the mansion’s first-floor lounge.
“Did you get anything?”
“Of course. He spilled some quite shocking stories. I’ve obtained the location of the Dark Magic Association’s headquarters, the names of some affiliated mages, and information regarding a shapeshifter.”
“A shapeshifter?”
“I think it would be best if we all went upstairs to discuss the details, Young Master Jin.”
In just one hour, she had extracted the absolute essentials. Jin was inwardly impressed, while Enya turned pale as she imagined what had transpired in the interrogation room.
Alisa noticed Enya’s expression and gave a gentle smile.
“Don’t imagine anything too scary, Miss Enya. The interrogation was conducted in a very humanitarian atmosphere. Once I told him Young Master Jin was the Eighth Prince of Viment and I was from Special Task Force Unit 2, he just started talking on his own. It felt quite strange to impersonate an organization I used to belong to.”
“Ah, I was just worried that you might have had a hard time because of that man, Alisa-nim…”
“Fufu. Mato Backer is a piece of trash who enjoyed murdering commoners. It was almost disappointing how easily he talked, especially considering how cruel his past deeds in the Haesum Kingdom were.”
He talked easily, without torture.
Jin and Enya wondered if that was the truth, but they both shook their heads internally. If they had to choose the most frightening person among their companions right now, they would choose Alisa without hesitation.
“Then, what happens to Mato now?”
“That is something you don’t need to know, Miss Enya, haha.”
“Y-yes!”
When they arrived at Casimir’s office, all their companions were gathered.
“Now that everyone is here, let’s organize the findings. Young Master Jin, you really brought back the right person. The location of the Dark Magic Association’s headquarters is, surprisingly, Oterium.”
“Oterium?”
“If it’s Oterium, isn’t that the old capital of Vankella?” Murakan and Quicantel spoke simultaneously, and Alisa nodded.
“Correct. It was the capital back when Vankella was located in the southwest corner of the Eastern Continent. That was about five hundred years ago, so Lady Quicantel likely experienced that era firsthand.”
Murakan had been asleep during that time. But as Alisa said, Quicantel clearly remembered Vankella being on the brink of destruction.
“I wasn’t there personally, but it was such a massive event that I remember it quite clearly.”
Five hundred years ago, Vankella was invaded by demons. They came to reclaim a demonic holy relic that Vankella had kept for generations: ‘Zito’s Eye.’
At the time, Runcandel and Zipple simultaneously dispatched knights and mages to aid the neutral nation of Vankella.
The ‘Holy Kingdom Defense War,’ recorded as the only war where Runcandel and Zipple joined forces, ultimately ended in Vankella’s victory. However, the land itself was devastated beyond restoration.
Consequently, Vankella moved to the central part of the continent and was essentially refounded. The site of Old Oterium remained an unprotected zone to this day, having become a habitat for monsters.
As Quicantel explained this, Murakan yawned, asking if such a thing had really happened.
Meanwhile, Jin had to hide his bewilderment.
‘The legacy of Riol Zipple. The magic tome for the final form of the Destruction Flame Orb of the Dark Heaven is located in Oterium. Why on earth are those bastards settled there?’
The Dark Magic Association wouldn’t have established their base there for no reason. The original Dark Magic Association had been annihilated by Riol Zipple.
He had intended to just clean up some minor villains, but the more he peeled back the layers, the more unexpected big fish kept surfacing.
“How long have they been settled there?”
“It seems it’s been about fifty years. Regardless, as you said, Young Master Jin, it’s certain the Dark Magic Association is more than just a group of remnants. As expected, Cold Jo, the older brother of Rolt Jo, was also a member. But that wasn’t all.”
Alisa then recited the names of the mages affiliated with the Dark Magic Association that she had extracted from Mato. Her companions let out short gasps.
“Feziron Henserck, the Grand Elder of the Viment Academy; Susan Lilista, the Matriarch of the Lilista family; and Chukon Tolderer, the Archmage of Anz. These three are confirmed 9-star mages. It seemed Mato didn’t know anyone beyond them.”
“…Before Rolt Jo died by my hand, he said his rank within the association was in the top ten. It seems he was exactly tenth. Good grief, what are they? If the Dark Magic Association is at this level, then Kinzelo, the parent organization, is even more of a nightmare.”
Even Jin couldn’t help but be shocked this time. He couldn’t begin to imagine why such prominent figures would gather in the Dark Magic Association.
‘The fact that Kinzelo and the Dark Magic Association are at this scale is information I never heard, even before my regression. I only found out by chance now, but it’s highly likely that the main family and Zipple are already aware of this.’
Surely they were.
With figures of that stature involved, there was no way Runcandel, Zipple, and Viment knew nothing.
But why?
That was a question to investigate later, but there were too many giants involved to move recklessly.
‘There must be a reason why the main family, Zipple, and Viment are just watching. Either there’s something they hope to gain from them, or they’ve judged that poking the nest won’t do any good. All of the great powers.’
The realization that the great powers hadn’t taken any action against Kinzelo, even when they were running rampant in his past life, turned his suspicion into conviction.
For now, just grasping the approximate scale of Kinzelo was a significant achievement.
“There’s one more shocking story. It seems Kinzelo possesses a shapeshifter. The one who perfectly transformed Mato Backer into Orton Melson was a man named Bubar Gaston.”
As Alisa finished sharing the information, Casimir’s eyes widened.
For Jin, this was the information he had been waiting for.
“Wait, Bubar Gaston… isn’t that the name that came up when you asked me to investigate Vishkel Ivliano, Young Master Jin?”
—It’s not certain, but there’s a possibility that Vishkel belongs to Kinzelo. He visits the Kurano Duchy once a week, and every time, he goes to a certain sculpting workshop.
—The owner of that workshop, which has the bizarre name ‘Art is an Explosion,’ is a man named Bubar Gaston. From what I’ve gathered, Bubar is an executive of Kinzelo. Since Vishkel meets him every week, it’s suspicious.
While Casimir marveled at the memory of his past conversation with Jin, the dragons were focused on the word ‘shapeshifter.’
“How on earth can a human shapeshift? And transform someone else? Not just a disguise?”
“This is the first I’ve heard of such a thing. Isn’t transformation a blessing granted only to us dragons…?”
“Well, it seems Mato didn’t know the specifics of the method. He said he would swallow a sedative, pass out, and when he woke up, Bubar would have finished the transformation.”
“I’ve encountered shapeshifted assassins before. On the day I left Storm Castle, Zipple extremists transformed into Guardian Knights and targeted me.”
When Jin brought up that incident, everyone’s attention focused on him.
“…And I once half-killed Bubar at a banquet. I will go and meet him myself.”