Chapter 71
Chapter 71
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 71
Chapter Title: Shadow Over Ark #7
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『Greeeeek-!』
The massive monster Gamigin let out a shriek. It was because Elga's enormous axe had begun shredding its gelatinous body.
“What, for something that looks like dog shit, it's really nothing special?”
Having grown accustomed to fighting monsters, Elga was easily overwhelming the creature that served as the mid-episode boss.
『Ballan, this half-assed body won't cut it after all. I need to switch. To a Draco body—. Mirna, give me your body—!』
After failing to target me and getting caught off guard by Elga's attack, Gamigin seemed to set its sights on Mirna Draco, who was deep in prayer.
From the start, Gamigin had its eye on Mirna Draco.
I'd heard it wanted to seize her body and use it like an undead puppet, but now it looked like it planned to use her as a vessel.
Was the reason it was so feeble, unlike a proper mid-boss, because Professor Ballan—the original owner of this vessel—was inherently weak?
“Can I ignore that?”
Thud.
Elga leaped into the air, kicked off a pillar, and plunged straight down, cleaving the giant monster Gamigin from head to tail.
Srrrring.
Splat.
『Kreeeek!!! Damn iiiit!!!』
Sliced clean in half, the monster writhed in agony, spewing slime like blood.
Its thrashing was as violent as a snake sprinkled with salt on its wound.
『Alistair, you useless bastard! What are you doing!』
As Gamigin screamed in pain, the blue glow in the undead lich Alistair's eyes flared brightly. He had been hovering motionless in the air.
But despite his intimidating presence, he hadn't so much as twitched a finger. It was probably because Mirna was putting up a fierce struggle to wrest control from him.
“Weak and frail ones, come to my shadow….”
I'd been a little worried since she feared ghosts.
But she clearly had nearly seized control of her father, Alistair Draco.
Father and daughter, after all.
Perhaps their soul wavelengths matched, or the blood tie made it easier to dominate.
『This is why there's no need to leave personalities in undead! Alistair, I, Necromancy Lord Gamigin, command you—! Offer me your daughter! Now!』
Whoosh.
The eldritch blue glow in its eyes blazed even fiercer, turning a blood-red like flames.
Floating in the air, it landed on the ground, knelt, and extended its bony hand toward its daughter, who was praying on her knees.
* * *
Among all the noble houses, the Draco family had a reputation for being the strictest and most fastidious about rules.
Even tough folks found their rigidity off-putting.
—They live and breathe rules. More like undead taking orders than living people.
—The Draco folk keep working even after they die.
Closed-off and rigid, the Draco family was always fodder for gossip.
Some family members might have chafed at it, but they accepted it as a matter of course.
Mirna and Narmi, the ladies of House Draco, had lived that way their whole lives. Never smiling in public, never showing base emotions.
Yet their minds brimmed with unspoken curiosities.
Why did House Draco have so many rules to follow?
Why couldn't they eat candies or snacks that even common kids enjoyed—.
The faces of kids eating sweets all looked blissfully happy.
Mirna had wondered what they tasted like.
But her father never bought her one in her life.
He was an extremely strict man.
So strict he vowed lifelong silence, not even speaking a word to his own daughter.
Could she ask such a father?
Why House Draco lived in this remote villa outside the kingdom….
Why he upheld eternal silence.
Where their mother had gone….
Someday, she vowed, she would ask.
But the world wasn't so kind.
One by one, the Draco family fell to an unknown curse, and when she buried her father—the last—the sisters had no one left to answer them.
Reviving him with necromancy wasn't just to bolster the house's forces.
There were so many stories she'd never heard from him. She wanted to bring him back to ask what she'd never dared before.
—Dol’s IkTum.
But the revived father and daughter spoke different tongues now. She couldn't understand most questions anymore.
The vast manor.
Nights guarding the graves.
Her father.
The rules….
It all blurred into a jumble in her mind.
Every time she closed her eyes to pray, the swirling chaos of complexities merged into a vortex, muddling her thoughts.
Swish.
Then something touched Mirna Draco's head.
Finishing her troubled prayer, she looked up to see the gaunt skull she wanted to avoid staring down at her with hollow eyes.
—Atem Dol’s Nobito.
“What did you say?”
She still couldn't understand her father. But she knew what she had to do.
This situation was her fault.
She'd failed to guard the graves, so the family corpses were stolen.
She'd revived her resting father, so even his body was taken.
Mirna bit her lip, reflecting on her failings.
“Father, you no longer need bear the weight of flesh.”
—Necromancy Release.
Deep within, Mirna Draco severed the thin thread connecting her to her revived father.
Breaking the pact between necromancer and risen dead.
Things would return to how they were.
“From ashes to ashes. From dust to dust—.”
—Grrrrrr….
Mirna bowed her head.
Fsssh.
The risen dead, unbound, crumbled like sand. Mirna couldn't bear to watch her father fade.
To face his death twice.
Then.
What must it feel like for him, dying twice?
“…….”
If she looked up, his stern, terrifying hollow eyes would reproach her. So she clamped her mouth shut, head down, staring at the floor.
Swish.
A worn, bony fist appeared before Mirna's face.
—Dal.
“This is….”
Mirna gasped.
In the open palm was something small and round, wrapped in paper, utterly unlike the stoic man. It smelled sweetly of candy.
Candy she'd longed to taste just once as a child.
As she took it, her father spoke.
—You don't cry anymore.
“What did you—.”
She looked up in a rush, but her father was gone.
* * *
Srrrrr.
The mighty lich's body turned to sand and vanished.
The skeletons and zombies lurking nearby scattered as handfuls of dust.
I didn't know what happened, but our potential enemies were gone—a relief.
『That idiot Alistair. Defying my orders like thaaat.』
The monster's voice dragged on.
Its body was already torn and cracked everywhere, vomiting purple slime in gushes.
“Hey, Theo, how long do I have to keep beating this thing? It won't die!”
Elga, battling the giant for ten minutes straight, was starting to tire.
『Fiiiine, then diiiieeee—!』
Splat—a long tendril of slime shot toward Elga. Less a leg, more a tentacle, sharper a spear.
Sizzle.
“Ugh!”
It grazed Elga's side.
Corroding her clothes instantly, Elga shed her uniform robe and tore off her blouse, flinging it aside.
Sweat glistened on Elga's toned body, her undergarments exposed. Scars dotted her skin.
She dodged well now, but one hit from Gamigin would be fatal.
Pffft, pffft.
The amorphous body bristled like a hedgehog, spines erupting everywhere.
『You bitches! Don't think you'll die easy—! I'll make you vessels for my spawn—!!!』
Pffft, pffft.
“Theo, dodge for now!”
Elga grabbed my waist, ducking behind a thick pillar. The sturdy castle ruin held against the tentacles.
“Got any better ideas?”
Elga asked me.
All I could think was hack away until it died—that's how villain hunters beat it.
“Too reckless. I can't solo it now. How many spells you got left?”
Peering inward at her question, I replied.
“About two.”
“Way too few.”
Elga clicked her tongue.
Then Mirna, silent since the lich dissolved, exhaled slowly.
“I'll perform the exorcism. We need the exorcism.”
“Exorcism?”
At Elga's question, Mirna explained.
“As I said before, Gamigin is a living spell of Demon King Solomon. Exorcise it, and it'll vanish.”
Exorcism, huh.
Made perfect sense.
I thrust my Heart Tail Wand past the pillar and chanted the exorcism spell I knew.
—Belial!
Zzzt.
White sparks shot out, slamming into the howling monster. It convulsed violently.
『Exorcism? Like that fool Ballan—. But this sloppy exorcism won't work on me…! I am the Scourge of Angmar…!』
No good?
My circle too low?
Drip, drip.
Then the monster shuddered hard.
Like a glacier melting into the sea from global warming, its body oozed and dissolved.
『Wh-what—. What's this? Why? Huh? My body, it's meltingggg—! Whyyy…!?』
My exorcism was working great.
Because I'm Angmar royalty?
Damn, should’ve started with exorcism.
“Hey, Theo! Keep chanting! It's working!”
“Want to, but mana’s almost zero!”
“Zero mana? Force it with willpower!”
Willpower.
Sure, never lacked will, just stamina.
Whatever, I scowled, squeezing every drop of magic from my body.
—Belial—!
Zzzzzzt.
Lightning burst thicker and faster from my wand. The bizarre current struck the melting blob.
『Eeeeeek!』
Splat, splat.
The monster's flesh fully dissolved into the floor.
“Whew….”
“Hey—Theodore—. Good—job—. Catch—your—breath—. Finish—it—.”
Elga muttered beside me, but my breath ragged, vision spinning, I had no strength left.
True mana burnout.
Losing consciousness felt imminent.
But I staggered to Professor Ballan, writhing on the floor like a goldfish flopped out of its bowl.
His pale back, clothes shredded, bore a round seal-like glyph.
Recognizing it as a magic circle took no time.
“K-kill me…. My body, won't obey…. Exorcism… studied it lifelong…. Can't escape….”
Professor Ballan's red eyes wept blood tears.
A moment of clarity?
“Hold… on to consciousness…. Hurry….”
Pitiful, almost.
How'd he end up cursed like this?
Mirna said.
“Theo Gospel, can you exorcise it?”
Staring at the blood-red glyph on her back—like savagely carved with a knife—I saw "Gamigin" written.
Coincidentally, like the zombie tongue mark from chess with Narmi. I touched her back gently.
“Grrrrk—!”
Ballan screamed, grabbing my leg. Pure malice, unlike her prior thrashing.
“Erase my existence? Nooo—. Impossible!”
She clawed my knee, climbing for my collar.
Then her eyes widened.
“No way, something's wrong. Why, why are you with those girls—!? You, you half-fairy scum, Theo Gaspel, liar—!”
Info flooded my vision.
「Gamigin: High necromancy spell. Can puppet the living. Effect grows with caster's circle.」
「Defeated mighty foe with miracle magic!
Job: Mage level up.
Mage lv. 5 → Lv. 7
Now a true mystic harmonizer!」
Srrk.
Ballan collapsed, spent.
Level up by 2—nice.
Mana surged, omnipotence tingling through my capillaries.
But the spell was wilder.
Gamigin puppets people?
Not plain necromancy.
Exactly what I wanted.
Could I control Aira with this?
Swish.
Elga checked Ballan's neck.
“Not dead. Lucky bitch. Anyway, minor stuff aside.”
Standing, she faced Mirna Draco.
“Spill what you know. Everything. Angmar bloodline remains?”
In the dark, Elga's blue eyes gleamed fiercely.
More urgent than the chaos: Angmar intel.
“Hide one thing, you die too. Mirna Draco.”
Yes.
Not over yet.
But I wanted Mirna's Angmar info, so I listened.
Finally, Mirna spoke.
“That’s…”