Chapter 17
Chapter 17
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 17
Chapter Title: Crisis
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I heard about the current situation through Levia.
"The spirit is attacking the Magic Tower's people right now?"
"Yes... It's a very urgent situation at the moment."
"And the fighting is happening at the church right now?"
"Yes. That's right."
Today, while the Magic Tower's people were activating the magic circle as usual,
the spirit finally revealed itself, or so I'd heard.
The Magic Tower's mages had been thrilled at the spirit's appearance.
But the spirit didn't seem particularly friendly.
The moment it saw them, it got agitated, as if something about them rubbed it the wrong way, and launched an attack.
And now, combat was underway.
"I'll head over right away."
"Please be careful."
"Got it."
I had to stop this somehow, right?
With that thought, I rushed toward the church.
I wanted to deal with the spirit before it was too late.
'It'd be a problem if the village got destroyed like this.'
This was the village I lived in, after all.
I couldn't let it get wrecked.
Besides, this was an assault on the church where Levia lived.
I might not care if it was someone else's home, but I couldn't stand by and let Levia's church be destroyed.
'Can't let the Hero Party's mage get hurt, either.'
Above all, it would be a huge issue if Dipne, the Hero Party's mage, got injured.
She was the one who needed to take down the Demon King later on.
If something went wrong and she died here, the world might actually end.
In the end, it looked like I had to handle this myself.
'It feels like the spirit showed up because of me.'
Well, I couldn't exactly claim to have zero responsibility in this.
In the original story, the spirit never appeared, but now it had come knocking.
No matter how I thought about it, the cause had to be me.
"It'll be fine, right?"
Still, I wasn't particularly worried.
Even if I had to fight the spirit, I had the Spirit Sword now, didn't I?
Worst case, I could just unleash my mana and sweep it away.
With those thoughts in mind, I headed straight for the church.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Had I run for about ten minutes?
I finally arrived at the church.
'Hope everything's okay...'
But since it was quite a distance away,
I hadn't gotten there as quickly as I'd hoped.
I couldn't help worrying that the situation might have already wrapped up by now.
But it didn't seem like I needed to fret just yet.
'Looks better than I thought?'
The three Magic Tower mages didn't appear to be in serious trouble.
Alex, the male mage, seemed to be injured and was receiving treatment in the corner,
but Dipne and Kailin didn't have a scratch on them.
Was the situation already over?
That was my initial thought.
'But what's that?'
Still, something odd suggested it wasn't quite finished.
A massive black sphere enveloping the church.
It looked extremely suspicious.
What was that thing, and why was it wrapping around the church?
Puzzled, I headed toward the mages.
"Is everyone okay?"
As I got there, Dipne welcomed me.
She bowed her head politely.
"..."
In contrast, Kailin glanced at me once before looking away, as if she couldn't care less.
"Dipne. I'll investigate this separately."
"Ah...! Yeah, got it."
With that, she started examining the black sphere on her own, as if she had work to do.
"What is this?"
I wasn't interested in Kailin anyway.
I ignored her and asked Dipne about the black sphere.
I wanted to know what it was and why it was clinging to the church.
But Dipne didn't seem to know the details either.
"Um... We don't really know. While we were fighting the spirit, it transformed into that."
Dipne looked a bit baffled herself,
explaining what had happened as best she could.
"The spirit transformed?"
"Yes..."
"I see."
The spirit transformed, huh...
Did that mean this was the spirit?
I couldn't be sure, but the current situation looked very problematic.
"Lord Davian. We have absolutely no idea what to do..."
Dipne let out a deep sigh and vented to me.
She continued, looking extremely troubled.
"We can't just attack the spirit we've finally found."
Discovering the spirit and harnessing its power was one of the Magic Tower's major projects.
Of course, it had always failed because the spirit never showed up.
But now, the project was finally bearing fruit.
They couldn't attack it in a situation like this.
"But we can't just leave it alone, either."
At the same time, they couldn't ignore it.
Who knew what the spirit might do?
From the Magic Tower's perspective, which had summoned it, they had to do something—especially since they didn't know if it was friendly or not.
"If we attack, the church will get destroyed..."
But attacking wasn't an option either.
An attack strong enough would take out the church along with the spirit.
That was a major issue.
Even setting aside the cost of rebuilding the church right away, destroying it would spark religious backlash.
It was bound to cause friction with the church one way or another.
"And we might not even win."
And the biggest problem:
They hadn't fully grasped the spirit's power yet.
There was no guarantee of victory, making it hard to even attempt.
"Lord Davian. What should we do?"
It was a situation piled high with multiple problems.
What to do...
She made a distressed face, seeking my advice.
'How should I know?'
Of course, I didn't know either.
I was a possessor and knew solutions to most events from the original story,
but this wasn't in the original.
Naturally, I had no clue.
"Hang in there."
"Hng..."
I offered some generic encouragement.
It didn't seem to help much; Dipne still looked miserable.
Then,
a clue to solving the problem emerged.
"Dipne. I found it. A way to resolve this."
Kailin, who had gone off to investigate earlier, returned.
She told Dipne she had a solution.
"What? Kailin? Really?"
"Yeah. It's real."
"Wow...!"
At Kailin's words,
Dipne's face lit up like she'd found an oasis in the desert.
"So, what is it? What's the plan?"
Dipne asked how they would do it,
and Kailin explained her discovery.
"There's an entrance over there."
"An entrance?"
"Yeah. The mana flow is different only in that spot. Come see."
On the black sphere, there was one spot
that felt different, she said.
That was the entrance.
Dipne couldn't grasp it immediately, so Kailin showed her the spot directly.
"Um... It's real?"
Dipne seemed to recognize it was genuine.
"Right? It's different, isn't it?"
"Yeah. It is. This area's way different."
"Like an entrance, huh?"
"Exactly."
Feeling the mana at the spot Kailin pointed out, she confirmed it really was different.
A place where the mana flow dipped sharply, as if inviting entry.
They called that spot the entrance.
"Then can't we just go in?"
Wouldn't that solve everything?
I chimed in on their conversation.
They'd found the entrance, so surely they could go inside and talk it out or something.
But it didn't seem that simple.
"...Can't get in."
Only then did Kailin look me straight in the eye.
She said flatly that it wasn't possible.
"Why?"
"It won't allow it. Can't enter without permission... I tried earlier. But it didn't let me in."
The entrance was there, but the "door" wouldn't open.
Kailin had already attempted to enter once.
But she couldn't.
The homeowner hadn't opened the door.
That's why she'd come to check if Dipne could get in.
"Hmm... I can't get in either."
But Dipne couldn't enter either.
Like Kailin, she failed to breach the entrance and looked troubled.
She tried a few more times but ultimately failed.
"You can't either..."
"Sniff... We're back to square one."
In the end, nothing had changed.
They knew there was an entrance, but no one could go through it...
As they stood there looking perplexed,
"I can get in, though?"
I gave the entrance a test touch,
and my body slipped right inside.
"You... got in...?!!?"
Seeing this,
the two of them wore completely stunned expressions.