Chapter 8: White Witch(2)
Chapter 8: White Witch(2)
A Legendary grade item. I’d seen countless items with my Goddess’s Eye, but this was my first time seeing something of Legendary grade.
Of course, given my life as a gutter-dwelling, F-rank adventurer, that was to be expected.
[White Witch's Seal]
[Grade – Legendary]
[Summary - A orb in which the White Witch has sealed herself.]
So, the White Witch was sealed inside this orb. I didn’t know what it was, but it was a Legendary grade orb, so I discreetly slipped it into my pocket.
This place was no different from a battlefield, all thanks to Lina and Natasha running rampant.
The air was filled with thunderous crashes and frantic screams. No one saw me pocket the orb.
Legendary item get! Fuck yeah!
I never imagined I could get a Legendary item this easily. If I were to convert this into cash, just how much would it be worth?
Considering the magic orb and equipment I’d already acquired, it was safe to say my luck with loot was soaring through the roof lately.
Just as I thought. Stick with a Regressor, and rare items just fall into your lap.
But this was no time to get lost in the joy of finding a Legendary item.
After all, a Legendary item was only meaningful if I survived the clash of monsters unfolding before my eyes.
The pig and the skeleton spoke, panting heavily.
“Who the hell are you bitches? Buhik!”
“How did you know to come here?”
Natasha, half out of her mind, was letting out guttural, beast-like snarls, while Lina ignored them as if they weren’t even worth speaking to.
Lina’s sword clashed with the skeleton’s spear. A terrifying crack, fitting for their stats, exploded outwards.
The skeleton seemed quite strong, but he looked to be a step below Lina. He was being pushed back helplessly by her relentless barrage of sword strikes.
The problem is Natasha.
“Kraaaaaaah!”
Natasha shrieked and charged at the pig. She had completely lost her reason. The pig snorted dismissively and countered with a terrifyingly large iron mace.
Natasha seemed faster, but perhaps because she’d lost her sanity, her movements were too linear.
She darted about wildly, unleashing a flurry of fierce, animalistic attacks, but none of them landed.
“You tiny bitch! Annoying!”
CRACK!
“Kyaaak!”
Natasha was sent flying by the iron mace.
Hearing Natasha’s scream, Lina instantly blew the skeleton away and rushed the pig.
“You bastard!”
“Buhik? Is it your turn now, bitch?”
The pig was no pushover. And the skeleton Lina had sent tumbling was already picking himself up.
The skeleton got to his feet and shouted to the pig.
“Furuku! We have orders from above. Retreat!”
“Huh? Can’t be helped. Got it. Buhik.”
The pig glared at Lina, looking resentful.
But there was nothing he could do. The pig alone couldn’t beat Lina. Even if he and the skeleton ganged up on her, they couldn’t guarantee a victory.
That was surely the case, yet Lina didn’t pursue the fleeing pig and skeleton.
She simply watched their retreating figures disappear into the distance, gritting her teeth.
*
A short while later, I understood why Lina had made the decision to let the pig and skeleton go. There were still remnants of their forces left.
If Lina had chased after those two… Natasha, who had already collapsed, would have been killed by their underlings. The old woman and I would have been killed, too.
Lina dispatched the remaining minions with ease.
Keeping up with a Regressor is going to be a real pain.
No, that probably wasn’t what Lina had expected of me. My role was to stop Natasha’s rampage.
Judging by the warnings she’d given me before we left, she must have been worried about a situation just like this.
But as Lina looked at Natasha lying in bed, she blamed herself.
“…It’s all my fault.”
“…”
“I was too complacent. I knew Natasha’s tribe had been massacred… I knew those bastards were performing human sacrifices… but I didn’t consider it. That Natasha’s family might be among them.”
To be fair, it was probably a bit harsh to expect anyone to remain calm after witnessing such a horrific sight.
But it couldn’t be called the Regressor’s fault alone. A Regressor couldn’t possibly know and predict everything.
“No. It was an accident. It’s not your fault, Lina. It couldn’t be helped.”
“…I can’t imagine how much pain Natasha must have been in. If it were me, I would have gone berserk, too.”
“…”
The old woman stood beside us with a grim expression. Natasha’s father was her family, too, so there was no way she wasn’t sad.
“All that matters is that she’s alive…” the old woman muttered.
Lina nodded as if she agreed. They had let the bastards escape, but they had stopped the ritual.
And it wasn’t as if the chance to catch them was gone forever. Lina’s will burned with determination.
‘The White Witch is more troublesome than those two. For now, I stopped her revival, so I’ll have to be satisfied with that.’
In her past life, the White Witch’s power was so immense that even Lina had struggled to handle it.
‘But the seal that was supposed to be holding her captive was nowhere to be seen.’
Lina had secretly searched the area, trying to retrieve the orb that sealed the White Witch, but she couldn’t find it.
‘So they haven’t given up on reviving the White Witch yet.’
Lina was convinced that those bastards had taken the seal with them. This was a painful mistake. She had to prevent the White Witch’s revival at all costs.
“…”
A somber mood filled the sickroom, but I found it hard to stop the corners of my mouth from creeping upwards.
Especially since they said Natasha’s life wasn’t in danger.
To be honest, I wanted to bolt out of the room and examine the orb in detail.
Legendary grade! My god!
*
The pig who had fled using his underlings as bait was named Furuku, and the skeleton was named Nassen.
“Who the hell were those bitches? Buhik… Buhik…”
“Shut up and run. That blonde bitch was absurdly strong. The two of us together couldn’t guarantee a win. It’ll be a problem if she decides to chase us now.”
“Ugh. This is all because the higher-ups didn’t give me enough prey. If I had just eaten properly and built up my strength, a couple of bitches like them would have been…”
“This is no time to be whining about prey.”
“Buhik? There’s nothing in this world more important than prey.”
“You pig bastard. Forget prey, we might both be dead soon.”
“?”
“The White Witch’s orb. Did you forget? That blonde bitch was so terrifying we couldn’t even grab it.”
“Buhik? That’s not good! If we lose the White Witch’s orb, I might not get any more prey! I have to go back!”
“Stop! You won’t find it even if you go back now.”
“The higher-ups said they absolutely need the White Witch! This was the final ritual! We sacrificed over 500 prey for it!”
Furuku snorted and threw a tantrum, screaming that he would risk his life to go back.
Furuku was just freaking out about not getting his prey, but Nassen felt the gravity of the situation to his very bones.
‘If we screw this up, we could both be kicked out of the organization.’
They might even be offered up as sacrifices, just like the humans they had been offering up all this time.
‘Surely no one will undo the seal on the orb.’
He wanted to believe that wouldn’t happen. No, if they were lucky, they might go back and find the orb just rolling around on the ground.
After all, it looked like nothing more than an ordinary orb. Nassen prayed that they would be lucky.
*
Kerry placed the orb down in his room and stared at it.
“So, what do I do with this now…”
It was an ordinary-looking orb. To anyone, it would look completely ordinary.
At a glance, it looked like someone had just polished a random stone from the street until it was smooth.
But the grade of this orb was Legendary.
It was then, as Kerry stared intently at the orb, that a hologram appeared, looking like a door lock. A keypad for entering a password appeared with it.
[Please enter the password.]
“Is this a real door lock?”
I had no way of knowing if I was the only one who could see it.
First, I decided to use the Goddess’s Eye to check the ‘detailed’ information on the seal, not just the ‘summary.’
The moment I did, a series of messages popped up before my eyes.
[Details - The password for the seal is 5147. Entering the password will allow you to move inside the seal, where the White Witch’s utopia has been created.
In the utopia, aging and disease do not exist. The White Witch has been living here for 100 years…]
The Goddess’s Eye automatically gave me the password. It provided some other miscellaneous information, but none of it seemed particularly helpful.
Should I just close my eyes and enter the password?
Since it was an object I’d never seen before, I was worried.
What should I do with this?
I had no idea how many hours had passed while I agonized over the orb.
Reason kept asking me if it wasn’t better to wait until I knew more about it.
But this was a Legendary grade item, the first Kerry, a former F-rank adventurer, had ever seen. I couldn’t help but be drawn to it.
“If I don’t do something… it’ll just stay like this, right?”
It was too much of a waste to just let a Legendary item sit here and rot.
Wasn’t there a safe way? A way to safely learn more about the orb or the White Witch.
Kerry stared at the orb, deep in thought.
Reason and instinct were locked in a tense tug-of-war.
I want to press it! I want to press the numbers 5147 so badly I could die.
Maybe the White Witch would be so impressed by my talent for magic that she’d take me as her disciple. If that happened, my life would be set.
Just then, I heard Lina’s voice.
“Kerry-nim. May I come in for a moment?”
It would be a problem if Lina found out I had the White Witch’s Seal.
So when I heard her voice, it scared the shit out of me.
But Lina was polite; she would never enter someone’s room without their permission.
Which meant I could relax.
But then why did my finger just press 5147 on the keypad?
Shit. I’m fucked.
In that instant, a sound like a door unlocking came from the orb. The world around Kerry began to change in a flash.
It felt like the entire space was shifting, just like in the movies.
My left hand had really gone and done it now.
A room where everything was covered in white came into view. The walls were white, and the lace-draped bed was also white.
Fuck. I have a bad feeling about this.
If someone actually lived in a room like this, there was a high probability they were a complete psycho. Weren’t mental hospitals also all white?
Kerry cautiously scanned his surroundings.
“…Is the White Witch not here, at least? Phew. That’s a relief for now.”
“Mmmph… mmm…”
“Heek!”
A sleepy mumble came from the bed.
Was someone inside? I wanted to check who it was, but the lace curtaining the bed blocked my view.
Okay, just stay dead silent.
If I was unlucky—no, with a high probability—the woman in the bed could be the White Witch.
This is fucking terrifying… but stay calm. She hasn’t noticed me yet. She might be a psycho bitch who lives alone in an all-white room, but she’s sleeping right now, right?
I had to calm down and find a way to survive. I still had a chance.
Don’t underestimate the resilience I’ve built up rolling around as an adventurer for two years. I’m not going to die in a place like this.
Calm down. The first thing I need to do is… secure an escape route back to my world.
It was then.
Someone shot up in the bed.
“!”
And she began to part the lace curtains. In that moment, my life flashed before my eyes.
Ah… Father… Mother… your unfilial son dies like this in another world…
But what was revealed when the lace was pulled back was an unexpected sight.
A beautiful woman with long, flowing white hair was rubbing her eyes sleepily.
Kerry couldn’t move a muscle at the sight, not so much from fear, but because the situation was so utterly baffling.
The woman in the bed was completely naked.
I truly couldn’t tear my eyes away from her naked form, revealed as the lace parted. Snow-white hair and crimson eyes.
Her white skin and S-line figure, exposed in all their glory, were so beautiful they could be called unreal.
I want to fuck her! No. I want to live!
My fascination with her beautiful naked body was fleeting. The intense, flaring instinct for survival crushed my libido.
Judging by her extraordinary aura, it wouldn’t be strange if this woman was the White Witch.
The woman, who had been sitting on the edge of the bed rubbing her eyes, stood up while stretching.
Thanks to that, her hairless white pussy was in plain view. Even in this situation, Kerry was the beast of a man whose eyes were drawn to it.
In a situation where I desperately wanted to hide somewhere, our eyes met.
“…”
“…”
After a few seconds of silence, a scream that could shatter eardrums echoed through the room.
“KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!”
*
Kerry didn’t know what to do in the unidentified white room.
Fortunately, the disaster of having his head magically lopped off in an instant hadn’t occurred.
…Did I survive?
The White Witch had fled behind the bed, then reappeared after getting dressed. As if to prove she wasn’t in her right mind, her clothes were also all white.
“Who… who are you! How are you here? This… this is my bedchamber! How dare a man such as you enter without my permission…”
“…”
For a psycho bitch who lived in an all-white room, her reaction was surprisingly normal.
She hadn’t just blown my head off with some unknown magic. At the very least, it felt like I could reason with her.
What should I say? Should I be honest?
Would she believe me if I told her that I have pretty good eyes, and I pressed the password on a hologram that looked like a door lock, and ended up here?
If it were me, I’d never believe it.
As Kerry was contemplating what to say to save his life, the White Witch, displeased by his silence, shouted with even more agitation.
“This is the inside of my personal multi-dimensional barrier! No one can enter this place without my permission.”
What the fuck is a multi-dimensional barrier… it’s just a fucking door lock.
“It should be impossible for even the greatest of mages to invade this place… Who in the world are you!”
I don’t know either!
“Do not just stand there gaping! Will you not answer me? How did you get in here? It is absolutely impossible to enter this place unless you are a follower of mine!”
I couldn’t see a path to survival. Kerry’s creed was to live a long, quiet life.
But right now, I couldn’t see a path to even a quiet survival.
Then, one phrase stuck in Kerry’s mind.
‘A follower can enter?’
A thread of hope. It proved nothing, but right now, it seemed to be my only hope for survival.
“O, great White Witch.”
Without hesitation, Kerry grasped the thread-like lifeline for his survival.