CHAPTER 69. Ah, So That’s What It Is?
Near the Third Base Camp.
On the thick branch of a giant tree.
In the Hamelin Great Forest, where the competition of the food chain raged fiercely in broad daylight, Belloc was concentrating with both eyes closed.
Under his closed eyelids, his pupils moved without rest, and it wasn’t long before those eyes opened.
“……Hmm.”
Belloc, half-lidding his eyes, let out a faint hum.
“Ha, well now.”
His voice was plainly flustered.
“There’s another monster like that?”
It hadn’t been that long since Belloc noticed the masked mage.
An old war mage.
To prepare bait to catch that monster, he had set up a few devices.
The Swamp Ruler.
The one that had guarded the Swamp of Death for hundreds of years—that ancient species had been moved to the wetland by Belloc.
‘If the wetland is blocked, they’ll have no choice but to change routes in the end.’
He thought he could wait leisurely, then just swallow the exhausted bait whole.
But.
“You’re telling me he actually killed the Swamp Ruler.”
It was an unexpected case.
The Swamp Ruler.
What kind of monster was it!
In words, he’d simply said he “moved it” for hunting, but even for Belloc, moving that ancient species that stubbornly clung to its own territory had taken no small amount of mental effort.
In the process, he had confirmed with his own eyes the power that ancient species called the Swamp Ruler possessed.
If someone told him to kill it himself……
‘It’s not impossible. Not impossible, but still.’
A scene of battle flashed through his mind.
The footage sent by the familiar he had released to track the bait’s situation was truly—
Pure shock itself!
Tearing out the Swamp Ruler’s two eyes, and engaging in hand-to-hand combat.
He was definitely a mage, and yet to the eye, he even traded attacks and defenses without yielding an inch.
In other words.
‘He’s a rare kind of crazy bastard.’
Hidden by the mask, his expression couldn’t be seen, but Belloc understood at once.
That guy is…… smiling.
Even as he got knocked down by the Swamp Ruler’s brutish fist, he tore its flesh and laughed.
Surely, the face hidden beneath the mask had been wearing an exceptionally bright smile.
But what was truly shocking was something else.
- Now, let’s finish it. Since it was fun thanks to you, I’ll show you something fun.
Rough, violent magic power sparks blooming in his hand.
Magic? No.
Belloc might be a Forbidden Magic Society mage, but his understanding of magic was not shallow.
No—he had understood and perceived magic far more deeply than most mages.
A Forbidden Magic Society mage is that kind of existence.
Not some riffraff who lacked talent and chose the path of a black mage, but madmen who were fascinated by the forbidden and corrupted themselves!
‘There is no magic that can produce that kind of power with such a small amount of magic power.’
If it were an archmage, maybe.
But among the fewer than ten archmages on the Eastern Continent, there was no one like that masked man.
Anyway, that wasn’t the important part……
- Wiiiiiiiiing.
An explosion that erased all sound in an instant.
After the light flashed once, all that remained was the Swamp Ruler’s corpse, as if it had been torn apart and eaten by some enormous beast.
An explosion that annihilated (滅) the target.
Thinking that far, Belloc unconsciously rubbed his forearm once.
Because goosebumps had risen over the skin hidden beneath his robe—and it was then that he flinched.
“Ha—so even I…….”
A bodily reaction that had surfaced unconsciously. He realized what emotion it had come from.
It was……
“……I felt fear?”
Fear. Or the emotion called terror.
But why?
“Hah.”
A laugh burst out.
“Heh. Hahahaha!”
Belloc then leaned his body back and, staring up at the sky, laughed loudly.
That laughter spread widely through the Hamelin Great Forest.
After a while of that.
“Hah, hahaha. This is really…… incredible.”
Belloc calmed his laughter and clutched his stomach.
How long had it been since he’d laughed like this?
He’d laughed so hard his abs ached, but it wasn’t unpleasant pain at all.
“It’s fun. It really is fun. Where did a guy like that crawl out from?”
Sometimes there are idiots who spout words like this.
‘The world is wide, and there are many strong people.’
Nonsense.
The world is wide, yes, but strong people who could satisfy Belloc…… no, prey—were not that common.
And something as lethal as that masked bastard, enough to make your skin tingle, even more so!
To confess……
“It seems like it’ll be fun.”
If you had to say it, an old war mage is for showing off.
A kind of trophy—Look at the prey I hunted!
But that guy was different.
‘I want to hunt him.’
For showing off, an old war mage might be superior, but separately from that, he was the kind of guy who stoked the desire to hunt.
No—wait.
‘He’s…… not prey.’
Right. This isn’t the emotion of a hunter facing prey.
Rather……
‘He’s also a hunter, the same as me.’
He doesn’t know what he hunts.
But one thing is certain: he too is a hunter.
Whether he’s hunted mages like Belloc, or hunted knights, or hunted monsters—he doesn’t know, but his essence is ultimately no different from his own.
‘This is, so…… yeah.’
An understanding counterpart with whom he can share the ecstasy of the hunt.
That’s why he wants to hunt him even more.
To a fellow hunter, what kind of hunter am I? You and me—who is the better hunter?
“Sss.”
Belloc licked his parched lips with his tongue.
‘I should…… prepare a little more carefully.’
He’s curious.
What kind of face is beneath that mask?
In the moment of death, what expression will the hunter make, and what kind of gaze will he have?
“Heh heh, heh heh heh—”
Like a doll whose emotional signal is broken.
Belloc stood rigidly in place, only his shoulders twitching as he let out a drained laugh.
Then Belloc picked up a communication crystal orb.
Not long after he sent a signal, a voice came through from beyond the orb.
[I gre……et the Seer……]
Was it because of the saturated mana density of the Hamelin Great Forest?
The voice coming from beyond the communication orb was mixed with noise and not smooth.
But Belloc didn’t care and delivered his order.
“I’ll tell you the location by spirit sense. Two days.”
[Yes……sir.]
It was a somewhat unreasonable order.
A chaotic place like the Hamelin Great Forest wasn’t easy to penetrate, no matter how stealthy you were.
But Belloc, who gave the command, and the black mage, who answered, both cut the communication as if it were only natural.
That is the relationship between a Forbidden Magic Society mage and a black mage.
Like a hunter using a hound however he pleases, regardless of circumstances, it is a relationship where the other side must simply obey.
‘Let’s see…… the hounds are ready. What kind of stage should I prepare for you.’
Heh heh.
Belloc held a smile on his face, flushed with excitement as if even imagining it was delightful.
We entered the First Base Camp around the time darkness would settle in thickly.
Even though it was the middle of the night, the Base Camp didn’t have a single torch lit, and Raileigh, familiar even in the dark, entered one of the tents and announced our arrival.
“Originally, when it gets to evening, Base Camps don’t light fires. Monsters might be drawn to the light, and…….”
The reason we could light fires whenever we camped was thanks to Oberon’s barrier magic.
The Base Camp also wasn’t completely without mages or Artifacts that could serve a similar role, but as a matter of efficiency, the principle was to not light fires.
“First, I think we can stay here.”
Raileigh said he’d been assigned a tent by the Base Camp keeper, and guided us somewhere.
It was darkness where you couldn’t see an inch ahead, but Raileigh, as if accustomed, found the tent and went inside.
Click.
When he lit a candle, the tent brightened.
Raileigh soon secured the tent to ensure there were no gaps where light could leak out, then sat down.
“Mm. I expected it, but it’s quite deserted.”
“Deserted?”
I had piled up enough magic power to see through the dark, but Raileigh wasn’t like that.
How did he know?
“There’s a thing called atmosphere, isn’t there? At night, a Base Camp being quiet as if a rat died is normal, but I can’t feel any sign of people at all. This is literally…… looks like everyone except the Base Camp keeper ran off?”
A sense that had somewhat recovered.
Sure enough, as Raileigh said, the presence felt nearby was quite few.
If you exclude the traces of small insects or small animals, it was, at most, about a dozen or so.
Even if you were generous, about twenty.
“But the Base Camp keeper?”
“Ah, yes. I mean the mercenary company that owns the Base Camp. They take the byproducts from the mercenaries who use the Base Camp as payment. They’re highway robbers, but…….”
It felt like a sort of feudal lord.
Just then, the tent opened and a voice came through.
“Highway robbers, huh…… Raileigh. You’ve gotten bold while I wasn’t looking.”
“……Ghk!”
The uninvited guest entering the tent.
He was a mercenary with a voice that echoed like a cave, and a hulking, burly build.
Raileigh is a big guy too, but next to him he looked small—like a lump of muscle.
I stared blankly at the man, and it was then that Oberon, who had been silent, spoke.
“……He is the Chief who rules the First Base Camp. The mercenary company’s name is…….”
“Abiot. It’s Abiot.”
The man cut off Oberon’s words, dragged over a chair, and sat down.
But would a chair even be able to hold that body?
It was to the point the chair looked pitiful.
‘But Chief?’
I swept my eyes over the middle-aged man once.
A beard turning white. His hair, too, sparse and grayish—like he was crossing from middle age into old age.
But the light settled in his eyes was fierce, no less than a young man’s.
It was then that the Chief held out his hand to me.
“……?”
“Just greeting you, that’s all. Don’t you know a handshake?”
“Ah, so that’s what it is?”
I’ve had experiences like this often enough.
You know how it is.
When you enter a group of men, there’s the usual contest of wills.
I smiled faintly and took his hand—and it was then that the Chief’s face twisted.
“Wha……t are you doing right now?”
“……?”
Was it pride?
A jaw clenched tight as if suppressing pain. The voice that leaked out between his teeth tried to sound calm, but the painful tone was obvious.
His eyes, on the other hand, were full of bewilderment—if anything, the one who felt bewildered was me.
“……Isn’t this it?”
The Chief didn’t answer.
He only turned his gaze and looked at Raileigh.
“……You really brought me some crazy bastard.”
“Haha, well, that’s…….”
“Enough.”
The Chief brushed off his hand and looked at me.
“Mage, consider my age. I’m past the age of doing childish strength contests.”
“Didn’t recognize you.”
“……Tsk.”
If not, then not.
He glares.
An impulse rose to drive a fist into his eye socket, but I barely held it in.
Because I was a mage who knew propriety.
But putting that aside.
“So, for someone so advanced in years, what brings you here?”
“What brings me here? I came because I have business, didn’t I. I heard last time you were going back to the Fourth Base Camp?”
“How did you……?”
It was Oberon who reacted to the Chief’s words.
And of course he would—because we hadn’t been in the First Base Camp for very long.
But the Chief glanced once at those innocent eyes, then stared at Raileigh as if he were pathetic.
“You don’t even know how loose the mouth of the Pathfinder you’re dragging around is. Last time you visited, he rambled on and on. He probably even blabbed his plan to fleece that naive mage, didn’t he?”
“……Ghk.”
“Well, from what I can see…… looks like you failed spectacularly.”
Raileigh’s face, already pale, turned completely ashen like a corpse.
But Oberon, whether he didn’t understand, or thought it was something in the past, only looked at the Chief with a calm face.
The one who broke that silence was me.
“So, what business do you have, Chief?”
“The business is…… simple.”
Creeeak.
When he leaned his upper body forward, the chair—already unstable—let out a scream.
At the same time, it seemed like the muscles all over his body swelled up.
“Take us to the Fourth Base Camp too.”
“Huh?”
As I let out a hollow laugh at the unexpected request, the Chief continued.
“That loudmouth might see us as highway robbers, but even highway robbers value their own territory.”
“So…….”
“I know, roughly, what’s going on. The Chiefs of the camps have a network.”
Meaning, he knew that Destrow was about to arrive deeper inside.
And it was then that the Chief opened his mouth.
“If the Fourth Base Camp collapses, we won’t be safe either. We’ll fight too.”
In other words, it meant this.
If you put it nicely, he was saying they’d stake their lives to defend their territory.
If you put it badly, he was asking us to guide them to the place where they’d commit suicide.
Well, it wasn’t a bad request.
‘The more hands, the better.’
You might think how much help mercenaries would be, but the enemy isn’t only Destrow.
The undead overflowing around it would also be no easy opponents.
But for some reason.
“No.”
A firm voice.
“……?”
Looking toward the source of the voice in confusion.
There was Oberon, staring at the Chief with a face unusually rigid.