Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 319

Kuuuuuung!!

[It seems Major General Jellych is starting to use his power.]

Unlike the reactor where communication was cut off, the connection with Felix, who was still confronting the enemy at the rear gate of the fortress, was still intact.

[He’s looking for the one who created this lightning zone. He’s probably planning to break through us and head inside the fortress. I’ll try to hold him here as long as possible.]

Felix didn’t wait for Lenok’s reply and continued immediately.

[If someone with that level of skill tries to break away with all their might, it won’t be easy to hold them back. It might be difficult to communicate from now on.]

“……”

[I’ll leave the rest to you.]

Click!!

As soon as he finished speaking and the communication stopped, the collision of magical power felt from below the deck became much more intense.

Felix, a key executive of the Antares Office, who possessed a powerful physique and had completed his hierarchy [a term referring to a level of power or skill], had begun to clash with Major General Jellych with all his might.

Lenok felt the full force of that magical power and silently raised his gaze.

Despite this chaos, the 8th gate was still firmly closed. But there were no more Barclay or command soldiers left to hinder Lenok.

All that remained was for Lenok to enter the fortress himself, see the truth of all this with his own eyes, and successfully capture the fortress.

There was no time to hesitate.

“Let’s go.”

Click!

With a twist of his wrist, Lenok held a charged shotgun in his hand.

The barrel of the shotgun, filled with heavy magical power, glowed fiercely, and as he pulled the trigger, the thick iron door of the gate crumpled like paper.

Kwaaaang!!

One more shot.

Kwaaaaaaang!!

Two charged magical shotgun blasts, amplified by an 8-layered firing support spell, exploded.

It was impossible for the empty gate to withstand that power, which could turn even a physical ability user’s body into a lump of meat.

The iron doors, firmly closed on both sides, crumpled, allowing a gap for one person to pass through in the center.

As Lenok slipped through the narrow gap, the guards waiting inside the gate corridor began to pull their triggers simultaneously.

Tatatatatatatatang!!!

“Fire!!!”

“Kill the mage!!”

“We have to stop him here, stay focused and maintain the line…!!”

Kuuung!!

The guards’ desperate cries did not continue.

An unidentified mass of carapace [a hard, protective outer covering] suddenly slammed down, blocking the entire gate corridor and deflecting all the bullets.

“Wh, what is this…?”

The guard with the rifle stammered, and at that moment, a massive flame flowed out from between the carapace, filling the corridor.

Using the burst of flames from behind as a stepping stone, the carapace that blocked the corridor advanced like a bulldozer.

The outer shell that had made up the body of the Apostle Walter. Its durability was so overwhelming that even Lenok’s magnetic field flames had difficulty melting it.

The mass of carapace, with its unbelievable durability and weight, advanced forward, crushing the guards and turning them into minced meat.

Uzhzhzhzhzhik!!!

Along with the grotesque sound of flesh and muscle being torn apart, desperate screams erupted.

“Kkyaaaaaaak!!”

“Fall back!! We can’t stop it!!”

“Save meeee!!!”

The movements of the guards became sluggish due to the continuous flames, and the mass of carapace pushed in heavily from behind.

The guards tried to escape backward, desperately seeking a way out, but it was not enough.

Lenok, who had instantly swept away the internal guards waiting near the gate, advanced forward without hesitation.

With Major General Barclay dead and other generals and colonels struggling, there was no one with the skill to stop Lenok.

The Gearside-modified guards surrounded Lenok, desperately trying to stop him from reaching the control room.

But they were only pierced and burned by the lightning and flame spears that appeared from behind Lenok.

Kwagwagwagwagwa!!

A huge wave of flames spread like a tide, swelling in size along the widening corridor.

In between, a flash of lightning became a sharp dagger, piercing the vital points of the guards convulsing in the flames and tearing apart their superhuman bodies.

Some of them, with their strong will and talent, broke through the fierce barrage and rushed towards Lenok, but the muzzles of the shotgun and revolver rotated alternately, completely silencing their last resistance.

“Kuaaaak!!”

“D, die…!!”

“He still had this much power left…!!”

“How can he be like this after fighting the Major General!!”

Desperate dying words echoed from all directions. They must have been waiting inside the fortress, watching the battle between Lenok and Barclay.

A spacious common area at the end of the corridor. Near the central corridor leading to various parts of the fortress.

Originally, it was a space prepared to periodically gather the forces of the defense forces working in the fortress, check their status, and issue work instructions.

But now, the wave of flames that Lenok had ignited endlessly surged, melting and stirring everything indiscriminately.

A fiercely rotating vortex of flames. Lenok, standing at its center, raised his head and looked at the paths leading in all directions.

Davi, realizing Lenok’s intentions, immediately chimed in.

[The central staircase on the 3rd floor of the fortress corridor. It’s the shortest route to the control room.]

“Right. I see. Only the passage leading there is protected from magical interference.”

Lenok’s eyes, as he raised his head, shone coldly.

He immediately kicked off the central staircase of the 3rd floor corridor and knocked on the firmly closed door of the control room.

A black hand, reaching out from under Lenok’s shadow, grabbed the gap in the door and twisted it open.

Kigigigik…!!

The door of the control room was much sturdier than the 8th gate he had just passed through, but unlike before, Lenok did not smash it with his shotgun.

If he accidentally caused damage, the facilities in the fortress control room would be ruined.

That’s why he was using shadow magic to pry open the door, materializing it and forcing the gap open.

“Ugh, ughaaaa…”

“Please, please…”

“Commander…!!”

Voices filled with fear could be heard from beyond the slowly opening door of the control room.

Were they the clerks who had been watching and controlling the situation from the fortress control room?

Lenok raised his magical power even more upon hearing those voices, but the firmly closed door of the control room was locked with multiple layers of locks, making it difficult to force open.

Kiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!

In front of the control room, where the distorted noise constantly echoed, Lenok was lost in thought.

“Smashing it open with force is easy, but it’s difficult to open the door without causing any impact.”

[The control room door uses facilities that are completely independent of the fortress system. There isn’t much room for me to intervene.]

“I can’t waste time.”

Lenok frowned slightly.

“Now that they know of my presence, the other Major Generals will try to break away from our forces and rush here.”

And following him, Ilya and Felix would also try to enter the fortress from different sides.

If the chaos intensified, there was a risk of losing Lieutenant General Trepen and Gearside.

[What are you going to do?]

Lenok didn’t hesitate for long.

“I learned a useful technique from Aris.”

He applied the knack he had learned over his shoulder when he unlocked the archive with Aris.

The shadow hand melted and flowed, digging into the lock inside the door.

Shhhik!!

The movement of the flowing shadow, the change in the magical power array, was reconstructed into a three-dimensional blueprint in his head.

He analyzed and understood the principle of the 8-layered control room lock in an instant. From the bottom up, he touched the delicate operating principle in reverse.

Davi was amazed at Lenok’s ability to move the shadows and unlock the device in reverse without a single mistake or hesitation.

[Is this possible just from learning over your shoulder?]

“If you can remember and draw the structure in your head, nothing is impossible.”

Lenok answered casually.

“The important thing is to draw the remembered structure completely in the opposite direction.”

Charrrrrrrrk!!

Contrary to before, the sound of gears being delicately unlocked from inside the door.

The clerks, realizing what that sound meant, screamed.

“No, no!!”

“We completely blocked the central system interference!!”

“Aaaaaaa!!!”

Kugugugugu!!

The last of the 8 locks were released, and the door of the control room slowly opened. The clerks, with pale faces, were trembling.

Some were sitting down, crying with incontinence, while others were just muttering something with blank expressions.

They might be skilled at commanding the fortress, but they were not very talented in combat ability or experience.

Thud!!

Lenok grabbed the collar of a clerk who was crying with tears streaming down his face and lifted him up, asking.

“Where is Lieutenant General Trepen?”

“Th, th…”

“Answer me.”

“In, in the office inside the control room… since yesterday… he told us not to let anyone in… hic!!”

The clerk’s face was trembling with tears streaming down his face. But the expression on his face was not fear of death.

It was despair at the fact that the coup d’état, which had been carried out with the safety, prestige, and history of the entire defense force at stake, was ending so futilely.

Those who had been assisting Trepen’s last orders most closely must have already guessed their own end.

“……”

Lenok released the magical thread and put the clerk’s body down.

He ignored them and headed straight inside the control room.

There were dozens of monitors floating everywhere. Thousands of wires were tangled inside. Through one of the glass windows, the view of the lowest common area of the fortress came into view.

And the commander’s office, located at the innermost part of the control room.

Kwaang!!

Lenok, without hesitation, smashed the door with an impact spell and entered, frowning.

A bed awkwardly placed in the middle of the empty office.

An old man, lying on the tilted bed, was foaming at the mouth with his eyes rolled back.

Under his gray hair, the blood vessels on his forehead had all burst, and the black blood that had flowed from his eyes and nose had solidified and covered his face.

The stars on the epaulets of his military uniform. Dozens of thick plug wires were stuck in the back of his neck.

Considering the identity and circumstances of who could be in this place, there was only one possible conclusion.

The fortress commander, whom our forces had been searching for with all their might. Lieutenant General Trepen was completely dead.

Pat!

Even with the unexpected scene, Lenok did not hesitate.

He immediately pulled out all the wires connected to the back of the Lieutenant General’s head and gestured to Davi to look inside.

Despite being aware of the risks of physically pulling out the wires, he thought it was necessary to prevent things from proceeding according to the Lieutenant General’s intentions.

Davi, who jumped out from his arms, clung to the severed wires at the back of the Lieutenant General’s neck, interfering with the signal, and immediately shook his head.

[Signal lost. I don’t feel any electrical stimulation. There’s nothing from the connected wires, let alone the life signs of the body.]

Lenok, who quickly grasped the situation, frowned.

“He’s dead. And it’s been quite a while.”

[Rigor mortis has completely progressed and is slowly loosening. If we estimate the time of death, it’s at least a day ago. At the very least, it’s been 20 hours.]

Lenok quickly calculated the time and frowned.

“It’s even before we finalized the entry route. If you think about it, it’s right after we arrived in the city… It’s too early to make a gamble.”

[Could it be that he failed in his body modification, unlike the others?]

Davi said.

[Lieutenant General Trepen’s own martial power is very strong, but he is a very old man. It’s possible that his considerable age was a problem.]

It wasn’t an impossible guess.

In fact, the fact that Lieutenant General Trepen’s body remained here proved his end.

But Lenok stared at Trepen’s body for a while and shook his head.

“…No, if that were the case, Barclay wouldn’t have said that before he died. The Lieutenant General died more than 20 hours ago. It’s impossible that the other Major Generals didn’t know about this.”

[Then…]

“And the tilt of this bed, this might be…”

Lenok strode to the bed and ripped open Trepen’s chest.

A muscular upper body, solidly built despite his old age. But that made the hole in the center of his chest even more bizarre.

Even Davi muttered in a startled tone.

[He doesn’t have a heart.]

“That’s what Barclay meant.”

Lenok muttered.

“Lieutenant General Trepen didn’t choose body modification like the other Major Generals. He was planning to throw away his own body and completely switch to a new one.”

[Is that… possible for a living being?]

“Looking at the fact that only the heart was removed, it’s certain. He must have been planning to reconstruct his body by recovering only the most important biological organs. Maybe…”

Lenok slowly raised his head and said.

“He might have already been resurrected and be watching us.”

[That was the only chance given to me.]

Paahhh!!

At the same time, dozens of monitors that had been shining all around began to glow simultaneously.