Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 485

“That’s what I should be asking. The service isn’t over yet, is it alright for a proxy to leave their post?”

Come to think of it, he was one of the proxies sitting on the platform in the plaza.

His outward appearance was ordinary, but his unusually faint presence suggested he was a skilled individual focused on mobility.

The bishop, called Tritan, scratched his cheek and replied.

“Uh… I’m not really sure either, but they told me to go ahead since I had something to do at the temple.”

“……”

“A few other proxies besides me also left their posts, but I don’t know where they are.”

Could it be that Archbishop Naderi had noticed the anomaly occurring in the temple?

Lenok and Zaif quickly exchanged glances, but then simultaneously shook their heads slightly.

If the two apostles had been caught sneaking in and out of the Archbishop’s office, there was no way he would be calmly proceeding with the service.

He must have sent the proxies back to the temple for other business.

Perhaps the Archbishop’s secret was hidden right there.

“Anyway, what’s going on, Apostle Zaif? And who is this person?”

“Actually…”

Zaif then told a modified version of the story he had already repeated dozens of times to the priests.

Tritan, who had listened to the whole story while nodding, had sparkling eyes.

“Wow, to think there was such a devout apostle in the main branch…!!”

“……”

“I can’t just stand by and watch this. I’ll help too!!”

“…What?”

Zaif’s expression subtly distorted at Tritan’s reaction, who readily rolled up his sleeves.

Tritan, oblivious to such thoughts, began to touch the broken wall with a cheerful look.

“It seems like it was difficult with just the priests’ power, but I’ve done a lot of odd jobs like this in the Northwest Branch. If it’s me, it’s like eating a cold fortune cookie.”

“Is that what a fortune cookie means?”

“Ahem, well, is that important? More importantly…”

Tritan glanced at Lenok and coughed, muttering.

“Um, could you perhaps put in a good word for me during the selection ceremony…? It would be great if I could get a definite answer on that.”

“……”

“I mean, we could become seniors and juniors, right?”

So, he was saying that in exchange for helping to clean up the temple’s mess, he wanted help getting in the Archbishop’s good graces during the ceremony.

For someone who looked so nice, he was a sly one.

Just as Zaif was about to dismiss the words with a dumbfounded expression, Lenok stepped forward and readily nodded.

“There’s no reason to refuse someone who wants to cooperate for the sake of the temple. However, there’s one thing I’d like to ask.”

“Yes, please do.”

Lenok’s gaze sharpened as he looked at Tritan, who seemed to be subtly anticipating something.

“The meeting place that the Archbishop mentioned beforehand. Could we stop by there before the ceremony starts?”

* * *

A massive armory located behind the Far East Branch’s main temple and the distribution center.

Unlike other buildings made of stone, it was impressive with its sturdy steel plates and its exterior painted pure white.

It was easy to be mistaken by the strong smell of paint, but it wasn’t difficult to notice the anomaly if you got a little closer.

At first glance, it seemed to be left unguarded without any security forces, but the entire armory was surrounded and protected by an elaborate barrier.

The system was designed to send a signal to the barrier’s administrator as soon as an intruder or unfamiliar magic approached, and then isolate the area with the barrier itself.

It was a high-level isolation barrier that required meticulous management, even among the Jintun’s [a type of advanced magic] barrier techniques, but its security was guaranteed.

Although it was disguised as something unimportant, the fact that only this place had a new layer of Jintun’s barrier techniques meant something.

Without hesitation, Lenok took out another piece of paper with the control code written on it and stepped over the armory’s barrier, standing in front of the door.

“……”

The smell of paint that had been lingering until just now was gone, replaced by an unknown stench flowing from the door crack.

Even Lenok’s dull sense of smell could tell that it wasn’t just from sewage.

After checking the surroundings one more time, he opened the door, and was speechless at the shocking scene that unfolded before his eyes.

The bullets and gunpowder scattered on the floor were soaked in sticky fluid, and countless corpses were strewn haphazardly on top of them.

Naked bodies of men, women, and children, without a single piece of clothing. There was not a trace of blood left on their bodies.

They were stiff and hardened like white wax dolls, their limbs twisted into bizarre shapes, and abandoned in the armory.

Even Lenok, who was indifferent to human death, slightly frowned at the sight.

“This is not good.”

Even Zaif was slightly tense at the horrific scene inside the armory, and Lenok shook his head.

“…The problem is that this isn’t everything.”

The fact that the location of the armory was kept secret from Zaif was proof that they wanted to hide this place.

Why did Archbishop Naderi hide this place and leave a message so that only the proxies could secretly enter?

Lenok, who was carefully examining the scattered corpses, finally succeeded in finding the identity of the faint sense of familiarity.

“Apostle Zaif, look at this part.”

Lenok said, lifting the corpse of an old man leaning weakly against the wall.

“A small hole piercing from under the left armpit to the chest. Similar wounds are present on every corpse without exception.”

“That’s right. There’s no way such marks would appear during the offering process…”

“It wasn’t done with a spell, but in a physical way. Do you understand what this means?”

At the same time, magic threads extending from his fingertips began to lift all the corpses and quickly remove the floor of the armory.

“Someone who killed people in this bizarre way is nearby.”

“…Someone?”

“And,”

Thump, thump, thump!!

The entire armory seemed to shake with the noise. But Lenok didn’t care about such commotion and continued to focus on searching everywhere.

A different noise than before echoed among the magic threads that passed by incessantly.

Lenok immediately rubbed the piece of paper with Jintun’s control code on the area where he felt that sense of familiarity.

Squeak…!!

The barrier hidden deep inside the pile of corpses melted away, revealing a circular passage.

A lukewarm breath blew from inside the open passage.

Lenok carefully looked down the passage and muttered.

“It’s not just a warehouse to store corpses.”

Why most of the barriers in the Far East Branch were changed to barrier techniques using Jintun’s artifacts.

Now he knew why the temple’s internal facilities were so strangely out of the control of the managing priests.

Even if it meant that other priests could not control the barriers or security facilities, Archbishop Naderi had a secret that she wanted to hide through her own power.

“It’s a breathing hole that spits out the humans they threw in as food.”

“Then…”

Lenok and Zaif looked at each other, and then, in turn, slipped into the passage.

They went against the direction of the rough wind, going up the passage.

“…!!”

Poof!!

Lenok’s body, which had bounced through the fleshy mass, soared into the dark abyss in an instant.

Seeing the face of a priest who had stopped with his mouth wide open right next to him, Lenok pulled up his magic power.

[Thunderclap Annihilation]

[Net of Atrocity]

Tzzzzzz…!!!

More than a dozen strands of electricity that burst out from the priest’s robes rotated in an instant, piercing and tearing apart the priests who were moving in all directions.

The immense firepower compressed between the finger-thin electric shocks instantly took the lives of those bodies.

Lenok, who had killed more than a dozen priests in an instant while barely able to support his own body, finally placed his hands on the floor and groaned.

“Ugh…!!”

Even though he had taken motion sickness medicine, his stomach was still churning, but the scenery spread out in all directions made it unnecessary to hold back his nausea.

A pure white room, presumed to be a hidden annex of the temple. The corpses of dead humans and the fluid that had flowed out were densely stuck all around it.

The smell of moisture and fluid that filled the entire space made it difficult to even breathe. The priests Lenok had killed were also wearing something similar to gas masks on their faces.

Without such items, it would be difficult to breathe, so they must have died without even being able to scream.

If it weren’t for the shield’s filter magic, Lenok would have had a hard time surviving in this space for even a few minutes.

Zaif, who had followed him down the passage, also muttered with a somewhat bewildered look.

“How could this be, to think such a secret place was hidden in the Far East Branch… Did the Archbishop really…”

“……”

Lenok, who had calmed his churning stomach, got up and quickly looked around.

A huge room made in a hexagonal shape. Through the passages on the floor of each wall, the corpses that had been treated with the fluid were being sent out for disposal.

The job was to receive the corpses that were endlessly pouring out from the center of the room, wipe off the fluid, and send them down the drain.

When a corpse with its bodily fluids neatly removed was thrown down, it would slide down one by one and fall out of the passage.

Lenok quietly closed his mouth as he looked at the corpse that still had fluid on it.

A miserable death, as if shedding tears of blood from the pores of the face.

The fear and pain at the time of the offering were clearly felt.

Forcing himself to ignore it and turning his gaze to the center of the room, he finally saw the appearance of the being that was endlessly reproducing all these corpses.

[Koo, koo…]

A clean and soft ball of fur, like white cotton candy.

A giant ball of fur, at least ten meters in size, filled the center of the room, sleeping with a quiet breathing sound.

An appearance that felt pure, completely detached from this horrific space.

However, every time the ball of fur heaved as it breathed, the sight of the fluid-soaked corpses falling out from underneath was not an illusion.

Before Lenok could even open his mouth to say anything about the absurdity,

Zaif, who was standing next to him, muttered in a strangled voice.

“The 10th Apostle, Amrita… Why, why in a place like this…”

“……”

Apostle Amrita. Lenok also knew very well about that name.

The owner of the apostle technique called [Amrita’s Scale], which can transfer the same number of lives as the number of humans offered.

“Apostle Evan, there was not a single lie in your words. Just how much did you see?”

Zaif’s expression was distorted with a bizarre emotion that was close to fear.

“Archbishop Naderi didn’t intend to make the proxies into apostles. She intends to offer the believers of each branch to Amrita-nim, simply as food.”

“……”

“We have to stop the ceremony. Tell me anything, I will cooperate with all my strength in what you intend to do.”

Zaif’s gaze was so intense that it seemed like he would agree to go kill the Archbishop right away.

Lenok inwardly shook his head as he listened to Zaif’s fiery words.

Has he gone too far to say that he didn’t know all these lies would become the truth?

If all the words he had made up to deceive Zaif were coming back like a boomerang and accurately piercing the secret of the Far East Branch,

And if that secret was so big that it even required him to change his existing plans.

There was no time to think for long.

The sunset was almost gone. It was enough time for the Archbishop, who had finished the service, to notice the anomaly that had occurred in the temple.

“Alright.”

Lenok, who had sighed, raised his head and sharpened his eyes.

“If you say so, I’ll tell you the last thing we need to do. Are you ready?”

“Yes…!!”

“Kill Apostle Amrita in this place.”