Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 601

How ironic it must be that someone who seems to be from the Machine City is being swindled by a special task force from a megacity. Does he even realize it?

However, the man completely misinterpreted Renok’s pitiful gaze, and with a faint sneer, he pushed the hand cannon forward.

“We’ll kill a wealthy magician, split his wealth and body, and start a new life as residents of the Machine City, Makina.”

Whirr!!

The man, raising the barrel inside his mechanical arm, flicked his hand, and with a heavy grinding sound, ammunition was loaded.

“I think it’s a clean finish to get rid of a shady business, don’t you?”

“You’re not wrong.”

Renok nodded.

“Knowing when to cut your losses and step back is a very important virtue. But it’s hard to know until you experience it yourself.”

[Master, you learned that after buying shares in the Thorburn Magic Tower, ignoring my portfolio, and getting stuck with them.]

He deliberately ignored Davi’s nagging from inside his pocket.

Conversely, the expression of the organ trafficking group, who had been listening to Renok’s answer, was distorted as if they were dumbfounded.

“…You’re fearless. Or do you think you can still be safe even after coming this far?”

Thump!

The man, naturally grabbing Renok’s shoulder and patting it, asked.

“We’ll cut off your arms and legs to extract your magic power, take out your organs, then preserve them and sell them off piece by piece. I wonder if you’ll still be able to talk so much even after that.”

“Conversely, I have a question.”

Renok asked with a blank face.

“If you want to sell my organs, you could just do it right away, so why are you making such obvious threats?”

“……”

“And the way you ostentatiously display the corpses with their organs removed between the rocks, it’s all just a performance that a normal organ trafficking group wouldn’t bother with.”

“You…”

“If you want something, just say it.”

Renok nodded, leaning against the cargo truck door.

“Besides, there are many things I want to hear from you about life in the Machine City.”

At those words, the members of the trafficking group standing behind the man quickly exchanged glances.

Renok’s attitude made them wonder if they had missed something.

The reason why the trafficking group chose Renok as their last target to get rid of was seemingly reasonable.

If he had to flee to the Machine City in such an old cargo truck, it was clear that he was a powerless magician who could barely take care of himself.

Moreover, it was obvious that he was in such dire straits that he could no longer stay in Vulcan.

Even if the magician himself had nothing, a magician’s body would still sell for tens of times more than that of an ordinary human.

However, as Renok said, the reason why the trafficking group was putting so much unnecessary pressure on him before killing him was for another reason.

“Okay. Since you seem unusually bold, I’ll get straight to the point.”

The man nodded.

“Tell us everything about your magic teacher and your fellow students. All the acquaintances you know and their weaknesses. Then we’ll let you go without pain.”

Only then did Renok, realizing why the trafficking group was trying to intimidate him in this way, laugh.

“After killing me, you’re going to go back to Vulcan and sell off my acquaintances too?”

“You’d better choose wisely. We’re people who have learned the human anatomy through real-life experience. We know very well where to touch to inflict pain until the brink of death.”

“……”

“If we cut open your belly and touch around inside, all the memories you have will come out, regardless of reason or morality. It wouldn’t be a bad thing for you, would it?”

The man softened his voice.

“If a magician from Vulcan has secretly slipped into Makina, isn’t it because you’ve completely turned your back on your fellow students?”

“……”

“It’s a chance for revenge. If you think about it, we could be solving your grudges for you.”

The man rummaged in his pocket with his other hand and pulled out a syringe filled with green liquid.

“If we inject the right amount, you can die as if you’re falling asleep. You just have to answer all the questions we ask. Then we’ll inject this very gently into your carotid artery.”

“I’d like to check it out.”

At Renok’s words, the man immediately took a step back and shook his head.

“No, that won’t do. This is a gift only for good friends who have answered all our questions. Don’t you understand what that means?”

“I don’t.”

As Renok replied, the syringe that had been in the man’s hand was now in Renok’s hand.

“I don’t particularly want to know either.”

“…!!”

While the man was stunned by the fact that the syringe had been snatched from his hand, Renok squeezed some of the contents onto his glove and smelled it.

“The essence extracted from water-colored jewel leaves, the bone marrow of a Zamer water buffalo, and the poison of a Kurdaine mushroom… It seems like there are three more ingredients mixed in, but the smell is faint, so I’m not sure.”

It was a smell quite familiar to Renok, who used alchemy to mix various potions and elixirs himself.

Even though his senses weren’t particularly sensitive, making it difficult to properly recognize the smell, he never forgot a scent or characteristic once he had remembered it.

Even if Renok’s sense of smell was only at the level of an ordinary person, there would have been no problem in identifying all the ingredients, but this much information was enough.

“They’re all things used for confession and torture, and the combination of ingredients isn’t very potent for killing the user. You’re going to kill me with this?”

“You…”

Renok sneered, watching the man step back.

“Regardless of whether I opened my mouth or not, you were planning to scrape out my memories to the very bottom and rip out my organs while I was still alive.”

“Hayden, that’s enough. Let’s just torture him and kill him.”

At that moment, one of the trafficking group members who had been watching quietly stepped forward.

“Gamin, wait!! He’s the last product. We have to extract as much as possible before killing him…!!”

“How long are we going to let this loudmouth keep talking?”

Clank!!

The man called Gamin suddenly rolled up his mechanical arm, grabbed Renok by the collar, and lifted him up.

Gamin, who had snatched the syringe from Renok’s hand without hesitation, sneered.

“It was a useless act from the start. There’s no reason to drag out something that can be solved with a single shot of a drug. Put your neck out.”

“I will.”

[Artificial arm system hacking complete.]

At that moment, Gamin’s mechanical arm moved on its own, and he plunged the syringe he was holding directly into his own neck.

Thwack!!

“…Huh?”

With a dumbfounded look, Gamin, not understanding what he had just done, stared blankly at Renok.

As his collar was naturally released, Renok, who had come down from the end of Gamin’s arm, smoothed his collar and asked.

“How long does it take for the drug to take full effect?”

“…10 minutes? Huk…!!”

In the meantime, Gamin, who had unknowingly answered Renok’s question, covered his mouth with a trembling hand, and Renok nodded.

“That should be enough to take care of the others.”

“You bastard… What did you do to Gamin’s arm!!”

Hayden, with a fiercely distorted face, strode forward and swung his mechanical arm, but he stopped in his tracks as Renok raised his hand.

Clank!!

“Eek, ik…!! Ughhh!!”

He twisted his whole body, trying to move his arm somehow, but the mechanical arm didn’t budge, as if time had stopped.

Instead, the arm slowly rotated, following Renok’s finger, and brought its fist to his own chin.

Hayden, belatedly realizing that the magician in front of him was manipulating his mechanical arm at will, trembled.

“No, no…!!”

“I saw earlier that you load ammunition separately inside your arm.”

Clank!!

Renok nodded, listening to the heavy grinding sound coming from inside Hayden’s arm.

“If you’ve loaded a bullet, you have to shoot it.”

At the same time as the ammunition loaded inside the mechanical arm was fired, the mechanical arm’s fist shot out like a rocket and struck Hayden’s own chin.

Thwack!!

A terrible cracking sound of bones, joints, and muscles being crushed and twisted.

Hayden’s eyes rolled back as he lost consciousness from that single attack, and he lost consciousness.

However, even so, Hayden’s own mechanical arm did not stop and continued to fire with the same force, hitting his own head as if self-harming, until all the ammunition was exhausted.

Thud, thud, thud!!

“Save, ugh, khaaaak!!”

He was forcibly awakened by the impact of hitting his own head again, then fainted again, and then awakened again by the impact.

Finally, the sound of his skull collapsing under the impact.

Crack!!

The bones caved in, and the contents that had been protecting the inside poured out onto Hayden’s neck as he fainted.

“Gerk, gerk…”

Below his completely shattered jaw and nose bone, Hayden’s tongue twitched as he let out an unknown scream.

Even the other organ trafficking members could not say anything and only stared with wide eyes at his miserable appearance.

Renok, passing by Hayden, who was on the verge of death, looked around at the trafficking members and nodded.

“Everyone is a cyborg. Or at least, you’re all wearing automatic prosthetic arms, right?”

Whirring!!

At the same time as those words, the mechanical arms, legs, and chests of the trafficking members began to glow with a bright blue magical light and began to move forcibly.

The members, having lost control of the equipment that was supposed to replace their bodies and life activities, stared helplessly at their arms and legs that were aiming at themselves.

“Hic, heeik…!!”

“Damn it, detach, detach!!”

Renok chuckled as he watched the members desperately try to throw off their mechanical equipment.

“From experience, the more shady the work, the more diligent they are in taking care of their equipment and lives. Thanks to that, things have become easier.”

If the prosthetic arms or mechanical equipment worn by the members of the organ trafficking group were cheap products or illegally modified items, it would not have been so easy to seize control of their prosthetic arms.

However, the prosthetic arms worn by the organ trafficking members were all high-performance, state-of-the-art AI control systems with built-in designated commands or automatic control systems.

Rather, that was why Renok was able to easily seize control of the prosthetic arms simply by hacking into the network using Davi’s power.

“If you’re the kind of people who transport people and sell organs between megacities and the Machine City, you must know a lot about the lifestyle and current situation in Makina.”

“Ugh…”

Renok said, turning to Gamin, who had injected himself with the truth serum and was now drooling with a blank expression.

“There are many things I want to ask to successfully infiltrate Makina.”

Since he had listened to the organ trafficking members’ empty threats and nonsense for so long, he had to extract all the information they had about the Machine City.

At the same time as Renok snapped his fingers, the mechanical arms began to violently beat their owners from all directions.

“Ugh, ugh!!”

“Damn it, damn it…!!”

The terrible sounds of flesh and muscles tearing and festering, and screams, echoed incessantly.

“Let’s start with the small things first.”

* * *

Machine City, Makina.

In the artisan district, known as the place where craftsmen gather.

In the streets filled with the acrid smell of burning coal, smoke, the sound of hammering iron, and the sound of hammers all day long, a strange rumor had begun to circulate in the past few days.

“Have you heard the story going around these days? They say a new blacksmith has come in who illegally modifies personal firearms.”

“He’s more skilled at modifying than making. He’s closer to an engineer.”

“What does it matter? I don’t care as long as he takes good care of my equipment.”

Without any external promotion or connections, the story spread quickly by word of mouth, and stories of what happened after were heard here and there.

“The satisfaction of those who have gone there is very high.”

“They say he accepts information as payment, not just money. It’s good to know before you go.”

“Information? What kind of information?”

“That… It’s better to stop here. You’ll know when you go and hear it.”

People were whispering and talking in various workshops where smoke was rising.

A middle-aged man passed through the crowd of people and returned to his workshop as if nothing had happened, closed the door, and turned his head.

The man with a full beard had an undisguised tension and a slight excitement on his face.

“Ban, more and more people are looking for you. It really went according to plan.”

“That’s a relief.”

Clank, clank!!

Renok, who was concentrating on welding on the workbench without even turning around, replied.

“It seems that the residents of the Machine City are more diligent than I thought. I thought I would have to work for about a month for the rumors to start spreading.”

“There are hardly any residents in this city who haven’t replaced their bodies with machines.”

The man sighed and shook his head.

“Once the rumors start spreading, more and more people will come. Are you really okay with this?”

“I’m fine, Mauzer.”

Renok, taking off his mask and sighing lightly, finally turned his head.

Even though he had already taken off his mask once, various mechanical parts were embedded like tattoos on the side of Renok’s face, quietly rotating.

“The more the rumors spread, the more people with better equipment will come to ask for repairs.”

Renok, having interrogated the organ trafficking members and obtained information about the lifestyle of the Machine City, did not delay long.

He immediately used his ticket to pass through the Machine City gate and infiltrated the outer districts of the city where the poor lived.

Immediately after, he succeeded in easily entering the artisan district through an acquaintance in the Machine City.

Mauzer, the artisan of the Machine City delegation whom he had met on the way to the Blaver Magic Tower with Ivelin.

Renok had once incurred a debt by saving Mauzer from the demonic horde that had invaded the Blaver Magic Tower.

Not forgetting that connection, Renok had come to find him, disguised himself as a workshop artisan, and had been trying to repair mechanical equipment for several days.

“The Machine City, despite its closed nature, is undoubtedly at the forefront of advanced civilization in the fields of mechanical engineering and magical engineering.”

Renok said, touching the mechanical parts he had embedded on his skin.

In fact, it was an iron mask that looked like it was working by applying artificial gel on the skin and assembling the parts on top of it, but it looked plausible.

“Since I’ve visited Makina, I shouldn’t miss the opportunity to touch, repair, and inspect the equipment used on the field.”

Compared to Vulcan, the boundaries between districts were strong, and there were restrictions on the distance of movement depending on the grade of the ticket, making it difficult for outsiders to blend into this city.

The most welcome people in this city were the existence of skilled artisans or engineers.

Therefore, Renok had chosen the most suitable job to adapt to this city in order to track down Kaise’s traces and the failure of the Ascension Gate.

“As for me, I don’t understand why a magician like you suddenly wants to play the role of an engineer…”

Mauzer sighed and nodded with a resigned look.

“Anyway, I’ll provide as much convenience as I can, so please be careful not to get caught.”

“Providing me with a space to use as a workshop is enough.”

He had secured a place in the artisan district with the debt of saving Mauzer’s life, but he had no intention of relying on him any further.

Mauzer was a respected artisan, enough to be dispatched to the Blaver Magic Tower as a representative of Makina.

It would be foolish to throw away such a connection just to extract a few more favors from him.

However, even with Renok’s confirmation, Mauzer muttered anxiously, as if worried.

“I’ve said it many times, but impersonating an artisan in this city is strictly prohibited. I don’t care, but considering your original identity…”

He opened the window behind the workbench of the workshop and frowned at the sunlight that was peeking out as the rain stopped.