Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 954

Ban (10)

The Far East Branch of the Ear Order. The decisive battle took place on the island that stretched across the sea.

The day the Saintess and the Apostle were mixed together, and were born as a new being, and died.

At the moment when Lenok was finishing his fight with the 10th Apostle, Amrita Praubel, he had met him.

The 2nd Apostle, known as the most elite combat force within the Order.

A transcendent being who leads the Order’s practical actions as the most perfect incarnation [a being embodying a divine or powerful entity].

A monster who still maintains his sanity while other Apostles are succumbing to madness.

How could he forget the eerie feeling of that day when he crossed the sea with his bare body, arrived alone at the Far East Branch, and tried to kill all life?

An ordinary-looking appearance. A simple way of speaking. A calm aura that is hard to believe he is an incarnation serving an Outer God [a deity or entity beyond the known universe].

But surely, hidden within him is the most dangerous and insidious intention among all the Apostles of the Order.

“Why am I here? That’s a meaningless question.”

The 2nd Apostle, who was sitting next to Lenok, leaned his chin on his hand and smiled languidly.

“Of course, I came to get my glasses adjusted. Can’t you see?”

“……”

“For people with bad eyesight, it’s like a part of their body. It’s something that needs to be taken care of delicately at all times.”

While Lenok remained silent, the 2nd Apostle casually made a joke.

He turned his head slightly and looked around the quiet workshop, then smiled.

“The artisans at Duris Workshop are very skilled, and the warranty period is quite long. I use them often.”

“Enough with the useless talk.”

From the fact that he was saying such things to the humans he had knocked out with his own hands, it was clear that the other party was not human.

However, the 2nd Apostle, who held a heavy responsibility within the Order, was spending time at Duris Workshop simply to get his glasses adjusted.

Either he was hiding another purpose, or those glasses were so special that they had to go through the hands of the Arcane Workshop.

“I heard you turned Machina upside down, but I didn’t know you’d be hiding in a place like this.”

A tension so tight it felt like it would snap if pulled even slightly.

Lenok carefully chose his words, gauging the distance between them with extreme caution.

The 2nd Apostle was a transcendent being who was said to be completely free from the madness among the Apostles.

In terms of power and status, he was in a unique position among the past Apostles.

If he was careless even for a moment, he could be attacked at any time.

Moreover, it was hard to expect that he, an Apostle of an Outer God, would care about the safety of other humans.

Lenok, who slowly raised his mental power so subtly that even the incarnation sitting right next to him could not perceive it, asked.

“It seems that even the lead Apostle of the Order had a hard time dealing with the mechanical city?”

“The mechanical city is a place entangled in more complicated situations than you think.”

The 2nd Apostle answered, pushing up his glasses.

“The Supreme Council has lost its power, but the superhumans who control the underworld are very difficult to deal with. Especially big shots like Mastermind and Chungryeong are dangerous enough that even the central headquarters checks their movements periodically.”

“…Are you saying it took time to deal with the superhumans of the underworld?”

Lenok also knew who Mastermind was, even if he didn’t know about Chungryeong.

A level 8 psychometry user [ability to perceive information through touch] living in the shadows of the mechanical city, Aoshu Spero.

A superhuman who approached Lenok after his battle with Hermes and helped him clean up the aftermath with his ability.

He seemed to have a connection with Maiya Lenslit, and he was also friendly to Lenok, but.

On the other hand, he was a madman who openly said in front of Lenok that he wanted to extract his memories and brain fluid.

When Lenok was staying in Machina, he had clashed with the public forces of the mechanical city, including the Supreme Council, so he only briefly encountered them at the end.

But surely, the superhumans of the underworld living in the mechanical city were also monsters with considerable power and status.

Could it be that the 2nd Apostle had clashed with them in Machina, cleared all the other forces, and returned?

“Let’s just say there was some kind of deal.”

He shrugged his shoulders, leaving Lenok lost in thought.

“It wasn’t easy. I had to destroy that old city to the point where it was impossible to recover for the time being, but on the other hand, I couldn’t annihilate it.”

“……”

“An incarnation like me is given meaning to every action I take. It would be troublesome if I were to be tied to a troublesome ritual like Gabihaeng [a potentially dangerous ritual], wouldn’t it?”

He smiled casually and brought up all sorts of secrets and taboos that Lenok had been digging into, as if it was nothing.

As if he was trying to test Lenok’s reaction, or conversely, as if he didn’t care about such things at all.

From the moment he appeared in this place, he was free and light, as if he was not bound by intentions or purposes.

Therefore, Lenok was feeling an undeniable certainty from the Apostle in front of him.

“You knew from the beginning that I would come here.”

At Lenok’s confident words, the 2nd Apostle’s smile stopped.

“The fact that you contacted me at this point must also be because you have something to say about Kaise’s matter.”

“……”

A word that refers to Kaise Bajur, who is a part that controls the hands of a similar clock, and who has lived a similar life.

Therefore, it was no coincidence that the three of them met through the death of Oshto Duris, who made the similar through a deal with the Order.

The fact that the story of the similar’s eclipse came up in the meeting between the commander and the leader was also something that was already decided.

The fact that the 2nd Apostle, who moved as he pleased and whose intentions could not be guessed, appeared in front of Lenok at this particular moment.

There must be a very strong purpose to keep the existence of such a 2nd Apostle in this place.

“If you have something to say, hurry up and finish it. I don’t want to face an Apostle of the Order for long.”

“Hmm, the hospitality is worse than I thought. That’s a bit disappointing.”

The 2nd Apostle shook his head and got up from his seat.

He slowly pushed up his glasses and chuckled.

“Is it because you killed the 6th Apostle not too long ago?”

“……”

Anathema’s corruption and betrayal. This man knows everything about his death and his end.

He knew everything, but pretended not to know from the beginning. He was being brazen, pretending it was a chance encounter.

He was approaching and talking to Lenok at the moment when Lenok had grasped something decisive.

The moment Lenok was certain of that fact, he was about to raise his magic power with cold murderous intent.

“No, I didn’t come here to fight you.”

Thud!

The 2nd Apostle casually placed his hand on Lenok’s shoulder.

He penetrated the shield and artifacts that Lenok was wearing, and the sensory power that he had spread out, and touched his body in an instant.

A move that effortlessly bypassed Lenok’s defenses with just one action, without any magic or manipulation of mental power.

But there was an eerie feeling in that gesture that was different from all the strong people Lenok had faced.

“……”

“I told you, this is a workshop that I use often.”

The 2nd Apostle, who was holding Lenok’s shoulder and slightly lowered his head, said.

“If we fight in a place like this, wouldn’t all the artisans who fix my glasses die?”

“You’re the one who doesn’t understand.”

Lenok looked up at the 2nd Apostle and smiled coldly.

“Let go.”

Crackling…!!

At that moment, intense electric current burst out from between the fingers of the Apostle who was holding Lenok’s shoulder.

The moment the 2nd Apostle, who glanced at it indifferently, changed his expression slightly.

A sharp flash of lightning flashed and instantly separated the two.

Bang!!

A blue shockwave rippled and burst out in the middle of the quiet workshop.

A powerful surge of mental power that shook not only the people who had fallen, but also the entire workshop facility.

Lenok, who had stepped back with his hand raised, turned around, shaking off his shoulder.

“This is… amazing.”

The 2nd Apostle, who was looking at Lenok with a slightly surprised expression, asked with interest.

“To penetrate the inviolable sanctum and even make a scratch. Has your magic power transcended the category of attributes?”

“……”

“You’re still using power as magic, but the lightning has already touched your mental power. Unless you’ve reached transcendence beyond the change of properties…”

“You’re always so relaxed.”

Lenok smiled at him.

“Let’s see how long you can keep that up.”

Whooooing!!!

Magic power rotated at an incredible speed within his body, scattering Lenok’s will indiscriminately into the surrounding space-time.

The innate ability of the Eight Trigrams Formation [a concept from Taoist cosmology] activated within his consciousness, which had accelerated to the limit.

It stretched out the perceived time as if pulling it, making everything around him slow down.

The imagery that was drawn from within instantly enveloped the entire workshop, and the moment it turned into a monochrome area.

“…No way.”

The 2nd Apostle, who had never lost his smile, lost his expression for the first time.

Fwoooosh!!!

The magnetic field was deployed with full power at the same time as it started.

The opponent was a monster of a transcendent level, one of the top three within the Order.

If he didn’t go all out from the beginning, he wouldn’t have a chance of winning, let alone guaranteeing his life.

However, instead of taking out the kaleidoscope and unfolding the prepared branch point, Lenok immediately withdrew his magic power due to the eerie sense of incongruity he felt in front of him.

‘It’s not there.’

In the fleeting moment when the space-time of reality and the domain overlapped.

The 2nd Apostle’s presence could not be felt in either space-time.

Even at the moment when his senses and intuition transcended their limits and reached transcendence, the presence of the 2nd Apostle standing in front of him could not be grasped.

“……”

After confirming that, Lenok folded his hand, and the domain that had been covering the entire workshop was canceled and faded away.

“I heard you were ruthless, but this is completely beyond my expectations.”

Even the highest Apostle could not have received Lenok’s domain without any countermeasures.

The 2nd Apostle, who had raised his hand and was drawing in magic power, muttered as if he was in trouble.

“To suddenly deploy a domain in a place like this, weren’t you in a life-or-death battle with Anathema a few days ago-”

“That’s the Apostle magic you serve from the Outer God.”

“……”

At Lenok’s sharp words, the 2nd Apostle closed his mouth for a moment.

“Avoiding the magnetic field is not something that is allowed for ordinary Apostles or incarnations.”

The magnetic field is the point of self-modification where the caster’s imagery is superimposed on the space-time of reality.

Because it is the power to change space-time as a whole, it is not a technique that can be avoided or blocked.

It is possible for each other’s domains to collide or overlap, but it is impossible to avoid the domain itself.

Then, the 2nd Apostle’s ability that he just showed must be related to the Apostle magic he possesses.

“The stripping of space-time. The evasion of concepts. The nullification of restraints. None of them are possible with just the distortion of mental power or imagery.”

Lenok said, looking at the 2nd Apostle with sunken eyes.

“Your origin as an Apostle. It must be the power related to the identity of the Outer God you serve.”

From the moment he met the 2nd Apostle, Lenok had been pondering about the blurry presence that he could not read.

Even though he was clearly present in front of him, it was a strange sense of incongruity that made it difficult to easily identify his form and target.

Even if Lenok used the authority of the priest he possessed, the essence of the Apostle was not clearly visible.

Perhaps the strange atmosphere that was clearly different from other Apostles was the essence of his being as an Apostle.

During his conversation with him, Lenok had finished his judgment, and at the same time as the battle, he deployed his domain to verify his guess.

“The origin as an Apostle…”

Perhaps it was because he also noticed that Lenok had glimpsed his essence for a moment.

The 2nd Apostle shook his head with a troubled expression and smiled.

“I made a mistake. I should have assumed that a mage who killed Anathema would know that much about Apostles…”

“……”

“I didn’t expect you to use the magnetic field as bait to figure out my magic. This is a bit troublesome.”

The 2nd Apostle, who had lived as the second Apostle of the leader, was infinitely free from madness.

Could it be that his ability and Apostle magic were the reason and origin why he was still able to not go insane?

But the Apostle in front of him readily admitted that fact, but he didn’t seem to have any regrets about it.

While Lenok was thinking about that fact, the 2nd Apostle tilted his head.

“But it’s amazing that you deployed your domain as soon as you decided to fight me. It’s impossible unless you’re very confident in the power of your domain… When I return to the main headquarters, I’ll have to completely revise the information about you.”

The 2nd Apostle had not seen Lenok’s domain, but he understood what Lenok’s response meant.

If he had deployed his domain immediately after preparing for a life-or-death battle, it was because he had absolute confidence in his domain.

Wasn’t that because the magnetic field possessed by Gyeonrye was a power that was thoroughly specialized for combat?

“If you’ve recognized the power I wield, you should have also understood that this is meaningless.”

The 2nd Apostle, who was leisurely rubbing his wrist, tilted his head and asked.

“Do you still want to settle things here?”

“……”

Lenok was silent at the 2nd Apostle’s question.

Lenok also felt doubtful about whether he could fight any longer at the point when he had confirmed the 2nd Apostle’s power.

Perhaps even the fact that the 2nd Apostle was calm even after showing a part of his magic was to induce this kind of reaction.

A strong person with transcendent experience and talent that even Lenok could not be sure of winning.

If such an opponent were to step back instead of facing Lenok head-on, there would be no fight in the first place.

After thinking that far, Lenok withdrew his magic power, and the 2nd Apostle also nodded and turned his back.

“There will be some time before Oshto’s son wakes up.”

The 2nd Apostle smiled and gestured towards the outside of the workshop.

“Let’s talk for a while until then.”

“……”

“It’s about Anathema’s death and Kaise Bajur’s role.”