The Shadowed Legacy of the Soulless Messenger [EN]: Chapter 67

But Azadin and his group had already disappeared, so the search was bound to come up empty.

“Baroness Nort, I apologize for the intrusion. I had no choice but to be rude due to the Count’s orders,” the knight who led the soldiers said, offering a perfunctory apology to Baroness Nort.

“I see. I understand. It would have been nice if you had come when I was kidnapped by the cultists,” Baroness Nort replied, barely suppressing her anger as she watched the knights and soldiers search her mansion.

“Baroness, have you perhaps allowed any suspicious people into this place?”

“Suspicious people, you say?”

“I’m talking about the person who rescued you and defeated Mezeri’s apostles.”

“Hmm. So you call the person who defeated the Kurt god cultists suspicious? Not someone to be grateful to, or a hero?”

“Just because a cockroach eats another cockroach doesn’t make it a heroic cockroach.”

It was then that the knight made that crass remark.

“Huh!?”

“S-Something terrible has happened!”

“What? What is it?”

“The castle is on fire!”

“What?!”

Startled, they rushed out to the garden and saw that, indeed, flames were rising in various parts of the Count’s castle.

*********

Azadin had not headed to Baroness Nort’s mansion to save her. If he went there, things would unfold exactly as Derrick wanted. So, he headed towards the Count’s castle instead.

“Are you going to infiltrate?” Midiam asked.

“Yes,” Azadin replied.

Azadin used his knowledge of the castle to first infiltrate the guard posts where soldiers were watching the surroundings. He easily knocked out two soldiers and climbed the castle wall. If he hadn’t knocked out the guards, he would have been discovered while climbing the wall.

“Alright. Now, where should I focus?” Azadin muttered to himself.

With his hawk mask on, Azadin took a deep breath. He focused his vision, trying to find the flow of black magic swirling within the castle.

“…There it is. It matches the information I received from the Countess,” Azadin said, pointing to the rear garden where the greenhouse was located. It seemed true that the Count was living with a strange witch as his lover in the rear annex, and that no one else was allowed to approach.

“Are you really going to approach today? You haven’t even received the down payment yet?” Midiam asked, recalling Azadin’s negotiations with the Countess.

“Well, it would be nice to get paid, but our mission isn’t about money, is it?” Azadin replied with a shrug.

“You’re going to great lengths to save Baroness Nort, aren’t you?” Midiam observed.

“That too. Well, we always need to improvise depending on the situation. Midiam! Ismael!” Azadin called out.

“Yes!” Midiam responded.

“Yes,” Ismael echoed.

“You know how to use fire arrows, right? The Rose?” Azadin asked. He could also set fires with arrows from a distance, but that was a skill that even he had a high chance of failing at. On the other hand, it was very easy for Midiam and Ismael, who knew how to use magic properly, to ignite fires with fire arrows.

“Of course,” Midiam replied confidently.

“Then, set fire to over there and over there,” Azadin instructed, pointing to the warehouse, the stable, and the armory roof. As Ismael and Midiam shot their rose arrows, they plummeted from the sky and began to ignite on their own.

The embers fell like scattered flower petals, and the arrows hit the roofs, starting fires. Perhaps because it was dry, the fire quickly grew and soon a commotion broke out in the castle.

“Impressive. The Rose of Fire, Flowers, Wind, and Moon,” Azadin said, admiring the magic he couldn’t use himself.

“Alright. You guys hide nearby and wait. I’ll infiltrate. Oh, and…” Azadin paused.

“Yes?” Midiam asked.

“Shoot some arrows into that wall over there,” Azadin instructed, pointing to the wall of the rear garden building.

“O-Okay,” Midiam replied, a little confused.

Midiam and Ismael shot arrows at the wall as Azadin instructed. Some stuck, and some fell and rolled around.

“Shall we go then? You can retreat for your safety. If you’re confident in hiding, then hide and wait,” Azadin said, taking advantage of the chaos as everyone was busy putting out the fire and began to infiltrate the castle.

*********

Soldiers and servants rushed to put out the fire, but with the roof burning and embers falling, it was more important to take out valuables to prevent them from burning than to put out the fire. Everyone was so busy carrying things and putting out the fire that infiltration was easy. Azadin moved through the shadows created by the torches and fire, easily approaching the rear garden.

The mansion located in the middle of the rear garden was where the Count had prepared for his daily life. Large earthenware pots were laid out in the garden, and various garden trees were growing in them.

“……” Azadin stopped as he approached. A strong smell of blood was emanating from among the scent of orchids. A smell of blood that could not be hidden even by the smell of flowers and herbs. In it, lizards began to appear.

The lizards were originally the Count’s guard dogs, but they were now devouring the corpses of the dogs. They were huge, crocodile-like beasts nearly 2 meters long.

-Hiss!

As soon as Azadin saw the lizards, he shot arrows.

“Chik?!” one of the lizards cried out.

“Kiek!” the other one shrieked.

The arrows Azadin fired pierced the lizards’ heads. But the magic connected to the lizards was activated.

‘I’ve been discovered,’ Azadin thought, clicking his tongue as he saw the alarm magic being activated. The caster in this rear garden had placed lizards instead of guard dogs and cast a spell on them.

Azadin quickly kicked off the ground, stepped on a garden tree, and broke into the second-floor window. The moment he entered the building, a transparent barrier-like rejection pricked Azadin’s skin.

“Ugh,” Azadin grunted.

An ordinary person would have fainted the moment they broke in. But Azadin had such a strong resistance to magic that he was not greatly affected.

‘A powerful caster. To spread this kind of magic throughout the mansion. But…’ Azadin thought, recalling Araelle’s letter. Compared to that letter, the magic surrounding this mansion was nothing.

‘What on earth is she thinking? Araelle? Is she going to conquer the world or something?’ Azadin shook his head at such random thoughts. Random thoughts while infiltrating enemy territory.

Azadin quickly entered the second floor. Then, he felt movement on the first floor. They had rushed out to the rear garden, perhaps to intercept Azadin who had shot the lizards… They were soldiers with a terrible stench.

‘Mummies, huh,’ Azadin thought, recognizing the stench. Mummy soldiers, with their insides removed and treated with special drugs, were wielding their badishes [a type of curved sword] and searching the rear garden. Azadin checked them through the window and headed inside the building. The smell of blood was his guide.

‘It’s getting stronger as I go down,’ Azadin thought, following the strong smell of blood, he found a basement with a thick door closed.

‘I’ll be discovered the moment I open it,’ Azadin thought, looking through the crack in the door, he saw that the inside was a huge operating room, and casters wearing face coverings were cutting up corpses with curved knives, removing their insides to make mummies.

‘Even if you’re a descendant of the Yaegas god clan, how can you be doing this?’ Azadin frowned as he watched the mummy surgery taking place inside.

‘I need to deal with this quickly,’ Azadin thought, preparing his arrows. His patience was running thin.

-Thump!

At the same time as kicking down the door, Azadin fired arrows in rapid succession.

-Swish!

Two arrows pierced the head of the caster furthest away. The other two casters, startled, turned around with their hooked knives, but Azadin, who had charged in with a bow in one hand, drew his sword from his waist with the other and cut the caster’s neck.

The neck bone was severed, and only the skin and flesh at the back held the head in place. Azadin, who had beheaded the caster in a single blow, turned and stabbed the other caster in the chest.

-Thwack!

The blade pierced through the torso and came out the back. Perhaps because Azadin had brought a considerable treasure sword among his swords for this day, the blade was intact even after cutting through the neck bone and piercing the heart.

Azadin kicked the caster’s corpse away, pulled out the blade, flicked it to remove the blood, and put it back in its sheath. But…

“Krrrrrr,” one of the casters groaned.

“Kikikikik,” another caster cackled.

The casters he had clearly knocked down were slowly getting up. They were getting up even with arrows in their heads, their necks half-severed, and their hearts pierced.

“Tch!” Azadin clicked his tongue in annoyance.

Azadin slung his bow over his body and picked up a hooked knife that had fallen on the floor and threw it at the caster furthest away.

-Thud!

The caster’s body was torn open, and a hand covered in scales appeared from within, catching the knife Azadin had thrown.

“Not bad, hu…” the caster began to say.

But the caster couldn’t finish his sentence. Azadin had grabbed his sword with both hands and slashed upwards, splitting the caster’s head vertically.

“Huh?!” the other casters exclaimed in surprise.

-Thud!

The other casters’ hooked knives were also embedded in their chests.

“W-Wait a minute!” one of the casters pleaded.

Before the casters, who had been in human form, could even finish transforming, Azadin jumped in and cut off their arms and slashed them.

-Crack!

“If you have an afterlife, make sure to correct your habit of transforming slowly there,” Azadin said, slashing the casters and going deeper into the operating room.

*********

The smell of blood, which had been getting stronger as he went deeper, had now entered an area where he couldn’t tell if what was entering his nose was air or blood.

In a place deeper than the operating table, there was a large bath-like area where the blood that had flowed out during the surgery had collected. A huge bath with blood that strangely didn’t solidify, reaching up to knee height. In that blood bath, two humans, a man and a woman, with strange yellow eyes were intertwined.

They must have clearly heard Azadin eliminating the casters outside, but they writhed like snakes in the blood bath.

-Swish!

Azadin fired two arrows of the Yiseon Palace [a type of powerful arrow] at once to eliminate the man. They were all the remaining arrows Azadin had. But the arrows were caught by an intangible force field near the man, and then…

-Bang!

They shattered as if exploding.

‘Tch. As expected, they were openly provoking me. They had measures against arrows. It’s colorless magic, so it’s hard to see even with my vision. I should have brought something like black steel armor,’ Azadin thought, clicking his tongue as his trump card, the Yiseon Palace, was rendered useless.

“Kyaa!” one of the women shrieked.

“Shaa!” the other woman hissed.

The women were startled and opened their mouths, revealing sharp fangs. It was as if poisonous snakes were opening their mouths and threatening. But the Count, while embracing the women, was not concerned about the direction the arrows had come from, that is, Azadin, and was instead exploring their bodies.

“Excuse me,” Azadin said, disgusted by the sight, knocking on the door he had entered through.

“Are you perhaps Count Kazel?” Azadin asked.

“You’re a rude one, Messenger Clan. Yes, I am Count Kazel,” the man who had been lying in the blood bath said, raising his body.

“Why don’t you keep lying down instead of showing off your unsightly form?” Azadin sneered at Kazel.

“Unsightly? What about you?” Kazel retorted.

“Your wife would propose to me,” Azadin replied. It sounded like a rude provocation, but strangely, it was true.