Chapter 479: Faithful servant (2)
“Shouldn’t I go with you?”
“It’s fine. I’m not going too far. I’m just going to check it out personally. There seems to be something strange about this.”
“Ugh. I don’t know, but… anyway, please have a safe trip.”
“Please be careful at all times, Honorary Cardinal. May Elune’s protection be with you…”
“You don’t have to worry, Elena.”
As I said my farewell to Sun Hee-young, Park Deokgu, Elena, and other guild members one by one, time got delayed further.
‘It’s not a big deal. There’s something a bit weird, so I’ll just find out what I need to know and come back right away.’
I claimed that, but everyone seemed anxious because of the lack of information.
Of course, it wouldn’t be bad to go as a guild, but… for the upcoming big event, it was better to go with Jung Hayan only.
In fact, there was no guarantee that Belial had been summoned. I still didn’t know if Jung Hayan and Han Sora summoned the demon, but even if they succeeded in summoning the 72nd Lord, it was unlikely that it would be Belial.
However…
‘It feels strangely familiar…’
Looking at the northwest’s friendly magic power, I thought I could a.s.sume that I was right to some extent. I was the contractor who had signed a temporary contract with Belial once… and I had never been wrong with that kind of feeling. My ears kept ringing.
It seemed like he wanted to keep communicating with me, but it felt like there was a continuous disturbance. Perhaps the incompetent, bankrupt Benignore and heartless Elune trash were cutting off our connection.
As I got on White Paul, patting him as I hadn’t seen him in a long time, Jung Hayan hugged me tightly.
‘f.u.c.k. I can’t breathe. Is this a Heimlich Maneuver or what?’
I coughed for a second, but she didn’t have any intention of releasing me. I felt like she was thinking about never letting me go, so I could tell her obsessive symptoms had gone through a relapse.
Of course, she usually stuck to me in the same way, but this was because I knew she wasn’t good at controlling her strength at times like that. She had a really refreshing face, which was quite in contrast to those around us.
It even made me glance carefully at them.
Of course, I could understand her. No one could be upset, considering that the Federation was being smashed even at that moment.
If I a.s.sumed that Jung Hayan was overhearing what Kim Hyunsung and I talked about…
‘She would be even happier.’
It only lasted for a second, but I had to organize the information in my head.
Considering that Kylie Yale from Federation had stuck to Kim Hyunsung for a while, I thought there was a conversation that happened.
Step 1 was when Kylie Yale muttered the story of my recent conduct to Kim Hyunsung or Jung Hayan.
She would probably have said something about women, and our Hayan would have reacted when she heard it.
‘I guess Kylie Yale is hooked up there.’
Since continuing education had been effective, she had put up with it very well.
In fact, she deserved to be complemented with the patience she had, given that the federal gangs had been scamming. While she was in a state of extreme anger that kept her awake all night in tears and wallowing in anxiety alone, Hayan must have heard what Kim Hyunsung and I talked about, and she judged that she would eventually get abandoned.
What happened next was that she led Sora and Yale to destroy the Federation.
Of course, many things about this bothered me.
First, the distance from that training ground to the Federation was quite long. It didn’t mean that 28 hours was not enough, but it was pretty tight.
Moreover, if I calculated the time to and magic circles, they would have needed even more time.
‘f.u.c.k… Park Deokgu wouldn’t have told her in advance, right?’
The way he acted so far was too clear to rule out the possibility itself.
If I a.s.sumed that he said something like ‘hyung-nim hooked up with a woman, and that’s why he’s going to the Federation. I don’t know what kind of gold digger she is, but he’s seducing hyung-nim and blah blah blah.’ The situation all but fit too well.
It seemed that there must’ve been continuous support from him until the Hayan-like plan of destroying the Union in a hurry and catching and killing the unknown gold digger was completed.
‘No matter how I think about it, it seems so…’
Having always moved around with her, I could finally get a rough idea of ??her behavior patterns.
a.s.suming that was true, a chill ran down my spine.
This was because I definitely felt that it was a different way of thinking than normal people. It was certainly not a normal mindset for her to go for a Federation breakdown just because she heard the news that I might be moving to the Union.
Even if she tried to persuade me not to go, it didn’t ruin my transfer place altogether.
Until then, it was just an a.s.sumption, but I was convinced with the voice I heard that I was right.
“D-D-D-Did you hear the news?”
“About what?”
“T-T-They said that the seash.o.r.e that can be seen from Amera… i-it’s been completely ruined. T-T-They said that now they can’t even go to the beach there.”
‘Where did you hear the news that even I didn’t hear?’
The memories of telling Kim Hyunsung bloomed.
“Because it’s a beautiful f-famous place… I really wanted to go with y-you, but there are still many beaches in the State. There are also ones near Laios. W-we don’t have to go only to the Federation… right?”
“Right…”
“A-And it was said that it has poorer quality than the rumors. All adventurers… they’re all bad people, and Federation women are also all bad. They said they try to do something with people from outside.”
“Right…”
“So, I was told that we should never believe people from the Federation. And they said there are many dirty women, so they are bad people.”
“Who said that?”
“Ah? Uh? I-I just heard it somewhere.”
I hoped she didn’t hear that from Park Deokgu.
I was scared to imagine what the h.e.l.l he would’ve been talking about. Regardless, Jung Hayan continued to mutter nonsense behind me.
The slander against the Federation that started over and over again was enough to make me feel embarra.s.sed. It started at, ‘the food is not good.’ Listening to her constantly talking for hours, I felt that she was getting desperate.
It was to instill bad perceptions in case anything happened in the already-ended Federation.
‘She’s a calculating person in her own way.’
It was enough to make me curious as to what her next plan would be.
Perhaps what Jung Hayan was planning was the complete destruction of the Federation. She might be picturing to be neatly devastated as if it didn’t exist from the beginning.
a.s.suming that one of the 72 demon lords was in Amera, it would take 7 to 10 days to get the Federation off the map. Of course, if I were to a.s.sume the contract was better than the last time…
It could be faster.
“Now we can’t go to the Federation even if we wanted to, right?”
“Yes.”
I wanted to threaten her that I would never see her again, but I already knew from a lot of experience that that effect wouldn’t last long.
Personally, I was grateful that she was doing that, but…
‘She needed to learn her lesson.’
She had to know that if she did things herself without my judgment, the consequences could end in tragedy. Just as Jung Hayan never touched me after going through the regression incident, she needed to learn her lesson that time again.
However, it was obvious that being kind to her was more effective.
As I responded with kindness in my own way, her tone of voice gradually rose as if she was also excited. It had already been several hours since I had been staring at the sky on the griffon.
After spending a long time with Jung Hayan and having a friendly and enjoyable conversation, I realized that I was close to my destination.
I put the magic power in my Mind’s Eyes in no time, allowing me to see the whole scene.
After that, I naturally realized why no further information could be obtained.
‘I can’t see anything.’
Everything had gone dark. I couldn’t even see Amera’s condition.
It was beyond my vision, even though I was looking at it with my Mind’s Eyes.
At that point, the sky, which was in broad daylight, could no longer be seen. It was enough to make me suspect that it wasn’t a demon, but a type of black magic instead.
Jung Hayan put up quite an entertaining display as her voice exclaimed her words.
“They sure are in b-b-big trouble. It looks almost impossible to… recover. What could they do now?”
‘You could stop smiling when you talk. And what do you mean impossible to recover when we can’t see anything…’
“I-I don’t know from where they should start. Shall we put it in the magic hologram first?”
“Okay. It would be better to do that.”
“Still… I-I wanted to go in at least once… I can see some lights over there. It’s small, but…”
Some refugees were still evacuating from the outskirts of the city.
Of course, that area was also dark. However, the light emitted by the priests seemed to be barely effective.
When I conjured my divine power, the effect wasn’t perfect, but my view began to open. Only then did I feel that the griffon was relieved. Below us, we could see the federal soldiers dealing with an agitated monster, but because the Continental Union’s reinforcement forces hadn’t been formed yet, they emerged inferior against it.
Some people who came down for reconnaissance pushed the monsters away as if they couldn’t stand them.
Nevertheless, overall, I felt they were having a hard time.
‘It’s a mess. A mess.’
The surroundings began to light up as they slowly went down to the place where the residents were evacuated and where divine power was spread around it.
As if they noticed the fact that the Honorary Cardinal of the State had come, I heard the voices of people chanting my name, but honestly, my concern wasn’t their rescue.
I just wanted to confirm the hypothesis I had in my head. I was sure that the vibration that kept ringing in my head was a signal from the intelligent Belial.
“O-Oppa. S-staying here might be a little dangerous…”
“We have to save the people.”
“S-Still… we said we were going to check for a second and go back. L-Let’s go back first.”
“I can’t pretend I didn’t see them. Let’s look around a little more first.”
“B-But…”
I could perfectly pretend that I hadn’t seen it, but it was important to stay there at that moment.
I could see some dark hairs on her as if she was finally a bit better than before, but I felt she was anxious because she hadn’t recovered from all the magical exhaustion.
What we saw were monsters of common-grade, rare-grade, and heroic-grade at best. There was no reason for Jung Hayan to be anxious.
There was no magic explosion, and black magic couldn’t be found.
Nevertheless, seeing her like that…
‘I was right.’
I could think of her having released the devil on the Federation’s territory.
It was a demon at a level that even the contractor couldn’t control. There was no need to confirm the facts anymore.
The more it got used to that place, the more the hum became clearer. It was then that the perfect voice was heard.
I wasn’t certain until the point when I realized the familiar energy belonged to the person I admired most.
[It’s been a long time. Long time no see, disgusting human! Fuhahaha. That disgusting soul is still the same!]
Belial, the Lord of lies and agitation, had once again been summoned in our world.
‘The faithful servant sees the true ruler of all evil! Long live Belial! Hurray! Hurray! Long live!’