Chapter 97.
After having secretly climbed onto the elevator that Squidward was riding and arriving at his destination, I killed my presence and observed the situation from the shadows.
Squidward got out of the elevator and went straight into the room that was labeled the Tower Master’s office. The old man beckoning him over seemed to be the Red Magic Tower’s Tower Master.
Hmm, by the way, why was the mana flow like this here?
The mana here was calm and heavy as if it had precipitated somewhat. Usually, for mana to precipitate to this extent, hundreds of lives had to have been killed here or there had to be a special mana stone in place.
The only time I had felt this kind of mana was when I was young on the peak of the mountain behind my hometown. The mana I felt back then was pure, but now it felt like someone was spreading a putrid smell of corpses.
Did life magicians usually require this type of unpleasant mana for experiments?
The Tower Master’s room had lots of peculiar magic formulas drawn all over it. I eagerly jotted down the magic formulas in my notes. While I was quickly scribbling, I felt something strange.
What’s this? Isn’t this forbidden magic that black magicians used?
There were curse magic, alchemy, and other unknown magic mixed in, but the basic framework of the magic circle was curse magic, and the core was black magic.
Shouldn’t this be stopped?
Of course, not all black magic was evil. The basis of black magic was sacrifice, and in that self-sacrifice. Therefore, in ancient times, there were also records of black magicians being revered as sages.
However, over time, the direction of sacrifice changed from self-sacrifice and developed into sacrificing others.Then they called over the Demon King, and soon black magic became a condemned profession. The records were lost.
Although I didn’t have black mana, I still lightly knew a couple of black magic spells. Black magic was that standard.
Why? Everybody knew of the Demon King’s summoning magic. It was also in my father’s study. Well, I did use it as firewood to make roasted sweet potatoes. Anyway, black magic wasn’t bad. The person who used it was bad.
Therefore, I decided to take a look first, to see if the Tower Master was going to perform a self-sacrifice experiment that would go down in history. I was definitely not waiting to find out how that magic circle worked. Of course not!
After properly preparing for the experiment, the Tower Master and Squidward each stood in their respective positions and began to infuse mana into the magic circle. And inside it, a magic formula that had not been there before, appeared.
I was making a note of the quickly appearing formulas but then paused my pen.
"Now!" the Tower Master cried.
Squidward infused his own mana, pointing to the magic circle on the floor.
"Good! Keep pouring it in!"
You bastard!
"Hectopascal kick!"
Squidward, the recipient of my fierce hectopascal kick, flew into the wall.
"Ah, NO!"
At the deathly pale Tower Master, I flipped my middle finger and yelled, "You XX bastard! I’ll just X the XXX and XXX then dip it in salted anchovies, you bastard!"
The Tower Master was stunned from the curses he had never heard in his life. Such a XX idiot didn’t even have the qualifications to make that face. He was openly offering Squidward to the newly appearing formulas. I couldn’t tolerate human sacrifice as a magician.
"What... What are you doing!" Squiward, throwing up blood after getting flung into the wall, barely got up and protested.
"You’re the same, you XX bastard! God damm*t, XX why is a life magician bastard doing human experimentation?!"
Squidward looked genuinely enraged, like when Flam had accused him of experimenting with humans.
"Who... Who’s experimenting with human beings?"
"You, I’m talking about you! You XX-like bastard, you didn’t even know that you were the human sacrifice for this human experiment? What a moron!"
"What... What are you—"
While Squidward was panicking, the magic circle was raging amok due to the sudden loss of mana.
Keuk! Aaaahhhk!
The Tower Master tried to stop the raging somehow, but it must have been painful as he let out a scream.
Kking! Kkkiiiing!
From behind, the chimera that was still tied to the magic circle whined as if in pain.
"46A-10346!"
Squidward called out to the chimera and tried to approach it. I grabbed his arm and restrained him.
"Let go!"
"It’s too late. If you go now, you’ll also be caught up."
Scarily, as I finished speaking, the chimera’s body split apart and began to crumble.
"Eh, Ed...Ward—”
The chimera crumbled into ashes as it spoke its last word.
"Ah... AHHHH!!"
Squidward was kneeling and crying in despair. It was not impossible to understand his heart. It probably felt like his beliefs as a magician were falling apart.
Even at a glance, I could tell Squidward was not handling the chimeras just for academic research. He probably felt even more despair knowing that he was also the subject of human experimentation, which was the worst taboo as a life magician.
However, sadly, there was no time to console him.
The Tower Master finally caught a hold of the raging magic circle. I took out a sword and a magic wand from the pocket space.
Kuahhhhhh!
As if he was stepping out from the flames of hell, the Tower Master let out a horrible shriek and was released from the magic circle’s restraint.
Tch, I felt a little regret about not having attacked the Tower Master regardless of whether Squidward would have died.
"Was this a magic circle to become a lich?”
I muttered to myself when an emaciated-looking skeleton with eye sockets containing naturally burning flames instead of eyes yelled at me.
"As if it is!”
I just shrugged when the skeleton got angry.
"Hey, what are you so upset about? Baldness, it’s something everyone will come across in life. Just think of it as having come a little early.”
The teary-eyed Squidward was looking at me with a “what kind of person is that” expression, but I cleanly ignored him.
"Damn you!"
The skeleton raised its skinny hand that was bare bones and attacked me with magic.
"Hellfire kill!!”
I pushed Squidward behind me with the sheath, and poured mana into the magic wand. The floating mana stones around the Dragon Heart quickly circulated and amplified mana.
"Barrier!"
It was only one layer, but the barrier was strong enough to block the fire magic of the skeleton. However, the problem was that although I had a large amount of MP, the mana was amplified, making it a little more difficult to handle it. If I had used this in my hometown, it would have run amok a hundred percent.
"Hey, survive on your own."
I warned Squidward and aimed the magic wand at the skeleton.
"Yes?"
Leaving the startled Squidward behind, I shot a spell at the skeleton.
"One shot for now!"
I lightly fired a mana bullet, but it came out the size of a cannonball because of the magic wand. The skeleton wrapped black mana around the magic wand it was holding and struck away my mana bullet. It resembled sword aura, but it was a kind of magic, not sword aura.
Kwang!
My mana bullet hit the ceiling and made a big hole. Based on the Tower Master’s magic control, he seemed to have broken down the wall of the Magic Way.
It was believed that there were three walls in the magical world. The first was an introductory wall, a wall that must be overcome to learn magic. The bulk of people couldn’t cross it and gave up being magicians.
The second referred to the wall of the Magic Way, the state of realizing the path beyond the laws of magic. Majority of magicians never reach this wall within their lifespan. A person who has seen this wall was an extraordinary magician and was called a great magician.
And finally was the wall of transcendence. It was a wall that could only be reached by those few who had passed the wall of the magic way and had reached the extreme in their own path. As far as I knew, there was no existence that had seen this wall yet in history. It was just a word that expressed a state of one’s imagination.
The "Four Great Magicians" were just monikers given by people who had guessed that they were the ones who came closest to the wall of transcendence.
Now, that skeleton was no longer a great magician, but a madosa[1]. Damn it, it just became annoying.
"Ahahaha! Great! Great!"
But still, it’s not great enough for you to call yourself great. You’re too cocky. Are you a narcissist?
"What a great thing this is! Even though the experiment failed, it was still enough to break down the wall! Aah! I will praise that great person!"
Oh, it seems he didn’t say that to himself.
I released my mana as I ran towards the skeleton who was still being deeply moved.
You won’t be able to deflect this!
"Fus Ro Dah!!"
The mana I released pushed the entire space in the room, making him crash into the wall. Brute force was the best! How thrilling! So effective!
Uek!
Jjuhjuk! Kwang!
The skeleton that hit the wall was thrown out of the tower as the wall broke. The Magic Tower was its space. If the skeleton had broken past the wall of the Magic Way and had become a madosa, then the magic tower would be too disadvantageous for me.
I jumped out of the magic tower and attacked the skeleton.
"Lady of the Wind!"
Wind spikes were shot off in all directions towards the skeleton. Having come out of his euphoric state, it also urgently used magic.
"Hell’s Heat Waves!"
The space around it shimmered with heat as waves of hot wind swirled it, blocking the wind spikes.
Usually, such heat waves would cook the user’s own flesh and hence were not used for defense purposes. But since it only had bones left anyways, it used it without any qualms.
The skeleton and I each used flight and stayed in the air.
"Summon! The Guard Dog of Hell!"
A huge magic circle formed over its head as the air became distorted.
Keuaaahhh!
A three-headed mutt wailed in surround sound as it tried to crawl out of hell through the crack in the distorted air.
Wow! I thought I was at a movie theater. The head alone seemed to be twice as big as the three-headed dog that was being raised as a pet in my hometown.
"Catch!"
I created a long spear with magic and threw it at the middle head of the three-headed mutt from hell.
Kkek! Kkeng!
The hell dog was hit in the center of the forehead, it fell backwards and went back over through the gap in space. I took the opportunity to take out a tear gas from the pocket space, pulled out the safety pin, and flung it.
"It’s a parting gift!"
Beyond the gap in hell, the tear gas exploded, and I could see the mutt in distress.
Try crawling out one more time. Next time, I’ll put it directly in your nostrils and blow it up.
I fired a magic bullet at the summoning magic circle that the skeleton had made and closed the passageway.
"Impossible! Ceroberos!"
The skeleton tried to make a summoning magic circle again with a dumbstruck face, but the hell mutt didn’t want to come and never made an appearance again from the summoning magic circle.
Good. It would be a nightmare if a mutt like that was summoned in the middle of the capital. Thousands of people would disappear on the spot just from the unruly panicking.
"Divine punishment!" I made white lightning with magic and launched it at the skeleton.
The skeleton ran away in a hurry instead of blocking my white lightning.
"You bastard! Are you a priest!?"
No, I’m not.
"That’s right! You black magician who is about to receive divine punishment!"
For your information, the magic I just shot was just imitating divine magic, and there was not a trace of divine power. I tried to imitate the divine power itself, but since I was not religious, not even a speck of divine power appeared.
In other words, it was not divine power the opposite of black magic. So even if that lich looking skeleton blocked my attack, it wouldn’t matter. However, the skeleton didn’t realize it and was breaking out in cold sweat.
Or perhaps it was just dewdrops forming on the skeleton because it was dawn?
1. It seems the author makes a differentiation between magician and mage in Korean, with mage being a magician who has broken past the wall of the Magic Way. I felt that it would be confusing to try to make a magician and mage distinction here in english as many people colloquially think magician and mage are the same. Therefore, I am using Madosa which is the korean word for mage that the author uses. So it seems a magician is one who has gotten past the first wall. Great magicians are ones who have seen the second wall, the wall of Magic Way but not passed it. Madosa are magicians who have passed the wall of Magic Way, but not the third wall of transcendence.
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