Damn Academy

152 – Taming the Madman (12)

[This is Vistien Jedna Bailey Gainax. Nice to meet you.]

[It is Silverine.]

Bibi suddenly heard a voice while passing through a passage of black smoke.

I turned my head to where the sound came from, but there was only black darkness.

It was clearly Bibi’s own voice. If so, hallucinations were evident.

And then I hear the voice again.

[…] It is better for the child to take his own life than to live halfway and suffer a disaster. And he is also a being that will harm the principality.]

[There must be a way.]

[If that was possible, I also… ….]

This time, it’s Silverin’s voice. It sounds clear as if something from the past is being recreated.

Bibi still remembers that moment clearly.

These are the words from the conversation between my father and Silverin. Bibi was behind her door, which she overheard.

In the meantime, Damian threw a word.

“Whatever you hear, it’s not real.”

Bibi looked at the back of Damien’s head as he took the lead.

“…… Did you hear that woman’s voice too?”

“I haven’t heard anything.”

Said Bibi, holding tight to the rope around her wrist.

“Then I’m glad. I can’t tell if I’m going crazy or if this space is strange.”

Damian cut it off.

“It will be the latter.”

After a while, they came out through the passage. A dome-shaped space appeared.

The walls on all four sides, including the ceiling, were covered with black smoke, making it seem like you were trapped in a huge closed room. When I closed and opened my eyes once, I was choking as if the black smoke would swallow everything.

“This is….”

And in the open space in the form of a dome, six tombstones were arranged in a circle, and jars were placed in front of each tombstone.

Why did they block it with such a strong barrier? How did Damian find out? It wasn’t just a question or two.

Looking closely at the jar, there were amulets with ancient characters written on it.

Damian silently drew his sword and slowly approached the tombstone.

Bibi, who followed her, also swallowed her saliva with her tense face.

I could feel the magic in each pot. It was bizarre that magic that was so powerful that it was difficult for ordinary wizards to imitate came out of the jar.

Damian asked.

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“Can you recognize the letters written here?”

His eyes are on the tombstone.

On the tombstone, there was something scribbled on it, like a child’s graffiti, in characters commonly used in the Barbisia region.

“It says “Ketone, the Forest Keeper of Romeda Forest.”

“Have you heard of it?”

Bibi shook her head.

“No, but it’s strange. It is so strange.”

She glanced at the names written on her tombstones one by one.

Shiny Kandalusia.

Stone Sage Demabund.

Acarox, the helper of phantom beasts.

Her heart started pounding wildly. These were the names of wizards who were once famous in various places. It was hard to imagine what these tombstones had to do with them.

Revived Gideon.

In addition, the knights of the duchy and the name of the magician who had evaporated were also there.

Bibi immediately informed Damian.

“They are all wizards. And among these is the name of the missing wizard I was talking about. Gideon. I remember interest.”

“….”

Damian was lost in thought, his face stiff.

“I am not dead yet. The magic power is pulsating.”

“What do you mean?”

“It is common knowledge that mana does not come from the dead. However, magic comes from them. That still means…”

“You mean locked alive in an urn?”

It’s so big that even a five- or six-year-old would have a hard time entering it. I didn’t want to think that there were grown people in it.

Then, suddenly, a jar rattled by itself.

The eyes of the two were focused on that place at the same time.

It was a jar placed in front of Keton’s tombstone in Romeda Forest.

“Did you hear?”

“Are you asking if it’s hallucinations? I listened carefully.”

Damien rattled once more as he approached the jar.

“Perhaps the human body is discarded and sealed in some other form.”

“I would rather be like that. It’s to the point where I’d rather live as a ghoul than be locked up alive in a place like that.”

Damian tapped the jar with a wooden sword. It made a clear sound as if it were empty.

Soon after, a strange thing happened.

Stronger magic power began to erupt from the pot. The mana had a bluish aura.

The magical energy swept the floor once, and finally began to write something on the dirt floor.

[Who absorbed my magic?]

Bibi hid on Damian’s back and said.

“S-Are you… alive?”

Damian said, holding the wooden sword tightly as if he would break the jar at any moment.

“I did.”

Then, the blue magic power wrote on the floor.

[I was still dreaming. I suffered for eons of time in the repetitive memories of the past. And, for the first time, I had a dream I had never seen before. It was a blue deer. It jumped into my memory, and I woke up. And you were standing in front of me.]

Bibi muttered puzzledly.

“A blue…Deer?”

“Who are you?”

Writing appears again on the dirt floor.

[An old friend of Hanox and Flence. Forest Keeper of Romeda Forest. And now the crumbs of the soul trapped in a small chamber.]

“What is this place for? Are you a warlock?”

[We are sacrificed to this cursed land and phantom beasts. Unfortunately, we don’t have time to talk for a long time. My soul is now almost crumbled and feeble. The souls of my old comrades have already been sacrificed to the curse, and I am not far behind.]

“Can you tell me how to get to the phantom beast of this land?”

[No, you are already being called by the phantom beast.]

“If we leave you alone, what will be your end?”

[Become a part of the phantom beast quietly in this jar, or get out and become a race.]

“Is it going to be a race?”

[The soul of a wizard who wanders this world will eventually become a race.]

“….”

[Who are you who woke me up from my dream? When you came, the evil spirits trapped in the barrier became quiet. And, more than anything else, I feel a strong presence from you. Even my soul instinctively fears you. But I don’t feel the divine power.]

“I am just an escort.”

[Your identity and position are not important. I only feel you with my soul’s eyes. You are a mere guard, but you can extinguish my existence. You can end our suffering. By erasing us, the power of the phantom beast can be removed.]

Bibi muttered to herself as if wondering.

“How can it end….”

Unlike her, Damian nodded her head as if she understood why she was here. He knew how

Then he untied the rope from her wrist and turned to the baboon.

“It’s dangerous, so please stay away from me for about 20 steps. And…… Could you close your eyes for ten seconds?”

“What the hell… what….”

Bibi stared at Damian, then gave her a reluctant nod.

She backed away slowly, counting her steps inwardly. And she doubtfully put her young feelings behind and covered her own eyes.

Damian checked the figure and said to the jar.

“Aren’t you afraid of extinction?”

[Not at all.]

As Damian stretched out his hand into the air, a powerful magical force began to form around him.

“The last thing you want to say?”

Soon after, letters are clearly engraved on the dirt floor.

[Tell the Archbishop of the Holy City that ‘I’ve come to find five rubies’. It is yours now.]

***

Bibi counted ten seconds inwardly and nervously lowered her hand that was covering her eyes. It didn’t seem like anything special had happened.

Damian stood still with his bare hands, neatly split in two as if all six pots had been cut against it. What happened?

Damian sees Bibi and nods her head as if he’s welcome to come over.

She hurriedly approached Damian and tugged at her left wrist. She then quickly wove her rope, which she had released.

“I was very worried that I might be possessed.”

“Do you still see me as Damian?”

She hated it.

“Nothing is interesting. What a terrible sense of humor.”

Damian looked up at the sky as the baboon hurriedly weaved her rope. Through the black smoke came the broad daylight that penetrated her dark clouds.

She stopped rubbing and looked up at the sky.

The black smoke was slowly clearing and the barrier was gradually blurring.

“… What did you do?”

“I did what you asked me to do.”

“….”

Then Damian suddenly pushed her baboon behind her on his back.

“Looks like it’s not over yet.”

His gaze goes beyond the barrier that is slowly being lifted.

As the smoke disappears, the disconnected external space begins to connect. Just like that, someone’s wailing sound reached Vivi’s ears.

It was the sound of a living person that Damian and I met for the first time as we moved.

Like the sound of music that spreads through a funeral hall, an old man’s long, thin sobs fill the silence.

The barrier completely disappears and the owner of the song gradually comes into sight.

About a hundred paces away, an old woman was sitting down.

A tombstone and a jar were placed in front of her. It was the same shape as the one that sealed the wizards.

It appeared so unexpectedly that I wondered if I was hallucinating.

Damian squeezed Vivi’s wrist and walked slowly forward. As she got closer, Bibi felt a sense of deja vu from the old woman. The old woman’s figure gradually became clearer, and the stench stung his nose. Some of the old woman’s flesh has rotted away, but she is alive and moving.

And the words written on the tombstone come to my eyes.

“… !”

[Vistien Jedna Bailey Gainax]

Her name was written there. Bibi got goosebumps like ice water had been poured down her spine.

If Damian hadn’t held on tight, she’d probably have sat down, her legs giving out.

As I approached her, the old woman’s sobs stopped. The old woman began to mumble softly.

“The prophecy is broken. The blood of the goddess…Still, still lives on.”

“Someone who came from somewhere ruined the prophecy. The order is out of order and the balance is broken.”

The old woman’s neck bends back grotesquely as she glares at them.

A familiar face. As expected, it was the same priest whose head was blown off by Nielen according to Vivi’s intuition.

Then he opened his worm-eaten eyeballs and screamed angrily at Damian.

“You were the one who ruined the festival!”

The old woman twisted his joints and forced his rotting body up.