Chapter 99
[Who Is Eddie Howard, the One the Newbie Took Down?]
[Taming Master]
(A photo of Eddie taken from far away)
Eddie Howard.
He was born in Britain, and his real name is Ed Junior Howard. It's too long, so I'll call him Eddie from here on.
This son of a bitch Eddie is a runaway wizard who did some Clock Tower blah blah, killed his master, and ran off. Just assume the omitted part means he studied at the Clock Tower.
Anyway, after leaving the Clock Tower, this bastard went completely off the rails and started using Mysteries on civilians. The reason hasn't been revealed yet, but it was speculated that he was testing magic and its lethality. Well, it doesn't really matter.
The Mysteries Eddie uses are all dangerous. He has plenty of mental attacks, of course, but also a huge number of physical attack methods. Most wizards couldn't survive a head-on clash with him. I can't really guarantee victory either.
And supposedly, the newbie killed that kind of wizard himself. He even got ambushed, then grabbed the guy by the neck and twisted it back.
(Picture of a frog with a question-mark face)
Damn it, newbie, how the hell did you do it?
[Upvotes 103][Downvotes 0]
[Comments]
-No, I mean. You're saying even established wizards can't be sure of victory, and a lunatic who uses magic on civilians got taken down by a wizard who's only been studying magic for less than half a year?
ㄴNow that you put it that way, that is insane lol
ㄴHe even got ambushed and still got crushed instead lolㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-What was that thing you were bragging about last time? The primate-killing knife? Didn't he just slice him up with that?
ㄴEven so, how would he have gotten close? Would Eddie have just stood there like an idiot saying 'irasshaimase' and let himself get hit?
ㄴWhy are you getting mad, you fucking bastard.
ㄴNo.
[Okay, analysis complete.]
[Deowida]
(Picture of a wizard giving a thumbs-up)
Eddie? You've got no talent.
[Comments]
-And that concludes the testimony of a wizard who couldn't last even one second against Eddie.
ㄴDeowida: Bullshit, no, I'd win.
ㄴlol
ㄴDeowida: Laugh it up. Want me to actually split you open?
ㄴThreatening Do-hwang is seriously fucking cool.
[But seriously, how long are we going to keep calling him a newbie?]
[Bug in Your Ear]
If he beat Eddie, then he's not a newbie in skill anymore. He's spoiled. He's gone into rapid decay.
When are you going to make a proper account!
A red-haired woman. Standing on the pier, quietly facing the sea breeze, she left a comment on the freshly posted thread.
-Dolores: How about the Lady in Red Shoes?
ㄴBug in Your Ear: Get lost.
“Why? It’s a really nice name.”
At the immediate reply, she pouted and glanced down at her shoes. The corpse beneath had a hole punched through it in the exact shape of those shoes.
The corpse had died without even being able to close its eyes. Staring at it as blood streamed from the holes all over its body, she grumbled.
“Honestly, you people just don't have enough lady-like sensibilities!”
Dolores Victoria.
She had specialized in puppetry and body-hardening techniques, and while rinsing the bloodstained shoes in seawater, she tapped away at her phone.
ㄴDolores: I'm sure the newbie will like the name I came up with! Because we're fellow ladies! Ohohohohoho!
Dolores replied like that and smiled brightly.
“I’d even like to see her face! She must be a beautiful woman with a lady-like personality!”
She turned around, fantasizing about enjoying tea time with the Ian she'd pictured in her mind.
A dark warehouse on the pier.
Mannequins were tearing the flesh from the brutally murdered corpses with grotesque movements. Dolores watched the scene and nodded in satisfaction.
“That makes another case solved!”
The savage sound of meat being crushed cut in sharply through her words.
*
Two days later, Eddie's bounty was deposited into Ian's bank account.
About 250 million won. For a bounty on an infamous wizard, it wasn't that large an amount, but apparently the Clock Tower didn't value Eddie all that highly, so there was no helping it.
If he had caused massive property damage or casualties at the Clock Tower, they would have taken a harsher line, but the only person he had killed there was his own master. There was no reason to obsess over tracking him down and killing him.
Thanks to that, the bounty wasn't all that large either.
250 million after every possible fee had been deducted.
Even that was compensation he could receive only because there was a body. Without it, it would have been a little less.
Well, he hadn't done it for the money in the first place, so he didn't care much. He was satisfied just to have gotten an unexpected windfall.
“Yeah, thanks for handling it so thoroughly.”
[Not at all. We happened to have some breathing room, too.]
Ian's workshop.
In the dark space where the curtains blocked out all outside light, Ian held his phone and spoke. The other party was the Administration Bureau agent he'd met at the hotel.
[However, since you've received the bounty, Eddie's death will also be reported to the Clock Tower. The cartel will keep quiet about who killed him, but they'll quickly realize an incident happened in Korea.]
“Hmm…… Will that be a loss or a threat to me?”
[I'm not sure. I just thought it would be better to let you know, so I mentioned it.]
“All right, noted for now. Thanks for letting me know.”
[Yes. Then I'll leave you to it.]
Ian let out a breath, ended the call, and sank into the sofa.
The Clock Tower.
A wizarding organization in Britain, and essentially the cradle of all wizards.
It was such a closed-off place that even among wizards, those who hadn't visited there had no easy way to obtain any information about the Clock Tower. The most they could know was that it was the homeland of wizards and the only magical education institution in existence.
‘I've read that there are a lot of schools and that they fight among themselves, but I don't know anything beyond that.’
Whether the Clock Tower's wizards were friendly toward Eastern wizards. Whether they would even count someone who became a wizard by picking up a grimoire with no bloodline at all as one of their own.
He couldn't know a single thing for sure. He had no idea how they'd react when they heard news of Eddie's death. Ian personally didn't want to make big trouble with them, but where in life did things ever go the way you wanted?
They might even try to kill him as an unprincipled wizard with no background. They might come rushing at him to take the grimoire for themselves.
If that really happened, Ian would have no choice but to kill them too.
After already killing Eddie, taking out a few more wouldn't change anything. Rather than trying to persuade them and acting weak, it was far better to rip their throats out from the start as a warning not to mess with him. There was no need to shoulder risks that brought no benefit.
Naturally, Ian had no intention of going in meekly just because the other side was the Clock Tower.
The hierarchy had to be clear. He wanted no part of a setup where they had him on a leash from the start.
‘Well, the best outcome would be for us to just pretend we don't know each other. If they find out I have a foreign god's grimoire, they'll try to respond no matter what.’
Historically, wizards who possessed grimoires of foreign gods were all insane without exception. Genocide was standard for them, along with cannibalism, indiscriminate slaughter, and polluting the land. They brought all kinds of disasters with them.
Of course, Ian was the sole exception, but the Clock Tower was unlikely to think that way. So if possible, it was best not to get caught.
“……Hoo.”
Ian cut off his thoughts there, let out a long breath, and turned his head.
On the table.
The alchemical materials he'd set up in advance came into view.
A metal beer mug, salt, a bowl of horse blood, bone powder, holy water, and Ian's blood.
These were the materials for making a vessel to hold a soul. Most of them had been bought from the cartel, and only the holy water was made by hand.
Making holy water was much simpler than he expected. Fill a transparent cup with water, add a few pinches of salt, and chant an incantation—that was all. To raise its purity a little more, he would have needed to add resurrection herb and let it age, but there was no need to go that far, so he finished it with salt alone.
Fortunately, the finished product was of quite high quality. He tried sprinkling it on the elevator ghost, and it was practically dying of happiness. It was lucky he stopped it right before it attained nirvana, or else it would have vanished outright.
Anyway.
The materials were ready, so it was time to make it. Ian immediately got to work.
He slowly drew a magic circle on the high-grade paper. He carefully inscribed all manner of geometric patterns without a single misalignment. He set the cup on top, poured in the holy water and horse blood, and mixed them together. Then he carefully sprinkled salt and bone powder into the slightly faded red liquid.
That completed the cup's preparation. Ian opened the stopper on the glass bottle containing his own blood and gently sprinkled it at the edge of the magic circle.
Soon, the rim began to turn red, and the magic circle glowed as the liquid inside the cup started to boil.
“O source bestowed upon life. O purity contained within the soul.”
Ian looked down at the sight and began chanting. The grimoire clutched in his hand gave off a faint light.
“I myself have prepared a resting place for you, so surrender your memories to me and be taken into God's embrace. I, as His representative and consort, command you. Take your rest.”
The moment the chant ended, all the liquid in the cup evaporated and scattered into the air. Red smoke rose upward, then slipped back into the cup and clung to its surface, melting into it.
This was the end of the crafting. Ian let out a breath and lifted the beer mug.
Perhaps because it wasn't an ordinary glass but a metal cup engraved with all kinds of decorations, it somehow gave off a mysterious atmosphere. Ian examined the cup, its surface stained red, from various angles, then set it down again and picked up Eddie's head. He placed it on the table and carefully pulled out the brain.
That task took quite a long time. He wasn't a doctor, so it couldn't be helped.
Who could have known he'd ever have to pull out a human brain in his life? If he told his past self from just six months ago, the guy would definitely slap him and tell him not to spout nonsense.
“Haa, I did it…….”
After quite some time, Ian finally succeeded in pulling Eddie's brain out, his own face covered in blood. With a reverent mindset, he shoved the pink lump of brain matter in his hand into the cup and mashed it to bits. He used the Buddha-shaped rod as the tool.
Crunch, grind-grind!
With a rather loud noise, the brain was crushed. Doing this made him feel weirdly like a mad scientist. The sensation transmitted through the rod to his fingertips was also extremely alien.
In any case, the preparations for containing the soul were proceeding steadily. The moment the brain was crushed into a complete smoothie, Ian stopped grinding and added a little of his own blood inside.
In that state, he began the chant.
“By the name of the Great One, I command you, being contained within the soul vessel. Reveal yourself.”
[……Aah.]
At the conclusion of the chant, Eddie's face rose within the cup in the form of a faint wisp of smoke. It stared straight at Ian before opening its mouth.
[……Did you call for me?]
Eddie's soul spoke in exactly the same voice he had in life. At this successful result of alchemy, Ian grinned and wiped the brain matter and blood from his hands.
“Shall we start with introductions?”
The maximum time a soul could remain bound to the cup was five minutes.
He had to squeeze every last bit out of it within that time.
*
Today, England's sky was as gloomy as ever. It was the result of the Industrial Revolution aberration that practically lived in Britain. That damn aberration, which multiplied endlessly no matter how many times it was killed, always brought dark clouds to the English sky.
This was already much better. In the early days it had caused smog and produced quite a few respiratory patients, so Britain had every reason to welcome the change from smog to dark clouds.
However, separate from that, he didn't like not being able to see a clear sky. Wine enjoyed while watching the moon at dawn was such a delicacy, and maybe because he hadn't seen the moon for a full week now, he felt stifled.
“Tch.”
The man clicked his tongue and shook tobacco into his pipe. The beret pulled low over his head protected his eyes from the light of the lamp on the table.
“Since the suppression's coming up soon, I'll put up with it.”
He grumbled like that and lit his cigarette. With the acrid smoke, the tobacco flared up, and the toxic fumes traveled down his airway and heated his lungs.
He knew it was bad for his body, but the sensation was so lovable he simply couldn't resist it.
How was he supposed to quit smoking like this? There was a reason the famous Holmes kept tobacco and opium with him his whole life.
Of course, that Holmes was now a Mystery, forcibly causing all sorts of murder scenes on Baker Street in London, but that was the Administration Bureau's problem to handle, not something the Clock Tower needed to worry about. Aberrations were their department.
Thinking that, the man put his legs up on the table. Then someone knocked lightly on his door.
“Elder. Are you there?”
“Come in.”
At the familiar voice, the man replied. At the same time, the door opened and a handsome young man with flowing long hair came into the room. He bowed deeply to the man at once.
“I pay my respects to Elder Dylan Duke of the Fortentum School of the Clock Tower.”
The Fortentum School.
One of the Clock Tower's branches, it was home to wizards who mainly dealt with Mysteries. Dylan was one of only three elders among them. It meant that even the school recognized his magical skill.
You couldn't become an elder or a senior simply by staying in the school for a long time. Only skill earned you the honorific of elder or senior. Dylan was one of the living proofs who had risen to the elder seat through relentless effort.
Although one of Dylan's fellow students had killed his master and declared himself a runaway ninja, his skill was real enough, in any case.
Thanks to that, he had never once lost his confidence in his life.
It was the same now. He looked down in satisfaction at the young secretary showing him due respect and exhaled smoke into the air.
“What is it?”
“I'll get straight to the point. Eddie is dead.”
The secretary said it in a flat tone. For announcing the death of the vermin that had come out of his school, his voice was relatively calm.
In truth, it wasn't strange either. Eddie had run out of the school thirty years ago already. By now, almost no one still hated him, and more people simply treated him as a ghost of the past, a stain.
Of course, as a criminal who had come out of the school, it was true that he had to be killed. However, because Eddie's skill was quite formidable and every Mystery he used was geared toward killing, even the Clock Tower didn't push his suppression too aggressively. What if they lost valuable wizards in the process?
So the strategy they chose was a bounty. It was practically outsourcing the job and saying, 'Just kill him—anyone will do.'
It had been ten years since they put that bounty on his head.
At last, news of his death had arrived.
“He finally bit it.”
At the news that his fellow alumnus had died, Dylan clicked his tongue and put the cigarette in his mouth.
It wasn't that his mood had turned bad. He just didn't care either way.
“Who killed him? A bounty hunter? Or a grimoire hunter?”
“It seems to have been another wizard. The body was mutilated to the point that it couldn't be explained unless it was the work of a wizard.”
“Hmm, looks like he died in Europe then.”
“Ah, no, that's not it. He died in a country called Korea over in Asia.”
“Korea?”
Dylan tilted his head as if surprised.
“Is there a wizard skilled enough there to take on Eddie?”
“I don't know. It's such a remote backwater over there.”
“……Hmm. Right. Well, that settles it. If Eddie is dead, that's enough. Still, hmm……I'm personally curious about which wizard killed him. Maybe that bitch Dolores who went to Korea.”
“Shall I investigate?”
“Do as you see fit. If you've got nothing better to do, then do it; if you're busy, don't bother. It's all the same to me anyway.”
Saying that, Dylan suddenly remembered something and looked at the secretary.
“More importantly, have you heard that news?”
“What news do you mean?”
“The news coming from the Mediterranean side.”
Dylan smiled faintly and idly swung one leg.
“I hear the Eighth Book of Moses has been completely destroyed. So the remaining Sixth Book and Seventh Book want revenge for it.”
He snickered.
“Looks like something interesting is about to happen, so keep an eye on the magical newspapers.”