Chapter 84 - Trail of Fire? More Like Way of Water (2)

The authority borrowed from my first Devil, Seir the Duke of Origin, was movement.

Thus, Seir's mana specialized in movement, flowing more freely than any other mana.

This made it perfect for magic bullet projection and quick physical enhancement.

The authority borrowed from my second Devil, Leraje the Great Marquis of Hunting, was toxicity.

Thus, Leraje's mana carried toxicity, weakening targets just by contact.

This made it perfectly suited to become the bullets themselves.

Taking advantage of these characteristics, my main attack, magic bullet, appropriately combined the mana of both Devils.

Then what about my third Devil, Procell the Duke of Bathing?

Surprisingly, the power I borrowed from her wasn't control over water.

Through the pact seal engraved upon establishment, linking two souls, I glimpsed Procell's power and implemented the most suitable authority through Devil Magic.

It was the power of illusions.

That was how my third Devil Magic, Ghost, was created.

[Hmhmhm! How is it, Covenant-bearer! The endless torrent of water like an endless sea of stars! You may tremble at this Bath Duke's infinite power!]

The water sounds I heard when summoning Procell.

They weren't real but auditory hallucinations.

It was the natural overflow of Procell's power, like breathing.

Perhaps Procell's fundamental power was closer to illusion magic than water control.

And when illusion magic reached a certain level, it led to materialization, exerting physical force on the world.

Naturally, Procell's illusion magic was exactly that.

My skill, having borrowed that power, wasn't talented enough to recreate Procell's complete illusion manifestation.

In other words, my Ghost couldn't yet materialize illusions.

However, what if I added the water control inherent in Procell's mana itself?

Illusion magic based on existing water could manifest into reality.

In short, it meant I could buff preexisting water magic.

If I develop Ghost further, I might be able to materialize water, but not yet.

But that's enough for now.

Endlessly draining mana.

Procell's mana, flowing through my now quite broad and solid mana channels, mixed with Undine's water to manifest endless rapids into reality.

Because of this, Undine was struggling with more water than she could normally handle, but that was fine.

I was the one driving this water anyway.

[Don't forget, Covenant-bearer! Once this is done, you must offer proper tribute befitting this Duke!]

Of course. I'll prepare the finest offering.

[Hmm, hmm! An excellent attitude! I shall look forward to it, yes, look forward!]

While mentally placating Procell with promises of future compensation, demands came from outside my body.

"Roman! Can't you go faster? This is easy now!"

The rapids didn't completely fill the Labyrinth.

It was just enough water to sweep away Blazing Deaths and extinguish their flames.

Filling it completely would leave no air to breathe.

Rei was standing on the water's surface by adapting Azurail into a board-like platform to surf the waves.

Training disguised as play.

Like whipping a horse, Rei shouted again demanding I increase the output.

Undine, unable to handle the output, swayed like she was completely drunk.

Ah, this isn't good.

Ultimately, these rapids were an illusion.

What pulled the illusion into reality was none other than Undine, this illusion’s core.

If Undine got reverse-summoned, my crude, newly learned illusion magic would instantly return to nothing.

Leaf panicked and grabbed Undine, infusing mana.

The High Elf's mana, carrying the World Tree's seedling, forcefully lifted Undine who wanted to collapse and return.

"Oh, Roman! The plaza's ahead!"

At Rei's words, I carefully adjusted the mana flow.

The plaza was wide.

If it was already occupied by Blazing Deaths, that meant the entire wide area was filled with fire.

Let’s increase output just a tiny bit more.

I’m sorry Undine... you’ll have to suffer a bit more but we don’t exactly have a choice, do we? 

"Hold tight! We're going to crash!"

The collision of fire and water brought intense aftershocks.

Right after I shouted to hold on to something even though there was nothing to grab.

KWAAANG—!!!

The water dragon swimming through the Labyrinth’s new river roughly thrust its head into the plaza.

From atop the water surging like a waterfall, Rei shouts with excitement, "Roman! Faster!"

"Get down from surfing!"

"W-wait! Something's wrong with Undine!"

KUUUNG—!!

Upon entering the plaza, a heavy, resistance-filled collision I'd never felt before ran up my spine.

"Hey! We hit something!"

"What? Must be a Blazing Death."

"But this feels different! Rei! Finish it!"

"Here I go!"

PAANG—!

With a light jumping sound, Rei's body separated from the rapids.

Running on air platforms through Azurail, she approached the one that somehow maintained embers even in these crazy rapids.

After wrapping her entire body in silver mana to avoid touching the flames.

JEEONG!!

She threw a straight.

For a Blazing Death, flames were life force.

Already knocked down by the double water lariat of Leaf's ultra-novice spirit magic plus my ultra-novice Devil Magic, it couldn’t withstand Rei's finishing blow.

That's the end.

The one hit by this traffic accident had its flames completely extinguished by Rei's confirmation kill and disappeared under water.

Thump-thump-splash—

Rei, lightly stepping through air to land on water, pointed somewhere without time to boast.

"There! Survivors!"

"Aerial!"

When Rei detected survivors with her beast intuition, Leaf immediately created air bubbles with the air spirit Aerial to envelop them.

After doing it so many times, they worked in perfect sync.

The two quickly finished the rescue operation and transferred the newly joined people to the steadily flowing water behind.

Except for two people.

More precisely, Leaf didn't extract them—they came on their own.

Living up to their Expert rank, Lyudmila approached without bursting their air bubble and could only exclaim in amazement.

"What are you guys? What is this!? You're really... unbelievable!"

Lyudmila covered her mouth, openly expressing her shock.

Though relatively calmer, Ruslan's eyes also couldn't hide his obvious astonishment.

"You've grown tremendously... Among our kind, I've never seen anyone grow faster than you. And that magic just now... were you hiding it? Or is it a late-awakening bloodline inheritance?"

Ruslan seemed more interested in Rei, probably because they were the same species and he'd seen Rei's abilities during training.

Rei shrugged and answered nonchalantly, "Well, something like that."

I’m not sure what “something like that” means but I can see your mouth twitching.

"But what is this really? Never seen anything like it. Mixing spirit magic with Devil Magic? Is that possible? How did you prevent mana repulsion? Both are rare orthodox types... and Roman has control? Not giving it to the Devil... then..."

"It's nothing special."

Ah, this routine again.

Though mind reading wasn't on my magic list, I could implicitly understand what Lyudmila and Ruslan were thinking.

They were probably wondering what massive price was paid.

Sorry, but there's nothing.

Noble self-sacrifice?

Noble self-sacrifice my ass.

What I paid as the price for contracting with Procell was incredibly trivial.

To maintain more dignity befitting my status as her covenant-bearer.

That was the condition Procell demanded as her price.

And that was somewhat satisfied by replacing my grimoire's leather with silver acquired —no, obtained during rescue operations.

Thanks to Procell's advice to wrap more silver around it.

Leaving behind these now-familiar reactions, I moved the conversation topic forward.

"Are you three alone? Where are the others?"

"We sent Arthur's group separately to secure the gate going up."

"Mr. Hernan is with them too. We sent the rescued people there as well."

While Lyudmila explained the others' whereabouts, Ruslan addressed me differently.

"The Blazing Death you and Rei just dealt with. Can you retrieve it?"

The corpse, you mean?

Though it was long-standing practice to recover Explorer corpses when found and deliver them to the Union if possible so families could hold funerals, that was only when “if possible” applied.

And that “if possible” meant having enough leisure to do so without any hindrance.

Honestly, we haven't finished dealing with all the Blazing Deaths yet, and there might still be survivors to rescue, so recovering corpses now was tough.

That was why we left behind the victims we've already passed to rest in the Abyss.

All Explorers were prepared for such endings.

Despite my somewhat negative response, Ruslan maintained his position.

Rather, he persuaded me, "You didn't know what you dealt with. Well, you handled it surprisingly easily. That was a Blazing Death possessing the body of Grant Dexter. Surely, there must be traces of those behind this incident on that corpse. We need to secure it as evidence."

"Then we should retrieve it."

You should have started with that! 

I manipulated the water current to lift the remains of Grant, the Blazing Death whose head Rei had just blown off.

Even if he couldn't serve as evidence for this incident, I would have retrieved him knowing he was Grant Dexter.

Grant Dexter is my fellow alumni’s brother after all.

Even though their sibling relationship wasn't particularly good.

It was right to take care of it as an acquaintance.

"Roman..."

"Yeah?"

"I think Undine's at her limit."

Ah... raising the output earlier was indeed problematic.

Though it was an unavoidable choice, it became the final straw that broke Undine back.

Having been overworked continuously for days without rest, it was amazing she held out this long.

Even spirits weren't immortal.

Spirits could perish too.

If we squeezed any more out of Undine here, she'd deplete her essence and vanish.

"Let's send her back. How long until recovery?"

Will a day be enough?

Back when I was a slave, even one day of vacation was a supreme reward.

"T-that won't be enough..."

Undine's really done in.

"Ah right. Our Guild Master..."

KUUNG—!

A massive vibration echoed from afar.

Not very refined, are they?

The roar sounded again.

This time the rumbling felt bigger and closer.

"Finally here... what were they doing?"

Though we'd been rescued, the tension flowing between us rapidly dissipated.

Because she'd returned.

It was Viola Pelletier's return.

"Leave the rest to me. You've done enough."

"Yes. You've done admirably, more than we could have hoped for. Now, get some rest."

I checked Leaf and Rei's complexions.

Their expression showed they still had energy left to spare. 

In Leaf's case, though the hood obscured full view, perhaps from being together so long, I could roughly read such signs.

But well, if they insist.

"Leaf, Rei. Shall we prepare to head up?"