The Sewer Mage (4)
In this continent, Dalen had faced death hundreds of times.
Naturally, he couldn’t remember every single one of those countless moments of demise.
Even with his superhuman intelligence, he could only recall where he died and who killed him.
He couldn’t quite capture the feeling of those moments.
“After all, it wasn’t me who died directly. I just watched my character die from behind a monitor.”
Yet, there were a few deaths that Dalen remembered vividly.
One of them was the corpse right in front of him.
Its twisted limbs resembled the tentacles of a mollusk more than human arms and legs. The melted face bore no trace of human features.
Long, layered nails and two small horns protruded from the top of its bald, gelatinous head.
Most notably, its upper body was impaled on a thick stake, severed from the waist down.
”…”
The moment this grotesque corpse was created was a memory he couldn’t forget, no matter how hard he tried.
[Corpse of a Mercenary Turned Cultist Experiment]
Improved regeneration.
Years into the future, the cult known as the Apostles of Regression would perfect their monstrous transformation technique.
A method that could turn people into mindless beasts, or in some cases, grant them powerful regenerative abilities while retaining their intellect.
They used this technique to launch a massive invasion from within the Bronze District, eventually taking over most of it.
“But they weren’t satisfied with just that. Their goal was to overthrow the entire city.”
After seizing control of the Bronze District, the Apostles of Regression turned countless people into test subjects to develop even more advanced techniques.
Dalen, captured in battle, became one of those subjects.
Days and nights of relentless, torturous experiments.
Days spent being treated worse than a mere beast.
“Looking back now, I don’t know why I just watched it all.”
He could have simply ended the game and started a new character.
Yet, Dalen watched it all unfold, and after thousands of failures, the cultists’ experiments finally succeeded.
“A surgery that applied an extract from dragon’s blood to grant even greater regenerative power than previous methods.”
The first successful test subject of that surgery was Dalen’s character.
And on the night the experiment was completed, they disposed of Dalen entirely.
“Corpse absorption.”
The ashen corpse turned to light and was drawn into his grasp. Dalen closed his eyes.
[You have recovered the corpse of a mercenary turned cultist experiment. Abilities inherited.]
[Inheritance Reward: Health +1, Senses +1, Magic +2, Dragon Blood Regeneration Factor (C)]
The hellish days he had watched from behind the monitor.
The result the cultists achieved at the end of it all had, ironically, returned to Dalen’s hands after many years.
Thump.
A being with a superhuman body and hundreds of potential paths stemming from the past.
In this breathing reality, not beyond a monitor, he now held the power to crush the cultists.
Thump.
His heart beat. Dalen’s superhuman senses detected a change occurring within his body.
Thump.
Something foreign had mixed into the blood coursing through his veins.
Rumble.
His blood heated up.
The feverish pulse that started from his heart surged to his extremities, enveloping his entire body.
Sizzle―
Like being seared with a red-hot iron, smoke rose from the wounds all over his body.
Wherever the blood touched, bones grew, blood vessels connected, and muscles began to regenerate strand by strand.
The white steam emanating from his body burned holes in his already tattered armor.
“D-Dalen?”
Penny rushed over, startled, only to find that beneath the torn armor, only fresh skin and faint scars remained.
”…Phew.”
Dalen took a deep breath and looked down at Penny. Then he turned his gaze to the fallen blonde wizard. He spoke.
“How is he?”
“Uh, what? Oh, um…”
Penny stammered before finally managing to say something.
“You’re… human, right?”
“What?”
What kind of nonsense is this? As he looked at her in disbelief, Penny hurriedly added.
“I mean, I know you’re human! But not everyone from the north is like you, Dalen! Punching hundreds of frogmen to death, and having new flesh grow over bone-deep wounds…”
“Hey, janitor.”
Dalen rubbed his forehead. He wondered where on earth this person had come from.
With such a distinctive character, he would have remembered her even if they had just passed by each other. Yet, he had never seen her in the game.
Looking at Penny with her wide eyes, Dalen spoke again, still rubbing his forehead.
“I meant the blonde wizard, not me. How is he?”
Penny’s face turned bright red in an instant.
“Could you be a bit clearer? How am I supposed to understand when you just throw out a single sentence without any context?”
“Figure it out.”
“No, I mean…”
“As expected.”
Dalen let Penny’s words go in one ear and out the other as he rummaged through the dark wizard’s robe. The wizard’s body was covered in bruises.
“The initial side effects of the regeneration-boosting drug.”
The dark wizard, with his frail build, had likely injected himself with the drug to compensate for his weak body.
But the cultists’ regeneration-boosting technology was still incomplete.
The serum enhanced regenerative abilities but left bruises all over the body and caused incessant itching.
For a well-trained body, such side effects wouldn’t be too severe.
But the dark wizard’s frail body only magnified those side effects.
Having been a test subject, even if only from behind a monitor, Dalen knew these facts all too well.
“Tsk.”
After noting the numerous needle marks on the inside of the sleeve, Dalen withdrew his hand from the dark wizard’s body.
He had to give up on retrieving the axe. In the process of breaking through the wizard’s protective spell and embedding it in his skull, the hand axe had become little more than scrap.
Crack―
When he grabbed the handle, the axe head separated from it. Both the handle and the axe head were beyond reuse.
“How roughly have you been using it?”
Penny, who had been sulking, approached with wide eyes. Dalen tried to recall. He didn’t remember using it particularly roughly.
“Did you throw it at speeds invisible to the naked eye or something?”
“I could always see it.”
“No, I mean, to the average person.”
“I can’t say for sure.”
Dalen scratched his chin. Come to think of it, he had used it for quite a while.
It was the axe he had taken from the mountain cabin where he first awoke in this land.
“That can’t even be recycled. At best, you might get scrap metal value for it.”
“I’ll have to buy a new one.”
“In that case, my uncle runs a blacksmith shop.”
Dalen raised an eyebrow slightly. Was she trying to make a sale now?
“Not that I’m insisting you come by. But since he’s a friend, I can get you a good price. It’s a win-win, right?”
“I’ll think about it.”
Watching Penny silently scream, Dalen shook his head.
Why hadn’t he encountered such a character in the game? Especially since she was connected to Sienna’s information network.
Leaving the unanswered question behind, Dalen bent down to pick something up.
A silver mask, split in two.
An item the Apostles of Regression wore as a symbol.
”…”
Gazing at the mask, stained with dried blood and serum, Dalen fell into thought.
It didn’t take long.
After slipping the mask into his belt pouch, he hoisted the blonde wizard, who had been lying on the ground, over his shoulder.
“Let’s go.”
The three of them retraced their steps out of the sewer chamber.
Left behind were the dead wizard, countless frogman corpses, and the ever-present waterfall of sewage.
Somewhere within the Bronze District, inside a stone chamber.
In a room where darkness hung like fog, four figures stood facing each other.
All were clad in long robes, their faces hidden behind silver masks.
One of them spoke.
“Delric is dead.”
The heads of the other three snapped toward him.
The man with the deep voice, who had first spoken, nodded heavily and continued.
“Yes. That’s why I called this emergency meeting of the Apostles.”
“How did he die?”
A sharp voice interjected. It belonged to a figure with a relatively small build compared to the other Apostles.
“Even though he was the last to join us, Delric wasn’t someone who would die so easily. What happened to the army of over five hundred frogmen?”
“Half of them are dead.”
Ahem. The man cleared his throat and continued.
“The other half fled. They were held by Delric’s magic, so once he was gone, they scattered like defeated soldiers.”
“Was it the city guard?”
A deep, resonant voice broke the silence. The man turned his head.
The owner of the voice, eyes glinting behind a silver mask, spoke with a sharp intensity.
Even through the mask, the vertical slits of his eyes gleamed vividly. He asked, “The Silent Company. Those ragtag mercenaries?”
“No,” the man replied, shaking his head. “It was the work of just one person. Technically two, but one was merely a cleaner, so it’s not an exaggeration to say it was just one.”
“One person?” A sharp voice interjected. “Are you telling me a single individual took down over five hundred Frogmen?”
“Half of them fled. About three hundred,” he corrected.
“Is this really the time for number games? Facing an army of Frogmen alone… Surely it wasn’t the elder mage of the Silver District himself? Damn Delric, why did he have to go and kidnap the elder’s direct disciple…”
“Felber Valentino did not move,” came the low, resonant voice, silencing the woman.
Creak.
The stone chamber door opened, and someone entered. Like the others, he wore a robe and an exaggerated mask. Taller than most, his copper-hued mask marked him as the leader of this apostolic council.
“Greetings, Grand Apostle.”
“Greetings, Grand Apostle.”
The four silver-masked figures bowed their heads as the Grand Apostle walked past them and took a seat at the end of the chamber.
“I did not summon you here to cower before some silver-plated mercenary.”
“Surely a mere mercenary couldn’t have taken on a monster army…”
“Enough!”
The chamber trembled slightly. The sharp-voiced woman quickly bowed her head and stepped back.
The Grand Apostle surveyed the four slowly before speaking. “We will advance the date of the Great Plan. Delric was never integral to our scheme. His presence would be beneficial, but his absence changes nothing.”
A man with a deep, mature voice cautiously spoke up. “Advancing the Great Plan means…”
“Release the funds. Acquire the ingredients for the elixirs and recruit those skilled in handling weaponry. If obstacles arise, use the guild’s influence to apply pressure. Isn’t this why we’ve nurtured our power in the open?”
The copper mask tapped the armrest with his fingers. “Nothing has changed. The order of reversal will begin with us. The day when diamonds turn to black ink and the seven walls crumble is near.”
Thud.
The Grand Apostle struck the floor with his staff. At this signal, the four silver-masked figures bowed deeply.
“For the day the seven walls fall.”
“For the day the seven walls fall.”
Darkness descended upon the stone chamber.