Missionary Kasas was glaring at me with a terrifying expression. As if looking at his lifelong enemy. What did I even do?
"Well, it's because you captured and imprisoned the priest and taught the child black magic...?"
"No, it was Hilde who directly captured and imprisoned him."
"You ordered her to! You're the ringleader, so of course she has to hate you!"
"What? You said before that you did the harder work because you ran around yourself, but now you're pushing the responsibility onto me."
Unfair. As expected, I should have bathed alone.
"Glory Road Celsius!"
Tempelus didn't sit still either at Father Kasas's intrusion. He swung his cane widely. Following its trajectory, a massive hemispherical ice formed, covering the missionary and me.
An ice formation of this scale with a short incantation? As long as he is inside the family, I should consider Tempelus practically a user of inherent magic. No, since I can't steal and use his inherent magic, is he an even more troublesome opponent for me?
"Stop right there!"
A prison of ice is erected. Sharp icicles swallowed Father Kasas like teeth. But only for a moment, as light flashed and time-reversal was enacted once again. The ice slowly melted from the point of contact.
Magic and time clash against each other. Water repeatedly melted and refroze, and a territorial battle between ice and water occurred like the glaciers of the North Sea. Freezing, breaking, clumping, and scattering, the ice shards sparkled like starlight.
"Deliver us from evil, deliver us from evil..."
The one at a disadvantage was Missionary Kasas. This was inside the Celsius family estate. If he were alone, he could have protected himself, but it was far from enough to protect Richard and the twenty people from the outer district.
Gripping the rosary tightly, he flipped the pages of the Bible with one hand.
"Saints, holy maidens, Holy Spirit! Let there be light in the beginning. Watch over the innocent!"
Light exploded from the closed pages. Light of radiance. A light-summoning spell that any cleric could use. However, the missionary's light was bright and hot enough to melt the ice created by magic.
The evaporated water mist slowly dissipates. Missionary Kasas's entire body was frozen blue, but the Bible was still emitting a sacred radiance.
The essence of divine power is the power to deny abnormalities. A restorative force that returns twisted things to their natural course. Nothing can match divine power in terms of defense. Tempelus revealed his annoyance.
"From the moment he used dark mana, that child is a dark mage! Are you saying a mere dog of the Holy Imperial Court will attack a mage to protect a dark mage?"
"The child has no sin. If there is sin, it is mine for not teaching him what evil is in advance, and the problem of this land for failing to stop it."
Yeah, that's right. What sin could a child who doesn't even know if black magic is good or bad have? The bad one isn't the child, but this world...
"Of course, the most detestable one is that man!"
"Huh. My intentions were purely good will."
"If it's good will, you should naturally lead it to a good outcome! If this is good will, then even demons would whisper in human ears with good will!"
Those words are right. Even if you say the intention was good, if you don't take responsibility when the situation gets tangled up, it's just malice.
But still.
"Then what should I do? Should I, like you, leave that child to slowly sink and die in the outer district? Mercifully?"
Divine power is the force that rejects ideals. A power that forces resignation and submission. A religion that endures the pain of reality and advocates the happiness of the afterlife is suitable for protecting the system.
"Shall we push him into a place where promised elimination awaits, trampling on the hope of looking up? Whispering only of the happiness of the afterlife while locking the child in a cold prison? Will Richard be satisfied with that life?"
I know the answer to that question. The correct answer is no. There is no need to ask.
"If that were the case, Richard wouldn't have come looking for me. He wouldn't have struggled to climb up, right?"
I looked up at Missionary Kasas and asked. He would know what my words meant.
To Richard, who was in the outer district, an outstanding mage who came from the floating castle... That is, it was Missionary Kasas who told my story.
Missionary Kasas's radiance faltered for a moment. But only for a moment. As if finding me detestable, he shouted at me.
"How shameless you are after spreading a sin like black magic! Instead of being such a heretic, you could help them with the right method!"
"That's sophistry. This structure is the result of correct methods piling up. This is the result. Regardless of good or evil, it's an order solidified over a long time by rightness."
It just came to be. It's a shame. In the beginning, the people who created this order must have imagined a happy and hopeful future for everyone. Because the world doesn't go as one wishes.
But will I hold them responsible? That's also an unfair act. Does one live in the world alone? Did a single person create the world? An era is the work of all the humans who live in that era.
"I'm not saying order is evil. Nor am I pursuing good. I don't care about such things. I won't push the responsibility onto anyone either. Because this is the result of everyone's struggles."
Humans are just beasts. Foolish and lowly beasts. Even if you try to shift sin and virtue to a select few, the creature called human does not have that capacity.
Neither the capacity to shift it, nor the capacity to bear it.
I took out my cards and shuffled them lightly.
"But if order inevitably came to be. Wouldn't attempts to overcome that order also inevitably arise?"
If magic was discovered to overcome harsh environments.
Overcoming the order created by magic is also a human's job.
"Stop!"
One of the guards pointed his spear and spoke threateningly. I gave him a grin.
I take out the cards. Spade, and Clover. The cards containing the Demon God and magic are held in both hands.
The Clover cards I used before were a sort of mana grenade that compresses mana. Since I, with my petty mana, couldn't use powerful magic, I filled a magic circle I designed myself with mana extracted from alchemy and used it as a one-time magic bomb.
It's easy to use but not that powerful, and it has the fatal drawback of being disposable.
Most of the Clover cards left with me now are empty shells with depleted mana. Duds with only their damaged magic circles forcibly repaired.
On top of that.
"Set."
I cram mana into it.
White mana? Dark mana? Actually, the type isn't important. Mana is scattered throughout all things in the world.
The reason white magic specifically chose crystals as catalysts is because the mana is consistent.
The reason black magic specifically uses the flesh as a catalyst is because it's my body, so it's convenient to use.
They were chosen for those reasons, but actually, using other mana is fine too.
"I told you to stop!"
The guard thrust his spear. A mage's guard warrior is the vanguard. A wall that creates distance from the enemy while the mage prepares magic.
The bifurcated spearhead aimed at me. Instead of avoiding it, I raised my hand to try to grab the spearhead.
Of course, it's a useless action. Even though my strength has increased a bit, grabbing a blade bare-handed is still a reckless act. If the blade is infused with ki, it goes beyond recklessness and is a stupid action.
My hand was slashed deeply, and blood spurted out. The blood shot out like a fountain seemed to swirl in midair, then returned to my right hand.
To be exact, to the Clover card held in my right hand.
"Phew."
Vampires use blood magic. They move blood energy with blood manipulation arts, and weave that vitality to complete magic. It's a huge price that humans wouldn't even dare to attempt, but for vampires with regenerative abilities, it's merely an appropriate cost.
In other words, it means I, who has gained regenerative abilities thanks to the Demon God, can also use blood magic.
Vitality moves. It's mana woven with human blood. This blood mana is a mana specialized in life, flow, and domination. There are many disqualifying factors for wielding white magic with it, so a refining process is necessary, but...
"Lightning Cluster."
Inside the human body, there is a magic circle.
A small lightning magic circle engraved on the body, to move this body made of blood, bones, and muscles according to my will.
I weave the Lightning Cluster and draw an overlapping magic circle.
T1NrUTkreFYvQUZ1VEE0bGdJSWROM0VCTGlqVW5YbUVGS1kvTk5IcHczVTY4L1A5YmpDTnZjVVowVmRnSnl5OQ
A dizzying pain rushes through my right hand. The purest pain of crushing the nerves themselves. Using my body as a tool wasn't enough, and modifying it for magic use caused a terrible rejection reaction. Pain and alienation fill my right arm.
Even during all this, the Demon God of Tir is trying to repair me. Regeneration and destruction occur simultaneously, delaying and delaying the end of this terrible pain. If it healed completely or broke completely, there would be no pain.
Mana arises from the collapse of a structure. With regeneration and destruction occurring in succession, the mana in my arm was more full and abundant than ever.
I overlapped two Clover cards. 5, 6. Wind, Condensation. Grab the air and solidify it, and push the space itself with the wind.
"...! This is!"
The air solidifies. The guard warrior inside it ended up looking like a bug trapped in amber. The guard quickly realized what had hit him.
Because this magic, possessing widespread physical force, was one that Tempelus used frequently.
"Goodbye."
After a light greeting, I struck the empty air hard. The impact spread throughout the solidified space, and cracks appeared with a cracking sound. The guard, pushed away along with the space, was finally blown far away.
Tempelus glared. He, too, was a mage. He couldn't not know what I had done.
"Dark mana...?"
Tempelus was horrified and enraged. Filled with instinctive revulsion, he pointed his cane at me.
The reason was neither because he used black magic in the Magic Federation, the land of white magic, nor because black magic was more powerful than expected.
"You copied my magic...?! With something like black magic?! No way!"
Because he wielded white magic with turbid and filthy dark mana.
My right arm was already healed. Shuffling the cards with my intact right hand, I said to Tempelus,
"Now. You gave a problem to the people earlier, right? Let me do the same."
The black magic I proposed was formulaic magic. A power rejected by the Magic Federation.
But the result achieved was exactly the same as Tempelus's magic.
"As you know, interpreting magic is much easier than devising it. Just as criticism is easier than creation. So, try guessing. What kind of magic I used."
There is a rule in the Magic Federation. That no one can be blamed if the person themselves cannot prove what kind of magic they were subjected to.
A rule created to deny the horrific witch hunts of the distant past.
"If you can't, then you are the one conducting a 'witch hunt'."