-The Black Mage’s Identity
The car began to skid toward the guardrail.
I desperately turned the steering wheel and drew up the mana within me.
The car we were in was driving across Hannam Bridge. In other words, if the car was flung off the road, we would plunge straight into the Han River.
I slammed on the brakes, trying to reduce our speed.
Scrraape!
I heard the sound of the body of the car scraping against the guardrail and crumpling. Fortunately, I had managed to turn the wheel just in time and prevent us from falling.
It was as though an invisible force had seized the car in an iron grip. Waves of mana surged in from every direction.
It was too late to deploy a barrier now. I raised my mana and activated kinetic magic in the direction that would push back the force being applied to the car.
An invisible struggle of strength began.
“Mr. Mage!”
Gil called out to me, almost screaming. The child wasn’t worried about my driving skills.
He had clearly realized what was happening.
“Don’t worry.”
I said it to reassure Gil, but I no longer even had the leisure to speak at length.
No matter how hard I pressed the brakes, our speed did not drop, and the force being exerted only grew stronger and stronger.
The enemy had struck from ambush. The fact that there had been no sign at all before the sudden surge of mana waves meant his magical skill was extraordinary.
On top of that, I had no idea where the enemy was right now.
I had lost the initiative, and while defending against an unseen foe, I had no room to spare as I maintained kinetic magic and detection at the same time.
Blaaaare!
The cars passing by saw our vehicle staggering and moving abnormally, hurriedly swerved away, and blared their horns.
At least there weren’t many cars on the road. That much was fortunate.
‘Who the hell is this?’
When I thought about it, a mage with this level of skill could have simply blown up the car.
And yet, after going to the trouble of setting up an ambush, he was engaging in a contest of strength with kinetic magic. It seemed he had another objective.
‘Show yourself!’
Good. After moving for a while while maintaining the balance of power, I was able to regain my focus, gather my mana, and refine my spell.
I began breaking down the other party’s mana waves little by little. In the gaps that opened, I spread out a barrier.
At the same time, I swept the surroundings broadly with detection magic. A magic circuit was detected. Only then did I learn the enemy’s identity.
It was that black mage. The owner of the traces I had been searching for.
A magic circuit bearing the imprint of the infinite pentagon was drifting nearby.
“Stop playing around in hiding and show yourself!”
I shouted.
That black mage had come to find me?
It was unexpected, but it was a good opportunity. The person I had been chasing had appeared of his own accord; I was almost grateful. Even if he was attacking me.
I had thought he had hidden himself long ago, since the traces at the scene had vanished, but it seemed he had been hiding somewhere at a distance.
“How does it feel to have your lifeline gripped in someone else’s hand?”
His voice came first.
A vile laugh scattered through the air, and then a gloomy voice spoke.
“Who says they’re holding my lifeline? If you’re not afraid of me, then hurry up and show yourself. Don’t hide like a coward.”
“Hahahaha! You think I’m hiding because I fear you? What an adorable little fantasy.”
He scattered that vile laughter once more, then suddenly appeared.
But it was not his actual body. A smoky, hazy figure rose on the car’s windshield. He had projected an image onto the glass with magic.
It was indeed the old black mage I had seen at Incheon Port.
Snow-white hair, a gaunt and wrinkled face. And yet, eyes and an expression brimming with vitality.
The moment I faced that figure before my eyes, my heart began pounding.
“Who are you? Why are you attacking me?”
I asked in a calm voice.
Both the black mage and I were still maintaining kinetic magic, but we were no longer applying additional force, only maintaining the balance.
I had the feeling that meeting me was his goal. Though he had not truly shown himself before me, there had to be a reason he was showing me his form.
“My name is Yashin. The great black mage, Yashin. Remember it. It is a name that will soon be widely known.”
The black mage introduced himself readily.
What I was curious about was not his name but his relationship with Samir, but I could not bring that up first.
I silently glared at the figure, focused my mind, and gathered my mana, while Yashin continued speaking.
“Who are you? No, I don’t mean I want to know who you are. I came to ask why you are interfering with my work. I came to show you what happens if you keep getting in my way. In other words, I came to kill you!”
Yashin threatened me in his peculiar way of speaking. As he said he had come to kill me, the figure was smiling faintly.
That meant he hadn’t really come to kill me. If he had wanted to kill me, I would already be dead.
No, perhaps he had harbored some intent to kill me after all?
Had he tried to drop the car into the Han River to disguise it as an accidental death? Or had he simply come to threaten me?
I still could not clearly understand why he had appeared.
“Work? Are you the one who released that tentacled monster? Why did you do it? Is your goal to destroy the city?”
I asked Yashin.
“Silence. Do you think I would tell a trifling human like you my purpose? I merely move according to a grand design. And what you must do is get out of my way and stop interfering!”
Yashin replied.
I took note of it. He said he was moving “according to a grand design.” Didn’t that mean that while Yashin carried out the terrorism, there was someone else giving the orders?
I guessed that person was Samir.
I asked again, more indirectly.
“Where do you belong? Which Magic Tower are you affiliated with?”
“I told you to be silent! You are not in a position to ask questions. Don’t be curious. You can just die.”
As expected, no straightforward answer came.
Then the invisible force constricting the car abruptly grew stronger. Mana waves swirled around us in chaos.
Since I had already spread a barrier inside the car, Yashin’s kinetic magic could not affect Gil’s body or mine, but tremendous pressure bore down on the outside of the car.
The body of the car was crumpling.
“Hahahaha! How is it? The feeling of standing at the crossroads of life and death? Get lost! Never interfere with my work again!”
Yashin burst into laughter and shouted noisily.
The laughter was nothing. The force applying pressure was ringing in my ears with a high, vibrating hum.
Even though the kinetic magic was not directly touching my body, its waves dug into my head like an auditory hallucination.
It was powerful mana. He was by no means an easy opponent.
“Uuugh…”
Gil let out a groan. I couldn’t tell whether it was from fear or from the pressure ringing in his ears, but there was no doubt that he was in pain.
I wanted to check whether Gil was all right, but I had no time for that.
I wove together all the mana I had gathered and transformed it into a wave of freezing. Rather than push back with kinetic magic, I would burst this pressure apart in one blow.
‘Freeze! Infiltrate through the gaps in the waves. Pierce into the inside of the magic circuit and freeze even the heart of the infinite pentagon!’
I focused my entire mind. I gathered every last strand of my intent and poured out the freezing mana waves all at once, as though setting off an explosion.
A waterfall of razor-sharp waves poured forth. The absolute-zero freeze stretched outside the car in an instant, freezing everything around it down to the smallest detail.
Craaaack!
Space froze, expanded, and tore apart the strands of the opponent’s magic circuit.
At last, the invisible force applying pressure snapped apart. Beyond the frozen space, Yashin’s mana waves scattered into pieces.
The imprint of the infinite pentagon was shredded and dispersed.
If the opponent had been before my eyes, he would have suffered serious injuries, but Yashin was not here.
“Not bad. Yes, good. I’ll acknowledge it. That freezing magic is strong enough to freeze a tentacled monster.”
Yashin’s voice spoke as though praising me.
Since he was casting magic remotely from some unknown distance, he had taken no harm at all.
It was frustrating, but Yashin’s abilities surpassed my own magical abilities.
“For someone hiding like a coward.”
“You call me a coward? I’m not cowardly. I’m simply skilled.”
“Then come out here!”
“Enough. Let’s stop here for today. I would also like to put you in the palm of my hand and crush you to pieces, but it wouldn’t be any fun if you died too easily, would it?”
“Are you running away?”
“We will meet again before long, so don’t be too disappointed. When that time comes, let’s see it through to the end. Hahaha!”
Before the sound of his laughter had even fully faded, Yashin’s figure on the car windshield vanished first.
The mana waves of his that had been scattering into fragments also disappeared without a trace in an instant.
“Phew…”
Gil let out a long sigh. I first turned to him and asked.
“Are you all right? Are you hurt anywhere?”
“Yes. I’m all right. Are you all right, Mr. Mage?”
“Yes. I’m perfectly fine.”
We both said we were all right, but in truth, neither of us was.
Gil had already been struggling from mana overload, and Yashin’s magic must have caused him even greater pain.
As for me, after drawing out all my mana down to the last strand and invoking freezing magic, all strength had left my body.
Thanks to the barrier I had deployed, at least we had not suffered any direct damage.
I looked around. Thanks to the freezing magic I had activated, the car had stopped.
We were still on the Han River bridge. The cars passing by saw our vehicle frozen solid out of nowhere, honked in alarm, and avoided us.
I withdrew my mana and released the freeze. Then I used detection magic to scan the surroundings over a wide range. Yashin was completely gone.
“The black mage is gone. You held out well. Now let’s go to the herb shop.”
“Yes.”
I spoke calmly, as if it were nothing, but in truth, even releasing the freeze took so much strength that my body trembled.
I also wondered whether the car, which had suffered the most trials out of all of us, would still move.
After the layer of ice vanished completely, I tried starting the car, and fortunately, the engine came to life.
Although the exterior of the car had been badly crumpled, it seemed the internal structure had not been damaged.
“This car’s sturdy. It still runs even in this state. Han Dain isn’t going to be happy when she sees what happened to it. She already made a fuss when I said I was taking the car to the sinkhole site. She’s going to curse me out, isn’t she?”
I deliberately made a few silly remarks to ease the tension as I got the car moving. Gil seemed to understand my intent and gave a small smile.
The car rattled terribly, but at any rate, it moved along the road.
‘Did he come to probe me?’
I still did not understand why Yashin had come to find me and then simply left. I could not say he had merely been driven away because he was hit by my freezing magic.
It was my first time directly facing a black mage.
The amount of mana Yashin possessed was considerable, and his skill was extraordinary enough that he could control magic remotely without revealing himself.
If Yashin was this capable, then Samir, the head of the Magic Tower, had to be far more outstanding.
I felt my own shortcomings. I could not grow complacent just because I was praised as an incredible mage. I had to become stronger. I had to hone my magic to an even greater level.
I clenched my molars tight.