Secrets of the Silent Witch - Volume 6 - Chapter Ep

EPILOGUE

Obstructing Winds

The Silent Witch bent down beside the suit of armor, now in shambles, and inspected its construction.

Bartholomeus frowned. Even a Sage couldn’t possibly understand how such a thing worked just by looking at it.

Metal threads were packed inside the armor, connecting its various pieces and allowing it to move. The threads were much more noteworthy than the armor itself. They were only about as thick as Monica’s thumb, and yet they were jam-packed with an unbelievable number of magecraft formulae.

Monica observed them impassively. “Hmm… I don’t think I’ll be able to rewrite these.”

Of course not, thought Bartholomeus candidly. You couldn’t just rewrite magecraft formulae like that.

“We’ll just have to destroy it,” he said, squatting next to her and rapping on the breastplate with a fist. “Apparently, this walkin’ armor is called a magical armored soldier. It’s got a gem at its core, somewhere around the belly. Armor’s thicker there, naturally, so it’s gonna take a lot of elbow grease to break.”

As Bartholomeus explained this, it struck him again just how incredible the magical item was. A suit of armor sturdier than a human, yet also nimbler. If it was mass-produced, you could probably send them to war in place of humans.

Monica stared, unblinking, at the threads. “What if we sever the spirit it’s using as a power source from the armor?” she asked.

“The spirit’s basically a part of the magical item at this point. I don’t think we can cut it free,” explained Bartholomeus.

Using metal threads to make a suit of armor move like a human wasn’t nearly as easy as it sounded. A magical item needed a lot of mana just to move something at all. And to mimic the precise movements of a human? The instructions would be way too complicated. Essentially, it was impossible to pull off such a feat using magecraft formulae alone.

Bartholomeus recalled the designs he’d once stolen a peek at. “If I’m rememberin’ right, the spirit and soldier are synchronized. Meanin’ the threads and armor are part of the spirit, too.”

“I see…”

Monica reached for the spot where the threads originated and plucked out the ornamental frame and the orange gemstone embedded within.

The scattered pieces of armor and bundles of threads looked like entrails. It was an eerie sight, like a human corpse. Monica seemed unfazed, however. The way she observed the soldier was like a doctor performing an autopsy.

She looked young and unreliable, but she was still a Sage—one of the greatest mages in the kingdom.

Monica pulled threads out of the armor one after another, then spread them out at her feet. “This magical armored soldier can be roughly divided into four parts,” she said. “The armor, the metal threads, the ornamental frame, and the gemstone.”

What’s this? Bartholomeus was a bit surprised. He knew a thing or two about the soldier from having peeped at its blueprints, but Monica was just seeing one for the first time.

She continued, separating out the threads into smaller groups and inspecting them. “If I can find the connection formulae linking each part together…,” she said. “I, um, might be able to cut the spirit free without hurting it.”

The suit of armor had been filled to the brim with metal threads. The magecraft formulae on them were innumerable. Reading them all, understanding them, and locating the connection formulae was no easy task. And attacking only the connection formulae inside a moving suit of armor actively attacking you? There was absolutely no way.

As Bartholomeus opened his mouth to point that out, he heard the clanking of armor from deeper in the forest. Looking around, he found more magical armored soldiers headed their way.

And not just one—five.

“Hey, kid! Not good! Reinforcements are here!” he shouted.

Monica slowly looked up. Her youthful face showed no hint of distress or fear. Her right hand moved in a smooth motion, and instantly, the new soldiers all froze from the legs down. She’d used unchanted magecraft.

But even without their legs, they could still extend those metal threads to attack.

And sure enough, just as Bartholomeus had feared, threads emerged from their right arms, turning into whips holding swords.

“…Around the left ribs,” murmured Monica instead of chanting.

A moment later, five lightning arrows—thin, like twigs—shot out from Monica’s right toward the soldiers. Extending their right arms like that had created a gap between their breastplates and right shoulders. The bolts stabbed into those gaps, plunging inside the armor.

What was that…? wondered Bartholomeus

The lightning arrows had probably struck the soldiers exactly where Monica had just specified—the place the left rib cage would be on a human.

The five armored soldiers gave full-body spasms, much like a human would, and stopped in place.

Monica disengaged her ice magecraft. As the ice shattered, the soldiers fell to the ground.

Bartholomeus gulped, then asked, “What did you just do?”

With plodding, awkward footsteps, Monica trotted over to one of the fallen soldiers. Then she pointed at a cavity in the armor between the threads extending from its right shoulder and its torso.

“When the threads in its right arm stretch out really far, it creates an opening right here. That’s where I sent the lightning arrows.”

Monica removed the soldier’s helmet, then pulled out the metal threads. A single section of the bundles had black burn marks on it—these were the ones from the left rib cage area.

“The burned part…,” said Bartholomeus. “Is that the connection formula?”

“Yes,” said Monica. “Attack here, and it cuts off the coordination between the armor, threads, ornamental frame, and gemstone… That way, I can sever the imprisoned spirit from the armor.”

Without the connection, the soldier couldn’t absorb the spirit’s mana. Taking away that power source had disabled it.

Monica then pulled the ornamental frame and gemstone out and lowered her gaze. The stone glowed with a brilliant light, casting several rays along her robe.

“I did it.”

Then, nestled in her little hands, the gemstone popped out of its frame. It really had been that easy.

Bartholomeus stared at the stone. It had been glowing orange before, but now its light faded, and it took on a cloudy brown color.

And then a white, chain-like pattern circled around the cloudy gemstone.

“That’s…a sealing formula?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied. “I’m sealing it temporarily until I can release it properly…”

Monica went to the second suit of armor and pulled out its threads and gemstone, too. One by one, she cut the spirits out of the armor and sealed them.

She’s… But how…?

Bartholomeus smiled nervously and began to sweat.

The Silent Witch had taken almost no time at all to grasp the structure of the magical armored soldiers and locate the connection formula.

And on top of that, she’d disabled them while dealing as little damage as possible.

She’d frozen the soldiers’ lower bodies to stop them in their tracks because she knew it would make them stretch their arms out to attack her.

And then she’d fired lightning arrows into the gaps in their armor, surgically striking the connection formulae near the left rib cage.

I can’t believe my eyes… The Gem Mage’s artistry was incredible, but this is really something else. Is everyone in the Seven Sages like this?

Bartholomeus had given up. He’d thought it impossible. But this little witch had accomplished the task so easily.

As he watched her with fear and awe in his eyes, Monica finished the last seal and put the gemstone in her pocket, then scampered back over to him.

“Mr. Bartholomeus, I’m, um, finished… Hyah?!”

The Sage who had just shown off her incredible genius tripped over the remnants of the armor and went careening face-first into the ground.

She sniffed and started sobbing. In every other respect, she was still just a child.

This kid’s full of contradictions. And frankly, she worries me a little bit…

The Silent Witch Monica Everett was, without a doubt, an extraordinary genius. A mage of the highest class.

And yet she was careless, even oblivious, when it came to herself. It reminded Bartholomeus of his little sister back home. He scratched his black hair through his bandanna.

Monica got back up, then checked her pocket to make sure none of the stones had fallen out. Seeing that they were all unharmed, she put them back.

I have to find Mr. Louis and the others quickly and tell them about how the spirits are being used to power magical items…

She hadn’t released any of the spirits yet—instead, she’d sealed them. She didn’t want Galanis, the Flute of the False King, to take control of them again. If she kept them sealed for now, they wouldn’t exhaust themselves to the point of annihilation.

Bartholomeus adjusted his tool belt, then turned to Monica. “Come to think of it, is that Alexander guy here today?”

“Oh, um, actually… He’s taking a break…”

Bartholomew Alexander was Nero’s false name when he assumed human form. Unable to tell the man he was asleep for the winter, Monica stammered and mumbled until Bartholomeus took her numb, red hand.

“Your left hand must still hurt from that dragon’s curse, yeah? You sure you should be movin’ it around?”

“Oh, um, yes. It still stings a little… But it’s much better than before.” Monica awkwardly opened and closed her hand.

Bartholomeus frowned. “Yeah, you definitely worry me…”

“…Huh?”

“A kid like you with an injured arm shouldn’t have come out here alone. Do the Seven Sages always act like this?”

“Um, well…”

After becoming a Sage, Monica had holed up in her mountain cabin, engrossed in magecraft research and calculations. She didn’t know how the other Sages carried out their work, but she thought they were probably similar. They almost never worked together.

Bartholomeus sighed at her vague answer. “Well, whatever. Let’s just go… I’m coming, Rynny, my goddess. Wait for me.”

Monica followed behind Bartholomeus as he tromped along through the forest. But after just a few steps, he stopped, saw how she was trotting to keep up with him, and slowed down. He was a nice person.

Monica kept moving, careful not to get her feet tangled in the tree roots

“Y’know, I just remembered,” said Bartholomeus. “I finished that investigation you requested.”

“Huh?”

“I meant to come and tell you, but I was waiting for a good time to pretend to be a contractor so I could sneak into your school. Gee, and to think I almost forgot because of Rynny’s crisis!”

Monica tensed. The investigation he was talking about had to do with Peter Summs—aka Barry Oats—the shaman she’d encountered in Rehnberg.

As Peter died, he’d said the name of Monica’s father—and implied he was somehow related to his death.

“Before that old fogy came to Rehnberg, he was employed by Duke Clockford. But not exactly as a servant, you see. It seems he often visited the duke’s mansion, but nobody knows exactly what he was doin’ there.”

Duke Clockford, Second Prince Felix Arc Ridill’s grandfather, was the most influential man in the kingdom—the same man who’d offered Monica a deal on the first night of the new year.

The Abyss Shaman had told her that he’d once tried to investigate the traitorous shaman, only to be stopped by the duke’s intervention.

It seemed Duke Clockford really was the one pulling all the strings.

Monica gulped. “When, um, did the duke hire Peter Summs?” she asked.

“About eight years ago,” replied Bartholomeus.

Monica clenched her trembling hands and tried to shove back down her rising distress.

…That’s a little before Dad was executed, she thought. The execution was seven years ago. Peter Summs had started visiting Duke Clockford’s mansion only a little while before.

The more information Monica got, the more her suspicion turned to conviction.

Duke Clockford is very likely connected to Dad’s death.

The same went for Felix, the man’s grandson. It was a terrible thought, and it made her insides freeze up, like her blood had suddenly turned to ice water.

But why…? Why would he do such a thing?

Monica’s father, Venedict Reyn, had been a scholar. He’d stayed far away from politics. She doubted he and the duke had any direct connection. The one linking them was Peter Summs. And Peter knew about her father’s research.

Was his work inconvenient for someone? Is it related to the Black Grail in the message from Mr. Porter?

But any further thought on the matter would be only idle speculation. Monica still didn’t have enough to draw any conclusions.

She took a quiet, deep breath and thought about the person at the root of their current mission. Emanuel Darwin—the Gem Mage, a supporter of the second prince and someone well-acquainted with Duke Clockford.

She didn’t think he was linked to her father’s death, but if she could get him on her side, he might provide her with more information on the duke. But she was a terrible negotiator. As she was wondering if she had any chance of persuading him at all, she tripped over a tree root.

“Hurgh?!”

“Whoa, watch it!” Bartholomeus quickly grabbed her arm as she toppled forward. “Careful, kid.”

“R-right.”

She’d been tripping all day. But as she bowed in thanks to Bartholomeus, she suddenly remembered something.

Oh, right. I have to reward him for gathering that information.

Peter Summs’s past was something even the Abyss Mage hadn’t been able to pry into. It couldn’t have been easy for Bartholomeus.

“Um, Mr. Bartholomeus, about your payment…”

Before she could say she’d pay him once they were done here, he said, “Payment? Don’t need it.”

“Huh? Wait, but… What?”

“I mean, at first, I was like, ‘Doing a job for a Sage will set me up for life!’ But…” He scratched his beard and glanced at Monica. “I’ve got a little sister. So I tend to spoil kids your age.”

“Um, but your payment—”

“Kids are supposed to ask adults for help. You shouldn’t be asking me to work for you—you should be asking me to help you.”

Monica had asked Bernie for help a lot back at Minerva’s. But ever since becoming a Sage, she’d stopped relying on people like that.

After all, her colleague—who was over a decade older than she was—was the type of man to drag Monica off on dragon hunts.

So when requesting assistance from Bartholomeus, Monica had framed it as hiring him. She thought that was normal.

But even though she was a Sage, Bartholomeus treated her as a child and told her she should rely on the adults in her life.

Monica felt her lips twitching beneath her veil.

Bartholomeus mussed her bangs with his hand. “C’mon. Let me spoil you, all right?”

“Um, well. Thank you.”

Bartholomeus smiled. He really is kind, thought Monica.

As she awkwardly played with her fingers, a thought struck Bartholomeus. “Right! I don’t need payment, but you’re still gonna help me out with Rynny! I won’t yield on that!”

“Oh, yes. Right…”

“And I’ll be cheering you on, too! So that things go well for you and the prince!”

Monica considered this. He must mean he’ll help make my bodyguard mission a success. He’s such a nice person, she thought, moved.

Bartholomeus stepped up to her, suddenly looking desperate. “So, I was thinking. When you introduce me to Rynny, could you tell her I’m very kind and very cool and just all-around wonderful?”

But just then, a gust of wind cut off his words.

As Monica shivered, she noticed something. That wasn’t the north wind. This wind was full of malice. It was sent from above to crush those on the ground.

Monica instantly put up a defensive barrier.

The hemispherical barrier appeared over the two of them as invisible blades of wind slashed down.

As the dead leaves all around them fluttered up into the air, Monica saw her—a beautiful blond maid standing, feet together, atop a tree directly in front of them.

“Miss…Ryn…,” murmured Monica.

The wind spirit Rynzbelfeid, her expression impassive, set upon Monica with her blades of air.

Her hostile gusts battered them, clearly meant to kill.