City of Witches Chapter 231

Darkness that has now been forgotten even in existence, thanks to various administrative maneuvers and magical devices.

In the underground of Seoul, within an abandoned drainage tunnel, Della let out a hollow laugh.

"If people knew I'd ended up like this... there'd be plenty who'd be delighted..."

That was certainly true.

To obtain what she desired, she had taken things without regard for means or methods, so the grudges against her would likely be as abundant as the things she had acquired.

Seeing this wretched state, they would roar with laughter.

They would say that Della, the once-greedy Witch of Embers, was now groaning in pain, clinging to life like a worm.

Della's appearance was truly pitiful.

Her red hair, which had always boasted a vivid luster, looked as if it had been covered in ash, matted with blood and dust.

Her limbs were densely pierced with white spears, pinned to the wall like a taxidermied insect.

Due to repeatedly vomiting blood, a foul stench mixed with the thick smell of blood rose from around her mouth and the chest area of her dress.

Pain?

At this point, she couldn't even feel such a thing anymore.

Della was clearly a Great Witch of the 20th Hierarchy.

She also had abundant combat experience, so she was confident she could crush most opponents without much effort.

However.

As her current state showed, Della had been miserably defeated by the thirty-two White Knights Paola had replicated.

The White Knights, replicated using an Enemy Knight as the base, possessed four 'eyes'.

With that level of ability, even if there were 32, 100, or even more, they wouldn't have been a match for Della.

But the White Knights were different from ordinary Homunculi.

Their movements were far more systematic and refined, and they hunted Della down as if possessing high intelligence.

The biggest contributor to Della's disadvantage was the white spears held by the White Knights.

The white spears possessed by the White Knights were linked to the distortion ability of the 'Red Branch' and had even replicated its unique ability.

Because of this, Della had to expend excessive power to deal with each one individually, and she was ultimately captured after incinerating twenty White Knights.

-Tap tap tap

A person walked in, their footsteps echoing through the wide cavern.

The three White Knights that had been standing guard, watching Della, cleared the way, and the 'Cowardly Witch' Paola revealed herself.

In Paola's hand was a bottle with a long, narrow spout.

"Drink."

"........"

"If you don't drink, you won't last a day before you die."

Della glared at Paola with sharp eyes before opening her mouth.

As she clamped her mouth onto the spout of the bottle pushed against her lips, a disgustingly foul-tasting liquid flowed into her mouth.

It contained various medicines to restore her Spirit Body.

The reason Della, whose entire body was densely pierced by spears, could remain alive for this long was also thanks to this medicine Paola brought her every day.

Knowing this, Della had no choice but to obediently take the medicine, even though she didn't know what scheme Paola was harboring.

"...Paola."

She stopped Paola, who was turning to leave after administering all the medicine.

Paola looked back with indifferent eyes.

The unmarred side of her face was perfectly expressionless.

Della, pinned to the cavern wall for 24 hours, had been able to watch everything Paola was doing.

Paola had used the replicated 'Dagon's Flute' to massacre humans without even deploying a Hidden Boundary, and had collected a massive amount of magic power from it.

Della was also a high-Hierarchy Witch.

She could tell what the Magic Circle engraved across the entire cavern and the Red Branch embedded at its center were preliminary work for.

So she advised.

"Even now, stop."

"Meaningless words. As expected."

Paola turned her back as if it wasn't even worth listening to.

"Paola!"

Della called Paola again with a voice hoarse and cracking from exhaustion.

At her desperate call, Paola's eyelashes fluttered slightly as she faced Della once more.

"You, you know what you're trying to do now, right?"

"I'm securing a massive amount of magic power."

"It's mass murder, isn't it?"

Seoul boasts an enormous population density.

What would happen if Paola completed her order of knights and set them loose to rampage?

Could the Witches in Seoul stop them?

Before the slow-moving Duke Keter took action, unprecedented casualties would occur.

Even Della, who possessed the typical Witch-like sense of superiority, knew that was wrong.

The most tragic fact was that this horrific event would be carried out by the hand of her friend, Paola.

Wasn't that why she had tried to end Paola's life with her own hands?

"So what?"

But Paola didn't even blink.

She was already broken.

Della had suspected it, but she hadn't known it was this bad...

"Even if you can use the distortion effect to resurrect the dead as you claim, you'll die by Keter's hand. Your disciple too! Cough! Cough!"

Della, desperately shouting to persuade Paola, coughed as if her whole body would shatter.

Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth.

Paola watched Della like that, then wiped the corner of her mouth with her own sleeve.

"Della, Della, foolish Della."

Paola spoke as if singing.

It felt like mockery, so Della sharply turned her head away to avoid the touch.

"........"

"Duke Keter won't move."

"How can you know that..."

"The 'Witch of Whispers' told me."

Della's eyes widened.

"You really trust that swindler?"

"I trust her. She's more trustworthy than Della, who pretended to be a friend and tried to stab me in the back."

"She's a liar. She won't care at all what happens to you!"

"Don't speak so loudly. The sound echoes and gives me a headache."

With a gloomy expression, Paola lightly covered Della's mouth.

Della was about to say something but resigned herself deep in her heart.

If she had mingled words with that female snake, it was already too late.

The poison the 'Witch of Whispers' instills is a deadly toxin with no antidote.

It must have seeped cleverly into every corner of Paola's broken heart.

At this point, persuasion from Della, who had once betrayed and become Paola's enemy, wouldn't work.

"So... why are you keeping me like this? If you can't even trust me, you could just kill me."

Her half-resigned heart dragged out words she normally wouldn't say.

It was partly her true feelings.

Even if she didn't want to die, being pierced by spears and pinned to the wall all day was torment.

In the sunless underground, she couldn't even tell how many days had passed, and she felt her mind slowly fraying."No matter how much you whine, I can't let you go. You know all my plans. You'd definitely interfere."

"...At least let me clean my body. I feel so disgusted I could die."

Paola snapped her fingers.

Simultaneously, all the filth on Della's body peeled away.

"You should have asked earlier. I left it because I thought you liked it."

"...You call that an excuse."

Without listening to any more of Della's complaints, Paola disappeared among the White Knights.

Suddenly stopping, Paola spoke without looking back.

"I won't kill you."

Her final words echoed several times within the large cavern.

"Because I still consider you a friend."

'In the future, you will learn to handle the Contract of the King of All Maladies. However, when wielding swords and spears to face enemies, there will inevitably be times when you confront them in ambiguous intervals. What you need then is the skill of Fist and Foot.'

With that explanation, Eloa did not let Siwoo hold a weapon.

She didn't even allow him to create the armor he always used.

Sparring bare-handed, solely in a state of Body Enhancement through magic power.

Yet, the recent training goal was to increase proficiency in Foot Technique.

So that, like Eloa, he could use Foot Technique freely in any posture, at any time.

"Hap!"

After exchanging a few attacks, Siwoo found an opening in Eloa's defense.

He immediately lowered his body to knee-height and charged in as if pouncing.

A technique aimed at uprooting the opponent's lower body from the ground—a tackle.

Though called a tackle, Siwoo was already adept at handling Body Enhancement through magic power.

Moreover, he utilized Foot Technique at the precise moments his strength peaked to control its intensity.

It was a technique so fast it would be invisible to the average human eye and powerful enough to topple an elephant.

Unfortunately, however, Siwoo's tackle did not bring Eloa to the ground.

"Grhuk!"

Eloa, sidestepping like a bullfighter, slid her leg sideways between Siwoo's legs.

With his balance completely lost due to the perfectly timed leg sweep, Siwoo's weight shifted forward, about to fall. Tiferet, grabbing the back of his neck, effortlessly slammed him into the floor.

To be precise, she lifted him slightly just as his back was about to hit the ground to mitigate the impact, but...

-Thud!

Even that alone caused cracks to spiderweb across the cement.

That made it the 50th knockdown.

Eloa clicked her tongue.

"Charging in like an angry wild boar like that, will it work? Your movements are too big and full of unnecessary flourishes."

"Haa, haa, isn't calling me a wild boar a bit much?"

Siwoo rubbed the back of his head as he sat up.

"Looking only forward, charging recklessly, and collapsing on your own. Exactly like a wild boar. Isn't that right?"

When Eloa's teasing retort came, Siwoo scratched his head.

Had they grown that close through repeated training and sparring?

Eloa had started speaking to Siwoo in a teasing manner quite often.

Thanks to her relaxed attitude, Siwoo also occasionally grumbled and complained.

"You just told me a little while ago not to shrink back timidly but to move big and powerfully."

"That didn't mean a charge full of openings. Didn't I teach you that power doesn't only come from big movements?"

"This is really... difficult."

"The only easy thing in the world is lying down during training. Here, get up."

Eloa extended her hand, and Siwoo took it, pulling himself up straight.

A month had passed since training began, and full-fledged autumn had arrived.

Compared to the early days when he was sent flying with each of Eloa's moves, there had been remarkable progress, but no further advancement seemed visible.

Then again, she was a veteran warrior who had survived countless real battles. Expecting to catch up with just a few days of training might be a thought lacking in conscience.

"You still intend to continue, I suppose?"

"Yes, it feels a bit unsatisfying to end it like this."

Siwoo felt a great wall before Eloa.

A wall so thick it seemed insurmountable.

But that didn't immediately lead to despair or giving up.

Such things didn't suit his temperament either.

Just attempting to climb a high wall brings its own sense of achievement.

Siwoo knew that if he replaced time for despair with effort and focus, at least he wouldn't be wasting his days.

And when he had a purpose for learning, his concentration never wavered.

After sparring like this and returning home, he often spent time watching things like UFC matches.

The technique Eloa called the 'wild boar tackle' was actually an adaptation of something he saw in yesterday's match.

"A desire for improvement is always good. If you don't settle for your current state and strive diligently, you will surely achieve results."

Eloa looked at Siwoo with an almost imperceptible hint of pride.

She had known he possessed unusual endurance even before.

But she hadn't imagined he was someone with such tenacity and persistence, continuing to charge forward even after being struck for over ten hours a day.

It was an extreme prejudice, but Siwoo's appearance was closer to that of a pale-faced scholar.

"I have something to tell you about your previous attack."

"Ah, yes."

Eloa straightened her slightly disheveled windbreaker and clasped her hands behind her back.

"Do you know the most dangerous moment in combat?"

"Regarding magic combat? Or are you talking about the physical combat we're doing?"

"A statement encompassing both."

When Siwoo remained silent for a while, Eloa opened her mouth.

"It's the moment of attack."

"Attack?"

"Your field of vision narrows, and your mind becomes filled with only one thought. If you think only of offense, openings are bound to appear. So..."

Placing a hand on her hip, Eloa pointed a finger with a click.

"Always remember during combat. See broadly, see deeply."

In truth, training with Duke Tiferet had a slight element of Zen-like dialogue.

What she taught was closer to a philosophy of mind rather than formulas for using the body.

"Could you teach me in a bit more detail? For example, telling me to take this posture, or that attacking in this way reduces openings."

"Creating a mold and forcing yourself into it is not good. The most natural is the best. Like flowing water. All I can do is help you not divert the watercourse uphill. The rest is up to you."

"I understand. I'll try it first."

It was still like a puzzling riddle.

But he didn't doubt her.No one knew better than Siwoo himself that his skills were improving by leaps and bounds each day.

"Then I'll be going again."

"Go ahead."

Eloa allowed a faint smile to grace her lips as she watched Siwoo reignite his fighting spirit.

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This is Eloah Tiferet, drawn by PCHN.

I really love the look of her in a windbreaker and tracksuit, and the color palette is fantastic!

Personally, I adore this sort of color-graded, almost filter-like aesthetic, and this one fits my taste perfectly!

Especially those weary, exhausted-looking eyes... they're truly art.

Thank you so much for the wonderful fan art!!