City of Witches Chapter 59

"Assistant, take Odette and run. I'll hold them off here."

Odil stepped forward, shielding Siwoo and Odette.

It was by no means a lighthearted boast or arrogance.

She understood the danger of that Homunculus even better than Siwoo did.

A giant cat leisurely climbing down a tree.

The sight of it blinking its three large eyes and casually scaling the tree trunk was grotesque, as if defying the laws of physics.

The sense of reality evaporated at the sight of the cat landing on the ground with a nimble, weightless movement.

"What are you doing? I said run, quickly!"

Even amidst Odil's urgent urging, Siwoo calmly assessed the situation.

Separately, he gave precise instructions to Odette.

"Lady Odette, is the music box operational?"

"Ah! Yes... yes!"

Odette, who had been fidgeting with her skirt hem for some reason, quickly produced the music box.

Then, looking up at Siwoo with apparent anxiety, she spoke.

"Assistant... It's okay if you run away! I can't leave my sister behind!"

"No! Odette! I told you, while I'm holding them off, you need to call for help!"

"I-I'll do it now!"

As expected, Odette was slower to assess the situation than Odil.

Whether it was because she had just woken up or because her personality was inherently less bold, she immediately began muttering an incantation upon hearing Odil's instruction.

The only fortunate thing was that the Homunculus before them was merely observing their commotion.

Eyes spinning round and round with a creepy gaze, as if watching something interesting.

Under that unsettling surveillance, Odette's Magic bloomed.

A massive string of characters began stretching toward the sky.

It was a Magic Formula one dimension higher than the Skyboard Siwoo had used.

It was an emergency distress signal meant to pierce through the dense trees of Latifundium, light up the sky, and call for help.

"Done, sister!"

"Good! Now let's run! ...Ugh!"

And the moment Odette activated her Magic, as if reacting to the Magical Power, the monster cat moved.

A tail slicing through the air like a chain-scythe.

Its speed was so ferociously swift it was hard to properly discern with the naked eye.

As if all the hunting until now had been mere play.

-Crash!

The Barrier Odil had preemptively deployed.

'Song of Repose' was shattered all too easily.

Odil's eyes widened amidst the scattered fragments of the Magic Circle.

"It... broke in one hit?"

Odil was astonished to see a Barrier, with hardness sufficient to stop anti-tank missiles, being torn apart like tissue paper.

Even at that moment, Siwoo was looking up at the sky.

Because something had felt off from earlier.

The distress call Odette had launched.

The string of characters, which had grown larger as it ascended, collided with the dense black shadow blanketing Latifundium.

-Crack!

And then.

A sound like shattering glass was heard.

The moment the brilliantly glowing purple string touched the shadow, the black shadow, as if alive, interfered with the Magic.

The shattered string broke into thousands of fragments, raining down over Siwoo's head.

"Ah..."

Odette blankly watched the scene of her last hope being destroyed.

The distress signal had failed.

Odil's defensive shield was cleanly sliced off by the monster's tail.

None of their attacks were effective against the enemy.

Their thoughts, unable to keep up with the sudden overturning of their peaceful daily life, finally shifted.

A bit late, but the three of them simultaneously shared the same sentiment.

Death.

The two letters, which had felt like nothing more than a bad joke, flashed vividly across their minds.

At that moment, what caught Siwoo's eye was the river of Magical Power behind the Homunculus, responsible for supplying Latifundium with magic power.

"Lady Odette, please protect Lady Odil. I'll create a smokescreen."

While everyone trembled with an eerie premonition, Siwoo was the first to move into action.

It was a strange feeling.

Death was clearly right before them, yet somehow, as if a thin membrane in his head had disappeared, his thoughts shifted rapidly.

Adrenaline, pleasantly coursing through his blood vessels, supported his trembling legs instead.

He runs.

Siwoo began sprinting toward the monster like a fired arrow.

"Ass... Assistant!"

Odette's desperate attempt to grab him was left far behind in an instant.

"What are you doing!"

Siwoo even passed Odil, who was facing off against the Homunculus, and began running toward the monster.

"Kyuu?"

As if the prey running toward it was unexpected, the Homunculus's head turned at a right angle.

Even while sprinting, Siwoo tirelessly analyzed the Homunculus.

The combat methods of the Homunculus observed so far.

The Spear of Shadow that had attacked the initial research building.

From when the shadows began gathering to their projection, roughly 5 seconds.

The maximum number projected simultaneously was three.

The interval between attacks was quite long.

However, judging by the monster's leisurely attitude, it had to be considered that it wasn't using its full Combat Power.

Their speed was so fast the eye couldn't follow, and their power was strong enough to snap giant trees dozens of meters around.

It was clear that none of the Magic Siwoo possessed could counter them.

Next, the tail.

The tail, with a scythe at its end, swung like a chain-scythe, making its attack range difficult to gauge.

Though its power seemed unremarkable at a glance, seeing it shatter Odil's Barrier in one hit left no doubt that a direct hit would tear a body to pieces.

Finally, the mysterious black shadow.

It was clear it wasn't simply hardened shadow.

The shadow, which had dominated the air like smog from some point, had shattered Odette's rescue Spell Formula.

Therefore, it had to be assumed there were effectively no means of communicating with the outside.

The Latifundium area had become that monster's hunting ground.

The distance between Siwoo, who continued his charge, and the Homunculus, who blankly watched him, was now less than 20 meters.

And, rendering Siwoo's desperate wish meaningless, the Homunculus began to move.

"Kiiiiiiik!"

With a bizarre cry befitting a giant insect, the tail writhing in the air began to lash out like a venomous snake targeting its prey.

Siwoo, who had been calmly timing it, stretched his arm into the air.

Latifundium, where the atmospheric Magical Power was richer than anywhere in Gehenna.

A trump card usable only because of this place.

Just once was enough.

The important thing was timing.

"Bloom!"

The tail, aimed at Siwoo like a pistol muzzle, swung with a menacing sound.And at that moment, Siwoo's body sprang diagonally like a tightly coiled spring.

-Whhoooosh!

The tail that barely grazed past his toes tearing up the road surface seemed to move in slow motion.

Leaping over the head of a monster over 3 meters tall wasn't due to some superhuman strength unleashed in a moment of death.

It was the 'Water Lizard Step' that Odil had demonstrated before leaving yesterday.

He used the Spell Formula that concentrates magic power in the toes to enhance mobility, gathering every last scrap of magic power he could scrape together for that single leap.

"Ah...!"

He had jumped three stories high with his bare body.

The wind whistling past his ears.

The anxiety of having nothing to step on beneath his feet was quickly diluted by an even greater unease.

The fear of falling.

Watching the ground approach in real-time, Siwoo braced for impact.

"Gah!"

The place where Siwoo, who had flown over 20 meters in an instant, landed was the riverside of the Magical Power river.

In the urgent moment of landing, he couldn't pour any magic power into cushioning the fall at all, so Siwoo, who bounced off the ground like a skipping stone, felt a pain as if his ankle would snap.

It was fortunate it was a parabolic fall; if it had been a vertical drop, he would have either died on the spot or been killed by the cat after losing consciousness.

The slow gaze of the monstrous cat, chasing its vanished prey, quickly found Siwoo.

-Kiiiiing!

The cat, gathering shadows around it to form a spear, intent on punishing the insolent prey that had jumped over its head.

Suppressing the pain, Siwoo stretched his arm toward the river right before him.

He ignored the throbbing pain.

Limping, he ran with his hand dipped in the water and shouted.

"Bloom!"

Risking his life to reach the river was for this very moment.

The concentration of abundant Magical Power absorbed through his fingertips rivaled the high-grade Magical Power Siwoo used for his Magic Research.

One deployment.

One transformation.

And one transmutation.

Just before the Spear of Shadow could skewer Siwoo.

The river water swelled as if exploding.

-Shoooosh!

"Kiiiik?"

The magic power undulating in the river all writhed at once, transforming into a dense fog that made it hard to see even an inch ahead.

It was an excellent smokescreen.

Unable to properly discern the situation, the Homunculus launched the three spears it had prepared earlier toward the riverside where Siwoo had been standing.

The sound of something exploding and the sound of a mound of dirt that had shot up to the sky falling into the river water.

"Kik?"

By the time the fog had blown away enough for a clear view, both Siwoo and the Twins had already disappeared somewhere.

"Are you okay, Assistant?"

"Grrrugh..."

As it was a moment of quick thinking, Siwoo reuniting with the Twins was close to a miracle.

If the Twins hadn't literally run to find Siwoo in the complete obscurity, they might have been scattered apart.

Fortunately, the Twins who found Siwoo immediately used Water Lizard Step to create distance from the Homunculus.

The place they hid in was a hollow in a tree with a split base.

A place where mushroom clusters resembling button mushrooms thrived.

"Let me see...!"

Odette rolled up Siwoo's pants to examine the injured area.

His ankle was completely wrecked.

Seeing it swollen to about 1.5 times its size in that short time, she thought the bone might be cracked.

"Why did you do something so reckless!"

Odil scolded Siwoo with tears welling up in her eyes.

"If we had kept confronting it head-on... we would have all died in the end."

Siwoo's situational judgment was accurate.

Odette's distress signal didn't work properly, and their attacks were nullified.

Even if the Twins kept deploying Barriers, it would only buy time.

The moment their magic power ran out, they would have become the Homunculus's prey without any protection.

"I thought if the music box could prevent magic detection, then just blinding it would be enough."

"But it was still too dangerous! You scared me to death."

"Right, I really thought you were going to be cut in half, Assistant."

Odil grabbed Siwoo by the collar, shaking him while whispering rapidly, and Odette chimed in from the side.

The Twins, who had watched Siwoo running from behind, understood what kind of perilous line he had crossed.

Jumping to avoid a tail swung with split-second timing...

Easier said than done. Jumping too late or too early would have meant a truly desperate situation where being cut in half wouldn't even be something to complain about.

It was essentially a rhythm game with his life on the line.

"But at least we bought some time like this."

"Stay still, I'll treat you first."

Warm light poured onto Siwoo's swollen ankle.

"You'll be able to walk, but you shouldn't run or jump like before. Honestly, it's my first time using this on an injured person, so I'm not sure."

"I'll be careful."

Even though it sounded like a quack's words, it should be okay.

Fundamentally, recovery through Magic works by promoting cell division to dramatically enhance the body's natural healing ability.

"What do we do now? Should we just keep hiding like this?"

As soon as Siwoo's first aid was finished, Odette trembled as if uneasy.

And then.

-Crash! Rumble!

A deafening roar shaking the ground came from not too far away.

Soon after, the vibration from a giant tree falling transmitted directly through their buttocks.

The Homunculus, having lost its toy right before its eyes, was indiscriminately attacking the surroundings to find them.

"There are two options."

Siwoo picked up a twig rolling around in the hollow.

Since it was filled with soft soil for mushroom cultivation, it could serve as a makeshift chalkboard.

"One is to stay quiet like this, pray, and wait until another Witch notices the anomaly and finds this place."

As long as the music box is active, their location won't be revealed until they are visually identified.

Using that chance to play a deadly game of hide-and-seek.

In other words, the prayer meta.

However, the possibility of being hit by the Homunculus's blind, indiscriminate barrage of attacks cannot be ruled out.

The downside of the prayer meta is that 'if your luck is bad, you're fucked.'

Odil also seemed to know this, wearing a serious expression.

"And the other one?"

"We catch that bastard."

A Word from the Author (Author's Note)

Lately, I've been making a lot of typos, and there's a reason for it.

I used to serialize using a computer,

but I got the feeling most readers would be reading my work on their phones.

So, to consider the readers' readability, I started writing through my phone screen.

This did improve readability a bit, but the problem is the text is so small that I can't easily spot my typos anymore lol...

It'll probably get better as I get more used to it.In that sense, I would like to once again express my gratitude to all the readers who have helped spot typos.