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defeat a demon, but we need a strategy that doesn’t scream chaos…”

After a night spent battling a demon with Lucia, a sudden uproar erupted outside. Rather than a protest, it felt more like a chaotic frenzy.

It was a collective movement sparked by the magicians.

But upon deeper reflection, something felt off.

Collective action, regardless of its cause, usually has a clear direction. Whether it’s fueled by anger or demands, it implies there’s something everyone can relate to.

From that perspective, the actions of the magicians right now make no sense.

It seems more like a panicked crowd haphazardly rushing out than an actual protest or riot. It gave off the vibe of a mob swept away by the atmosphere—disorderly and lacking structure.

Honestly, I’m still not entirely sure how the magicians ended up in such a frenzy…

“What happened over the past two days?”

“I figured you might know something, Colonel.”

“Well… let’s move to a more private setting first.”

For some reason, I felt like I might finally get some answers today.

—

Episode 12 – The World’s Strongest Magician

—

“It’s all due to rumors.”

Inside a now-quiet building, while the internal security and military police were on edge, we made our way to a small office.

Francesca, after pulling the curtains closed, spoke with a subdued voice, with a tone cracking slightly like an old record.

“Rumors?”

“A few magicians working in the nearby city reported their observations from the early dawn of the day before.”

Even as she maintained her usually elegant demeanor, for once, Francesca looked worn out.

“Gunfire, monstrous roars, shouting. The clashing of heavy weapons and shockwaves rising from below. Distinct sensations of divinity and ominous energy. Those were the common experiences reported by mages from last evening to dawn.”

“……”

“And at the break of dawn, a group of priests emerged from the underground.”

Her posture was rigid, chin lifted, with fatigue seeping through despite cups of caffeine.

“Do you happen to know anything about this?”

I leaned back, letting the words slip out.

“Knowing about it isn’t the problem.”

I recounted everything that had transpired the previous night to Francesca.

The demon encountered in the underground cavern, Lucia’s grand exorcism, the summoned Muspel from hell, the sudden appearance of the necromancer, the arrival of Saint Veronica and the Inquisition at a critical moment, the fierce battle, the necromancer’s death, and the buried demon.

Francesca listened intently with a serious expression.

“Ah… so that’s how things went down?”

“Exactly.”

“A demon and a necromancer… this isn’t just ordinary business.”

According to her, the magicians in the Magic Tower that night detected the battle occurring underground.

The intensity of the fight had even reached ordinary citizens, making it inevitable for mages with heightened sensitivity to detect suspicious movements below.

The issue was that the mages had seen a rush of priests emerging from the underground just as dawn was breaking.

Given that imperial combat magicians and magic department investigators had been killed, and the duke had permitted the Inquisition’s investigation, the chaos in the northern region was palpable. For magicians, witnessing priests flooding out of the sewers would have likely painted them as conspirators.

“No wonder the Inquisition’s forces are suddenly on the move. You can’t imagine how shaky the tower’s atmosphere has become. The mages who first witnessed it said the ground was heaving, thinking the demonkin were launching an attack from below.”

“Is it really that severe?”

“It felt like walking on thin ice.”

Francesca muttered lightly, pointing at the door.

“Did you see the mages rushing out of the building earlier?”

“Yeah, I saw them.”

“They’re the mages dispatched to the north. Elder members of their faction. Elders? Executives? I’m not too sure how to explain it, but they’re definitely in positions of authority.”

Francesca explained that the elders had come to clarify the rumors spreading from the mages who witnessed the events last night.

Of course, it wasn’t just them—higher-ups, curious mages, those anxious enough to visit, and even random mages were flocking here, making it a complete mess.

“They were all so startled, unsure of what to do. Some said they needed to flee to a safe place, others insisted they should return to the Magic Tower. There were even proposals to call the combat battalion from the front lines here, demanding the empire conduct a thorough investigation.”

“That sounds completely unrealistic.”

“They probably know that deep down. But what can they do? It’s scary; they feel compelled to act.”

Suspicion ran rampant.

In the end, while these concerns might seem baseless, in some sense, this was the worst-case scenario.

There was no concrete evidence of a necromancer’s involvement. While there were witnesses, all who could testify were priests from the Cult. The mages of the Magic Tower, distrusting the Cult, were likely to dismiss their claims no matter what. Furthermore, they would probably cling to the quest for evidence, turning the suspicion into an ongoing spiral.

Francesca wasn’t oblivious to this reality.

“I understand the situation. Then from now on, we need to find concrete evidence to calm everyone down.”

Her legs crossed elegantly as she rested her chin on her hand, settling into the task.

“A necromancer would likely have been a former magician. Exiled? Or perhaps from the Ivory Tower? Maybe even from the Magic Tower. Any defining characteristics? Like what kind of magic they used, or particular colors of their magic power?”

“I only recall the green color of their magic, aside from the curse they cast on Lucia.”

“Green, huh? There are indeed a number of registered magicians in the Magic Tower who can wield green magic…”

Tap. Tap.

Her slender fingers rhythmically drummed on the table.

The quick pace mirrored her anxious thoughts, and time continued to tick away without showing signs of slowing down.

Francesca was struggling to mask her complex emotions. After all, everyone knew most necromancers had originated from the ranks of magicians. A necromancer was, for all intents and purposes, a disgrace within the magical community, treated as a terrorist wherever they went.

“A curse, that means a practitioner of sorcery, right? Since it’s closely related to voodoo practices, that’s not an unreasonable guess. The necromancer said their soul was consumed by a demon, right?”

“Yeah, they turned into something like a mummy.”

“Hmmm… I don’t know much about necromancers, but that seems a bit off. Even if it’s a demon, as a party in the contract, they shouldn’t directly absorb the necromancer’s soul.”

“Well, maybe they were tricked into a fraudulent contract.”

As I shrugged, Francesca’s eyes narrowed.

“Right now, the only effective way to calm this chaos is to secure the necromancer’s corpse. The better method would be to capture the demon directly, but…”

Her voice trailed off, laden with fatigue.

“Both options seem impractically difficult.”

Whether the demon is alive or dead was second to the challenge of retrieving it from below, buried tens or possibly hundreds of meters underground.

Recovering the necromancer’s body, which lay next to it, wouldn’t be any easier.

“Using magicians would make it easy to…”

“Isn’t there a way to dig deeper?”

“Well, it depends on the situation at the scene, but in this freezing winter, with everyone bundled up and frostbite patients emerging, it’s pretty impossible. It won’t be a job done in just an hour or two. Above all, there’s a risk of surrounding buildings or the underground sewers collapsing.”

Francesca began to ponder how to calm the situation, combining her magical knowledge, the current conditions, and the information she had gathered so far.

I sat silently across from her, listening to her story, then tossed out a question.

“What about the necromancer’s corpse?”

“Yes, Colonel.”

“Do we need to bring the entire corpse?”

It was a question about whether a complete body was necessary for examination or performance to convince people.

Francesca shook her head.

“No. If we want to be precise, having a complete corpse would facilitate the autopsy, but we don’t need a whole one as evidence.”

“Then how about a piece this size?”

“What do you mean by that?”

I grabbed my wrist with my left hand.

“A wrist this size.”

“Hmm….”

Francesca narrowed her eyes. After a significant pause, contemplating the size, she suddenly spoke.

“Well, if it’s that size, I think we can do a few tests.”

“Really? Then we don’t have to dig up the ground and call in the magicians.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

I scratched my head, feeling awkward as I replied.

“I brought the wrist.”

“What wrist are you talking about?”

“The necromancer’s wrist.”

“…Where on earth did you get that?”

“I cut it off the corpse.”

“…….”

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

Francesca stared at me as if I were a lunatic, but I couldn’t care less.

Good things are good, right?

*

The necromancer’s wrist, tucked deep inside a hotel freezer, was delivered to Francesca.

Interestingly enough, the wrist showed no signs of decay. Given that it was winter and kept in the freezer, it was quite a strange phenomenon.

“I’m gathering the executives from the faction and the Secretariat staff to observe the examination. The Imperial Ministry of Magic will conduct it.”

“What about the Inquisition? Won’t there be some complaints since they’re part of the joint investigation team?”

“If it’s revealed that it’s the necromancer’s corpse, there won’t be any doubts left.”

As she said, presenting the necromancer’s wrist as evidence had a clear effect.

The examination conducted under the supervision of the magicians from the Magic Tower and the clerics from the cult was successfully concluded.

The Imperial Ministry of Magic mobilized newly acquired equipment brought from Petrogard, detecting a significant amount of magic power related to dark magic from the necromancer’s wrist.

From that moment, the magicians who had been babbling about the Inquisition’s conspiracy were silenced.

Necromancers, along with exiles, were entities that were not forgiven in magical society.

If some weird rumor had stuck from spouting nonsense, the public security from the Magic Tower might have dissected me for a mental sanitation check, or I could end up trapped forever in the notoriously infamous crystal prison.

Anyway, as the situation shifted to the Inquisition, I resolved to engage in something more productive instead of calculating the movements of panicking magicians.

“About that necromancer, how was his identity determined?”

“No, it’s difficult to collect fingerprints since it’s in a mummified state. The Ministry is seeking help from other investigative agencies, but both fingerprint analysis and magic residue detection seem tricky.”

Unfortunately, identifying the necromancer appeared to be a distant possibility.

As expected in a town with outdated forensic technology, the Ministry couldn’t gather mummified fingerprints, and securing the magic residues left in the body was also unsuccessful.

I heard that a significant portion of its magic had deteriorated, making it impossible to yield results even if tests were conducted.

For now, this part would be left to the imperial investigative agency.

“How about having some faith and waiting? They are dependable people when it comes to getting things done.”

“I know the Empire’s capabilities well, but looking at their recent actions, it’s hard to trust….”

“Still, give it a chance. You never know—they might find something you overlooked.”

Francesca, one of the leaders among the dispatched personnel from the Magic Tower, suggested putting faith in the Ministry’s capabilities, and I decided to trust it since similar sentiments were voiced from the cult side as well.

“Veronica, why do you suggest leaving it to the Imperial Ministry?”

Veronica’s voice came through the receiver, sharp and curt.

– “Then what else can the Colonel do other than trust the Ministry? You can’t just sit around doing nothing, can you?”

“No, but it’s just that….”

– “Shut up and come to the cathedral. I told you to rest, but are you working outside again? Or when did you even sneak out? According to the knights at the main gate, they’ve never seen you leave.”

With both sides coming at me like this, I felt there was nothing I could do.

– “Come and get treated. What if something weird happens again because you left it for too long? People are so reckless.”

In the end, I was left with no choice but to hand over the necromancer’s wrist to the Imperial Ministry.

Though trust was shaky, there were no other options at present, so this was the best course.

Thus, I left behind the anxious magicians stirred by the necromancer’s appearance, the suspicious clerics observing closely, and the soldiers revealing their uncomfortable moods, as if burdened by a bomb ready to explode.

I returned to the Cathedral of Saint Basil, where Lucia and Veronica awaited.

*

The cathedral remained still as if nothing had happened.

Believers came to pray, priests celebrated masses, monks cleaned the courtyard, and knights stood guard.

It was the usual scenery, but today, the weight of each step leading to the cathedral felt heavier than usual.

“…….”

After slowly climbing the stairs, I opened the cathedral door.

The priest standing near the door recognized me and greeted me warmly.

“Hello, Brother. Where have you been?”

“Oh, yes. I was busy with something….”

“I see. Please come inside.”

The priest smiled and gestured toward the hallway.

“Saint Veronica is waiting for you.”

I took a subtle deep breath as I watched the priest guide the way.

The corridor, lined with pristine white marble, felt like the path leading to a slaughterhouse, as I managed to calm my fluttering heart and shuffled forward, unable to take my eyes off it.

 

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