Chapter 120 - Wizard May Cry (6)

Yoannis's hideout.

Mia, a black-haired, feminine-looking pretty-boy Vampire, was checking an article about a certain incident on his tablet.

It was an article about the Spontaneous Massacre Incident, essentially a murder case caused by an invisible monster.

"...This is rather out of nowhere. Could the owner of <De Vermis Mysteriis> have done it to lure you out, Master?"

Yoannis had been leaning back on the sofa, writing a post on [Mephisto Market] with his phone, when he lowered it.

"Hmmm~."

Brushing back his blond hair, he thought of Kim Yo-han, the owner of the Grimoire <De Vermis Mysteriis>.

"No. I don't think he'd go out of his way to do something like this."

"Hmm~ You sound quite certain."

Mia cocked his head, looking surprised, and Yoannis gave a light laugh.

"We aren't exactly friendly, but there are things you can understand precisely because someone is your enemy."

Still, apart from Yo-han, the incident itself bothered him.

A smile spread across Yoannis's lips, and his blue eyes gleamed.

"Shall we go out for the first time in a while?"

"Haa...."

Mia let out a small sigh and brought over a silver case.

If Master wished it, then as his Retainer, Mia had to attend him.

More importantly, if this was some crude trap meant to lure Yoannis out....

For an instant, Mia's eyes turned cold.

...then he had to find whoever had done this and kill them.

Mia placed the silver case on the table and opened it.

"I've adjusted them as you requested."

They were too short in the grip to be called rifles, yet absurdly large for pistols.

A handgun said, with only slight exaggeration, to be capable of blowing a bear's head apart.

A steel-colored revolver with a long barrel, the S&W M500.

Two of them lay inside.

Along with his Damascus steel magic sword, they were Yoannis's primary weapons. The guns were already exceptionally powerful to begin with, but Yoannis, being an Alchemist, had modified them and imbued them with magic.

The maintenance and adjustments had taken time, so he hadn't been able to use them during the previous city brawl.

Yoannis picked up one of the hefty revolvers.

Some Wizards disliked guns, but....

"You have to keep up with technological progress."

Convenient and powerful was still convenient and powerful.

Whether mystical or scientific, if something was useful, he took it and made it fuel for magic.

Using firearms as secondary weapons instead of insisting on magic alone conserved magical resources and was more efficient.

***

If one were being generous, maybe it had an Instagram aesthetic?

An abandoned building with exposed concrete walls and floors, the kind of place best avoided considering the danger.

There, Kim Ha-eun, a girl with a hoodie pulled over her head, sat crouched against a wall with her face buried in her knees and arms.

She dreamed of the past.

She stood blankly at the railing of a bridge, the cold wind washing over her as she stared down at the gloomy, deep river below.

...A common misfortune. Common in this world, painfully common.

That was why she didn't particularly want to go back over it again in detail.

A single-parent home with no father, a mother who had trouble walking.

Still, that had been fine. She had been happy living with Mom.

".........."

...So where had it all gone wrong?

Was it when a rental deposit scam forced them to move to a neighborhood with such narrow, tangled streets that fire trucks took a long time to get there?

Was it when some rotten delinquent with rich parents picked a fight with her at school?

Was it when Ha-eun refused to just take it, ignored the teacher telling them to get along as classmates, and reported the assault to the police?

Was it when that delinquent retaliated by waiting outside Ha-eun's house with her gang, supposedly there to apologize, smoking cigarettes until they set the house on fire?

Was it because I wasn't home then, because I'd taken Poppy to the animal hospital?

And because of that, Mom hadn't managed to get out in time and had burned to death?

That bastard's rich parents bringing in an expensive lawyer and insisting the fire hadn't been set intentionally.

Was it when they twisted the case into an "accident caused by a carelessly discarded cigarette butt nearby"? When she wasn't even detained and was released because it had been an unintentional mistake by a minor and there was no risk of her fleeing?

Was it when those delinquents, acting as though they'd already been acquitted, posted on Instagram while grilling meat and laughed about how Mom had burned to death?

Like a snowball rolling downhill, the misfortune grew and grew until it crushed her beneath its weight.

...I wish I'd been older.

I wanted to hurry up and at least become a high schooler, get a part-time job, and help Mom.

Would things have gotten better then?

Or would things have been better if I'd just put up with it at school?

She stared blankly down from the bridge railing at the murky river.

She had no idea what someone who was only a middle schooler could even do.

Then a shrill voice rang out loudly toward Ha-eun.

"W-Wait! You there, young lady! You can't commit suicide!?"

"...?"

Ha-eun turned her head toward the voice.

"You mustn't throw your life away!"

A bespectacled woman in a wheelchair was rolling the wheels as fast as she could toward Ha-eun, looking horrified.

"Wheelchair drift- Aaah!?"

Then she tried to take a corner and went down in a tremendous clatter.

".........?"

Ha-eun stared blankly at the absurd sight.

The bespectacled woman lay sprawled on the ground, her long ebony-black hair spilling around her and her large breasts flattened against the floor, as she shouted at Ha-eun.

"Y-You can't commit suicide!"

There was no real need to answer. Still, Ha-eun reflexively responded to the shout.

"...I wasn't really going to kill myself."

"Ah, I see."

The bespectacled woman sighed in relief and smiled gently.

"Hehe... I just made a silly mistake. What a relief."

Then the woman looked up at Ha-eun with tears welling in her eyes.

Eyes welling....

"Um, but... c-could you help me get up?"

Squeeeak-.

The overturned wheelchair's wheel spun forlornly.

"Ah... sure...."

Ha-eun approached and helped the woman up.

She was used to helping someone into a wheelchair. She had helped her mother often.

"Huh?"

What surprised her, though, was that she hadn't noticed while the woman was lying down, perhaps because of her soft, demure face, large breasts, and otherwise slender figure, but the woman was considerably taller than Ha-eun had expected.

Judging by their difference in height, she had to be at least in the high 170s, perhaps around 180 centimeters.

Using Ha-eun's shoulders like a pair of canes, the woman stood and looked down at her, her black hair hanging like curtains as she smiled kindly.

"Thank you."

"N-No problem."

Since she could stand while using Ha-eun for support, it seemed she hadn't completely lost all strength in her legs.

Ha-eun helped the woman sit in the wheelchair she had righted.

Seated in the wheelchair, the woman beamed and clapped her hands.

"I tried to help you, but I ended up being the one who needed help. Thank you!"

"...It's fine."

Ha-eun quietly and cautiously studied the woman in front of her.

A fluffy wool sweater that emphasized the swell of her large breasts, a cardigan worn over it, and a long skirt that reached all the way down over her feet.

Her soft, slender, pretty face and round glasses gave her a harmless air.

Noticing Ha-eun's gaze, the woman met her eyes and spoke.

"My name is Alice. Alice, as in Alice in Wonderland."

Ha-eun hesitated for a moment before answering.

"...I'm Kim Ha-eun."

At Ha-eun's reply, Alice spoke in a warm, gentle voice.

"You don't look well. Since I've already meddled once, may I meddle a little more?"

".........."

Ha-eun's eyes trembled.

There was no reason to tell someone she'd just met about her personal circumstances.

And yet, whether because of Alice's uniquely harmless air, or because she was a complete stranger with absolutely no connection to her life, Ha-eun began murmuring the story she'd kept bottled up inside as though she were talking to herself.

...Including the story of the people responsible for her mother's death.

Alice listened calmly, then took out a sheet of Parchment and began drawing something on it with a fountain pen.

Scratch- scratch-.

To Ha-eun, it was a Magic Circle filled with symbols and writing she couldn't understand.

"What is this...?"

"You helped me, didn't you? It's a magic glass slipper for a kind Cinderella."

Alice handed her the Parchment bearing the Magic Circle and added,

"Hmmm~ Or perhaps calling it the sheep box from The Little Prince would fit better? I've already configured all the little details. All it needs is desire and a single drop of blood."

Ha-eun still had no idea what was going on, and Alice whispered kindly to her.

"If you think your problem is money, a being that gives you gold will appear. If you desire power, a being that helps you achieve social success will appear. If you want to kill them with your own hands, a being that helps you take revenge will appear."

"What are you even-!"

Ha-eun thought Alice was making fun of her and tried to shout, but....

"—!?"

She flinched and froze when she saw the eyes revealed behind Alice's round glasses as the woman gently lowered them.

They had definitely been ordinary black eyes just moments ago.

Not anymore.

Horizontal pupils.

Not the eyes of an ordinary human, but those of a beast like a sheep or goat.

Ha-eun asked in a trembling voice.

"...What are you?"

"A Wizard."

Alice pushed her glasses back up, beamed, thrust her chest forward proudly, and placed a hand over it.

"And I'm a super-genius, sickly beautiful girl!"

Despite the surreal situation, Ha-eun couldn't stop herself from saying it.

"You're a little old to call yourself a girl...."

"Don't say such mean things! Hmph-hmph!"

Alice puffed out her cheeks and pretended to be angry, then returned to a calm expression and offered Ha-eun the Parchment bearing the Magic Circle.

"It's a gift. Whether you use it or not is entirely up to you, Ha-eun-yang."

".........."

Ha-eun carefully accepted the Parchment, and Alice smiled gently at her.

"Think of it as a single wish for when there's something you want badly enough to achieve no matter what price you have to pay, but can't achieve on your own."

Then, even though Alice hadn't touched it, the wheelchair's wheels began rolling on their own as if 'something invisible' behind her were pushing it.

"Well then, goodbye."

Alice passed Ha-eun and rolled away into the distance.

The whole thing had been so surreal and bewildering that Ha-eun stared down at the Parchment in her hand.

She thought about throwing it away, but didn't.

".........."

Whether the Magic Circle left behind by the self-proclaimed sickly beautiful-girl Wizard was real or not, there wasn't really anything to lose.

And when Ha-eun returned to the facility, Poppy, the dog she'd raised together with her mother, had died of old age.

There was no longer any reason to hesitate.

.

.

.

"Aaaaaaaaaagh!"

Ha-eun woke to the agonized scream and raised her head, staring blearily at the carnage before her.

"I-It hurts, aaaaaagh!"

A gang of kids ranging from middle school to high school age writhed in pools of blood with their legs severed.

Beside them, the invisible demon Glasya-Labolas grinned.

"Quite the sleepyhead. I got them ready while you slept."

"...I only took a quick nap."

Ha-eun looked coldly down at the gang who had set her house on fire.

Had they at least quietly kept their heads down, it might have taken her a while to find them. Instead, they posted every pointless update she never wanted to know across social media, making them easy to track down.

But she still hadn't found the most important one.

Ha-eun's icy voice echoed through the abandoned building.

"Where's Park Ji-yeong?"

One boy rolled his pain-filled eyes toward her and spoke.

"If I tell you, then-."

Glasya-Labolas immediately severed one of the boy's arms.

"-Aaaagh!"

At the sight, the rest of the gang immediately scrambled to give up the information, talking over one another.

Ha-eun learned Park Ji-yeong's home address.

"W-We told you! Now let us live!"

At the shout from below, Ha-eun answered flatly.

"Fine. First come, first served. One person. I'll spare whoever crawls over to me first."

"—!?"

The girl closest to Ha-eun began crawling toward her as fast as she could.

"N-Now-."

Crunch-!

Without hesitation, Ha-eun stomped on the girl's head and crushed it, killing her.

"Like I'd ever let you live."

Ha-eun looked down at her shoes, smeared with blood and chunks of flesh.

".........."

She could see why Alice had called it a magic glass slipper.

The moment Ha-eun formed the contract with the demon, her physical abilities had also risen to superhuman levels.

Maybe that was why she sometimes blacked out....

Still, that was fine.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaah-!"

Ha-eun stomped every last one of them to death as they tried to crawl away.

She would finish her revenge before the magic wore off.