Chapter 659: Dawn (2)
The welfare center in Zone W of Landa. The Poor Brothers.
Like every other organization and institution in Landa these days, it had been caught up in a whirlwind of activity. The reason was none other than the "Pied Piper."
Though hard to believe, the Pied Piper had invaded Landa single-handedly, leaving an unprecedented wave of destruction in the city’s history in under an hour.
The city was swarming with rats and zombies, and countless casualties and displaced people filled the streets, regardless of their social status.
All welfare centers receiving city funds had a duty to respond to such crises, and the Poor Brothers' welfare center was no exception, requiring its staff to work late hours and overtime continuously.
(This was also why they were still at their posts as the morning sun rose.)
Because of this, everyone at the welfare center was so exhausted that they only spoke when absolutely necessary, falling into an atmosphere of weary silence.
A silence steeped in fatigue.
But that silence was soon broken.
“Is it true a wizard from the Tower of Magic arrived?”
“You idiot, it’s not just any wizard.”
“Then, who?”
Despite everyone being busy with their work, they had stopped, gathered together, and were chatting. Even the middle managers, who usually cracked whips to keep workers motivated, were part of the commotion.
It was easy to think they’d all gone mad from the never-ending night shifts, but a closer look would reveal that was not the case. Because—
“—It’s not just any wizard. It's Archive! The Archmage, Archive!!”
Archive had arrived.
The pinnacle of all wizards, the one person honored as Archmage, acknowledged by both kings and the Pater Church for his unmatched authority and esteemed reputation—a figure shrouded in mystery.
Such a wizard had come to visit the Poor Brothers’ welfare center personally.
Stopping work and creating such a clamor that it reached even the director’s office was understandable.
Of course, it was only proper for the head of the welfare center to apologize for the disturbance.
“My apologies for the noise, Archive... Grand Master?”
With the murmur of the crowd faintly audible beyond the door, Kent apologized to the guest. His words were slightly tangled as he seemed uncertain about the appropriate title.
The guest replied.
“No need. I came here unannounced… just call me Merlin.”
“Are you sure?”
“Certainly. If so, may I call you Kent?”
“It would be an honor.”
Kent agreed.
After all, Archive was that kind of presence. Though he seldom made public appearances, his influence extended beyond Landa...
Correction.
His power went beyond Landa and into the world. Just the mere fact of his existence carried weight.
Kent, who primarily dealt in underground information, could hardly begin to grasp the extent of it.
All Kent knew was that Archive had effectively founded the Tower of Magic and, according to some speculative intelligence, might even have had a hand in creating Landa.
Just like the many urban legends that circulated through the underworld.
What set this rumor apart from others, though, was that it felt oddly plausible.
Anyway, Kent’s main point was that for Archive to appear in person and kindly suggest they refer to each other by name was no ordinary matter.
Therefore, Kent was uneasy. Anything out of the ordinary often signaled trouble.
Whether good or bad, it was likely something Kent himself would struggle to handle.
So, he got straight to the point.
“Mr. Merlin, may I ask you a direct question?”
Merlin nodded as he sipped his coffee.
“Did you come here because I was investigating the zone closures?”
Rather than conceal his wrongdoing, Kent brought it up immediately, calculating that Archive’s intelligence network surpassed his own.
After all, nothing is more dangerous than a half-baked scheme, and it was better to be upfront than to miscalculate.
At the very least, this way he could minimize any potential damage.
Merlin responded.
“That’s not the reason I came.”
“But you knew about it?”
Kent filled in the blanks like matching a puzzle piece to an empty space, guessing information based on Merlin’s response.
“I happened to learn of it along the way. Personally, I don’t think it’s wrong. Preparing for risks is an individual’s right, after all.”
Kent, despite lacking a dark wizard’s eye for reading emotions, could sense Merlin’s sincerity.
If Merlin had come to accuse or warn him, he wouldn’t be here so formally, nor would he have observed the usual courtesies. No, if anything, he would have come secretly, away from prying eyes.
This left only one possible reason.
“Do you have something you want to ask me?”
A question Kent asked, half-expecting the answer to be no. Merlin, however, answered with silence, which spoke volumes.
“Is it about Zenon?”
Zenon. More precisely, Zenon Bright. The name Oliver currently used within the Tower of Magic.
“How did you know?”
“What else would someone like Archive ask me about?”
“Fair enough. Would you mind if I asked you some questions as well?”
“What if we take turns asking each other questions?” Merlin agreed readily, but he claimed the first question.
“Could you tell me how you first met the boy Zenon?”
Kent replied without hesitation to Merlin’s question.
It was back when he’d first encountered Oliver, who had been cornered by thugs in Zone X.
Kent had driven the thugs away and brought Oliver into his group of beggars.
“Why did you help him?”
“What reason would there be? Let’s just call it meddling. Isn’t it strange to demand a reason for helping a child in trouble?”
“True, that makes sense… having a reason would indeed be odd.”
“Although, in the end, he ended up helping us more than we did him.”
Kent recalled the moment Oliver had first used dark magic in the sewers, defeating a puppeteer—a dark sorcerer—single-handedly and returning on his own.
A truly shocking display. But what shocked Kent the most was Oliver’s final words to him.
“I want to see it. I want to see what you do with the money. So, please, just accept it.”
Kent remembered Oliver’s face as he offered him money.
He wondered how things would have turned out if he had squandered it for selfish gain… Would Oliver have smiled at him?
“May I ask my question now?”
“Go ahead.”
“Could you tell me the real reason for the zone closures in Landa? Is it due to an epidemic or zombies?”
“No.”
Kent flinched.
Merlin’s firm shake of his head made Kent flinch instinctively, even though he had expected that answer. Given who Merlin was, his response had seemed more serious.
“Then…”
“There have been sightings of phenomena even the Tower of Magic cannot define.”
“Phenomena?”
“Yes. Unusual occurrences that ordinary wizards cannot endure. Cracks have formed on the ground and in buildings, and an unknown force is seeping through those crevices, contaminating the surroundings. That’s also why the holy knights were deployed.”
Kent was about to ask what that mysterious force could be when Merlin, half a beat faster, asked his next question.
While Kent didn’t mind Merlin asking questions in turn, the subject raised suspicion—at least from Kent’s perspective, the questions went beyond mere curiosity and carried an underlying intent.
“How do you feel about the boy Zenon?”
“...?!”
Kent was at a loss for words.
What did he think of Oliver? It was a difficult question to answer, not only because it was personal but also due to the unclear intent behind it.
So, ignoring their agreement, Kent voiced his honest thoughts.
“Why are you asking that, Mr. Merlin?”
“I’m asking so that I may answer. Kent, what do you think of Zenon?”
A brief question, yet full of implications.
Hearing it, Kent recalled the time he’d lost an arm to a druid.
Blood pouring out, ribs broken, and just when he was on the verge of passing out, a stranger had appeared and said—
“Didn’t I tell you? He might be someone who once saved the world. That’s why I helped him.”
Thinking back, it was still a riddle to Kent, words he couldn’t fully understand. Yet, paradoxically, Kent felt he knew exactly who they referred to.
Oliver.
A feeling that defied logic or reason, yet pointed straight to him.
Kent spoke.
“He may seem clumsy, but he’s incredibly smart. Appears fragile, yet is tougher than anyone. Cold, yet kinder than anyone, always aiming to do what’s right… that’s who he is.”
“Is that all?”
Merlin’s words felt like he was seeing right through him. Kent hadn’t shared everything he felt.
“There’s more, but that would be overstepping. I’d rather not add unnecessary remarks.”
“...”
“So, this time, Mr. Merlin, would you mind telling me why you asked that question?”
Kent found himself gripping his quarterstaff tightly, almost without realizing it.
“Why did you ask me how I feel about Zenon?”
“Hm… Before I answer, may I tell you something else?”
Kent gazed at Merlin. Was he avoiding the answer…? No, it didn’t seem that way.
His instincts, honed during the real estate boom and refined further within his gang of beggars, told him otherwise. Even if he were wrong, there was little Kent could do. So, he decided to let Merlin speak.
“What is it?”
“About what was discovered within the city’s cracks.”
“?... But wasn’t it said that even the Tower of Magic couldn’t explain it?”
“Yes, that’s what they said. However, I am not the Tower of Magic.”
“Oh.”
Kent let out a small gasp. It sounded like a mere play on words, but it wasn’t something he could easily dismiss.
More importantly, he had a more pressing question.
“What exactly was discovered in the cracks?”
The answer was beyond anything he could have imagined.
“Hell.”
“...Hell?”
“Or, you could call it the remnants of the Great Calamity, the one that took place before Landa was founded.”
“And how can you be so certain?”
“Because I am Archive. The Archive who banished the Great Calamity and laid the foundation of Landa. The Archive before me… he left me his memories.”
Kent recalled hearing rumors about Landa’s founding—that while many politicians, wealthy individuals, and wizards had cooperated in its construction, there was supposedly one true mastermind behind it all.
It wasn’t a stretch. A project as immense as erasing the scars of a Great Calamity and establishing a new city would have required the focus and guidance of a single, exceptional individual.
After all, daring and dangerous journeys are often embarked upon alone.
Like the founder of the Tower of Magic establishing the first school of black magic.
Kent was at a loss, overwhelmed by the gravity of what he had just heard. It was so astonishing that he felt paradoxically calm.
However, he couldn’t simply sit back and do nothing.
So he asked the most fundamental question.
“Why did your predecessor Archive purify this land and establish Landa?”
Merlin held up two fingers, his index and middle fingers extended.
“First, this land wasn’t purified. It was merely covered.”
“Covered?”
“And second, the reason he built Landa over the remnants of the Great Calamity was to set the stage.”
“Stage? For whom?”
“For Oliver. This is his stage.”
...
As the morning sun chased away the darkness, brightening the world, armies began to gather around the outskirts of a small city in the Kingdom of Aizan.
Each unit bore different flags and uniforms, proclaiming their allegiance to different nations, which only added to the confusion of the army’s overall demeanor.
Strictly speaking, the royal family members—whether kings, princes, or other nobles—leading these forces were the ones in disarray.
And the reason these self-proclaimed nobles were in such a state of disorganization was that their original plan had taken an unexpected turn.
The plan to defeat the Pied Piper… to be precise, the plan to let others fight the Pied Piper and then claim the victory was now in shambles.
The key hero of Landa, the one they’d counted on to defeat the Pied Piper on their behalf, had vanished.
The holy knights said he had left to investigate something, even though he had been summoned by both the Templar Priest and the king.
So here they were, the kings, princes, and royal family members who had come boasting that they’d defeat the Pied Piper, now crowded into a narrow space like caged crows.
They vented their frustrations on Roderick, the Templar Priest who had organized this plan in the first place.
“Templar Priest! What do you plan to do now? You’re the one who ordered us to mobilize our armies!”
“That’s right. We can’t keep the troops waiting like this… What if the Pied Piper appears again?”
“Take action now!”
The elderly nobles, their pride wounded, clung to Roderick and whined like children.
It was understandable.
The kings of these small kingdoms, whose authority had been thoroughly humiliated by the Pied Piper, now faced an even greater humiliation—returning without action or encountering the Pied Piper unprepared would only further erode their already diminished reputations, burying their authority even deeper.
And since their kingdoms were barely sustained by the support of the Pater Church, they might not be able to maintain their countries if things went south.
In other words, though the morning sun was shining peacefully outside, here in the heart of the continent, the lives of many small royal families were hanging by a thread.
It was infuriating. They had merely followed the Templar Priest and the sisterhood’s counsel.
But now, the Templar Priest who had proposed this whole scheme stood silent.
Finally, one of them, unable to hold back, shouted.
“Are you sure he’ll come back?”
After a pause, Roderick, who had been silently listening, finally spoke.
“He will return. I just can’t say when.”
“Maybe? Did you just say ‘maybe’?!”
The royals who had led their armies burst out in anger.
Even in their weakened state, they were still royalty. Such disrespect was unheard of.
At that moment, a nun dressed in a black habit who had been standing behind Roderick stepped in.
“He will return. I promise.”
Instantly, the agitated atmosphere settled.
“...Are you certain?”
“Yes, I give you my word.”
This was the influence held by the sisterhood here in the center of the continent.
Because they took responsibility for the public welfare where kingdoms could not, and because they healed the nobility and royal family members suffering from mysterious ailments through prayer, they wielded power that even kings could not ignore.
With the nun’s reassurance calming the kings, one of the more astute nobles, King Veller of the Aizan Kingdom, spoke up.
“Let’s deal with the dark wizards first.”
“The dark wizards?”
“Yes, Templar Priest. The dark wizards… the ones we’ve captured as prisoners, yes?”
The dark wizards taken as prisoners were none other than the rogue dark wizards—those who had surrendered under Oliver’s persuasion and under the watch of countless creatures.
At Oliver’s suggestion, Roderick and over a dozen holy knights had sustained considerable damage as they fought, persuading the rogue wizards to lay down their arms and submit to confinement.
“Let us execute them with the armies gathered here. That was the original plan, wasn’t it?”
It was, in fact, part of the plan, and, to be honest, a tradition of sorts.
An annual event unique to the central continent, where royal authority weakened by the Pied Piper could be slightly restored by executing dark wizards.
Roderick had dutifully upheld this tradition, but this time his response was different.
“That is not possible.”
“Why?”
“Because those dark wizards are under someone else’s protection.”
“...That dark wizard?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. I’ve already promised him. Killing them now would cause a problem.”
Roderick calmly addressed the numerous kings, but they appeared unyielding.
“We don’t care! They’re nothing but filthy dark wizards… If that fellow dares to make us wait, then surely—”
—Keeiiiiiiiiiiik!!
As one king spoke, the entire building shook with a tremendous sound coming from above, a noise that seemed as if it could not belong to this world.
Every animal in the city let out a terrified cry, and even the dignified kings rose from their chairs and rushed to the windows.
Thanks to this, they were able to see the massive shadow cast across the city—the colossal beast responsible for it.
“A… dragon…”
Oliver had returned to the city, riding a dark crimson dragon.