Chapter 82

Destroyer of Wrath

The Hidden Quest, [What a Fine Day to Stir Up Trouble].

Completing the Hidden Quest that would reward me with Ian’s Journal required more than merely seizing the Dark Merchant Company’s funds.

The Fall of Violess.

'Violess is nothing more than a stage.'

Violess was practically a city created by the Dark Merchant Company. In other words, someone else had set this stage and was pulling the strings behind it.

Iratum, the Destroyer of Wrath.

Iratum had been a key figure at the very heart of the Emperor’s plan to swallow the continent.

'I have to take him down.'

So, after cleaning out every last bit of the Dark Merchant Company’s funds, I hurried to the site of Isolde’s rampage.

Except—

'Just how much havoc did she wreak?'

The entire black market had been smashed to pieces. Forget functioning as a black market; the place was in complete ruins.

'Was she holding back when she fought me?'

... This was more than I had expected. Even with my disruption operation, how had she demolished the black market this thoroughly?

Perhaps that explained it.

"M-monster!"

The few remaining Acatas were trembling in fear, their will to fight gone.

"How could a mere worshipper of a hollow shell be this...!"

Worshippers of a hollow shell. That was the blanket term the Devotees of the Fallen Souls used for the Holy Kingdom’s priests and holy knights.

Strictly speaking, the god worshipped in the Holy Kingdom did not actually exist. It was a god created through divine power—the collective faith of a people and the ultimate form of aura—and had merely transcended the ontological argument through that power.

That was why the Devotees of the Fallen Souls called the Holy Kingdom’s faithful worshippers of a "hollow shell." Meanwhile, they claimed to be the true believers who worshipped a real god.

The Sovereign of the Abyss. Whether he was a god or not, he certainly did "exist" beyond the Negative Dimension.

"I-I can’t take any more...!"

"Run...!"

The frightened Acatas began backing away, faltering as they fled. Then they spotted me—

"Executor...?"

"The Executor?!"

"The Executor is here!!"

They all brightened, hope spreading through their ranks in an instant. Their masks hid their expressions, but I could tell all the same.

"This is the Executor who mercilessly slaughtered a hundred Black Grasp Visters!"

"No matter how much you rampage, a wretch like you is no match for the Executor!"

The Acatas looked as smug as children telling on someone to their parents. Following their gazes, I turned to find Isolde in her ogre mask.

But a golden aura rippled around her entire body, stripping her of her human appearance.

'Divine Ascension?'

The Divine Martial Fist technique Isolde had created herself.

Divine Ascension.

'No wonder.'

I had been wondering why the black market was in such ruins. But if she had used Divine Ascension, this was more than understandable. It was only natural.

'She was already using Divine Ascension this early?'

A monster was a monster, all right. No wonder the Acatas had been trembling in fear.

'In that case...'

Couldn’t we move straight on to the plan?

I turned to the Acatas.

"You lot. Where did you move the slaves?"

"We moved them to the Scrap Iron Grounds!"

The Scrap Iron Grounds were a dump outside Violess where the city’s discarded materials were thrown away. With so few people venturing there, the Dark Merchant Company used it for secret experiments and rituals. It also served as a hiding place for all sorts of illegal drugs and weapons.

In other words, the people’s safety had been adequately secured. The city’s poor would also have evacuated on their own by now to escape the rampaging Visters.

"Did you know?"

As if giving Isolde a signal, I said,

"Dead men tell no tales."

SPLURT!

I immediately turned and tore out an Acata’s heart. Isolde lunged forward without a moment’s hesitation.

Divine Ascension had elevated her physical abilities so far that even my Agility-enhanced senses couldn’t keep up.

"H-huh...?"

"What just happened...?"

Perhaps that was why the Acatas still had no idea what was going on.

Isolde and I swiftly dispatched them one after another. When only the last Acata remained, the eyes staring out from behind his mask were trembling.

"Y-you can’t mean...!"

Yes, this had to be why.

"You tricked us?! Aaaaargh!!!!!"

Why the imperial soldiers in my previous life had ground their teeth to nothing whenever they saw me, that is.

The Acata shook with rage at the realization that I wasn’t Avarus. His gaze was now steeped in betrayal.

"Do you think you’ll get away with this?! Have you no fear of the heavens?!"

The sheer shamelessness was astounding. Experiments, torture, exploitation, abuse, assault, pillaging, massacres—the list went on and on. If they gave even a thought to what they had done to innocent people, they couldn’t possibly say something like that.

In short—

"Your logic is garbage."

Well, they weren’t sane to begin with. What was the point of bringing logic into it?

"You’re the ones who should fear the heavens, not me."

SPLURT!

I tore out his heart with Dragon’s Claw[A].

As the last Acata fell, Isolde removed her ogre mask. She staggered the instant she did. The golden aura that had stripped away her human appearance was gone.

Fortunately, she managed to catch her balance just before collapsing.

"Hah...! Hah...!"

She looked dangerously unsteady. Hot breath kept streaming from her mouth with every ragged gasp, and blood she hadn’t managed to swallow trickled from her lips.

Divine Martial Fist. Isolde Style, Divine Ascension.

The technique worked on the same principle as Metabolic Overdrive[U]. In terms of performance, though, it was a superior version.

To put it childishly, a super-super-superior version.

After all, Divine Ascension drove not just the endocrine system into overdrive, but every muscle fiber and nerve cell as well. It allowed the user to "transcend" human limits, but placed a tremendous strain on the body in return.

What if an ordinary human body tried it? Their entire body would burst apart the instant they used it.

In other words, Isolde could use the technique only because her body was practically forged from divine power. Even the Saints and Saintesses of past generations would have struggled. That was how extreme the strain imposed by the Isolde Style of Divine Martial Fist, Divine Ascension, was.

Right now, every muscle fiber in her body was torn and every nerve cell had burst. It was fair to say she was utterly wrecked.

"Are you all right?"

"I’m... fine."

She struggled to answer.

Was it her lack of mastery of Divine Martial Fist, combined with the technique still being incomplete? She wasn’t recovering easily from the backlash of overloading her body. I wanted to give her enough time to recover, but—

"Contrary to what we expected, the Crimson Soiree hasn’t made a move."

Unfortunately, time was short.

"You mean..."

"The Black Grasp and the Vister alliance alone won’t be enough to push back the Dark Merchant Company."

"Then what should I do now?"

Isolde spoke as she caught her ragged breath.

She still hadn’t fully recovered, yet she was looking at me, waiting only for my orders. She paid no heed to her own safety. That, too, was no different from my previous life.

Except our roles had been reversed back then when it came to giving orders.

'This feels strange.'

... It felt very strange indeed.

"At present, we can’t determine the Crimson Soiree’s exact intentions. Do you have any way to contact the Eye of the Pilgrim?"

The Eye of the Pilgrim.

The Holy Kingdom’s secret knightly order, which monitored heathen forces and anti-religious organizations abroad and gathered intelligence. Its members were spread across the continent, tasked with identifying and eliminating threats to the Holy Kingdom before they could materialize.

"... A report should have been sent in already."

"Ah."

It seemed the Eye of the Pilgrim had been keeping watch on the lawless city. Come to think of it, Isolde had said she learned I was here through them. With Violess turned completely upside down, there was no way they could be unaware of the situation.

Normally, they would have observed the situation and waited to see how it developed, but—

"They should also have reported that I’m here."

With Isolde in Violess, it was a different story. There was no way they would leave the Holy Kingdom’s princess in this city of chaos.

That gave us one advantage and one disadvantage. We wouldn’t need to take any additional measures—but we had even less time now.

"Can you use Divine Ascension again?"

"How do you know about that?"

... Oops.

Divine Martial Fist was a martial art created by successive Saints and Saintesses, but Divine Ascension was a technique Isolde had developed herself. An incomplete technique, at that. In my previous life, it had been complete, and I had seen it countless times—but that was my previous life. Now that I had returned to the past, no one but Isolde could know about it.

The urgency of the situation had made me blurt it out without thinking. Perhaps that explained the way she was looking at me. Her eyes shone like topazes, but suspicion lurked within them. In other words, that look demanded a reasonable explanation.

"I’ll explain later."

"..."

"It’s complicated to explain. We don’t have much time for me to go through it all right now."

It was a rather flimsy excuse, but I had no choice. Still, did she trust me to some degree now?

"I think I can manage it once more."

Fortunately, she seemed willing to let it go for the time being.

I inwardly sighed with relief and immediately gathered my thoughts.

'We have to move quickly.'

Now that Isolde’s presence here was known, the Holy Kingdom would send troops or take some other action. And once the Holy Kingdom made its move? Iratum would abandon Violess without hesitation and disappear. There would be no telling where he would turn up next or what he would plot.

I couldn’t let him get away.

"The one ruling Violess from the shadows is a man named Iratum. He’s currently in the Ruins District."

I took some oil out of my Inventory, poured it into my mouth, and gulped it down.

The final disruption operation.

"I’ll deceive him, then watch for an opening. Lady Isolde, please draw his attention."

A resolve to drink the dragon’s poisoned wine.

* * *

No matter how hard he thought about it, Iratum simply couldn’t make sense of the situation.

BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!!

Even now, the uproar in Violess continued unabated.

"These fucking bastards!!"

His anger finally exploded. Unable to stand it any longer, he was about to intervene personally when—

"Lord Iratum...!"

Was there an Acata with some sense left after all? Someone called to him. He turned toward the voice, and there—

"... Avarus?"

Was that Avarus? And he was limping, covered in blood.

"???"

For an instant, Iratum’s ability to comprehend anything plummeted beyond the depths of the Abyss.

"Gah!"

Avarus suddenly vomited blood, wracked with pain.

Iratum briefly came to his senses, only to hear—

"You must... get away...!"

"...?"

What was this supposed to mean now? Iratum had no idea how he was supposed to respond.

But Avarus wasn’t merely covered in blood; he was coughing it up as well. Judging by his condition, something seriously wrong certainly seemed to have happened.

It was at that very moment.

Something hurtled toward Iratum at tremendous speed. He hastily dodged aside—

KABOOOM!!

The spot where he had been standing exploded, raising a thick cloud of dust. As it settled, someone emerged from beyond it.

An unidentified figure wearing an ogre mask.

But the figure radiated an extraordinary presence, and Iratum understood at once.

The uproar that had engulfed Violess. The reason the Acatas sent to investigate had vanished without a word, like sacrifices cast into the Abyss. Even the cause of Avarus’s wretched condition—all of it.

"... So it was you."

It was all the work of that figure in the ogre mask.