I Became the Cute One in the Troubleshooter Squad-Chapter 107: The Enigma Auction Showdown (8)

Honestly, I was beyond relieved that I didn’t need to use the bathroom at that moment.

Because the instant Morte pointed his finger at me, my entire body almost gave out on the spot.

That was probably Death Finger, Morte’s signature technique for executing weaker targets.

A blast of will-infused mana, designed to rupture the victim’s heart in an instant.

Technically, it wasn’t even a real spell.

It was just a concentrated mass of mana fired at supersonic speeds—faster than sound itself.

If Raven hadn’t intervened, I wouldn’t have even had time to blink before dying.

But the sheer level of life-threatening danger I felt just from making eye contact with Morte...

That was beyond anything I had ever experienced.

First Akashmir, and now this.

The Septenary Guard of the Liberation Army...

Every single one of them was absurdly dangerous.

‘Back in my old world, necromancers were just punching bags for the church. But now, I get why they were so hated.’

Still, wasn’t instantly trying to blow up someone’s heart a little much?!

I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants and, as naturally as possible, hid behind Raven.

Because in this entire room, he was the only one who could face Morte head-on.

My beastkin instincts had kicked in, guiding me to the safest place possible.

‘Fix this somehow, Raven! You’re the protagonist! You can do it!’

Still trembling from the shock, I hugged my now massively puffed-up tail and sincerely prayed for his victory.

“Hmm... I see. So this is what’s been going on down here.”

Raven kept his eyes locked on Morte while scanning the surroundings, his expression shifting slightly.

Then, with a slight furrow of his brow, he muttered to himself.

“So the plan was to create chaos in the auction, forcing the fixers to split up?”

It seemed that just from looking around, he had already pieced together what had happened.

Well, even an outsider could tell that this wasn’t just a random attack.

And Raven, with his experience and knowledge, wouldn’t take long to figure everything out.

Morte must have realized that too, because he didn’t even bother denying it.

Instead, his voice carried a drained, lifeless tone, as if he were speaking from the depths of a grave.

“Yes... I didn’t have enough spare corpses, so I intended to replenish my forces. I never expected my masterpiece—Vita and Verita—to be stopped here.”

Hearing that, I could roughly guess Morte’s original plan.

He had likely intended to spread the Rage Gas throughout the auction hall and mix his undead soldiers among the infected crowd.

Since undead bodies were already dead, the Rage Gas wouldn’t affect them at all.

If the entire area was filled with only undead, the fixers could have just wiped them out without hesitation.

But the problem was—the gas-infected victims were still living citizens.

Fixers, bound by duty, would hesitate to fight back immediately.

And that moment of hesitation would be enough for them to succumb to the gas, turning into berserk killers themselves.

Then, Morte could have used both the infected fixers and his undead soldiers to completely take over the hotel.

...If Tamamo hadn’t held out against the Vita sisters, and if Alice hadn’t swiftly evacuated the civilians...

This would have been an absolute disaster.

‘We really got lucky. The fact that I was able to contain the Rage Gas also played a huge role. If even one part of our plan had failed, everyone here would’ve died.’

Morte was, after all, considered the most difficult opponent among the Septenary Guard.

The fact that we had managed to survive this battle without suffering massive losses was almost miraculous.

If he had been inside the auction hall from the start, there’s no way we could have handled him.

So in a way, we were lucky beyond belief.

Raven must have come to the same conclusion, because he let out a mocking scoff, his gun still trained on Morte.

“Hah. Must be a real headache when things don’t go your way, huh? The world doesn’t always work out the way you want.”

“Yes... I suppose that’s true....”

But Morte, unfazed by Raven’s taunts, simply reached into his robes.

“...But I have already accomplished half of my goal. It’s unfortunate that I couldn’t bring despair to humanity today... but we have still taken another step toward our cause.”

“Your cause...?”

Srrrk.

Something glimmered in Morte’s skeletal, withered fingers as he pulled it out.

It was a crown, adorned with two red and two blue gemstones—exquisitely crafted, almost beautiful.

...It would have been better if I hadn’t recognized it.

But unfortunately, I did.

That crown...

I had seen it before.

It was something I knew from the original story.

That crown... was it originally meant to be auctioned at the Enigma Auction?

Its name was the Queen’s Profane Tiara—an incredibly dangerous artifact created by a queen from another world.

‘Don’t tell me... was Morte moving separately from the Vita sisters just to get his hands on that?’

This was bad.

No—more precisely, it would be catastrophic if the Liberation Army managed to obtain it.

So the moment I recognized it, I immediately gathered my holy energy into the shape of a spear and hurled it at Morte with all my strength!

“Tch. Useless tricks...! Renta Depositio Putredinis....”

But my spear was instantly blocked by a swirling mass of darkness that had materialized around him.

Even though holy energy was supposed to counter necromantic magic, the gap in power was too overwhelming.

...If only I had the same overwhelming strength I did when I used the Tesseract to take on an adult form.

But no—right now, my form was optimized for survival and efficiency.

Even if I had transformed into an adult, the effect would have likely worn off before Morte even arrived.

“Tch! Alice! And you—purple hair! Get back, now!”

“Ah, got it!”

“H-hiiik?!”

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BANG! BANG BANG!

Raven opened fire on the spreading black mass, his shots ringing out in rapid succession.

Of course, there was no way that bullets alone could inflict any real damage on Morte’s magic.

But surprisingly, his bullets pushed back the darkness, slowing its advance.

The secret behind this?

Raven’s bullets were special anti-magic rounds, crafted with mana-suppressing material.

Each shot was worth thousands of credits—a ridiculously expensive but highly effective weapon.

It was like how vampire hunters coated their bullets with silver to deal with their targets.

Since Raven couldn’t use magic and his physical stats /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ were only on par with an orc, these special bullets were his only real advantage.

‘But that’s what makes him strong. Raven isn’t some fair-and-square warrior—he’s a ruthless, intelligent hunter. If his enemy has a weakness... he never loses.’

And right now, he had recognized the true threat—the Tiara in Morte’s hands.

He gripped his jet-black gun and darted forward, firing relentlessly to keep Morte from making any sudden moves.

The thick, fog-like aura of decay stopped most of his bullets...

Or at least, it looked that way.

SHHK! THWAP!

Suddenly—two of Raven’s bullets pierced straight through the necrotic mist and sliced through Morte’s body!

“Ghhk?! Y-you...! How did you bypass my magic?!”

“Idiot. You think the same trick’s gonna work on me twice? The moment you pulled that shit from above... I already figured it out!”

Logically speaking, this should have been impossible.

Morte’s spell released a field of necrotic mist that corroded and decayed all incoming attacks.

The only viable countermeasure was to dodge—directly breaking through it was practically impossible.

Given the layered nature of the spell, straight-line projectiles like bullets shouldn’t have been able to pass through it at all.

But Raven had just pulled off the impossible—

By ricocheting his bullets against each other, he had twisted their trajectory in an unnatural way, forcing an opening in the mist.

A miracle-level feat that no one else could have achieved.

Because when it came to marksmanship, no one in this world could match Raven.

“Kuh... my insides...! T-to think this was possible....”

“Morte, sir!”

Splat.

Blood poured from Morte’s skeletal frame, gushing onto the floor.

The ricocheting bullets had torn through his insides, shredding him from within.

His clavicle and abdomen—where the bullets had landed—began bleeding heavily with black ichor.

As a necromancer, Morte’s physical body had never been his strong suit.

And Raven had just exploited that exact weakness.

Of course, Morte wasn’t an ordinary undead—he was an Elder Lich, a powerful necromancer inhabiting a reanimated corpse.

But still, having his physical form damaged meant losing control over his mana flow.

And if the damage kept piling up, it would definitely become a problem.

Raven knew this.

That’s why he didn’t hesitate.

Raising his gun once more, he aimed it directly at Morte’s head.

“Necromancer Morte. Your reign of terror ends here.”

“Khh... how amusing....”

“Huh?”

Suddenly, Morte smirked.

As if none of this had ever been a real problem for him.

Raven frowned, confused by the reaction.

After all, this should have been checkmate.

The true danger of Morte was his ability to turn any corpse into an undead soldier.

And his wide-area necrotic spells, capable of corroding anything in an instant.

But right now, he had no corpses to reanimate.

And with Raven standing right in front of him, he had no time to set up any large-scale spells.

In this moment, Morte should have had no way out.

Unless...

He had another escape plan.

And unfortunately—he did.

Morte slowly lifted the Tiara-shaped artifact in his hands.

“Remember me, black-haired human... and you... the Saintess of Earth.”

“...?”

RRRIP!

A harsh tearing noise filled the air—

As if space itself had been violently ripped apart.

The Queen’s Profane Tiara—

Its ability allowed the user to create a portal to any location of their choice.

Morte shot one last glance at us before stepping into the portal with Verita.

And just like that, they vanished.

The decay mist dissolved into thin air, fading without a trace.

Even though we had completely neutralized his attacks...

It still felt like we had suffered an immense loss.