Shepherd Wizard-Chapter 176.2

Translator: Pai_

Two days later, with one man, one mermaid, and one White Elf aboard, Bije finally passed the scorched port of Ophen and arrived in Kalamaf.

Unlike the citizens of Slon City, who had fallen into near panic at the sight of the giant golden eagle, the citizens of Kalamaf waved their hands at the appearance of the divine beast that protected them.

After landing in the garden located in the heart of the family head's residence, Turan immediately summoned Ashiz and the executives of the House Parsha to report the outcome of the war.

"The House Ruvan has been completely subdued."

"Ooh...!"

"As expected!"

Though it was an outcome to be expected, there was no one who wasn't pleased to hear the news.

After all, war is a game of repeated variables upon variables.

Then, one of the vassals glanced at Nia, who stood silently behind Turan, and asked.

"But the lady behind you...?"

Although she wore a mask and hood and was completely wrapped in a cloak to conceal the pale skin unique to White Elves, it wasn't hard to tell her physique was that of a woman.

As the expressions of the vassals hinted at the suspicion that Turan had perhaps brought back a new woman from Ruvan, Turan let out a chuckle.

"Come to think of it, I forgot to mention. This one should be locked up in the underground prison for the time being. Leave the clothes as they are, and under no circumstances remove the mask or hood."

"P-Prison, sir?"

"Yes. Oh, and while we’re at it, we’ll need to renovate the facility a bit... For now, I’ll personally provide her meals."

Though the underground prison of the House Parsha had been enchanted by Meisa to restrict magic use within, it could not block spiritual arts like Soul Manipulation.

Which meant that placing ordinary people or knights as guards risked them being subdued via soul techniques.

After confining Nia, Turan next visited Meisa, who was resting in their quarters, to catch up.

Now four months into her pregnancy, her belly was visibly swollen enough that anyone could recognize it when she wore light clothing.

"A White Elf?"

"Yeah. I don’t know if I should call it a stroke of luck..."

But for some reason, after hearing Turan’s explanation, Meisa furrowed her brow slightly.

"Why?"

"Well, just... listening to the story, it kind of feels like the White Elves are a bit pitiful."

She, too, had become sick of elves after seeing the dark elves slaughter humans and hang their corpses during the suppression, but from what she’d heard, the White Elves didn’t seem to share much in common with the dark elves apart from the name.

Looking at it that way, they had just been desperately struggling to survive while being tossed about by the personal desires of the Preah God Tribe.

Of course, they had occupied the House Ruvan, continued to wear human skins, and stood in opposition to Turan’s forces.

Ordinary wizards likely wouldn’t feel sympathy for such alien races that were enemies of humanity, but then again, weren’t they also friends with Armania, a mermaid?

Because of that, it was hard to apply a different standard just because they were a different race.

"They're not worth that kind of sympathy."

To Meisa’s words, Turan shook his head in denial.

Even though the White Elves had been a minority even before the descent of the gods and didn’t operate large-scale human farms like the dark elves, they still shared the same cannibalistic nature of eating humans.

Having heard that story in outline from Reshion, Turan explained it, and Meisa also let out a soft groan and shook her head.

"Well then... So, what are you going to do?"

"First, we need to contact the Lavitas side and inform them. In the meantime, we’ll need to figure out how to handle them."

And there was one more thing to do.

That was to absorb Calais’s magic power.

Meisa wore a conflicted expression as she looked at Calais’s corpse, which had been taken out from the large-capacity pouch.

“Seriously... seeing it like this feels weird.”

“There’s no helping it.”

The last image Meisa remembered of Calais was him cheerfully laughing and sending them off.

Now, with Calais lying decapitated on the living room floor at Turan’s hands, it was only natural for her feelings to be hard to put into words.

Still, they couldn’t just leave this immense power unattended.

Calais, having lost his body, would probably be more than willing to let those who avenged him make use of his power.

Though, of course, one could hardly presume to predict the will of the dead.

This time, it was Turan, Meisa, and Bije combining their efforts.

It was a bit disappointing that one spot was left vacant, but there was no one among those remaining in the Parsha main house capable of absorbing Calais’s power anyway.

Because of the many battles they had fought recently, most had already absorbed power up to their limits.

Although there was none of the previous thrill that came from absorbing power from an equal, they could still clearly feel themselves growing stronger. In the midst of this sensation, Bije let out a choking noise and expelled the magic power she had been absorbing.

“Looks like Bije’s reached her limit too.”

Having finally stopped growing, Bije’s magical power now stood at a level somewhat weaker than that of great noble family heads, but still far stronger than that of top-tier nobles.

Considering her characteristics as a flying magical beast, she could likely stall someone like Osel, who lacked offensive capabilities, for quite a while.

Once all the complex and exhausting matters were taken care of, naturally, rest followed.

Turan relaxed with Meisa in bed, recovering from the fatigue of travel and battle.

As a bonus, Bije, who had endured days of flying, was given a delicious meal and allowed to rest as well.

After spending the night that way, Turan gave Bije a task now that she was feeling refreshed.

That task was to deliver the news to Lavitas.

Perhaps due to having become stronger after one last magic absorption despite having hit her limit, Bije nodded energetically.

-You remember, Bije?

-Yep! White Elf Soul Manipulator secured, study it, and share the information. Right?

-Exactly. Only tell Rida or Osel, and never speak to anyone else about it.

-Got it!

What set Bije apart from other messengers was not only her strength but also her communication ability based on her exceptional intelligence.

Unlike other carrier birds where you had to tie a written message and worry about possible interception, Bije could simply be told the message and relay it herself.

Of course, considering how few in the world could shoot Bije down and steal a message, such concerns were mostly unnecessary.

Even after sending Bije off, there were still many tasks to be done.

He designed medals for those who had participated in the recent war, and researched the weapons and tactics that had been used.

What particularly drew attention this time was the performance and limitations of the firearms that had been deployed in actual combat for the first time.

“It took more than ten shots to bring down a mid-tier noble?”

“Yeah. Of course, considering it was a noble from House Ruvan, it makes sense to assume they had durability equivalent to high-ranking noble or above. But he was unarmored, and most nobles typically carry at least one or two defensive magic artifacts, so it should be seen as a similar case.”

Hearing Turan’s explanation, Melo furrowed his brow.

Firearm development was a topic of great interest among the upper ranks of Parsha, with many contributing ideas, but the one closest to the project lead, next to Meisa, and the most skilled Enchanter was Melo himself.

“Should we try to boost the performance...? But if we increase the amount of gunpowder, the chances of it exploding become too high.”

“What about increasing the size? There’s no reason we need to stick to the current dimensions.”

The current firearm size had been based on suggestions from the half-elves who helped with the design, but after using it, it seemed that even larger and heavier versions wouldn’t be too much of a burden.

Originally, firearms were designed for ordinary humans, but the physical strength of wizards far surpassed that.

"I suppose we'll have to think in that direction."

“In the long term, it would be nice if even commoners could use them... but is that still difficult?”

“Yes. The ideas you mentioned, my lord, require technologies that are far too advanced to implement right now.”

The firearms currently being developed by the House Parsha were, in truth, so crude that actual gunsmiths would probably cough up blood upon seeing them.

The weak frames couldn’t withstand the explosive force of gunpowder, so they relied on magical enchantments to boost durability, and in the absence of proper firing mechanism technology, they substituted with ignition magic.

About the only real 'technology' they had was quantifying the amount of gunpowder by wrapping it in cotton cloth for ignition.

After offering a few more leads on firearm development, Turan headed to the underground prison.

Where the White Elf princess, Yukvalenia, was being held.

“Have you been well?”

“...Not really. This place is filthy and stinks.”

“Well, it is a prison.”

Of course, noble houses with long histories like Varaha operated high-class prisons for detaining high-status individuals, but unfortunately, Kalamaf was not yet at the stage to have such facilities.

Turan provided new food and informed her of the task she would now be taking on.

"Methods of handling Soul Chains?"

“Right. Is it possible to resolve the aging of Soul Chains with Soul Manipulation?”

Of course, this wasn’t the first time he’d asked that question.

Even Reshion and the other half-elves had once been powerful Soul Manipulators, summoned for rituals during their lifetime.

But unfortunately, the answers returned had been negative.

The reason being, White Elf Soul Manipulators had never bothered to research a way to solve the aging of Soul Chains in the first place.

‘Well, when the physical body is going to age and die anyway, there was no real need to look for such a method.’

Once they entered the bodies of gods, even if the interest arose, they had already lost their White Elf bodies, and thus could no longer use Soul Manipulation, so there was no way to conduct research.

In contrast, with the lineage of White Elf Soul Manipulators continuing, surely some method must have emerged by now?

Regrettably, Turan’s expectations were thoroughly betrayed.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Yeah. I’m not that skilled of a Soul Manipulator...”

Like Necromancers, Soul Manipulators also had ranks in power, and Nia said she was not particularly powerful.

Those who originally had great strength were either hunted down or fused with the gods, and she was a collateral descendant born among royalty with relatively diluted blood.

“I see... well, it can’t be helped. We’ll just have to research as much as we can for now.”

After that, Turan made time whenever possible to go down to the underground prison and, through Nia, study the basic principles and applications of Soul Manipulation.

While he had already acquired some foundational knowledge through the half-elves of Varaha, direct experience was something else entirely.

There’s a reason people say that seeing once is better than hearing a hundred times.

“Stop.”

“...Ugh.”

One bothersome part was that during these experiments, Nia would occasionally make aggressive attempts.

Like when she tried to force her spirit form into Turan’s and merge it with his. She now trembled as he gripped her throat.

Turan quietly looked at her and spoke in a low voice.

“This is your last warning. If you pull another stunt, I’ll kill one of the next White Elves we bring here before we even start.”

“...I understand.”

Her pitiful posture as she lowered her head was quite beautiful, resembling that of a human, but it failed to stir any sympathy in Turan.

That was because he was always seeing her spirit form, which was essentially her true self, and it was completely different from her current appearance.

While experimenting with Soul Manipulation, another line of research was also progressing smoothly.

It was the study of how to prevent her from recklessly using her power to harm others.

"How about this, can you get through this?"

[No.]

“Any way to get through with a different technique?”

[I don't know.]

“Good, that’s perfect.”

Among the magical artifacts Meisa had helped create, the one that blocked spiritual perception proved most effective.

Just as wizards couldn't cast magic accurately without sight of their target, Soul Manipulators also couldn't attack another spirit form or dominate a soul when their spiritual perception was blocked and their own spirit form was exposed.

Turan affixed the magical artifact, crafted in the shape of a headband, and then created a separate locking mechanism that could secure and release it.

With that fastened, there would be no risk of someone feeding her or cleaning the cell suddenly having their mind dominated.

‘Now that I think about it, Bije should’ve been back by now...’

As he emerged from the underground after perfectly preparing the restraint, that thought suddenly occurred to Turan.

If she were carrying someone, that might be different, but for Bije to fly alone between Kalamaf and Lavitas, two days was more than enough.

Strangely enough, just as he thought that, he sensed Bije’s presence in the distance.

And someone else riding on her back as well.

“Sorry to drop in uninvited.”

Moments later, Rida Lavitas, who had landed in the garden with Bije, waved warmly at Turan with a gentle smile.

*****

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