Shepherd Wizard-Chapter 207

Translator: Pai_

With a heated roar, the cannonball fired from the allied forces shattered the walls of Axum City, along with several police officers and knights standing atop them.

It was a hit rate hard to believe, considering that it was a shot made without a proper gun carriage or even knowledge of ballistics.

This was because, as it had been when Turan threw stones in the past, the cannonballs contained magic that tracked their targets.

Although they were much heavier and could not produce such dramatic changes as stones or metal balls, as long as they flew in a similar direction, minor deviations would be automatically corrected.

“Jump down!”

“Don’t stand on the wall!”

The wizards of House Zahar, who had planned to launch a preemptive strike on the approaching enemy troops by using the height difference, were startled and leapt down from the walls.

After a few minutes of continuous cannon fire, with dozens of cannonballs exploding, a section of Axum City’s wall finally collapsed completely.

It wasn’t just a small hole that formed; rather, a large enough passage had opened for hundreds of people to pass through at once without issue.

“Advance.”

With a quiet order, Solif was the first to move forward.

As the family head of the Guardian bloodline and possessing the most durable body, he was truly a person well-suited to lead the front.

“Ugh......”

“P-please spare me.”

However, what awaited the allied forces as they entered the city were not bloodthirsty enemies, but dying citizens.

When the walls collapsed, buildings beneath were destroyed, and a significant number of people had been killed or injured.

‘How terrible.’

Turan did not turn his eyes away from those dying people.

It was a sacrifice he had to accept to hunt wolves, but the moment he justified it as not his fault, he would become no different from those fallen gods.

Just as he was about to pass by the victims and head toward the Red Fortress, a sharp arrow was caught by Solif’s hand.

“Kill the invaders!”

With a furious voice, the wizards of House Zahar, hiding among the ruins, launched a simultaneous attack.

In an instant, the sounds of sharp gunfire, the heat emitted by various spells, and screams turned the streets of Axum into chaos.

“Ugh, I got hit in the arm!”

“This is... poison. Lavitas! Is there any healer of the Lavitas bloodline!?”

“Damn it, I feel completely surrounded.”

Only then did the allied forces realize that House Zahar had planned their strategy from the beginning with urban warfare in mind.

True to its age of thousands of years, the buildings of Axum were densely packed and towered high.

Dealing with attacks from House Zahar’s wizards, who hid between them dressed indistinguishably from civilians and then suddenly struck, was no easy task.

“I-I’m not one of them!”

“Then stay down- Ugh!”

“Die!”

Now, all civilians who hadn’t yet evacuated due to injury or panic had effectively become potential enemies.

Because of that, even though the allied wizards had numerical and qualitative superiority, they could not simply crush the enemy.

What’s more, the enemy was now attacking not with the conventional throwing weapons they had used before, but with new methods.

“Urgh!”

With a bang, more than ten wizards were blown away.

Just moments before, a boy who had been running away in a panic suddenly hurled a leather pouch that exploded.

They had begun using gunpowder weapons, once seemingly exclusive to House Parsha.

Though the method was primitive to an incomparable degree, it was still undeniably a threatening attack.

“Damn disgusting bastards......”

However, not even they could stop Solif at the front.

With the halo unique to the Varaha bloodline glowing behind him and his whole body wrapped in white flames, he shot light-speed beams with every wave of his hand, toppling House Zahar’s wizards.

It was a result made possible by his persistent training, allowing him to adapt a beam skill originally usable only on a large scale.

At that moment, a figure appeared next to Solif, as if silently rising.

“Looks like I’ll have to step in.”

“You sure? You need to conserve your magic power to deal with the higher-ups.”

“At this rate, we’ll suffer too many losses breaking through. It’s better for someone like me, who can detect wizards, to step up and preserve our forces.”

Even as Turan spoke, he snapped his fingers to create a few fireballs, spun them around, and fired.

Four wizards of House Zahar, hiding behind a stone wall as a shield, were burned to death without even letting out a scream.

There were plenty of other ways to attack as well.

When he confirmed that there were no civilians nearby, he would vaporize Water of Death and spray it to burn their lungs alive, or at times, he would catch flying arrows or concealed weapons and throw them back to kill.

Once Turan took the lead, the allied forces’ advance became significantly faster than before.

Following behind Turan, who walked ahead in long strides, Solif hastily tried to stop him.

“Hey, you’re moving too fast right now! At this rate, the rear formation is going to collapse.”

“We need to go faster.”

“Why?”

“I suspected it when they declared surrender and then kept resisting... these bastards are waiting for something.”

Compared to how they had bowed their heads and begged in disgrace, the current situation was clearly a setup for urban warfare.

Moreover, most of those continuing to attack the allied forces were either knights or low-ranking nobles.

If they had truly lost hope and were making a final desperate stand, then it would have made more sense for high-ranking nobles like Rahman to join the urban battle as well, or for the nobles to flee separately and engage in guerrilla warfare.

The way things were being handled now clearly indicated that they had some plausible solution, but it wasn't ready yet, and so they were buying time.

Solif, who found Turan’s reasoning plausible, also let out a heavy sigh with a grim expression.

“Still…”

While listening to Solif, Turan continued moving forward until he noticed something like a barrier made of magic power on the ground.

To confirm, he conjured Light of Judgement and extended a whip to strike the ground, and at that moment, an enormous explosion and shockwave slammed into the two of them.

“Kegh.”

“Khuk-”

The two of them were flung dozens of meters away in an instant.

After standing dazed for a moment, they looked at each other and burst into laughter.

It wasn’t exactly appropriate behavior for such a serious situation, but their appearances, covered in soot and looking pitch black, were just too ridiculous.

“Are you a crow or something?”

“Look who’s talking.”

After teasing each other, the two looked forward again and saw that the ground on the path they had just been walking had completely caved in.

It was clear that the Zahar forces had intentionally dug out the ground and buried a large amount of gunpowder.

“There was something on the ground, so I touched it to check.”

“If you hadn’t triggered it yourself, a lot more people would’ve died.”

If the allied wizards had walked over it and it had exploded then, it could have killed at least hundreds.

Compared to this, the traps Turan had laid for the Varaha nobles earlier were child’s play.

The barrier they had sensed was likely installed to conceal the smell of the massive amount of gunpowder.

It seemed they hadn’t expected that barrier to be detected at all.

After creating water to lightly rinse off their bodies, the two led the allied forces forward again.

They discovered a couple more traps like the one before, and one of them had no barrier at all, so they barely detected it by smell.

Those following behind were all armed with firearms, and the enemies had been using a lot of gunpowder for attacks as well, so everyone’s noses were half-numb; a moment’s carelessness, and they might have missed it.

Had they marched for about an hour?

Finally, after pushing through about half of Axum City, the Red Fortress began to appear in the distance.

“You pushed through all of this last time too?”

“Sure did.”

Muttering that it was truly insane, Solif fired a beam to kill a House Zahar wizard.

“Back then, I moved while blending in pretty well. Escaping was just flying away, so it didn’t even take a minute... wait.”

As he murmured, Turan hardened his expression and focused on his sense of smell.

“I smell blood.”

“Of course you do. People are dying everywhere right now.”

“Not here. From over there, near the Red Fortress. And it’s the smell of blood that’s been sitting for quite a while.”

Turan explained as he spoke, simultaneously drawing a conclusion in his mind.

A ritual that sacrifices many humans and uses unknown techniques to offer them as tribute, converting ancient ruins left behind by the old gods into a special power...

The Red Fortress of Zahar was more than sufficient to serve as the subject of such a ritual.

As for the human sacrifices, they could have easily used any of the countless citizens of Axum, or brought others from elsewhere.

𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

“I’ll go first. Can you handle things and bring them after?”

“Of course. Don’t push yourself. I’ll follow quickly.”

“Got it.”

Leaving command of the allied forces to Solif, Turan immediately took off from the ground.

Though it had taken over an hour to cross half of Axum City, it didn’t take even a minute to reach the other half.

Covering several kilometers in an instant, Turan fired a steel ball toward the barrier that hung in the sky above the Red Fortress.

With a thunderous crash, an illusion like shattering glass spread through the air, and the barrier disappeared.

‘How horrific...’

The stench of rotten blood, which had only faintly registered before, now stung his nose with overpowering intensity.

It was strong enough that even an ordinary person could tell from a distance that something was terribly wrong.

It was obvious now that the barrier that had surrounded the Red Fortress until moments ago had served to conceal this smell.

Looking down from above, Turan thought the Red Fortress should now be called the Black Fortress.

That’s how it looked, with symbols drawn in dark, dried blood smeared across the floors, walls, and every part of the buildings.

With the sense of a Sacred Relic, Turan scanned the inside of the fortress and fired a steel ball toward the nearest presence of the enemy he detected.

With a rumble, a building collapsed, revealing the Zahar nobles who had been hiding there.

“Damn, he’s already here?”

“No. Looks like he left the main force behind and came alone.”

“Shut up and block him, quickly!”

As murmurs rose, so did their magic power.

Though the distance made it hard to see their symbols clearly, Turan could tell they were possessed by fallen gods.

In response to these wolves that devoured humans, the Shepherd symbol shone even more brightly.

‘It’s coming.’

The first thing that flew toward him was a teal beam fired from the hand of a bearded man.

Turan responded to what was likely a skill with the same technique as before, spinning a fireball to gain momentum and launching it.

The opponent, who had been sneering, looked shocked as his skill shattered under the fireball spell.

“What, how?”

Had it not been an established truth over thousands of years that skills held an overwhelming advantage over magic?

Before he could even process the unexpected outcome, the fireball that shattered his beam pierced his chest.

Of course, the defensive magic artifact he wore could not stop it.

Activating Spiritual Perception, Turan confirmed that the spirit form rising from the dead body was heading somewhere southeast.

‘As expected, they relocated their Soul Anchor.’

They must have made that decision knowing that if they left their Soul Anchor in Axum, it would be captured the moment the city fell.

When one of them was killed so suddenly, the other gods flinched and backed off, but in that moment, Turan couldn’t reach the escaping soul.

No matter what, they all likely had at least Spiritual Perception, so they would definitely detect their own spirit form leaving their bodies and retaliate.

Just after he had taken down one of them, another attack flew toward him, and it felt strangely familiar.

Turan deflected the ice axe swung by a lanky man and opened his mouth to ask,

“You... are you Ymir?”

“That’s right. Why?”

The symbol embedded in that body was also familiar.

It was a tangle of Berserker and Frost, following after Chaser and Hunter.

No wonder he hadn’t seen him during the last battle with Aravion, he must’ve been here all along.

“Where’s Phoenix?”

“Obviously went to kill your brat. Leaving him like that was practically begging for a stabbing, wasn’t it?”

At Ymir's sneering, Turan felt his heart sink for a moment, but he struggled not to show it.

If they had really dispatched a special forces unit targeting Luska, there was no way they would openly admit it.

“If you’re not going to talk, there’s no helping it.”

You’ll just have to die. Murmuring quietly, Turan immediately fired a steel ball loaded into his slingshot.

Ymir quickly tried to block it by raising an ice barrier like before, but there was no way someone like Ymir could withstand an attack that even the heavily armored Badal couldn’t endure.

Unless the body he possessed was exceptionally powerful, which it wasn’t, being only at a high-tier level at best, there was no chance.

“Ghhk...”

As Ymir collapsed, vomiting blood with his solar plexus pierced clean through, Turan approached without hesitation and smashed his head with a kick, confirming the kill.

It was a dramatic change, considering how he had barely escaped with his life when he infiltrated this place before, severely wounded by the attacks of the possessed ones.

Of course, that time it had been largely because Badal and Phoenix were present.

Having dealt with two possessed hosts in his preemptive strike, Turan dodged incoming attacks, hurling himself aside.

Zahar nobles who had gathered after hearing the commotion joined in, and what had been a six-against-one fight quickly escalated to dozens against one.

However, Turan shattered the gods of Zahar with a combat style that left no openings whatsoever.

Using accelerated flight magic, he kept a wide distance, surrounding his body with wind to deflect incoming projectiles, then used Night to block the enemies’ light and conceal himself as he one-sidedly ravaged them.

In the end, nobles of mediocre strength only held real power when someone of family-head level stood at the center.

And the current Turan had already transcended even the realm of such beings.

As he was wiping out more than a dozen Zahar nobles who hadn’t participated in the urban battle, a familiar face appeared.

It was his aunt, Aril Zahar, who had come as a messenger earlier.

Turan drew Light of Judgement and beheaded her, then let out a quiet sigh upon realizing the spirit form flowing from her body was extremely faint.

She was a human like him, not a possessed host.

‘It can’t be helped.’

At the very least, anyone who had stayed within this fortress was practically an accomplice in the gods’ massacre of wizards.

Of course, some might have had grievances, perhaps they were coerced under hierarchy or their families held hostage, but how could he possibly consider all that right now?

‘They’re definitely doing something in there.’

Zahar nobles, who had once emerged so confidently, were now completely dispirited and desperate to avoid him.

Seeing this, Turan turned the suspicion he’d formed earlier into certainty.

If Phoenix had been here, he should have revealed himself by now.

If he had, Turan would have had to withdraw, unable to face him while also fending off other enemies.

In other words, Phoenix was clearly engaged in something too important to come out and face Turan right now.

‘The problem is... I can’t sense his presence.’

Even the barrier that had been installed at the former residence of the Zahar family head, and many others within the Red Fortress, blocked detection of magic power from the Mimic Sacred Relic.

Considering that there had been no such measures at the Aravion side’s quarters, it was probably Kim Woong’s technology.

Just because he had defected didn’t mean all the barriers he previously installed had disappeared, so if Turan wanted to find the hidden Phoenix, he would have to search or destroy every building in the area.

‘No, wait a minute.’

At that moment, just as Turan recalled something, a roar rose from behind him.

The allied wizards he had left behind earlier had finally begun pouring into the Red Fortress.

At the front, Solif kicked the fortress gate open in a single strike and entered.

Considering that the walls of the Red Fortress themselves were originally Sacred Relics, it meant the entire structure had now lost its mystical power.

“Not late, am I!?”

“Not yet, probably!”

The Zahar nobles, seeing the allied wizards pouring in, began to retreat as if their morale had crumbled.

Taking advantage of the opening, Turan immediately put into action the idea he had just thought of.

The Librarian burst out from the Soul Prison, looked around, and grimaced with a groan.

“What is this place now? The screams of the souls are enough to deafen me.”

“You remember the pattern that was in the library and the Tomb of the Gods, right?”

The Librarian made a slightly sulky face at Turan’s disregard for his complaint, but then he responded seriously, realizing this was no time for jokes.

“I remember. But why?”

“I think this is the same pattern. Could you perhaps compare it and tell where the center is?”

At Turan’s words, the Librarian let out a hum and looked down.

Since Turan was flying, the Librarian was also at a high vantage point and could view the entire fortress, fortunately.

“There!”

The spot the Librarian pointed to was, coincidentally, not far from the restroom Turan had previously snuck into.

Turan dove toward the location and, using the momentum, stomped the ground to cast Earthmover Bloodline Magic.

The surrounding terrain shattered and shifted in an instant, creating a massive hole.

‘So there was a basement here.’

The underground level was sealed with the same material as the outer walls of the Red Fortress, and whether by design or not, that wall seemed to have retained its strength.

Turan immediately poured out a large amount of Water of Death he had newly prepared and brought with him.

Rather than slowly melting it bit by bit as before, he poured it until it pooled, and the floor began to corrode rapidly.

Moments later, as soon as a person-sized hole opened, Turan endured a bit of stinging pain and swiftly slipped inside.

“What?!”

“How did he get through the ceiling?”

The first thing he saw, along with a startled voice, was Phoenix, Rahman.

Next to him were the two possessed hosts who had survived and escaped the previous battle, and a young man with knight-level magic power.

The young man, upon seeing Turan, briefly wore a look of irritation before quickly smiling and speaking.

“Ah, Turan. Long time no see. I owe you from last time, don’t I?”

He spoke in a friendly tone, as if addressing a friend, but it was laced with arrogance, the certainty that he was fundamentally a being far above.

Without even needing to approach and check the symbol, Turan could sense who was dwelling within that knight.

The steel ball that flew from his hand immediately burst Monarch’s head.

*****

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