Shepherd Wizard-Chapter 213

Translator: Pai_

'I never thought they would betray me so immediately like this.'

Turan's first thought as he countered Rodor’s sudden attack from behind.

He had already suspected the Carmine bastards would betray them.

He tried his best to suppress it, but the hostility directed at him couldn’t be fully hidden in their eyes or tone of voice.

What he hadn’t expected was the timing of the betrayal.

He thought they’d wait until the mermaids were dealt with and the group was somewhat worn out before striking, but to try and hit him from behind right as the battle began?

‘Did they secretly conspire with the other side beforehand?’

If that were the case, things might get more complicated, but judging by the mermaids hesitating in apparent confusion, that didn’t seem to be it.

To anyone watching, it looked like the enemies had been caught off guard by this sudden internal conflict.

As that line of thought passed through his mind, Turan saw Rodor, startled, pulling back the trident he had thrust out.

[You bastard-]

Turan focused on the short trident in his hand. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

Even though it had been used with a light thrust, it had created a powerful shock as if to turn the sea upside down.

Inside that weapon was a power equal to Aravion’s “Heaven’s Punishment”, Haroon’s long musket, or Turan’s own Mimic Sacred Relic.

The weapon the mermaid king had previously used must have been an inferior imitation of that item.

‘So that’s the true King of Calamity.’

Considering that the original owner of that Sacred Relic was Monarch, it seemed the bastard had handed it over to manipulate Carmine.

Since they had done similar deals before, Monarch had likely urged them to act immediately in exchange for giving the Sacred Relic in advance, which was originally promised for later.

Now he could see what they had in mind.

The situation had already been somewhat balanced, but if Carmine now wielded the King of Calamity, the war between the Carmine and mermaid factions would end in overwhelming victory for Carmine.

If the betrayal came at the end of the battle, the others would’ve been on guard. So the plan must have been to catch them off guard right before the clash, deal a massive blow, and then use the Sacred Relic’s power to wipe out everything.

As a plan, it wasn’t half bad.

If Turan hadn’t had the power to counter the King of Calamity’s attack or had been defenseless, he’d have ended up incapacitated, like the time he was pierced by Badal’s lightning.

If he activated the Lavitas bloodline in the middle of the sea, he would lose his underwater breathing ability, making treatment impossible, essentially a guaranteed death. And using that Sacred Relic’s power, they could have even massacred all the great sea serpent mermaids allied with Armania.

However, what Rodor and the Carmine God Tribe had overlooked was that Turan had been on alert against them all along, and he now possessed enough strength to fend off their ambush.

[Armania, they’re enemies too. Don’t trust anyone but me.]

[Got it!]

At Turan’s shout, Armania, who had been standing there blankly, not understanding the situation, quickly swung his tail.

The Carmine nobles nearby screamed and tried to flee, but a few were caught by the tail and crushed.

‘Seems like they didn’t even bother sharing the full plan with anyone outside their own group. Well, if they had, I might’ve noticed sooner.’

Just a passing thought, Turan felt a vibration emanating from the King of Calamity aimed at him again.

Water, being a medium that transmits vibration even more effectively than air, made the resulting shockwaves incredibly intense.

‘Ugh.’

Turan quickly took cover behind an ice shield to avoid the shockwave.

Getting hit once helped him understand why Rodor had been so desperate to obtain that Sacred Relic.

To be able to unleash an attack comparable to Aravion’s Heaven’s Punishment over such a wide area, within the underwater environment, it could be considered an even more powerful magic artifact.

In fact, the fact that it partially pierced through defenses made it even nastier.

However, this didn’t mean Turan was in danger.

Very few even within House Parsha knew what he had become now.

The Carmine bastards and the mermaids knew nothing, and even Monarch had only seen Turan shatter Badal’s skull by shooting a steel ball, through a puppet from afar.

The completion of the Shepherd Combination allowed him to organically link all four emblems, which meant that most of the magic he now performed as himself essentially functioned like skills. It didn’t just mean he could draw out more power than before.

[What- where did he go!?]

[I definitely lit up the area...!]

The Carmine wizards instantly lost track of Turan, who had hidden himself in the water, and, startled, began conjuring orbs of light in every direction.

However, even as the deep, deep seafloor lit up like midday, Turan did not reveal himself.

‘It’s definitely manageable now.’

Though the concealment ability he had as a Shepherd still consumed a great deal of magic power in the presence of light, it was no longer as dramatic as before.

That was because his ability now held superiority over ordinary light magic.

While they were momentarily flustered by Turan’s continued invisibility, what struck the Carmine wizards next were the mermaids.

Whatever had just happened, the current situation appeared to them as an opportunity.

The damn devils who had seemed ready to wipe them out at any moment were now split into two factions and fighting each other.

If given time, those two might end up tearing each other apart, but there was also the risk that they might reconcile. So their best chance at survival was to attack one side now and reduce its power.

[W-Wait!]

[Now’s not the time for us to fight each other! You stupid mermaids……]

The Carmine wizards hurriedly sent waves carrying their intention for a ceasefire, but most of the mermaids were far beyond the point of listening, their eyes rolling back with bloodlust.

Let alone the commoner-class mermaids, who were practically slaves to instinct, even the more rational noble mermaids were going wild, riled up by the scent of human blood.

The royal mermaids, who could transform into great sea serpents, still retained some reason, but even they, instead of targeting the now-invisible Turan or Armania, who was at least their kin, chose to strike the Carmine nobles first.

"Kheuk-!"

The scream of a Carmine noble dissolved helplessly into the seawater flooding his mouth.

The battle that began in the middle of the sea was utter chaos.

The three forces, Carmine nobles, Armania, and the mermaids, clashed in every direction: front and back, left and right, up and down.

Armania made clever use of the situation.

Knowing that if he got surrounded by either the Carmine nobles or the mermaids, he would be overwhelmed, he skillfully weaved along the border between the two sides.

Amusingly, the mermaids sometimes mistook Armania for one of their own royal kin and even died by taking ice spears thrown by Carmine nobles aiming at him.

Likewise, Turan actively used disguise to fuel the confusion.

Remaining hidden, he quickly stole the upper garment of a dead Carmine noble, changed his face, and fought among the mermaids, only to suddenly kill a nearby Carmine noble and disappear again, repeating the process.

Thanks to that, Rodor and the Carmine wizards couldn’t afford to trust even those beside them.

If any one of them happened to be Turan in disguise, it would mean instant death.

Their only stroke of luck was that this battle was taking place underwater.

Had it not been, invisible railguns would have been flying in from all directions.

Not to mention, lightning-based attacks were practically neutralized here.

[Damn it, how the hell did it come to this……]

Rodor Carmine, known among his comrades as the Lawyer, gritted his teeth as he looked around.

Right up until the battle began, Turan had seemed solely focused on the great sea serpent in front of him. So how had he been able to counter the ambush so precisely?

If only this ambush had succeeded, they could have turned everything around.

They could have taken care of those arrogant mermaids, once their slaves, now rebels, and eliminated Turan, who dared try to stand above them despite being just an NPC.

If it was true that Turan had destroyed House Zahar, then killing him and crushing the Parsha faction would have given them the chance to reclaim center stage in the world…….

“Urgh!”

Just as that thought crossed his mind, an ice spike tore through the water, aiming for Rodor’s side.

If not for the vibration detection ability granted by the King of Calamity, he wouldn’t have noticed such a stealthy attack.

Dodging it and creating another vibration that pierced a hole through a great sea serpent’s body, Rodor then saw a Carmine noble get devoured by Armania.

The man, who shared the same type of possession as Rodor, mouthed words at him in terror.

‘Help me.’

They knew that the death of the flesh did not necessarily lead to the death of the soul, yet death on this battlefield was still something to fear.

There was no guarantee that their souls would return intact the moment Turan won.

Of course, the soul base that Jemel and the other Carmine God Tribe members knew about had already been abandoned and relocated long ago, but if they were captured here without returning, even that would be meaningless.

In fact, the soul form of a comrade who had just been devoured by Armania was immediately seized by Turan, who had also summoned his own soul form right beside it.

‘Where’s he keeping his body? Is it attached to the body of that great sea serpent?’

The moment one draws out their soul form is when they’re most defenseless, so it would be best to aim for that moment. But finding it somewhere on the enormous sea serpent, which was nearly a hundred meters long, was no easy task.

Even more so with two great sea serpents constantly targeting him.

Rodor quickly moved, narrowly dodging a wide-open maw filled with sharp teeth, grinding his teeth as he did.

“You bastards.......”

With a growling sound, the four emblems within Rodor activated their power.

Rapids, Frost, Earthmover, and Minstrel.

As the trident struck the ground, a strong vibration rang out, shaking the sea floor and stirring up the surrounding currents violently.

The range reached several kilometers in all directions.

“Uwaaah!”

“Stop! You’re dragging us in too!”

“Please, save us, Family Head!”

The currents were so turbulent that even the mermaids transformed into great sea serpents couldn’t maintain their balance, let alone the weaker ones.

Thousands of commoner mermaids had their innards crushed from the shock of the current in an instant. The Carmine nobles also screamed, but the currents were too fierce for any sound to carry.

Even Turan was forced to abandon his concealment under the crazed turbulence and emerge.

Just for a moment, his brain was so shaken that maintaining magic became difficult.

Resistance to this kind of shock wasn’t something one could handle with just excellent physical abilities.

‘Looks like I’ve got twenty fingers...’

Looking down at his hand and trying to regain focus, Turan finally noticed that Rodor, having found his target, was drawing a vibrating blade, and he responded accordingly.

Just as Ymir once had, he summoned an ice shield.

Though connecting ice manipulation to Shepherd skills was difficult, so it wasn’t classified as a skill, the ice magic Turan cast with his Carmine bloodline activated was top-tier.

“Turan-!”

“If you were going to betray me, you should’ve been more thorough.”

Their voices didn’t reach each other, but just from lip movement and facial expressions, they understood one another well enough.

Turan subtly shifted his gaze to confirm that Armania was still in fierce combat with the mermaid king, and the other mermaids were still busy clashing with the Carmine nobles, none of them could afford to pay attention here.

It meant this was the perfect situation for a one-on-one duel.

Once again concealing himself, Turan used the sea currents to swiftly close the distance and immediately drew out an ice whip.

With a boom, a shockwave exploded around Rodor’s body, deflecting the attack.

‘He shouldn’t be able to detect attacks not in contact with his body, so it must be a barrier-type skill.’

Despite the puzzlement, the assault continued.

Just like when he had used Light of Judgement in the past, Turan rapidly melted, froze, and reshaped the created ice.

As a result, his attacks looked like a giant ice octopus with dozens of limbs striking from all directions.

Of course, there was no one who could perceive that.

“You...!”

Rodor tried to spread the vibrations as widely as possible to attack the invisible Turan, but by then, Turan had already figured out a way to defend against the attack to some extent.

As the incoming shockwaves were enveloped by dozens of layers of ice barriers, each layer absorbed some of the force, weakening the vibration rapidly until it dissipated.

He had instinctively grasped that multiple thin layers were more effective against vibrations than a single thick one.

At the same time, as Rodor's attention was drawn to blocking the ice whip, an ice spike slipped through the disrupted vibration barrier and pierced his abdomen, tearing into his organs.

Though things like gunpowder explosions or magnetism acceleration couldn’t be used underwater, Turan’s shooting technique using a slingshot had already ascended into the realm of skills.

“Ghk-”

Rodor saw the blood from his mouth mix and scatter through the seawater and urgently looked for reinforcements.

But then it struck him, against an invisible Turan, brute force in numbers meant little.

It was only then that he realized this had been an unwinnable fight from the very beginning. All he could do was wear a defeated expression.

***

After Rodor's death, the Carmine nobles, having lost their will to fight, attempted to flee, but it was nearly impossible to shake off mermaids in the sea.

At that point, Turan began attacking the mermaid side to restore balance.

He ambushed one of the surviving great sea serpent royals and pierced its head, killing it. When the enraged queen charged in over the death of her child, Turan dove into her gaping maw and released a massive electrical surge from within.

When the mermaid king, who had been fiercely fighting Armania, saw this and rushed in, Turan quickly used the Carmine nobles as shields to cause mutual destruction between them. In the end, he joined forces with Armania to take the mermaid king’s life.

In the end, the mermaids fought until the last one and all died, and only a few Carmine nobles who fled the fastest managed to survive.

Whether they would be able to return to land while avoiding other mermaids or magical beasts was uncertain, but in any case, all the possessed hosts had been captured, so the leftovers didn’t matter.

The sea, where the battle had ended, was now thickly tainted with the blood and flesh of mermaids and humans alike, a stark contrast to its once-clear beauty.

Naturally, many marine magical beasts, attracted to the remains, had begun to gather, but Turan left them alone.

With the recent wars being so numerous, there weren’t many wizards left in need of magic power, and left unattended, they would simply become undead spirits.

Of course, he made sure to collect the bodies of Rodor and a few high-ranking nobles separately.

Leaving them behind could lead to the birth of a myth-class marine magical beast, something too horrifically troublesome to allow.

Naturally, he also retrieved magical items like the King of Calamity. His technique of using water to manipulate objects telekinetically played a major role.

If Turan had tried to collect everything by hand, it would have taken a long time.

Meanwhile, Armania, his body now completely torn and battered, was tending to the remains of his kin.

Seeing the great sea serpents lying on the ground, he let out a low, growling sound.

Watching this quietly, Turan approached him in silence and placed a hand on his enormous head.

Having never truly had any family besides his mother, Turan couldn’t fully understand Armania’s feelings, but he knew that right now, Armania must be deeply troubled.

[Turan……]

[I’m sorry, Armania.]

It was an apology for killing Armania’s family, blood relatives, even if they had tried to kill him.

If his mother had still been alive and sided with Badal as a member of Aravion, and he’d had to kill her as an enemy, how would he have felt?

Or if Solif had killed his mother in his place?

Most likely, he wouldn’t have been able to brush it off so casually, saying it was just something that had to be done.

At Turan’s apology, Armania bowed his head deeply and remained silent for a long time.

[Do you not want a separate grave for them?]

[It’s fine like this…… If we leave them here, they’ll naturally disperse and become one with the sea.]

That seemed to be the mermaids’ way of holding funerals.

There was no reason to interfere.

After all, the bodies of great sea serpent mermaids were essentially just shells, with no particular value left to use.

[There’s no chance other mermaids will transform into great sea serpents using these bodies, right?]

[No. There’s no true essence left in our bodies.]

[Hmm.]

Turan nodded and stepped into the heart of the mermaids’ completely ruined sanctuary.

Once a street adorned with elaborate coral decorations and quite vibrant in appearance, it was now half-destroyed and in ruins.

Thanks to the senses granted by his Sacred Relic, he already knew there were no survivors.

Even the young mermaids who had been hiding in underground caves had all died, swept away by the massive currents Rodor had stirred up.

For Turan, this was something he was quietly thankful for.

He couldn’t afford to leave behind anything that might become a future threat, but at the same time, he didn’t want to show Armania the sight of him killing all his living younger siblings right before his eyes.

[This must be the royal family's residence.]

[Yes.]

Turan entered the mermaid king’s palace with Armania, who had returned to his mermaid form.

Though it was practically a ruin, the scattered belongings all around confirmed that it had once been a splendid place.

As they passed what remained of what were once young mermaids, the remains of a great sea serpent undead, hunted long ago, came into view at the innermost part.

Already battered from previous attacks, it had now been processed in some special way, making it significantly smaller than before.

[By offering rituals here, they draw power from it.]

[I see.]

Nodding at Armania’s explanation, Turan conjured a massive ice blade and sliced the great sea serpent remains into pieces, storing them in his large-capacity pouch.

Compared to the transformed bodies of the mermaid royals he had killed earlier, this one was much tougher, consuming a considerable amount of magic power.

The mermaids had likely used some special technique to process it.

After recovering the serpent’s remains, Turan finally searched for the mermaids’ treasure, and among them was the Blue Coral Crown that Carmine had once obtained.

Considering it was the treasure used to lead the mermaids, it might later prove useful in controlling or driving the mermaids of the two seas to extinction.

[Looks like everything's settled. Let’s head up.]

[Alright……]

Turan patted Armania on the shoulder as he stared gloomily downward, then ascended with him to the surface.

As always, the sea was peaceful, as if it knew nothing of those who had fought and died below.