“Carlisle. Where is High Priest Dietrich?”

“I’ve received word he is on his way from the temple, my lord.”

As Shed anxiously awaited the temple’s visit, the office door creaked open.

“My lord, High Priest Dietrich has arrived.”

“Show him in.”

At Werner’s report, Shed straightened at once, as though he had been waiting for this very moment.

Dietrich entered with his awkward gait, eyes flicking nervously around the room, and Carlisle stepped aside to give them privacy.

“It has been some time, High Priest Dietrich. May the Lord be with you.”

Shed offered a brisk greeting, then urged him quickly to sit.

Dietrich adjusted his glasses in his familiar, uneasy way and folded his hands together.

“May the Lord be with you as well, Lord Lester.”

Since waking, Shed had been waiting for Dietrich’s return. After the heretic hunt, the High Priest had gone to Dynaemes to report to the Central Temple and had only returned the day before.

Seeing how much more gaunt Shed appeared compared to before, Dietrich sat awkwardly across from him.

“I heard that you were unable to wake up for a long time because of the curse. Are you… are you OK now? Is there anything I can do to help…?”

“The reason I asked you here today, High Priest, is to speak with you about black magic.”

“Of—of course. Ask what you will.”

When Dietrich nodded, Shed fell silent for a moment, carefully choosing his words. He had been gathering these questions in his mind, waiting for the right moment to release them one by one.

“…What exactly happened to that heretic?”

The first thing he wanted to ask was about Pamen’s end. Others had told him the man had been “dealt with,” but the precise details had never reached him.

“Do not trouble yourself. The heretic collapsed utterly. That is to say…”

The High Priest, still stammering as always, provided a lengthy explanation of what had happened. It was usually forbidden to speak about black magic in such detail to anyone outside the clergy. However, Shed had confronted the heretic face-to-face and had even been cursed by him. The temple deemed him to be the person most deeply involved in the affair, and thus allowed him to know more than most.

“He sustained mortal injuries and was unable to replenish his life force.”

After Shed’s blade struck him, the heretic fled. But he did not get far. His strength was born of an incomplete rite; without consuming life, he could neither heal nor achieve immortality. Wounded as he was, when he raged in search of new prey, he proved powerless before Dietrich’s holy power.

The High Priest had held him back, stopping him from escaping with the force of divine light. Without sustenance, the heretic collapsed completely.

“This collapse… does it mean the same as death?”

“It is more than death. In other words, he disintegrated completely, as if he had turned to ash.”

Dietrich picked up a teaspoon from the table, scooped some sugar from the bowl and demonstrated how it dissolved.

He then tipped the spoon back over, allowing the sugar to fall back into the bowl. The grains of sugar scattered and crumbled into a shapeless heap.

“I took the remains to the Central Temple. They are completely harmless now. Proof of the black magic’s dissolution.”

Shed stared at the sugar, silent. Pamen’s end was as hollow as the powder dissolving before him.

“…I was told that eight years ago, the heretics of Ideana had all been eradicated. Do you know how he survived?”

“I-I’m so sorry…! It must have been a heretic I failed to root out…”

Dietrich bowed his head at Shed’s question, as though he were being accused. He had been the one tasked with purging and cleansing Ideana back then.

“That wasn’t my intention.”

Shed said quietly, raising a hand to calm him.

“I only wish to know.”

Still fidgeting with the rim of his glasses, Dietrich drew a nervous breath.

“T-To be honest… this was kept secret from the outside world. Eight years ago, the fall of House Ideana was not wrought by the Temple or even the Imperial army.”

“…What do you mean?”

As far as Shed Lester knew, the temple priests and knights from several houses had marched on Ideana to punish acts of treason and heresy. This marked the complete collapse of the Count’s house. At the time, Shed was just a foot soldier in the rear support lines of House Lester. He had not even set foot in Ideana’s domain before it was all over.

“All members of House Ideana confirmed dead.”

The reports said he was driven by vengeance. He wanted to drag her before him and brand her a criminal before demanding answers.

Why had she sold him into slavery? Why had she hidden behind the cowardice of her father? And what about the trembling words she had tried so hard to hide?

“I heard that a great battle took place in Faradel at that time. Apparently, what happened there is the reason the land is the way it is now…”

“That was the official report.”

Dietrich admitted this with a bitter smile tugging at his lips as he averted his gaze.

When the army sent to crush the traitors reached Faradel, they were greeted not by battle, but by a barren wasteland drowned in deathly silence.

“I—I think something went wrong during their research into black magic. Before we arrived.”

“Something went wrong… during the research?”

“Everything was already dead. Black magic had wiped them all out. Perhaps it was a fitting end for heretics.”

Even Count Felix Ideana, who had led the research, had been found among the corpses. His body was black and crumbling.

The scene was ghastly. Rivers of blood ran through the streets. Blackened corpses lay everywhere. A crimson light bordering on madness mingled with shadows scraping against the abyss of fear.

Even knights who had fought in countless battles were sickened by the sight. It took them days to steel themselves enough to endure it.

All they could do was search, hoping to find survivors. But no trace of life was ever uncovered. Thus, Ideana’s sins ended in ruin so hollow that it was almost meaningless.

Upon hearing Dietrich’s account, Shed pressed a hand hard against his brow, trying to calm the chaos in his mind.

He had always found it strange. When traitors were caught, they were publicly executed in a spectacle intended to serve as a warning. Yet no such punishment had ever been meted out to House Ideana. There were no prisoners, captives or paraded criminals. Furthermore, Faradel itself was steeped far too heavily in black magic for it to have been merely a clash between the Temple and heretics.

The evidence had always been there. But nobody had ever questioned the Temple’s account of events. After black magic tainted Ideana, few people dared to go there, so the public accepted the Temple’s account as the only truth available to them.

“Then why hide it?”

“B-Because the power of black magic was too terrible and overwhelming. His Holiness feared that others would covet such power.”

Yes, it was a horrific end, but the power was far too immense. The Church was wary of allowing any mention of black magic to spread. So, for the sake of peace, they cloaked it all in a story of triumphant righteousness, burying the truth.

She could no longer distinguish truth from lies. All he knew was that two people had survived the massacre.

One was Pamen, the heretic and his brother, whom he had once revered.

The other was Luise Ideana.

‘How did she survive that catastrophe?’

Had Pamen orchestrated it? Had she fled before it struck? Or… had she been there, at the heart of it?

Thorny questions twisted together in his mind, constricting his breath.

“…The crescent-shaped mark.”

“…Pardon?”

“I saw it. That heretic bore a crescent mark on his body.”

He had seen it clearly—the same mark carved into Pamen’s flesh, identical to the one etched near Luise Ideana’s collarbone.

“Tell me… is that mark connected to black magic?”

The words spilled out like shards of broken glass, cutting him as they left his mouth.

In the face of his fear, the High Priest merely blinked, his pale blue eyes wide with innocent surprise.

“A c-crescent mark… ah! You mean the mark of the demon Mephisto?”

Dietrich recalled the scripture—how the demon Mephisto bore a crescent upon his brow. In sacred paintings, artists had often depicted him with that very moon-shaped sigil.

“Yes, it is considered a symbol of black magic. B-But why do you ask such a question?”

“I saw that very crescent on the body of the heretic.”

“A-Ah!”

Dietrich’s eyes lit up, sparkling with the thrill of discovery, as though Shed had just revealed something remarkable—something almost wondrous.

“I wish I could have seen it myself!”

The meticulous Inquisitor lamented the fact that, with the heretic now completely destroyed, there was no way to verify the mark Shed had described.

“St-Still, this is an enormous help. Y-Yes, very good. This matter must absolutely be reported to the Grand Temple.”

Dietrich nodded eagerly, his voice rising with excitement.

Throughout history, heretics who practised black magic were rare. Since their bodies usually crumbled to ash upon death, there are few records of them ever having been examined. Shed’s testimony would be invaluable to the study of black magic.

However, despite this ‘great discovery’, Shed’s expression only darkened further.

‘If that mark truly does appear on the body of one who wields black magic…’

A foreboding chill ran through him, his heart pounding faster and faster.

“That can’t be. Lucifer told me—I was nearly perfect.”

“…Lucifer.”

“Pardon?”

“The heretic spoke of him before he died. He said Lucifer was the one who made him nearly perfect.”

The memory was blurred; just fragments of what he had heard before he collapsed. But that name had stuck with him, echoing endlessly in his mind.

Dietrich adjusted his spectacles, his face stiffening.

“A-Are you saying, then, that the heretic had… a master behind him?”

Shed did not answer. He neither confirmed nor denied. His lips pressed into a grim line.

Instead, he remembered the day Pamen had sought out Liana. He remembered the words they had exchanged and the secrets buried there.

‘Don’t tell me… Luise herself is Lucifer…’

Shed’s hand tightened on his robes, knuckles white.