Chapter 10 (Part 7)

Anthus wanted to rush to the Holy Kingdom alone, but he couldn’t move recklessly as he was in charge of commanding the war. All his nerves urged him to run to Yuliana, but he knew he needed to remain calm at times like this.

“We must capture Pope Rybid alive. I won’t kill him easily.”

“Yes, understood.”

Anthus used the large-scale teleportation in the Florence territory. If they had marched, it would have taken a month, but they could deploy troops to the border of the Holy Kingdom in one day.

“The Holy Knights and priests of the Holy Kingdom won’t have combat power. So it should be easy to subdue them.”

“Duke, Your Grace!”

The tent flapped as a knight rushed in.

“What’s the matter?”

“Duke! The shadow that left with Mercenary King Erzen just arrived through a teleport scroll.”

“Let them in!”

The shadow, who entered the tent, felt a chill at the sight of Anthus’s face.

“Erzen must have sent a map, right? Did you find Miss Luda?”

“Yes.”

The shadow carefully took out a letter and a map from their pocket and handed them to Anthus with a bow.

Anthus, after reading the letter, crumpled the paper. He had somewhat expected it, but as he anticipated, the rescued person was ‘Luda.’ This made it clear. Yuliana was inside the Holy Kingdom!

To swallow the anger rising to his throat, Anthus clenched his fists and tried to calm his trembling self.

Surely, the pope would know about Yuliana’s pregnancy. Her current situation… it was bleak. The kind-hearted Yuliana might be threatened, forced to choose between saving Luda or the child in her belly.

Yuliana might be tearfully complying with their demands. Thinking of Yuliana, possibly crying, Anthus slammed his fist onto the desk. The desk split in half.

Bang!

With all sorts of vicious thoughts, Anthus felt like he was going insane.

Unable to sit still, Anthus stood up. He tore the teleport scroll, which could take him to Erzen, made by giving many magic stones to wizards.

Anthus teleported to where Erzen was in an instant.

“Duke!”

Luda knelt as soon as she saw Anthus suddenly appear.

“I’m sorry. I couldn’t protect her.”

“Luda, I couldn’t protect her either. Let’s only think about rescuing Lia now. Where was she taken?”

“She must have been taken to the Holy Kingdom.”

Luda steadied her trembling hands.

“Pope Rybid is not in his right mind.”

“Tell me in detail. Exactly as it is.”

“Pope Rybid said he would hold a wedding with the young lady, and he thinks the child in her belly is his…”

Before Luda could finish speaking, a sharp murderous aura began to emanate from Anthus.

Animals fled, and birds in the trees chirped loudly and flew into the sky.

“Hey, Yan. Calm down.”

Erzen grabbed Anthus’s wrist to calm him down.

“I understand you’re angry. But this is a forest near the Holy Kingdom! What if they find out we came secretly!”

“It doesn’t matter if they find out. If the bugs come, I’ll just step on them and kill them.”

“Still, restrain yourself! I’m fine, but Yan, you’re murderous aura is harmful to Luda!”

“I’m restraining myself the most in my entire life…”

Anthus said with a fresh smile, contrary to the intense murderous aura. Erzen swallowed dryly. He couldn’t agree with Anthus’s claim of restraint.

“I’m restraining myself as much as possible, Erzen. To be honest, it’s hard to restrain myself. But I hope you know I’m trying my best.”

Erzen knew Anthus well from the war. A monster who kills people mercilessly with a beautiful face and a captivating smile. That was Anthus Rockbellion. Rybid had provoked this beautiful and captivating monster.

“Would it help if I soothe my mood by listening to the sound of their bones being cut as they desperately resist? Of course, rescuing Lia comes first.”

Anthus’s smile, filled with murderous aura, was dangerous. Just as the venom of a beautiful snake is dangerous. Erzen swallowed hard. Anthus was the most dangerous person in the world right now.

“I’m thinking of going to the Holy Kingdom alone like this.”

“Calm down.”

Thinking of Yuliana, Anthus’s heart became noisy again. They had confirmed each other’s hearts and loved passionately. No matter how much of a god, they couldn’t separate them.

“Duke!”

Anthus looked at Luda, who was calling him.

“I’ll show you the door leading to the underground where I was trapped. I captured and tied up a priest there.”

“The place where you were trapped?”

Luda pointed to the ground next to the carriage.

“It seems to be under a spell. So it looks like ordinary ground, but there’s an underground torture chamber beneath it.”

“But only one priest?”

“Yes. He came alone without telling others, intending to violate me.”

“You subdued the priest who tried to violate you and tied him up underground… That’s amazing, Luda.”

Compared to Luda, who smiled brightly, Erzen’s face turned grim and frowned deeply.

“I’ll finish off that priest bastard. Don’t touch him, Yan.”

In response to Erzen’s words, Anthus raised the corners of his mouth instead of answering.

The shadows began descending the underground stairs, holding torches. As they descended, the smell of blood stung their noses. Erzen covered his nose and spoke in a nasal voice.

“How many did they kill to make it smell like this underground!”

“Even a slaughterhouse doesn’t smell this much of blood… It’s too severe.”

Creak.

The shadows opened the thick iron door and entered. The priest, tied up with rope, looked up at the people entering with a face covered in tears and snot.

“P-Please spare me!”

Anthus took out a magic stone that emitted light from his bosom. The place, fully illuminated by the light of the magic stone, was a prison with iron bars, chains, and an alchemical formula drawn on a magic circle that looked familiar.

“Luda you were confined in a dreadful place.”

Anthus approached the priest tied by Luda and asked.

“Have you seen our Lia by any chance?”

“Huh?”

Terrified, the priest couldn’t answer Anthus properly.

“You don’t recognize ‘Lia,’ do you? You know Lady Yuliana Loengrin, right?”

“That… famous spiritist…”

The priest only knew Yuliana as a famous spiritist. He had just heard that a woman was in the torture room and came to have fun. He felt it was unfair to be in this situation.

The priest glared at Luda, who had tied him up and left. He was angry and annoyed, thinking she wasn’t even pretty and had rejected him. But in the current situation, he had to lie low because he was at a disadvantage.

Above all, he strongly felt something like a suffocating pressure tightening around his neck.

“But… what’s that magic circle? It looks like a magic circle I’ve seen somewhere…”

Anthus examined the magic circle drawn on the floor. He realized it was the same as the one found on the altar underground in Luteons Village.

“It wasn’t the dark wizards who did this, it was the Holy Kingdom.”

“What do you mean, Yan?”

Anthus gestured for Erzen to examine the magic circle.

“This… isn’t this the magic circle, no, the alchemical formula found in the northern dungeon!”

“That’s right. This proves that the new monsters were related to the Holy Kingdom.”

The priest, hearing the conversation between Anthus and Erzen, began to tremble.

“There’s no corpse here, yet the stench of rotting flesh is overwhelming. How many people were tortured and killed here? And why were they killed?”

The priest couldn’t speak.

“If you don’t talk, I’ll consider it as not knowing and kill you, okay?”

“P-Please spare me!”

“If you tell the truth, I’ll spare you. I promise.”

Looking at Anthus, who spoke in a gentle voice, the priest nodded.

“This place is for extracting divine power.”

“Extracting divine power?”

“Yes, we place a person with divine power on the alchemical formula drawn on the magic circle over there and extract the divine power to bring it to His Holiness.”

“If what you’re saying is true, then the pope doesn’t have divine power, right? Since he doesn’t have it, he extracted divine power and used it as if it were his own?”

At the priest’s nod, Anthus sighed deeply.

“The people whose divine power was extracted all die… Then what happens to the bodies of the dead?”

“Oh… When we place the bodies of those who died after having their divine power extracted on the ground, they disappear by themselves.”

“Disappear? That’s an incomprehensible statement.”

“When we place them on the ground, within a day to two or three days, the bodies seep into the ground by themselves. We also dug the ground to find the missing bodies. Then they were just buried as if they found their own grave. We don’t know why either!”

The priest trembled as he spoke.

“Anton said alchemy isn’t magic but an exchange of equivalents. To gain divine power, they exchanged something equivalent. That was human lives… The holy water that saves people was actually made by killing people.”

Anthus slapped his own cheek hard to contain his rising anger.

“Yan!”

Startled, Erzen called Anthus.

“That’s how they killed Saint Rosaline. They took all of Saint Rosaline’s divine power and killed her, claiming it was divine punishment, but it was all a lie!”

Anthus shouted his indignation loudly. He finally understood. The reason Rosaline left her will with Matthias, Yuliana, and Louis before leaving for the Holy Kingdom for the last time… It was because she knew she would die if all her divine power was taken.

“The Holy Kingdom has been doing worse things than the dark wizards…”

Hearing the disgusting truth, Anthus dropped his gentle smile and spoke to the priest.

“As promised, I’ll spare you. Erzen, we’ll go up first. Let’s go, Shadow, you too Luda.”

“Huh? Yes, Duke.”

Anthus took Luda and the shadows and went up to the surface.