Shepherd Wizard Chapter 53

Translator: Pai_

Turan, having left Kalamaf City, flew above the old empire's road stretching westward, using it as a guide.

Before long, he spotted the building where House Arabion’s army had been stationed during their battle against the Dark Elves.

‘They left without destroying that.’

Considering the number of wizards involved, it wouldn’t have been a difficult task. But it seemed they didn’t see the need to put in such effort.

Perhaps, in the future, it would serve as a resting place for travelers passing between the Gray Zone and the central-western region.

Of course, since it was hastily built using magic, there was a greater chance it would collapse before then.

As he continued westward, leaving the structure behind, the ashen stone mountains came to an end, revealing a land where forests and plains harmoniously blended.

This was the largest and most resource-rich forested area in the west, often referred to as the central-western forest region.

It was also near this area’s western edge where Turan had once met Ashiz.

‘There really isn’t a single living person here.’

Even after expanding Human Detection magic across several dozen kilometers, not a single human presence was caught in his spell.

The towns and villages scattered across the land were all in ruins.

One could say that death had completely settled over this land, and it wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

‘Are the Dark Elves truly nothing more than wolves incapable of coexisting with humans?’

According to the Dark Elves captured and interrogated, this great invasion had been an act of retaliation.

The Necromancer King’s youngest daughter and her husband, whom he cherished the most, had been sightseeing on the surface when they were killed.

Since humans ruled this land, it was naturally assumed that humans were responsible. To avenge them, they slaughtered humans in return.

For such an absurd reason, countless humans and Dark Elves had died. But in their society, the orders of a royal who wielded control over the undead were as absolute as law, so they had no choice but to comply.

In that regard, it was disturbingly similar to how human society was ruled by the absolute commands of wizards.

‘That daughter and husband must have been the two who tried to kill Ashiz.’

Would this truth be known within House Arabion?

Turan thought the chances were about fifty-fifty.

It depended on how well House Berg had kept their mouths shut.

Of course, he didn’t feel particularly guilty about it.

Leaving Ashiz to die there and allowing those two Dark Elves to treat human lives as mere playthings wouldn’t have been the right choice.

Though the people who perished here might have seen things differently...

‘May you rest peacefully in the Celestial Palace.’

Turan prayed for the people of this land.

He could no longer be certain whether the gods truly resided in the Celestial Palace or whether they would accept human souls.

But if they didn’t, if the dead had nowhere to rest, then that would be far too tragic.

Unlike his previous journey across the Enril Desert, Turan had no urgent reason to rush this time.

So, he allowed Bije to rest properly and traveled at a relaxed pace.

He only flew when the sky was clear and the sun shone warmly during the day.

When Bije grew tired, he carried her under his arm and walked on foot, and at night, he would find an abandoned village to rest in.

One significant difference from his past travels was his meals.

Thanks to the Large-Capacity Pouch Meisa had given him, he had stored a variety of dried foods, cooking utensils, and spices.

Now, even on the road, he could prepare meals that were quite decent.

"Is it good, Bije?"

[Too salty!]

"Stop complaining and eat. It's not like you're the one cooking."

[I could cook better even with my feet!]

With occasional arguments with Bije who claimed she could do better than Turan even with her feet, the two proceeded smoothly and without incident.

On the fourth day of their journey, Turan realized they had reached the forest near where he had once met Ashiz.

A little farther ahead, he could see the location where he had previously warned that Maderi, the hidden city of the Dark Elves, lay in wait.

Going a bit further, he could see Maderi City, the place he had warned about having a hidden Dark Elf city.

Naturally, this place had also been invaded and left in ruins.

“…Would things have turned out differently if I had warned them more forcefully…?”

Bije, who was beside him, tilted her head as if wondering what he was talking about. But Turan simply smiled and brushed it off, saying it was nothing.

In truth, even if he had insisted back then, nothing would have changed.

The Dark Elves’ offensive had been so swift and overwhelming that no one could have predicted it.

If the nobles of this region had banded together to mount a defense, things might have been different, but who could have foreseen such an attack before experiencing it firsthand?

After passing through Maderi, Turan flew for another day.

As the western forest region gradually came to an end, a landscape of uneven hills began to spread out. Then, at last, he saw people again.

He had reached the Western Wasteland, a region he once considered extremely prosperous. However, in the grander scheme of the world, it was nothing more than a remote borderland.

He quickly passed by several cities that had once seemed troublesome to stop at. Before long, the sight of Orem City came into view.

'...Was this place always this small?'

Back when he had first seen it, it had seemed like the most populated place in the world.

Then again, at that time, Turan had only seen tiny villages with a few dozen people and small towns with populations barely reaching a thousand.

To suddenly encounter a city with a population in the tens of thousands, it was no wonder it had looked enormous to him back then.

But now, Orem City seemed no bigger than Kalamaf, or perhaps just slightly larger at best.

Having once served as the savior and ruler of a city that size, Orem now appeared almost insignificantly small in his eyes.

"You've done well, Bije. I’m going to take a quick look around. Do you want to rest here?"

[You won’t take long, right?]

"I won’t. Um, probably. As long as nothing unexpected happens."

Perhaps recalling how he had said similar things before and ended up taking much longer, Bije tilted her head suspiciously. Then, with a flick of her wings, she took off, telling him to at least make her next meal taste good.

Turan waved casually to see her off before stepping into Orem City.

'Ah, it's that guard from back then.'

The guard who had once told him to clean himself up because he was too dirty was now stationed at the east gate.

Then again, it hadn’t been that many years, so it wasn’t surprising that the same people were still around.

Using Concealment magic, Turan walked right past the man without being noticed.

Unseen by anyone, he passed through the city gates and headed toward the distant library.

Now that he was actively using his concealment abilities, he was reminded just how absurdly overpowered they were.

If he wanted, he could walk into the central mansion right now and slaughter the entire Baltas family, and they wouldn’t even have a chance to resist.

However, as he wandered through the city unseen, he noticed a strange tension in the air.

‘Did another magical beast appear?’

Turan considered dispelling his concealment and asking someone about it but ultimately decided to continue toward the library.

It would be troublesome if someone recognized him.

As always, he slipped past the knight guarding the entrance and approached the locked library door.

After blowing air into the keyhole a few times to understand the internal structure, he used Telekinesis to precisely align the cylinders inside and unlock it.

‘Success.’

Normally, even with Telekinesis, one wouldn’t be able to unlock a padlock without knowing its internal structure, at best, they’d end up breaking it.

However, by utilizing the power of the Storm Bloodline, he could blow air inside and detect the way it flowed, allowing him to pick the lock with precision.

It was a simple trick he had picked up while spending time in Kalamaf.

Glancing behind him, he saw that the knight was still staring ahead, completely unaware.

Even though he wasn’t as perceptive as a noble, he still had sharp enough senses to have heard the noise just now.

And yet, he remained oblivious.

A power that prevented people from recognizing the natural reactions caused by the user’s actions, this was what made House Zahar’s Concealment ability so special.

Just like how footprints would clearly appear on the sand, yet people would unconsciously overlook the change, the sound of the lock opening had reached the knight’s ears, but he had failed to connect it to the presence of another person.

Unless he physically made contact with someone or sensed an attack coming toward him, he would remain unaware.

Turan stepped inside the library, closed the door behind him, and turned to look around.

The first things that caught his eye were the round walls and the spiral staircase, both familiar sights after having entered this place multiple times before.

In front of them sat a middle-aged man at a desk, the librarian.

“Elder?”

Just in case, Turan called out to him, but the librarian didn’t seem to notice.

Even if he was a spirit created by the gods, it seemed he wasn’t capable of piercing through House Zahar’s Concealment magic.

Due to the bright magical lights on the ceiling rapidly draining his magic power, Turan dispelled his concealment and approached the librarian.

“It’s been a while, Elder Librarian.”

Yet, for some reason, the librarian didn’t react to Turan at all.

He simply sat there at his desk, staring blankly ahead, unmoving.

His unblinking eyes made him seem like a well-crafted doll.

“…Elder?”

Turan poked the librarian’s shoulder, but his fingers passed right through, as if touching nothing but air.

Come to think of it, hadn’t he already experienced this before?

He had been too startled to recall that he couldn’t physically touch the librarian.

‘Could it be because I didn’t bring an official entry pass?’

Since the lord of this city and the owner of the library was the head of House Baltas, perhaps only those who had his permission were recognized upon entry.

Just as Turan’s expression darkened with concern, the librarian suddenly snapped his head toward him and spoke.

“How was it? Did that seem convincing?”

“…Yes.”

Turan let out a breathless chuckle in disbelief, and the librarian grinned mischievously.

From their first meeting, he had known the librarian was this kind of person, or rather, this kind of spirit, but he hadn’t expected him to be playing tricks again.

“You really startled me.”

“Judging by your face, I’d say it was worth the effort. But you sure came back quickly. Given how confidently you set out, I thought it would take at least ten years."

“To be honest, I thought so too. But for just a short visit, I’ve seen far too much.”

From the secrets of his birth to the mysteries surrounding gods and bloodlines, and even an unknown conspiracy, there were too many things he wanted to ask.

Turan decided to start with something that could be confirmed quickly.

“Would you be able to check my bloodline again?”

“That’s easy enough.”

As he had done before, the librarian immediately plunged his fingers deep into Turan’s body.

“Tracker, Hunter, and Airbender.”

Airbender likely referred to the aspect of the Storm Bloodline that governed wind manipulation.

It seemed that, long ago, after being absorbed into House Arabion’s lineage, it had been consolidated under the Storm Bloodline and subsequently forgotten.

“And one is still locked. You really are absurdly lucky, inheriting two different types from each side.”

Turan had expected as much, his ability to control lightning was still dormant.

Feeling satisfied now that he had confirmed this, he moved on to another question that had been weighing on his mind.

“The Preah God Tribe, did they all possess four bloodlines? I mean, the four types you mentioned?”

“Hmm? Yeah, that’s right. You certainly haven't been idle. Where did you hear about that? Don’t tell me there’s still another spirit out there?”

“I’m not sure if it was a spirit, but I did see something similar.”

Turan proceeded to recount everything he had witnessed to the librarian.

The Tomb of the Gods deep in the Enril Desert.

The labyrinth slumbering beneath it.

How the gods had reshaped giants into monstrous beings.

And the process of transforming wizards into gods.

Finally, he even presented the experiment records left behind by the unknown creator of the labyrinth.

The librarian, after reading through them, let out a low groan and twisted his beard.

“Hmm… A subterranean labyrinth and experiments on creating gods… Who could have done such a thing?”

“It’s the Lame Goddess, isn’t it?”

“Probably not. Hold on, I’ll need to search through some old records.”

The librarian seemed lost in thought for a moment, his gaze shifting slightly upward.

Then, suddenly, his eyeballs began to spin in circles.

Rather than moving up, down, left, or right like a human’s would, his eyes rotated continuously in a single direction.

After a few minutes of eerily spinning his eyeballs, the librarian suddenly snapped his fingers. A translucent book materialized in front of Turan.

“Read it. This is one of the lost documents from after the fall of the Old Empire, the same handwriting and script as the one you found.”

The ability to recreate lost books… This was something the librarian had never shown him before.

Turan tried to turn the pages, but just like the librarian’s body, he couldn’t physically touch it.

Instead, there were strange symbols on the sides, pressing them allowed him to flip through the pages.

‘This handwriting…’

Just as the librarian had said, it was identical to the script found in the labyrinth, the writings about the Night Hunters, left behind by the labyrinth’s master.

The book seemed like a journal, though its author didn’t seem particularly enthusiastic about writing it. Each entry was rather short.

[That pig bastard Otas is a real moron.

I told him that if we leave a species capable of scientific thought unchecked, they’ll inevitably become a threat to our descendants. I told him we should wipe them out in advance. But he’s too lazy to care.

If I didn’t need his tracking abilities, I wouldn’t have had to rely on that bastard at all.

Let him waste his life chasing women forever…]

Whoever this Otas was, perhaps a god, there were strong negative feelings toward him in these words.

The next page contained a response to the complaints from the previous entry.

[I’ve figured out a way to exterminate those steampunk rat bastards without Otas’s help.

It's modifying the ones we've captured as prisoners.

Their offspring will be designed to have low intelligence, superior physical abilities, and extreme aggression.

Keeping them in a constant state of heat and enhancing their pheromone-based tracking abilities would be a good idea too.

If we release a mass of such creatures into an apocalyptic scenario and let them breed freely, in a few dozen generations, their entire race will be nothing but mindless beasts.

Their so-called ‘defensive systems’ won’t activate against creatures of their own species, as long as they’re capable of reproduction.

At the very least, our descendants won’t have to worry about being hunted by rat bastards flying around in steam-powered airships.]

The way the author treated an entire race like playthings was chilling, even considering that the victims weren’t human.

Turan turned to the librarian and asked about a word he didn’t understand.

“Do you know what steampunk means?”

“Hmm.”

The librarian gave a vague, unreadable response, making it unclear whether he knew or not.

As Turan continued reading through the journal, he realized that these steampunk rat bastards referred to the Dwarves.

A plan to degrade their intelligence while maximizing their physical abilities, it fit their current state perfectly.

Moreover, the relics of the ancient Dwarves were known to use steam-based technology, which aligned with the mention of steam-powered airships.

‘…So my suspicions were right. This god had the power to manipulate life itself.’

But none of the Preah God Tribe he knew of, nor any of their descendant bloodlines, had such an ability.

Perhaps this was a god from the southern or eastern lands that he had yet to visit.

Or maybe this was an unrecorded god, one who left no descendants and had been completely forgotten.

As he flipped to the next page, the content shifted entirely.

[The humans here are fundamentally flawed.

Not just because they’ve spent generations as slaves to other races, but because they entirely lack the ability to explore new phenomena.

For centuries, they haven’t advanced a single step, merely accepting and using whatever we provide them.

Is this a problem with their brain structure?

Would it be possible to artificially implant ‘creativity’ into humans?

And in doing so, could we still maintain control over them?]

Previously, the author had seemed concerned about the future of his own people. But in this entry, he was contemplating modifying and controlling humans.

Had so much time passed between these entries that his mindset had changed?

A strange chill crept over Turan as he turned the next page, only to realize that it was the last one.

[Having a lifespan is ridiculous

There must be a way.

What could it be???

That last job change experiment I conducted

If I use that as a vessel and transfer my body]