Shepherd Wizard Chapter 55

Translator: Pai_

Seven years ago, when young Turan lost his mother to illness, the village elders presented him with a document under the pretense of managing his inheritance and demanded that he place his print on it.

The document stated that the sheep farm on Hisaril Hill would be transferred to communal ownership by the village.

Since Turan could read, he naturally refused, but the elders dismissed his defiance, claiming that the document was nothing more than a formality from the start, and forcibly expelled him.

Unfortunately, at the time, Turan’s body and magic power had yet to fully mature, so he couldn’t even consider fighting back.

His fear of being captured by corrupt nobles if he openly revealed that he was a wizard also paralyzed him.

After being driven from the farm, Turan lay in the field for a while and thought of a way to reclaim his mother's inheritance without openly revealing his magic.

His plan was simple: hide in the sparse bushes around the village and throw stones at everyone who came out of the village.

His first targets were the village elders who had stolen his inheritance.

Fortunately, the full-strength stone throws of a young noble were powerful enough to fly dozens of meters and break the bones of the middle-aged men.

The first two he attacked had their legs shattered, the next one lost his jaw and had to eat porridge for the rest of his life, and the last one was struck fatally on the head and died after suffering for days.

Enraged, the village’s young men took up weapons to avenge them, but Turan, using his keen sense of smell, always detected them first, sniped one or two from a distance, and then ran away.

Even though he was still just a child, his speed already surpassed anyone in the village, making him impossible to catch.

And so, the battle continued for several days.

After more than a dozen people were severely injured or killed, the village, reduced to near submission by a lone twelve-year-old boy, finally surrendered.

This memory suddenly resurfaced because the current situation felt eerily similar to that time.

He had just killed one noble, leaving seven nobles and thirty-five knights as his remaining enemies.

Individually, they were all far weaker than Turan, but if he faced them head-on, he couldn’t be sure of victory.

Especially since they were an allied force, each possessing different bloodline abilities, making the battle even more unpredictable.

However, such disadvantages could be easily overturned with the right strategy.

“Go up first, Bije.”

At Turan’s words as he stepped out of the tent, Bije immediately soared high into the sky.

It would be much more convenient if he could share his Concealment ability with others.

Perhaps the House Zahar had a hidden technique related to that.

Whether he would ever learn it remained uncertain.

As the golden eagle swiftly took flight, a few knights nearby shouted in surprise.

“Huh? Isn’t that the magical beast Lord Maxie caught earlier?”

“But its wings are perfectly fine.”

“She definitely ordered it to be kept locked up…”

While the camp grew noisy over Bije’s sudden flight, Turan, still maintaining his Concealment, silently moved toward the commander.

At the same time, he imbued magic power into his slingshot and created a path of wind.

'This one first.'

Swish- A faint hissing of wind accompanied a small stone as it flew straight into the head of the large-built noblewoman.

Instead of brutally smashing her skull, the sheer speed of the projectile left a sizable hole in her head.

Had she faced him directly, she might have lasted at least a few minutes, but for someone of her caliber, it was a pitifully anticlimactic death.

Although the stone itself made no sound when thrown, the impact of it piercing her skull did, drawing everyone’s attention to the noblewoman as she collapsed with a thud.

“Lady Maxie?”

“Sister…! We’re under attack! We’re under attack!”

“Everyone, defensive formation!”

Caught in a situation they never anticipated and having just lost their leader, the Corel Alliance forces were thrown into complete chaos.

Of course, not a single one of them suspected that a House Zahar noble had infiltrated their ranks and launched the attack.

It was far too unreasonable to assume that those who should have been in the distant Enril Desert would suddenly launch a surprise attack.

Thanks to that, Turan was able to take his time preparing a wind path and snipe the second-strongest noble.

'Second one.'

This time, the target was a rather small and frail-looking male noble.

Unlike the first victim, he seemed to possess a magic artifact for defense. Instead of having his head pierced through and dying instantly, he screamed and tumbled to the ground.

However, judging by the pale brain matter oozing from his head, it seemed unlikely that he would be able to continue fighting.

At that moment, one of the nobles finally seemed to realize what was happening and shouted loudly.

"It's concealment! Everyone, light up the area!”

It would have been much easier if he could have killed a third target right away.

But with the two strongest nobles already dead, the power balance had completely shifted, so it wasn’t a major issue.

Turan clicked his tongue lightly and snapped his fingers.

A single spark, created by frictional heat.

The moment he blew a powerful wind into it, a storm of flames that erupted above Turan's head swept across the entire camp.

“Aaaaaargh!”

“It’s hot! Water! Get water!”

Desperate screams echoed in every direction.

If such a firestorm had surged from a distance, it wouldn’t have been too difficult to counter.

After all, the speed at which flames traveled on the wind wasn’t particularly fast by wizard standards, and they could simply counter it with opposing wind magic.

If it had been just one person, perhaps Turan could have overcome it, but with dozens of opponents working together, even he wouldn’t have been able to hold out.

However, a firestorm that suddenly erupted right in the middle of their encampment was devastating enough to force the Corel Alliance into complete ruin.

The eight knights and one noble closest to the blaze burned to death before they could even scream, while about six knights further away suffered horrific burns, writhing on the ground in agony.

Before the flame storm that swept through the camp could even clear, dozens of spells rained down on its center.

“Kill him!”

Were they perhaps battle-hardened wizards who had even experienced war?

Every single spell hurled at him carried an overwhelming force.

Fire arrows, a shower of rocks, water bombs, spears of light, real arrows and javelins imbued with magic power…

Each spell had been enhanced by bloodline abilities and honed over decades, making them even more powerful than the magic their casters originally possessed.

However, in the spot where all those attacks rained down, there was no one left.

"What..."

“Concealment! Light up the area first!”

The nobles of the Corel Alliance quickly conjured spheres of light and scattered them in every direction. But even as the area lit up for over a hundred meters, no figure was revealed.

“Huh…?”

"There's no one?"

After unleashing the firestorm, Turan had used wind magic to propel himself out of the camp at high speed.

He had taken a few hits from stray spells in the process, but thanks to activating his Guardian magic artifact, he only suffered minor injuries.

And those wounds were quickly healed by the remaining Healer Bloodline magic he had used earlier.

While the Corel Alliance forces stood frozen, as if battling a ghost, Turan once again created a wind path and sniped another noble.

Realizing that the enemy was precisely targeting only their nobles, the morale of the Corel Alliance plummeted.

“Ugh… Aaaaah…!”

"Surrender! We surrender! Please spare us!"

“Surrender? Are you insane?! Scatter and run! That bastard intends to kill us all!”

At a noble’s desperate cry, Turan shot another stone, proving that their fears were justified.

If he could have overwhelmed them without using bloodline abilities, he might have shown mercy.

But now that he had revealed his powers, there was no option of letting them live.

If rumors spread that a House Zahar noble was in the far west, there was no telling when they would eventually trace it back to him.

["Now, let’s attack together, Bije."]

Using wind magic, Turan sent his voice to Bije, who was soaring through the sky. At his command, Bije let out a chirp and dove toward one of the fleeing wizards.

A knight attempting to escape was caught in Bije’s talons and was torn apart, his screams echoing through the night.

“Aaaaaagh!”

The surviving remnants of the Corel Alliance scattered in all directions, but deep down, they all knew,

Perhaps, none of them would make it out of here alive.

“A total of forty-three... Good, not a single one got away.”

Turan counted as he tossed the last knight’s corpse onto the pile at the center of the encampment.

He had killed people before, but forty-three in a single night far exceeded his previous record.

Now that his head had cooled from the rage that had consumed him, the reality of it all left a bitter aftertaste.

Some of them might not even have wanted to participate in hunting down tamed magical beasts.

Of course, Turan had only one way to be considerate of them.

To just leave without even attempting revenge in the first place.

Unfortunately, he was not a kind enough person to overlook an injustice just to spare the innocent.

If he was struck, he would strike back. And if he took revenge, he would make sure there were no loose ends.

“Let’s clean up first. Bije, you ready?”

[Yes!]

Turan and Bije first absorbed the magic power of the wizards.

As expected, the magic from the knights was utterly useless, serving only to prevent their bodies from turning into undead spirits. The magic from the commander and the second-in-command nobles provided only a slight benefit.

However, his Mimic Relic had absorbed as many as six new bloodline abilities.

Unlike Turan, Bije showed significant growth in magic power.

After all, she had devoured several wizards who were her equal or stronger.

Seemingly thrilled with her newfound strength, Bije chirped and danced in the air.

“Don’t get too excited. You might get used to killing people."

[I’m strong now! Next time Won’t get caught!]

“Be careful. There are still plenty of people out there who are stronger than you or me.”

Though, in truth, there weren’t that many who were stronger than Turan.

Only the top-tier wizards of great noble houses, like Meisa, and the house lords who ruled over them.

Considering that there were fewer than ten great noble houses, the total number of people stronger than him wouldn’t exceed forty or fifty at most.

After absorbing all the magic power, Turan searched for magic artifacts among the bodies.

He managed to find a ring and an earring.

The defensive artifact that had blocked one of his slingshot attacks earlier must have been a single-use item, as it had shattered.

Unlike before, he didn’t have to worry about House Zahar nobles tracking him down, so he took everything valuable and set fire to the entire encampment, erasing the last traces of the battle.

“Looks like we’ll have to leave this place for a while. Where do you want to go?”

[Anywhere is fine as long as I’m with you, Turan!]

Bije responded brightly to Turan’s question.

“Then let’s head in that direction. It’ll be more fun to travel somewhere new.”

The north was too close to House Arabion, the west was blocked by the Sky Mountain Range, and the east was where he had already traveled. That left only one choice, the south.

According to the map Keorn had given him in the past, there was a great noble house in that direction.

House Lavitas, rulers of the land known as the Siraf Wetlands.

They were famous for being a great noble house formed from two non-combat bloodlines, the Healer Bloodline and the Purifier Bloodline.

This flight, unlike the one from Kalamaf, had once again turned into a forced march.

In wizard society, stealing a magical beast that had been soul-bonded was a crime deserving of death. But since there was no way to prove it aside from Turan’s word, it was no different from robbery and murder.

Fortunately, the journey was much smoother than when they had left the Enril Desert, thanks to Bije, who had absorbed a significant amount of magic power. Her speed and stamina had improved significantly.

Despite flying almost non-stop, she showed no signs of exhaustion.

For three full days, they avoided people using tracking magic as they flew. Eventually, the landscape and climate began to change.

By the time the area was completely covered in short forests and wetlands, Turan spotted a village in the distance and landed nearby.

“This place smells awful…”

A foul stench, like something rotting, rose from the stagnant water beneath the reeds.

His sense of smell would eventually dull with time, making it easier to tolerate, but it was still unpleasant.

Turan tucked Bije under his arm and headed toward the village he had spotted from the sky.

Since he had no information about this region, he planned to gather details about the local customs and any nearby cities.

‘Oh.’

He hadn't noticed from above, but up close, the village had a rather unique structure.

Nearly half of the houses were built on the lake.

Not all of them, but about one-third seemed to be constructed that way.

As Turan approached, a middle-aged woman with dark skin caught sight of him and cried out in surprise.

“Oh my goodness!”

At first, he wondered why she was so startled, but soon realized that her gaze was fixed on Bije, who was hanging from his side.

"It's alright, ma'am. She's a good one."

“I’ve never seen a bird that looks like that before… But, are you sick or something? Why are you wearing such thick clothes?"

Now that she mentioned it, the middle-aged woman was dressed far more lightly than Turan, with her arms and legs exposed.

Perhaps it was because they were in the south, where the climate was warmer.

Back in Kalamaf, he had been suspected of being a wizard for dressing lightly, yet here, he was seen as suspicious for the exact opposite reason. The irony of it all was amusing.

“No, nothing like that. I just traveled from quite far away. Is there a large city nearby?”

“A city? If you head in that direction, you'll find one… but things have been rather unsettling lately.”

“Did something happen?”

The last time he ignored such uneasy signs, he later found out that a war had broken out.

Turan immediately pressed for details.

The middle-aged woman hesitated before answering cautiously.

“Well, I don’t know the exact name of the house, but I heard that a high-ranking person passed away recently.”