A Returner’s Magic Should Be Special - Chapter 70

Episode 70. Terror (2)

Crash!
The half-melted pillar crumbled to dust beneath the collision of two spells. Part of the building gave way, collapsing inward.
Jord gritted his teeth, weaving a new Magic Formula and unleashing another spell.
A single moment of carelessness could spiral into catastrophic failure.
This was a clash between mages of 6th Circle and above. The average level of the magic being deployed approached the 5th Circle—these were the kinds of lethal techniques that ordinary mages considered their ultimate trump cards. They were being unleashed without restraint.
Their battle was accelerating the Royal Palace’s collapse.
Meanwhile, at some distance away, the key dignitaries of the Western Kingdom Alliance hurried their descent toward the lower floors.
“What…… is…… this sudden…… calamity…….”
Greed, whose frame was considerably stout, could not muster proper speed and gasped for breath with each step.
A single knight supported him, but his weight was so great that their pace slowed considerably.
Dezir Armang enhanced his own physical capabilities with magic and braced Greed from the other side.
“This is insane! How is this happening!”
“Infuriating,” Dezir muttered.
The kings who composed the Western Kingdom Alliance looked thoroughly exasperated. Dust clung to their fine garments, and some bore wounds from their stumbles.
The most outraged among them was King Divided, who had advocated a hardline stance against the Hebrion Empire.
“How dare they commit such rudeness! It is utterly unforgivable.”
His voice trembled with fury.
He glared at the sight of Jord and Raven Mask locked in combat, then turned to the knights surrounding him.
“Help Jord at once! Kill that bastard!”
At the king’s command, seven surviving Knight-rank warriors charged toward Raven Mask.
“No!”
That opponent was a 6th Circle mage!
Dezir Armang cried out, but it was already too late.
Raven Mask glanced at the approaching warriors and deployed a spell.

Spectrum Shower.

A 5th Circle spell.
A brilliant light source materialized above Raven Mask’s head.
The bodies of the approaching knights were severed in an instant, falling in pieces. It was ultra-high-temperature light rays, rotating at a speed beyond perception.
Upon witnessing that sight, Kolora sealed his lips and quickened his flight down the corridor.
Raven Mask, who had been reaching out to pursue him with magic, was forced to redirect the trajectory of his spell by Jord’s sudden advance.
“Where do you think your focus is going!”

Magma Howl.
Molten Requiem.

Boom-crash!
The exchange continued. While Raven Mask and Jord remained locked in combat, the key dignitaries of the Western Kingdom Alliance safely cleared the interior of the Conference Hall and descended to the lower levels.
Once that was confirmed, the offensive and defensive maneuvers between Jord and Raven Mask came to an abrupt halt.
Jord turned toward Raven Mask with a sharp demand.
“Who in blazes are you!”
Instead of answering, Raven Mask began deploying another spell. Jord, matching spell for spell in response, found his mouth turning bitter.
‘A troublesome opponent indeed.’
If Jord so chose, crushing this adversary would be simple—merely a matter of bearing down with overwhelming force.
But Jord was in a position where he had to protect all the members of the Western Kingdom Alliance as well. He could not recklessly unleash powerful magic and bring the Royal Palace down around them.
The man before him knew this far too well. That was why his magic was directed entirely toward the Western Kingdom Alliance’s key dignitaries.
Jord responded to each of those spells, carefully calibrating his own magic’s intensity to minimize damage to the Royal Palace as he continued his defense.
‘If I can just hold out until they evacuate…….’
At that very moment, a voice emerged from Raven Mask.
“You are…… far too naive.”
Upon hearing those words, Jord suddenly grasped something and expanded his Mana Sense range across the entire castle. His eyes went wide.
‘No……!’
The Royal Palace’s entrance.
A fifth-Circle Magic Formula was detected in the direction people were fleeing toward. It was concealed so cunningly that one could not sense it without intense concentration.
The magic deployed by the man in the Raven Mask before her eyes was unmistakable. Yet this was not freshly cast.
‘It’s identical to the first spell.’
Eclipse—the sixth-Circle magic the man in the Raven Mask had used in his initial assault. Magic of that caliber should have shown some sign during its preparation phase.
Yet it had activated without warning, swallowing the Royal Palace whole.
He must have completed the magical calculations beforehand, then triggered the spell at his desired moment.
‘Could it be… the Memorize Artifact?’
An Artifact capable of activating pre-calculated magic at the user’s chosen timing. An Artifact the Hebrion Empire had possessed decades ago.
An Artifact lost following the revolution.
Jord stared at the Raven Mask with widened eyes. If his assumption held true, the man before him was far more dangerous than he had thought.
‘First, I must protect the kings.’
Just as Jord attempted Space-Time Magic to descend to the lower levels and intercept the spell, the man in the Raven Mask seized his sleeve.
Their forms vanished for a moment, then reappeared in their original positions.
“No!”
Jord could sense the crowd heading toward the exit where the trap lay waiting. Desperation mounted within him. Yet his opponent refused to relent, blocking him at every turn.
“…?”
Then the footsteps of those heading for the exit suddenly ceased. And—
“Reverse Calculation… they countered it?”
The Magic Formula that had been waiting for activation shattered in an instant. Someone had discerned his spell and unraveled the magic.
‘Dezir?’
The crowd slipped away unimpeded.
Jord felt a surge of quiet triumph. He began drawing power in earnest now. With no further restraint, offensive Magic Formulas began to unfold before him.
“Well then—are you prepared?”
“Unfortunately, I have no further business with you.”
The moment the words left his lips, the body of the Raven Mask man began to dissolve into particles.
Space-Time Magic executed without incantation. Even Jord could not respond to such speed.
‘Tch… damn.’
Jord clicked his tongue.
‘I should have finished him here.’
The enemy had fled, yet this was far from over.
As if in testament to his thoughts, black smoke rose from various points throughout the Royal Palace.
“…This is quite the catastrophe.”

* * *

“How did you know there was magic installed there?”
Once they had escaped the scorched corridors and emerged fully from the Royal Palace, this was Priscilla’s first words. She gazed at Dezir with profound admiration.
The crowd had been rushing blindly toward the exit when Dezir suddenly halted them and used Reverse Calculation to disarm the fifth-Circle spell set at the entrance.
Had they passed through, everyone there would have been blown to pieces.
“The Royal Palace has only one exit.”
Upon calm reflection, it was not a particularly difficult deduction. An attack spell vast enough to engulf the entire Royal Palace—it could only have been meant to kill those within.
If the man in the Raven Mask’s goal was to assassinate all the leaders of the Western Kingdom Alliance, and his targets were multiple, then it was certain he would have prepared an escape route as well. And prepared it carefully.
The Royal Palace had but one entrance and exit.
It was equally convenient for laying traps as it was for discovering them.
Dezir had reasoned that a trap would be set along the sole route of escape. And as they made their way out, observing his surroundings closely throughout, his suspicion crystallized into certainty.
“You have emerged safely, Your Highness!”
Outside the Royal Palace lay the traces of fierce battle.
Shattered roads. Burning trees lining the streets.
The stench of blood hung in the air. Bodies of Outer soldiers and Western Kingdom Alliance troops lay scattered haphazardly. It appeared there had been a diversionary engagement to prevent the Knight Order from entering the Palace.
The battle seemed to have just concluded. The Knight Order approached and formed a protective perimeter around those who had attended the conference. The caliber of the royal guard was counted among the finest on the continent, so their presence promised immediate safety.
Only now did Dezir have the leisure to survey the surroundings.
“This is bad.”
Smoke rose from various points throughout Deltheim, and citizens were evacuating.
‘The attack wasn’t limited to the Royal Palace.’
It was a Terror attack of staggering scale. In scattered locations, Deltheim’s knights and soldiers clashed with Outer forces.
Dezir turned to one of the knights who was maintaining his weapons.
“What is the current situation?”
The knight dismissed him as merely a boy and moved to pass by without answering.
Priscilla spoke to the knight in response.
“Do answer his question for us.”
The saint’s authority was absolute. The knight’s mouth opened.
“Deltheim is currently overrun with groups believed to be Outer operatives in numerous locations. Our soldiers are engaging them, but they’re employing rather brutal tactics—burning civilian homes—to fracture the capital’s forces.”
Moreover, each Outer member possessed Knight-rank strength. Ordinary soldiers stood no chance against them.
“I never anticipated they would act so boldly.”
‘This incident never occurred in my previous life.’
Dezir was bewildered. It was the first time he’d encountered an event that hadn’t existed in his past life.
An attack on a gathering of all the Western Kingdom Alliance’s rulers—it was an unprecedented situation.

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