Memoirs of a Wicked Magician - Chapter 40

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 40
But Liriope crossed her arms and shook her head firmly once again.
“That’s enough. I don’t need it, so take it away.”
At this successive refusal, Belkiers’ eyes dimmed.
“I’ve already told you—I want the same thing. There are plenty of insects at Oetaek. It shouldn’t take you long, so bring back the same kind of insects again.”
Truth be told, there was no real need for her to be so demanding about it; she was making a point out of sheer spite.
In her heart of hearts, Liriope didn’t actually believe Belkiers would gather insects in such an undignified manner.
Rather, wouldn’t he be offended and simply leave this very moment?
Perhaps his desire to linger before her would vanish entirely.
Even Ode seemed to have run out of things to say at Liriope’s cunning display of spite.
The smile had vanished from Belkiers’ face as well.
He regarded Liriope with narrowed, slitted eyes.
“You’re… really quite strange, aren’t you?”
Yet Belkiers proved equally unpredictable to Liriope’s schemes.
As if divining that she was being deliberately stubborn, a faintly twisted smile played at his lips.
“Fine, if that’s really how you want it, then I have no choice. I’ll give you what you ask for.”
Whoosh!
And when his magical power extended in all directions before drawing back, a downpour of black insects cascaded before Liriope like a sudden torrential rain.
At the sight of their repulsive mass, even Liriope couldn’t help but recoil in horror.
Stumbling backward reflexively to dodge the insects, she nearly lost her footing—until Belkiers caught her.
“What—what is this? I didn’t need this many!”
“You said you wanted the same thing. Since I didn’t know what kind of insects you eat, I simply swept up everything within a fifty-meter radius.”
“Then what am I supposed to do with all of this?”
“Eat it. You said you like insects, didn’t you? So eat plenty.”
Belkiers spoke in a cold voice, then stared at Liriope intently for a moment.
Rather than leave immediately, he instead tilted a smile that mingled exasperation and amusement across his lips, and asked her:
“And what else do you like?”
“What?”
“Besides grass and insects—if there’s something else you enjoy, tell me.”
At a question that sounded strange to anyone’s ear, Liriope’s eyes narrowed toward Belkiers’ face.
Immediately after, her body couldn’t help but stiffen.
Now that she thought about it…
The distance between them had become far too close.
Even between people with a casual, unguarded familiarity, one wouldn’t ordinarily face each other at such proximity and exchange gazes like this; much less could Belkiers and Liriope claim any goodwill toward one another.
His face, smooth as sculpted white jade, remained perfectly, exquisitely beautiful in a way that contradicted the situation, awakening something strange within Liriope.
Where his gaze fell, a peculiar, stinging warmth seemed to bloom.
Whether it was a momentary optical illusion or not, a faint golden light rippled within his crimson eyes as they faced hers.
Liriope gazed at it as if enchanted for a breath, then—almost of her own volition—stepped back half a pace.
Get a grip.
She rebuked herself harshly.
Even if his demeanor seemed unusually kind, after all, this was someone who had tried to kill her not so long ago.
Liriope tensed her body, which had begun to slacken.
Belkiers, too, perceived this shift in her bearing with sharp awareness.
“There isn’t. And even if there were… why would I tell you such a thing?”
An intense rejection and wariness that filled her small frame entirely and spilled outward—directed at him.
“Is that so?”
Compared to that fearless beast who had bitten his hand, it was but a trifling provocation; yet Belkiers, uncharacteristically, felt something twist sharply within him for a moment.
“Then I’ll give you more of what you like.”
And his twisted sentiment manifested as a mountain of insects heaped before Liriope in towering mounds.
Seeing the shock on Liriope’s face, he felt a grim satisfaction at having nearly exterminated every insect in Oetaek in the sweep, and his irritation seemed to ease somewhat.
Yet immediately after, his mood soured further at the sight of his own pettiness.
Belkiers looked down at Liriope with a sharp gaze, then promptly deployed Spatial Teleportation Magic and departed Oetaek.
Liriope found herself left with this enormous mountain of insects—and the situation was utterly absurd.
Moreover, no matter how easily pleased she was by food, the sight of insects stacked so high killed her appetite entirely.
But this time too, the object of her fury had already vanished before her eyes.
So she was forced to simmer alone for a while, grinding her teeth quietly.
Yet since there was no harm in eating, the secret was that Liriope, weighing her options, ultimately pocketed Belkiers’ gift in handfuls and carried it away with her.
And it was equally unknown to all but the two of them that Ode, now resigned to the situation, had heaved long sighs while helping pick out insects that looked less grotesque to carry along.
As for Cassel and Dino, forgotten by Liriope by now, they later crept down from the trees, gazed at the heaped insects in horror, and—with tears in their eyes—surreptitiously gathered some as emergency rations, an event that no one would ever learn of.
* * *
The forest, cloaked in thick darkness, was deeply oppressive.
In the quiet woods where only the occasional chirping of insects broke the silence, the tense breathing of children added another layer.
Whenever leaves and grass rustled against skin already prickled with goosebumps, the already heightened nerves tensed even sharper.
Children who had entered the Blue Forest once before, and those treading this land for the first time, all moved their pupils—constricted with tension—ceaselessly, vigilant toward their surroundings.
Everyone present felt the dread of walking as living offerings into the jaws of a monster.
Yet no one among them possessed the courage to break formation rashly; instead, they gripped their weapons and ventured ever deeper into the thick darkness.
Like beasts that had stumbled into a swamp and knew no way to escape on their own.
“Don’t go. Don’t leave me behind, Mom, Dad, Sister, Brother… Please don’t all abandon me…”
How much time had passed since then?
The sobbing voice of Milena suddenly flowed into Liriope’s reeling mind.
Liriope forced her eyelids—which kept falling—open. And she bit her lip hard, until the coppery taste of blood bloomed on her tongue, sharpening her vision at last.
All around was the Blue Forest.
Upon opening her eyes, she saw flowers—grotesquely massive and vivid—blooming in profusion everywhere.
The towering flowers overhead, like giants looking down upon humanity, cast dark shadows like curtains across her field of vision.
On the cyan petals, ashen-grey markings resembled hundreds of eyes, staring down at Liriope.
“I can run faster… Older brother, so please take me with you too. Please…”
Among the flowers, half-swallowed by one bud, Milena continued to mutter deliriously and sob, lost in visions.
As though the children had fallen into a nest of serpents, thick green vines—spreading across the ground and seizing even the trees—writhed ceaselessly, coiling around the bodies of those trapped in their snare.
When Liriope shifted her gaze to survey the surroundings more broadly, she realized that not only Milena, but all the other children of the Jed Group were in the same state.
The evidence was the delirium spilling forth from various corners.
“I—I didn’t mean to kill you. I really didn’t… But what can I do? The living must survive!”
“No, no… I’m not tasty. So please don’t eat me…”
“It’s so cold… so cold… Please save me…”
Each was wandering lost within their own illusion, with one common thread: they were all witnessing their deepest fears.
Before Liriope’s eyes too, a dark woman writhed, caked in filthy mud.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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