The Last Place Hero’s Return - Chapter 154

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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 154. The Consecutive Disappearance of Candidate Program Members (8)
‘Artificial Stigmata.’
As I listened to Jade Bastian and Sophia’s conversation, memories from my past life surfaced.
‘In my previous life, Jade Bastian abandoned his research into artificial stigmata.’
Did he abandon only the artificial stigmata?
He had even abandoned his own life.
But.
‘Things have changed.’
I don’t know what prompted it.
Yet he resolved to continue his research.
Into a life filled with nothing but despair.
He dared to dream of hope.
‘And someone exploited that hope.’
The unsettling sense of discord I’d been feeling all along.
Now I could finally grasp its true nature.
“So it was that ‘serpent’ who seduced the professor?”
I pointed toward a section of the undergrowth and flicked my hand lightly.
Flames erupted savagely, consuming the trees.
A pristine white serpent slithered from the burning wood.
With a soft rustling sound.
The snake transformed, its form shifting into that of a woman with snow-white hair.
She gazed at me with sinister eyes before her body morphed into the appearance of a woman with pure white hair.
“My, how did you know I was here?”
The white-haired woman looked at me with an expression of intrigue.
I shrugged and replied.
“Because there’s been a reek of decay emanating from that direction the whole time.”
“Oh my, calling a young lady rotten and fishy—isn’t that rather harsh?”
“Young lady, my foot.”
I stifled a chuckle as I regarded the white-haired woman.
Whether I should call this fortunate or not, I wasn’t sure.
But I knew the identity of this woman.
‘Serpente, the Archbishop of Depravity.’
A Demon Human who served under Mephistopheles, the Arch-Bishop of Depravity, and had orchestrated countless incidents across the Continent in his stead, as he rarely revealed himself.
“Hmm. Judging by that expression, you seem to know who I am?”
Serpente narrowed her eyes while crossing her arms.
She raked her gaze over me from head to toe, her serpentine tongue flicking out languidly.
“Dale Han… Just as Lord Mephistopheles described.”
Serpente murmured my name and nodded, already knowing who I was.
Her cautious expression shifted as her lips curled into a sinister smile.
“But it’s already too late. The descendant of the Great Sage has already heard my ‘whispers.'”
Whisper’s Blessing.
A mental-type blessing that incited the target’s ‘hope’ to induce their actions.
“Well, Professor?”
Serpente turned toward Jade Bastian with a slight smile playing at her lips.
“Huff, huff.”
Jade Bastian bore a stigma gleaming with an ominous black light etched upon his right chest, his bloodshot eyes heaving with ragged breaths.
Serpente gazed upon Jade Bastian and whispered.
“It is time for you to eliminate the hindrance obstructing your dreams.”
Sweet whispers caressed my ears.
Jade Bastian’s bloodshot eyes turned toward me.
His hand wove a seal in the empty air.
Crackle, crackle, crackle!
Geometric patterns unfolded across the void, tracing intricate designs.
The patterns that had shimmered with a jewel-like brilliance were now suffused with murky black, casting an ominous teal glow.
“Bloom.”
The geometric patterns, linked in succession, unfurled like blossoming flowers.
Magical power swollen to an incomparable degree compared to before.
Torrents of light erupted from the patterns, surging toward me like a tidal wave.
“Danger!”
Sophia, recognizing the magnitude of Jade Bastian’s magic at a glance, cried out to me with a pallid, horrified expression.
True to her words, the magic Jade Bastian unleashed possessed a power that the word “formidable” scarcely did justice to.
“Ignite.”
Whoosh!
Flames engulfed my body, burning fiercely.
I swung my blade toward the surging teal light torrents.
Ash Inferno Sword, First Form Variant.
Ash Severance—Wave.
Boom!
Dozens of ashen aura waves shattered the teal light torrents into fragments.
“Bloom.”
Yet that respite was brief.
With a quiet incantation, the teal light torrents surged forth once more.
Watching the patterns ceaselessly pour forth light, I furrowed my brow.
‘What principle governs this?’
The patterns interlocked like a precisely engineered mechanism, continuously generating barrages.
“Hah!”
Ash Inferno Sword, Second Form.
Flame Blade.
Even as I created and fired flame blades from a distance, the moment they drew near the patterns, their trajectory twisted sharply, veering off in an entirely different direction.
‘It launches endless ranged attacks while simultaneously maintaining defense.’
Indeed, it was a cheat-like magic that justified the title of “Great Sage’s” successor.
‘But.’
I harbored a power in my heart that was incomparably more cheat-like than that.
“Burn brighter.”
Whoooosh!
The flames consuming my body grew fiercer, and ash-gray smoke swirled violently.
Engulfed entirely in fire, I kicked toward Jade Bastian.
Uuuuuung!
Teal-blue light clusters flying from all directions.
I twisted my lips into a savage grin and extended my blade.
Ash-fire Sword, Third Form.
Flame Lance.
A gray fireball formed at the sword’s tip as it greedily absorbed the teal-blue light raining down from every direction.
The blazing ash-fire sphere shot toward the barrier of runes Jade Bastian had created.
And then.
Kwaaaaaaaang!
An explosion so violent my ears rang.
Surrounding trees and stones scattered like ants caught in a typhoon.
The geometric runes Jade Bastian had conjured shattered and dispersed into the void.
“Cough!”
Jade Bastian was driven backward, spitting a mouthful of blood.
“What is this…?”
Serpente stared at me with an expression of shock, apparently unable to fathom how a successor of the “Great Sage”—and one who had grown even stronger through artificial stigmata—could be overwhelmed so pathetically.
‘This can’t be real.’
With trembling eyes fixed on me, she seized the brief lull after I unleashed my major technique to whisper to Jade Bastian once more.
“Professor? I think it would be wiser to seize another Candidate Program member as a hostage here?”
The sweet whisper echoed in my ears again.
Jade Bastian’s gaze shifted toward Sophia.
“Ugh…!”
Sophia tried to hastily retreat upon sensing the danger, but Jade Bastian’s hand signs drew runes in the air first.
Teal-blue light rippled across the much smaller runes than before.
Uuuuung!
“Danger!”
“Kyaaah!”
Berald embraced Sophia and turned his back to shield her.
He squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for the impact to come.
“…?”
The geometric runes Jade Bastian had created merely glowed with an ominous teal-blue light—nothing happened.
“What are you doing? Seize the hostage quickly!”
Serpente glared at me with an anxious expression, then barked at Jade Bastian.
“….”
Jade Bastian’s hand, which had frozen mid-motion, reached toward Sophia and Berald once more.
But.
“Ah, ugh.”
A faint groan escaped Jade Bastian’s lips.
Though his eyes burned crimson and his breathing came in ragged gasps, Jade Bastian ultimately refrained from casting magic toward Sophia and Berald.
“You… resisted my Whisper?”
Serpente stared at Jade Bastian with an expression of shock.
In truth, Jade was not the first human to resist the Blessing of Whispers.
There had been quite a few heroes who had never succumbed to her whispers.
But.
‘That was only possible because they never fell under the whisper’s influence from the beginning.’
The Blessing of Whispers she wielded began as nothing more than a faint whisper one could ignore by simply closing their ears.
But the moment one succumbed to the whisper.
It gradually grew louder, filling the target’s mind completely.
For someone like Jade Bastian, who had been under the whisper’s influence for more than a month, it should have been impossible to hear anything but her whisper.
“Why isn’t my whisper working…!”
Serpente ground her teeth and whispered toward Jade Bastian once more.
Yet despite her efforts, the crimson flush draining from Jade Bastian’s eyes was gradually returning to their natural color.
“Hah.”
The whisper faded, and a voice emerged.
The most important voice to him now.
Jade Bastian slowly turned his head toward Sophia and opened his mouth.
“Oscar was….”
He continued in a low, subdued voice.
“A terrible Candidate.”
“….”
“Self-righteous, selfish, willful, and thought of no one but himself.”
Tears welled in the corners of Jade Bastian’s eyes as he gazed at Sophia.
“But… but, you see.”
He caressed the artificial stigma carved into his right chest and wept.
“He was my… my one and only precious… student.”
“…You.”
Sophia looked at Jade Bastian with trembling eyes.
She gently pushed away Berald, who had been holding her, and rose to her feet.
Step, step.
She moved slowly toward Jade Bastian.
“I’m sorry… I should never have harbored such an absurd dream from the start, speaking of saving the world… My hollow dream drove your brother to his death.”
“….”
“Heh. To complete research begun to save the world by borrowing the power of Demons… How pathetic and wretched an ending this is.”
Even if faded, a dream that had never been tainted by filth.
I had defiled it with my own hands.
“Do not forgive me.”
Jade Bastian knelt before Sophia, offering a bitter smile.
“I wasn’t planning to forgive you anyway.”
Sophia extended her staff toward the kneeling Jade Bastian.
Crimson mana swirled at the tip of her staff.
And then.
Bop.
A light impact rippled across Jade Bastian’s forehead.
“Huh?”
Passing by Jade Bastian as he touched his forehead with a bewildered expression, Sophia spoke softly.
“Next time… complete it without borrowing the Demon Human’s power. The dream you and your brother dreamed together.”
“….”
“If I help you, it’ll be finished faster than you think.”
Sophia shrugged her shoulders toward the dazed Jade Bastian.
“Despite appearances, my magical prowess far surpasses my brother’s.”

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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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