I Became the Narrow-Eyed Henchman of the Evil Boss

A shabby-looking man appeared before us as we headed to the evaluation panel. His torn clothes and the numerous wounds on his body indicated he had endured quite a lot.

At first glance, he didn’t look infected by Silver Threads. How did he get hurt like that?

“We are the Ten Towers Emergency Rescue Team. We are currently moving to a safe location; would you like to join us?”

Niobe stepped forward and asked. In that brief moment, it seemed like they had determined the man wasn’t an infected host.

No matter how clueless, a Blasphemia agent was still an agent. Just as I admired his keen observation, the man opened his mouth.

“You are…”

“You are Blasphemia, aren’t you?”

“…Huh?”

Niobe’s response came a breath too late. The man’s hair stood on end as fighting spirit enveloped him.

Damn it. Looking for Blasphemia means he is about 90% likely to be a vanished Priest of the Gods. I asked Lampades with a glimmer of hope.

“Do you recognize that face? Have you seen him in the mercenary world?”

Perhaps he was a troubleshooter given a secretive request from Blasphemia. Maybe the client was just angry because they didn’t pay him.

“No. I’ve never seen him before. It’s been quite a while since I stepped back from the industry to establish a Mage Tower, so he could be a rising power that appeared during that time…”

Lampades charged his tools with magic power, eyeing the shabby man warily.

I suppressed a sigh that was about to escape. Could he really be a Priest? I had considered the possibility of him being a troubleshooter for using fighting spirit.

In a world dominated by magic, the practitioners of fighting spirit were few. It was because the status of magic was absolutely supreme. Fighting spirit felt like a refuge for those who had been pushed out of magic.

Among troubleshooters, however, users of fighting spirit were relatively common. Most used it as an emergency measure when their magic ran out or as auxiliary equipment for physical enhancement.

So, the chance of that guy being a troubleshooter isn’t zero…

“Blasphemia bastards! Where are the cult members you kidnapped?!”

Nope. Definitely 100% a vanished Priest of the Gods.

‘A Priest who uses fighting spirit, huh.’

I recalled information about the gods. It was common for priests to acquire other abilities to hide their divine power.

However, the level of skill displayed by this man couldn’t be reached simply by learning fighting spirit as a disguise. He had clearly trained seriously.

Not only divine power but also a warrior god promoting the training of fighting spirit. It was not hard to guess which cult the man hailed from.

“If you won’t answer…!”

A red light flickered in the man’s grip. His fearsome presence made the children following us tremble.

I quickly sent a message to Kine to instruct her on actions and stepped forward.

“That’s enough.”

*

A man with a smiling face stepped a bit closer. His ordinary stride held neither energy nor pressure.

Thud

‘No magic power detected…!’

But that ordinariness felt out of place.

The reason the vanished Priest of the Gods could see through the identity of the Young Mage was because of the magical tools used by the agents of the Ten Towers.

The life signal detection devices provided by the Ten Towers. He completely memorized the pattern of the magic field of that tool specialized in receiving and transmitting signals.

Normally, the output would be too minimal to detect behind the individual magic fields of the agents. However, the Priest, who had fought countless battles against the Ten Towers’ minions, possessed the ability to sense the faintest traces of the magical tools’ field.

That guy did not show any traces of such magic. A complete silence.

None of the Blasphemia agents he had fought against could hide their magic so thoroughly. He was undoubtedly a formidable magician.

“Are you… the one in charge here?”

“To some extent, yes.”

Orthes, who shrugged once, spoke quietly.

“Let those behind just go. Let’s have a conversation just between the two of us. After all, aren’t they just unfortunate people caught up in a terror incident with a clueless rookie?”

“Ha. When have you ever let us go just like that?! Have you ever listened to our plea to save even a single child?!”

Niobe took a hesitant step back at the fierce presence. Orthes remained unfazed.

“If it comes to that, you’ll never know the whereabouts of the believers.”

“…”

I couldn’t accurately assess how powerful the Blasphemia agent in front of me was. But I instinctively felt he was not an easy opponent to defeat. If reinforcements arrived during the battle, even I would have a hard time achieving a complete victory.

“Fine. I acknowledge that time is not on my side. But how could I trust you?”

“…I will be the hostage.”

Stepping forward from behind Orthes was Kine, resolute. Everyone escaping with her turned their gaze toward her.

“I don’t really understand what you’re saying, but… if I become your hostage, that person can’t act recklessly, right?”

The vanished Priest of the Gods glared at Orthes. Orthes calmly nodded.

An unspoken agreement was reached. Kine began to move forward gradually.

*

Among the people present, only Lampades understood the relationship between Kine and Orthes. The corporate scholarship student and the secretary of that company were shocked.

‘That, that guy…?!’

Did he just offer up his company’s scholarship student as bait without hesitation?

‘No way. Could the child even come up with the idea to become a hostage by herself? Surely it must be at Orthes’s directive!’

How could a person be so cold-hearted?

“I’d rather become the hostage!”

There wasn’t much distance left to the evaluation panel, and with the magician and enrollment officer from the Ten Towers nearby, Astraphe would surely arrive safely.

The enrollment officer, having heard from Lampades, raised his hand excitedly. It was the manifestation of his professional ethics as an adult who needed to protect the child.

“No. You skilled magicians are still a threat even if you disarmed yourselves, so get out. Now!”

But the forgotten Priest of the Gods rejected their offer. Orthes’s voice echoed through the adults who were biting their lips.

“Everyone else should take the other children to a safe location. I will handle this.”

“Branch chief…!”

The enrollment officer choked on his words.

He thought of Orthes, who introduced himself as part of the Emergency Rescue Team, as Niobe’s superior. Despairing at his helplessness in not being able to protect the students, he bowed his head and pleaded with the magician from the Ten Towers.

“Please, please rescue them safely. That child, that child…”

The enrollment officer had gleaned a little about Kine’s past by casually asking about her prosthetic arm. Despite her unfortunate past, she was a kind-hearted child willing to sacrifice for others and shouldn’t die at the hands of superstitious followers.

Orthes nodded solemnly.

Lampades, unable to bear the naturalness of that act, closed his eyes tightly.

*

As Kine moved forward bit by bit, Orthes whispered to Niobe.

“Do not report this case to the upper management. There are rumors that there are those in league with the Followers of Superstition. I will report this directly to the Auditor General, just like at the Charlotte Branch…”

Niobe felt a sense of tension within Orthes’s smiling demeanor. It was the burden someone handling tasks related to the fate of the organization and the lives of innocent civilians typically held.

“Right now, you should only think about safely evacuating these people. I will somehow bring that child back.”

With respect and encouragement, Niobe nodded.

Only after the sorcerer candidates, including the Musaeon enrollment applicants, disappeared did the forgotten Priest of the Gods start to move. He lifted Kine and moved with a complex trajectory, as if trying to shake off any potential pursuers.

Orthes ran, silently cursing the overly suspicious Priest.

‘Damn it. That ignorant fool. Surveillance cameras must not be operational anyway, so stop being paranoid.’

The man’s run came to a stop. Orthes, who stopped next, thought.

‘I should lay low in Etna City for a while after leaving Elysion.’

*

The Priest standing in front of Kine glared at me.

“Where did you take the cult members?”

Damn it. Why am I playing this ridiculous part?

But this was also an opportunity. An unusual power charging into Elysion alone. He clearly held a relatively high-ranking position within the cult.

If I could persuade that guy well, it would greatly help with the upcoming conflict with Argyrion.

…Although concerns lingered about his intelligence since he charged in alone.

“First, pleased to meet you, Priest of Enyalius.”

*

The Priest of the war god Enyalius, Demus, tensed his muscles.

“You couldn’t have left any of the Blasphemia bastards alive that you met. How did you know?”

“For a simple reason. I—”

“Is that so! You gained information by torturing our cult members! You filthy scum!”

“…It’s because I possess an artifact of Phoibos.”

“What?”

Shock. A good start. Orthes’s smile deepened.

It was, in fact, a straightforward deduction that didn’t require a sharp mind. After all, how many close-combat specialists wielding fighting spirit were there?

Seizing the initiative in the conversation, Orthes’s mind began to work swiftly.

“First, I need to ask this. Is your dispatch the consensus of the Divine Cult? Or is it your own independent decision?”

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