Became the Unjust Contract Slave of the Archamage’s Book

Richard Bernstein was running away. For a while, he had neither eaten nor slept properly, constantly pursued by mages. At a stream he found along the way, he hurriedly quenched his thirst.

“Phew…”

He roughly washed his face and looked into the stream, seeing his reflection marred by deep dark circles. Where had it all gone wrong?

Bernstein was a wandering mage. He made a living traveling and hunting demons on behalf of lords and nobles. Not long ago, while passing through a small village, he received a request to hunt a demon. The reward was meager, but the village headman seemed desperate. Normally, he would have declined, but he accepted the request this time, considering it an act of charity.

After a fierce battle with the demon, he eventually emerged victorious. However, it was a victory filled with scars. The demon had left a deep wound across his chest, a wound so severe that it was a miracle he survived. Bernstein collapsed into a pool of his own blood and lost consciousness. When he awoke, it was the middle of the night.

He returned to the village and asked for help. Seeing his severe injuries, the villagers banded together to care for him. Bernstein barely managed to swallow some thin porridge before falling into a death-like slumber. 

When he woke again, he found the bodies of the villagers who had cared for him strewn around his bed. Each had a long wound across their chest similar to his own. The cuts looked like they had been made by the demon’s sharp claws.

Terrified, he noticed his own hands, stained with congealed blood. He ran to the bathroom and washed the blood off, discovering something more shocking: the long, deep wound from his shoulder to his hipbone had vanished.

He left the village. Since that day, he had a vague sense that two selves coexisted within his body, like a sleepwalker. While he was himself, he was just a normal wandering mage. But when he was something else, he was more like a demon in human skin. Many times he regained consciousness to find himself surrounded by corpses, with blood on his hands and mouth, feeling an unsettling fullness in his stomach.

To avoid people, he chose secluded paths and headed for Elfenbine, believing it was the only place where he could be cured. Finally crossing the tower gate of Elfenbine, he realized he had made a grave mistake.

Every person he met in Elfenbine was brimming with mana. He instinctively knew: I did not come here to be healed. No mage can cure me. I came here… to feed.

Mana, mana. The scent of mana everywhere made his mouth water. Struggling to maintain his sanity, Bernstein was approached by a stern-looking professor he vaguely remembered.

Standing before Professor Freud, Bernstein’s expression was bizarre. It seemed both a smile and a cry, as his true self clashed with the demon within. Sensing an inexplicable dread, Professor Freud distanced himself, preparing to defend.

Bernstein lunged at him with inhuman speed. Professor Freud countered, but Bernstein was no ordinary demon. He was a mage corrupted by dark magic. He devoured the professor’s spell and, along with it, the delicious old professor himself.

Bernstein fled Elfenbine, running once more. There was no longer any guilt left in him. The part of his consciousness that resisted the dark magic was fading. The mages dispatched from Elfenbine pursued him, but they were prey he had already tasted.

East, there was far more tempting prey to the east. He could feel it. As he looked at his reflection in the stream, he noticed that his face was now smiling. He stood up, overwhelmed by the irresistible scent coming from far to the east. He wanted to devour it.

Binaeril and Inyakan had left Elfenbine. Dean Yulio told Inyakan that while hunting down the fugitive mage, he would investigate more about the Inya tribe. However, neither the dean nor Binaeril voiced their suspicion that the Holy Kingdom of Vitory might be behind it.

Inyakan was a man with nothing to lose, and he wasn’t a calculating person either. Given that it was still just a conjecture, mentioning the Order’s name to him could lead to unforeseen consequences. Dean Yulio gave Binaeril a crystal ball that could track the location of the pursuers. Taking it and putting it in his pocket, Binaeril said:

“So, it’s a mission to track the mages who are tracking the fugitive mage.”

Inyakan responded, “What nonsense are you talking about?”

“I said, it’s a mission to track the mages who are tracking the fugitive mage.”

“If you keep talking like that, I’ll knock you out and carry you over my shoulder.”

Fearing he might actually do it, Binaeril shut his mouth. Inyakan didn’t seem to be in a good mood. It seemed he was frustrated because they had come all the way to Elfenbine but had found no clues about who had massacred the Inya tribe.

To lighten the somber mood, Binaeril began explaining their journey. “The Principality of Pigny, bordering Elfenbine, is often called a free trade state. Though small in size, it’s near the center of the continent and borders both Elfenbine and the Holy Kingdom of Vitory, which has developed its commerce.”

“Due to its developed transport and trade, the principality has accumulated considerable wealth for its size. Once we enter the principality, we can get a carriage to Ruben.”

“Surely, you’re not going to say you can’t ride in a carriage, are you? Whether it’s the belief of the Barbarians or just a fear of riding, please bear with it. I don’t want to walk to Ruben.”

Originally, Binaeril intended to ride a horse, but Inyakan refused. He said he didn’t know how to ride and didn’t plan on learning.

After Binaeril had been talking to himself for some time, Inyakan suddenly spoke up. “I’ve been thinking.”

“About what?”

“That old man said he didn’t learn nothing. And you seemed to catch on to something while talking to him.”

…This was bad.

‘If he gets a hold of this, it’ll be troublesome.’

Binaeril had been rambling on to avoid such a conversation, but Inyakan wasn’t just a fool.

“If you have a reason you can’t tell me, fine. The old man said he would take his time, but I can’t wait forever either.”

“What do you plan to do? Are you thinking of running away?”

“Me? Why? Where to? I don’t run.”

That’s a lie. Inyakan had abandoned Binaeril and fled right after hunting the Hydra, when Count Huber’s soldiers had swarmed them.

“The old man also said this: you have skills that rival the professors of that tower.”

“…He did say that. Though it’s an overestimation.”

The ominous feeling grew stronger.

“If it’s something I can’t figure out just from my memory, would going directly to the village where the Inya tribe lived help?”

“It would… probably help.”

“Good? Got it.”

Clang, clang! Inyakan banged on the bracer on his forearm. The meaning was clear.

Binaeril looked at Inyakan with incredulous eyes. “Are you serious?”

“Just sleep for a bit. When you wake up, we’ll be in the northern lands.”

Inyakan raised his huge fist and struck Binaeril on the head.

***

“Apologies, Commander.”

The knights in white armor bowed their heads and apologized to their commander. Yunnaeril Dalheim, the commander, was dressed in plain clothes and swinging a wooden sword. To an outsider, he might have looked like a diligent apprentice knight in training.

Indeed, the commander’s youthful appearance was often mistaken for that of a novice knight. No one would guess that this tall, handsome young man was the first knight of the Holy Kingdom of Vitory, the most honored Paladin.

The commander usually spent his time in personal training whenever he had no specific duties. There was a significant contrast between the commander clad in white armor leading the Order’s soldiers and his current appearance.

“We failed to retrieve the cursed sword. Although we secured it, we were ambushed and it was taken from us on the way back.”

Paladin Callisto, third in rank among the Order’s knights and the eldest among them, took on the role of a senior figure despite being lower in rank than Binaeril.

“An ambush?” the commander asked in surprise. These knights were not ones to fall prey to mere bandits.

“A demon?”

“Then, was it the Imperial army?”

“Then, who…”

“It was a mage.”

Callisto raised his head and met the commander’s eyes. “We encountered Sister Priya.”

“…Priya Merzina?”

The commander pronounced the name of his former lover as if it belonged to a stranger.

“Sister Priya was after Starfall.”

“Why would she…”

Callisto shook his head. “I don’t know. When we resisted giving up Starfall, she stole the cursed sword as a substitute.”

“Priya, targeting Starfall…”

He put away the wooden sword he had been swinging.

“Are you unharmed?” the commander inquired, prioritizing the well-being of the two paladins rather than rebuking them for losing the artifact. He extended a warm hand towards them, showing genuine concern. The two men bowed their heads in gratitude, failing to notice the cold gleam that settled in the commander’s eyes.

“We’re not injured. Sister Priya only targeted me, sparing Matthias,” Callisto reported.

“It’s a relief that both of you are safe.”

Callisto shook his head. “Brother Matthias was wounded by magic.”

“What? But you said Priya only targeted you?”

“Matthias’s injury wasn’t inflicted by Sister Priya. It was another mage.”

“Another mage? Did Priya have a companion?”

“No.”

As Callisto’s gaze turned towards him, Matthias, the knight with an eye patch, stepped forward to explain. “During the process of retrieving the cursed sword, we encountered those who were confronting it. Duke Dux of the Empire, his knights, and a mage who introduced himself as Binaeril Dalheim.”

“Binaeril Dalheim?” 

Callisto tried to look up at the commander’s face, but the sunlight created a glare, making it difficult to see clearly. The commander’s shoulder-length dark gray hair appeared pale as it filtered the sunlight, the same color as the mage they had met in the Rotfallen underground tomb.

“Commander Yunnaeril, we met a mage in the Empire who claimed to be your brother.”

The commander’s expression remained obscured, but his tense posture betrayed his unease. “My brother has become a mage?”

That statement was as good as an admission that Binaeril was indeed his brother.

“You didn’t know?”

“We lost contact long ago.”

“Your brother, it seems, has become a highly skilled mage.”

The commander’s expression turned complex, and Callisto recalled another forgotten detail. “Ah, and your brother was also after the cursed sword.”

“My brother was after the fragments?”

“Excuse me? Fragments?”