ALL NOVEL Chapter 241: Wonderland – 44
It was a path I had taken just yesterday.
I estimated it would take me about 10 minutes to get from the hall to the commune at my pace.
However, things didn’t go as planned.
Shortly after leaving the hall, I encountered a scene where an Saint and a Reaper were fighting.
“How long do you plan on dodging and weaving?”
The Reaper, swinging a scythe with menacing force, had the voice of a young woman.
Her opponent was the Diamond Queen, a Saint.
She had honed the basics of card magic and was once banned from all casinos in Vegas due to her sharp observation and deft hands.
Even with just one eye, she could perfectly discern her opponent’s habits and movements, skilfully evading the scythe in the narrow corridor.
Her fluid movements and taunting words were befitting of Lord Fantastic’s mentor.
The Reaper’s eyes glowed red as she intensified her attacks.
The corridor they were fighting in was extremely narrow.
A single glancing blow from that scythe could be the end for my fragile body.
If that happened, even Debulroots wouldn’t be able to restore me.
So, I took a detour, finding another staircase down.
Below was a place I knew well.
It appeared in the game and was one of our initial attack targets: the prison where prisoners were held.
On either side of the cliff were thousands of caves, each with iron bars, holding a prisoner in a prison uniform.
The person in the foremost cave looked up at me.
“Who are you? You don’t seem like an Saint.”
Other prisoners reacted to his voice, rushing to the bars.
“Who’s here?”
“What’s that noise? What’s happening outside?”
“Are you an intruder? If so, please let us out!”
There seemed to be around a hundred prisoners.
Excluding the voodoo mages, the prisoners were a mix of demons, fairies, personas, and followers of other Demon gods.
“Hey!”
“Over here!”
“Straw Hat!”
I quickly moved past them.
While there were plans to use the prisoners in our escape strategy, I had more urgent matters now.
But after a few steps, I stopped in my tracks.
The diagnostic function detected that all the living humans were Voodoo mages.
The status screen showed a common trait applied to their bodies.
At that moment, I heard a voice from the corridor I had descended.
“Prison, prison… Ah, found it!”
There was no need to guess who it was.
Frost was spreading from the entrance of the prison.
I quickly scanned the prisoners and hid in one of the caves.
***
The Reaper Pahomet, commonly called Patty by friends, wasn’t late to his destination because he was lost or in a fight.
Today’s mission was an unprecedented attack on a Demon god’s territory.
Excited, he had recklessly smashed anything that felt like Kirku’s influence.
Though he wanted to run out into the square and create more havoc, he knew his friend would scold him, so he hurried to perform his task.
Entering the prison, he looked around at the prisoners and shouted.
“Voodoo mages, hands up!”
The prisoners froze at the sight of the high-ranking Demon known as the Reaper of The Abyss.
Some poked their heads through the bars at the mention of Voodoo.
Realizing something significant was happening due to the noise and the appearance of an outsider, some responded.
“We are with the Voodo…”
“Are all of you?”
“Here’s another one!”
“And me too…”
Some shameless demons and fairies claimed to be part of the Voodoo , but Patty was aware that they were alive, ignored them and focused on his targets.
“I’m here at the client’s request.”
“The client…?”
“Of course, your Organization.”
The mages smiled brightly at each other at the Reaper’s words.
“We, we survived!”
“Long live Voodoo!”
“Grr, to think they would go this far for us…”
The Reaper cast a cold smile toward the jubilant crowd.
“But you lot are impressive. One, two, three… wow, not a single one dead?”
The mages were excitedly chattering, thinking they could finally leave this place.
“Those Wonderland guys are quite soft, aren’t they? They don’t even do physical torture.”
“They always try to capture us alive…”
“Though I nearly lost my mind during the punishments…”
Instead of joining in their banter, Patty shook his head.
“That’s not what I meant.”
His voice had a mocking tone.
Finally, the mages sensed something was off and exchanged uneasy glances.
“I’m surprised none of you mentioned the boss’s name.”
Patty spread the fluttering black cloth wrapped around him, enveloping himself in it.
This act multiplied his defensive capabilities, as if he was donning solid armour.
“Uh… that is…”
“H-how did you know?”
“What does that have to do with nobody dying…?”
Patty bared his sharp teeth at the bewildered mages.
“You’ve all got bio-bombs attached to your bodies. They activate as soon as they hear the keyword.”
A chilling silence fell over the prison, which had been filled with laughter moments ago.
Bio-bombs?
Frozen in disbelief, they finally snapped back to reality when Patty opened his mouth again, and they began to scream and shout in panic.
“R-reaper!”
“Wait, please!”
Ignoring their pleas, the reaper shouted the name told by the Voodoo.
“Frank Wonderstein!”
An immense pressure and a deafening roar shook the cave.
The bodies of the ten or so mages swelled up like balloons and then exploded simultaneously.
The blast was powerful enough to collapse the caves they were confined in.
With the prisoners conveniently gathered on one side among the thousands of tunnels, the other prisoners were also inevitably caught in the carnage.
Patty glanced around at the collapsed cave, strewn with shattered flesh and blood, and burst into laughter.
“Kahaha! Success! Blowing things up really is fun. Now, shall I go hang out with Katpia?”
With that, he left the place.
Not long after he left, the debris on one side of the collapsed cave began to stir.
Two people emerged, gasping for air.
One was the Scarecrow, and the other was a Voodoo mage who had been furthest from the entrance of the prison.
“Damn, to think they’d use us as a discardable pawn.”
The mage muttered, touching his back.
There, a hard, turtle-like shell had grown.
Without it, he too would have been caught in the explosion.
Or rather, if the bomb inside his body hadn’t been defused, he would have swelled up and exploded like the others.
He felt around his lower abdomen.
The higher-ups had implanted something there, claiming it would enhance his physical abilities.
The foreign sensation it caused was now completely gone.
He looked at the ridiculous figure made of cloth and straw.
The scarecrow had entered his cell just before the reaper had arrived.
It was the scarecrow who had deactivated the bomb and caused the turtle shell to grow on his back.
“I can’t believe it. To nullify something made with Debulroots without starlight… How could that… Wait. The only person who could…”
The mage looked at the Scarecrow in shock.
The Scarecrow nodded, confirming his suspicion.
“Thank you for not mentioning my name until the end.”
“A-ah, as I thought, y-you are…?”
The mage knelt before the Scarecrow.
Although he did not know how it happened, the cult leader he had never seen before appeared and saved him.
“Uh, why did you…?”
The scarecrow chose his words carefully.
The more he tried to fabricate a story, the higher the chances of getting caught in his own lies.
He was the one who saved the man’s life and was also the leader of the organization he belonged to.
He didn’t need to make him understand; he could guide him in the desired direction without doing so.
“I see the Executives have been up to some interesting things while I was away.”
Honestly, the scarecrow didn’t know how much of it was Wonderstein’s doing and how much was the executives acting on their own.
But he believed that if he feigned knowledge and probed a bit, the other party would react accordingly.
As he had expected, the mage sighed as if he understood something.
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Some of those things don’t please me.”
The mage did not have a high rank within Voodoo.
He was just a field operative following orders, not an executive.
Therefore, he didn’t know the details of what the cult was doing.
However, there was one recent event he knew about.
The normally secretive executives had shared information about this particular matter openly enough for the whole island to buzz with it.
It was about the Vergsong Chambers of Commerce.
They had taken a hostile stance against the Voodooo.
They used their intelligence resources to uncover the organization’s secrets and handed them over to investigative agencies in various countries, cut off the organization’s funding, and hired mercenaries to attack the organization’s secret operations.
Why had the leader allowed this to happen?
Unable to understand his actions, the executives had secretly plotted something against Vergsong.
That must be what he was referring to.
“W-what should I do?”
He seemed to have a clue. The scarecrow inwardly rejoiced.
“Judge and act on your own. However, the next time we meet, you’ll need to bring a gift for me.”
It wasn’t good to give detailed orders to a subordinate who feared their superior.
Out of fear of punishment, they might stick rigidly to the instructions given and not deviate.
Thus, the scarecrow gave a deliberately vague order.
After all, he didn’t know much about the internal affairs of the Voodoo. It was better to be vague than to risk suspicion by pretending to know too much.
Moreover, by doing this, he could prevent the Voodoo from figuring out how much he actually knew.
It was a useful strategy in many ways.
The mage nodded resolutely.
Demon worshippers of a contracted demon were a minority even within the Voodoo
Their abilities were not particularly useful for the organization’s operations, so they were only deployed for tasks like this.
He usually had many grievances but endured for the sake of his dependents.
But installing a bomb in his body?
That was the moment when even his pride in his loyalty hit rock bottom.
However, with the leader saving his life and directly assigning him a mission, he decided to change his mindset.
It was an opportunity to become a direct subordinate of the Black Magician.
He couldn’t miss this chance.
After finishing their conversation, the two stood up.
“Um, how do I get out of here?”
“The barrier surrounding Wonderland will be temporarily lifted soon. When that happens, escape. Use this passage to exit the theatre. It leads to the lower northern area. It’s chaotic outside right now, so it should be a good place to hide.”
As the scarecrow was about to hurry on, he suddenly realized he hadn’t asked the most important thing.
“By the way, what is your name?”
“Ben Sullivan, sir.”
“…Outside, you should call me Director.”
“Yes, Director!”
“See you later, then.”
With his subordinate seeing him off, the scarecrow descended the stairs.
TL Note: Yes. Wonderstein is the leader of Voodoo Union of Mages and the Cult. The Executives are the Witches. We have already seen Rabbit Witch Lele Rohe. High Priestess of the Cult. Then there is the Crow Witch who is also the Vice President of the Comprachihos.
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Chapter 240: Wonderland – 43