Chapter 234

“This is more chaotic than I thought.”

For someone suffering from a serious illness like self-aggrandizement, the hardest thing to endure isn’t criticism or insults.

Inside these individuals is a miraculous translation mechanism that completely ignores whether the accusations aimed at them are justified or not, drawing the transcendent conclusion that “The other person is angry at me! I am superior to that jerk!”

Even if the wizards from the Tower of Guardian were raging about cowardice and ugliness, Valdeus wouldn’t care. Of course, being the petty person he is, he’d likely shout even louder at the opponent.

Because of that, Valdeus found it even more unbearable to see this situation completely disregarding him and flowing freely.

He grabbed the Master of the Tower of Guardian by the collar, lifting him up in a show of strength as he exclaimed.

“What are you doing?! Don’t you care what happens to the Master of the Tower?! If that’s the case, I’ll crush your heads right now!”

“Wait a moment!”

“Then make them stop at once!”

“They are not under our command! Even if we want to stop them, we’re in a situation where we can’t even speak!”

“Stop the nonsense! You’ve been cooperating fine until now, and you expect me to believe that now?!”

“It’s not a lie! After the Master was captured, we completely lost contact for a while!”

“Ugh…!”

As if revealing his complicated feelings, Valdeus’s movements slowed down.

***

“Once the opponent has taken hostages, they will surely try to use that in some way.”

“There are many methods. They might test the waters or throw a hissy fit to break our morale, or they could use it to tie us down at a crucial moment.”

“At that time, we mustn’t show any signs of being manipulated. More accurately, we must avoid any dialogue altogether. The opponent who tries to gain the upper hand through conversation hates those who, like the Tin Knight, just beat them up.”

“But we can’t just leave the hostage to fend for themselves. We are not just fighting to dismantle the Tower of Control; our goal is to reveal the truth behind this incident and restore the Friedel Territory’s honor. For that, we need the help of Lady Hermina, and we can’t fully break off relations with the Tower of Guardian even if we can’t retrieve her.”

“Thus, we must force the enemy into a state of confusion. If we act like we don’t care about the hostage while the main force of the Tower of Guardian moves like there’s room for negotiation, the enemy will have to rethink their decisions. They won’t be able to wave us around as they thought, but the value of the hostage won’t disappear entirely either. They’ll inevitably have to think carefully about the next move.”

“──That hesitation is precisely the opportunity we must seize.”

***

The clicking of heels echoed.

Gale, having teleported behind Valdeus, swung her staff and struck the back of his head.

Pow!

It was a strike that shattered all of Valdeus’s protective magic and luxurious defensive magical devices as if activated by instinct.

“Cough!”

Valdeus, undoubtedly an excellent wizard, found that he had no way to counter the surprise attack from Gale, who was stronger than him when his mind was elsewhere.

As the surrounding wizards reacted with a delay, Gale was quicker to seize Valdeus and present him as a shield.

“If you don’t behave, I can’t guarantee the hostage’s safety. -This was what you all were planning, right?”

The wizards couldn’t move under the polite yet mischievous tone of Gale’s words.

As they hesitated, Gale activated her magic.

『Bind』 『Shield』 『Accelerate』

The characters of Bind formed ropes that tied up Valdeus, the characters of Shield surrounded her companions, and the characters of Accelerate assisted Gale’s movements.

In the blink of an eye, Gale moved to the formation of the wizards from the Tower of Guardian and handed over the two people she brought along.

Most were staring dumbfounded, unsure of what was happening, but a few who had been informed of the plan showed signs of joy.

“Well done! You really did it!”

“Now we can fight without any reservations!”

The wizards began analyzing the contents of Valdeus’s pouch. Being outstanding magical device creators, they quickly understood its structure.

As they infused magical energy into the bizarrely shaped root, the wizards who had been transformed into plants began to revert back to their human forms one by one.

Since all those taken away by Mombi were experienced individuals who had contributed to the Tower of Guardian for a long time, the remaining leaders also expressed their joy as they welcomed them back.

In other words, those gathered here were the core members of the Tower that could not be lost.

Master Hermina’s gaze gleamed coldly, and her fingers turned sharp like blades.

Like the hands of a clock, she swung her blades and turned her body widely.

The wizards within the radius of her spinning blades instantly turned into countless chunks of meat.

Kaahh!

If she had completed a full circle, she might have ended the war in a single moment.

But the deadly clock’s hands came to a stop just a quarter of the way, between 12 and 3 o’clock.

The White Knight.

On pure stats alone, it was the strongest and newest magical automaton that had forcibly halted her attack.

“An imposter in the form of me! Fall back!”

The wizards present, all skilled fighters, quickly recognized the situation.

They grabbed their still-frozen or sluggish comrades and hastily withdrew beyond the reach of the spinning blades.

Master Hermina of the Tower of Guardian.

“Tch, what a pity. It could’ve ended comfortably.”

No, it was Mombi, who had transformed into her, who clicked her tongue in disappointment.

Valdeus, rolling on the ground bound by ropes, lifted his head groggily to look at her.

“M-Master…?”

“That’s right, son of Rotbart. It was quite entertaining to watch. When clowning around crosses a certain line, it becomes art.”

Her words and gestures seemed to carry both affection and mockery.

Maybe for Mombi, both sentiments were the same.

Only then did Valdeus realize.

That the figure he called Master had never referred to him by name even once.

Valdeus’s head drooped.

Swish!

Right after that, the blade of the White Knight lunged toward Mombi’s head.

The attack of the White Knight reinforced by Gale’s enchantment had the power to pierce even a steel wall, but Mombi merely raised a hand to block it.

Her body, reconstructed through transformation magic, appeared human on the outside but was far from an ordinary person on the inside.

On top of that, she had inherited powerful protective magic from Olin.

Seeing her nonchalant defense, Gale’s expression hardened.

Not only did the White Knight, who had been ordered to respond immediately, fail to completely block the ambush, but the overwhelming defensive power she was displaying now was also clearly stronger than when they first fought.

As both a wizard and a top-notch technician, Gale quickly discerned.

‘She’s manipulating the magical power surrounding her as if it were her own through the Tower.’

Enhancing her basic abilities using ley lines was a simple and fundamental ability for wizards’ combat.

However, because Dorothea and her group had acted swiftly, she likely hadn’t had the time to decorate her new setup to her liking, focusing only on her basic abilities, but the issue was that even those were more than sufficient to make her strong.

“Gale. You’re quite bold to attack using your master’s body. Don’t you know that if I die, your master will be finished too?”

“You, on the other hand, seem completely clueless using the same body as your master. That person would feel worse about a wizard shedding tears due to your evil deeds than about losing a finger.”

“Hmph. Then aren’t you curious where the real Master of the Tower is? I might tell you if you kneel and kiss my shoes right now.”

“Knowing her personality, if she hears that because of her, we couldn’t fight properly, everyone here would probably have to kneel and listen to a week-long sermon, so I’ll pass.”

“Tch, you really are a disciple with no cuteness.”

Mombi shook her head.

There should be some hesitation or agony to poke fun at, but with her being so guarded, there was no gap to slip through.

Above all, even the wizards of the Guardian side, who had previously shown hesitation, were visibly steeling themselves after witnessing the corpses of their comrades killed by Mombi’s attacks and hearing Gale’s words.

“Well, it doesn’t matter.”

However, Mombi wasn’t particularly attached to that.

Being a fickle witch, if her scheme went awry, she would just suppress through force.

The clash between Mombi’s hand and the White Knight’s spear resumed.

The wizards observing from the Control side began firing their onslaught, and the wizards from the Guardian side quickly entered a counter-attack stance.

Blood and flames erupted, and the curtain of full-scale conflict was lifted.

***

A wizard becomes stronger in their own domain.

Especially if it’s a joint setup made by over a thousand wizards using a massive ley line as fuel.

Layer upon layer of layered barriers. Guardians like evil spirits, ghosts, spirits, and golems, prepared to greet the enemies, each with dozens of copies.

Traps that had been left inactive are all activated in this emergency, and invaders must withstand all sorts of traps like projectiles, lightning strikes, and spatial shifts while simultaneously countering the wizards’ attacks as they advance step by step.

Even a regular army from a territory would face annihilation without even breaching the first floor against such overwhelming defenses.

And yet, the Tin Knight and his companions charged through without a second thought.

When the enemy’s assault came rushing, the Tin Knight swept it away, Dorothea responded to magic, dangerous traps were absorbed by Sophia, and whenever they were physically blocked, Adelheid smashed through.

Such was their overwhelming strength that even Captain Bill, who was recruited as a collaborator via contract, was left speechless.

“They’re really something else! And what you’re doing looks strangely familiar. Are you guys perhaps bigger villains than me?”

[‘The Tin Knight’ argues that making judgments based on Dorothea’s outfit alone is a prejudice!]

“Can’t you two stop talking nonsense!? You’re way too relaxed!”

Breathing heavily, Dorothea shouted irritably.

Though she had somewhat expected this, the defenses of the Tower indeed felt deadly serious.

When they tried to launch a mass undead attack initially, if they had thought it through, they wouldn’t have wasted their power on empty undead that looked flashy but were devoid of essence; they might very well have collapsed from exhaustion.

It was also a huge help that most of Captain Bill’s crew stayed on the first floor to cut off external support.

To keep Captain Bill and other executives from being automatically re-summoned after remaining away from the ship for an extended time, Trot, who was with them as a kind of wedge, kicked the fiery mouth of the dog hard and screamed.

“We’ve been climbing for a while now, how many floors are we on?!”

“You won’t feel it because of the structure and the magic complicating things, but we’re probably a little over halfway. Anyway, the old man we’re looking for should be on the top floor—”

Before Dorothea’s sentence could finish, a small skull in her possession raised its voice.

The skull, embedded with Gale’s unique magical characters, spoke fluently.

《Witch detected! Witch detected! Outside! Outside!》

“…Tch!”

Dorothea’s expression hardened.

Considering that Mombi, who focuses on transformations and ambushes, hadn’t attacked while they were climbing the tower, it was expected, but of course, the target was likely outside.

Inside and outside the tower.

As soon as one found Mombi, the other would join in the fight, so right now, Dorothea’s group must exit the tower and head to Gale.

The problem was that this wasn’t the only message.

《Witch! Defensive magic is continuously restoring automatically! At this rate, it can’t be eliminated! To subdue, you must destroy the Tower’s core supplying magical energy to the witch!》

《I’ll focus on stalling, so please hurry and conquer the tower and come to assist!》

The skull’s tone was curiously urgent, reflecting Gale’s precarious situation.

Dorothea frowned and looked at the Tin Knight.

The Tin Knight seemed to understand her intent and replied.

[‘The Tin Knight’ states that to properly deal with that witch, you need at least him with the White Knight, and Dorothea with Gale, making a minimum of four!]

[‘The Tin Knight’ warns that if they get caught before they go, it could complicate matters significantly!]

“But we can’t help it. We need to deal with the barriers in some way. We have no choice but to move as quickly as possible.”

“No. You two should go back.”

Interrupting her words, Adelheid stepped forward.

She gazed skyward, as if seeking something at the top of the tower.

“─I’ll handle the end.”

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