Chapter 558

Descending into Ophelia’s laboratory felt no different from exploring an underground dungeon.

The strangely damp and heavy air. A bizarre scent lingering in the void. The dim, gloomy atmosphere. It felt like at any moment, a monster filled with endless hatred for the living could let out a shriek and crawl toward you, and it wouldn’t even be surprising.

If I had brought clerics with me, they would’ve taken one look at the basement entrance and immediately declared it a den of evil, trying to tear it down.

Maybe Ophelia’s personality has worsened compared to the original because she spends all day living in such a gloomy place.

It’s the kind of environment where even a sane person would turn into a cave troll obsessed with slaughter and destruction within a month.

Anyway, after passing through the sticky corridor and arriving at Ophelia’s lab, a wooden nameplate on the doorknob caught my eye.

No unauthorized entry. Announce yourself at the door if you have business.

– Ophelia Sigmilus.

It wasn’t a nameplate—it was a warning. And it seemed like she had embedded some kind of magic stone into the door, as a strange magical energy was flowing through it.

Well, if the servants or maids witnessed the inside of the lab, they’d probably faint on the spot, so she had no choice but to take magical precautions to keep them from barging in.

“Ophelia—are you awake? Your employer is here—.”

As I called out to Ophelia and lightly knocked on the lab door, the magical energy flowing through the door soon dissipated, and I sensed movement from the other side.

“Come in. I’ve disabled the defensive magic.”

“What kind of magic was it?”

“Huh? A lightning spell.”

At Ophelia’s casual reply, I couldn’t help but pause for a moment before grabbing the doorknob.

I had assumed it was just a spell to keep the door locked or restrain anyone trying to enter, but in reality, she had set up a spell that could instantly kill an ordinary person.

“…No casualties, right?”

I pulled the doorknob and stepped into the lab, pressing Ophelia for answers. If she had killed any servants with such an unnecessarily strong security spell, I’d have to send her to Lacey to verify whether she’d been corrupted by dark magic.

“Don’t worry, there weren’t any. The only ones who’d die from a lightning spell are the hired help, and anyone foolish enough to barge into a magician’s lab wouldn’t have been hired in the first place. Right?”

“Still, switch to non-lethal magic if you don’t want to have a chat with the Saintess.”

Though, technically, I’m already having a chat with the Saintess.

A Saintess talking to a soul extractor… Lady Astraea, are you really okay with your Saintess doing this?

Aren’t you starting to regret bestowing the Holy Mark?

Of course, there was no response from Astraea. She told me to do as I pleased, so I guess she really doesn’t care what I do.

“Such a terrifying threat… Alright, alright.”

Ophelia sighed, adjusted her slightly open gown, and pulled out a long magical cigarette from between her breasts. She, too, must find the idea of facing the Saintess uncomfortable.

“I’ll change it to something lighter. A simple knockout spell should do, right?”

“Yeah. That should be fine.”

You should’ve done that from the start.

—-

While Ophelia adjusted the magic on the entrance, I leaned against the wall, lit a cigarette, and glanced around the lab.

Nothing had changed much. Isabella was nowhere to be seen, and the only difference was the unidentified grotesque creature floating in the central tank.

“Hey, what the hell is that?”

It had the torso of a boiled fetus, the face of a praying mantis, a crayfish-like lower body, and a colorful snake replacing its spine, sticking out like a tail.

On top of that, a pair of large centipedes replaced where arms should be, and its back was covered with dozens of compound eyes like a dragonfly’s. It was so grotesque it made me feel nauseous.

…I’d believe it if you told me this was a monster.

What the hell did this woman create? Even though I couldn’t sense any dark magic, it looked like some kind of hybrid monster.

“Oh, that? Well, you see…”

Ophelia seemed hesitant to explain in detail. She took a long drag from her magical cigarette and exhaled into the air.

“What is it? Why can’t you say?”

“Did I mention this before? I tried to extract information from Isabella by tampering with her soul. I guess I went a bit overboard.”

Ophelia scratched her head and gave an awkward laugh.

“…So, that’s Isabella?”

I glanced back at the monster floating in the tank. Now that I looked closely, it did have an insect-like appearance.

“More like Isabella’s homunculus… I messed with her mind too much, and the foundation of her soul completely collapsed. No matter what body I prepared, insects would burst out and distort it the moment I tried to connect her soul. So, I just preserved it in a fixative solution. I needed your permission to dispose of it.”

“Dispose of it?”

“It’s useless now. I’ve extracted all the information I could, and even if I tried to continue interrogating her, her ego and memories have completely collapsed. All she does now is make insect noises.”

Ophelia shook her head, apologetic but resigned.

…Well. It seems it’s time to say goodbye to Isabella.

We didn’t even get close enough, and now we’re parting already. I was planning to torment her for at least ten years, so this is quite disappointing.

“Sigh… Alright. Let’s say we dispose of Isabella. What happens to her soul?”

“It depends on how we dispose of her. If we convert her shattered soul into magical energy and consume it, Isabella’s soul will completely vanish. If we just separate it from the soul stone, it’ll either fall into hell or end up in the hands of an evil god.”

So, I have to choose between annihilation or the afterlife. Falling into hell would be ideal, but I’m a bit hesitant to hand Isabella’s soul over to Lilith.

Not that evil gods are known for being faithful enough to take care of their loyal followers… but still, just in case.

“What do you want to do?”

“Annihilation sounds better. If I were Isabella, I’d find that more terrifying.”

My conclusion was to completely erase Isabella from this world. To prevent her from resurrecting in the afterlife or being used by Lilith, the Evil Goddess.

It’s better to erase something unsettling than to just get rid of it.

“Alright. Then, we can dispose of this now.”

Ophelia smirked, blew magical energy into the surface of the tank, and muttered an incantation I couldn’t understand.

The water in the tank began to boil, and Isabella’s body rapidly decomposed. It was like watching the process of a living being decaying into soil, sped up a thousand times.

“Kiiieeeek!”

Whether she regained consciousness or not, Isabella let out an insect-like scream and thrashed around, but her crumbling, melting body made it all seem ridiculous.

I hummed a tune along with Isabella’s screams and savored the cigarette smoke.

“I’ll convert her soul into magical energy tomorrow. I need to prepare a few things.”

“Alright. Report the results when you’re done.”

I watched the flesh turn to fragments and silently bid farewell.

Goodbye, Isabella. Congratulations on your pitiful, bug-like demise.

I hope I never hear your name again.

—-

After completely melting Isabella’s homunculus, Ophelia laid out the information she had extracted from Isabella.

The knowledge about magic was meaningless to me, but the other information was overflowing with usefulness, she said.

Perhaps feeling guilty for turning Isabella into an irreparable waste, Ophelia was as enthusiastic as a thirty-year-old job seeker in an interview.

Certainly, the information she presented was quite valuable. Or rather, it *would have been* valuable.

“A soul extractor who’s lived for centuries, collaborating with Peirus to incite the beastmen and Ka`har… The resurrection of Nidhogg, the insect-dragon buried beneath the Imperial Capital… Using the hearts of dragons and the souls of the Imperial citizens to achieve transcendence…”

“How about it? Isn’t this incredible information? Any one of these would shake the Empire to its core. And since it was extracted by tampering with her soul, there’s no chance it’s false, right?”

Well, it’s true. After all,

“I already knew most of this…”

The information I only had suspicions about had been confirmed, but the general content was something I already knew.

While my uncertain speculations had turned into certainties… it didn’t provide any breakthroughs for the current situation.

At least the fact that Nidhogg was buried beneath the underground waterways and that Peirus had deep enough connections to mobilize the beastmen’s forces was somewhat helpful.

“Wait, you already knew? How?”

Perhaps thinking it was her trump card, Ophelia seemed genuinely surprised by my indifferent reaction.

“Hmm… Should I say I heard it from a dead spirit, just like you?”

I told Ophelia about meeting Rotholandus’s spirit, warning her not to spread it around since it was classified information.

“…That makes sense? An ancestor’s spirit warning of future dangers—it’s like something out of a fairy tale.”

It’s not impossible.

If you think about it, the original heroine turning into a lunatic, incestuous rapist and soul extractor makes sense, right?

Compared to the gap between the original Ophelia and the woman in front of me, an ancestor’s ghost appearing to offer blessings and warnings isn’t that surprising.