Chapter 26

Oliver asked, raising Andrew’s torso slightly.

Maggots squirmed between the waist section that had been cut.

Joseph was silent for a moment and then opened his mouth.

“…are you curious?”

“Um…yes, it’s okay if the master doesn’t want to say anything.”

At Oliver’s outrageous remarks, Joseph laughed silently, then spoke.

“You are half right and half wrong. I killed Andrew to obtain the Demon’s blessing, but it wasn’t just for that. He…offended me.”

“Offended you?”

“Yeah, it was very unpleasant. Despite the fact that I was there, he thought of my organization as his own and… as if that was not enough, he created his own group and dared to challenge my authority. It’s very unpleasant.”

Oliver nodded. 

Oliver knew to some extent that Andrew had those thoughts.

“I see….”

Oliver put Andrew’s body back on the Altar. The maggots squirmed even more due to the impact.

“Master… Can I ask you something if it’s okay?”

Joseph answered while taking out a pilgaret and putting it in his mouth.

“Okay……Go ahead.”

“Have I also offended you, master?”

“…. no. You taught Marie magic in exchange for learning letters from her. I understand. Above all, you are not like Andrew.”

“… I’m glad you understood, Master.”

“But that can’t save you.”

“Why?”

“There are no personal feelings. Just for a bigger goal…Answer me. What is my goal?”

Oliver remembered the first time he had met Joseph.

“…You said that your goal was to train excellent warlocks…..to survive, to become strong. Ah……”

Oliver made a sound as if he understood what Joseph really meant.

“That’s right. The goal of wanting a strong warlock is to make a bigger sacrifice to the Demon. Just like you.”

Oliver raised his hand.

“I’m curious, Master. How did you meet the Demon?”

Joseph looked at Oliver and said while looking at the half Pilgaret that was left.

“When I wasn’t even a third-rate warlock. The Demon whispered to me, who had no talent. He said he’ll give me strength if I were to do what he tells me to do. Hence, I made this altar as the Demon told me to and offered my Master and my fellow disciples as sacrifices.” 

Oliver looked around again.

It seemed like Joseph knew a lot about this place, maybe it was because this place was the Warlock family that Joseph belonged to in the past.

Oliver wanted to ask what he was doing here and who Joseph’s Master was, but he suppressed his curiosity and focused on the situation in front of him.

“Can I ask one more thing, Master?”

“Only one. I’m done smoking now.”

“Thank you. Could you please spare me? There are things I want to do personally and I will be grateful to the Master. You taught me many things. If you spare me, I will serve you for the rest of my life.”

Joseph threw the finished pilgaret on the floor and spoke while stepping on it.

“Seriously it is a good offer but I have to turn it down. I can’t imagine what kind of reward there will be if I were to make a great sacrifice like you, and above all…”

“Above all?”

“…If it’s not now, I don’t think I can defeat you ever again.”

With those words, Oliver could see a flash of murderous intent for a moment.

Oliver rolled to the side as his instinct told him, soon a shadowy tentacle jumped out from the place where Oliver was a few seconds ago.

RUMBLE RUMBLE!

If Oliver’s reaction were to be a little late, he almost could have gotten caught.

“You can see through my emotions even if I tried to hide my emotions. You have good eyes. More than anyone I’ve ever seen.”

Joseph soon extracted emotions from the test tube and shot a Las bullet.

Oliver also took out a test tube and deployed a black shield to block the attack.

However, the process was time-consuming.

While Oliver was busy blocking, Joseph took out a Life-force test tube from his pocket and chanted aloud.

[Revive]

According to the spell, the Life-force that had been filled in the test tube got split into dozens and entered into the corpses and skeletons scattered on the ground.

Oliver observed the scene silently.

One by one, dim light came from the eyes of the corpses, and they began to stagger from their seats.

When joints and muscles that had been hardened for many years started to move again, a crackling sound resounded throughout the room.

Oliver witnessed the bizarre, terrifying sight, and exclaimed in shock.

“This…”

“Manipulation-based black magic. Revive. It can bring a corpse back to life in a moment. Even though it’s not my specialty, still I can do it to some extent.”

“It doesn’t really look like a threatening thing, does it Master?”

Oliver asked while looking at the corpses that had just been resurrected without any hostility.

“Right. It’s not over yet.”

With those words, Joseph opened a test tube filled with emotions and used a new black magic.

[Inject Hate]

The feelings of hatred in the test tube gushed out and flowed through the air.

It then went straight into the torn and resurrected corpses.

Then a wave of hatred rose from the faces of the dead bodies and then they turned their heads to look at Oliver and then rushed towards him with a squealing noise.

“Woooooooooooooooooomuh!!!”

“Uhhhhhhhhhhh!!!”

“Kyaaaaaaah!”

A herd of 30 zombies approached Oliver.

After identifying the approaching zombies, Oliver extracted minimal emotions from the test tubes and used them in his shadow.

[Shadow Vine]

This was the first black magic used by Joseph. 

Oliver mimicked it, and it wasn’t just the same thing.

By making it thinner than Joseph’s tentacles, Oliver caught the zombies pouring out from all directions at the same time.

The zombies stopped moving.

They were screaming to get rid of it somehow, but Oliver pulled his hands together as if strangling them.

The shadow tentacles dug into the flesh and then cut the zombies into pieces like cheese.

When the damage was severe the remaining Life-force scattered into the thin air and without missing the timing, Joseph made a fierce attack.

“As expected, you’re amazing! I’ve picked up someone amazing!!”

Las bullets poured out while Oliver deployed the Black Shield by extracting only a minimum of emotions.

However, as expected, Joseph fired Las bullets with different emotional densities to force Oliver’s consumption of emotions. 

There were even attacks from different angles which further amplified the emotion consumption of Oliver.

[Quiet Snake]

Four venomous snakes appeared at Joseph’s feet and crawled silently toward Oliver.

Oliver, who was defending Joseph’s attack, fired Las bullets as soon as he caught sight of the snake.

If anyone saw Oliver now, they would surely be amazed.

Joseph, who was pouring out attacks with numerous test tubes was blocked by Oliver with just one test tube.

However, that didn’t mean Oliver had an advantage.

While Joseph’s test tube was overflowing with emotions, there was only ⅓rd of the emotions left in Oliver’s test tube.

[Black Javelin]

A black javelin, not comparable to the one Andrew was using, flew and pierced Oliver’s black shield.

The Black Shield that was broken and the Black Javelin that had fulfilled its role disappeared like a mist.

Oliver, who barely escaped a piercing wound, observed everything silently as if time had stopped.

“It’s over now.”

Joseph said while looking down at Oliver’s test tube. 

“At best one bullet?”

Oliver looked at Joseph without saying a word. 

Oliver suddenly lifted his hand and tried to extract Joseph’s emotions.

Oliver thought he would be able to pull out some emotions, but when Joseph swung his hand vigorously, the extraction stopped, and another attack flew in.

Even the extraction of emotion, Oliver’s last hope, failed.

But Oliver didn’t give up. 

He gathered the last drop of emotion that is enough to make a Las bullet and then shot towards Joseph’s Las Bullet.

Two Las bullets crashed into each other in the air and the emotions started disappearing.

Oliver focused his attention at that moment.

Suddenly, time passed slowly, it was as if the time had stopped, but Oliver didn’t care about it.

Oliver increased his concentration to the maximum.

What was important now was the emotions that were disappearing into the thin air.

Surprisingly, when he showed extreme concentration, the emotions that were about to disappear like his smoke condensed once again little by little, and a small amount entered Oliver’s hand.

Oliver shouted as soon as he got the emotions.

[Black Shield]

A thin black shield formed.

The thin shield narrowly stopped Joseph’s attack.

Of course, it was broken at the end due to the lack of emotion, but it cannot be denied that Oliver managed to save his life.

It didn’t end here.

Oliver, who had mastered extracting emotion, extracted the residual emotions from the broken black shield and blocked hat bullets in the air, and stabilized the emotions with his hands.

Joseph looked at it without saying a word and shouted.

“……What the hell are you? OLIVERRRRRR”

Oliver pretended to be exhausted and manipulated the emotions in his hands.

Joseph, noticing this, extracted every bit of emotion from the test tube and poured it into an attack.

Las bullets, black javelins, poisonous snakes, and black flames all poured at the same time.

Oliver shoots and strikes hat bullets according to the order of flight, deploys a black shield to prevent desperate attacks, and re-extracts emotions that are about to disappear. 

It was a very dangerous and breathtaking task.

Missing a single beat in the sequence would have resulted in death, but strangely, Oliver felt excitement at this moment.

He even thought it was strange.

If he died here, he won’t be able to see that beautiful light again and he won’t be able to find out the secret within that light.

Nevertheless, Oliver enjoyed the moment very much and his head began to spin accordingly.

Oliver chanted at the same time as he blocked the attack.

[Shadow Spike]

A spiky stake of shadows rose under Joseph’s feet, who was completely immersed in his assault.

A black magic that reinterprets Shadow Vine inflicts a severe wound to one side of Joseph’s face.

And, if it had been a little faster, it could have pierced Joseph’s face.

“Ahhhhhhh…! You f*cking dog sh*t…!”

Joseph lost his composure in confusion. 

It was easy to see how deadly the attack was.

Oliver missed the attack, but he wasn’t disappointed.

Because it wasn’t the real attack.

“What?”

Joseph looked at the dartboard on his body and shouted.

Joseph watched the black darts curve sideways and fly towards the dartboard on him.

“B, Black Shield!”

Joseph unfolds the shield in confusion.

The Black Dart, an improved version of the Black Javelin, could not penetrate the shield and only got stuck to the shield, but that wasn’t the end.

“uh?”

Joseph looked at the black dart with a sense of alienation.

As the owner of a family, he immediately recognized the difference in its texture.

“FU*K…!”

BOOOOOOOOM——!

The Las bomb planted in the black dart exploded.

The power itself wasn’t that great, but thanks to the outrageous timing, it was strong enough to break the black shield and managed to blow off Joseph’s one side of the shoulder.

The test tube that was in Joseph’s arms fell to the floor and broke.

Joseph grabbed the flying arm and screamed as if his world was destroyed.

“Aaaaaaaaah! Aww-! FU*CK FU*CK. YOUUUU Co*ck su*ing dipsh*tᅳᅳᅳᅳ! I’M GOING TO FU*KINGGG KILLLLLLLLLL YOUuuuuuuuuu”

Red blood ran down the floor and the smell of burning meat spread in the air.

Joseph couldn’t calm his emotions and emitted them into the air.

Oliver extracted those emotions and approached Joseph, who was gone mad due to pain and fear. 

Joseph screamed and crawled on the floor while running away from Oliver as he bled.

“Fu*k! Fu*k!! Fu*k you!! Don’t come! Don’t come! Don’t come!!!”

Oliver observed Joseph.

He could see emotions like an obsession that went beyond simple fear and pain.

It was something more than a simple emotion for survival and Oliver didn’t know what to call it right now.

Only one thing is certain, the light is getting more and more beautiful.

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.

Oliver felt his heartbeat and soon he started to search for an intact test tube from the group that had fallen on the floor.

“Master. Wait a minute, please wait a minute. Please.”

Joseph felt even greater fear towards Oliver as he crawled on the floor.

While the red blood left traces like a snail, Oliver found a test tube in good condition.

“Ahhhhhhh!”

Seeing Oliver approaching with a test tube, Joseph mumbled as he crawled away.

“I… I don’t want to die here…”

At that moment, Joseph felt a strange emotion from somewhere.

An unusual aura that surprised even the excited Oliver and Joseph, who was a step away from death.

When Joseph turned his head, he could see the dead bodies clinging to each other, strangely and horribly.

The entangled corpses got transformed into a crude form.

Oliver instinctively sensed that this was similar to black magic but was something on a higher level.

“Hahahahahahahahahahahaha! Indeed! There is no way he will leave me like this!!”

Joseph started laughing madly as if he had forgotten about the pain from the arm that had been torn off.

His laugh was that of a madman deprived of his sanity. 

He bursts into madness forgetting pain and fear.

What Oliver saw in Joseph was relief and trust that was close to faith.

When Oliver turned his head again, the lump of meat woven together had a more plausible appearance, and it was similar to…

“Old man on horseback ?”

Oliver tilted his head and muttered.

The rotten flesh and skull of the zombie were merged together to form a small horse, while the intestines were merged to form the figure of an old man.

In particular, the mustache and hair made from the intestines looked bushy.

Under normal circumstances, it was time to attack quickly, but Oliver instinctively realized that it was pointless.

Looking at the bizarre figure, Joseph suddenly shouted.

“Help me! Old man on horseback!! Help me just once! Then I will bring more sacrifices for you…!”

As if Joseph’s wish reached him, the Old man on horseback came up to Oliver. 

TAK TAK

Oliver looked at the scene without a word, and the Old man on the horse slowly raised his hand to his chest and bowed his head.

It looked like a polite greeting to anyone who sees it.

Joseph, who was in a bigger shock than when his arm flew away, tried to argue with something, but before he could even speak, the mass of dead bodies collapsed and the Old man on horseback disappeared..

Intestines and maggots pouring out stained Oliver’s shoes and one side of Joseph’s face.

Oliver asked Joseph politely.

“Master…what was that just now?”

But Joseph just muttered in despair, as if he had not heard anything.

“I can’t admit this… I can’t admit this… I can’t admit it…! My fu*cking life…!! I CAN’TTTTTTTTT…!!!”

Joseph screamed louder and louder as if he had been possessed by something evil.

At one end Joseph’s emotions shone beautifully and Oliver extracted them with excitement.

It wasn’t that much but Oliver was really happy.

As if to prove his joy, Oliver patted his master Joseph’s chest and thanked him.

Even though Joseph was dead.

“For everything until now… Thank you very much, Master.”