Apostle of the Void

[Translator - Kiteretsu]

[Proofreader - Kyros]

Chapter 58: Wintering (9)

Three weeks had passed since the Festival of Shelters.

In mid-January, the season had turned to the heart of winter.

With the Festival of Shelters concluded, the task was already accomplished.

However, Arzen had come here with the intention of staying until he cleared the entire forest.

Once the forest had only about 30% of its scrub left, Arzen's logging efforts began to pick up speed.

Thanks to the growth of his control over the Void, in accordance with the initial training goals he had set.

“Kaz tu Arcturus.”

“Su Ja Heros, pruning.”

“Re Taripo.”

“Evakta.”

Now, he could capture trees with Evakta before they crashed into other trees with a 50% probability.

As his control abilities grew, the time to manifest them also increased. That was more important.

The growth of the number of Void Insects plateaued at a maximum of 105.

However, he was satisfied as his skill in handling other powers had noticeably improved.

‘Hmm, it would be even better if Evakta could uproot trees…’

He could wrap around trees that could fit in both hands, but trees he had to wrap with his arms were challenging even for Evakta.

‘But if I used Barolus, it would just smash everything to pieces. Sigh.’

But what if he used double chanting here?

‘Double Chanting!’

It wasn't just about memorizing the explanation section of the scriptures.

In that brief moment of reciting the chant, he could compress the entire phrase into ‘words’!

“Re!”

To fill a new bag with wine, you first have to dump the rotten water out of the old bag.

“Ta!”

Thus, the Void is the first step toward enlightenment (啓蒙).

“Ri!”

Only those who have made the old bag empty can reach true enlightenment and truth.

“Po!”

Through this new advancement, delve into the Void anew and realize the fragments of truth.

‘Good, good feeling! It went in perfectly!’

At the point when the double chanting succeeded, Re Taripo's destructive power increased by 1.5 times.

This meant that the explosion range would also expand.

“Yahoo! The destructive power is amazing!”

At this point, the only way to finish off the logging was to use Re Taripo to completely delete the trees.

‘If I keep doing this and eliminate about half, I’ll be able to pull them out with Evakta!’

Just as he was celebrating his victory and dancing with joy, the worker bee flapped its wings ominously.

“Hmm?”

Soon, the Void Insects entered the gaps where the trees had disappeared and brought something strange out of the soil.

“What is this?”

Strange, very strange!

It was a cursed doll!

It appeared to have been buried for a considerable amount of time.

Hair that seemed to belong to a victim was tightly wrapped around it.

‘Black magic? Dark sorcery?’

A strong fragment of the void could be felt.

It was a sensation similar to what he felt when he encountered the golden threads surrounding the golden area while hunting the Elder Goblin.

The more peculiar thing was that, upon confirming that he had been “detected by someone,” it seemed like it was about to explode remotely.

“This bastard…!”

Of course, at that moment, the Void Insects rushed in and devoured the doll, so the explosion was averted.

However, this also meant that the evidence had vanished.

A strange premonition hammered away in his heart.

The words Eren had told him about the endemic disease during the first month he came here resurfaced in his mind.

“Arzen!”

At that moment, Dave and Tom, the father-son duo, appeared pulling a cart.

Currently, the three were business partners.

Arzen had been moving the wood to sell as firewood to the villagers for money.

Although the price was low, the quantity was substantial, so it turned out better than expected.

During that process, Dave and Tom collected the transportation fees.

These guys were serious about money, and that made him want to work with them.

“You're working hard today too.”

“Yeah, gotta make money.”

“Why does your face look so sour?”

“I saw you two since this morning, so how could I not be sour?”

“Haha! But hey, have you seen Eren?”

“Why?”

“No, the witch came alone, looking for Eren. She said she still hasn’t returned.”

Is it possible that Eren still hasn’t come back?

“When I went back for lunch earlier, he wasn’t there either. So, I prepared food for myself.”

“Did he say anything this morning?”

“He said he was definitely going to gather herbs this morning…”

At that moment, an ominous feeling clouded his mind.

The premonition he felt when he saw the cursed doll had taken shape.

Arzen began to run, leaving Tom and Dave behind.

“Hey, Arzen! Where are you going!”

“Load it onto the trees and take it away!”

As Arzen ran toward the forest where Eren usually went to gather herbs, he shouted the sacred war cry of the Void.

“Kaz tu Arcturus!”

Buuuuuuuuuuuuuum……!

The queen of the Void Insects, commanded by the apostle, appeared leading her subordinate Void Insects.

Currently, he could summon 30 with his magical power.

“Worker bee, disperse the Void Insects and find Eren!”

***

When Arzen arrived at the forest, panting, several Void Insects were already waiting for him.

Following the guidance of the Void Insects, he was able to find Eren quickly.

Eren collapsed somewhere along the path, gasping for breath. Her body felt like a furnace.

‘What the hell…’

First, he needed to bring down the fever.

He opened the scriptures.

This was a miracle from the Teresia series, which was the healing series, not from the Void series.

“Stop! Are you trying to kill Eren?”

At that moment, a firm voice rang out.

Turning his head, he saw the wandering witch Merry hurriedly jumping off her broom.

“A fever is proof that the body’s immune system is functioning properly!”

“!”

“The scarier thing is when you have no fever and feel cold. That’s a sign of death. So, you shouldn’t force the fever down. Not right now.”

“Don’t come any closer!”

The first suspect could only be Merry.

It was just an instinct.

The Void Insects resonated with the apostle’s hostility and formed an attack formation. The situation was tense.

“Look at this. My witch's mantle! I belong to the Hyeogyo Division, which identifies and resolves all kinds of phenomena.”

“!”

“None of the witches who came here have been able to identify the source of that ridiculous endemic disease. Not for thirty years! That’s why I’m here. I’ve been lying in wait. If I appeared as a suspicious wandering witch, maybe the culprit would show themselves instead of lying low.”

Merry casually advanced through the formation of Void Insects, as if daring them to attack.

“So far, your identity has been unclear, and I’ve been suspicious of your strange powers… but it seems this situation has cleared you of any suspicion.”

Merry quickly knelt beside Eren and examined the girl’s condition.

“Have you only been looking for humans in your search until now? No… most people chant healing spells when they have a fever, so the evidence must have vanished like this.”

Merry pointed to the nape of Eren’s neck.

‘Really, really faintly, only if you focus your eyes can you barely see… a mark that looks like something has bitten her…?’

It wasn’t a beast.

It must be a very small insect.

However, when Merry infused it with the spirit energy, she could see the flow of poison infiltrating and spreading throughout the bloodstream.

“This is a truly terrifying poison… it doesn’t kill the host immediately but instead infiltrates the body and has an incubation period. It only awakens when the lethal dose accumulates.”

“You can’t cure it?”

“A lethal dose means exactly that—lethal! It would only matter if you could develop antibodies against this poison… but this type of poison is hard to cure unless you’re of the dragon lineage. The truly frightening poisons aren’t the famous ones; they are the ones you’ve never seen before.”

She’s going to die?

Eren is going to die?

He didn’t want to be involved in someone’s death like this… but after spending months together, this girl was different.

She felt like a little sister.

“Is there… really no way?”

Just then, despair darkened his mind.

A worker bee landed on Arzen's shoulder and fluttered its wings a few times.

‘What is it? Does that mean it can be done?’

The beings of the Void are originally without feeling, ignorance, and intention.

However, when delivering Rodenkal's will to Arzen, it acted proactively.

Arzen gained some enlightenment from this and opened his mouth.

“Witches… they also learn surgery, right? When treating someone. Cut open Eren’s abdomen!”

“Right here?”

“Show me the location of where the poison has accumulated in the organs, just like before! My summoned creatures can eat what they want! I can’t explain it properly… but they can leave only the skin and eat the flesh!”

If that applies to poison as well…

It was close to gambling, but no, it wouldn’t be gambling.

Rodenkal had indicated through the worker bee that this was possible.

“……!”

Being a member of the elite Hyeogyo Division, Merry’s judgment was swift.

She took out poppy juice from her pouch and poured it into Eren's mouth.

Then she cast a spell to block the sensation around the surgical area…!

With a blade heated in fire, Merry opened Eren’s abdomen.

“Only now, since the poison has only been injected for a short while, is it possible to trace its trajectory. It’s already starting to fade. Hurry!”

Buuuuuuuum……!

The worker bee landed on the area that resonated most with Merry’s magical power, the darkest spot.

As it unfolded its folded mouth and pierced that spot…!

The dark energy boiling within the intestines began to gradually settle.

‘It’s working……!’

The power of the Void can selectively devour foreign substances in the intestines.

“The fever is subsiding…… When I heard the explanation, it felt hopeless, but what on earth is this summoned creature? I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

Arzen had no intention of answering that question.

Honestly, would he believe the answer?

It was a relief that he wasn’t reporting her for believing in a heretical god called Rodenkal.

Thus, Arzen dismissed Merry’s question with a casual shrug.

And he began to say what he wanted to say.

“Hmm~ I can’t forgive this. Yes, I cannot forgive. It’s a death sentence.”

The worker bee swallowing the poison within Eren's body brought him the answer to this riddle.

It was easy to pinpoint the source of that energy through the mysterious signal system that spread among the Void Insects.

“How dare you turn this loyal maidservant who serves Lord Arzen into this state? You must pay for it… Evaakta!”

In an instant, a Void plant surged from behind Arzen, targeting… Merry the witch.

“!”

During this winter, the size of the cut wood’s trunk varied greatly.

This meant that Arzen had become quite adept at handling Evaakta’s movements.

It had become possible for him to ensnare only Merry without involving Eren.

“Your insides will be vomited out through your mouth and backside as you die.”

Pududududuk……!

It sounded as if bones and intestines were grinding, and then Merry’s body exploded.

Instead of brain matter and blood clots, it transformed into thousands of droplets that scattered in all directions.

In other words, that wasn’t the main body.

“How did you know?”

A voice came again from the other side of the herbal path.

Merry’s true body leaned against a tree, frowning.

Arzen snorted.

“Hmph, an illusion-type spell, huh?”

Illusions are different from magic.

The methods of utilizing each attribute are diverse.

Because of this, one can create illusions of various attributes depending on the caster's individuality.

“I was raised by thugs in terms of manners. You can tell if someone is trash just by looking at their face, roughly speaking.”

“What?”

“Curious? You want to know how I figured it out? You can’t stand not knowing, right?”

While she seemed to be eagerly responding.

In truth, this was merely a strategy to divert the Void Insects and target the true body behind her.

By rambling on as much as possible, she was buying time for the Void Insects to approach the coordinates sufficiently.

‘That witch Merry probably gained information about that unidentified bug in no time.’

Earlier, Eren’s condition was too critical for him to think clearly, but…

‘Then she must have intended to lure me into a trap… to meet the same fate as Eren.’

“How do you know this so well?”

“Your pathetic trashy illusion was just too similar!”

“?”

“Suddenly appearing and acting like you know the whole situation… It’s the same way the thugs who taught me used to deceive their clients!”

At that moment, the Void Insects surged toward Merry from all directions.

Merry chanted her spell at high speed.

Then, a yellowish droplet, resembling pus, unfolded in all directions.

“!”

The Void Insects that came into contact with that liquid began to lose strength and disappear one by one, heated up.

‘I see. So she’s a poison expert…….’

From her recent movements, it seemed that the witch’s charm was indeed real. It meant she definitely had skills.

‘No letting my guard down! I can’t let those bugs ambush me easily.’

Merry’s eyes, as she scanned Arzen from top to bottom and licked her lips, were alluring.

It was the gaze of a predator inspecting its prey's flesh.

“Now that no maidens come to this village anymore… I was planning to savor you until the end, but well, I’ll use both of you cuties as a sacrifice for my ‘youth.’”

Feeling that chilling threat, instead of shrinking back, Arzen began to laugh.

“A sacrifice? You think you can use me as a sacrifice? You’re hilarious for a pathetic witch!”

He was confident!

He was certain that the power of the Void was an overwhelmingly powerful force that far surpassed all abilities in this world!

“Kaz to Arcturus! Full deployment of the Void Insects!”

Currently, the maximum number of Void Insects that Arzen could control was a staggering 105!

The queen, commanding these 105, orchestrated the most suitable battle formation for the current situation.

Once the apostle's permission was granted, the normal units would merge into a composite entity, completing the combat arrangement.

“Consider it an honor! From now on, you’ll be the punching bag to see how much this Super Void Commander Arzen has grown during this winter!”

[Translator - Kiteretsu]

[Proofreader - Kyros]