Chapter 182
After Zeke faked Kei’s death, the work of dividing the Syndicate proceeded step by step.
He spread rumors about the internal division within the Syndicate, and at the same time, he secretly sent several Syndicate executives to the Southern Continent, faking their deaths under the pretext of punishing traitors.
Zeke laundered the identities of the Syndicate executives and had them stay in the Cusco Kingdom, keeping a low profile for the time being.
Once things calmed down, he planned to deploy them to reorganize the cartel organizations within the Cusco Kingdom.
Zeke closed all Syndicate hideouts and moved to the territory of the Principality of Troy instead of Mycenae.
There, he planned to rest for a while and observe the movements of Abel and Narak. It was a time when rest was needed.
Nevertheless, he had to finish what he was doing, so Zeke called Feinan to the Troy Principality.
A few days later, Feinan arrived at the castle, looking quite emaciated.
“What happened?”
When Zeke spoke, Feinan shook his head.
“Jeff and Al… Huu, never mind.”
It seemed that the young but eccentric and difficult genius alchemist twins had been causing a commotion with Feinan.
Zeke looked at Feinan sympathetically and patted his shoulder.
“If something happens to Jeff and Al, I’ll come with you next time.”
Feinan’s face brightened at Zeke’s words.
He finally relaxed his expression and asked Zeke, “Enormous things seem to have happened in the Syndicate while I was away?”
Feinan was also aware of what had happened in the Syndicate.
He knew how much Zeke trusted Kei and how diligently she worked, so her betrayal was hard to believe.
Moreover, he was quite shocked to hear that Zeke had designated her and several Syndicate executives as traitors and purged them.
Then Zeke took Feinan into a room inside the castle and spoke softly.
“Feinan-nim. In fact, Kei is not dead.”
“What? What do you mean…”
Zeke showed the parasite that was inside Kei’s body and explained what had happened.
Feinan’s face was filled with shock.
“Who on earth would use such an evil magic…?”
Zeke gestured to Feinan.
“There’s something you need to see.”
He took Feinan down to the castle’s basement. There, Zion, whom Zeke had captured, was imprisoned.
“Damn it! Release me right now!”
Zion shouted, hitting the prison door with his fists.
Feinan was startled to see Zion locked up.
“Who is this boy?”
“He’s one of the top-tier blood line ability users sent by the Nosthra Family.”
“What? This young boy?”
“Don’t be fooled by his appearance. He’s currently sealed, so it’s okay, but he has the power of at least a Red Knight.”
“Really? I’ve never heard of a blood line ability user having such great power.”
At that moment.
Suddenly, Zion, who was swearing, began to tremble all over and collapsed, having a seizure.
Zeke quickly opened the door and went inside.
Then he used healing on Zion.
TSU! TSU! TSU!
When Zeke used healing, Zion’s seizure barely subsided and stabilized.
Zeke sighed and laid the now-sleeping Zion on the bed.
His sleeping appearance looked pure, just like any other boy his age.
Zeke said to Feinan, “This is what I wanted to show you. He has seizures almost every day periodically.”
Feinan approached Zion’s bed, checked his pulse, and examined his pupils. Then he raised his magical power to inspect Zion’s body.
After finishing the examination, Feinan opened his eyes and spoke.
“Huh, this is impossible…”
“What’s wrong?”
“This child… everything is too fast.”
“Too fast?”
“The heart rate, the pupil’s response, everything is running at about three times the speed of a normal person.”
Zeke nodded at Feinan’s words.
“The Nostra Family said they gather blood line ability users for experiments. Experiments to enhance blood line abilities through drugs or procedures.”
“Enhancement experiments? That’s clearly an illegal study!”
“These mafia guys probably have nothing to hide. The problem is that the Empire might be involved in these experiments.”
Feinan’s expression hardened at Zeke’s words.
Looking at the sleeping Zion, he slowly spoke.
“At this rate, this boy won’t live long. It seems he was periodically given drugs to forcibly lower his physical response speed.”
“So the seizures are happening because those drugs are no longer available.”
“If the master’s words are true, it’s highly likely these are side effects from experiments to enhance abilities.”
Zeke nodded at Feinan’s words.
Currently, Zeke was somehow helping Zion recover through healing, but it was only a temporary effect.
Zeke thought for a moment and remembered Arina.
‘Maybe Arina could find a way to recover him.’
Even if he wanted to interrogate Zion, in this state, he would likely pass out before any questions could be asked.
Currently, Arina was moving towards the Holy Kingdom with Boris to rescue the Lubern clan.
‘I’ll show him to her as soon as she returns.’
Zeke asked Feinan to temporarily create medicine for him.
Feinan nodded.
“Understood. If I can procure the ingredients, I can quickly make something that will just alleviate the condition. Oh, and I’ve made some progress on the research of the golem’s heart, the dragon slayer, and the Sky People’s armor that you entrusted to me last time.”
Zeke was delighted by Feinan’s words.
“Is that really true?”
“Yes. As you thought, those armors indeed operate by using high-compression magic stones as fuel. If these armors were used during the Liberation War, they would have been capable of fighting massive magical beasts with high-output equipment.”
“I see. Would repairing them be possible?”
“Since they are very old and the driving circuits are in a method I’ve never seen before, I’ll need to examine them more closely.”
Zeke nodded.
“Understood. Please inform me if you make more progress in your research.”
Feinan stayed at the castle, created medicine to calm Zion’s seizures, and then returned to Atlas.
Zeke finally took a proper rest and decided to proceed with equipment enhancement that he had been putting off.
By inserting necessary materials into the ‘Rolang’ orichalcon sword, it was possible to upgrade to higher abilities.
Zeke put various metals and gems needed for enhancement into his inventory.
While organizing his inventory for the upgrade, Zeke hesitated when he saw one item on the material list.
“A meteoric iron ingot. Obtaining meteoric iron isn’t as easy as I thought.”
Even intermediate managers at shops couldn’t purchase such metal materials.
While contemplating and examining his items again, Zeke discovered the mace he had previously received from a random box.
It was an artifact containing the Light’s Punishment skill, but he had forgotten about its existence as he rarely used it
‘Lubern’s mace. Maybe…’
Zeke put the mace into the disassembly window and checked the list of extractable materials.
“It’s here! Meteoric iron ingot! Great!”
As he expected, the mace was a weapon made of meteoric iron and mithril.
Zeke disassembled Lubern’s mace.
Ting!
With a cheerful signal, the mace was decomposed into meteoric iron ingots, mithril ingots, leather, and runes.
“What are these runes?”
Upon examining the runes, he found the ‘Light’s Punishment’ magic inscribed within them.
“Oh, this would be good to add to Clonne’s mace.”
If he could use the Light’s Breath magic that enhances strength together with Light’s Punishment, Clonne’s combat power would surely be strengthened.
Zeke set aside the runes and mithril extracted from the mace and inserted the meteoric iron ingot into the enhancement window.
He had barely met the enhancement conditions for Rolang.
Zeke pressed the enhancement button with a pounding heart.
WHOOSH!
A light flashed in the enhancement window.
Unlike disassembly, enhancement took quite a long time.
‘Compared to when I repaired Hersion, this doesn’t seem like a very long time.’
After about ten minutes, the enhancement progress reached 100%.
DING!
A clear signal sounded, and a message indicating the completion of enhancement appeared.
[Equipment ‘Rolang’ has been enhanced.]
[Equipment name changes to ‘Jewel Sword Rolang’.]
[Jewel Sword Rolang’s abilities have been enhanced.]
Zeke took out the enhanced Rolang from his inventory.
“Wow, what is this.”
Rolang, which had previously had a quite crude appearance, had transformed into a glamorous form.
The scabbard and even the sword handle were intricately worked with mithril and gold, with gems embedded in various places.
Zeke was bewildered by the excessively ornate Rolang.
“Is it this glamorous because the name is ‘Jewel Sword’?”
Zeke checked the information of the Jewel Sword Rolang.
―Jewel Sword Rolang Information―
Description: An orichalcon sword meticulously crafted by an outstanding artisan, enhanced with noble metals and gems
Unique Ability: Light’s Punishment (applied only upon striking), Light’s Barrier, Light’s Arrow, Gem’s Will
Special Notes: Deals 3.5x damage to undead and demon races / Unique abilities are randomly triggered based on the gems
The damage increase against undead and demon races has increased by an additional 0.5x, and a new skill has been added.
“Gem’s Will? What kind of ability is this?”
Zeke drew the sword from its scabbard.
The orichalcon blade shone beautifully.
Zeke activated the ‘Gem’s Will’ skill.
[Skill will be randomly triggered.]
[Ruby’s Will is activated.]
WHOOSH!
The ruby attached to the scabbard sparkled, and flames erupted from the sword.
“Is this what ‘Gem’s Will’ means?”
There were seven gems attached to the scabbard in total.
It seemed each gem would trigger a unique will differently.
Zeke tried the Gem’s Will skill again.
[Skill will be randomly triggered.]
[Aquamarine’s Will is activated.]
WHOOSH!
Suddenly, cold air burst from the sword.
Zeke retracted the skill and slowly examined the Jewel Sword Rolang again, exclaiming.
“This means I can use seven different abilities with just this one sword?”
Of course, the skills are randomly triggered, but even so, its value was more than enough to become a unique artifact beyond a rare artifact.
At that moment, a message appeared in Zeke’s view.
[The use of the skill has reduced the durability of Ruby and Aquamarine by 5%.]
[Please repair with a new gem before the durability is completely depleted.]
“What? Repair with gems?”
It meant that every time he used the skill, the jewels’ power would wear down, requiring continuous repair.
Zeke clicked his tongue while looking at the Jewel Sword Roland.
“This is basically a money pit.”
In fact, he hadn’t really lost out since it was an excellent sword even without the Gem’s Will skill.
Zeke stored the Jewel Sword Roland in his inventory and took out the sealed meteoric iron sword with Arataso.
This sword could also be enhanced, but unfortunately, he currently lacked fairy stones, making immediate enhancement impossible.
He released the seal and spoke to Arataso trapped inside the sword.
“Arataso, are you well?”
Despite Zeke calling out, Arataso remained silent.
‘Could his soul have returned to the demon realm?’
Zeke gripped the sword and used the sacred flame skill.
WHOOSH!
The meteoric iron sword was instantly enveloped in holy flames.
[KIAAAAAK!]
Arataso, who had been quiet, suddenly screamed.
Zeke confirmed Arataso’s presence and withdrew the sacred flame.
“Why aren’t you answering when you’re here?”
Arataso spoke in a low voice.
[I am the leading rider and honorable warrior at the forefront of ‘Clear Green Wish’. You are holding my soul and insulting me. Yet you expect me to answer obediently?]
Zeke thought about Arataso’s words, then raised the sacred flame again.
WHOOSH!
[KIAAAAAK!]
Gripping the sword, Zeke said, “Talking about honor. Stop spouting nonsense and answer quickly when I call.”
Arataso ground his teeth within the flames.
[You… a terrible curse will fall upon you! My master will inflict a punishment worse than death!]
“Talking big for beings who can’t even come to the present realm. Who told you to crawl out here?”
Arataso gnashed his teeth at Zeke’s words.
Bound as a soul and unable to move, he had no real options.
Eventually, his spirit somewhat subdued, Arataso asked Zeke:
[How can I be released?]
Seeing Arataso take the bait, Zeke grinned.
“I’ll think about it.”
[If you’re a knight, uphold your honor!]
“How ridiculous, talking about honor when you’re a demon’s subordinate. Listen, Arataso. There might be one way for you to escape.”
[What is it? Tell me.]
Zeke smiled a devil-like smile.
“The barrier technique you used. Teach it to me.”
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