The Shepherd Alone on the Hill is a Genius Wizard

Chapter 35 The Night Hunter Returns

Watching Turan disappear into the darkness, Dolf tilted his head.

Invisibility magic?

Wasn't that just a trivial magic that spy knights learned, only hiding appearance while presence remained exposed?

But when he reached out to where the opponent had been standing and nothing was there, his puzzlement turned to shock and terror.

Disappearing without leaving even footprints in the sand, with no trace detectable even using all senses of hearing and smell...

No one in this desert failed to understand what that meant.

"No way, Zahar-Argh!"

Before he could finish speaking, Dolf screamed and fell to one knee from the intense pain that surged through the back of his head.

Warm blood flowed down his neck, perhaps from a cracked skull.

'What was that? What hit me?'

Turning around, he saw an egg-sized stone rolling on the ground.

Before he could think about what this meant, second and third stones came flying in succession, striking his side and back.

Each hit had enough force to shatter bones of an ordinary noble.

Fortunately, he saw the last one coming and managed to deflect it with his arm.

In the midst of terrible pain, the brain of a noble who had wandered for over a hundred years desperately devised survival measures.

"Flames!"

Along with the unfamiliar spell, flames arose around him.

The first method of dealing with invisibility magic - illuminate the surroundings.

But the flames couldn't extend beyond his immediate vicinity.

This was due to the History bloodline's characteristic unfamiliarity with releasing magical power.

The opponent would surely be preparing another attack from the darkness beyond the firelight's reach.

'Where are you, where!'

Dolf kept turning his head, trying to detect where the opponent would attack from.

At least with stone throws, he could block or dodge them once they became visible after leaving the body.

And if the opponent attacked up close, he could take one hit and grab them, then victory would be his...

At that moment, he saw five or six fireballs blooming in the distance.

They rotated in place several times before flying toward him at tremendous speed.

"Aaaaargh-!"

Dolf charged forward while covering his face with both hands to withstand the incoming fireballs.

Though he felt his clothes burning and flesh cooking on his arms, shoulders, and abdomen, he gritted his teeth and endured.

If he could just, if he could just catch that bastard-

"Come out! Come out!"

Arriving where the fireballs had been shot from, Dolf shouted while swinging his arms in all directions and kicking up sand.

But there was no feeling of contact with anything.

A hopeless fight against an existence that couldn't be seen or felt...

As his mind, half-frozen from pain and fear, cooled down, some judgment returned.

'Run away!'

Fighting a Zahar wizard in the desert at night was literally suicide.

Especially considering he was just a noble of the History bloodline, not even from a great house.

Dolf picked a random direction and started sprinting.

He even threw away the pouch at his waist as it hindered his running.

"Huff, hah, huff!"

True to his History bloodline, his speed was far faster than ordinary nobles.

While doubled strength didn't mean doubled running speed, at least strong leg power helped.

With better stamina too, if he could just keep running like this, he should be able to survive for now.

Though the thought of having to live the rest of his life being chased by Zahar nobles made him want to wet himself-

As if mocking his relief, a faint flapping sound came from behind.

Dolf's face turned pale as he turned his head.

"Ah..."

In the pitch-black sky above, Turan was looking down at him while holding one of the black eagle's legs.

"You're tough, even if not as much as a Guardian bloodline. An ordinary noble would have died from that much damage. Or perhaps you have some magic device that helps with defense?"

"P-please have mercy-"

"You know I can't do that."

The gray eyes looking down showed not a trace of mercy, let alone humanity.

Dolf tightly closed his eyes as he watched the fireballs plummet down.

==

Turan looked down with a dry expression at the corpse sprawled on the ground, its entire body scorched.

He felt not the slightest guilt at the miserable way it had burned to death.

He was simply stronger; after all, the fellow was no different from the bandits he'd met when first coming down from the hill.@@@@

From his experience pretending to be a fallen noble, he found he preferred traveling as a commoner unless absolutely necessary.

Most importantly, while one could reveal noble status after acting as a commoner, the reverse was difficult.

"Customer? Are you alone?"

"Yes."

Upon entering the city, Turan found an inn that doubled as a restaurant and ordered a simple meal.

Since he was the only customer, the innkeeper sat across from him and made conversation, allowing him to gather information.

"You ran away from home to travel alone? My my, what a reckless fellow. Haven't you encountered any bandits or magical beasts?"

"I was lucky."

The owner in his forties looked at him with an expression as if viewing a naive youngster.

It was an appropriate look to give someone claiming to be a merchant's son who had run away just to see some ruins, walking for a full week.

"More importantly, do you know how to enter the Gods' Tomb here? From what I read in books, it just requires money."

"You even read books? Must really be from a wealthy family. Anyway, from what I know, you can't enter right now."

"Why not?"

While Turan was thinking that it had clearly been written so in the travel journal, he soon realized that book must have been written at least ten or more years ago.

No, perhaps even several decades.

The policy might have changed with a new head of the house ruling Banipel during that time.

But according to the innkeeper's following words, that wasn't the case.

"Nothing special, just that it's been that way since about a week ago when some important people came. Even a merchant caravan that visited recently had people who wanted to see the ruins but couldn't."

"Important people?"

"You know, those people. Those people. You know what I mean."

"Ah."

Seeing how he spoke circuitously as if afraid to even mention names, Turan finally understood who the innkeeper was referring to.

Knights or nobles of Zahar had visited this city.

'This has become troublesome.'

So the important people were monopolizing the ruins because they wanted to look around without being disturbed by commoners.

Though it was said there wasn't much to see, he wondered what they were doing there for a whole week.

After brief consideration, Turan decided to just stay here until they left.

It would be annoying if someone like Lord Karl read Tallis's shadow in Turan's face if he showed himself unnecessarily.

"I guess I'll have to stay here for a while then."

"Do you have money?"

"Of course."

No matter how leisurely nobles might be, surely they wouldn't spend weeks or months touring ruins.

'Wonder what I should give the black eagle.'

It didn't seem to like dates much before, and since he couldn't get fish in the desert, he thought he should probably catch a magical beast nearby for it.

==

"Ferga! Ferga! Where are you!"

"I'm here so stop shouting! They'll hear us!"

In the pitch darkness, Ferga Zahar shouted irritably while hooking a chakram on his finger.

Beyond the darkness that even the Zahar bloodline's night vision ability couldn't penetrate, bizarre cries could be heard.

The Gods' Tomb had a hidden underground level.

This was what he had heard from his grandfather, the head of House Zahar, in his childhood.

The lord had told Ferga, half-jokingly, that he might become the next head if he could solve its secret.

Decades passed from then, and he visited the Gods' Tomb once every year, searching for the passage leading underground.

Since forcing their way through a facility built by gods was out of the question, he tried methods like tapping wall crevices or speaking mysterious languages that only appeared in ancient texts.

Naturally, there were no results.

But a few days ago, when he visited the tomb half-routinely with a few close friends, suddenly a door to the underground opened.

Ferga jumped down rejoicing that he had finally solved the secret, that he would become the next head.

But what awaited him was a labyrinth filled with pitch-black darkness where he could barely see ahead, and unknown monsters lurking within.

[□□□□□□----!]

Life forms that seemed neither magical beast, human, nor heteromorphic race.

These creatures, which looked like humans twisted as maliciously as possible, not only possessed powerful strength but were also accustomed to the bizarre darkness, making them difficult opponents even for Zahar's elite.

Moreover, since even the passage up had disappeared, they had been trapped underground for an unknown number of days.

"Water left?"

"None..."

"Make some quickly. We need to at least wet our throats."

As he gave the order, strange cries echoed from behind.

Why did he feel like he could somewhat understand the meaning contained in those voices, Ferga wondered.

It wasn't just his imagination, as the friend beside him muttered quietly.

"The Night Hunter... has returned... to the desert?"