CSWA 91

Chapter 91

Aftermath

“Oh, what happened with that demon? The one they called the Magician?”

“The Supreme Leader said she would handle it personally. She said that even if she couldn’t kill the demon, she’d make absolutely certain she could never try anything against the Omnipotent One again…”

“…Well, neither side can touch the other anymore, so she probably won’t do anything too rough. Our lady really is impatient, though. She could’ve sent us, but she went out there herself.”

The man who said that swept back his hair and turned his gaze into the distance.

“So he really did it.”

Ganesha Aldebaran, the man known as the ‘Merchant of Death,’ looked up at the glittering night sky with open admiration.

He was merely sitting in a rocking chair at a villa on the outskirts of the Imperial Capital and watching the heavens, yet he could tell just how violent the events within the city had been.

The Demon God’s energy Aiden had just repelled was dispersing high above, fading away into the sky.

A human body had driven back the remnant of a god.

No matter how drastically it had deteriorated compared to the original, it was unquestionably a celestial existence. Accomplishing that alone would have been enough to leave a mark on history.

But Ganesha suspected that what had just happened there went even further.

He chuckled softly before speaking to the drakan beside him.

“Drakan.”

“…Yes.”

“Something extraordinary just happened, didn’t it?”

Ganesha possessed quite a few talents he kept hidden, but in the end, he was still a human confined to the human realm. He could not perceive things that existed beyond the scope of what he himself could handle.

The drakan beside him, however, was a life-form composed of pure magical power. Her eyes would have seen something different from what Ganesha could perceive.

“…I did not see its true form, but divinity lingered there for a moment.”

That answer was exactly what Ganesha had expected.

Ganesha smiled as he watched the golden energy spread through the heavens and nodded.

‘A god descended.’

There were almost no precedents in the entire history of the continent for beings from the Pantheon in the heavens descending into the material world.

It was said to have happened only during catastrophes great enough to overturn the entire continent.

Put another way, those lofty beings were so proud that an incident threatening to destroy a single city would not normally have been enough to draw even their attention.

And yet one had descended this time.

“Why do you think something like that came down here?”

“…”

The drakan carefully chose her words before finally answering.

“I felt… very strong affection.”

“Affection?”

“At the very least, the Goddess of Struggle seemed to be fond of Aiden.”

“…”

“It felt as though she had simply taken the opportunity to come down and see him for a moment. As if she did it out of personal familiarity.”

As though she had come to look in on a relative she had not seen in a long time.

As though the two of them had known each other for ages.

It was a god showing familiarity toward a human.

“…The Omnipotent One of this generation really is entertaining.”

Ganesha smiled as he rose from his seat.

There was no way for them to know why such a phenomenon had occurred, nor why a god of the Pantheon would show such one-sided affection toward a single human.

There was, however, one thing they could say with certainty.

If something happened once, it could happen twice.

If Aiden had managed to draw the attention of the beings who were the source of all supernatural power once, then perhaps he could do so a second time, or even a third.

Which meant Aiden’s already immense value had just skyrocketed beyond measure because of what had happened tonight.

From now on, it would not only be the rulers currently standing atop the continent who turned their eyes toward him. Ancient beings who had remained silent until now would begin looking his way as well.

The great, the divine, the bizarre, and the sinister would all take notice.

‘…The support we’re giving him now won’t be enough.’

At least that much was completely certain to him.

The ‘Supreme Leader’ whom Ganesha served had already taken an enormous interest in Aiden.

If someone else snatched him away now, with her personality, she would probably try to slice Ganesha alive on the spot.

They needed a more definite way to keep Aiden on their side.

And if they wanted to do that, there was something that had to be done.

“…Drakan. Sorry, but there’s something I need you to do.”

✦ ✦ ✦

A white ceiling filled his vision.

That was Aiden’s first thought when he opened his eyes.

“The patient is awake!”

Judging by the shout from someone nearby, he was apparently in a hospital. A nurse hurried out of the room while calling to someone in the hall.

The next person to rush breathlessly into the room was Noel. Aiden saw her and gave a small nod.

“Oh, Lady Noel…”

He did not even finish the sentence before Noel hit him, and she did not hold back in the slightest.

“Please!”

She struck him hard enough to make him flinch.

“Stop making people!”

Then she hit him several more times without pause.

“Worry about you!”

“…I’m sorry.”

There was not much else he could say.

What response could he possibly give when Noel stood in front of him with tears gathering in her eyes?

There was also another reason for his immediate surrender.

‘If I make the wrong excuse, I think she might actually kill me.’

The tears were one thing, but the anger blazing in her eyes was even more frightening.

He had seen that look before. Where had it been?

‘Ah.’

It was the same look his father had worn while clinging to him and crying, begging him to calm down because he was going to get himself killed if he kept charging after the people who bullied Sisella.

Aiden remained silent for a moment as the memory settled in.

So Noel was apparently looking after him with the mindset of a parent watching a child left alone beside the water.

Realizing exactly how she regarded him left Aiden with a complicated feeling.

Fortunately, Noel’s anger cooled quickly enough, and he soon received an explanation of what had happened afterward.

“The Imperial Prince has been arrested and is currently being held in custody.”

Noel said this while struggling to peel an apple beside Aiden’s bed.

There was room for a rather fierce debate over whether she was peeling the apple or simply crushing it to pieces.

How could someone so skilled with a blade be this hopeless at every minor household task?

“He has refused to say anything about why he did it, his motives, or the circumstances behind it. His Majesty the Emperor seems to have stopped caring about the reasons, though. He intends to make certain the prince receives punishment appropriate to his crimes.”

It sounded as though everything had been resolved.

There were still unanswered questions, however.

“Lady Noel.”

“Yes?”

“So why was that man so determined to make you his wife in the first place?”

“…I honestly don’t know either. It never felt as though he had any special feelings for me.”

Noel tilted her head as if wondering whether Arden had harbored some special intention even she had never known about.

Aiden suspected they did not need to look very far to find the real background behind it.

“Lady Noel.”

“Yes?”

“What do you think about demons?”

“…Aren’t they a race that disappeared long ago? Why are you suddenly asking me that?”

Aiden let out a deep breath through his nose.

They had done an excellent job shaping public perception.

There was a saying that the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist.

Demons truly existed. Yet even Noel, who had been directly caught up in one of the disturbances they caused, still wore an expression that asked whether such beings were real at all.

“…No reason. I was just curious.”

If that was the case, there was no need to launch into a long explanation. Doing so would only make him look like a strange man ranting about imaginary enemies.

‘And I don’t need to explain it yet.’

Other people might not know, but Aiden was certain those beings existed.

Nobody would believe him if he simply announced it, but for now, knowing that they were real and being able to prepare for them was enough.

If he truly needed help someday, he was confident that Noel and Katia, at the very least, would stand on his side.

More importantly, an equally mysterious window was floating in front of Aiden.

Skill Info ■ Omnipotence . . . ■ Origin . . . ■ Divine Descent Acquire more ‘Remnants’ to unlock this trait! [1/3]

“…”

He felt as though he had acquired all kinds of traits by now, but this was the first time he had seen wording quite this grand.

The authority of a god. Those were two concepts he had always assumed would never have anything to do with his life.

At least he had been given a clue about why this had appeared.

System Log ▶ The Goddess of Struggle, Karva’s affinity toward you increases. ▶ Your Bond Stage rises! ▶ You can borrow 1 ‘Divine Authority!’

Aiden could only stare at the system log in disbelief.

The words themselves were simple enough, but their meaning was dizzying.

Apparently the enormous version of Noel he had seen back then had actually been Karva, Goddess of Struggle.

The authority of a god was already an absurd concept, yet the system was telling him it was real.

‘It really was incredibly strange at the time.’

When he used the skill Remnant, the power that flowed into his body had clearly not belonged to any human whose abilities he had copied before.

Even now, the sensation of handling power far beyond anything he could withstand remained carved into his body. The thought of how he had ever become involved with something like that was frightening all by itself.

‘What?’

Aiden immediately opened Karva’s skill window, only to freeze in confusion.

System Message ▶ Viewing is unavailable. ▶ Skill upgrades for the traits ‘Omnipotence’ and ‘Origin’ are required.

“…Hmm.”

So it was not simply going to hand him power for free. There were conditions he had to satisfy before he could use it.

Still, he had already experienced firsthand how powerful that authority could be, so he could hardly complain about a few conditions.

If anything, the restrictions only made him more curious.

“By the way, Aiden.”

As he thought about it, Noel suddenly seemed to remember something and brought an object over to him.

It was a letter written in an elegant, old-fashioned script. The recipient was Aiden himself.

“This was left outside the entrance to your hospital room.”

There was no one he could think of who would send him something like this.

Aiden blinked at the seal on the envelope.

A familiar symbol had been stamped into it.

‘…Ganesha?’

There was no mistaking the man’s seal.

Despite the extravagant envelope, the message inside was remarkably simple.

‘I prepared a discharge gift for you. I hope you find it useful.’

Aiden stared at the sentence for a moment.

He had a very bad feeling about it.

✦ ✦ ✦

The next day, Aiden was discharged in perfect health.

An unbelievably cold atmosphere had settled over the office in the Imperial Administration Building.

Katia and Noel were both glaring daggers, and Aiden himself stood at the center of their combined stare.

The cause was probably the visitor who had appeared without warning.

Aiden held his throbbing head and looked at the figure in front of him.

“…Hello.”

Then again, should he really call her human?

Her form was humanoid, but even a fool could tell she was not an ordinary human after seeing the reptilian scales covering much of her body and the narrow, slit-shaped pupils in her eyes.

Aiden immediately recognized exactly who she was supposed to be.

He had once made contact with her through the system window. She was a drakan, a half-human, half-dragon being.

“I came at Lord Ganesha’s request. My name is Morrigan.”

The calmer Morrigan’s introduction became, the more venom seemed to gather in Katia and Noel’s gazes.

Aiden, by contrast, seemed to shrink a little more with every passing second.

“Yes, Miss Morrigan. It’s nice to meet you.”

Sparks practically flew from Noel’s eyes as she spoke.

“Just to make absolutely sure, I’ll ask again. What exactly did you say you came here for?”

“Lord Ganesha told me to try taking Lord Aiden as my new master…”

“…Master?”

“…You said master?”

Katia and Noel turned toward Aiden at the same time, their expressions utterly dumbfounded.

They looked as if they had never imagined he possessed such questionable tastes.

Aiden could only remain silent beneath their stares.

‘Ganesha, you damned bastard.’

That was the only sentence passing through Aiden’s aching head.