The Guild Master of Demon Hunters that the Empire is Obsessed With

32 – Owner of the Tower Dreaming of Beyond (8)

“It’s been a while, Leonard. I knew we would meet again someday, but I never thought we would meet like this.”

“Me too.”

“Did you open the sign and come in?”

“Yeah. Guess the words you love.”

Orléans smiled softly and nodded his head.

“For the Leonard I know, a mark like that wouldn’t even be on the axis of obstacles. Oh, have some tea.”

Orléans gestured to Celestine and Vivien, who didn’t know the English language, to take turns looking at me and Orléans.

“I didn’t ride anything out of the ordinary.”

I was joking, but Vivien, who had just put her lips to the teacup, sniffed startled.

“You still can’t joke.”

“hahahaha. People don’t change that easily.”

“Hey, secretary…”

Celestine, who was scratching his head still unable to comprehend the situation, leaned over and whispered to me.

My shirt was soaked in sweat, but instead of the smell of sweat, I could smell the perfume.

“Are you friends…?”

“Not friends.”

“Then what is it…?”

“The wizard who worked with me while entrusting me with a few requests. He looks fine, but his head isn’t normal.”

“Ugh…”

You must have heard my voice, but as always in Orléans, only a peaceful and benevolent smile in the world.

“You also eat sweets.”

When Orléans calmly offered the snack, Celestine hesitated, but reached out her hand to pick it up and started eating it.

“This is delicious.”

“Is there anything you don’t like?”

“Guild leader’s food…”

“hahahaha!”

When I laughed, Orléans smiled warmly.

“By the way, is this the mage’s tower…?”

Vivian asked cautiously, and Orléans nodded.

“Yes. Wizards of a certain age build towers full of their own tastes. My tastes, as you can see, are like that.”

Orléans extended his finger.

A breeze blew in the direction he pointed, and petals of various colors rose to the surface.

I asked while looking at the unrealistically beautiful sight.

“What are you doing here?”

“What do you do? As you can see, I’m taking care of the flower garden. Since you came and went, I’ve planted more kinds of flowers.”

It definitely seems like that, but that’s not the point right now.

“I think there are more things that have changed than that.”

“What are you talking about? Oh, right.”

As Orléans stretched out his arm, something like a lump of stone began to be pulled up from the middle of the lake.

“I released some turtles in the lake. Isn’t it cute?”

Vivian and Celestine’s eyes widened at the casually cast magic.

I snorted at the tortoise floating in the air and struggling.

“Stop harassing the little turtles. It’s not like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“Mmm.”

After putting the turtles back into the water, Orleans rolled up the sleeves of his robe and held up a teacup.

Then he gazed at me over the glass as he sipped his tea leisurely.

That bastard is real.

“What are you so curious about?”

“I heard there’s an invisible prison in the basement.”

“Yes. It’s a prison. It catches and reforms the troublemakers who bring chaos to the world. It’s a new hobby I’ve recently discovered.”

“I see. Why does it look so suspicious. Why don’t you explain what exactly it is?”

“Ha ha, Leonard.”

Orléans spread his hands to the left and right while laughing as if he couldn’t stop it.

“It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other. Forget about the dreary dungeon and tell us what you’ve been up to.”

“How am I?”

“I know that you killed the Great Demon that descended on the Grand Test Empire a few months ago.”

“What?!”

Vivien squealed and spattered cookie crumbs in my face.

“Chief… What are you doing…”

“Oh, sorry. Hmmm!”

Vivian covered her mouth with her hand and hurriedly chewed and swallowed the remaining snack.

Meanwhile, Celestine stared at me with her mouth open as if her jaw were about to fall out, a hardened state.

From noble mtl dot com

You didn’t believe me when I said I killed the Great Devil.

It’s only natural that the word of a wizard is more credible than that of a demon hunter.

“Miss Leonard killed the Prime Evil?!”

After swallowing all the sweets, Vivien asked again.

“That’s right. But this is actually a secret. The Empire gave me money and told me never to tell you.”

“Then the Imperial Knight Commander didn’t kill the Archdemon… Oh my God…”

As if it was hard to accept, Vivien muttered something to herself as she rolled her green and gold eyes around.

“In the first place, no matter how strong the Imperial Knight Commander is, killing the Archdemon is absurd. Only Demon Hunters can fight soberly in the face of demons.”

Orléans helped me explain further.

“So what have you been doing since you were betrayed by the Empire?”

“I crossed over to the Duchy of Nantes and entered the guild.”

“The Duchy of Nantes. It’s a nice place. So, have you become a guild leader now?”

“No, I’m the manager. I’m not qualified to be a guild leader. I just work for a salary.”

I haven’t told Celestine the details of the office manager’s guild yet, but next to me is the chief investigator of the Border Guard, who is in charge of security in the city.

No one knows how they will come back if they are exposed here.

“I see. It’s the office manager. It’s hard to imagine the Leonard I know sitting at a desk and rolling a pen.”

“That’s why you’re wandering around like this because you’re sick. The reason I came today is because of a request.”

“Request?”

“If you want to earn a living, you have to run the quests. But the quests are so dirty that it’s a headache. You know what kind of quests demon hunters carry out?”

“I know it well. So, what kind of request is it?”

“Where the people of a small village have been corpses alive.”

Orléans nodded his head as if to continue talking without any change in expression.

“With no cognitive ability and no will to live, I literally became a corpse that can only breathe. At first, I thought it might be the exploitation of souls by higher level demons.”

“But?”

“But no matter how much I investigated, I couldn’t find any signs of the devil. So I ended up using the blind gaze.”

“Blind gaze. A very sharp and dangerous technique. So did you find it?”

“I found it. As you said, it’s a very sharp and dangerous technique.”

“What was it?”

I looked at Orléans without saying anything.

Orléans also calmly received my gaze with lonely sea-blue eyes.

His eyes were serene, as if looking into the depths of the North Sea.

Me and Orléans stared at each other, and Vivien looked at us alternately with anxious eyes.

Celestine, too, began to keep an eye on him with the snack in her mouth.

“Why did you do that?”

When I asked, Orléans smiled softly.

“Why do you think so?”

“It’s probably to create the perfect world you long for. It’s equipped with the three elements of control, peace, and sacrifice.”

Orléans laughed quietly and took a sip of his tea.

“For that purpose, did you decide to remove the negative things of humans with magic?”

As expected, Orléans was silent with a smile.

“But no matter how great a wizard you are, you wouldn’t have been able to artificially separate human emotions and wills with magic alone. So you were thinking of physically separating them after you’ve extracted them all and molded them? What’s trapped in that dungeon over there is the shape of those emotions and wills.”

Orléans raised his hands and shook his head with a smile.

“I lost. You are indeed a demon hunter. No, is it you?”

“Both. So did you succeed? Looking at the dungeon tail, it seems like a failure.”

“Still testing.”

“That means not yet. If so, that means it has failed.”

“That’s not the case. The experiment is going well.”

“Yes, yes. No matter what you do, you’ve always been confident and answered with conviction.”

Orléans smiled.

His smile was always beautiful to look at, but I know well beyond that smile.

Love, generosity, arrogance, self-righteousness, madness, sacrifice, stubbornness.

A human being who is a mixture of various things that are incompatible with each other, and which ordinary people can never understand.

A high-level wizard who has dedicated his life to creating a flawless world without any conflict or unhappiness.

That is the owner of the tower, the wizard Orléans, who dreams of ‘beyond’.

“Stop doing weird things and quickly return everything. You have to do that to finish the quest normally. I have to make a living too.”

Orléans, who had been laughing silently, spoke in a calm and affectionate voice.

“This world can be peaceful only when proper control intervenes, and some sacrifices are inevitable in the process. Humans are such beings.”

“You mean you can’t?”

“Nothing like that. Just begging you to wait. A little more research will separate the positives from those in the dungeon…”

“No no.”

I waved my hand and stopped Orléans from speaking.

“Who the hell asked you to do that? I don’t think anyone in the world ever asked you to make a perfect world.”

“This doesn’t have to be requested from anyone. It’s a mission that anyone who walks the path of magic must take on. It’s something only a wizard can do.”

He laughed out loud and shook his head.

“No one expects that from wizards. Wouldn’t it be nice if the cost of casting magic was reduced a bit?”

“Leonard. People like you and me have to look ‘beyond’ money, not right in front of them.”

“That’s not true. I don’t want to see that place ‘beyond’ that I don’t even know is invisible. I just want to think about the money that will come in after solving the quest right away. So, Orléans. Restore the people in the village I crossed over to. Then I will quietly leave your flower garden.”

“I can’t do that.”

As Orléans shook his head, his silver hair rippled.

“This is an indispensable step in making the world a better place.”

“Don’t wrap it up like something great. The monsters in the dungeon that you pulled out and shaped. It’s because you can’t separate the bad ones from there, right? Just put it back.”

“That’s difficult. The experiment is nearing completion, and we can’t stop here. We’ll separate it in the future through the proper methods and return only the positive parts. I promise.”

“No. Put it back now. Even at this moment the villagers are starving to death because they are not eating or drinking anything. You are killing them.”

Orléans sighed lightly.

“I told you. Some sacrifices are inevitable.”

“A competent wizard who wants to achieve the world ‘beyond’ must have found a way to avoid even that sacrifice. Turn it back quickly.”

“This is the most promising experiment I’ve ever done.”

Orléans spoke softly, as if admonishing him.

“Please don’t interrupt me. I can really make it this time.”

“Stop talking nonsense. Judging from all the crazy experiments you’ve been doing, this one is definitely a failure.”

“Leonard…”

“If you don’t like it, I’ll force you to do it.”

“I see.”

Orléans’ sea-blue eyes turned to the hilt of Nightrend.

“You are the best demon hunter in the world. Even I, a high-ranking mage, are reluctant to fight.”

“So let’s not blush and let’s end it happily.”

Suddenly, the surroundings expanded, and Celestine and Vivian moved away from behind.

I stood face to face with Orléans in a flower garden where even the table was gone.

“Are you really going to do this?”

“I can’t back down this time. No matter how much I respect you as a sincere friendship.”