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How could her traces be so faint? How could she leave so little behind, no signs of evil energy or aura of malice?

“And more importantly, how could she be that powerful?”

Karnak held up a black cube.

“This is the answer.”

Serati thought the witch might have been a case similar to Laficel. A future powerful being whose soul returned and entered the body of an old woman.

“When you look at the way she fought, it doesn’t add up.”

In Laficel’s case, she was able to display such grandeur because she wielded the power she possessed with extraordinary skill.

She was a master at maximizing minimal force to its utmost potential.

But the Candy Witch wasn’t like that.

“Necromancy itself is simple. It’s just a basic method of amplifying physical abilities using necromantic power.”

It’s just that the total amount of necromantic power was unimaginably vast.

“If you compare it to me now… it’s about a thousand times more.”

Both Baros and Serati were shocked and asked again.

“A thousand times?”

“Then how did we win?”

Karnak answered casually as if it was nothing special.

“Because she handled necromantic power about ten thousand times worse than I do.”

It was the exact opposite of Laficel’s case.

She was wildly swinging an immense power of darkness that had been absurdly compressed.

“That’s why there was almost no trace of evil energy or aura of malice left behind.”

Because the necromantic power was so highly compressed, very little of it leaked out. But that also meant she couldn’t fully utilize her necromancy.

That’s why the witch had no choice but to resort to such bizarre hand-to-hand combat.

“But since the compressed darkness was so massive, everyone else was simply overwhelmed by it.”

“Can necromantic power really be compressed that much?”

Suddenly,Baros raised his hand.

“I remember, young master, you once said that was impossible.”

“That’s right. For a necromancer, it is impossible. Even if it were possible, it would be useless.”

Normally, necromancy is not about concentrating power.

“You know how, in stories, when a Demon King exerts his power, there are earthquakes, storms, and lightning? That’s because the power is so unfocused that it leaks everywhere.”

Magic focuses on concentration, while necromancy emphasizes dispersion.

Magic gathers vast amounts of energy into a single point to create immediate changes. That’s why magic has an image of intense concentration.

On the other hand, necromancy spreads its power wide, subtly infiltrating and overtaking. Accumulation and dispersion are more critical than concentration in necromancy.

“But this is fascinating. She managed to compress necromantic power to an extreme degree. I have no idea how she did it.”

“Not even you, young master?”

“No.”

“Then it must be another cult technique. Either aura , magic (??), or divine power.”

“That’s the most likely, but nothing stands out.”

No aura, no magic, and no divine power can be detected.

In fact, you can’t even feel the necromantic power.

If Karnak hadn’t known it was left behind by the witch, he would have thought it was just an ordinary dice.

Serati, who had been hearing the conversation between Karnak and Baros, cautiously asked.

“So, the dice was inside the witch’s body, right?”

“Huh? No.”

Karnak shook his head.

“This is the witch.”

“Huh?”

“I told you before, she wasn’t human.”

People had assumed that an ordinary old woman had absorbed the Darkness of Doom and become the Candy Witch. Lately, that’s how things have been happening.

But if it had been a case of darkness being absorbed into a human body, no matter how high the necromantic power was, her physical abilities wouldn’t have been so enhanced. The human body couldn’t withstand that.

“The truth is, the witch was the Darkness of Doom itself, compressed to an extreme degree.”

She wasn’t a necromancer, but rather the result of necromancy.

Like Karnak’s evil spirits, she was a mass of darkness that followed pre-set commands.

This part, Karnak was quite certain about.

“I could tell from the Candy House.”

The witch’s necromantic power was so compressed that none of it leaked out.

So, how did the candy house, that hellish fairy tale image, come to be?

The answer is simple: “The witch didn’t create it.”

The witch, too, was a part of the fairy tale.

That’s why she had such an unrealistic appearance, like an old woman from a story, and her dialogue was equally bizarre.

“I think someone projected the collective unconscious of children onto the Darkness of Doom. There’s necromancy like that, although it’s not really my style.”

The witch hadn’t conjured up the fairy tale image.

Someone else had conjured the fairy tale image around the witch.

And what this meant was…

“There’s information about the person who did all this inside this cube.”

***

Serati quietly nodded.

She felt like she had a rough understanding of the situation.

“But why did you call us here?”

Suddenly, Karnak sighed and held out the black cube.

“I want to extract the information from this.”

It wasn’t just the information. Since it contained such a massive amount of necromantic power, absorbing it would also grant great power.

“To do that, I need to dismantle it slowly and absorb it.”

However, this black cube was an extremely compressed mass of necromantic power.

It was so compressed that no evil energy or aura of malice was leaking out.

Karnak continued, almost as if he were complaining.

“It’s too solid. No matter how much I try to melt it, it doesn’t react at all.”

It was like trying to scratch a diamond with a fingernail. Naturally, there wasn’t even a speck coming off.

“The only thing that worked, even just a little, was chaos power. I couldn’t extract any information, but at least it made a tiny scratch.”

It seemed that an energy different from necromantic power worked better. That’s why he was asking Baros to give it a try with aura.

“Ah, I see.”

Baros took the cube and wrapped his right hand in a red aura. He channeled the aura and attempted various things.

Watching him, Serati asked.

“Since you have Sir Baros, why did you call for me?”

“Baros isn’t my subject anymore. I thought maybe I could control it indirectly through a subject’s soul.”

Karnak then also tried channeling necromantic power into the cube again through Serati’s soul.

But the result was still disappointing.

“Ah, it’s no use.”

“Same here, young master.”

“Do we need to find another method?”

“How did the one who created that witch even use this? You can’t even use it, young master.”

“Isn’t that exactly what we’re trying to figure out right now?”

Clicking his tongue, Karnak returned the cube to his pocket.

“I’ll store it safely for now.”

It looked like he was simply putting it in his clothes, but that wasn’t the case.

A small space opened between his garments, and he stored the cube inside that space.

Seeing this, Serati asked a question.

“Oh my, what was that?”

“Huh? It’s an illusory space.”

“Is it like a mage’s subspace pouch?”

“Similar. But it’s more like a necromancer’s subspace pouch.”

“My goodness! Isn’t that a 9th-circle spell?”

In shock, she widened her eyes.

A subspace pouch is a magical space that can store several items with the volume of roughly a cow. Time doesn’t pass within the subspace, and the weight of the items disappears as well, making it incredibly useful in many ways.

With a bitter smile, Karnak responded.

“The illusory space is much easier to use. Its storage capacity is also far larger.”

Compared to the subspace pouch, which is a 9th-circle ultimate spell, the illusory space doesn’t require such a high level of necromancy. In terms of difficulty, it’s roughly equivalent to a 6th-circle spell in magic.

Even so, it can hold dozens of times more items than the subspace pouch.

Feeling frustrated, Serati raised her voice.

“With such a convenient magic, why did you make me carry everything?”

As she spoke, something felt odd.

‘Wait a minute, weren’t these guys carrying stuff too?’

Besides, it wasn’t like Karnak to hold back from showing off.

“Well, there’s a serious drawback to the illusory space.”

The two of them sighed.

“If you store food in it, it all rots.”

“Not just food. Even clothes get tainted with evil energy and an aura of malice.”

“And if you put a living creature in there, it comes out as a corpse.”

“So, I’ve only used it to carry catalysts and reagents related to necromancy.”

“Didn’t you mostly store corpses in there before, young master? And a heap of skeletons too.”

“I don’t live the way I used to, so I purposely didn’t bring any of that along.”

In other words, you can’t really put any normal items in it.

Disappointed, Serati remarked.

“It’s surprisingly useless.”

“Exactly. It was pretty handy back when I was a necromancer, though.”

After closing the illusory space, Karnak picked up his wine glass again.

“Well, until Alius gets back, let’s finish our drinks.”

This, too, couldn’t be stored in the illusory space.

“Since carrying it would be a hassle, we’d better just drink it now.”

***

It was late at night when Alius returned to the inn.

“I’ve gotten a general understanding of the situation here through Priest Belton.”

First of all, their target, Count Hudel, was currently absent from his territory.

Karnak and Baros frowned.

“He left the territory?”

“Wasn’t this supposed to be the period when he stays here?”

Like most nobles, Hudel alternated between spending time in the imperial capital, Thea Crahan, and his own estate.

However, there was something different about Hudel compared to other nobles—he traveled between the two places far too frequently.

Typically, nobles spend spring and summer in the capital, return to their estates during the autumn harvest season, celebrate the New Year there, and then head back to Thea Crahan once spring arrives.

Hudel, on the other hand, made the trip back and forth almost every two months.

Because of this unusually short interval, Karnak’s group had timed their journey to coincide with his return to the estate.

“But if he’s left the territory, then our schedule is messed up, right?”

“Not exactly. It seems he’s just delayed by about half a month.”

“Well, that’s a relief.”

In any case, Count Hudel Grenthal had no formal accusations of being part of a cult.

“But it seems Priest Belton has been suspicious for quite some time now.”

The Grenthal estate itself appeared spotless.

Having lost his parents and family to necromancers, Hudel governed his territory with great vigilance, ensuring that no sinister figures could set foot in Grenthal County.

“That’s not particularly surprising. It’s just proof that Count Hudel is competent.”

However, in the neighboring Baron Ralcade’s territory, Kalat City, and Aolin’s territory, cultists had been far more active than in other regions of the empire.

The problem was that these cultists were incredibly elusive.

Even when they were tracked down, they always severed ties and disappeared, with their leaders vanishing without a trace. No one could figure out where they were hiding.

“Priest Belton believes that the Grenthal estate is the most likely place they’re hiding.”

Baron Ralcade’s territory lies to the east of Grenthal, Aolin’s territory to the south, and Kalat City is situated at the center of the three.

In other words, the Grenthal estate was perfectly positioned for cultists, whose identities had been compromised, to escape to.

If everything around you is a sea of blood, yet one place remains peaceful, what does that imply?

“He’s definitely the culprit.”

However, it seemed they couldn’t do anything just yet, as evidence either vanished naturally or was impossible to find.

“Not just Priest Belton, but other priests also suspect that Count Hudel has spies within the Saisha Temple.”

Now that they had gathered this information, it was time to cross-check it.

Alius spoke.

“Starting tomorrow, we’ll begin investigating the village. If there are any cultists here, they must have left some traces behind. That’s where we’ll start.”