At that moment, my eyes flew wide open. Amazingly. Truly, amazingly, nothing happened with the key!
“What is this?”
I shook the key in disbelief for a moment. Before I knew it, the people who had been kneeling in prayer were now glaring at me with piercing eyes.
“God might be angered by this.”
“How dare you pull something like this during a sacred altar prayer ceremony?”
“I have something else to do during the altar prayer ceremony.”
Pretending not to hear their voices, I held the key up to the light. It was sparkling. One more time. The key definitely glimmered, but nothing happened.
Did the ‘light’ in the phrase, <Only when God shines His light on me will the door open>, wasn’t referring to this altar? This isn’t working?
Just as a wave of exhaustion washed over me, the ones who had been preparing to recite doctrine suddenly grabbed my wrist roughly, their faces incredulous.
“Doctor Wot, I knew you were up to something. Looks like you brought something weird.”
“I thought you were acting a little too compliant.”
“And earlier, there was some weird fly flying around. Did you bring that too, Doctor Wot?”
Right then, I heard the sound of that very weird fly, Coocoo, suppressing an angry growl. Well, at this point, my only option was to find Grandma and make a run for it.
“She’s suspicious. Search her more.”
“Yeah, you can’t search me, can you?” I shook off their hands, sprang to my feet, and bolted. Thanks to my body being overdeveloped from all those potion buffs, I thought it’d be easy to shake them off…
“Get her!”
“Screw off!”
…Yeah, it really was easy.
You see, I’ve been here many times in my previous life, so I’ve got this place burned into my memory. I knew exactly how damp these freezing prison walls were, how much mold was growing everywhere. Even the path down to the underground labyrinth prison was steep, but I knew how to get in quickly. Guess all that time I spent locking up here getting ‘persuaded’ wasn’t for nothing.
Barreling down the moldy underground stairs, I shouted to Coocoo. “Open every door, and if anyone gets close, burn them to ashes!”
“Coocoo! (Yes!)”
I ran until I was out of breath and finally reached Grandma’s cell, where she stood looking bewildered. Thankfully, I’d made it this far without a single interruption.
“Grandma, listen to me. We have to get out of here, now.”
“Cough! Doctor Wot?”
Before I knew it, I’d untied the blindfold covering Grandma’s eyes and grabbed her hand tightly. Just then, true to their petty villain nature, they blocked the cell door and stared me down.
“Welcome, Doctor Wot. Didn’t expect you to walk right into your own cell, did you?”
“I was going to treat you like a gentleman, but I guess that’s not happening.” I scowled and squeezed Grandma’s hand even tighter.
“Get lost.”
But they were faster than I. The moment a dazzling light blocked my vision— Rumble, rumble. The prison walls between Grandma and me started closing in, tightening with every passing second.
“Oh no, Wot!”
“Damn!”
A hand’s width, then half a hand, until finally I was wedged in so tight I couldn’t move a muscle. Clutching Grandma’s hand, I glared at him. “So this is your ability, huh?”
“That’s right. It’s a special kind of divine power.”
No wonder someone with such sloppy kidnapping skills could hold a high position in the sanctuary.
There are different types of divine power. Offensive-type divine power, defensive-type divine power, and special-type divine power. His divine power seemed to be the special type.
“You wanted to introduce yourself, didn’t you, kid? Fine, let’s do it now. My name is Miro. I can manipulate any space I create however I want, as if it were alive.”
“So basically, as long as we’re in this sanctuary, we’re trapped in the palm of your hand, right, Miro?”
That’s why Miro was the one guarding the sanctuary. He could reshape it at his will, seal it off, merge the walls, or even bring them crashing down.
“Foolish. I herded you right into this space on purpose, and you didn’t even notice.”
What a thoroughly despicable b*stard. Grinding my teeth, I glared at Miro, the spatial manipulator.
He took a step closer, looming over me, and muttered in a threatening tone. “If you want, I could crush you to death in here. Snapping an ankle or two would be easy. I’m sure my lord would let that slide.”
“One ankle, huh. You look so scrawny, I bet you couldn’t even snap an ankle properly.”
The other guy let out a derisive laugh and stepped closer to me. Being taunted by someone you look down on is more humiliating than you’d think. No wonder he’s losing his cool.
I realized the moment I’d been waiting for had finally arrived. I threw in one more jab. “And what about you, just standing there like a sack of barley? Are you supposed to be nothing?”
“What?”
“What’s wrong, extra? Go on, try attacking me.”
I might not have known Miro’s special ability, but I did know what the guy next to him could do. He was the one who used offensive-type divine power.
The moment I taunted him, his face turned red and blue with rage, and he unleashed his divine power at me. A blinding white light shot toward me before I knew it. At last, I pulled the key from inside my clothes and flashed a bright smile.
“Seriously, thanks.” I blocked the white light with the hand holding the key, murmuring through my teeth. “<Only when God shines His light on me will the door open.>”
Only when God shines His light on me. That must mean divine power. So, when they direct their divine power at me, that’s when I can use this key-shaped magic artifact. And this time, things went exactly as I’d expected.
Boom! The moment the white light touched the key, the entire space exploded in a flash of light. Along with the violent surge of mana I unleashed.
* * *
A minute, two minutes, or maybe even dozens of minutes might have passed. By now, in the space that had exploded into blinding white, their eyes were rolled back. After making sure Grandma, whom I’d been protecting in my arms, was safe, I approached them.
“Hmm, what a shame. I’m so full of energy. I wish I could deal with you a bit more.” Looking at their bodies, half-charred like rotisserie chickens, I couldn’t help but be dumbfounded. “Come on, is this really all you’ve got?”
“W-What… You, can use, di-divine power…?”
“Nope, I can’t.” I flashed them an even brighter smile. “You probably have no idea what I’m talking about right now.” I gently pressed down on the foot of one of them sprawled on the floor and whispered, “The real payback starts now.”
They probably won’t be able to come to their senses for a while. Just recovering from the damage to their bodies and minds would be a struggle.
With that, I helped Grandma out of the collapsed sanctuary.
“Do-Doctor Wot. Is your body alright?”
“My body’s fine…”
I squeezed her hand tightly as I glanced back at the half-collapsed underground prison of the sanctuary. There’s just one problem. Time was the issue. I told Giyet to let Duke Kalinos know if I didn’t return for too long, but it’s taking longer than I expected.
No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t tell what time it was right now. At least I’d given Giyet a detailed map, so he should be able to find this place without a problem. Alright, that means I need to get back to the mansion before then.
“Grandma, let’s hurry and use the teleportation scroll to get out of here.”
“Y-Yes, let’s do that.”
Of course, I’d even hung a teleportation scroll around Coocoo’s neck, just to be extra cowardly. I’d made sure to prepare thoroughly for an escape from here in advance.
But it was right at that moment. In the underground prison of the sanctuary, which had been nothing but dark and damp. Standing there, I suddenly glared at the cluster of white light that appeared out of nowhere. And in that light…
“L-Lady Wot!”
…Giyet showed up, right on cue. And though I couldn’t make out their exact expression because of the backlight…
“…D-Duke?”
…Duke Kalinos was walking toward us.
Comments (0)