Chapter 640: Airship

Sharp eyes, sunken cheeks, tightly closed lips, rough skin.

The dark wizard disguised as a crew member using the uniform left quite a strong impression.

Just like when Walter Meyer asked Oliver for help.

He seemed to be from the Central Continent.

A life of struggle naturally made him rough and rugged.

Such people rarely showed their emotions, and this dark wizard was no different.

However, unusually, he was inwardly quite flustered, even if he didn’t show it.

He couldn’t help but be in such a state.

The blade Oliver caught with his bare hands was so lethal that even touching it lightly could cause the flesh to rot.

It was a dark magic item tempered in the blood of a plague-carrier.

Regardless of the target’s skill, one touch would cause their flesh to rot completely, a vicious item that none would dare to use.

Yet Oliver caught it barehanded.

Without any issue.

Just as the dark wizard was questioning whether Oliver was human, Oliver asked the man.

“What are you doing here?”

“…Kr-Kraaah—!!”

The man howled as he snapped back to reality in response to Oliver’s question.

He had remembered his mission.

The roar, more akin to that of a beast than a human, reverberated through the walls, spreading across the whole airship.

It was a signal, not an attack.

Instinctively understanding this, Oliver blew on the man’s mouth, causing him to shut it.

Using the Disease-Weakness Death Magic Dumbness, the man instantly lost his ability to speak.

“…?!”

Despite the sudden turn of events, the man wasted no time in taking action.

He abandoned the knife trapped between Oliver’s index and middle fingers and drew out a new dagger.

Judging by his swift decisiveness and the discoloration of his skin coupled with his lightning-fast movements, it was clear he was a highly skilled and experienced dark wizard.

An accomplished dark wizard lacking neither experience nor skill.

However, there was one thing that puzzled Oliver.

For someone here to kill, his emotional state was unnervingly –

-Chaaang!!

As the man’s knife was about to reach Oliver’s face, Derek suddenly pulled out the longsword he had stored with Minimization Magic, shielding Oliver.

“What are you doing?!”

Derek shouted at the unresponsive Oliver. However, instead of replying, Oliver remorsefully activated his Warlock’s Eye.

The scope covered the entire airship.

As he activated Warlock’s Eye, the world turned black, and Oliver examined everyone onboard while also capturing the spreading cries along the walls and the people responding to those cries.

There were quite a few dark wizards scattered around, some even setting up bombs.

“…Huh?”

As Oliver meticulously scoured the airship, his brows furrowed as he noticed something.

A slight hint of unease.

A strange reaction for someone who had been nearly stabbed just moments before and remained unfazed.

Regardless, he kept focusing on his Warlock’s Eye to reconfirm what he saw, and unfortunately, he hadn’t seen wrong.

“Why is Rosburn here…?”

Oliver muttered upon spotting Rosburn in the economy class.

“What’s wrong with you?!”

As Oliver tilted his head in confusion, Derek yelled at him once more.

Even as he asked his question, Derek was fiercely exchanging blows with the dark wizard, lining the air with silver traces from their swords.

Considering the narrow corridor of the airship made the longsword difficult to use and limited the use of magic, he was doing quite well.

He must have undergone significant training.

Though he wasn’t able to subdue the dark wizard immediately, he managed to pin him down long enough so that the passengers in the first-class cabins could open their doors and observe what was happening.

Among those passengers were Kevin and Yareli, who were traveling with the Holy Knights.

Shhiing—!

As Kevin tried to assist Derek after assessing the situation outside, a slicing sound echoed.

Oliver had gripped the blade between his index and middle fingers more tightly, stepping forward to slice the dark wizard apart.

He slashed from the wizard’s stomach, to his chest, to his throat, to his face, to his head, diagonally from bottom to top without a moment’s hesitation.

The red blood pooling on the floor, the neatly bisected flesh and bones, and the vacant eyes of the dark wizard, who hadn’t even realized what had happened.

“…”

The dark wizard who had been ferociously exchanging attacks with Derek collapsed without a word, unable to even scream or groan.

The sight of such a calm yet terrifying scene made Derek’s blood run cold as he widened his eyes in shock.

Kevin, who was standing behind Yareli, the Holy Knight, and the nun, silently stared at Oliver too.

What could they say? It was too cold and mechanical.

It was as if he’d just disposed of something annoying.

And in reality, that was exactly what had happened.

The reason Oliver swung the dagger was simply to get rid of an annoyance.

Though normally, Oliver wouldn’t have drawn his sword just because something was annoying, things changed when he spotted Rosburn in the economy class.

You could say it truly annoyed him.

As if to express his frustration, Oliver threw away the knife he had just used, not even sparing a glance at the fallen dark wizard.

The knife landed beside the diagonally slashed dark wizard, whose wound was now rotting and decaying.

There was a risk that the rotting flesh could spread the disease inside the airship.

One of the Holy Knights quickly dashed forward to purify the corpse.

[Holy Light]

It was the most commonly used and potent Holy Power spell.

It was thought to be for combat, but it could also be used to eliminate contaminants, as demonstrated by the Holy Knight.

Normally, Oliver would have watched with interest, but instead, he turned to Kevin, who was gazing at him with a surprised expression.

“…What’s the matter?”

Kevin asked in a much more serious tone than usual.

After all, he had never seen Oliver cut someone down outright before.

Oliver answered in response.

“Dark wizards are currently attacking the airship. And Rosburn is on board.”

“Ros…what?”

Derek muttered back, still trying to grasp the situation, but Kevin, who had heard the name from Merlin, quickly understood.

Rosburn, the child Oliver rescued in Martel and who was later entrusted to the local branch of the Tower of Magic by Merlin.

Oliver said that this child was now on the airship.

How or why he ended up here was unknown.

But what mattered most at this moment wasn’t that.

What mattered was that Rosburn’s presence here was aggravating Oliver.

Just as Kevin was about to say something, Oliver left the floor to head for the economy class.

Each step was resolute.

Yareli shouted, asking.

“Where are you going?!”

“To Rosburn.”

In the midst of a dark wizard assault on an airship vulnerable to terrorism, Oliver answered almost too naturally.

In fact, it was more of a notification than an answer.

There was an air of finality, clearly intending not to accept any objections.

Even so, Kevin was about to say something when.

Tatata-dang!!

Gunshots rang out from the lower level of the airship.

***

Airships.

They were hailed as proof that humanity had conquered the skies…a grandiose claim, yet in reality, it was more precarious than it sounded.

While securing the ability to fly between nations, experts argued that claiming to have conquered the skies was pushing it.

The reason was the numerous vulnerabilities.

Weather was a key example.

When violent storms struck, no airship, no matter how huge, was anything more than an oversized, expensive coffin in the sky.

This is why airlines operated their own weather stations—it wasn’t for the fun of it.

Unfortunately, it couldn’t be helped.

No matter how advanced magic and industry became, what could humans do before the great forces of nature crafted by god?

Moreover, nature wasn’t the only threat.

People were problematic as well.

Airships were enormous, capable of carrying hundreds of people at once, but they were also highly susceptible to chaos.

The unique condition of being in the sky, the limited space, the sensitive engines, and gasbags.

If a fight broke out on board, things would get dangerous quickly, which is why passengers were thoroughly screened with magic before boarding. (In Derek’s case, he was exempt as he was traveling with the team of Holy Knights.)

Security might have seemed excessive, but people didn’t mind, as it was better than dying from doing the bare minimum.

Of course, even with such thorough precautions, incidents were inevitable.

“Hiiiii!!”

“Shut up! We’ll blow you up if you resist!”

Just like right now.

Numerous figures presumed to be dark wizards were waving guns, swords, or even disfigured arms to threaten the passengers.

How they passed security was a mystery, but no one was contemplating that at this moment.

There was a dark wizard intent on causing a terrorist attack here, in the sky over the vast ocean.

Some of the onboard security personnel and a few passengers tried to band together to subdue them.

‘We’ve planted bombs on the airship! Resist, and we’ll blow it up!’

One dark wizard, who seemed beyond reason, yelled as he held up a detonator above his head, forcing everyone to stop.

Whether a bluff or not was uncertain, but it was enough to make everyone hesitate just for a moment. In that brief moment, the dark wizards dealt with those who resisted.

The bloodied bodies lying on the ground were proof.

Most of the remaining passengers gave up resisting, merely cowering in fear, hoping to survive this disaster.

“Engine room secured! Gasbags secured!”

“…What about first class?”

“Well…”

“Damn it…”

One of the dark wizards muttered under his breath.

As no reports came in, it seemed something wasn’t going as planned, but the dark wizard reacted as if he had expected this.

A strange reaction for someone trying to hijack an airship.

But that wasn’t the only strange thing.

They were desperate, but there was none of that crazed aggression seen in other maniacs.

All they were displaying was a sense of mounting anxiety, as if cornered.

Of course, the terrified passengers remained oblivious to this detail.

Meanwhile, one of the dark wizards quietly asked the one holding the detonator.

The look on his face went beyond unease, showing outright terror.

“What should we do now?”

“What should we do? This was where our orders ended, so now…”

The one holding the detonator trailed off, staring at his left hand.

The one grasping the detonator.

Surprisingly, as beads of sweat formed from gripping it so tightly, frost began to gather around his hand, spreading like mold until the entire hand was encased in thick ice.

All in just a moment.

“Wh-what…?”

The situation was beyond understanding.

After the hand holding the detonator was entirely frozen, the dark wizards finally noticed Yareli standing at the entrance.

Yareli was staring coldly at them, her glasses now off.

They immediately tried to retaliate, but before they could move, Yareli’s gaze froze them in an instant.

Chachachang!!

As a sound like something scraping came from their noses, mouths, throats, and limbs, the dark wizards’ bodies froze solid, turning white all over.

Derek took advantage of this, gripping his longsword backward and quickly closing the distance. He swung the pommel like a mace, capturing the dark wizards.

With all the passengers gathered around, splattering blood was unthinkable, and they needed to capture one alive to find out who was behind this.

“All subdued?”

“Yes. According to Xenon, this should be all of them. The Holy Knights should handle the engine room.”

Following Oliver’s findings with the Warlock’s Eye, Roderick’s group and Xenon’s group split up to subdue the dark wizards trying to hijack the airship.

There were a few unusual actions by Xenon, causing some setbacks, but thanks to Kevin’s persuasion and promises from Derek and Yareli, they divided the roles effectively.

And now, Derek was trying to fulfill one of those promises.

“Rosburn!”

Without warning, the wizard who had just saved them from the dark wizards suddenly called out to someone.

The passengers who were about to express their gratitude quietly were dumbstruck as someone peeked out.

It was a boy. A familiar boy.

Everyone remembered who he was.

The boy who remained by Xenon’s side while he was unconscious.

The boy who returned the Quarterstaff to Xenon when he woke up.

Derek looked at the boy and asked.

“Rosburn?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why are you here?”

There was no need to ask who had raised that question.

As Rosburn was about to explain.

Bang!! Baaang!!

Explosions echoed from the stern and above, shaking the airship violently.

The bombs set by the dark wizards had gone off. Judging by the location, it seemed like the engine room and gasbags, the airship’s lifelines, were targeted. In other words, they were in big trouble.

The passengers screamed, descending into chaos. Before anyone could demand silence, a sensation of falling gripped their stomachs, signaling the ship’s ominous descent.

As they all thought this was the end, the terrible velocity of the fall suddenly began to slow, as if someone was propping up the airship. Then, massive amounts of power began pouring out from above, enveloping the massive airship that was carrying hundreds of people and their belongings.