Shepherd Wizard (Novel) - Chapter 151
Chapter 151
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Discord
Two days after occupying the Temple of the Sun.
The Parsha-Ravitas coalition forces quickly established control over the entire Land of Five Lakes from their base in the capital, Helio.
Naturally, Solif was the busiest among them.
Having ascended as the new master of Baraha, he not only had to control the former vassals but also had to carve out a portion of the family’s vast wealth to offer to the coalition forces.
“The kids aren’t listening to you?”
“They’re trying to sow discord between the two families, talking about restoring Baraha’s glory. Saying that the great Baraha cannot become a mere vassal territory of another family.”
“Who’s saying that? Should I kill them?”
“When you say it, it doesn’t sound like a joke, so please don’t.”
At Turan’s words, Solif shook his head with a disgusted expression and put down the documents he was holding.
Of course, ordinary nobles would typically delegate such tasks to their subordinates, but without properly established trust in those subordinates, he had no choice but to supervise everything personally.
“By the way, where’s Meisa?”
“She’s gone back to Kalamaf with Armani for now. We need at least one person guarding our base in case someone attacks.”
“Ah, right. I remember hearing about that before, but I’ve been so overwhelmed that I forgot for a moment. So, how’s your work going?”
“Hmm. Things are wrapping up on my end too.”
Over the past two days, while Solif had been consolidating his power as Baraha’s new family head and Meisa had been organizing matters at their home base, Turan had been buried deep within the Temple of the Sun.
Some might have mistaken this for the typical indolence of a great noble, but in reality, he too had been busy with important work.
Specifically, extracting all the half-human, half-elf beings from the stone tablet, binding them in the jewel box, isolating each one, and interrogating them.
“There were six in total… no, five now. One of them was being too stubborn. I made an example of him by tearing him apart in front of the others.”
“Ugh.”
“But thanks to that, the rest became frightened and gave me more accurate information. Having multiple sources made cross-verification possible, which was convenient.”
When he had only been getting information from Lesion, it was difficult to verify its truthfulness without actually testing it, but with the addition of other half-elves from Baraha, this weakness was resolved.
By asking one for information and then casually bringing it up with others, lies could be easily detected.
In truth, such precautions proved unnecessary as Lesion had been consistently cooperative since his conversion.
Presumably, having already betrayed his kind, he had half-resigned himself to the fact that there was no going back.
Since Lesion, as the leader of the group and former head of Baraha, knew the most, the other half-elves were primarily used for cross-verification while Turan mainly dealt with him.
As a result, Turan had learned an incredible amount of information.
“First, I found out what those needles in your and Meisa’s heads are.”
“What are they exactly?”
“They’re leashes.”
“Leashes…”
“Long ago, the first generation of mages born from the interaction between the Freya gods and humans were difficult to control. They would obey their divine parents, but they viewed ordinary people as so insignificant that they would slaughter them as casually as breathing. So the gods implanted devices to suppress such aggression, designed to be passed down through bloodlines.”
Turan’s thoughts immediately went to Oneil of the Carmine family.
A brute feared by all for his willingness to harm those weaker than himself.
Such individuals, occasionally born into various families, were likely the result of some defect in these ‘leashes.’
If the average temperament of the first generation of mages had been that extreme, such control measures were understandable.
Of course, how the subjects themselves might have felt about it was another matter entirely.
“According to Lesion, the very social structure of the current world is maintained because of this measure. If left to human nature, mages with their tremendous power would abuse and manipulate ordinary people like insects, rather than carefully nurturing and helping them prosper as they do now.”
“Huh.”
Humans worship mages, and mages protect humans…
To think that the most basic teaching mentioned in the first chapter of the Freya faith wasn’t a natural development, but something the gods had practically brainwashed into their mage descendants?
Clicking his tongue at this unexpected revelation, Solif suddenly asked about something that had occurred to him:
“Then why did our heads hurt that time?”
“Well, that was just the original purpose, but several more functions were added later. Things like obedience to the gods or defensive measures when someone tried to attack them… Now that they don’t have their original bodies, these don’t normally activate, but they seem to apply in spirit form.”
And most shockingly and terribly, the pain that Solif and Meisa had experienced last time was apparently milder because the Baraha gods had been partially transformed into elves.
If they had maintained pure divine spirit forms, the moment they confronted them, their spirit forms’ heads would have simply exploded.
“So we need to remove them as quickly as possible. Don’t worry. I’ve learned some techniques for removing the needles, so we should be able to finish soon.”
“I’m not sure if we should just remove them all. If what you’re saying is true, aren’t these needles preventing me from becoming a crazed murderer?”
If removing all the needles turned him into a monster who casually slaughtered ordinary people for entertainment like the first-generation mages, how would that be any different from dying?
At Solif’s concern, Turan smiled and pointed to himself.
“Look at me. Do I seem like such a monster to you?”
“Well, honestly, a little…”
Solif faced Turan’s expressionless face and muttered softly, “Just kidding, man.”
“Anyway, the problem is having too much power with an immature personality at a young age. Once you’ve reached adulthood, removing them probably won’t affect your self-control.”
“That reminds me of another question—why don’t you have needles in your head? You didn’t remove them yourself, did you?”
“I don’t know either. I investigated this quite thoroughly… but it seems no one really knows.”
The one who designed and installed these ‘leashes’ was the Biologist, skilled in handling living beings and souls.
Otas, the progenitor of Zahar who ruled the Enril Desert as the Night Hunter, had a poor relationship with him, but even he considered such measures necessary and entrusted his descendants to the Biologist’s hands.
However, at Otas’s request, the leash design for his bloodline was made somewhat looser than for others, which might explain the characteristic cruelty of the Zahar bloodline.
“Hmm, so in the end, bloodlines control not just our power but even our thinking…”
“Not completely, but yes.”
Turan recalled the conversation he had recently had with his grandfather, Talis.
Based on his hints at that time, it was clear that he too knew about this properly.
There were many more stories that followed.
Such as why Lesion had risked ambushing Ravitas’s family head Osel, or what price he had paid to bring in the great family Ruban.
As the gloomy stories continued and the atmosphere grew heavy, Turan deliberately raised his voice:
“As a bonus, I also learned something good this time.”
“Really?”
“Yes. The Silver Sun’s skills.”
“Great!”
Turan handed Solif, who looked like he had just received a gift, a chart he had prepared in advance.
It contained detailed information from methods of combining symbols that Turan had directly drawn using thought transcription, to the names, effects, and usage methods of various techniques.
“You’ll probably become the best among the three of us at handling skills before long. Meisa and I are just learning as we go.”
“Heh, since I’ve reached my growth limit anyway, I might as well master this. I’ll make sure to learn it thoroughly, so don’t worry.”
Pleased with Turan’s gift, Solif read and reread the technique chart with an excited expression.
While smiling at this sight, Turan’s face soon darkened.
‘Skills… huh.’
Turan had intentionally withheld one important piece of information he had obtained from the half-elves from Solif.
In fact, he planned not to tell anyone else either.
This was because he couldn’t predict how others might react if this fact were revealed.
Compared to the secret he had just learned, the revelation that the Freya gods were controlling the world from the shadows was nothing.
Turan turned his head to look at the moon, unusually clear in the cloudless sky.
‘That this world was created as a fiction, and that a true world exists elsewhere…’
* * *
[This world is fake, you say?]
[That’s right. Well, strictly speaking, perhaps “fake” isn’t the right word… a constructed world? An overlaid world? That might be a more accurate description.]
Turan frowned at Lesion’s words.
This world is fake? What kind of incomprehensible statement was that?
[Family Head Parsha. Have you ever thought about this? How grasslands and wastelands, deserts and marshlands can exist side by side with barely ten meters of boundary between them, or how one place can be a fertile plain while another at the same latitude is a frozen snowfield? Doesn’t that seem strange to you?]
[Not at all.]
If you’re walking and suddenly the desert becomes a marshland, isn’t that just how the world naturally is?
And what relationship did a region’s latitude have with its climate anyway?
At Turan’s response, Lesion, whose expression was unreadable, spoke in a tone that suggested he was giving a bitter smile:
[Yes, that’s what you would think. Having been born and raised in this world, you’ve never seen a normal world. This is difficult to explain, but a normal world doesn’t work like that. Perhaps the reason you find it difficult to achieve scientific progress is because this world fundamentally doesn’t operate according to scientific principles.]
After making these difficult-to-understand statements, Lesion eventually shared several things with Turan.
He spoke of a world based on scientific civilization, a special form of entertainment called “games,” and the worldviews that existed within them.
[As an additional note, this world itself isn’t the worldview of the game we enjoyed. While the geography seems to have been transplanted directly, there were no other races, magical beasts, or beings like you mages.]
The conversation drifted into overly academic territory around the point where he suggested that while the world might be overlaid, the living beings might still be real.
It became a discussion about whether what one sees is truth or not, and what criteria determine true reality.
Turan wasn’t particularly fond of pondering such academic questions.
For him, if something could be perceived by his five senses, or six including his spiritual perception, then it was real.
[Actually, what I’m most curious about now is you, Family Head Parsha. There have been previous instances of natives of this world raising the banner of rebellion against us, but none have possessed such definite and powerful strength as you. And to be born without a ‘leash’ on top of that.]
[Do you think I’m not human?]
At Turan’s question, Lesion’s jewel-like eyes rounded.
Though uncertain, it seemed like he was grinning.
[That’s for you to decide, not us. Anyway, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to start by figuring that out. In our world, there are sayings like ‘know thyself’ or ‘know yourself and know your enemy, and you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles’…]
“Family Head, are you perhaps sleeping?”
A woman’s voice awakened Turan from his deep contemplation.
Only then did he realize he had been in the middle of a meal, and he blinked several times.
As his sunken consciousness resurfaced, he recalled that he had returned to Kalamaf the previous night and had gathered the people of the mansion for a banquet to announce his safe return.
The people who had been watching him with concern resumed their eating and chatting once they saw him come to his senses.
“I was just thinking about something.”
“I see. About what I asked earlier, do you know where Solif went? We had a puzzle we were going to solve together…”
Turan slightly frowned at the chatter from Berit Zahar, his fifth cousin and Zahar’s hostage-spy.
Her chattering mouth immediately closed at his expression.
“He’s been dispatched on business. Where he went is family confidential information that I can’t disclose.”
“Oh, I see…”
While an ordinary person might feel some sympathy for her dejected appearance, Turan couldn’t feel any such emotion toward her.
Behind that sullen face, he could sense hostility toward Turan for not yielding easily, and a determination to somehow uncover secrets.
Before long, Berit changed her target to Meisa and began fawning again.
“Sister, couldn’t you tell me? Please!”
“No. And why am I your sister?”
“The stronger one is the sister, of course. Is age really that important?”
Some people clicked their tongues at the bizarre spectacle of Berit, who was over thirty, calling the younger Meisa “sister” and acting cute.
Of course, since both were high-ranking nobles, there wasn’t much visible difference in their apparent ages.
As Meisa was looking uncomfortable with Berit’s clingy behavior, Bije, who had been eating food next to Turan, suddenly flew over and made a snapping sound with her beak, threatening Berit.
-Don’t bother Meisa!
Though only Turan could hear her voice, the intention was clear enough from her attitude, causing Berit to shriek and back away.
Those around them burst into laughter at the sight.
After the banquet ended, Turan walked with Meisa around the garden near the mansion, talking.
“How’s your head? Any pain since that day?”
“It’s fine. I didn’t expect you to ask about that first.”
“Then?”
“I thought you’d ask about the family situation or surrounding circumstances first.”
“I asked Asiz about those things separately yesterday. More than anything, your condition is more important.”
Meisa’s eyes widened momentarily at these direct words, then she smiled gently and shook her head.
“How’s Solif doing?”
“He seems to be managing well enough. He had already learned some governance methods as the original heir, and with the support of two great families, he has sufficient control over his vassals.”
Most importantly, many loyalists who had actively supported the former family head had been swept away in the recent battle.
Additionally, Turan had brought up the story of how Lesion had tried to forcibly restrain and execute Solif when he ran away.
No matter how absolute a family head’s authority might be or how much an heir must obey, execution for merely running away was excessive.
Naturally, Baraha’s remaining forces vehemently denied this as slander, but it emerged that several high-ranking nobles who had been mobilized for the pursuit had secretly spread such rumors.
It seemed that, being human, they couldn’t keep completely silent about the shocking fact that all of Solif’s rights would be stripped and he would be returned as a prisoner.
Thanks to this, an atmosphere had been created where Solif’s ascension was viewed not as “terrible impiety” but as “unavoidable self-defense.”
Of course, without clear evidence, it remained somewhat ambiguous justification, but such minor help was necessary for legitimizing rule.
“I hope things normalize there quickly. Then our dispatched forces can return.”
“It will probably take about half a year.”
After chatting while walking around the garden, the two entered a bedroom deep within the main house.
This was to conduct private matters that shouldn’t be seen by others.
“Ah, I really hate this…”
“But we have to do it. If you don’t want to experience something like last time again. Or maybe even worse.”
As Lesion had demonstrated, a small number of the ancient Freya gods possessed spirit forms even more powerful than Turan’s current state.
To restrain and handle such beings, Meisa and Solif’s help was essential.
“I know, I was just saying.”
Meisa sighed deeply before lying down on the bed and closing her eyes.
Before long, her spirit form, revealing the symbols of three bloodlines, appeared.
[On the bright side, with the methods I’ve learned this time, we can remove them faster. Probably less than three days if we do it daily.]
[Won’t that hurt?]
To Meisa’s somewhat frightened question, Turan shook his head with a sympathetic expression.
[Solif asked if we could use the previous removal method, even if it’s slower.]
Shortly after, spiritual screams that human ears couldn’t hear spread beyond the quarters.