Shepherd Wizard (Novel) - Chapter 73

Chapter 73

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Though Turan wasn’t familiar with politics, having rarely mingled with people, he had learned enough about its basic concepts.

The act of flattering superiors, manipulating colleagues and subordinates, entrapping enemies with schemes to secure one’s position.

While ordinary humans naturally had to conform to society to survive and thus were subject to such political logic, even powerful nobles couldn’t escape it.

They had to maintain relationships with family members and nobles from other houses that made up the larger society.

And such political structures became more complex and tangled as the group grew larger. The internal politics of great houses, nobles among nobles, were more sinister than ordinary people could imagine.

Over the past few days, Turan had wandered around during the day disguised as a young knight to identify which nobles lived in which mansions, then infiltrated their mansions at night to raid their studies and collect information.

Though each had creative ways of defending their studies, fortunately none were impenetrable.

Perhaps they thought their studies were their safest spaces.

The more he dug there, the more foul stories emerged.

Taking bribes to influence distribution of magical devices and power within the family was barely worth mentioning.

There were countless stories of framing others for crimes they didn’t commit or faking the strength of magical beasts that needed hunting, treating human lives like toys.

There were even implications, though indirect, of ordering assassinations.

After reading and combining many such documents, Turan learned there were three factions within Arabion.

If he had to name them: the Elder faction, Middle-aged faction, and Youth faction.

The Elder faction consisted mainly of those between 300-400 years old, slightly younger than or the same age as the current family head.

Though widely respected for achievements built over long years, they rarely involved themselves in family matters.

The second was the Middle-aged faction that Kadram belonged to, nobles between 100-300 years old.

They were essentially the family’s core, monopolizing important roles and wielding all kinds of power.

Notably, they actively supported the family head’s partner from House Nagin and her children while being hostile to Meisa.

Last was the Youth faction centered on promising young nobles.

Naturally the weakest of the three factions, they supported Meisa who should become the next family head, but failed to form proper bonds with her.

Among these, Turan mainly raided the Middle-aged faction’s studies, confirming they were systematically isolating Meisa.

First, they used the Zahar noble Leto to make Meisa constantly suspicious of Zahar assassins targeting her.

Meanwhile, they created an atmosphere suggesting the assassins were just delusions, treating Meisa like she was insane.

Not only that, they sent away all servants who had built some friendship with Meisa, and even harassed or killed young people from the Youth faction who tried to approach her.

This was why she lived in a nearly ruined mansion with just a few elderly maids.

He could understand why Meisa had fled to House Berk’s mansion back then.

They probably left them alone because they were hesitant to touch a vassal house, or feared Meisa might actually commit suicide if they destroyed even that.

Fortunately, there were no signs they specially treated or communicated with House Berk, suggesting they weren’t allied.

If they had been, it would have been terrible not just for Meisa but for Asiz too.

Combining this newly discovered information helped explain the meaning of the letter from Meisa’s half-brother Renod.

‘Based on circumstances… it seems the Middle-aged faction killed Meisa’s mother and younger brother.’

Though not written in the family tree, Meisa had one younger brother.

In 2207, ten years ago, he died with his mother at just eight years old before even awakening magical power.

And Renod’s letter was written that same year.

Wasn’t this too coincidental to have no connection?

‘Officially it was ruled an accident.’

Meisa’s mother, Orin Berk, was a lowest-tier noble who had barely awakened bloodline abilities, yet received the family head’s favor for bearing him a powerful child.

But one day she died in an accident and was simply buried as if she had never existed.

Even her relative Asiz only heard she “died in an accident” without knowing what kind of accident.

Given multiple documents mentioning how the legal wife from House Nagin found the existence of a concubine who bore an heir-level noble unpleasant, and that her supporters controlled a Zahar noble, it wasn’t surprising they were involved in this accident.

Moreover, while raiding Middle-aged faction nobles’ mansions, Turan even found circumstantial evidence they had “dealt with” Orin.

[Used Leto to eliminate mother and child.]

[Confirmed.]

Though it didn’t specify whose mother and child, given the document was from 2207, the context was clear.

Later he found content criticizing this act too.

[Mother and child was too much. Target broke.]

[Was necessary for isolation.]

[Find way to recover.]

Meisa’s habit of refusing food seemed to stem from her mother and brother’s deaths, and their expression “broke” suggested they weren’t pleased with this.

Probably because it worsened the condition of the body the god was supposed to use.

Yet they continued complaining how difficult it was to overcome this while maintaining Meisa’s isolation which they felt they had to continue.

Through this, Turan became half-convinced there was a divine being behind the Middle-aged faction.

Just as they had shaped Solif into a specific personality, they were clearly trying to manipulate Meisa’s personality by isolating her.

‘In the first place, tormenting Meisa like this makes no sense without such backing.’

Being this hostile to the next generation of power – a confirmed successor heir with no replacement – was literally suicidal.

Moreover, with the current family head already aging, the moment power transferred the entire Middle-aged faction could be purged without seeming strange.

Yet they did this, likely because the Middle-aged faction knew the secret of soul exchange.

After all, once a Freya divine tribe soul inhabited her, there would be no need to account for all the unreasonable treatment past Meisa experienced.

No, the divine being might even be the one who ordered making the body transfer easier… Killing Meisa’s mother and brother was probably also part of the plan to isolate her.

Though none of the documents here explicitly showed the family head ordering anything, without his tacit approval, no matter how many influential people gathered, it would be impossible to persecute the heir this much.

The problem was there was no clear evidence of soul exchange or killing Meisa’s family.

Perhaps because they felt unsafe leaving even such secrets explicitly recorded in studies, despite being personal spaces, there was nothing written about that.

‘Should I gather more evidence, or tell Meisa right away?’

After much contemplation, Turan decided to make proper contact with Meisa.

Having thoroughly searched most influential nobles’ homes, he would now need to either raid the family head’s main building or directly capture and torture Middle-aged faction nobles for information, both too risky without Meisa’s cooperation first.

He had perfectly prepared materials to convince her.

Using thought-writing that drew portraits with ash and paper, he had copied all relevant documents.

Given Meisa’s current situation, just delivering these materials should be enough to gain her trust.

* * *

Turan chose to contact Meisa on exactly the tenth night since infiltrating here.

During the day there were too many people around, increasing chances of drawing attention from unexpected noise, and it would be harder to hide and escape if things went wrong.

Leaving the mansion where he had been secretly staying, Turan flew toward Meisa’s mansion while maximizing the holy relic’s senses.

Countless living beings within the main house entered his senses.

After checking them one by one for a while, realizing he still couldn’t find his target, Turan let out a soft sigh.

‘Still not here this time either?’

Over the past few days, whenever he had time, Turan had used the holy relic’s senses to check for other races here.

Based on past dark elf necromancers, if light elf soul mages existed, they should be detectable too.

He could form two hypotheses from this.

Either they didn’t need soul mages to exchange souls, or they kept them outside the main house or in special spaces that couldn’t be detected.

He personally thought it was the latter.

From experience so far, the Imitator holy relic’s senses were often blocked in unexpectedly impossible situations.

Lost in such thoughts while approaching Meisa’s mansion, Turan realized she wasn’t in her mansion.

At 2 AM, not a time normal people would have business, yet she was gone.

‘Where did she go?’

Perhaps she had slept too much during the day and couldn’t sleep at night, so went for a walk?

Fortunately, since Meisa’s presence was so massive, he could easily find her by expanding his senses.

Come to think of it, her leaving her house was actually a perfect opportunity.

He had planned to just secretly leave related materials in her room, worried there might be secret surveillance systems even the holy relic couldn’t detect, but outside he could actually speak to her.

Flying toward her, what appeared before Turan’s eyes was a large bakery wafting old bread and flour smells.

This building that supplied freshly baked bread throughout Arabion’s main house was eerily empty with all bakers gone home and lights off.

Following Meisa’s presence inside, Turan quickened his pace at strange sounds from within.

“Ugh, ugh…”

The voice was naturally Meisa’s.

Surprisingly, she was forcefully stuffing leftover bread from the bakery into her mouth.

Then she tightly closed her mouth and covered it with her hands, but soon after couldn’t hold it and vomited everything out.

“Haa…”

After catching her breath, Meisa burned what she had vomited with incredibly hot ignition magic leaving not even smoke, then grabbed another piece of bread and stuffed it in her mouth.

It was pitiful watching her continue this act without stopping despite repeated retching making her eyes stream with tears.

Turan finally realized what Meisa was doing.

In a situation where she could barely eat food, she was clearly trying to forcibly replenish nutrients somehow.

‘This…’

It wasn’t something that should be shown to others – should he pretend he hadn’t seen and wait for another chance to speak to her?

After brief contemplation, Turan dropped his stealth.

Not only would pretending not to have seen after seeing everything be closer to deception, but more importantly, comfortable chances to talk might be rare if not now.

Once morning or daytime came, Meisa would return to that empty mansion.

Compared to that, this bakery was quite solidly built with much better soundproofing than that ruined mansion, and above all, less likely to have separate surveillance systems.

“Meisa.”

Startled by the sudden call, Meisa turned around.

When Turan quickly raised both hands to show he had no intention to fight, the lightning gathered at her fingertips dispersed into the air with crackling sounds.

Judging by that, if he had taken a direct hit, it would have dealt significant damage even with the Guardian magical device fully activated.

“Turan? How are you here? Wait, is this… an illusion?”

Perhaps because someone who shouldn’t be here suddenly appeared.

Meisa carefully poked Turan’s shoulder with her finger to confirm he really existed.

If not for what he had seen earlier, he might have smiled slightly at such behavior.

“It’s real. But how are you here, no, more importantly… did you see everything just now?”

“It wasn’t intentional. I’m sorry.”

Meisa’s extremely thin face made reading expressions harder than others, but he could guess it mixed anger and shame.

Natural, since a young lady wouldn’t want others seeing her repeatedly eating and vomiting food, especially if it related to personal emotional wounds.

Shortly after, the emotions carved on Meisa’s face changed to shock and wariness.

She seemed to have finally deeply considered what it meant for Turan to be here now.

“How did you get in here? Did you come with Asiz? If you came as a guest, I should have heard about it…”

“I snuck in. But first, could you look at this? It’s important.”… While casually mentioning something that would shock others – secretly entering a great house’s stronghold – Turan immediately held out documents copied from Arabion nobles’ mansions.

Even then, Meisa took and opened them instead of questioning further.

“What is this?”

“Information obtained from nobles here.”

The truth was for her to see and judge herself.

After saying that much and closing his mouth, Meisa looked back and forth between the documents and Turan before frantically scanning the documents with her large protruding eyes.

Turan lightly added:

“For reference, the Leto mentioned there is indeed that maid in the main house. She’s a noble with Zahar bloodline.”

Though Meisa’s whole body flinched at this shocking statement, she didn’t stop reading the documents.

She seemed deeply immersed in their contents already.

After about ten minutes passed thus, Meisa crumpled the papers she was holding and burst out laughing.

Her skinny hands trembled.

“I knew it, I knew it. Of course. I wasn’t crazy after all…”

Though worried she might faint from intense emotions, fortunately Meisa was managing herself quite well despite streaming tears.

It was amazing how such a thin body could produce so many tears.

Shortly after, somewhat calmed, Meisa looked at Turan and said:

“So, will you tell me now? How you got this and why you came to show it to me.”

Unlike her words demanding explanation, her blue eyes already held complete trust.

Turan could feel that Meisa had desperately wanted this information, and thus deeply trusted him for bringing what she desired.