Adopt 200

Episode 200

Among them, one child, paralyzed with fear, collapsed to the ground where he stood.

A smaller child tried desperately to lift him back up, but it was no use.

I barely restrained myself from shouting at the children to take cover and dashing out of the barrier.

Considering the distance between me and the children, any rash move could have drawn the Red Tower Lord’s attention.

I bit my lip, struggling to regain my composure.

If there was one fortunate thing, it was that the Red Tower Lord, caught up in battle with Lady Cherry and Giuseppe, had yet to notice the children.

Keeping a close watch on the chaos, I reached for the pistol fastened at my waist.

My only weapon.

Yet, without an enchanted magic circle, pure mana lacked offensive power, and my special ability worked only on monsters and beasts.

If I tried to evacuate the children carelessly, I risked hindering Lady Cherry and Giuseppe instead. Still, I couldn’t just stand here idly doing nothing.

Clenching the pistol tight, I quietly called to the cerberuses standing guard beside me.

“Kerr, Rebé, Vero.”

My loyal hounds, ears pricked despite their injuries, waited obediently for my command.

“When I give the signal, save the children. I’ll cover you.”

Kerr, the leader of the cerberuses, gave a low growl in reply.

I stroked his ruff lightly, timing our entry.

“Hey! Hurry up and get up!”

At last, the desperate shout of a child pierced through the sound of rain and echoed across the square. I shouted back with all my strength.

“Now!”

With a roar and a burst of flame, the cerberus, now a true hellhound, charged without hesitation.

I stepped half a pace out of the barrier, mustering every last reserve of mana.

Immediately, a crown of fire appeared above my head as my mana mingled wildly with the cerberus’s.

Unlike my resonance with Kao, fusing with the cerberus felt as though I was swallowing a ball of fire.

The sensation of an untamed beast clawing recklessly within me.

But I did not let go of the reins of rampaging mana.

I held out, and held out longer still…

Like a tug-of-war suddenly reaching its conclusion, I gained full control over the cerberus.

At that moment, the very nature of my mana changed. I had achieved ‘resonance’ with the cerberus.

In this state, magic circuits and mana vessels were meaningless to me.

I wielded the magical force blazing within the cerberus as if it were my own, channeling it into the pistol.

Perhaps finally registering the children’s presence, the Red Tower Lord lashed out a whip in their direction, aiming for the cerberus sprinting towards them.

Without hesitation, I pulled the trigger.

Clack—bang!

The crimson whip, poised to strike the cerberus’s back, vanished instantly, consumed by the mana bullet I fired.

It was a force of attack utterly unlike the binding nature of my usual magic.

While I fired several more rounds, the cerberus seized the children by their collars and leapt easily onto the roof of a low building.

Unlike with Kao, whose eyes I could share, resonance with the cerberus allowed me to wield his magic as my own, but only for a limited time.

Once I confirmed the children were safe, I counted the remaining seconds, packing as much magical force as possible into the pistol.

“More. Just a bit more.”

The compressed magic heated the pistol until it was searing in my hand.

“Ah!”

The heat lightly burned my palm, but I gritted my teeth and endured.

If I could land even a single blow on that wretched tower lord, it would all be worth it.

Sugar, who had been hiding in my rainy hat all the while, cried out quickly, but regrettably, I had not a single gold coin to spare.

Still, I wasn’t uneasy. Sugar’s blessing would be almost excessive just for blasting away the Red Tower Lord.

Calming myself, I suppressed the pain and levelled the muzzle at my target.

Just as my resonance with the cerberus was about to end—

Click.

The pistol fired a blazing bullet of condensed magic.

The heat was so intense I could feel a portion of my hair singe.

A tremendous roar and recoil shook my whole body, sending me sprawling backward.

Anticipating the pain, I squeezed my eyes shut, but instead of the wet stones of the square, I landed in a solid, heated embrace.

“Master, thank goodness you’re safe.”

The voice was so familiar I knew instantly who was holding me, even without looking back.

I could feel Cheshire’s arms trembling as he hugged me tightly.

Having seen the black magic circle fall into the square, he must have rushed here out of concern, but now was no time to rejoice at our reunion.

“Cheshire, now’s not the time.”

The mana bullet I fired had been so powerful it instantly vaporized all the rainwater in the square.

I assumed that once the steam cleared, the Red Tower Lord would be sprawled in utter ruin. That was how powerful the attack had been.

“Ugh. That damn—thing…”

But when I saw the Red Tower Lord still standing, even with a gaping, soccer ball-sized hole in his right chest, I realized I’d greatly underestimated the situation.

“He’s a complete monster.”

How on earth were we supposed to stop the Red Tower Lord?

Just as unease made my shoulders tremble—

“It’s all right, Master.”

Cheshire, resting his forehead on my shoulder, finally raised his head and gently pulled me by the hand.

“It’s almost time-out.”

Time-out?

“I’ll tear this city to shreds before your very eyes!”

The Red Tower Lord’s curse-laden shout echoed through the square.

Yet Cheshire walked toward him without a trace of hesitation, and even Lady Cherry and Giuseppe seemed so transfixed by something that they didn’t glance our way.

It was then I noticed something odd about the Red Tower Lord’s condition.

Immediately after attaining immortality, his wounds had closed in an instant. But now, battered and with a gaping hole in his chest, his injuries showed no sign of healing.

“This… what is this… urgh…”

Finally realizing the state he was in, the Red Tower Lord coughed up blood, clutching at his chest.

His once-small frame began to crumble, like a block of ice left beneath the sun.

“Seeker…!”

That single word was the last he ever spoke.

By the time I reached Lady Cherry’s side, the Red Tower Lord had already lost even a human form.

“What… what happened to him?”

I pointed at the lump of flesh, grotesque and alone atop what remained of his tattered robes, and asked.

“That is the end of an imperfect immortality,” Cheshire replied, drawing every eye in the room.

His words gave us no clear answer, but inspired an instinctive sense of revulsion.

“He may look like that, but he is not yet dead,” Cheshire continued.

“What?”

“The dark magic that granted immortality to the Red Tower Lord demanded too small a price. Only a handful of priests’ lives, nothing more.”

“So the black magic failed?”

“Most likely.”

Even with Cheshire’s answer, none of us could move, our gaze locked for a long time on the sudden and unbelievable end of the battle.

Not even the torrential rain could cleanse the ominous feeling that kept us rooted to that spot for ages.

---

The relentless rain finally let up by noon.

The city, revealed beneath the bright sun, looked as if it had survived a war—devastation everywhere.

“Did you see the clock tower, half-destroyed? It’s a miracle the casualties weren’t worse.”

“Indeed. Not just the clock tower—the square looked like it had been struck by lightning dozens of times. This storm must have been truly wicked.”

“And yet, according to the Thompson brothers, it wasn’t the storm, but the doing of some wizard. They say a three-headed dog the size of a house saved them.”

“Ha! The brothers must have shared the same nightmare.”

Oblivious to the fierce battle waged the previous night in Valico, the townspeople busied themselves blaming the storm as they set about rebuilding.

But unlike the energetic cityscape passing by the window, the inside of the carriage was thick with tense silence.

Before we set off, Cheshire had quietly shared the true story of the incident—something he hadn’t dared mention in front of Giuseppe.