Necromancer Of The Black Bible (52)

For the past six days, Damir had been desperate.

He had followed Investigator Sanchez’s advice and attended church, but his daughter’s condition deteriorated rapidly.

Her heartbeat weakened, and her breathing grew faint.

A few physicians drawn by the bounty remained, but many left after warning that she could die at any moment.

Many magicians and shamans came as well, but all in vain.

Even the vast sum of a hundred thousand gold was powerless before his daughter’s death.

On top of that, his promise to Investigator Sanchez was to attend church faithfully for a month.

He even gave him an attendance sheet.

But his daughter’s condition was so precarious that even a single day was uncertain, let alone a month.

In the end, Damir sent word to Sanchez through his younger brother, Ray.

Begging him to save his daughter.

Saying he would do anything if only she were saved.

Fortunately, Ray knew Sanchez personally, and upon hearing the situation, Sanchez promised to connect them to Raiernov—but there was no word from Raiernov’s side.

He heard that Raiernov had entered indefinite seclusion.

‘Seclusion at a time like this!’

It was common for monks to go into seclusion for training in the Kallios Theocracy.

But to do so when his daughter’s life hung by a thread—truly the heavens were indifferent.

He felt pathetic for even briefly trying to believe in God.

Damir looked at his daughter lying in bed.

Seeing her pale face and slender wrists made his chest ache as though it would tear.

Her breathing was barely audible, and only the faint rise and fall of her chest confirmed she was still alive.

Damir held his daughter’s hand and sobbed for a long time.

Yes.

This was reality.

No matter how desperate one is, things beyond one’s power never happen on their own.

Even the Blackleaf family’s motto spoke to the same truth.

<Only our footsteps make the path>

Damir looked up at the motto hanging on the annex wall.

Written in bold hand, it had been penned personally by his father, Cain Blackleaf, before he left this place.

Thinking of his father, Damir cooled his mind.

‘My daughter is dying now.’

Perhaps now he would have to accept his daughter’s death.

How was he to accept the death of the one who was his entire world?

How was he to go on living in this world?

The path he could not see at all in despair and panic began to show as he calmed his heart.

Damir wiped his daughter Erian’s forehead with a wet cloth at his side.

Her forehead was so pale it had turned bluish.

Not just her forehead.

Her once-plump cheeks had sunken, and her lips were tinged black.

Damir rubbed her forehead, face, and lips several times and muttered.

“Perhaps it’s time to let you go now.”

Just as he finished saying that.

The annex door opened and someone entered.

It was Ray.

He spoke with a brightened face.

“Brother. Please come out. He has arrived.”

“He?”

Damir still looked uncertain.

Ray shouted, sounding exasperated at him.

“Hurry on out, Brother! He is waiting.”

Damir was pulled outside by Ray and soon saw.

An elderly priest wearing a dark-brown silk robe.

There was only one group of people who wore such robes.

“Surely… High Priest Raiernov?”

“That’s right. I came because I heard your daughter was in critical condition.”

Raiernov passed Damir and entered the annex where his daughter lay.

Then he spoke sternly.

“Let no one in until I come out. And…”

He whispered softly so only Damir could hear.

“I don’t know who told you what, but I cannot cure every illness. If I can heal her, I will; if not, prepare your heart. Understand?”

Damir could only answer in stunned agreement.

Kallios Theocracy Branch of the Blackleaf Merchant Guild.

It took less than half an hour from the First Monastery to here.

A carriage drawn by six fine horses was already prepared, and in front stood Ray Blackleaf, whom I had saved before.

He explained everything inside the carriage.

“Among the goods in this transport carriage was a Hundred-Year Ginseng. My elder brother and branch leader Damir shipped it to treat his daughter Erian. Even here, he had a renowned healing priest brew it, but Erian’s condition worsened.”

“Side effects of the Hundred-Year Ginseng…”

The Hundred-Year Ginseng has long been called a cure-all herb.

But because so few specimens have been found, no precise research exists.

It is not properly known whether people were truly healed by the herb or what its properties really are.

Thus many doctors and priests use the Hundred-Year Ginseng as an excuse when faced with an incurable disease.

They say, “If we had the Hundred-Year Ginseng, it might be cured.”

I carefully examined the girl’s condition and suddenly had a question.

‘In the previous life, the Hundred-Year Ginseng never arrived here. Ray’s transport carriage must have been robbed by bandits at Shadowpeak. Yet even then Erian died around the same time as now.’

Coming here confirmed it.

Looking at Erian lying there, my brow tingled.

I closed my eyes and focused my mind, and the tingling in my brow flared open.

With it, the previous life of this timeline began to appear.

Ray Blackleaf who never arrived.

Erian, who went daily to the city gate waiting for him, one day happened to meet Sanchez.

Sanchez and Erian began meeting at the same time every day and became close.

After several months passed like that.

Erian fell ill and could no longer go to the city gate,

and Sanchez found this strange.

Worried, Sanchez finally went to the Blackleaf Merchant Guild and heard the whole story there.

The Guild Master Damir begged him to treat his daughter, and Sanchez conveyed this to Raiernov.

Raiernov brought Sanchez and others here and began a healing prayer.

But in the end, Erian died.

From there on it was what I had already seen.

Sanchez crying before the girl’s corpse still felt poignant even seeing it again.

His tear-drenched eyes were the same as my master’s in the previous life.

Seeing that gaze, I came to a conclusion.

“The Hundred-Year Ginseng didn’t kill Erian. It merely hastened a death already fated.”

Its potent medicinal energy must have acted as poison.

Energy the body cannot withstand is itself poison.

As I reached that conclusion and opened my eyes, Erian’s spirit beside me asked.

How is it? Can you heal me?

[I’ll have to examine you now.]

I looked down at Erian.

Pale face, darkened lips. Faint breathing.

Her pulse was extremely weak.

It would be no surprise if she stopped breathing right now.

‘No matter who comes, saving her would be hard.’

If even the High Priest Raiernov of the Theocracy failed, that said it all.

The priests’ specialty, the Blessing of Healing, works well on wounds but not on disease.

Some priests can heal diseases as well, but never with full certainty.

With a combination of blessings, herbs, and potions, they could cure mild illnesses, but in all my past life, I had almost never seen cases of serious diseases like cancer or stroke being healed.

Moreover, Erian’s very lifespan was short. Unless one were the Demon King, saving such a child would be impossible.

But I had a feeling.

A feeling that I might be able to heal her.

This child didn’t seem to be suffering from an ordinary illness.

Above all, the scent told me so.

She didn’t have the scent of sickness.

‘That means…’

There was something others could not see.

I closed my eyes again and opened up my extrasensory perception.

Then Erian’s body began to appear anew.

Her entire body became transparent, leaving only its form.

Her skin and organs were the same—outlined in fine lines like a drawing.

I examined each of her organs one by one.

A faintly twitching heart, lungs weakly contracting and expanding, and other organs pulsing and quivering.

I felt something was different about the way they moved compared to others.

‘Their movements are excessively suppressed.”

As though bore down by something heavy.

Why?

Why were her organs being weighed down like this?

With that question, I examined Erian’s heart.

And at that moment, I discovered something.

Something clutching her heart.

Looking closely, it resembled a hand.

A child’s hand.

That hand, coming from somewhere, was gripping Erian’s heart mercilessly.

‘What is this?’

[That is…]

As Equinox began to explain, I stopped him.

[Quiet. I’ll handle this myself.]

I didn’t want to rely on Equinox’s help forever.

I was his master.

What I could do, I would do myself.

If I accepted unnecessary help, I might end up playing into his designs.

I wouldn’t hand over the initiative of my life that way.

Above all, if I failed, I would bear responsibility. If I did what someone else told me and failed, I would regret it deeply.

I didn’t want to leave such regret behind.

‘I’ve already found the hint.’

With the formation of the third Mana Ring, I had gained a new ability.

The ability to “see the remnants of time.”

I wasn’t sure if I had gained any other abilities, but the only ability I needed now was my extrasensory perception.

And extrasensory perception changes its scope depending on where I focus.

I focused on the hand clutching Erian’s heart.

And I tried to discern whose hand it was.

At that moment.

I saw the arm connected to that hand. Following it up, I soon saw the face.

The face of a mischievous boy.

He grinned at me.

[Who are you?]

Huh? You can see me?

There was no need to answer his question. I was staring straight into his eyes.

Seeing my serious expression, the boy quickly dropped his grin.

Don’t look at me like that, it’s unpleasant.

[Why are you doing this?]

At my question, the boy briefly looked at the heart he was holding.

Then he spoke.

Because it’s mine.

[What?]

It was mine to begin with.

[Why do you say that heart is yours?]

At my question, the boy’s eyes changed.

Suddenly his two eyes turned into a fierce red light, and he spoke in a different tone.

I’m Erian’s twin brother. Erian killed me and was born safely into the world. She’s lived for more than ten years now—looking so happy. But I wasn’t. No one could see me, no one could speak with me, and it was suffocating. So I decided. I’ll take back the chance she gained through my death. I’ll make sure she never smiles so brightly again.

In his voice, I felt a deep, searing resentment.

That resentment was so hot it began to scorch the surroundings.