Chapter 568 He Wants Eins
Chapter 568 He Wants Eins
I decided to try acting dumb, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Fuckface smirked at me, “Do you think I will not recognise a summon when I see one? I’ve spent half my life researching them! I know them better than anyone else does!”
I blinked at him, “Wait… Do you mean those Shadow Devourers are Shadow Summons? But they drop Mana Crystals when you kill them?”
Wait… Oh… I think I can guess what he’s doing…
“Ha ha! That is my crowning achievement!” He boasted proudly. “Look at you, you’re only able to call out one Shadow Summon at a time, right? But I’m able to create an army of them on my own! That’s what I have achieved that no other Umbramancers could!”
“Hmm… I see… Instead of just using your own magic to summon a Shadow Summon… You’re making use of Liquid Mana and a corpse to anchor the summon physically by turning them into pseudo monsters, am I right?” I asked.
“Heh, heh… Dare I ask if you’re also a Magic researcher as well? I thought you were just a simple maid of some noble family.”
I elected not to answer him.
But that didn’t stop him from continuing his monologue on his own, “But you are right~ I had always wondered why Shadow Summons are only limited to one? If you have enough mana, one should be able to summon more right? But I realised that it might not be an issue of having enough mana or not but something related to a person’s soul.”
He then gestured to Eins, “You have anchored your summon’s existence to yourself, correct? Because of that, you can only have one because having your soul be used to support both an existence beside your own is already something that is pushing your limits. That is why Shadow Summons aren’t permanent either.”
Well… I hate to tell this guy that I’m basically a living embodiment that proves his hypothesis wrong…
Also, you can stop peeking at me, Gwen, I know what you’re thinking.
Unfortunately for us, Fuckface was still not done talking.
“Now as you had guessed, I managed to overcome that limitation by making use of Liquid Mana and a body as a substitute to create my Shadow Summons! I transformed them into pseudo monsters themselves so their existence is not anchored to my soul! Now I can create hundreds of them and they will not disappear!”
I tilted my head, “Why do you even want more of them? Are you lonely or something? Do you need them to fill the void in your heart because you were an outcast or what?”
He furrowed his brow, “Don’t you understand? In order to create a Kingdom, you need people to help you run it. But people might not always agree with you and they will have their own selfish needs and wants too. My Shadow Devourers are loyal to me and only me. They cannot be bribed, coerced or brainwashed to go against me. I will be able to create the perfect Kingdom with them!”
I suddenly had a sense of deja vu and I realised this was what Sebastian had told me about after he learned of my Shadow Guards.
That made me realise what this Fuckface actually wanted here.
“I’m guessing you realised these Shadow Devourers could not actually help you manage a Kingdom by themselves because they do not possess sentience. They only run on instinct because you created them as monsters, am I right?”
“Hahaha! I knew it! You are right of course, which is why I want to know how you created your Shadow Summon? Yours is clearly special! I was watching her and she was obviously self-aware and could make her own decisions! If I can replicate that on all my Shadow Devourers, then it would be perfect! That is the only thing I am missing!”
I crossed my arms, “And even if that is true for my case… What makes you think that I will tell you how I did it?”
He smirked, “Do you still not realise your own position? You are trapped in this Dungeon that I have full control over. If I do not want you to escape, then you have no escape! What’s more… You are also hopelessly outnumbered here! When I said I have hundreds of Shadow Devourers, I am not exaggerating! And people you saw in those prison cells above? They can also be transformed into more Shadow Devourers! Do you think you can beat an army by yourself?”
“Yes,” I answered without hesitation.
He probably wasn’t expecting that answer from me because he looked stunned for a moment before scowling at me, “Trying to act tough huh? No matter. Once I have brought you to the depths of despair, I’ll chain you up and torture the truth out of you if I have to. It is only a matter of time!”
Fuckface then threw something on the ground which created a cloud of smoke to hide himself from view.
When the smoke cleared, it revealed that he was no longer there.
How dramatic.
The moment he was gone, Olgar and Thorn turned to look at Eins before looking at me, their eyes filled with curiosity.
Olgar pointed at Eins, “She’s… A Shadow Summon?”
I scratched my cheek, “Well… Yes and no… It’s kind of complicated but I guess the short answer is that I found a way to improve my Shadow Summoning spell I guess?”
“So she’s not actually your cousin?” Thorn asked.
I shook my head.
Gwen rolled her eyes, “I already told you that you didn’t stand a chance. Believe me now?”
Stand a chance with what? Were they thinking about recruiting her to their party or something? Well I guess in that case, there really wouldn’t be a chance for them to do that since she won’t join them after all.
The two male Rejmars were in the midst of falling into despair when the walls around the room, including the one that had blocked the stairs, suddenly slid up, revealing Shadow Devourers hiding behind them.
At the same time, I spotted the Renegade Shadow Devourers that were chasing us from earlier starting their descent down the stairs towards us.
Fuck, I knew this place was a trap.
Do I just call out the rest of my Shadow Guards here? But that Fuckface would definitely be watching me right now so I don’t want to show him that I could actually summon more than one if I can help it…
Is there a way out of here?
Wait… Those Shadow Devourers that came from the wall… Those must lead somewhere right?
“Everyone close your eyes!” I shouted.
I didn’t hesitate and reached my hand up to cast [Light Flash], causing a bright flash of light to fill the room for a brief moment.
All of the Shadow Devourers recoiled as though they were physically struck, a few of them even taking several steps back.
I once again picked up Gwen in my arms and Eins followed suit with Olgar and Thorn, both of us dashing towards the closet Shadow Devourer to reach the wall behind it.
The monster was still dazed so I kicked it out of the way before running past it and entering through the narrow corridor that it had stepped out of.
I heard the sound of several claws scratching against something and I peeked behind to see the Shadow Devourers had recovered and were trying to squeeze into the hole to come after us.
Thankfully, because of how small the hole was, they ended up getting in each other’s way as they tried to squeeze inside.
That probably will delay them for a while but I wasn’t counting on them to be stuck there forever.
After running for a while, we found a doorway at the end and rushed out to it, finding ourselves in a junction with three paths leading away from us.
The scratching noise was getting louder and I knew without turning back that the Shadow Devourers had managed to squeeze into the tunnel to chase after us.
Not having an idea of where to go, I simply chose to turn right and started running in that direction with Eins keeping up with me.
A loud crash came from behind and I guessed that those monsters must have reached the end of the tunnel as well.
“Please allow me, Aster,” Gwen spoke up suddenly, her hand reaching under her skirt to pull out several throwing knives.
Do all our maids hide weapons under their skirts or something?!
She threw those knives even while I was running with her in my arms, a dull thud from behind told me that her aim had been true.
The sound of the knives hitting their targets was quickly followed by a crash before several more could be heard.
I chanced a look back to see another pileup of Shadow Devourers like what I had done with the Renegades back on the floor above us.
“Nice throw,” I praised.
“I am honoured, Aster. But are we just going to keep running?”
I was about to answer her when Eins called out from the front, “Master, there are stairs up ahead.”
I looked up and sure enough, there was a set of stairs like she said. I realised that these were the Dungeon stairs so that meant we could actually use this to escape!
Right as I came to that conclusion, the floor below us suddenly disappeared and I found myself falling down with the rest of my companions.
Fuck! Does he have control over the Dungeon traps too?!