Chapter 197: Eleven

[Mental Load: 11%]

A Dragon.

The great mystical creatures of the world that had appeared merely in webnovels had finally shown themselves before Cillian.

Those eyes and that mouth that breathed Dragon Fire… it was fascinating.

Though by the end of it, he had experienced death through it.

Cillian wanted to think that it was obvious for a Dragon to show itself here when there were already dwarves, elves, beastfolk, and monsters that were about to appear in this world through the gates.

So why not already add a dragon?

‘Amazing…!’

Even though Cillian’s head was hurting due to the mental load burdening his mind from prying into the possible deaths of one person, his heart pounded with excitement, akin to a child who had found a toy he could play with for a long time.

[Death Flag Probe #1 Ended]

‘Show me more…!’

[Death Flag Probe #2 Starting]

Soon, the scenery changed.

He wasn’t chained from before, as ‘Darwin’ found himself high in the sky, a pair of wings rooted on his back as he surveyed the situation below.

A part of Xesie’s Sorcery Academy had already been destroyed, with a few bodies scattered everywhere, but it wasn’t the worst thing that could have happened. The changes implemented in the Academy had reduced casualties at the very least, but there were still casualties.

Below, there were also a lot of Sorcerers with their spells conjured and aimed towards him.

‘What’s happening now? Why…’

Why was he flying?

Was he thinking about the dragon so much that ‘Darwin’ had become one? And why were the Sorcerers aiming their spells towards him?

But every thought that came to ‘Darwin’ immediately came to a halt when his back was struck by a huge spear that passed through his chest.

‘Ugh!’

‘Darwin’ started falling from the air once he lost control of his ability to fly after being struck in the chest.

Thud!

It didn’t take long before he landed on the ground before hearing shouts coming from all directions.

“It somehow lost focus!”

“Why? Why would it start losing focus now?! Do monsters get tired?!”

“Do you have to ask that now?! Go, aim your spells at it! Fire!”

‘Darwin’ received the brunt of the attacks coming from everywhere, all of them targeting him. Somehow, he was still confused about this particular probe.

Why were they attacking ‘him’?

‘A monster?’

Soon, the smoke from the mixture of spells faded away as ‘Darwin’ looked around, only to see the fearful faces of the students as they got ready to cast spells at any moment.

Limping on the ground and having no way to escape, feeling that this was what the students of the Sorcery Academy wanted, ‘Darwin’ was about to speak with them when his eyes narrowed at a huge broken window.

Cracks ran across it, showing his reflection in broken imagery.

[Mental Load increased by 1%]

A disfigured face with a huge build and a pair of black wings sprouted from his back. There were no words to describe him aside from the fact that he had turned into a literal monster, the result of a Berserk State from a Piece.

That monster was the current ‘him’.

‘Darwin… lost control?’

Darwin was a Ruiner who had lost control and wreaked havoc because he had been unable to revert himself back to normal.

[Mental Load increased by 1%]

Cillian shuddered as he remembered Darwin’s words back then about why he had been able to take on this suicide mission of hunting down the Shepherds.

‘Is this what he meant when he said his condition wasn’t good? Because he was on the verge of losing control?’

That…

That didn’t sound too good.

His guard was literally a walking time bomb that might either go crazy at any second or explode, which would result in this probe in the near future.

However, as far as Cillian could remember, he hadn’t seen the crazy principal use any Ruiner ability.

No, in the first place, Cillian didn’t know that he was a Ruiner. Though he had heavily considered it before, now it had become true.

Yet, for him to lose control, it only meant that Darwin had abused himself by using his Ruiner powers.

Or was he at least forced to become the monster that he was?

‘Motherfucker…’

Cillian didn’t know, but he couldn’t care less right now.

Death was approaching, and it soon appeared.

The students of the Sorcery Academy wasted all their spells to finally kill him after the time frame in which he had suddenly ‘lost’ himself, becoming docile all of a sudden.

[Death Flag Probe #2 Ended]

[Mental Load increased by 5%]

The first death was caused by a dragon.

The second death was caused by students after he lost control of his Ruiner powers.

[Death Flag Probe #3 Starting]

What would his third death show?

[Mental Load: 18%]

‘Darwin’ began to look through the last death he had decided he would watch from another perspective.

“Stop Death Flag Probing—”

[Death Flag Probing couldn’t be stopped while the probed target was on display.]

Just as he was about to ask his system about stopping the display, which the system still answered since he had managed to get the words out, ‘Darwin’ had to stop once he realized that a group of people in black robes was looking at him while he sat at a table, with one white-robed individual sitting in the middle.

“You couldn’t live up to your past, so you started searching for it again, which only led us to you.”

[Death Flag]

The White Shepherd spoke rather hoarsely. Rather than being a man, she was a woman. Her brown eyes stared down at him as she continued.

“You never learn, do you, Darwin Moose? Now look around you. Their deaths are your fault.”

‘Darwin’ looked around and saw the lifeless bodies of Ulrich, Meister, and nine more people sitting around the table, their heads placed on the table as if they had just finished a dinner.

Yet none of them were alive.

Everyone that ‘Darwin’ had met at that abandoned house had died—

‘No, wait. Eleven?’

If Cillian had to exclude himself from the meeting that had ensued back in the abandoned house, there should have been at least twelve people present among these piles of bodies if the Shepherds had managed to track down and hunt their entire group in one sitting.

‘Someone’s missing… Someone—who?’

[Mental Load increased by 1%]

“Hey, are you that heartless to use them as you please?”

‘Darwin’ continued to ignore the White Shepherd, who didn’t stop spouting bullshit that he couldn’t understand, no matter how many times she had already spoken.

Why would Cillian even care about Darwin’s death? He was curious, but that’s just all there is to it.

The objective was to find any type of tell that one of his deaths caused from the sewers in the three deaths.

However, right now, what was on Cillian’s mind was why there were only eleven bodies at the table.

‘Did the other person escape? No, it didn’t look like it, so how?’

‘Darwin’ started looking through the faces he could see from this distance, comparing the faces of the people from the abandoned house with those at this table, their faces turned toward him with bloodshot eyes and foam around their mouths.

“Why do you keep looking at them? Stop looking at them!”

The White Shepherd thumped her hands on the table, making it shake slightly before a deranged smile formed on her lips.

“Curious about how they died?”

This time, ‘Darwin’ stopped looking at the faces of the dead individuals at the table as he began comparing everyone in his memory while looking toward the White Shepherd.

His brain didn’t stop working to find the missing person until… someone came to mind.

The person missing from these deaths.

“As if I’ll tell you. Hey, go kill him. I’ve had enough of this guy.”

The White Shepherd had already ordered a killing, but none of the Black Shepherds behind her moved.

The order wasn’t meant for those people.

Slash—!

Before ‘Darwin’ could know what was happening, he realized that only his head could move before a knife struck his throat.

[Mental Load increased by 1%]

Splash—!

Blood spurted out as ‘Darwin’ began to fall to the ground.

He didn’t see the face of his killer or the look his killer was wearing when he was killed.

But he did see something.

He managed to see the blade the killer used and the familiar-looking silver ring on his right thumb, where he used to grip the blade as he thrust it through his throat.

‘You…!’

‘Darwin’s’ eyes started quivering as he failed to utter the words from his mouth, struggling to look at the person’s face, even though that single clue, that silver ring, was enough to tell him everything.

[Mental Load increased by 5%]

[Mental Load: 25%]

The missing twelfth individual hadn’t escaped.

‘You fucking…’

He was with the Shepherds.

“…traitor!”

[Death Flag Probe #3 Ended]

[Do you wish to continue?]

[Yes] [No]

sorry for the bad release rate, i’m currently taking midterms and had to study and write at the same time. *cough* my bad my bad