Silent Witch

The current head of the Albright family, one of the few families in the Kingdom of Ridill who specializes in witchcraft, the Third Abyssal Sorcerer, Ray Albright was comparatively young when compared to the other Seven Sages, having just turned 20 years old.

His reasonably fine-looking face with slanted eyes and a straight nose was somewhat too thin and pale. In addition, his loose and disheveled hair, as if the amethyst powder had been bleached into it were purple in color. His eyes, outlined by matching colored eyelashes, were so vividly pink that they looked as if they had been inlaid with gemstones.

His overly flashy purple hair and pink eyes leave a strong impression more than his fine-looking face on those who see him.

And now such flashy-looking young shaman was touching the still laying on the bed Monica's left hand, speaking to her in a pleading voice.

"…do you love me?"

With a stiff face and sweats forming on her forehead, Monica looked back at the Abyssal Shaman.

"Um, well…"

"Do you love me? Do you need me?"

"I need you… very much… but…"

"Then will you tell me you love me?"

When Nero saw Ray leaning closer to the bed, he grabbed his neck to pull him away before creasing his nostrils and snorting.

"If you want someone to say "I love you," I can say it for you until you feel satisfied. I love you, I love you. Come on, get on with the treatment already."

"…Being told by a man wouldn't make me happy at all. I much prefer girls instead."

As Ray made a sulky expression, Nero looked at Monica with a face of utter dismay.

"Hey, is this guy really one of the Seven Sages? Or are the Seven Sages a group of weirdos?"

*stabs in the heart*

Unable to say anything back to Nero's words, Monica could only clam up.

＊ ＊ ＊

Monica hardly remembered anything after what happened when she suffered from the curse.

According to Nero, he had used his black flame to incinerate the cursed dragon including the curse crawling on its body before it vanished without a trace.

While it was rather regrettable for Nero's identity to be exposed to Felix, given the circumstances, she could not blame him for it. Rather, both Monica and Felix were able to return alive because Nero was fully prepared to reveal his true identity in order to defeat the cursed dragon.

While Nero made sure to keep Felix quiet about his identity as Black Dragon Wogan, the latter returned to the mansion to give Monica time to rest.

With the witchcraft had been destroyed by Nero's flames, the cursed black shadows crawling on Monica's and Glenn's skin have completely disappeared. But, some after-effects were still present, leaving Monica with a bluish-black bruise on her left hand and Glenn with a bruise all over his body.

Although the pain was no longer as intense as the pain of nails hitting blood vessels, her injured left hand had almost no strength, and she felt ached when she tried to move it forcibly.

One night passed afterward, and Ray Albright, the witchcraft expert called by Duke Rehnberg, arrived at the mansion.

Monica was a little surprised when she saw he was coming. After all, Ray preferred idling in his home and rarely going out.

However, she was convinced when she recalled the appearance of the cursed dragon, a legendary disaster. After all, it was only natural for the country's most renowned shaman to come to investigate the situation. At least in the field of witchcraft, no one can match the Third ‘Abyssal Sorcerer' Ray Albright.

Contrary to her expectation, as soon as he arrived, the country's best shaman was asking, "Do you need me? Do you love me?" and pestered the maids spectacularly. Even after the people around him used all kinds of methods to coax him into Monica's room… the situation was still ended up this way.

"…everyone always talks in my back and says shaman are so creepy…"

Released from Nero's hands, Rey drooped gloomily as he covered his face with his hands.

"I just want people to think shamans are cool, but everyone always thinks shamans are ‘gloomy' ‘uncanny', and ‘creepy'… I just want to be respected, be fawned over, and to be loved… I mean, who's not want to be popular?! Look at the Barrier Magician, there are many young girls fawning over him. Damn, a person like him should just die, die, die, die, die…"

Rey kept mumbling over his resentment in a voice that sounded like the grudge could project itself. But Nero assured him in earnest.

"Rest assured, I guarantee you… even if you weren't a shaman, you'd still look gloomy, uncanny, and creepy."

"Nero!"

Monica hurriedly chided Nero and gathered her poor vocabulary to appease Rey as hard as she could.

"W-Well, you shouldn't let his words get into you. I think shaman's an honorable job. There's nothing creepy about it."

Ray glanced at Monica through the gap between his fingers.

"Many said the color of my hair and eyes are creepy… if only I had blonde hair and blue eyes, or maybe a more conservative ones…"

The First Abyssal Shaman had engraved more than a hundred witchcrafts in his own body.

Just as the royal family members drank poison in small doses from childhood to build up its resistance, the first generation of Abyssal Shaman also built up a resistance to witchcraft in their own bodies.

Many witchcraft that he had engraved into his body was passed down to the next generation of Abyssal Shaman. And the Third Abyssal Shaman, Ray's body bears more than 200 witchcraft, while patterns of curses would appear like tattoos on his skin from time to time.

Therefore, because of a large amount of witchcraft that had been engraved in his body, his hair and eyes had undergone unusual coloration due to pigmentary abnormalities.

Similar to mana poisoning, it would poison the body when a large amount of mana is taken into. No matter how they are taken in, both mana and curses can be poison to the human body when taken in large quantities. When that happens, it can lead to all sorts of abnormalities occurring in the body.

"Oh, um, I think purple is a very noble color and beautiful…"

Hearing Monica's earnest words, Ray slowly raised his head. He looked at Monica as his jewel-like pink eyes glowed eerily from the depths.

"… then, do you love me? Do you love me? Will you tell me you love me?"

As it turns out, if she doesn't tell him she loves him, he won't give her the treatment.

But Monica was not skillful enough to be able to say "I love you" affably in such situations.

"Well, um…I would say I love you as a senior of the Seven Sages, and I admire you and respect yuh—*bites*."

Although she bit her lip dramatically at the end, Ray seemed to feel her sincerity in Monica's words.

He mumbled "admire, respect, admire, respect…" and his smile was somewhat ecstatic as he slowly lifted the edge of his mouth before smiling eerily.

"This feels great. Being adored makes me feel like a special person. Although it's more modest compared to saying ‘I love you.' But being respected huh… it feels great to have someone admire and respect me."

"Hey, isn't that be enough? Just get it over with already."

At Nero's exasperated words, Rey simply nodded his head and said, "Alright."

Feeling rather exasperated at the thought of the wasted time from Ray's arrival to the starting of his treatment, Monica silently rolled up the sleeves of her sleepwear.

Monica's slender arms were covered in bluish bruises starting from the elbows down to the lower part of her arms. It was not just the bruises, but streaks as thin as her hair, reddish-black in color etched on her arms. Touching the bruises with his fingers, Rey squinted his eyes and muttered, "These bruises were not caused by witchcraft, not a natural curse."

Although Monica was unable to distinguish between a naturally occurring curse and an artificial one, apparently in the eyes of an expert the difference was obvious.

"Is it that thing easy to differ?"

Nero interjected with intrigue, but the ever-hating men Abyssal Shaman was always cold toward men, so Ray replied curtly, "it is."

"…witchcraft tends to leave behind some remnants. As long as a piece of the witchcraft tool that was used as a medium for the witchcraft remains, the curse that blended into the piece may remain forever in there."

In fact, the curse remained stubbornly in place even after Monica's attack inside the dragon's body. Perhaps Monica's flame magic alone was not enough to completely burn away the remaining witchcraft tool.

"…From the looks of it, you seemed to have destroyed the witchcraft tool completely, since the curse had vanished cleanly," said Ray in admiration, but Nero standing behind him seemed to be proud of himself.

After all, what destroyed the cursed tool was the all-devouring flames of the legendary black dragon. Since neither the body nor the curse of the cursed dragon had remained, it had spared Monica from suffering any severe aftereffects.

With Nero being Monica's attendant on the surface, she couldn't tell Ray about Nero's true identity. Not even Louis knows Nero's true identity. Only Monica…

Ah, His Highness knows it too…what should I do, I wonder if he will probe me later. I'm sure he will…

Her head hurts when she starts to think about it. Her stomach hurts as well. Anyway, Monica decided to consider this matter later and moved on to the next issue.

"…will this bruise remain for a while?"

In all honesty, Monica wanted Glenn to be the first to be examined first. But for another reason, the servants of the Rehnberg family, as if half-pushing him toward her, had brought Rey to Monica's room. Since they're unable to have a proper conversation with him, why not they bring him to Monica, the same Seven Sages as himself, so they pushed him to her, hoping she might be able to do something about it…

"T-Then, could you examine Glenn after this? Glenn's symptoms were much worse than mine. He was afflicted by the curse all over his body."

At the mention of Glenn's name by Monica, Ray furrowed his brow.

"Glenn? …oh, I remember now. The disciple of the Barrier Magician?"

"You know him?"

"I've seen his face before from the distance. His big, loud voice made him stand out very much… But I hate that guy. His tall figure and innocent face tell me that he's loved by everyone, and I bet he's popular with the ladies…"

Seeing Ray was about to grumble again, Monica hurriedly persuaded.

"Um, please examine Glenn first. He's got really bad symptoms…"

"Don't worry, he should be fine. After all, he has more mana than we do, so his resistance to curses should be higher."

"…eh?"

As Monica blinked in surprise Ray said, "You didn't know?" and looked at her unexpectedly.

"Technically, the mana capacity of the disciple of Barrier Magician is over 250, unofficially it is."

"Eeeh!?"

The average magician's mana capacity was around 100, and the minimum required to become one of the Seven Sages was 150, but Monica's mana capacity was a little over 200.

According to official records, there were only four people in the kingdom who have a mana capacity of over 250. And two of them were from the Seven Sages, the Thorn Witch, and the Artillery Magician.

Since records of the measuring mana capacity cannot be registered until one becomes an official magician, Glenn's record as an apprentice was still an unofficial record, apparently.

N-Now that I think about it, a while back in an elective class, Glenn had broken the mana measuring device…

At that time, he broke the mana measuring device with an upper limit of 250; in other words, his mana exceeded that of the measuring device.

"I-I never know that Glenn was that amazing…"

"Despite having a monster mana capacity, his skill at magic is absolutely terrible, which's why he was entrusted to the Barrier Magician. What I want to say is you don't need to worry about him. I bet he'll be up tomorrow."

Just as Ray said this, a knock came at the door of the room and a servant's voice was heard.

"Lady and Lord Seven Sages, I would like to inform you that Master Glenn Dudley has regained his consciousness."

"See?" Ray shrugged, looking like he couldn't care less.