The Elusive Sorcerer

Chapter 163

In the midst of the bustle of Nuvles City, on Silver Street, Heinn Warlock and his two subordinates hurried toward the alley where the gravely ill elderly businessman lived, according to the information he had received.

Not long afterward, they arrived at the mad businessman's house.

Heinn lowered his hat slightly, as though he was hesitant to ring the doorbell.

At Kevin's urging, Heinn took a deep breath and pressed the bell.

Ding... Dong...

"...Who is it?"

The three of them exchanged glances.

Kevin cleared his throat and said loudly, "The unfortunate man who survived that occult incident..."

The living room was incredibly dark, as though the old businessman was preparing himself for death, those tense moments before his soul would be freed from his fragile body.

Even the air itself seemed filled with the darkness and silence of the room.

"Are you alright?" Kevin continued in a raised voice, since the man's hearing barely functioned anymore.

'Kevin, is it?'

The old man immediately sat up. His gaze swept across the darkness inside the room, silent and suffocating, before he rose from his seat and slowly walked toward the door.

Tap!

Joxel swallowed hard as his sour gaze shifted toward the two of them.

"Hey, he's coming!"

"Yeah," Heinn replied, lowering his hat.

Kevin raised an eyebrow.

"Damn it, are we going to be asked to do that again?"

Their pupils widened as a realization struck them.

"...Why are you only saying that now?" Joxel said loudly.

He had only just realized it, and he wasn't the only one.

Kevin raised his hands defensively as though afraid they were about to hit him.

"Just remembered, honestly," Kevin replied, breathing heavily.

Click...

Their eyes widened as the sharp, continuous creaking sound was followed by the door opening, revealing a man with a white mustache but black hair that did not make him look old at all, standing beside the still-unlocked left door.

"Sir?" they muttered in unison.

The old businessman examined them carefully.

"Why are you here?" he asked, a twitch appearing on his forehead.

Joxel and Heinn both pointed toward Kevin, who stood on the right side.

'Huh? Why are they both making me the scapegoat?'

Kevin muttered to himself, frowning.

"...Kevin? Did you come here for something important?"

Kevin hesitated for a moment, not daring to meet his eyes.

"Heinn brought us here," Kevin said, looking at the two of them, who immediately looked away.

The old businessman glanced at them with a sharp stare, his eyes empty as though light itself was swallowed by them.

"If there's no reason, let's go," the man said in his deep voice.

"Eh?"

They muttered in unison, staring at the old man as he went back inside, walking with a body that was nearly hunched over.

"Mr. Zoren? Um, where are we going?" Joxel asked to make sure.

Zoren stopped in place. His pale, wrinkled hand rested on the open door as he turned around and studied the three of them carefully.

"Of course we're going fishing..."

"At sea?" Heinn Warlock asked, just to be sure.

Zoren shook his head.

"A river is fine too."

...

After the suffocating conversation ended, the four of them arrived at a medium-sized river, sitting carefully along the riverbank with their legs hanging straight down.

The river was located several meters from Kadas Bridge No. 10 on Silver Street.

'Huh, I thought those bad rumors were just a hoax. Turns out they're true after all.'

Heinn stared at Zoren in disbelief, but in truth he was quite excited by the plentiful catches. He was hoping for coffee as payment for accompanying him during what might be his final moments.

At first, he had wanted to refuse for a simple reason. Sea sickness. Joxel suffered from it too and could not endure the suffocating air of the ocean.

Meanwhile, Kevin was accustomed to anything related to the sea, having been born and raised in a province northeast of GreyHeaven Province.

'Hahaha, this isn't bad. Being a villager from Nrangen County actually has its advantages.'

Doubt filled his mind as he lifted his head and noticed several women quietly laughing and whispering.

'Damn it, this is exactly why I don't like following that old businessman around.'

Even though he knew they weren't the only four people fishing in the Luat River, which was famous for its abundance of fish, for some reason Kevin felt as though the world he lived in was different from the world above the river.

With the calm current and the chirping of a few birds, Kevin temporarily forgot everything and enjoyed fishing until boredom eventually crept in.

To liven up the atmosphere by the riverbank, atop a neatly stacked pile of stones, Kevin looked toward the three of them, who all wore disgusted expressions.

A faint grin appeared on Kevin's face for several seconds. He lifted his fishing rod and spoke in a calm tone.

"Why did Mr. Zoren retire from the StarRetrivel Club?"

For a moment, Heinn and Joxel, who were sitting to Zoren's left, became interested in Kevin's question.

Zoren lifted his fishing rod with enthusiasm absent from his heart while his gaze remained fixed on his own reflection in a distant building.

"Lately I've been haunted by demons that are slowly eroding my sanity," Zoren said weakly, completely unaware that one of them was a Receiver of the Exorcist.

Heinn knew that fact. He had first met Zoren Sarmenan eight years ago, along with the two of them, when he was still twenty-five years old.

Several months before Heinn Warlock's birthday.

"If you're willing, I'll help remove that influence," Heinn said calmly.

With his worn face and vacant stare, Zoren nodded hesitantly and asked, "How?"

Heinn looked at the two of them with a faint smile etched across his face, though it concealed another intention beneath it.

Joxel and Kevin immediately stood up, fully aware that Heinn was ordering them to find ritual items for the exorcism of whatever demon was attached to the old man's body.

Not wanting to reveal the existence of Receivers to someone like Zoren, Heinn improvised by using random objects as ritual tools.

It did not take long before they found two naturally smooth black stones shaped by the river's flow and a partially broken plate with strange patterns that Joxel discovered among the bushes along the riverbank.

The plate and stones had been cleaned by the moderate river current. They carried them back and handed them to Heinn Warlock, then quickly moved away because remaining close to them was too risky.

Zoren sat cross-legged. The two smooth black stones rested on his thighs, while the partially broken plate with its strange patterns lay before him.

With several swift additional movements too fast for the eye to follow, making Heinn resemble an experienced shaman, his final motion was to open his palm before touching both of Zoren's shoulders.

Zoren's brain never had the chance to send a warning signal when something cold made him feel as though he was being pulled upward while his body remained seated.

With Zoren's soul now within his magical grasp, Heinn prepared himself before swinging his hand and striking Zoren's back.

Puk!

"Ah..."

An unpleasant sound followed the impact.

Heinn's pupils widened as the shade of the tree above them became the destination of the demons leaving Zoren's body.

He wanted to capture those demons, but Heinn abandoned the idea.

'I didn't even see them enter the tree's shadow.'

Heinn muttered to himself, staring at the tree above that sheltered them from the scorching midday sun.

'There are signs that a storm will arrive tonight.'

Heinn was aware of the suffocating cold that would come with the approaching night.

"Can you move your body normally?" he asked, making sure.

'Yes, the work of the StarRetrival Club involved visiting abandoned houses or places cast aside by human life. That reason only grew stronger when he decided to retire from that strange profession, one that paid well, and now he could only enjoy whatever remained of the life God had given him.'

After spending too long lost in thought and noticing the two of them walking back, Heinn immediately patted Zoren's shoulder to restore his awareness.

Puk!

Zoren flinched as though waking from a horrifying nightmare!

"Why... am I here? I remember being inside my house."

Zoren looked dazed, like someone who had fallen asleep at three in the afternoon and awakened before nine at night.

"Hah!? Kevin's here? This, this is near Kadas Bridge!"

'Ah, I feel like a madman.'

Although he had forgotten what had happened moments ago, he still remembered the time when he had grown weary of his own life and prayed for the Almighty to take it away.

Remembering that moment, Zoren rubbed his face until it reddened, realizing that he had sent someone to inform the three of them about his deteriorating condition.

"Sorry," Zoren said tiredly. "Did I invite all of you here?"

He seemed like a completely different person from before!

Kevin stood silently, staring at him as though he had discovered something strange about him.

"Are you alright, Mr. Zoren?" Joxel asked softly.

Zoren nodded, confused by his own condition.

"Maybe," Zoren finally answered.

Then he glanced to the left, noticing his fishing rod and the other three rods.

After thinking for a moment, Zoren said,

"Yosh, we'll go to the sea and rent a boat as a way of thanking you."

"No..." they replied in unison, their faces filled with disbelief.

"Why?" he asked, searching for a clear reason.

They hesitated, unsure what to say as each of them looked in a different direction.

After a moment of thought, Kevin immediately voiced his personal opinion.

"The sea is incredibly boring!" He looked at him firmly. "We, we... want to go somewhere suitable and..."

'Not boring like the sea,' Kevin added inwardly.

Kevin wanted to finish his sentence, but he respected the feelings of the other three.

Zoren let out a long sigh and said quietly, "Alright. I'll head back, and if you want to visit, come by."

He gathered all four fishing rods without another word before leaving the three of them behind with gloomy expressions.

"Was that what you wanted to say?" Kevin asked quietly.

Heinn lowered his hat slightly.

"I have no connection to that man."

Then he turned around and walked toward the staircase connected to the sidewalk.

"Strange," Joxel muttered as he patted Kevin on the shoulder.

"Something strange will always exist," Kevin replied while tilting his head back, watching birds fly through the fog and the black-and-white steam flowing like a river.

After that, the two of them quickly left the increasingly gloomy and suffocating river behind, following Heinn so they would not be left behind.