Chapter 549: Betrayal Among Thieves

Saul wasn’t the least bit upset by the muscle-bound male wizard’s tone. Instead, he turned to speak with the female wizard, who seemed at least capable of a proper conversation.

“Why do you think it’s pollution and not just an injury?”

The female wizard looked flustered. She was stumbling over her words as she tried to calm the irritable man who looked ready to storm off, and at the same time, pitifully tried to explain things to Saul.

“Half a year ago, we were chasing a water-element magic creature and ended up entering an underground river. But we got separated shortly after. I eventually found him, and we managed to escape together. But once we got home, I suddenly discovered… he’d already been back for some time. And…”

She paused, her face growing paler at the memory.

“…and there was another me with him.”

“That’s when I realized—the person I was with might’ve been a fake. And the one at his side was probably a fake too.”

“Can they take on the form of other people?” Saul asked thoughtfully. “I’ve at least heard of three types of entities with that ability. So how did you figure out who was real and who wasn’t?”

The female wizard tilted her head upward. Her neck was slender and pale. “We go adventuring together often and are very familiar with each other’s mental power. At first, we were too tense to notice anything off. But once we calmed down and really focused, we figured out who was real. As soon as the two fakes were exposed, they attacked us. He tried to protect me and ended up with both of them clinging to his arm.”

She glanced gratefully at the male wizard, which seemed to calm him down a little.

“We barely managed to kill the two imposters, but ever since then, his arm has had these two red marks. No healing magic works on them, and they’ve only been spreading. He’s also grown more and more irritable. That’s why I suspect it’s pollution, not an injury.”

By this point, Saul had a general idea of what was going on.

“I see. So, you’ve already tried everything you can think of. Now you’re hoping I’ll give it a shot?”

“Yes.” The witch nodded, eyes filled with unshakable gloom.

Saul leaned back, draping his arms over the chair’s armrests. “Then I take it, you’ve brought payment?”

“You’re asking about payment before you even know if you can fix it?” the male wizard glared at Saul.

“I’m not saying I can fix it,” Saul replied, resting his chin on his hand.

“You—!”

“If you want my help, be prepared to pay for it first. I’m not giving you two a chance to skip out.”

Skip out?

The two looked confused, but they more or less grasped what he meant.

“Our last mission ended badly, and we used up what we had, clearing pollution… we don’t have many magic crystals left.”

“Other rare materials are acceptable too,” Saul said coldly.

“We don’t really have those ei—”

“Then if you don’t have three thousand magic crystals, kindly see yourselves out.”

The male wizard looked about ready to explode at the number, but Saul didn’t give them a chance to bargain. He had the ice wolves turn around immediately.

Leaving only one sentence behind:

“Come back when you’ve got something of equal value.”

Back at the Wizard Tower, the Old Witch and the steward were on the first floor.

Saul briefly explained the situation, and the Old Witch immediately flung herself backward dramatically.

“Three thousand? Are you robbing people now?”

Saul paused mid-step, then suddenly changed direction and walked up to the now nearly 1.4-meter-tall Old Witch.

She craned her neck to look up at him. “Why are you getting so close?”

“I want to ask you for a favor.”

“No time!”

“Three hundred magic crystals.”

“Hah! You’ve got some nerve! You really think I won’t smack you?”

…

On the third day, Little Algae came to report: that aggressive muscle wizard and the tearful wizard had returned.

“They brought the magic crystals?” Saul asked.

Little Algae tilted his head.

Didn’t understand.

Saul chuckled, bent down to tuck Little Algae into his pocket, and once again rode the wolf carriage to the lakeside.

Same place. Same people.

The male wizard’s eyes were bloodshot—he looked even more volatile than before.

The pale-faced female wizard clutched a small pouch tightly in her hand.

“We don’t have three thousand crystals,” she said softly, glancing down at the pouch, her face filled with reluctance. “But this magical artifact… we obtained it three years ago. It should… no, it must be worth three thousand.”

“Let me see it.”

The female wizard held the pouch close to her chest.

“Relax. Just open the bag and show me. I won’t take it until after the cleansing is done.”

The female wizard gave him a look of gratitude and quickly loosened the drawstring. She tugged open the taut mouth of the pouch, letting Saul get a clear look inside.

Because the pouch was so small, Saul initially thought it had a space-compression formation.

But once he saw the item inside, he realized the magical artifact itself was simply tiny.

Inside the bag was a red spinning top.

About the size of a fingertip.

“It’s definitely an artifact. But what does it do?”

The female wizard patiently explained, “I don’t know its real name, but I call it the Thunderstorm Top

.

If you channel your mental power into it and spin it clockwise, it releases lightning. If you spin it counterclockwise, it releases gales.”

“…Then shouldn’t it be called the Wind-and-Thunder Top?”

Saul’s sudden quip caught the female wizard off guard. She blanked out for a moment, then remembered what she wanted to say.

“Uhh… there’s a rumor that if you can spin it clockwise and counterclockwise at the same time, you’ll summon a catastrophic storm.”

At first, Saul wasn’t too impressed with the two basic functions. But that last bit of lore piqued his interest.

If it really could summon a disaster-level storm, then this artifact was far from ordinary.

Three thousand crystals? Absolutely worth it.

Saul jumped down from the carriage and approached the male wizard.

Perhaps the female wizard had talked him down, because today he stayed silent.

Still, the look in his eyes made it clear he was barely holding back.

“I’m going to cleanse your pollution now. Don’t move.”

The muscles on the male wizard’s face twitched, but he held back and nodded.

But as Saul stepped down from the wolf carriage and slowly approached, the man’s eyes shifted from impatient to serious.

By the time Saul reached him, the man had already removed his robe, revealing a pair of arms marked with large red blotches.

At first glance, nothing seemed unusual. But up close, the red marks clearly formed the shape of two people clinging to his arms.

And if you stared at them long enough… they moved.

The two silhouettes had been hugging his arms tightly, seemingly chewing on his skin. But little by little, their heads turned—from facing away from Saul to profile, then bit by bit, fully turning to face him.

They were now staring straight at Saul.

But just as Saul was focused on studying the red marks, the male wizard’s face—ignored until now—began to morph.

His features slowly stretched, like someone was forcibly tugging on his skin.

His eyes elongated and widened, his nose flattened, and his mouth… his mouth became a massive void!

Then—he lunged, aiming to bite Saul’s skull!

But at that very moment, a shadow sprang out from behind Saul.

It started small and thin, but within a second, it had grown into a full-sized figure. Eight spider legs sprouted from its lower half—each like a short spear—lunging straight for the morphing wizard’s head.

The wizard had intended to ambush Saul—only to be ambushed himself.

Luckily, he hadn’t come unprepared.

The two red humanoid marks on his arms tore away with a

shrrrip

—lower halves still connected by threads of flesh, upper halves fully turned, jaws wide open as they lunged at Saul.

At the same time, the female wizard behind Saul pulled out the thunderstorm top—the one meant to be payment—and spun it hard clockwise in her palm.

The top had just begun to spin when a silver flash burst from Saul’s body, rushing toward the woman. In the blink of an eye, it crashed into her with a brutal headbutt, sending her flying.

The top clattered to the ground, emitting only a few tiny sparks of lightning.

The female wizard didn’t even know what hit her.

Everyone else was using magic, but you had to go for a physical tackle?

Shameless!

Clutching her dented chest and coughing up blood, she struggled to lift her head—only to see the silver figure already picking up the thunderstorm top from the ground.

And not far away, Saul had just cleaved the ambushing male wizard clean in half with a strike of his Black Blade.

The bisected corpse now hung like skewered meat on two spider legs.

As for the two red silhouettes?

They had vanished without a trace.

(End of chapter)

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