Another Convict who jumped down after them confirmed this:
"He really wasn't trying to kill me."
This female Convict had once been a clown in the Stardust Circus. Toying with a bomb made of pure magic power, she said in puzzlement, "It looks like he's being forced."
"And I sensed something on him that was a little like the light the mage gives off... a color. Orange, I think."
Although this was only her guess, based on a feeling, she trembled uncontrollably as she spoke, as though an icy wind had pierced straight through her, plunging her into a frozen abyss.
The three who heard her silently touched their arms-more precisely, the places where the Thorns of Justice had been implanted.
Lord Kroya had branded a seemingly eternal trace of golden magic power within them. That magic constantly radiated warmth from inside the thorns, serving as their unwavering beacon.
But now, as they looked toward the castle, they seemed to sense something: a greedy orange glow swirling around it.
It seemed to shroud the entire castle. Even amid the blizzard, it constantly spread an indescribable power outward, as though tempting people to approach.
"..."
"Let's go back!"
Ryan suppressed the stirring in his heart and hurried back to the group waiting in the distance with his two companions and the Convict.
He felt that if he stayed here any longer, he might succumb to the temptation.
Meanwhile, on Reef Island.
Kroya abruptly stood up. A new poem had suddenly appeared in the Song of Orange within his mind, whose every word he already remembered perfectly.
It was...
"Mammon's Boundless Greed."
He spoke the chapter's name and read its contents. It described the evil deeds of one who had received the blessing of orange light, yet could not satisfy the