Muddying the Waters

Leon's movements paused for a moment.

It wasn't because he was afraid. He simply felt as though he had encountered this will somewhere before.

Leon thought quickly and soon remembered.

In the Lands Between, at the lake of rot deep beneath the Ainsel River, he had sensed the same aura among the ruins covered in rot.

So the being sealed there wasn't some entity tainted by rot. It was the Scarlet Rot itself!

Leon's brief reflection did nothing to slow his hands. He shoved the golden needle all the way in.

The instant the needle vanished completely into the bud, all sound disappeared.

The orange-red light abruptly dimmed, like a candle flame being snuffed out.

The writhing roots loosened one by one and fell away from Old Neil's flesh.

Leon looked up at the eye that had switched sides halfway through. Now there was no trace of Scarlet Rot's corruption in it at all.

All that remained was an eye without lashes. Even its originally cloudy gaze seemed much clearer, and for the first time, a flicker of thought appeared in it.

Leon looked at it suspiciously. When he had lured it into a clash between their spirit bodies, he had discovered that the evil god worshipped by the secret organization was afflicted by more than just the Scarlet Rot.

He had originally intended to drive out the eye along with the Scarlet Rot, which had yet to establish a firm foothold. Instead, he had unexpectedly touched upon a deeper corruption, one far stronger than the Scarlet Rot.

Leon even believed that, were his true body to act, he might not be able to purify it.

Fortunately, this was only a projection of will or a symbolic manifestation, containing little of its true body's corruption. With the Scarlet Rot removed, briefly blocking the other corruption wasn't difficult.

That was why the "Hidden Sage" had switched sides in the middle of the fight and helped him suppress the Scarlet Rot instead. Leon was happy to have less work to do.

After everything was over, the eye, its clarity restored, made no other move. It simply stared at Leon as it gradually faded, until it vanished completely.

Old Neil's body, now completely free of the influence, fell heavily back onto the sofa. His breathing was labored and rapid, but the sickly, wet rasp was gone.

Leon gripped the end of the needle and slowly pulled it out.

Every inch of the golden needle met with resistance, as though he were drawing a thread from hardened amber.

The bud came out with the needle, its detached roots hanging limply in midair like a marionette with its strings cut.

Pop.

With a soft sound, the needle came completely free.

The golden needle brought the dim bud out with it. Its roots curled unconsciously in the air, then slowly wound themselves around the needle, one by one.

Leon then took a stone emitting a gentle light from his storage pouch (note 1), crushed it, and scattered it over Old Neil.

He looked down and saw several bleeding holes in Old Neil's chest slowly healing.

Through Spirit Vision, there was no longer any trace of an evil god's aura here.

But with his Spirit Vision still active, Leon noticed a peculiar presence.

He looked through the floor toward the piano on the first floor. A peculiar, nearly transparent spirit was sitting at it, both hands pressing the keys.

A melodious piano tune rose again, the same country ditty as before. It was no longer filled with eeriness, but had taken on a cheerful tone.

Leon stared in a daze at the spirit, which had distinctly feminine features.

How had I failed to notice this spirit all along?

Was it because the power of the Scarlet Rot or the Hidden Sage had concealed it?

Leon gave it no further thought. There was no doubt that it posed no danger now.

But Leon noticed that the figure at the piano was gradually dissipating, having lost the vessel that sustained it. The music was growing fainter as well.

After a moment's contemplation, a wisp of tiny golden lights emerged from Leon's body and slowly entered the spirit.

The dissipation of the spirit body was reversed, and the piano music grew melodious again.

Leon paid the spirit no more attention. To the sound of the piano, he searched for documents, going from bedroom to bedroom.

Judging by the tidy rooms, Old Neil seemed to hire temporary workers to clean them regularly, so the place lacked the mess typical of most bachelors.

Instead, everything was neat and orderly, as though a mistress of the house truly lived there.

A few minutes later, Leon found what he wanted on the bookshelf in Old Neil's bedroom.

They were manuscripts, covered in disordered notes on certain strange, bizarre rituals.

Leon left a few nonessential clues behind, put the rest in his storage pouch, and returned to the still-unconscious Old Neil.

The golden needle could drive back an outer deity's interference, but it could not erase what had already happened.

The Scarlet Rot had taken root here, and the bud's disappearance wouldn't change that fact.

Part of Old Neil's spirit body had already been corrupted, and Leon couldn't prevent that either. After an evil god's intrusion, keeping one's life was already something to be proud of.

Fortunately, the damage wasn't life-threatening. Just as Leon was wondering how to wake Old Neil sooner, the spirit finished its piece and, instead of continuing to play, slowly moved in front of him.

Then, under Leon's peculiar gaze, it simply broke apart and merged into Old Neil's body.

Leon activated Spirit Vision and discovered that Old Neil's damaged spirit body had been made whole.

This was indeed beyond his knowledge, and he didn't know what to say.

Leon glanced at his pocket watch. Less than twenty minutes had passed since Klein left.

So he began to ponder the situation at hand.

More and more strange things were happening. A deity sealed in the Lands Between had appeared in this world just like that.

It had even corrupted a local deity. Leon wouldn't believe for a second that any of this had anything to do with the mastermind Klein suspected.

That rat in the gutter wasn't qualified to scheme against such a being. If someone said he was taking advantage of the opportunity to make a move, Leon might believe it.

But this was clearly no coincidence. A sealed deity wouldn't simply grow legs and come running here on its own.

That meant there was another faction involved, and quite possibly more than one.

They were more skilled, and they too wanted to do something in this city.

Did the people here commit some offense against heaven? Leon closed his eyes and grumbled silently.

At that thought, he suddenly looked at Miquella's Needle in his hand, which had become a plant specimen.

The patterns on it no longer flowed. They had returned to ordinary engravings, resting quietly in the golden metal.

Those patterns were the physical manifestation of laws.

That meant the rules of the Lands Between still existed and remained in effect, even after crossing the barrier between worlds.

That was the conclusion he had reached over the past few days.

It should have been something to be happy about, but once he considered that conclusion alongside the half-corrupted eye,

something felt wrong no matter how he looked at it.

If the Scarlet Rot could already corrupt an evil god worshipped by a secret organization,

what about the other outer deities? The Frenzied Flame was entangled with the organization called the Aurora Order.

The letter that had arrived early was still in his storage pouch.

The Haligtree's seed had already been planted. Before he had even had time to study it, a seed of the Scarlet Rot had appeared.

Leon thought no further. Instead, he stood up, walked to the second-floor landing, and looked at the door standing slightly ajar.

The door was pushed open the next moment, and Dunn strode in with a grim expression. A somewhat nervous Klein and a group of Nighthawks followed him.

Klein immediately breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that Old Neil had completely recovered.

There wasn't a single wound on Old Neil now, and that damned bud had disappeared as well.

"The two of us heard Old Neil was ill, so we thought we'd visit. It was only after we arrived that we realized something was wrong with him. It wasn't a simple illness..."

Leon walked over to Dunn, who was examining Old Neil, and briefly explained the situation, just as they had originally planned.

After hearing the account, Dunn carefully examined the manuscripts scattered around the room, then looked at Leon and asked,

"What clues did you find?"

But just as Klein was reflecting on how Leon could finally stick to the plan, an ominous feeling welled up in him.

Having stumbled in the same place many times, Klein hurried forward,

trying to take control of the conversation before Leon could speak.

But this time, before he could even open his mouth, Leon reacted faster and threw an arm around his shoulders.

"We found the aura of a secret existence, and Klein performed a divination about it. Someone deliberately sought out Old Neil and corrupted him."

"This seed was the medium for the corruption. I suggest notifying the cathedral immediately and investigating everyone who has recently been close to Old Neil."

As he spoke, he handed over the long needle with the bud embedded in it.

Klein looked at the needle, the withered roots wound around it, and the shriveled bud. For once, he felt little emotional fluctuation.

He was used to it. Or rather, he had guessed what Leon intended to do.

He intended to muddy the waters.