Fire Mage (Web Novel)

Chapter 707: Doomsday Avatars

"You are Charles Nightwind, the one presumed dead two decades ago," Cardinal Benedictus stated, his voice measured. "What brings you back from the shadows, and why have you taken control of this property?"

Charles gestured for Cardinal Benedictus to take a seat. "Sit, and we can discuss matters peacefully. But be aware that this place is shielded, and any attempt to use force or magic might lead to undesirable consequences."

Cardinal Benedictus hesitated for a moment before taking a seat opposite Charles. The room was filled with an air of tension as they started the conversation.

In truth, it was a one-sided order to Cardinal.

"Here are the few things you need to follow from here onwards. First, I don't recall selling my home to the Life Church. Although I made a deal with Life Church to keep my mother safe, you guys failed miserably. So, this property and the wind villa you are currently staying still belong to me." Charles said as he observed Cardinal's facial reactions and added.

"I'll give you guys 10 days. Before the time ends, all of you should pack your belongings and scram away from there."

"You can't do this to me-" When Cardinal was about to refute, he suddenly sensed a sharp pain appearing in his neck and instantly touched it.

A sharp cut appeared on his neck, causing blood to spurt out the next moment.

'What the heck? I didn't even see him taking out his sword and sheathing it again! F*ck, I messed with the wrong person.' Cardinal's face turned pale.

"I'm not negotiating with you, old man. It is an order."

Cardinal Benedictus could only nod and kept his ears sharp.

"Second, it is something to do with the punishment for you tarnishing the place I cherish most. Of course, you must die to compensate. But before I tell you about how you should die, I will tell you what would happen if you fail to keep your promise." A cold smirk appeared on Charles's face as he ordered Genesis and started looking into Cardinal Benedictus's family status.

"Benedictus Greykeeper... Born from a renowned noble family in the Rogue Throne Empire 530 years ago, he has twelve siblings, two wives, seven children, and twenty-one grandchildren. Your weakness is your family members, especially your two sons and their children. And you have a great reputation in the Rogue Throne Empire noble circle. Hmm, you also have greed for power and wealth, especially the greed for the power to rule over the masses like a King. Wait, you have a secret deal with an Organization named Divine Order?" Charles abruptly stopped and showed a deep look before walking closer to Cardinal Benedictus.

"It's been a while since I heard that name. But what does a Life Church member want to achieve by colluding with an Evil Organization like Divine Order? Well, it seems you are having a mutual relationship with them."

As Cardinal was about to refute, he suddenly forgot what to say and showed a dubious look.

"Oh? Count Vossenburg is a member of Divine Order? Interesting. I first thought of using you for my benefits but I changed my mind now." Charles didn't even hesitate as he cast the [Purple Consciousness] on Cardinal Benedictus and started erasing his memories.

Although Cardinal managed to wake up from the deep state and tried to retaliate, Charles didn't give him any chance at all. Once again casting [Burning Thoughts] spell to erase his current thoughts, Charles unsheathed the sword and made slashes at him.

A second later, both his hands slowly fell, splattering blood all over the floor.

"Someone said he doesn't want to taint the floor with blood a while ago." Runeth showed an amused look and commented from behind.

"I was planning on doing that only. But after learning Cardinal has some connection with the Divine Order members, I thought of investigating more thoroughly. Although I've confronted this Divine Order group multiple times already, I still found no clue about Project Z or Edhen's Children's true motive." Charles responded calmly and continued to invade Cardinal Benedictus's Inner World.

At the same time, many secret information started to appear in his head one by one.

The first thing that caught his attention was actually the information about particular rank members in the Divine Order cult called 'Doomsday Avatars.' They had infiltrated every nation long ago and were already holding power as equal to the King. Some even became rulers of some kingdoms and were secretly gathering forces.

For example, the newly enthroned monarch of Arc Kingdom was also a Doomsday Avatar and had power equal to Legendary Powerhouse.

Just by hearing the word 'Avatar,' Charles thought of Sasha and Fate Professor.

'Now that I think about it, didn't the Divine Order members from the Miracle City also try to take control over the city instead of killing everyone? From their original motto, their ultimate goal should be erasing all the lifeforms from this plane, right? If so, why would they want to control the masses under the order of Fate Professor?' He also recalled the moment when Sasha tried to take control of Rhea.

'Wait... Does that mean all other kingdoms' rulers have also been replaced by the Divine Order members secretly? What are those bastards planning?' A grim look appeared on his face.

As Charles further read the memories, he actually learned that Cardinal Benedictus was in the middle of conducting an important experiment to fuse humans with nightmare creatures to increase their strength temporarily. In truth, he explored the Nightmare Realm only to search for a powerful ally but ended up discovering a big secret in the dream mansion of Eddie Nightwind.

It was the creation of 'Nightmare Soldiers.'

It was more like the Warlock Method but with severe side effects.

As long as a human fuses himself with a Nightmare Creature, his original would underground a unique mutation and gain the creature's abilities, strength, and even a part of its memories.

But as time progresses, the nightmare creature takes complete control over the body and becomes a mindless humanoid beast.

Alas, even a normal human could retain his rationality for more than two years after fusing himself with a Nightmare Creature.

After finding out such a secret method to strengthen even a mortal, Cardinal decided to make a profit out of it.

He decided to make Nightmare Soldiers and sell them to Count in exchange for wealth.

Of course, he needed many human experiments in the beginning. But thanks to Count taking over Ethan's territory, his job went easier.

So far, he had made around 200 Nightmare Soldiers and even took a bulk order of about 5,000!

'Are they preparing for a large-scale war?' Confusion appeared on his face.

After some time, Charles finally erased most of his memories, gripped the old man's neck tightly, and snapped it before dropping it on the floor.

The old body twitched for a few seconds and slowly went motionless.

After that, Charles dragged the corpse all the way from the living room to the yard and directly dropped it outside the forcefield, causing complete silence among the crowd.

Then, a large commotion broke out.

"Oh my god!!!!" "Murder!!" "Inform the Guards!" As the Holy Knights and priests unsheathed their weapons to confront him, the common people got panicked by Charles's action and started backing away.

"Tell Life Church that this is the result of opposing me," Charles stated arrogantly.

At that moment, Mary suddenly stepped forward while unsheathing her sword and asked angrily.

"What about my father? Where is he?"

"Oh? You must be Reynolds's child." Charles quietly observed her for a second and soon shook his head.

"He is no more. Although I tried to save him, but he couldn't make it."

"Y-YOU!" Mary's eyes went bloodshot as she heard those words.

"You killed my father too?!!!!" She instantly enveloped her sword in a reddish sword aura and directly slashed at the forcefield fire to cut it.

Unfortunately, it didn't even bulge a bit.

She recklessly attacked the forcefield and slowly knelt on the ground while crying.

"When you get strong enough to face a Legend Rank powerhouse, come to the Rebirth Tower and find me. Well, you can also avenge your father by killing me then. Oh, that will happen only when you become powerful enough, though."

Saying so, Charles didn't stay at the entrance and returned to the living room.

"She is going to hold a grudge against you, lad."

"I will tell her the truth when she comes to the Rebirth Tower. Also, if she knows the real truth, she will go after the demons and end up getting killed in the back alley. I couldn't save that greedy man but I at least want to keep his last wish true." Charles said solemnly and then heaved a deep sigh before talking.

"My work here is done for now. Although I want to dig for more information about the Divine Order by capturing the Count, there are better times than now. And from the looks of it, those guys are already in control of the major forces and kingdoms.

"And if what you said about the Lawful Gods being true, they are already in full control of this Edhen World. Except for the Azure Federation, Rogue Throne, Blood Empire, Iron Kingdom, and the Miracle City, the rest of the places are already under their palm." Runeth said in a grave tone.

"Don't forget that anything can happen in the remaining places too. Although I don't know what those bastards are planning, I'm going to mess up everything with the help of this Chaos Era." Charles said firmly and then added with a cold glint in his eyes.

"Let's go to the Ember Kingdom and finish our business first."

"I've been waiting for that all day. We could've finished this business later on." Runeth grumbled and stood up from the chair.

Meanwhile, Charles waved his hand, manipulated the false flame, and created a flame portal.

A second later, both jumped into the portal one by one and disappeared from there.