Volume 9, Chapter 30 – Uncontrollable Power

“Lin? Lin? Are you awake?”

A companion’s call sounded by her ear. Lin slowly opened her eyes.

What came into view was the powder-blue ceiling. The air was filled with a faint, floral fragrance. Everything was familiar.

This was her room.

As for the person who had called her name, Lin thought for a moment before whispering, “Purple?”

Strange. She didn’t remember bringing Purple into her room. Although Purple knew how to break the magic lock and enter, she wouldn’t do something so intrusive.

Lin habitually turned slightly to her side, propping herself up on her elbow to get out of bed. However, the moment her elbow touched the bedboard, it suddenly made a ‘crack’ sound, followed by the sensation of her elbow sinking slightly.

Eh?

Reflexively pulling her arm back, Lin looked at where she had just propped herself—the sheet was indeed indented slightly. Her sensation hadn’t been wrong.

Lin subconsciously looked at her elbow, tilted her head slightly, a question mark appearing above it.

People who had reached the level 50 Hero’s domain did indeed easily break things around them with casual movements. But she had been at level 50 for over ten years, and her control over her own strength was exquisite. Even in her sleep, she wouldn’t accidentally break things. Lin was certain she hadn’t used any force just now; she had simply propped herself up gently as usual.

No, wait.

Why am I in my bedroom?

If I remember correctly, I should have been having lunch with Yisi.

As her consciousness flowed to this point, Lin suddenly noticed something abnormal.

Her senses were much sharper than before. Not only that, but her body felt unprecedentedly light. Her mind wasn’t groggy like it usually was upon waking, but quite the opposite—exceptionally clear. More importantly, Lin realized she hadn’t had her usual nightmare.

Something definitely happened.

Lin immediately looked towards Purple, who was rushing in from the doorway. Purple’s long hair was down, and she was dressed in a light purple nightgown, making Lin think she had stayed the night in her room.

“Purple, what happened to me?”

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“Drink some water first.” Purple handed the cup to Lin. After Lin took it steadily, she sat down beside her, her beautiful face full of worry. “It’s already been a week. How are you feeling?”

“A week!?”

Crack.

Startled, Lin couldn’t help but tighten her grip slightly. As a result, the glass cup in her hand shattered into several pieces. Warm water spilled onto the quilt, and the shards easily cut her unguarded palm. Drops of blood stained the water pale red.

“Lin?!” Alarmed by Lin’s action, Purple jumped off the bed, hastily threw back the quilt covering Lin, then grabbed a towel from the side and haphazardly covered Lin’s legs. “What are you doing?”

“Wait, Purple, stay away from me for now. Although I don’t know what happened, I know something is definitely strange about me right now. Let me adjust. I feel like I can’t control my strength. Just now, I only used a little force, but I crushed the cup. Go outside first. I’m afraid I might accidentally hurt you.”

“O-Okay, alright. I understand. I’ll go inform His Holiness. If you have any problems, just call the maids. They’re right outside the door.”

Looking completely flustered, Purple backed away while rapidly giving Lin instructions. Amused by her companion’s panicked state, Lin, sitting on the bed, nodded gently.

“Don’t trip.”

With the ‘click’ of the door lock, the room fell silent again. Lin raised her right hand, the one that had held the cup—in just the time it took to speak, the wound had already healed itself. Only the beads of blood clinging to the surface of her skin proved that there had indeed been a wound.

Lin frowned.

“It shouldn’t heal this fast.”

Even with her dragon and monster bloodline, based on past experience, a wound like that should have taken half a day to fully heal. But now, it had taken less than a minute.

She tried clenching her fist.

“My strength is greater than before too. My magic power… huh?”

If the magic power flowing within her body before could be described as a pond, now it could be called a lake. The docile magic flowed through her limbs and veins, but Lin was certain that with just a slight exertion, the magic, currently gentle as a kitten, would instantly transform into a tsunami-like wave.

Furthermore, the gray magic power that had previously permeated her entire body was now completely gone, as if it had never existed. Even when she focused all her attention, she couldn’t see the slightest trace of it.

That gray magic power was the deathly aura that had accompanied her since birth. The reason she possessed level 50 strength at the age of six was that she had assimilated half of that gray magic through the magic circle, turning power that wasn’t originally hers into her own. Now that it had disappeared, and her own magic power had significantly increased, Lin could only attribute it to the complete assimilation of the gray magic.

“How is this possible!”

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Even Lin herself couldn’t believe it.

As the person involved, Lin knew better than anyone how difficult that deathly aura was to assimilate. The ritual back then, which sacrificed so many members of the Divine Religion, had only allowed her to assimilate half of it. Although the interruption of the ritual was a factor, Lin had also discovered over the years that even if the ritual had proceeded normally, the gray magic within her could not have been fully assimilated. Lin had tried before, using her own magic to envelop the thread-like strands of gray magic distributed throughout her body, grinding them from all directions like a millstone. But the result was fruitless. Trying to assimilate the gray magic was like trying to dissolve oil in water—utterly impossible.

But besides the complete assimilation of the gray magic, could there be any other explanation for her current situation? Judging from the amount of magic power, she should have surpassed level 60 now, reaching the realm beyond heroes, right?

To achieve such growth just by sleeping… if she were to announce this, people would surely think she had lost her mind.

If she weren’t in her room, but out in some deserted wilderness, Lin would be unable to resist trying to use Tier 6 magic to test whether she had truly reached the legendary realm beyond heroes. Currently known existences in that realm, aside from those long-lived races, numbered less than five even when combining humans and the Blood Clan.

Did I just become the sixth?

Lin didn’t realize that a beautiful curve had formed on her lips.

“I didn’t expect to reach level 60 just like that. Wait, if that’s the case—”

Suddenly remembering something, Lin’s spirits lifted. She summoned her black-hole-like storage magic and reached in to retrieve the beautifully bound Book of the Gospel.

Opening the table of contents, she expertly found the page on the monster encyclopedia.

“‘Control the gray magic within the body, assimilate it as one’s own. If this step can be achieved, although the cycle of calamity cannot be broken, there is a high chance of avoiding becoming the calamity oneself. This is my preliminary hypothesis.’ …Have I already completed the first step? Haah.”

Lin let out a long breath.

This was a secret known only to herself and Atwood in the entire world.

The ‘Witch of Calamity’ was not a legend, but something real.

The very existence of the Witch of Calamity was a disaster, like a forbidden spell primed to detonate at any moment. When the Witch died, the power of calamity would emerge from her body, spreading destruction and turning all living beings into the dead. Historically, whenever a Witch of Calamity appeared, nations would fall as a result. Witches of Calamity had appeared multiple times, but the most recent occurrence was before the war between humans and the Blood Clan. A thousand years of peace had made humanity forget the Witch, dismissing her as a mere legend to frighten children.

And now, the Witch of Calamity was her.

Although the old Pope and Atwood had never mentioned it, when she obtained the Gospel and saw the descriptions concerning the Witch of Calamity, a general idea formed in her mind—the Gospel commanded people to establish the Divine Religion and painstakingly search for the Hero, but in reality, they were searching for her, the incarnation of calamity. As long as her death was prevented, the world could be spared from disaster. The so-called search for the Hero was just a misinterpretation by previous generations, mistaking the incarnation of calamity for the savior of the world.

However, when she told Atwood this interpretation, he immediately denied it. In Atwood’s interpretation, the Gospel commanded the church to find the ‘Hero,’ not the ‘incarnation of calamity.’ When mentioning this, the Gospel did not use a substitute term but directly stated the word ‘Hero.’ Therefore, the idea that Lin was the calamity was merely her own conjecture. The Demon Lord was the one who would bring destruction in the future. Those were Atwood’s exact words to Lin at the time.

But Lin couldn’t fully believe him.

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Although she could also read the words in the Gospel, she couldn’t clearly interpret every detail like Atwood could. In Lin’s eyes, Atwood’s words were meant to comfort her. Before the future truly unfolded, no one knew what disaster the Gospel referred to. The reason the Gospel wanted her to control the power within her might be precisely to prevent the disaster from happening. After all, the preface stated that if the gray magic within could be fully assimilated, there was a high probability that the Witch would avoid becoming a calamity upon death.

Since she was highly suspect, she had to minimize the potential damage. Lin had once planned to seek death in the uninhabited Sea of Thunderstorms. There, even if she became the incarnation of calamity, she wouldn’t harm others. The lightning in the Sea of Thunderstorms deterred even dragons from approaching recklessly. Even as the incarnation of calamity, she surely wouldn’t be able to stir up trouble there. However, when she had truly made up her mind, even setting sail and entering the Sea of Thunderstorms’ domain, she hesitated.

If the truth was indeed as Atwood said, that the disaster would be brought by the Demon Lord, then what would her current sacrifice achieve? It wasn’t fear of death, but that she already carried too many lives on her shoulders. To escape responsibility through death… even as an ethereal soul, Lin could not forgive herself.

And so, Lin realized once again that all she needed to do was follow the Gospel. She didn’t need to think. Even if she was the calamity prophesied by the Gospel, the Gospel would surely provide the best countermeasure. And if she wasn’t the calamity, then there was even more reason to act according to the Gospel.

Her only regret was that she couldn’t make amends to those who had already died. She couldn’t even find anyone to apologize to.

Her recurring nightmare flashed through her mind.

That was the first and only time she had seen the true form of the Witch of Calamity. Even though she had only been near death, and the calamity’s power had only manifested partially, it still brought irreversible consequences.

That destroyed city.

A wave of dizziness washed over her. Lin shook her head, gently placing her right hand over her chest.

“No… now is not the time to dwell on those things. Wait until everything is settled, then go and atone.”

The immediate priority was to find the reason for her sudden increase in strength.

Her hand, resting before her, began to play with her long black hair. Lin carefully recalled the events before she fell asleep.

“Took Yisi to the spire, had lunch on the top floor, then something called soy sauce, and exchanging blood…?”

Only a fool would think the problem lay with that thing called soy sauce. Lin instantly identified the blood as the cause. After drinking Yisi’s blood, she had first felt immense comfort, then a tearing sensation in her body. The drop from the clouds to the ground had nearly made her faint.

No, I must have lost consciousness on the spot. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have woken up in my bedroom.

To confirm this hypothesis, Lin opened the Gospel to the page capable of prophecy. She hadn’t used the Gospel before because both books needed to work together on the same event, but that restriction no longer applied. After offering a prayer to the Gospel, Lin stated the question she wanted answered.

“Was Yisi the cause of all this?”

There was no need to be too detailed. As long as one’s affinity with the Gospel was high enough, it could provide an answer even if the questioner only thought it internally.

A minute of silence passed.

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Not even a ripple of magical fluctuation occurred.

“Tsk.”

Lin couldn’t help but click her tongue.

How stupid of me.

The Gospel couldn’t even perceive Yisi’s existence. It would be a miracle if it answered her. At this point, the only option was to go and confirm with Yisi directly.

With this thought, Lin immediately got up, quickly put on the black gauze long dress that covered her entire body, and walked to the mirror. She casually picked up the fox-ear ornament. In the process of adjusting it, a hesitant look suddenly appeared in Lin’s bewitching purple eyes.

“…Is this outfit a bit too simple?”

Although this was her usual attire, today Lin felt it wasn’t quite right. After pondering for a moment, she scratched her black hair in frustration.

“Since I’ve completely controlled that gray magic, I should make some changes to make people feel I’m different now.”

However, when Lin opened her wardrobe, she couldn’t help but freeze.

Apart from her nightgowns, all her clothes were identical. Not only that, but there wasn’t even any makeup like rouge or powder on her table.

I was such an idiot for not listening to Purple’s advice back then.

Annoyed at her past foolish decision, Lin could only face the mirror, trying her best to smooth out non-existent wrinkles on her clothes and constantly fiddling with her black hair, attempting to arrange it at an attractive angle.

After a full half hour, Lin finally felt satisfied with her ‘new’ image.

“This should be fine.”

After firmly patting her cheeks, Lin tilted her head at the mirror and gave a faint smile.

Then, quickly feeling ashamed of her own behavior, she uncontrollably jumped onto the bed and rolled around awkwardly for a while. As a result, because she hadn’t controlled her strength, the bed collapsed completely amidst a series of cracking sounds.

Staring blankly at the ceiling, Lin lay stiffly amidst the wood splinters for a full minute before sheepishly getting up and slipping out of the room, looking embarrassed.

I’ll clean it up when I get back.