Episode 11 : The Secret of Kal-Mor - Part 2

For a while, the heroes of Mongol stared at the man, Kal-Mor, without speaking.

 I had to say that it was understandable. The reason is that he took off his black and oppressive hood, and what emerged from underneath was a strange, or should I say monstrous, disfigurement that could not be seen again.

 It wasn't just a disfigurement. A living skeleton... is not enough.

 Those who saw it could not help but wonder, after their exclamation, whether it could be called a man. The man's face looked almost like a mere skull with a piece of suntanned skin tightly attached to it.

 As if his lips, nose, and even eyelids had melted away, the man's slender gums, sparse, missing teeth, and the eyeballs in his sunken eye sockets were all that stood out.

Black death?

 Many of them must have suspected this at once.

 But it was subtly different from the disease of the Black Death. Above all, it lacked the characteristic sizzling sores. Instead, all of the blood was shriveled and clotted, as if it had been lost from the body.

 In the midst of the strange face, which has hardly retained its original form, only the eyes are unusually bright, and they look back at the people without any sign of being ashamed of their own face, which is exposed under the light. Eventually, when Amneris signalled that it was time, he raised his hand lazily and pulled back his hood, hiding his horrible face.

 At last the people sobered up from their despair and breathed a secret sigh of relief. There was something in Kal-Mor's face that frightened those who saw him and shook them to the depths of their souls. Perhaps it was because he could not help thinking about the circumstances that had led to his becoming this way, about the experience that had transformed a single person into something that could be called a monster.

"Kal-Mor is a man of Kitai, a land far to the east."

 Whether it was because she was accustomed to the strange appearance of Kal-Mor, which had terrified so many men, or because of her personality, the eighteen-year-old lady explained without any sign of hesitation.

"He was a dedicated young mage, so eager to master the secrets of the arcane that he was obsessed with the tremendous ambition of meeting and apprenticing with the legendary great mage Agrippa. --Isn't that right, Kal-Mor?"

 The monster gently lowered its face, which was now completely covered by its hood.

"But speaking of Agrippa..."

 Little Earl Regan shouted.

"It is said that he was born thousands of years ago - no, 20,000 years ago, and of course he is said to have lived for 20,000 years, but who would believe such a thing?"

"But, by the way, Kal-Mor believed, Regan."

 Amneris raised a thin hand as if she were a priestess making a proclamation.

"Not only that," he believed, "but I have the proof of it. At any rate, Kal-Mor had heard that the legendary Agrippa was still alive and still practicing his mysterious alchemy somewhere in the world, and he set out to find him. He set out from Kitai to find him. And they thought of the place where they were most likely to find him - that is, they went into the Canaanite Mountains and looked after the ancient empire of Canaan, and finding nothing there, they went straight into the wilderness of Nosferus."

 The captains listened with bated breath.

 It was a bizarre story, and to most people it seemed like a fairy tale. But the captains couldn't help but believe it. At any rate, they had seen Kal-Mor.

"Of course, no ordinary man would dream of crossing the wilds of Nosferus and returning alive. But Kal Mor is a mage. He knows many wondrous things. He was young and strong... much stronger than most... and blessed with luck. He walked and walked and walked for several months."

"After that, I'll tell you myself, Your Highness--if you don't mind."

 Suddenly a voice leaked out from underneath Kal-Mor's hood, and they all froze in fear. Somehow, they felt that it was impossible for this living corpse to speak like a normal human being.

 Kal-Mor's voice was like a wind blowing across a ruin, as if it were fit to come out of a gaping mouth with no lips.

"I walked."

 The mage continued in his gruff, crusty voice.

"Of course, if I am a magician who has mastered the art of magic, it is not necessarily difficult for me to make even the demon Nosferus fly. Among the forbidden black magic of Bratwurst and Magick, there is an ancient secret that twists and bends space and time as it pleases. But I must walk on my feet. Because my purpose was to find the hidden place of Agrippa the Great.

 So I walked, fought sandhills, was troubled by bloodsucking sand moss, changed course in a panic when I saw the village of Lagon, and walked for months in the midst of rock and sand in search of Agrippa. There was never a shortage of food or drink. Being a mage myself, I know how to get them out of the air and how to sleep safely in the air.

 And as I walked, I knew that the land of Nosferus was real. They say it's a place forsaken by the gods. The fauna and flora here have undergone a strange and monstrous transformation. This is the only place in the world where the demon child was planted from another planet. ... The mage also learned a lot about plants and animals, so I could understand the abnormality of Nosferus.

 And it was proof to me that if the Great Agrippa lurked, it would certainly not be in this land. Ever since I entered Nosferus, my crystal ball has been clouded by the miasma of this place, and I have been unable to dispel it.

 When I woke up one morning, I found that the crystal ball had finally turned completely black. As soon as I stretched out my finger to touch it, it fell to the ground and shattered into pieces, leaving nothing behind."

 None of them opened their mouths. Even Amneris, who should already have known the story, was silent, his face tense, listening to the story of Kal-Mor as if he were determined not to miss a word.

 With a voice devoid of any emotion, Kal-Mor continues his extraordinary story in an indifferent manner.

"Rather than an omen, it seemed to me more like a sign that I was approaching Agrippa. I felt that Agrippa was a man who had learned the art of the Old Gods and had mastered its secrets, and that he was therefore naturally opposed to the divine system of Janus, and that the crystal ball had cracked because it could not take in the spirit of Agrippa. That's how I felt.

 In fact, a few days ago, I myself began to feel an unusually strong presence or specter. It became stronger and stronger as we proceeded, and it became an intense stimulus for the mage, as if he were walking into the midst of a dizzying waterfall of roar, light, and smell that was unfolding all around him.

(This must be Agrippa's miasma) - that's what I thought. No one else but Agrippa could have emitted such a strong miasma in all directions - even if it was the Demon Doll herself. That's because the miasma was not merely an evil spirit, but rather something unexplainable, an alien spirit, that is to say, something that had nothing to do with the creatures of this planet or any system of magic.

 Thus, as I crossed Nosferus, I was drawn to the center of the miasma like an insect attracted by fire.

 And one morning--"

 Kal-Mor kept his mouth shut, rested a little, looking tired, and then began to speak again.

"One morning I noticed a staggering change in the landscape around me.

 It was an out-of-this-world scene that was too bizarre even for Nosferus, which was originally called Death and was nothing more than an inhospitable place for barbarians and monsters.

 I stepped into the valley of the dead, which was all white and covered with the bones of the earth, as if by the hand of a capricious demon.

 No, "valley of the dead" is not a metaphor or a figure of speech.

 Beneath my standing feet, with a crunching sound, something brittle and hard, white and gray, shattered, and then a cloud of white dust flew up. I gazed at my feet and realized that the earth was covered with bones, the remains of every living thing that had once lived and moved like me. The earth was made up of bones, bones, and bones again, stretching on and on and on.

 Among them were the ribs of some ancient beast of immense size, thrust up into the air as if resentful of its exhaustion, and the skulls of several small, probably Semitic, humans. They were all unusually brittle and white, and anyway--oh! How numerous they were!

 I am standing in a field of bones and bone powder, and beyond that, a forest of bones, a forest of bones, and an island of bones drifting in a sea of bones - not a sound, not a sign of living things moving, it is an eternity of white and gray, as if death itself had taken shape and appeared. It was an eternity of white and gray.

(This can't be.) At that time, I remember standing there in a daze, thinking with a dreamlike feeling.

This can't be. This is not the work of Agrippa. Agrippa, though a man of legend, though a believer in the old and strange gods, is a mortal. This is not a feat possible for a mortal - no mage of any age, in any country, could have conceived of such a thing.

 Even I, who had participated in the secret rituals of the Black Demon and was never afraid of anything, was made to murmur such a thing, because the "death" that was there was so terrible, and the fact that it was silent made it even more awe-inspiring and self-doubt-inducing.

 So much so that my self-control and reason must have stopped working for a while.

 When I realized this, I knelt there and scooped up the poor fragile bones with both hands. The bones had been subjected to the serpentine erosion of any kind of action, and even the slightest touch would cause them to shatter in an instant.

 What kind of curse, what kind of overwhelming magic had turned this place into such a hell itself--I was suddenly overwhelmed with a burning desire to know. I realized that I had unwittingly walked towards the center of this bone-encrusted valley, where all the bones were fluttering towards it.

 I don't know why, but my body felt inexplicably heavy, as if it had been filled with lead. My throat became thirsty and I felt as if all the strength in my body was being drained away. At that time, I did not have any premonitions. Rather, my brain had ceased to move, and my soul, too, was locked in a nightmare, as if it had forgotten its ability to feel and to feel.

 I stomped my bones and kept going, and - finally - I looked into what I thought was the center of the valley.

 There was nothing unusual about it, contrary to all my expectations. There was not even a trace of Agrippa's dwelling, not even an abyss of deadly fumes, not a single thing unusual enough to explain the secret of the Valley of Death.

 But there was only one thing there, one huge stone. A chrysanthemum stone, as someone once told me, a bumpy, pockmarked stone that was hard to see.

 Somewhere in my numb and increasingly heavy brain, I heard a voice puzzling over this. How could a stone like this, a stone with nothing unusual about it, turn three tad squares of the area into a valley of death and a forest of bones like this? As if they were being dragged towards the stone with overwhelming force and finally lost their strength on the way, all the corpses are lying down in concentric circles with their heads towards the stone, those on the north side going to the south, those on the south side going to the north, and so on.

 This isn't just-- well, I thought vaguely. This isn't just something. This stone holds some terrible secret. I foolishly - because in my strange paralysis, all my clarity and gentleness had been forgotten - reached out and picked up a piece of the stone. I reached out my hand and picked up a piece of the stone.

 Can you believe it? - When my hand touched the stone, I suddenly felt something strange and inexplicable. I withdrew my hand. I should have. But the next moment, I was staring at my hand - or the place where it was - with so much fear and astonishment that I could not speak.

 My hand, as I watched, weathered and melted away, and as I watched it, even the bones crumbled away, and in the twinkling of an eye, there was nothing left of it from the wrist down."

 Kal-Mor showed his hand from beneath his cloak. The captains turned away - it was a complete skeleton, missing from the wrist down.

"Surprisingly, I didn't feel any pain. In fact, I didn't even have time to feel it, to be honest.

 I was so stunned that I fanned the sky. The ashes of my bones danced in the sky, and even the sun seemed to be wearing a veil of hot white-gray. Suddenly, as if to draw back the white veil that covered my vision, I saw something black fly into the air. It was a desert glass. The bird was about to fly over the valley of death without incident, when suddenly, without warning, it began to chirp and flap its wings - and after only a few seconds, it fell like a stone. Just like a stone, dead.

 It fell onto the iron sand around the stone, as if it were the only sanctuary that the bones had kept away from as a silent promise. However, when it seemed to have fallen, it melted with a sizzling sound, and in the next moment, there was no proof that there had been anything alive there. Just like my lost right hand.

(SARAH'S STONE)

 That one word was the only thing that kept going around in my head.

(The Valley of the Slain Stone--Gul Nhu, the Valley of Death)

 I have to get out of here... that's what I was thinking in the depths of my hazy consciousness. We, mages, are not already one hundred percent mere human beings. In the course of our training and in the process of transforming the structural organization of our bodies into something that is suitable for our practice, our bodies become much more closely related to our spirit than usual, and our spirit, in turn, becomes a particle that has become a physical body. This is why we are able to transform ourselves into other things and feel the various energies of the universe in our bodies.

 If it had not been for that, my life would have been lost in the miasma of the stone in the blink of an eye, just like the other beasts who foolishly approached the few tad around the stone. However, even I, who was not a normal person, had already lost my senses after standing there for only three or four minutes, and my body was so weak that I was about to fall down.

 I know that if I were to fall there, even I would disappear in an instant, as my lost right hand teaches me bitterly.

 I have to get out of here, I have to get out of this valley no matter what, I thought.

 After that, with what kind of mental and volitional effort was it possible for me to stagger out of that valley of death, Guru Nath, apparently alive, as if I were drunk? As if I had been drunk, I have no memory of anything that happened during that time.

 But when I came to myself, I was lying in the endless rock and sand of Nosferus with my spirit exhausted. I felt a painful and crazy feeling that I did not know how I could have escaped from that hell, or whether I was really alive, or whether I had actually become a mere spirit, although I believed so.

 Perhaps I was no longer half-human, for I staggered on, not knowing what had become of me. No matter how far I went, the desolation of Nosferus never changed, and no matter how far I went, there was no sign of life, as if everything in this world had been turned into an uninhabited land by the miasma of that killing stone. Only once did a kind Shemite call out to me.

 I faintly remember that a high-pitched, chirping voice peculiar to Semites asked me in a friendly manner what was the matter. However, as soon as I raised my head, the Semites ran away with a scream of fear, because I was so happy to see someone and I was so thirsty.

 I stretched out my hand - or rather, what was left of it - begrudgingly to the earthenware jar that the Semites had left there. Oh, thank God--water!

 But when I looked into the jar, at the slight surface of the water, I forgot even to pour the water into my burning throat, and only stared at what I saw there.

 What devilish power was hidden in that accursed stone - my face (and not only my face), it was a mess as you can see, as if the flesh had been burnt and roasted. A living skull, as it was, its swollen tongue protruding from between its teeth and jawbone, its eyeballs staring in eternal horror, unable to stop...

 Thus, I had become the only living corpse to return from hell."

"Kal-Mor then managed to reach the Kes River and was saved by the frontiersmen."

 The cool voice of Amneris blew in the ears of the voiceless people like a gust of wind, bringing a calm conclusion to the strange story.

"At first, the settlers feared it was a new disease, but when they heard the story, they secretly handed him over to the Frontier Guard. Through that route the story spread to Torus, and so here we are."

 The lady did not wish to add any particular details about the matter. She only said that it would be enough to hear that, and gave the rest of the warning quickly, ordered the resumption of the march after two more zan, and announced the dismissal.

 The captains made no attempt to question them. Obviously, they had been completely drained of their poison and had been driven out of their minds. They left the lady's tent in a hurried manner, not even speaking to each other.

 The only ones left were the noblewoman Amneris, the mage Gayus, and our own Kal-Mor... well, there was one now.

"What can I do for you, Count Mars?"

 Amneris looks at the old nobleman with a cold, suspicious gaze, as if he cannot leave. He is not old, but he is not decrepit. His stern, warrior-like face is clouded with concern for the princess he has loved since he was a child.

"So, did the Golden Scorpion Palace hurry like fire to conquer Nosferus?"

 He tore off his tent, which had become unoccupied, and drew near to the lady, and lowered his voice.

"What do you want me to say? What do you have to say for yourself, old man?"

"I'm afraid you're going to have to ask me to leave."

 Count Mars gazed at the beautiful lady with a look of deep anxiety in his eyes.

"Before that, I've had a hunch since I got the order to capture the Paro twins on their way out of the Crystal and across the Mongol frontier."

"We haven't given up on the secret of the device that allowed the Paro twins to escape the crystal."

 The beautiful face of Amneris frowned as he remembered the princess of that lost kingdom who had openly defied the conqueror, the Lady of Mongol.

"Eventually--eventually they must have fled to one of the Semitic settlements. If not, they may have fallen in the wilds of Nosferus--that's good, for we do not care if their secrets fall into the hands of other nations. Once we have the Paro Twins, we will use any means to make them reveal the secret... but the Golden Scorpion realized that the importance of the Stone of Death, as seen by Kal-Mor, was not inferior to that. And this is a secret that only Mongol knows for now. The mystery of Paro, who sends people wherever he wants, and the mystery of Guru Noo, who kills all kinds of beasts with his miasma, when Mongol controls these two mysteries, it will not be a dream for him to conquer not only the Three Great Lordships, but also the whole Central Plains, or even the whole world! That's it!"

"Princess--Princess!"

 Mars said sadly, forgetting his fear of displeasing Amneris.

"I can't help but have a bad feeling about this. I can't help but feel that it's beyond human understanding to tamper with such a fearsome, unknown weapon. It is nothing less than the work of Dole, cursing not only the world but all who touch it. I can't help but feel that this is a realm that must never be touched."

"Stupid."

 Amneris laughed.

"A weapon is only a weapon. It depends on the man who uses it. There's nothing to be afraid of.

 That was the signal to leave. Count Mars passed through the exit of the tent in silence. But his thoughtful face was downcast, and he murmured softly in his mouth.

You don't know that people are used to things-- young, too young!

 The tent was just silent.