Witch Hunter Rhapsody

An unnamed forest outside the city of Otham.

The land where the dead rise again.

It's not entirely accurate to call it a place of resurrection. About one-third of the undead that attacked Ortham were created using local residents, while the remaining two-thirds were created through the combined efforts of the Noctis Necromancer War School.

Raphael Deliano felt very lucky to have gotten this job. Unlike other schools of thought, the School of War was not fragmented; it was more like a tightly knit organization. Within this organization, to gain greater power and resources, one had to contribute to the entire school.

However, the opportunity to make a contribution was not the right one, especially for someone like Raphael who held a certain position; being stuck in the middle was extremely awkward. Therefore, he now cherished this opportunity all the more, this chance to gain more experience and improve himself.

As dawn broke, the people of Ortham were cleaning up the mess. The complex situation inside the city left them with no time to pay attention to what was happening outside.

A spirit slowly rose to its feet.

It had been buried underground as a last resort.

The position outside the city was set up to deploy a larger magic array to teleport the created, even larger and more powerful bone dragons over.

Once the magic circle is drawn, it will continuously consume magic power. After the magic power is exhausted, the entire magic circle will eventually disappear.

Generally speaking, if you want to maintain a magic circle or inscribe an image, it is best to start within three hours after the person who created the magic circle dies.

The undead were still following the route they had planned.

About five minutes later, it walked to the external entrance of a magic circle, where the magic Raphael had planted on it before the battle began to generate and flow into the magic circle.

Black mist emerged from the magic circle and eventually enveloped the entire forest.

In the forest, all the undead gathered. Vitas should have wondered why there were so many undead here when he first arrived. This shouldn't be the main battleground.

Unfortunately, Vitas didn't have time to think that much at the time.

The decaying flesh of these undead began to dissolve, then, under the influence of magic, it coalesced again. Their target was clear: Raphael, who had been smashed beyond recognition by Vitas.

Finally, Raphael's bones began to grow, his flesh began to regenerate, and finally, as the greenish-yellow substance from the magic circle flowed into his body, his tightly closed eyes opened.

"Ouch, that hurts! What's going on?"

Raphael carefully surveyed his surroundings.

He remembered coming to Ortham City in search of Via's legacy for the sake of his school. He had prepared a large-scale attack and planned to find the monster Via amidst the chaos and take her away.

But now...

"The resurrection array has been activated? Damn it, I failed?"

Raphael finally understood the situation.

But who killed him, and what happened to the plan? He was the only one who personally arrived in Ortham City; his other colleagues were assisting him remotely.

He cast a communication spell.

"Teacher, what's going on?"

"Raphael, are you dead?"

"It seems I did die once, but the memories stored in the resurrection circle are from before the battle began, so I don't know the specifics."

"Ha, that's a real pity. You missed Nexus's crushing defeat of our magic circle."

"Nexus? How could that guy... Why would he be eyeing Viya's legacy? Isn't he the one who does soul research?"

"We don't know right now, but we have to find out. Raphael, our last mission failed, but that's understandable because too many things happened that we didn't anticipate. Now, we need you to continue the investigation."

"clear."

Raphael spent some time cleaning up the magic circles and other traces left behind before focusing on his own body. Resurrection spells activate after death, and considering that Noctis necromancers often modified their bodies to some extent, this was almost a perfect resurrection spell.

However, since there is no way to perform surgery right now, it is not safe enough to rely on this body, which is in danger of collapsing at any time.

But there were no other options.

Raphael took out a new set of clothes from his dimensional ring and put them on.

"Now that things have come to this, let's go into the city and see what's going on. What's the first incantation of Anonymous's Transfiguration spell again...?"

……

Inside the city.

Raphael was very confident in his necromancy and summoning magic. The streets were now in a state of chaos and ruin, and people were grateful to have survived.

The vast majority of places where the undead actually appeared were basically the places where the Viya monster had appeared.

Raphael was quite proud; he had spent a long time gathering information and roughly figuring out the monster's daily routine and activity range. It was because of this that he came up with the method of using necromancy to force it out.

Raphael originally intended to capture it himself, but before he could set off, he was found by Nectus's men and brutally killed.

How exactly was I killed? That is a question.

Raphael saw many corpses on the ground, both human and undead—excellent material indeed.

Raphael felt a little regretful.

The city will be holding a long funeral next, but Raphael is used to it. If a necromancer can't even accept these things, then it would be too bad.

Raphael overheard the conversation among the mercenaries nearby.

"It's truly tragic; it seems even Viya's monster died."

"What? Really? Oh my god, that's terrifying."

"I don't know, I don't know anything. To be honest, this situation is really strange. We don't know anything. It's really strange."

This is quite normal, after all, wizards don't like to publicize what they do.

It's not a big problem that Viya's monster is dead. As long as we can find the body, we can succeed.

Raphael cast a spell in the corner: Necromancer's Eye.

As a specialized branch of the Necromancer school specializing in reconnaissance magic, the Necromancer's Eye possesses the talent to discern the identity of corpses within a certain distance.

Raphael knew roughly where the fighting was most intense, so he headed in that direction.

Finally, Raphael arrived at the morgue, where most of the bodies were piled up together, but a few were pulled out separately.

Raphael noticed a heavily armored warrior who didn't seem like the type to be here.

He pretended to be a passerby, his gaze sweeping over the corpses. When he saw the charred Viya monster, he was undoubtedly disappointed.

In that case, the plan to capture the monster Viya would have completely failed.

"Oh shit."

He cursed under his breath as he continued his search, trying to find something to make up for his losses.

Finally, he noticed a peculiar corpse.

The man's face was intact, and his appearance was such that even people of some status could recognize him.

Draco's reading, Alistair.

interesting.

If they could bring this corpse back, it would make up for the loss of not being able to capture the monster, Via. The corpse will probably be taken away soon; he needs to come up with a solution as quickly as possible.

They seem to have no idea they would end up here.

Raphael placed his hand on Alistair's corpse and began chanting a spell.

"Hey! What's up with that guy?"

"No! Stop him!"

It was too late. With a dazzling light, Alistair and Raphael disappeared from everyone's sight.

Maximus hadn't realized what was happening by then.

"What's going on now?"