Became the Unjust Contract Slave of the Archamage’s Book

Yunnaeril, who had been playing with the Inya tribe’s children, sensed that something was amiss and approached. Priya, who disliked children, was standing a little distance away, puffing on her pipe.

“It’s nothing you need to worry about,” Bala II said brusquely as he hurried out of the village with his warriors.

“I can feel the presence of a demon nearby,” Priya remarked.

Both Yunnaeril and Priya followed in the direction the Inya warriors had gone. Not far from the village, the Inya warriors were engaged in a fierce battle with a demon.

Bala II, who had sprinted there, threw himself into the fray.

“KSHVARL! MONBAU!”

— *Snow Serpent!*

Binaeril instantly recognized the creature. It was a Snow Serpent, a demon known to inhabit the snowy northern regions. The creature had a long, white body, covered in spiky protrusions that jutted out threateningly as it moved. While not inherently a massive threat, it was a different story in the snowy terrain. The white spikes blended seamlessly into the snow, making them hard to detect, and they served as dangerous weapons capable of attacking from unpredictable angles.

‘A Snow Serpent encountered in the snowfields is as strong as a medium-class demon or higher. It’s advisable to lure it out of the snow before engaging it in battle,’ Binaeril recalled reading in a demonology manual.

By the time Bala II arrived, the Inya warriors were already locked in a brutal fight with the Snow Serpent. The landscape was nothing but snowdrifts, and the serpent’s spikes were tearing through the warriors with deadly precision. The warriors’ blood splattered across the white ground.

“GRRRRRYA!” Bala II and the reinforcements roared in fury as they charged at the demon.

But their efforts were not enough. Their arrival only provided a brief respite for those who had been fighting, but the tide of battle remained unfavorable. Before the Inya warriors could even land a punch, many were impaled by the serpent’s spikes.

“VALLA TAN COMMA, INJYA BAK!” Bala II shouted, commanding the remaining warriors to retreat with the injured.

It seemed he was telling them to take care of the wounded while he and a handful of others stayed to fight. After a few of the wounded and other warriors managed to pull back, only Bala II and six or seven warriors remained.

At that moment, Bala II clashed his bracers together and shouted,

“MAL PARAVINYA, INYA VAISA!”

He led the chant, and the other warriors followed suit, echoing his words with fervor.

As the warriors chanted in unison, a strange wave of mana surged through the air.

— *This is…!*

Binaeril recognized the mana, not from a memory stored in his mind, but from a sensation his body remembered all too well. It was the same power that Inyakan had used when he had beaten him. Yunnaeril and Priya, who had followed the warriors, also listened to the chant with mild surprise.

“Snow Serpent!” Priya exclaimed. “If we don’t help, those men are all going to die.”

As Priya made to intervene, Yunnaeril held her back with his arm.

“Priya, wait a moment.”

Yunnaeril watched the Inya tribe’s battle closely. The limbs of the warriors began to glow with a crimson hue. As the chant reached its peak, Bala II launched himself at the Snow Serpent. The serpent’s spikes shot toward him, but with what sounded like a curse, Bala II swung his arms, smashing the spikes to pieces with his fists, reducing them to mere fragments.

“…What kind of mana is that?” Priya muttered to herself in disbelief.

The warriors who followed Bala II’s lead also began shattering the serpent’s spikes with reckless abandon. As they leaped into the air, the resonant sound of their bracers echoed like a powerful reverberation. The serpent, now having lost a significant number of its spikes, was vulnerable. Bala II’s fist was poised to crush the creature’s head when suddenly—

*Swish!*

A spike shot from somewhere, aiming directly for Bala II’s head at a speed and trajectory impossible to evade.

— *Damn it…!* 

Just as Bala II closed his eyes, bracing for impact, a voice called out.

“Phew—such an impatient barbarian. I knew this would happen.”

A white, fluffy cloud enveloped Bala II, and the spike bounced harmlessly off, unable to penetrate the cloud. The cloud gently lowered him to the ground. While it was unclear how this had happened, the important thing was that the demon was still alive.

“Shriek!”

From beyond their line of sight, another Snow Serpent appeared, letting out a deafening roar. Not one, but two serpents now confronted them. The crimson flames that had enveloped the warriors’ limbs began to flicker and fade.

The flames that flickered from the Inya warriors were a testament to their indomitable spirit. However, the emergence of a second Snow Serpent threatened to extinguish that fire, as fear began to take hold. The warriors gazed at the two serpents with a mixture of dread and despair, their courage faltering.

At that moment, Yunnaeril drew Starfall. Suddenly, a cascade of radiant stars began to pour down over the warriors’ heads. It was an unusual sight, considering it was still far from nightfall.

“Everyone, get down!” Yunnaeril shouted, and Bala II quickly translated the command to the warriors.

In unison, they all dropped to their knees, bowing their heads low. 

*Shk-shk!*

The blade of stars swept across the battlefield, slicing the massive bodies of the Snow Serpents clean in half. The radiant arc didn’t just stop there; it continued to cleave through everything in its path, splitting the very landscape in two.

The warriors, who had kept their heads down, cautiously raised them again once the celestial spectacle had passed. The two demons were now reduced to four lifeless chunks. They looked up at Yunnaeril, who stood atop the hill, in awe and fear. Was this man a mere human, or was he a god?

“Thank you,” Bala II muttered, his expression far from grateful. 

While his words expressed thanks, his face was twisted with resentment. Inside, Bala II was torn between the acknowledgment that they had been saved and his pride as a warrior. The result was an awkward, almost bitter expression of gratitude.

“Forget it. Being thanked like that is more likely to give me indigestion,” Yunnaeril responded dismissively.

“Not thanking you,” Bala II replied curtly.

“Does this guy not realize whose help just saved his neck?” Priya said, incredulous, as she glared at Bala II.

It was only after the battle had ended that Bala II realized the white cloud that had protected him had been Priya’s doing. But to him, it didn’t matter. She had saved herself, not the members of the Inya tribe. That alone couldn’t diminish his pride as a warrior.

“So what?” he retorted.

Priya sputtered in frustration. “Just listen to the way he talks!”

“Calm down, Priya,” Yunnaeril interjected before she could completely lose her temper. “The Son of Bala Who Fled from the Wolves is probably more grateful than he’s willing to admit.”

“Son of Bala Who Fled from the Wolves,” Yunnaeril addressed him directly.

“You said earlier that there’s no such thing as a treasure among the Inya tribe.”

“That’s right.”

“But after what I’ve seen today, I think I’ve figured out what that treasure really is.”

— *A treasure that the Inya tribe possesses?*

Binaeril had once asked Inyakan a similar question: whether the Inya tribe possessed any special artifact, a fragment, perhaps. Inyakan had responded just as his son did now, swearing on the name of the Khan that the Inya tribe had nothing worth stealing.

But now, Yunnaeril had claimed to have discovered something—a treasure that even Inyakan might not have known about? Binaeril, who had been observing the situation, found himself completely at a loss. Both Bala II and Priya focused intently on Yunnaeril as he spoke.

“The treasure of the Inya tribe, its true identity is…”

Suddenly, the world flickered and darkened. A strange noise filled the air, and everything—Yunnaeril, Priya, Bala II, the entire village—seemed to dissolve into static.

— *What’s going on?*

— *I can’t show you anything beyond this point.*

— *What? That’s not fair! I haven’t even gotten an answer yet!*

— *It’s not my decision. From here on, Starfall’s power is interfering, and even I don’t know what happened.*

— *Starfall’s power?*

— *Yes. To put it briefly, after this moment, the Inya tribe vanished from the world, including Bala II and all the other tribe members.*

— *Why?*

— *I have some guesses, but I don’t know for certain. What I do know is that Starfall’s power is involved, and that’s why even I can’t access the truth.*

— *Does that mean…*

— *It’s possible Yunnaeril lost control.*

Yunnaeril losing control… Binaeril knew better than anyone what could happen when someone wielding a fragment lost control. He had experienced it himself, more than once, and it had often been Inyakan who stopped him.

If Yunnaeril had been wielding Starfall, something similar might have happened to him.

— *So, what do I do now? Should I tell them the truth, that Yunnaeril was responsible?*

— *What I suggested is just one possibility. If you want to know the truth, it’s up to you to find out.*

— *How?*

— *Find Priya Merzina. She could hold the key to understanding what happened to the Inya tribe.*

When Binaeril opened his eyes, he found himself staring at Bala II’s face.

“Bala!” Binaeril shouted, startled as he returned to reality.

The one-eyed, bald man looked just as shocked and asked, “How did you know?”

“…Huh?” 

“How did you know?” 

Binaeril needed a moment to reorient himself, shaking his head slightly as he tried to ground himself in reality. How did he know what?

“Bala Who Fled from the Wolves?” Binaeril ventured, using the name he had heard from the past.

Inyakan’s face flushed red, his fists trembling with suppressed rage. Binaeril’s guess had been correct. The reason Inyakan had never revealed his name wasn’t due to some lofty reason about inheriting the Khan’s spirit. It was simply because he was embarrassed by it.

“Bala, did you really run away from a wolf?” Binaeril asked, unable to resist poking fun.

“…Shut up,” Inyakan growled.

“It’s hard to imagine someone with a face like yours running away…”

Inyakan’s bracer emitted a faint, low hum, a sound of tension. He said nothing, just glared at Binaeril with bloodshot eyes. Realizing he might be pushing his luck, Binaeril decided to change the subject.

“I met the ‘Son of Bala Who Fled from the Wolves.’”

Inyakan flinched.

“What are you talking about? He’s dead. I never saw the body, but I’m certain my son is dead. Are you saying my son is still alive?”

There was a faint glimmer of hope in Inyakan’s eyes—the desperate hope of a father yearning for his lost child.

Binaeril felt a pang of sympathy, but he knew he had to be honest. “No, he’s not alive. I saw him in a memory, just before the Inya tribe was wiped out.”

Inyakan’s expression quickly shifted from hope to bitter disappointment. But that disappointment didn’t last long. His impatience to know more quickly overtook it.

“Then what happened? Did you find out what happened to my people? How did they die?”

“Well… that’s the thing,” Binaeril hesitated, unsure how to explain. The memory had cut off just as Yunnaeril seemed to discover the tribe’s ‘treasure.’ What followed was unclear. If he told Inyakan outright that Yunnaeril might have been involved, the man would likely storm the Order in a rage.

“I don’t know for certain,” Binaeril continued, “but I did find someone who might know the truth.”

Inyakan frowned deeply, pounding his chest in frustration. “And who is that?”

“It’s someone you’ve met before,” Binaeril said cautiously. “We need to find Priya Merzina, the Enchantress, again.”