Miss Witch’s Devotion Has Gone… Twisted

“Master, what should we do with him? We won’t be found out, will we?”

“It’s fine. We just need to clean things up properly. As it happens, I’ve been wanting to capture a Plague Envoy for an experiment.”

Because of their unusual body structure, the Plague Envoys couldn’t even stand after losing their supernatural powers.

Loren stomped on the Plague Envoy’s head, crushing it. The bugs inside him didn’t burst out as they usually did, or even crawl out. It was as if they were dead.

These bugs were also manifestations of the God of Plague’s power. Once the Dust of the Mundane suppressed the power the God of Plague had bestowed upon the Plague Envoy, the bugs lost all ability to move as well.

Now that he had reached a conclusion, Loren simply used Return to Earth to dispose of the Plague Envoy’s corpse.

At a time like this, every fighter was crucial. It wouldn’t be long before the Plague Church discovered that one of its Plague Envoys had disappeared, but they wouldn’t be able to trace it back to Loren.

“Let’s go.”

Even if Loren was discovered, it wouldn’t matter. The Orthodox Gods couldn’t come down and deal with him at such a critical moment.

They couldn’t, and they didn’t dare.

Loren was even planning to show himself before leaving, just to put more pressure on the Orthodox Gods.

…

Loren glanced at the newspapers here. They were still reporting only good news and hiding the bad. According to them, the war between the Plague Church and the Bountiful Church had achieved a major victory, but Loren’s sudden appearance had prevented them from expanding their gains.

In the end, they drove Loren back and withdrew their own forces, while saying nothing at all about the Desolation Deer’s death.

The newspapers also took the opportunity to disparage Loren. Most of the remaining space was devoted to boasting about how open and tolerant they were, and how theirs was the most civilized place in the world.

This was a tactic the God of Plague’s territory had always favored. The Bardo Kingdom had used it to attract quite a few people.

The place really was open and tolerant. The people who came here would have been burned alive in the territory of the God of Vows and Wind.

Loren also found another piece of useful information. Scarra had now completely taken control of that war-torn country, bringing all the warlords under his rule.

Scarra had already lost the Emperor Card, but it hadn’t affected him much. He was powerful in his own right, just not quite as strong as Loren.

His pure technique was absurdly powerful. If magic were off the table, he might well be the strongest person in the world.

Unlike the other Tarot card holders, he didn’t rely much on his Tarot card. He depended far more on his own fighting ability.

On top of that, he had now obtained Cassian’s power. Loren just didn’t know exactly what that power was, or what its price might be. There was no way to tell from the newspapers.

Now Scarra was going to war as well, joining the fight against the God of Bountiful Harvest.

His country was quite far from the battlefield. To join the war, he would have to cross another country, and he would have to pass through here.

Loren was considering whether he could get Scarra to conquer this country while he was at it.

The Church wouldn’t allow such a thing, but if Scarra moved quickly and made it a fait accompli, the Church wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.

Besides, it might not even be a bad thing for the Church. There weren’t many normal people in the countries under the God of Plague. Strictly speaking, the only relatively normal one was the King of Bardo.

It wasn’t just the king. The believers weren’t normal either. They had little fighting spirit, and their sexual preferences were hardly conventional. A large part of the reason they went to war was so they could capture enemy soldiers and make them into playthings.

If they could take an enemy city, so much the better. Old men and little boys were even more sought-after prizes.

That was why their morale was absurdly poor. A slight disadvantage was enough to send them fleeing. They had acted just like that when they faced Luna, who had joined the war earlier.

The only reason they could go toe-to-toe with the Bountiful followers was that the Bountiful followers weren’t especially eager to fight either.

They went to war to defend their homes and country, which was certainly a more respectable reason than the Plague Believers’ motives. But they were weak-willed to begin with, and things back home were a mess.

The Bountiful Church didn’t care about how the soldiers felt. Instead, it concerned itself with those who stayed away from the battlefield, granting them all sorts of privileges.

The Church told the soldiers to defend their homes and country, while their wives sent them breakup letters and threw themselves into the arms of enemy soldiers. That left the soldiers with no motivation to fight. As long as they could deal with the execution squad, they would surrender as soon as the other side offered them a few concessions.

The King of Bardo had been having a wonderful time absorbing the surrendering troops lately. With Noah’s fertilizer, he didn’t have to worry too much about food.

Compared with those monsters, Scarra was downright normal. The soldiers under his command were real soldiers, men with fighting spirit.

So when he faced the other warlords, he could overwhelm them with ease.

It would indeed be a good thing if he ruled this country, and Loren wasn’t going to do anything that benefited the Orthodox Gods.

Scarra wasn’t the sort to meekly follow the rules, either. After receiving Cassian’s blessing, he had no real faith in the Orthodox Gods. When Loren told him he could fight the Angels and Orthodox Gods, the excitement he showed at the time had been genuine.

He really wanted to do it. That was why Cassian had given him power.

If Scarra really could take control here, it would provide Loren with more forces and give Scarra a chance to work with Noah.

Taking power would be easy, too. The soldiers here weren’t particularly loyal. Scarra only had to storm the royal palace and kill the King and his Ministers.

They were all Plague Believers, so taking over wouldn’t be difficult for him.

The information in the newspapers was limited and subject to control. To find out more, Loren went to a tavern.

Scarra’s situation was just a move he was keeping in reserve. Loren’s real goal was to get his hands on the Tarot card.

The Lovers card had changed hands many times, and Loren had no idea who held it now. But he could be certain that whoever had it wouldn’t be staying out of trouble, so he planned to ask around here.

For the sake of social stability, even if a Tarot card holder really did commit a crime, the papers couldn’t report it.

“Why are there so few people in the tavern?”

The tavern, which should have been noisy, was quiet now, with hardly anyone inside. Loren asked casually.

Something unusual was bound to have a reason. There had to be a reason no one was coming.

It probably wasn’t just because of the war. Unlike the Church of Pain, the Plague Church hadn’t been forcibly conscripting people. Those who weren’t on the battlefield would still come out for drinks, especially since this place was so far from the front.

“Are you a tourist?”

“Yes, I’m a Bountiful follower. I arrived recently.”

As he spoke with the bartender, Loren casually placed a few silver coins on the counter. The bartender slipped them into his pocket without a word.

“There have been a lot of murders lately. Everyone’s a little scared, so they don’t go out much at night.”

“Murder cases?”

People dying in a place like this was common enough that no one would make a fuss over it. If people were being this cautious, then quite a few must have died.

“Yeah. The killer’s murdered a lot of people, most of them female Bountiful followers.”