“So that’s the truth behind the purple moon?”
“That’s amazing, Noah. No wonder you’re an S-Class Mage. You figured out the cause almost immediately.”
Noah basked in their praise with obvious satisfaction.
“Of course I did. Pay attention and learn something.”
Gray frowned.
“Then… why didn’t you just tell the village chief and the others?”
Noah immediately gave him a look of contempt.
“Are you stupid? Their memories have already been altered. Do you really think they’d calmly accept our explanation? They’ve spent years believing they’re cursed, and they’ve even ‘killed’ members of their own families because of it. If I suddenly told them they were demons from the beginning, they’d probably lose their minds, decide we were useless too, and throw us out of the village.”
Gray hesitated.
“Uh… yeah, that actually makes sense. Wait, if they were demons all along, doesn’t that mean the chief’s son died for nothing?”
“Don’t worry. From what I’ve heard, demons are pretty hard to kill,” Noah said.
“Besides, the chief specifically said his son ‘lost himself.’ That means there was probably a point when he regained his real memories. If that happened, I’d say there’s a good chance he simply left the island.”
Noah started walking again, heading deeper into the forest.
“Everything has a cause. Something like this doesn’t suddenly start happening across an entire island for no reason. Whether we’re dealing with a disease or magic, the fact that it only began a few years ago means something must have changed around that time.”
Loke glanced at him.
“So where are we going now?”
“First, we look for something resembling a large-scale Magic Circle. If the magic really covers the entire island, then whoever set it up would need a considerable amount of preparation. That means they’d also need a large enough area to construct the necessary formation.”
“A place that big?” Gray asked.
“We didn’t see anything like that on the way here.”
“There’s an ancient ruin on Galuna Island mentioned in the records I found,” Noah replied.
“It’s a place that naturally gathers lunar energy. Since moonlight carries a sacred quality, the demons living on the island can’t easily approach it, which makes it the perfect place to set up a Magic Circle.”
Loke nodded.
“That does make sense. If the villagers can’t get near it, there’s little risk of anyone interfering with the spell.”
Noah folded his arms smugly.
“Exactly. Learn from this. Before taking a job, gather information properly. Read more books, keep up with the news, eat more fruit and vegetables, stay up less, drink less, get into fewer brawls, and stop chasing women all the time.”
Ten minutes later, Noah stopped at the front of the group.
“We’re here.”
An ancient, mysterious ruin stood before them.
Broken stone lay scattered everywhere, and several sections of the structure were decorated with patterns resembling crescent moons.
“So this is the ruin you were talking about,” Cana said as she looked around.
“It isn’t even that far from the village. Why didn’t any of the villagers mention it?”
The others soon noticed that there was even a direct path leading from the village toward the ruins.
“Because they can’t approach this place,” Noah said. You are reading on novelping.com, the official source.
“They probably assumed we wouldn’t believe something that strange even if they told us, so they left it out.”
He looked toward the upper levels of the structure.
“This is both the center of the island and its highest point. If someone wanted to set up a large Magic Circle, the top of these ruins would be the ideal location. Let’s head up and take a look.”
Loke suddenly stopped.
“Hm? There’s a hole here.”
He stepped closer and examined the opening.
“There’s another hole directly above it, almost exactly the same size. Coincidence?”
Loke tilted his head back, then narrowed his eyes.
“No. Several floors above us have been broken through too. This isn’t natural deterioration. Someone did this deliberately.”
Gray and Cana walked over to inspect it and quickly saw that Loke was right.
While the three of them were still considering what it could mean, Noah’s voice came from behind them with perfectly rehearsed realization.
“Of course! So that’s what this is. Now it all makes sense!”
The others turned around.
Noah looked as though the final piece of some great mystery had just fallen into place.
“If you think about it, this ruin naturally gathers an enormous amount of lunar energy. There couldn’t be a better location for that particular magic.”
He adopted the solemn expression of a detective about to reveal the culprit.
“There is only one truth!”
Gray stared at him.
“What magic are you talking about?”
“Moon Drip,” Noah replied.
“A legendary spell created by gathering moonlight into concentrated beams and accumulating an enormous amount of lunar energy. It’s said to possess the power to dispel any magic.”
Gray and Cana both looked startled.
“A spell that can dispel any magic?” Cana asked.
“Something like that really exists?”
Noah noticed that Loke was far less surprised than the other two.
That made sense.
As a Celestial Spirit who had lived for who knew how long, Loke naturally possessed knowledge ordinary Mages didn’t.
In the original story, information about Moon Drip had also come from a Celestial Spirit.
“Of course it exists. I’ve read about it,” Noah said.
“But the conditions required to perform Moon Drip are extremely demanding. You need an enormous amount of lunar energy, enough people to maintain the ritual, and an ancient incantation that hardly anyone even knows anymore. It’s essentially a lost art at this point.”
He continued, “It also produces a kind of magical pollution. According to the records, Moon Drip gives off a special substance during the process, and that may be what’s affecting the island.”
Cana’s eyes widened.
“Maybe, but we can’t be sure yet. It could still be something else. The sun will be setting soon, and once night falls, we should know more.”
Gray scowled.
“Who the hell is doing something like this? And why do we need to wait until tonight? Why not just go up there and destroy the Magic Circle now?”
Cana nodded.
“Exactly. Even if we don’t understand everything yet, destroying the Magic Circle should at least stop the source of the contamination, right?”
“Moon Drip can only be performed at night,” Noah replied.
“If we go up there now, there won’t be anything active for us to destroy, and there probably won’t be anyone around to fight either.”
Gray thought back to the chief’s explanation.
“Didn’t he say this has been going on for three years? They still haven’t completed the spell?”
“It isn’t that simple.” Noah shook his head.
“Moon Drip is extremely difficult to produce. Even on an island with this much lunar energy, three years isn’t necessarily enough. And the effects it has already caused are troublesome enough that simply destroying the Magic Circle won’t solve everything.”
Cana immediately followed up.
“Can’t we at least remove whatever is affecting the island first? You should have some way of purifying the air, right?”
“The thing is, ever since we arrived, I haven’t sensed anything unusual in the air. That’s why I said we need to wait until nightfall before drawing conclusions.”
Noah glanced toward the opening in the ruins.
“As for right now…”
A faint smile appeared on his face.
“Aren’t you curious what these mysterious people are trying to free with Moon Drip?”
That immediately caught the attention of all three.
He had a point.
Whoever was carrying out this ritual had spent years gathering lunar energy and secretly using Moon Drip on Galuna Island.
What exactly were they trying to dispel?
Noah pointed toward the depths of the ruins.
“The answer should be somewhere below us. Want to take a look?”
“Of course!”
Gray, Cana, and Loke answered almost together, each of them visibly excited by the mystery ahead.
Gray grinned to himself.
‘S-Class jobs really are different.
This is actually pretty fun, and I’ve already learned a bunch of things I never knew before.
I’m going to be able to brag about this to Natsu for ages.’
Noah looked at Gray’s eager expression and smiled inwardly.
‘Go ahead and enjoy yourself while you can.’
‘You won’t be smiling for much longer.’
End of Chapter 10