Maria Huwon sat next to him as if to act as his aide—since she was to his left and there was an empty space to his right, it made it seem all the more like the two of them had their own special status, though there was no official difference between any of the Numbers. At least, Orphen had heard that at some point. It had already been almost twenty years since people started calling Pluto the boss of the Thirteen Apostles though, and the “official” stance hardly seemed relevant at this point.
Before approaching the circle, Orphen counted the number of sorcerers there. It was only seven, including Pluto and Maria. Some were as young as Maria and some were much older.
“Brethren,” Pluto started. The Demon hadn’t waited for Orphen to take a seat, but he had waited for him to be in hearing distance. “What I must start with is an explanation. A foolish, worthless excuse for my pathetic, shameless self. But it’s something that must come from me. I’ve confirmed that we lost fifty-four of our Thirteen Apostles today. I do not think there have been as many sorcerers lost in one incident since the dark ages of the Sorcerer Hunts.”
The Demon of the Capital said all this in one breath and then bowed his head deeply. Still facing the ground, he continued, “There would be no point in me apologizing to you for the loss of life. It would be presumptuous of me. After all, I foresaw this the moment I resolved myself to this course of action—I knew that we would be no match for the dragons. You might say I was certain of it.”
Pluto’s head swayed and he slowly lifted it to gaze out at his listeners. Maybe he was waiting for some sort of argument, but the assembled sorcerers said nothing in response.
Orphen stopped before entering the circle, sensing that it would be better not to intrude. He listened, just close enough that the sorcerous light didn’t quite reach him.
Maria’s eyes flicked over to him for a second, but just a second. They immediately returned to the downward gaze she was maintaining as Pluto spoke.
“Still, we must fight the sanctuary. There is only one reason why: we are the most suited to it—we are gathered near the sanctuary, we have power, we are able to manifest our full strength in a short period of time, and we are capable of doing it. That is why we were summoned here.”
“By who?” Orphen intruded. From observing the expressions on all of their faces, he was the only one who didn’t know the answer to that question.
Pluto gave him an annoyed look. Orphen almost thought he wouldn’t answer him, but he did. “By the white sorcerers. They’ve seen through the plans of the Imminent Domain and the sanctuary. We were the practical fighting power they summoned,” he quickly explained before turning back to his original audience.
“What we were here to do was eliminate Damian Rue. This has been fulfilled. The next thing to do is to suppress the sanctuary as quickly as possible. That is the reason we are currently stationed here. So, what do we do now? That is what I would like to decide.”
One of the Thirteen Apostles spoke up. “We’ve lost too much of our fighting power.”
Pluto glared at the person who’d spoken, but another person followed soon after. The rough-looking sorcerer with thick eyebrows looked visibly frightened. “We’ve already lost half our numbers. It’s clear that the rest of us will follow. And it’s only been half a day—not to mention that wasn’t even all of the Red Dragons in the sanctuary, was it?”
“And on top of that, we don’t have Seek Marrisk or Kakorkist Isthan with us anymore. It was your error sending them to wipe out the Imminent Domain, wasn’t it?” a middle-aged man who looked to be the oldest among them said angrily.
“We should have had more time to gather our forces—”
“In the first place, the reason why the Thirteen Apostles had to take action on our own was—”
“What happened to joining forces with the Tower? You should have been able to do that, Maria. We were only able to add ourselves to this list because—”
“It’s not that we were too weak, it’s that our formation was too sloppy to fight against Red Dragons. If they need to, they can even attack from underground—”
“Pluto, are you scattering our lives across this wasteland for your own amusement?”
With that last voice, the commotion drew to a sudden stop. Even the person who had spoken hadn’t expected it, and looked around in a panic. No one else was meeting the young sorcerer’s eyes.
No one but Pluto and Maria. Pluto was giving the man a harsh look, though Maria was more sympathetic.
The man was speechless now, so Pluto opened his mouth again, wide, as if to take a deep breath, and said, “Let me answer each of you in turn. You are exactly right about the loss in our fighting forces. You could say that we have already been defeated. We have lost so many of our troops that it’s unlikely that we could even execute a strategy properly. As for the total number of Red Dragons in the sanctuary, needless to say, I have no idea how many there might be. But we know there are at least six of them, and we know it is not just Red Dragons we are up against. Let us also remember that we were powerless to stop a single Deep Dragon.”
After that, he turned accurately and responded to each sorcerer who had spoken. “Seek Marrisk, Kakorkist Isthan, and Irgitte Sweetheart. The three of them were all young, but brilliant casters, and we have lost them forever. Just as we lost the fifty-four others today. I was the one who sent them on a mission that forced them to risk their lives, but I think the only thing we can do to repay them is to not waste their honorable sacrifices.”