Barthomeloi Lorelei, the "pinnacle of contemporary mages" that London's Clock Tower took pride in.
As a female, possessing talent to train all abilities to their limits, serving as the current Marshal of Magecraft and also being a candidate for the Mage's Association Dean.
In every respect, Barthomeloi was a perfect person in mages' eyes, so she had quite many followers within the Clock Tower.
However, Barthomeloi looked down on those ordinary mages. She had very orthodox mage thinking, viewing bloodline nobility as extremely important.
Precisely because of this, when she received Waver's communication earlier, she hadn't given Waver a pleasant tone either—after all, although Waver temporarily held El-Melloi's position, he lacked matching bloodline.
In Barthomeloi's view, Waver remained just a third-rate mage with terrible bloodline. If not for occupying El-Melloi II's name, he wouldn't even have the opportunity to speak with her.
But precisely because she viewed Waver as a minor character, after finishing speaking with Waver, Barthomeloi threw him to the back of her mind, not caring why Waver asked whether she was at the Clock Tower.
And it was precisely this dismissal that cost her the chance to escape.
"Thank you very much for your cooperation, Baruletta Lord."
In the Mage's Association's Creation Department office, Waver smiled at the pale elderly woman before him, speaking seemingly polite words.
Zuke stood beside Waver, boredly playing with sand in his hand—that sand wasn't ordinary material, but the magical artifact of the Creation Department's Lord, Inorai Valualeta Atroholm.
Baruletta Lord's magical ability was quite strong. After all, she was Touko Aozaki's teacher. That sand-based magecraft would even make Touko Aozaki wary.
But just now facing Zuke, Baruletta Lord had released large amounts of sand, trying to turn him into a sand painting—yet that sand was casually grabbed by Zuke and forcibly compressed into a sand ball.
That invisible force came from the "telekinesis" obtained from Goto Hitori's Stand—although this power substantially wasn't as simple as mere telekinesis, it could still be used as pure telekinesis.
Under Zuke's mental power amplification, terrifying telekinesis directly enveloped the sand, squeezing the magic-filled sand into a ball and simply holding it in hand.
Afterward, Zuke also instantly released "Blackbird Lovers," sneaking into Baruletta Lord's ear, making her understand her situation.
So now Baruletta Lord could only cooperate somewhat reluctantly with Waver, completing her oath of allegiance to Zuke, becoming Zuke's subordinate with a bitter smile.
No choice—her attacks looked utterly powerless as a child's to Zuke. Plus with her brain invaded by the opponent's peculiar "magecraft," she couldn't disobey even if she wanted.
If it were her disciple Touko Aozaki, perhaps there'd be a way to escape Zuke's control.
Because Touko Aozaki was a puppet master, she could even create "puppets" completely identical to her physical body, transferring all abilities to another "puppet" body through "death," achieving body-swapping techniques.
If she encountered Zuke's "Blackbird Lovers," she might escape Zuke's brain threat by changing bodies.
But although Baruletta Lord was Touko Aozaki's teacher, she lacked Touko Aozaki's nearly divine puppet techniques. With her brain controlled, she was truly controlled.
"I didn't expect to become colleagues with you in this manner, El-Melloi Lord."
After understanding her situation, Baruletta Lord's expression looking at Waver was somewhat strange.
Although Baruletta Lord was one of the Three Great Aristocrats, she actually thought quite well of Waver and previously had ideas of recruiting him.
However, unexpectedly, before she could successfully recruit Waver, she herself was forced to become Waver's colleague in this unexpected manner.
"Actually, you don't need to worry so much."
Perhaps seeing a trace of worry on Baruletta Lord's face, Waver smiled slightly.
"In fact, soon all the Clock Tower's Lords will become allies."
"Huh?"
Hearing Waver's statement, Baruletta Lord's expression immediately stiffened, then she instinctively looked at Zuke.
"In fact, before finding you, we'd already visited other Lords. Now almost all the Lords have already become Zuke-san's subordinates."
Waver's thin face showed a faint smile, though presumably in other Lords' eyes, this smile would be quite eerie.
"Now only Barthomeloi Lord and Gaiusling Lord remain... And we're planning to visit Barthomeloi Lord next."
Although two Lords remained, everyone at the Clock Tower knew Gaiusling actually completely obeyed Barthomeloi, so dealing with Barthomeloi meant dealing with the remaining two.
Hearing Waver and Zuke were going to find Barthomeloi, Baruletta Lord's face immediately changed:
"You... aren't even planning to spare Barthomeloi? That person is very dangerous!"
As Marshal of Magecraft, although Barthomeloi looked like just a young woman, her strength naturally couldn't be underestimated, so Baruletta Lord naturally felt somewhat worried.
Of course, she wasn't worried whether Zuke would encounter danger. After all, she'd also yielded to Zuke under "Blackbird Lovers'" threat to her brain and had no loyalty to speak of toward Zuke.
But if Zuke failed, then her surrender to Zuke would inevitably face Barthomeloi's purge afterward.
"Dangerous?"
Hearing this, Zuke couldn't help but sneer—mages constantly buried themselves in research, but their horizons were just that limited.
Waver beside him showed no change in expression—Baruletta Lord didn't know Zuke's strength, but Waver knew something about it.
Barthomeloi's strength was indeed top-tier among mages, even capable of hunting Dead Apostle Ancestors. Probably even some Servants weren't as strong as her.
But Zuke wasn't an ordinary Servant. Barthomeloi wanting to threaten Zuke?
Waver wasn't looking down on her, but please let Barthomeloi wake up from her dream quickly.
Regarding Zuke's plan to control all the Mage's Association's Lords, Waver never considered the possibility of failure from the start.
To be continued…
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