Book 9 Chapter 13

Chapter 212

“Lin, where are you going? Lin!”

Ignoring the call of the Eldest Senior Disciple, I left the Magic Tower.

I mustn’t meet them.

I cannot meet them.

It’s a bond I left buried in the world 300 years ago. If I were to meet that person again now, I would start to think.

I’d want to keep staying in this fake world. The moment I think that, everything will end.

I need to hide somewhere until Valensidis, that guy, can help me. Or I need to find a way to escape on my own.

“Madam Dean!”

“Madam Dean Auntie!”

“Look who’s here!”

The moment I was about to exit the main gate, a refreshing autumn breeze brushed my cheek.

‘Ah.’

In the curtain of night, the pine forest surrounding the Magic Tower rustled with a clear sound.

‘No.’

A shiver ran down my spine. My heart’s pounding showed no sign of calming down.

Not since the moment I saw that person walking along the forest path leading to the Magic Tower.

“What’s all this commotion at night instead of sleeping? If you put this much effort into solving math problems, then…”

How many times had I dreamt of this, I wondered?

Time and time again.

This day when I would meet you again—I had so much I wanted to say, but not a single word came to mind.

Damn it, I mustn’t say anything. No, I shouldn’t.

“I…”

Had the ravages of time etched a few more lines on their face? Had they suffered greatly because I went to the battlefield?

The wrinkles on their revered face deepened, and their once soft hair was streaked with gray.

Yet, despite that, I recognized them at once. There was no way I couldn’t recognize them.

“Madam Dean Auntie.”

Before consciousness could control the unconscious, my unconscious desire to stay here, to return here, was controlling my body.

“I… I’m back.”

* * *

“He won’t wake up…”

Miria panted with bated breath.

The fabric of Seresia was rapidly thinning, and its burning interior began to show through.

‘How?’

Seresia, detecting the wearer’s crisis, repeatedly sent the flames into sub-space, but this was not an attack.

‘What am I supposed to do?’

It was a self-purifying action originating from the Yeouiju trying to cleanse the abyss within the body.

“BaHaaaa…”

“Sheeeee…”

The flames had already consumed his hand and forearm, creeping up to his upper arm.

If left unchecked, the flames would eventually reach his heart…

But they couldn’t keep trying to wake him either.

“Aki!”

Miria, gripping the Demonic Sword with both hands, wary of the primitives encircling them and waiting for an opportunity to attack.

“Wake that idiot up with Nen, alright? Until he gets up!”

Aki nodded, then, *Kroooong*, put more force into his jaw, which was gnawing at Rain’s head.

What utter simplicity!

As blood streamed from the fanged scalp, the Heukyangrin, which Miria had pulled out of Seresia when she shook his collar earlier, pulsed gently.

“Aru?”

Had that light given some kind of revelation to her heart? Setsunen suddenly, as if possessed, unfastened the front of Seresia.

Then, she put her head and both hands into Seresia’s sub-space pocket, wiggling, and soon pulled out an old straw hat.

That straw hat, a treasure the boy cherished more than any other in this world, began to scatter light as if resonating with the Heukyangrin.

* * *

In a silence where time seemed to have stopped, Madam Dean simply stared at me without a word.

‘It’s over.’

With the full moon resting on her shoulder, her face was shadowed, yet the changes in emotion in her eyes were strangely vivid.

‘I said I wanted to stay in this world. Now my soul will be eroded.’

She looked overjoyed, then infinitely loving, before her smile turned into one of poignant sadness.

“Lin, is this truly where you belong?”

What did she mean by that?

Did she mean she didn’t want me to return? As if sensing such thoughts, my fellow students glanced between us with bewildered eyes.

“Madam Dean Auntie, what’s wrong?”

“It’s Lin, Lin! The Lin you waited for every day!”

“Is she just shy? Let’s give them some space!”

Suddenly.

At the gaze that had nurtured and taught me in my younger days, at the voice that had encouraged and guided my path.

Something in my chest became unbearably hot. Startled, I fumbled at my chest, and a holy relic that hadn’t been there until just now had appeared.

“…Heukyangrin?”

The moment I uttered that name.

A profound sense of realization, indescribable, poured into my mind as if a dam of memories had burst.

[Daily life with the Ludwig family.]

[Days of laughter with my companions at <Delighten>.]

[Alakish, whom I met in Harvadonia. Aki, entrusted to me by that person.]

Those were memories newly built in the 300 years that came after this moment.

It was a humble past created in a timeline where neither Madam Dean nor my fellow students could exist.

The meaning pointed to by these preposterous images was only one, just one, merely one, exactly one—a truth that was agonizing to admit.

“That’s right…”

I pressed my fist against my chest, which had begun to throb as if it would burst.

I couldn’t have returned here.

I had said I would return, but there was no way to go back to this era 300 years ago. If I had truly returned, Toureina would have been by my side.

- Master!

I should have gone back.

I wanted to come back.

Ah, how wonderful it would be if this were truly my reality.

So, my unconscious chose to abandon the future and remain in this obsession forever.

“You should go now.”

But she didn’t allow it. Not I myself, but my master.

“To the people waiting for you.”

Even if this was an obsession truly born from my own desires.

My master was not the kind of person to hold me back with all sorts of sweet words and deceptive promises.

You were always that kind of person.

“Go to the future.”

At that moment, as we exchanged bitter smiles, smiles that had somehow become so similar to hers.

Dragon’s flames enveloped my entire body.

Before my fellow students could even gasp in surprise, the flames subsided. After burning away my past body.

“T-transfiguration?”

“Lin turned into a super handsome flower boy!”

“Who are you? Where’s Lin?”

My eye level was noticeably higher.

Perhaps the way I appeared in my fellow students’ eyes now was the appearance of Rain Ludwig, whom I had seen in the mirror earlier.

Nevertheless, Madam Dean’s gaze upon me remained the same. It was simply a loving gaze.

I knew I could recognize the emotions in that gaze thanks to my days with Aki.

“I’m going again, Auntie.”

Lowering my gaze mournfully, I said so with a bitter smile.

“I probably won’t be able to come back this time.”

What else was so stiflingly shameful?

I could say it.

I should say it.

I should say the words I couldn’t say on that day, at that moment, 300 years ago.

“So please, don’t wait for me.”

Since being reborn, no, during my five-year journey, I lacked the courage to put into words the feelings I had harbored in my heart.

No, it’s not that I lack courage.

It’s because this world is fake. Because it’s a world my delusion falsely created. So there’s no need to say it, is there?

“Then…”

Starting from the night sky, I turned towards the Magic Tower, which had begun to crumble into particles. I could no longer bear to look at the faces of my old family.

If I did, I felt as though I would never be able to escape this dream.

Two events caused cracks in that thought, in that certainty that this was a dream.

‘It’s hot.’

The Heukyangrin hanging from my chest was emitting an unprecedented heat. I felt Karen-den whispering directly to my soul.

It is only now.

The time to connect the bonds you couldn’t forge in your old life… and.

“Lin.”

If it were the Madam Dean in my thoughts, she would have grandly sent me off to the future without hesitation.

“You were the pride of my life.”

It was only at that moment that I realized.

This was not a dream. It was a reunion that could never have been, an impossible encounter beyond the spacetime barrier of 300 years.

Karen-den had opened a small passage in that barrier, allowing me this fleeting reunion. That we were connected for this brief instant.

- This is not where you belong.

- Your name is Lin, and you will be remembered in this world like a spring breeze.

- Lin, come here.

- Lin, magic is about putting your heart into it. Try it. Then magic will respond to your heart.

- Lin, the sun in the south is very hot. This straw hat will help.

Even if, perhaps.

Even if this was just my delusion and wish, I could no longer control the tears welling up in my eyes.

“Master Atlante…”

I pulled my voice from lungs full of weeping.

“The love with which you took in one who had nothing, gave me a name, and raised me—I will cherish it until the day I die…”

Turning around, I simultaneously knelt on the ground, placing my head on my hands pressed to the earth.

“I was truly happy to receive your teachings, Master…”

Always, always, always.

The regret that had solidified deep within my soul, the sorrow that had festered.

The words I should have offered on the day I left the Magic Tower.

“Please, do not forgive this unworthy disciple who failed to keep a single promise…”

Saying those words, I pressed my head to the ground three times.

One bow was for Master Atlante, who had bestowed upon me kindness that could never be repaid.

Another bow was a greeting to my fellow students, who had treated me, an orphan, like real family.

And the final bow was a prayer to Karen-den, who had permitted this meeting beyond providence.

“Please, live a long and healthy life…”

* * *

“Quite a skill for a human, wouldn’t you say?”

A powerful torrent of qi clashed in the sky, a swirling gale.

Amidst that gale, a blade of tone shot out, and Valensidis was thrown backward, barely clinging to a melodic surface composed of five lines.

It had been a close fight by a hair’s breadth, but ultimately, it was Valensidis who was reaching his limits.

“But a lower species that can only use inferior versions of magic or sorcery, no matter how strong, can only do so much.”

One 5-star magic spell usable at high speed, and two 5-star sorcery spells.

But all of them used taboo-type Orvios, causing massive repercussions. They couldn’t be used in this situation, with civilians packed below.

That meant he couldn’t use a decisive blow to break the sound barrier Ruelaya had deployed around herself.

“Valen, Valen, Valen.”

With the barrier up, Pipi couldn’t do anything either… and above all, Valensidis only had one hand free to use.

‘Truly annoying.’

His demonic left hand had to hold onto the prince, so the current situation was like fighting while burdened.

“Hmm, are you going to make excuses that you couldn’t fight properly because of that?”

At that moment, Ruelaya’s eyes changed as she recognized Ovin.

“What is that? It’s alive?”

Even if he had used a counter-attack technique, it wasn’t enough to deceive an expert, and above all, the necklace around his neck was impossible not to recognize, even if one wanted to.

“This is why humans can’t be trusted.”

Ruelaya roughly plucked the strings of her lyre. Along with a dissonant, dull sound, translucent melodic awls rained down.

He opened spatial-temporal rifts with Kasha-sur, blocking them all.

“You thought that was it, didn’t you?”

Ruelaya’s true intention lay elsewhere.

One of the awls deeply pierced the demonic hand and exploded, scattering it. Ovin’s body, which that hand had been holding, began to fall.

From this height, death was highly probable; even if he miraculously survived, he would be eaten by the primitives.

‘But if I throw myself to save him…’

They would seize that opening and pour out attacks. Wouldn’t that be falling right into the opponent’s trap?

- Catch my disciple, Valensidis.

He clearly thought he was steeped in such agony, but his body reacted faster than his mind.

Did he think that by following those words, he would gain something that fellow possessed?

As soon as a sense of weightlessness bordering on helplessness enveloped him, Ruelaya’s laughter rang out.

“They call this killing two birds with one stone, don’t they!”

An elegant yet eerie performance. Even without looking back, he knew a tremendous torrent of power was pouring down from above.

Just as he barely extended his hand to snatch the prince, just as he belatedly constructed magic to cushion the impact and sorcery to defend against the attack.

Just when he thought everything was a beat too late, a white lightning bolt dominated his vision.

‘What…?’

Countless, immeasurable, innumerable lightning bolts burst forth from all directions—up, down, left, right, and impossible angles—overpowering the entire area.

It was a chain.

Only after the flash subsided could he barely discern the outline of a radiant chain—a lightning chain.

‘He built up such immense power in an instant…?’

The dragon’s lightning bound all the rampaging primitives and instantly annihilated Ruelaya’s full-force attack.

Jeseoswaeran-yeon: Lightning Style.

‘What on earth is this presence…?’

Primal fear caused Ruelaya’s heart to pound violently. Cold sweat beaded on her back and forehead.

A transcendent presence that felt as if her entire body was being crushed and pulverized under an immense weight.

An absolute aura that, merely by its presence, threatened others’ lives—something she had only felt a few times when Elamas expressed anger.

“Thanks for the good dream.”

The mage, loosening his joints while wearing dazzling gauntlets that seemed woven from individual current crystals.

His dignity, moving alone in a silent world where everything felt bound by chains and stopped…

Perhaps because of the baby dragon still furiously gnawing at his head, or the blood streaming down, it looked a little, no, very… faded.

“It’s a bit much to call it a thank you, but I’ll send you off without pain.”