The voice that had been speaking several more times abruptly cut off without any warning. Once the cause disturbing my head disappeared, my mind became much clearer.
This made it certain. The butler couldn’t hear the voice. Even I, who was used to voices buzzing in my head from conversations with God, was like this, so it would be impossible to stand there so calmly like that. If he could hear it, he should already be lying face down on the floor, gasping for breath.
That’s how much the owner of the voice couldn’t control its intensity. It rummaged through my head recklessly. In the first place, seeing how the words ‘kill,’ ‘you,’ ‘want’ were heard repeatedly, it might not have self-awareness like God. It also felt like an empty shell that just repeated words to convey a message.
“Are you truly all right?”
“I’m fine.”
I answered the butler lightly as he asked again. I didn’t know what my complexion looked like, but it seemed not worth looking at. My head had been thoroughly rummaged through, so it was understandable.
Only after regaining my senses did the interior come into view. Wasn’t this too vast to be called a study? It seemed to match the size of the imperial palace library.
Could I find books about curses here? A realistic doubt arose. I liked books, but there were so many bookshelves, large ones at that, that it would be difficult to memorize where every book was. Fortunately, there were criteria written on one side of each bookshelf, otherwise I probably wouldn’t have been able to read the book I wanted even if I searched all day.
Of course, even with them, it would only shorten the time, and I couldn’t deny that it would take a long time to search. The organizational criteria were quite comprehensive, and there were at least four bookshelves with the same criteria. There were so many books, it seemed impossible to count them.
“This way.”
As if predicting I would hesitate, unable to find the books right away, the butler guided me. As if he already knew what books I was looking for, there was no hesitation in his steps.
“Here. The forbidden books are in this bookshelf.”
“…Are forbidden books originally in such an open place?”
“How could that be?”
His face was resolute. I knew it was an absurd question too. Still, I asked it. To see if he was confident enough to even open the forbidden books. To see if there really was no way to break the curse no matter how much I searched.
“Then please look comfortably. I’ll take my leave now. When you need something, you can press that button.”
Before I could ask him to leave, the butler bowed first in greeting and turned around. With the same refined steps as when he came, he left the vast space that should probably be called a library.
The sound of the door closing spread through the quiet space, and I was left alone. Even if he let me wander around alone like this without his master’s hands and feet, he must have set up some device. For example, the viewing sphere placed right in front of me.
Does he not even intend to hide it? The absurdity I had disappeared at the viewing sphere brazenly placed in an open location. I could tell he already clearly knew what my purpose was, but this was extremely blatant.
After letting out a sigh, I selected books from the bookshelf filled with curse-related books that the butler had pointed out. There were many questions about what the voice that rushed in fiercely as soon as I opened the library door was, what it was trying to convey, and whose voice it was.
However, to delve into that, breaking the curse took priority. Since my first priority was Ruvlian, it was natural.
Ruvlian might have already woken up, rummaged through various worlds, and almost arrived here. I still didn’t know the reason God overlooked him coming to another world, but if time flowed the same way, 4 days had already passed. I had to hurry. If I had time to worry about other things, I had to invest all of it in breaking the curse.
<Basic Theory of Curses>, <Applications of Curses>, <Do You Want to Learn Curses? Then Choose This Book!>, <You Learning Curses Are Really Hopeless. But This Book Is the Answer>…
…The book titles were full of personality. People obsessed with one field were all not quite right somewhere. I shook my head, recalling going to the Magic Tower following Ruvlian.
Having seemingly selected all the books, I sat at the round circular table next to me. The first book I opened was <Basic Theory of Curses>. The author’s note visible as soon as I opened it caught my attention.
“I, the curse user Mwollyuhakjal, realized while writing this book that there are many bastards in the world who carry their heads as decorations. They said it was difficult to publish because they couldn’t understand anything even when explained easily. How can they not know this? It’s quite shocking, but I decided to write the explanation slowly and easily once more and failed. And I challenged it again. This is a book published after 103 revisions. If you can’t understand this, you’re hopeless. Give up. I wrote it with that mindset, so I hope everyone understands.”
Below that, it was written that this author’s note originally got rejected, but it was set up so only those with talent in curses could read it, and if you couldn’t see this, you had no talent from the start, so give up.
People without talent can’t see the draft, so how are they supposed to give up? After seeing the author’s note, I didn’t know whether to be glad I had enough talent to see the draft.
Moreover, the part “How can they not know this?” was even familiar. It resembled my physics teacher who would explain something and say “Hmm, very perfect,” get locked in his own world feeling proud alone, then look at students who didn’t understand with eyes that saw the world’s stupidest people. Seeing how vividly his expression came to mind, it must have been quite impressive.
After turning past the table of contents and opening Chapter 1, in less than 5 minutes, I slowly closed the book. I understood why it got rejected. If compared to mathematics, it was like skipping multiplication and calculating calculus.
How could I understand that when I didn’t even know the basic terminology? This book might have been published due to the persistence of 103 times. Somehow I had a premonition that the other books wouldn’t be much different either.
…And bad premonitions are never wrong. I looked through the other books too, but there wasn’t a single book that explained the meanings of key terms so that an outsider who didn’t know curses could understand.
Usually mages learn Magic under a master’s tutelage. Whether curses followed the same path, they explained with the premise that you already knew the foundation and terminology to build from.
So there was no way I could understand. There was a reason he kindly sent a person and guided me to the study. I didn’t know the very basics, so there was no way I’d understand even if I read.
What I gained was only one fact: that I couldn’t break this curse. There are several ways to break a curse, and there are typically four representative methods.
First is the death of the one cursed. Naturally, if you lose your life, the curse is broken. However, I wouldn’t commit suicide. So this is a pass.
Second is the caster breaking the curse. In other words, the Parallel World Ruvlian can break the curse, but there’s no way he’d break it. So this method is also discarded.
Third is casting an opposing curse. In the case of the curse currently on me, the closer to the designated target, the more life force is stolen… Now conversely, I would need to have a curse cast on me that says the closer to the designated target, the more life force is stolen from me.
In a way, it was a natural premise. However, there was a problem. Since opposing curses would be placed on one person, the curses would collide with each other, making survival uncertain. In other words, death or life would be decided with a 50% probability. I had no intention of entrusting my life to luck, so this was likewise excluded.
Lastly, a curse user whose skill was superior to the caster could break it. However, I didn’t know any curse users. Even if there were any, I couldn’t know if their skill was better than the Parallel World Ruvlian’s, so this method was also eliminated.
There was no method. If there was a God, I would have at least asked, but there was no answer even when I called. I didn’t know the reason for not coming, but I was certain it wasn’t on purpose. That God who seemed to have no humanity overflowed with affection after all.
I leaned back against the chair and habitually tapped my nails together. The sunlight coming through the window right next to me warmly enveloped my body. Unlike my ceaselessly turning mind, my body became languid. Despite this being essentially no different from kidnapping, to leisurely flip through books like this. It was for the purpose of breaking the curse, but judging only by appearances, it was ridiculously absurd.
‘God.’
Just in case, I tried calling God one more time, but there was no answer. I gave up waiting for God. I thought He would come when the time came.
My gaze that had been fixed in the air moved to the curse books stacked like a tower on the white table. To think I understood only a few things despite reading all those books. I felt like I indirectly experienced being stupid.
…What should I do now? I kept tapping my nails together while turning my head.
The biggest purpose of following him to this world was to break the curse. However, now that I knew I couldn’t find a method here either, I just needed to safely escape from this world. Since the Parallel World Ruvlian was also ‘Ruvlian,’ it seemed he would search for me again and invade my native world. It was a premonition close to certainty.
The most urgent thing was escape, so I was about to start planning that when I felt Mana unnaturally gathering right next to me. A magic circle formed and blonde hair scattered above it as the Parallel World Ruvlian appeared.
“Did you finish reading, darling?”
Unlike Ruvlian’s cute way of speaking that drew out the end of his words, it was a cheeky and leisurely tone. At his words about waiting for me to finish reading, I indifferently gestured at the viewing sphere right in front and asked.
“There’s more.”
“Why are you asking when you know everything?”
Fake Ruvlian answered without hesitation. Even if the other person knew, could he be this shameless? His shamelessness was top-class.
