As the final note fell like it was leaving an echo, I froze so badly that I forgot all the words I’d heard before. The voice that had blamed me with self-deprecating words, asking why I died in his place, was now pleading desperately for me to please stay alive, filled with earnest emotion. The disconnect with the Parallel World’s Ruvlian I’d seen was too great. It was unfamiliar to see him not endlessly relaxed but precarious, as if he’d collapse at the slightest touch, to see him begging like this.
“I’ll come get you, so just stay alive.”
“……”
“I hate you so much I wish you’d die, but I like you so much I want you to live. So first, stay alive. Live and let’s see the end. After we pass twenty-two, let’s end this tenacious connection, whether it’s fate or ill fate.”
He bowed his head and pressed his lips against the inside of my wrist, then lightly pulled away. Unlike how lightly it fell away, it felt like sticky emotions clung to the rubbed wrist. The heavy, stagnant emotion was unpleasant.
When I tried to pull my wrist away, he released his strength then grabbed it hard and pulled me as is. I was stupid to think he’d let go like before. My center of gravity collapsed and I placed my hand on the chair’s backrest. Our faces were close, and when I tried to back away, he wouldn’t allow it.
A different color flashed through the eyes staring intently at me. It was ominous. Had he noticed it wasn’t an illusion? At the momentarily loosened strength, I forcefully struck out my arm and used magic to escape from him.
A voice echoed in my head with a droning sound, similar to God’s.
[You really have gone mad. Look closely. That’s not an illusion.]
It was an even lower, more sinister voice, like what a demon’s whisper might be. After putting as much distance as possible between myself and the Parallel World’s Ruvlian, I prepared to cast magic.
He rose as if throwing aside the chair, slowly blinked his eyes a couple of times, then parted his closed lips.
“You…… aren’t an illusion.”
With a voice that said he’d only now realized, the earnest emotion gone, his figure trying to approach me entered my vision. I had no intention of being caught anymore. I flicked my hand. Within the rippling scenery, the Parallel World’s Ruvlian had a face full of joy. It was disturbing.
_oOo_
At the time Baek Sihyeon infiltrated the Magic Tower, Ruvlian sat in a plush chair holding his head, not hiding his foul mood but openly displaying it.
“Mikel.”
“What are you trying to do now that you’re calling me……?”
His expression said just imagining it was horrible. Mikel tightly closed his eyes, recalling the reckless acts Ruvlian had committed. Among them, the most horrible was of course when he actually blew up the Temple. After a few hours he’d properly restored it due to his own complaints, but the feeling he’d had when he saw the white fragments scattering from the explosion. He’d thought he was going to die from fear that the Magic Tower would be billed for it, even while feeling refreshed.
When God didn’t appear no matter how much he destroyed things, Ruvlian, whose already foul personality had become even fouler, looked at Mikel with sinister eyes.
“What have I done and how much?”
“Yeeees…… You blew up the Temple, put everyone in the shopping district to sleep, pulled up trees from the mountain and flipped them upside down, melted all the gold in the Imperial Palace, but you haven’t done anything at all. Yeeees……”
“Mikel, do you want to die?”
At what was obviously sarcasm, Ruvlian reacted sharply. If words could cut people, he would have cut and had plenty left over. Mikel immediately lowered his tail.
“No, sir.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Leaving the grumbling Mikel alone, Ruvlian fell into thought. Dimension Travel wasn’t just about space alone. Time was the same. In other words, if he didn’t know the exact coordinates and time period, he wouldn’t be able to find Sihyeon.
Last time God had told him, but now no matter how much of a ruckus he caused with a hopeful heart, God wouldn’t appear. If he went around searching through every time period one by one, the probability of missing each other was high.
After agonizing and agonizing, Ruvlian decided to head to Baek Sihyeon’s native world. He couldn’t know which time period, which world Sihyeon, who was in neither his native world nor the Parallel World, had fallen into. But Sihyeon would eventually return to his original world no matter what happened. He was that kind of person.
Having made up his mind, Ruvlian rose from the plush sofa. Then he called Mikel, who was in the middle of working while reading documents.
“Mikel.”
“Yes?”
“I’m leaving now.”
Then Mikel, as delighted as a puppy hearing they’re going for a walk, jumped up from his seat. Crash. The sound of the chair falling backward rang through the room. Silence flowed for a moment.
Mikel, who had shown how extremely happy he was, was sweating profusely, and Ruvlian thought as he narrowed his eyes. Since he was leaving anyway, let’s give him a gift.
“That forest we restored, I’m going to flip the trees over again, so handle it yourself. Oh, and make sure to cast preservation magic on it too.”
“……What? What? Eh, ehhh~ Why are you doing this, Master of the Magic Tower?”
“I properly keep my word once I’ve said it. You’ve assisted me for so long, surely you don’t not know that.”
How could he not know! Mikel desperately held back the urge to shout for the first time in a while. If he talked back here, it would only make the situation worse. He was someone who kept even words muttered like wondering whether to blow up the Temple. He was truly someone who acted as he pleased without caring about his surroundings. Therefore, Mikel could do nothing but nod his head.
The preservation magic of the strongest Master of the Magic Tower since the Magic Tower’s founding. Who on earth could break it? He could hear the sound of the Magic Tower’s money draining away. Mikel suppressed his grief.
“Well then, I’ll be going.”
After Ruvlian headed to the forest and kept his word, he moved to Sihyeon’s native world. Stuffy air entered his lungs, and hazy fine dust entered his eyes. A landscape clearly different from his own world. Tall buildings and fast-moving cars passed along the road.
When he’d first come to Sihyeon’s world, he’d been flustered, which was rare. Everything was different. He’d thought about it to the point of wondering if Sihyeon felt this way too. Ruvlian, who had been taking in that sight, headed to the house he’d bought while going back and forth between past and present.
He’d been planning to ask Sihyeon to live together, but that old bastard had ruined it all. He’d bought only the absolutely necessary furniture and left the rest empty to fill together, but it seemed the day for that was still far off. Ruvlian, sitting on a sofa as plush as the one in the Master of the Magic Tower’s room, raised his index finger then lowered it, tapping in a steady rhythm.
He wanted to go out and search for Sihyeon right away, but he knew this was the best course. It was more practical to think here about how to kill that crazy bastard from the Parallel World.
If it were up to his heart, he wanted to cross to another world, cause a scene, then ask even another god about Sihyeon’s location. However, hearing a god’s voice was only possible if you received that god’s blessing or protection. Unless, like last time, the gods exceptionally descended to the world.
Ruvlian, who pressed firmly on his eyes, slowly regulated his breathing. The deeper he fell into contemplation, the more a sense of helplessness that all he could do for now was believe covered his entire body. The somewhere empty, hollow sensation and unnecessary thoughts he hadn’t felt since the day he met Rian again came rushing in.
It had been exactly one day. That he’d met with Rian, or rather, with Sihyeon. But that one day had the greatest impact on his life. One day, two days, a month, a year, ten years while clutching only a single note tightly. He’d endured those long years. How desperate must he have been for the first magic he learned to be preservation magic?
Before that, he hadn’t had much interest in magic, and had no motivation. The person who picked him up was the Master of the Magic Tower, and he was lucky enough to have talent concentrated in magic, so he had to learn it as an obligation. Nothing more, nothing less than that.
What changed that was a single note. He’d devoted himself to training with the intention of preserving the tattered note from looking at it too often. Sihyeon probably had no idea, even in his dreams, that his determination to properly learn magic had arisen that way.
Recalling the paper he’d carefully enshrined in subspace, Ruvlian returned to the original topic. The old bastard from the Parallel World would also eventually come here. This time, he had to see the end of the battle they couldn’t finish last time. He drew various simulations in his head and made plans.
And the next day, evening. Along with a faintly moving mana wave, the Parallel World’s Ruvlian appeared. Both Ruvlian and the Parallel World’s Ruvlian quickly realized the other was here. That realization naturally led to battle.
Both tended not to pay attention to others besides Baek Sihyeon. There was no Baek Sihyeon to stop the two of them. There wasn’t even a god to at least help them avoid other people’s eyes. Since they didn’t even use transparency magic, the sight of the two fighting while destroying buildings was broadcast vividly enough on the news. And in the middle of that battle, Baek Sihyeon appeared.
The helicopter flying in the sky that was obviously filming, and the completely pulverized surroundings. Even the fishy smell of blood seeping into his sense of smell. Baek Sihyeon, who had come to Ruvlian’s side through a properly successful magic circle, looked around then spoke with a coldly frozen face.
“……Are you guys insane?”
