Chapter 44 - Seollang (6)

“Ice Crystal.”

As the enormous wall of ice formed before him, Alon let out a deep sigh behind his expressionless facade.

'What on earth is going on?'

He found the situation utterly bewildering. From his perspective, he had merely gone to the tower at the center of the city to hear what its occupant had to say. Then the entire cavern had suddenly shaken as though it were about to collapse, and he had rushed outside to find this scene awaiting him.

And that was not the only thing beyond his understanding.

'Those two definitely seem to have used Abyssal Cores.'

Alon recalled the dense, ink-black mana flowing from Maliam and Kalman, who had just been trying to kill Seollang.

'How?'

As far as he knew, Abyssal Cores did not appear this early. In the original story, they only began circulating after roughly two of the Five Great Sins had appeared. Their effect was to grant anyone who absorbed them genuine “divinity,” however weak it might be.

Psychedelia never explained how they worked, which had led to considerable speculation that Abyssal Cores were simply a device for balancing the game's difficulty. After all, enemies who used them became overwhelmingly stronger than before.

Alon wondered why Maliam and Kalman had Abyssal Cores, but soon put the question aside. What mattered most now was not that, but getting out of this predicament. He assessed the situation coolly.

'Remaining spell casts: zero.'

He had already cast three spells to create the bitterly cold terrain, then another to shoot dead Maliam as he tried to harm Seollang. The spell he had just used to protect himself against any unexpected attacks made five. Alon could no longer use magic.

Under normal circumstances, anyway.

GULP

Without hesitation, Alon uncorked a bottle at his waist and drank it. It was the top-grade mana potion Penia, the Blue Magic Tower's deputy tower master, had given him some time ago.

'This gives me one more spell. If I buy enough time, I might manage two, but the barrier will disappear in twenty seconds.'

After draining the potion, he immediately turned his gaze to Seollang, who lay on the ground. He had spent a fair amount of time secretly preparing his magic to avoid detection, so he had overheard the rough circumstances.

“...”

Looking down at her, he found her eyes filled with emptiness, desolation, and intense anger.

Seeing the gloom radiating from her entire body, Alon immediately took another potion from his waist. It was a top-grade potion that had arrived six months ago, when gifts had been pouring in for him.

“Drink.”

Alon crouched down, brought the potion to Seollang's mouth, and whispered as he fed it to her.

“Those people should be the only ones who betrayed you. Don't worry.”

“Is that... really true?”

“Yes.”

Despite his firm answer, Alon did not actually know how many members of the Golden Mane Tribe had sided with Ralga. And however thoughtlessly Seollang might live, a moment's consideration would surely be enough for her to see how little credibility his words held. He had lied nonetheless because he desperately needed her help right now.

'I have one chance. Seollang has to hold off their attacks until I finish preparing the spell.'

Alon's magic took a long time to cast, and he knew perfectly well how foolish it would be to expect his enemies to wait. That was why he had lied—to get the heartbroken Seollang moving immediately.

“Can you hold them off until the spell is complete?”

Once Alon had fed her the entire top-grade potion, Seollang rose resolutely, though she swayed a little, and nodded in answer.

“Yes.”

Even a top-grade potion had apparently not yet diluted the poison sufficiently, but there was no other option. Alon decided to trust Seollang and prepare his spell.

Once his spell was ready, disposing of Kalman would not be difficult. Kalman had certainly grown stronger by absorbing an Abyssal Core, but ironically, that very fact allowed Alon to become stronger still. He had imposed a Constraint—one that granted him the power to twist the world when facing a god.

“Whew.”

The moment Alon breathed out lightly and formed a hand seal, the cold wall of ice that had been scattering frost vanished as though it had never existed.

“Ice and Snow.”

He recited the next phrase.

As frost swirled wildly around him, the assassins and Golden Mane tribespeople charged as though they had been waiting for this moment. There were dozens of them.

But...

“Form.”

Despite her unsteady footing, Seollang began knocking back every enemy charging at them. Watching her, Alon uttered the next phrase.

Then he closed his eyes and recalled the words of the being whose form he had been unable to discern.

[“Those unworthy of even being called mages, who have lost the great legacy of the past, may not know this. But the essence of magic lies in embodying the laws that the Magus ordained for this world.”]

[“The arrangement of magic, its phrases, even its name—all exist to embody those laws. Only when all of them are placed correctly according to the Natural Order—”]

[“—can it be called magic.”]

“The Snowy Mountain's Shadow—”

At Alon's words, the round sphere formed between his middle and ring fingers froze. But it did not merely freeze. Each individual “point” in the arrangement he had prepared to manifest his magic sprouted its own bud from a hexagonal plate, as though snow blossoms were blooming.

[“You appear to know only a few phrases, but you must use sentences as well. Phrases can distort the laws, but a sentence is a key that opens a particular gate leading to the laws ordained for this world.”]

[“Well, the mages of this age have not entirely lost the names. They have merely abbreviated and standardized them so excessively that the original words have been lost.”]

[“In this age, they apparently call this something as... paltry as 'Ice Spear.'”]

“The Blind Man's Inevitability.”

The buds blossomed. The sphere at Alon's fingertips was no longer round; it had become an enormous snow crystal.

CRACK!

At the center of that crystal, a spear took shape before him—one whose beauty anyone could recognize.

And...

[“But that magic's original name was not something like that wretched 'Ice Spear'—”]

“Ice-Crystal Painted Halberd.”

[“Ice-Crystal Painted Halberd—that is the true name those imbecilic mages have forgotten.”]

After murmuring the name, Alon opened his eyes. He saw Kalman staring at him with dismay, ink-black gauntlets on his fists, and Seollang desperately holding him back. Watching them, Alon clenched the hand seal he had maintained and completed the spell's manifestation.

A snowfield descended upon the hot cavern.

####

Riyan watched the magic Alon had unleashed. Whatever spell she encountered, her mind would normally run through simulation after simulation, drawing upon all her knowledge to unravel it. Now, that mind had stopped. She could only stare blankly.

Everything along the path of the spear Alon had launched was frozen. The ground, the air—even Kalman, whose heart had been pierced by a direct hit from the spear. Everything had frozen solid.

Riyan and the other mages could not tear their eyes from the unnatural, and therefore beautiful, sight.

“Impossible...”

“That's... a mage?”

The mercenaries, who had been filled with despair mere moments earlier, all stared at Alon, murmuring in awe.

Their eyes brimmed with boundless respect and reverence. Naturally so. The desperate situation had changed so dramatically because of the person standing before them.

And so, while even Seollang, who had escaped the spell's range by a hair, was looking at Alon, something suddenly moved.

“Ah—!”

Ironically, the first to notice it—or rather, Ralga, whom everyone had assumed lay defeated after Seollang struck him—was a mercenary looking in his direction.

“Die—!”

With his right arm smashed, Ralga raised the poisoned dagger that had put Seollang in peril earlier and lunged.

He was a member of the Golden Mane Tribe, and the power Seollang had shared with him through the Essence had not been revoked. Swift as a ray of light, he appeared close to her when her guard was at its lowest.

“!”

Seollang, who had thought it was all over, realized she could not block him and tried to pull back. But she was too late. Her body was already covered in wounds from holding off Kalman and the charging bandits, and the poison still lingered. All she could do was watch the dagger approach her heart.

Ralga's face filled with delight.

'If I kill her, I can steal ownership of the Essence and escape! I can start over, start all over again!'

With that thought, he put still more force behind his dagger. But...

“!?”

Ralga's dagger failed to pierce Seollang's heart.

'Mentor...!?'

Like the mercenary, Alon had seen Ralga lunging. Instinctively, he reached out and pulled Seollang back.

However—

The motion naturally carried Alon's own body forward, into the path of Ralga's horizontally swinging dagger.

“Urgh—!”

He coughed up blood. Blood so black that anyone could see it was dead.

Ralga stood stunned at the failure of his final gambit. Immediately after the enraged Seollang's foot burst his head apart, Evan's voice rang out.

“My lord!”

####

To get straight to the point, nothing had happened to Alon.

... Of course, a knife had struck his side, but despite that, truly nothing had happened. Ralga's dagger had indeed caught him in the torso, but it had only barely reached him, tearing his clothes and nothing more.

In other words, he was not wounded.

Then why had Alon coughed up blood if the dagger had not injured him? Purely because of mana depletion. He had certainly secured enough mana to cast at least one more spell, yet the moment he used it, the consumption had gone beyond exhausting his mana and actually damaged the inside of his body.

'... Its power certainly exceeded my expectations... But I'll need something else to supplement my mana shortfall.'

Rubbing his stomach, which still felt uncomfortable despite the top-grade potion he had drunk, Alon watched the ruins recede into the distance. He had not seen the stone tablet in the east, but given the attack, they had decided to leave the ruins for today.

After gazing for a while at the ruins growing ever farther away, Alon turned toward Seollang, who was staring intently at him.

“...”

By his original expectations, he ought to have been comforting her by now. Knowing that she would become one of the Five Great Sins in the future, he could not risk letting her harbor dark thoughts. Yet, contrary to his concerns, he could see no negative emotions such as anger or hatred in her eyes. Just as he was wondering about that, she spoke.

“Mentor.”

“What is it?”

“Can I ask you something?”

“What?”

Seollang asked her question.

“When Kalman attacked earlier, why didn't you dodge?”

“...”

'When Kalman attacked?'

Alon thought for a moment, then remembered Kalman's gauntlet coming right up to his face while he was casting Ice-Crystal Painted Halberd.

'... It wasn't that I didn't dodge. I couldn't.'

That was his immediate thought, but saying so did not seem like a good idea. Instead, he answered:

“Because I trusted you.”

“... Me?”

“Yes. You said you could do it.”

'Actually, it was less trust and more, Please, I'm begging you!! ... But still.'

At his heavily embellished answer, a slight sheen appeared in Seollang's eyes, and she asked another question.

“Then why did you save me when Ralga tried to kill me?”

“... Why?”

Alon could not find a fitting reason.

'... A girl I've supported for years—not an enemy—was about to die right in front of me. Wouldn't it be strange to just stand there? ... Honestly, I never expected the dagger to reach me, though.'

As with her earlier question, Alon considered his answer. This time, he said what he thought.

“... Do I need a reason?”

“You don't... have one?”

“You don't need a reason to save family.”

The answer came naturally. To him, Seollang was already like a daughter he had fed and raised for more than five years.

'Ah.'

But he soon realized he had made a mistake. From the few days he had spent with her, family seemed to hold an exceptionally special meaning for Seollang.

Alon raised his eyes cautiously.

“But, Mentor... you're not family. Family means blood kin.”

He nodded, intending to agree with her murmured words. But...

“Still, with you, Mentor... I want to become family.”

“...”

At her next words, Alon once again felt an extraordinary warmth fill his heart.

Was this how it felt for someone who had never been acknowledged as a father to finally receive that recognition after years? Not that he had experienced it himself, of course. Just as Alon was about to nod, not in agreement this time, but in satisfaction...

“But—”

Seollang moved in a flash and climbed onto him. Sitting on his thighs with both hands on his shoulders, her eyes shone brightly. Alon was bewildered by the sudden turn of events.

“We can't become family as we are. I'm from the Golden Mane Tribe, and you're human. So—”

Seollang smiled as she spoke.

“Let's get married!”

“...???”

... Alon's thoughts came to a halt.

Seollang's tail, on the other hand, was swishing more emphatically than ever.