The Fiancé (1)
The monster straddling the boundary between life and death, the Great Sage Faust, reached a hand out toward me.
"There is no need to be so wary."
"What, are you suggesting we shake hands? You and me?"
No need to be wary? After turning the place into this kind of slaughterhouse?
Even if his goal was simply to have a conversation, creating this sort of scene rendered any pretense of goodwill completely meaningless. He had already demonstrated, in gruesome detail, precisely how he handled his affairs.
"There is truly no need to bristle so. After all, even if you were on your guard, there is nothing you could do."
"Maybe so."
In truth, it wasn't a matter of 'maybe'—there really was nothing I could do. It was pure bravado on my part. Yet, a piece of leverage existed that could turn even an empty bluff into reality.
The fact that he stood here looking so relaxed meant Lobelia or Olga Hermod was currently pinned down. But surely he hadn't managed to kill them. Faust appeared boundlessly profound and unfathomable on the surface, but the reality was far simpler.
The reason I had always looked down on Faust the most among all the final bosses in the original story was simple: he was completely incapable of personal growth. His power expanded horizontally, never vertically.
"You are remarkably bold. Do you perhaps have something to rely on?"
"Surely, that would be..."
In that instant, the surrounding world plunged into pitch darkness. Amidst a suffocating silence where even the flow of time seemed to grind to a halt, that being revealed itself once more.
"He would be referring to me, of course."
The Great Demon, Mephistopheles.
That ancient demon, bound to Faust by deeply tangled ties of fate, finally made his long-awaited entrance. He hadn't shown so much as a whisker even when I had been on the verge of dying several times before, which had made me plenty anxious. Thankfully, it seemed confronting Faust was more than enough to touch his raw nerve.
"It has been a long time, my friend."
"You dare utter the word 'friend' to my face?"
"I still feel a deep regret over how our contract concluded. However..."
"Silence, Faust! You tampered with the very soul you pledged to render unto me as payment, perverting the sacred bounds of our pact!"
"Hmm... Yes, I suppose it cannot be helped if you fail to grasp it. I can understand your wrath. Even so, I hold faith that one day, you too will come to understand my path."
"Wh-what? Have you gone completely mad? How can you stand there with such shameless audacity? Do you truly comprehend nothing of what a contract means?"
Faust merely shook his head as though brushing off an everyday triviality, while Mephistopheles trembled in sheer, bewildered disbelief. It was a level of human depravity so bottomless that even a creature of the abyss could hardly stomach it. Honestly, even from where I was standing, the guy was a complete bastard.
When a demon enters a pact with a mortal, they claim the mortal's soul as the price. But what had Faust done? He had utilized his innate ability, Cycle, to manipulate his very soul. What began as a rudimentary ability to circulate ambient mana into loops—starting with simple elemental spells like Fireball—eventually expanded to encompass the grand cycle of life itself.
Faust had forcibly wedged his soul into his own personal, self-sustaining loop rather than allowing it to enter the wheel of reincarnation, granting himself an artificial eternity. He had, quite literally, taken the exact collateral item promised on his legal contract and pocketed it for his own private use.
"It was all for the sake of the greater good."
"You are utterly insane!"
It looked like Mephistopheles, a literal Great Demon, was somehow losing the verbal debate, yet there was genuinely no other way to frame it. Faust was simply out of his mind.
Before long, rendered utterly speechless by his adversary's unflinching shamelessness, Mephistopheles began radiating a suffocating, ominous aura. Excellent. Let them tear each other apart.
"Cry out 'Stay a while, thou art so fair!', Yohan! Speak the words, and I shall personally tear this scoundrel limb from limb on your behalf!"
"Look, I appreciate you suddenly calling me by name on such familiar terms and all... but are you seriously telling me you can't handle him on your own?"
And please, don't go dressing up your personal petty grudge as my dying wish. Can't the two of you settle your domestic squabble between yourselves while I take my leave?
Mephistopheles snarled in response.
"I cannot."
Well, aren't we remarkably proud of our own helplessness?
Then again, an uncontracted demon couldn't channel their true power into the mortal realm. Honestly, the fact that he could exert this much ambient influence without a binding pact was already ridiculous. If I actually formed a contract with him, would he truly be able to bring down Faust? I knew Mephistopheles was an entity of terrifying stature, but given that his vessel would be me, I couldn't say my expectations were particularly high.
"Then let us return to our discussion," Faust said smoothly.
"At whose discretion?! I am far from finished with you, Faust!"
"Wait, hold on a second. Why is the atmosphere turning so bizarre? What even is this?"
What kind of situation was this supposed to be? This was unquestionably a lethal, life-threatening crisis, yet there wasn't an ounce of proper tension in the air. I found myself needing to pause and seriously analyze how this absurd mess had come to pass.
"Ah..."
I realized it then.
This ridiculous atmosphere was entirely the product of one individual: the Great Sage Faust. He was setting the tone. When he first spoke to me, he told me there was no need to be on guard. From his perspective, he had dropped by for a casual afternoon stroll. That was why, even as I dripped cold sweat in panic and Mephistopheles ground his teeth in murderous fury, the dialogue felt so comically mismatched.
What was the root cause behind all of this? It had to be that lunatic's complete inability to feel the weight of death. We had just survived an unprecedented act of mass terror, but to him, it meant nothing. To an existence like him, a place soaked in the stench of slaughter was no different from his personal living room.
"Hm?"
As Faust continued his self-absorbed monologue and Mephistopheles kept barking back, a sudden tug at the hem of my trousers caught my attention. I looked down.
"Yo... han..."
"Yuna."
I crouched down and gently scooped up Yuna, who had dragged herself across the blood-soaked floor. It seemed the power Mephistopheles had unleashed during his spat with Faust was receding, allowing frozen time to resume its normal flow.
"It's all right now, just rest. It doesn't look like he plans on hurting me."
"..."
"If you're still worried, you can keep holding on like this. It's not like either of us can do anything right now anyway, right?"
"Mm..."
Yuna bowed her head, her fingers clutching my jacket with a desperate grip. Holding her close against my chest, I turned my gaze back up toward Faust. Thankfully, Mephistopheles lingered at my flank, keeping a sharp eye on the sage, but it felt largely unnecessary. If the man had intended to kill or kidnap me, he would have done so already.
Of course, the terrifying part was that there was no telling when or how his twisted whims might shift. If that happened... well, there would be no choice. I'd have to sign a pact with Mephistopheles just to drag myself out alive.
"So, what is it you want to say to me, Great Sage?"
"Your tone has suddenly become quite polite."
"I've simply recognized that bristling will do me no favors in this situation."
If a path to survival opened up, I would crawl through the dirt to seize it. That was just the kind of man I was.
"I have a question regarding the supernatural trait you harbor."
"Good grief. Why does everyone take such an interest in an ability I can't even use?"
My innate ability was Thought Partition. It certainly sounded impressive on paper, but presently, it was completely inaccessible to me.
"Or what, is this a recruitment pitch? Are you planning to turn me into one of your rings?"
"That is a matter that can be addressed after your demise. Thus, there is no need for me to slay you here."
The rings forged through the Great Sage's Cycle bound the soul itself, storing whatever innate abilities that soul once possessed. The massive scythe Melana had wielded had undoubtedly belonged to someone else's soul originally. Fortunately, it seemed he had no immediate desire to end my life.
"In fact, killing you now would be a profound waste. I would prefer to avoid causing any damage to your memories."
"What nonsense are you spewing now?"
Mephistopheles, who had been brooding with low growls, interjected. He stared at Faust with an expression of baffled curiosity.
"I see now, Yohan Damus. You managed to deceive even my ancient friend with that power of yours."
"Deceived? Me? What kind of ridiculous drivel..."
Mephistopheles cut himself off mid-sentence, his head snapping around to glare straight at me. In my arms, Yuna also tilted her face upward, staring at me in utter disbelief. Everyone around here was sickeningly quick on the uptake. But the sharpest among them was undoubtedly Faust.
Was this what it meant to be the First Archmage?
"Where are you directing that ability of yours right now?"
How had he deduced it? A secret that even Yuna had never managed to pierce, he spoke aloud as though it were the most obvious truth in the world.
Yes. I...
"Just what are you analyzing?"
It wasn't that I couldn't use my ability. I couldn't use it because it was already running—perpetually engaged without a single moment of rest.
I often dreamt a recurring dream.
It was a dream where I stood blankly, watching a pale blue flame burn.
Within that dream, a young boy stared into the flickering azure fire before his eyes. That exquisite blue flame was a cruel blaze that consumed human souls and innate genius as its kindling. Yet...
It was also breathtakingly beautiful.
Within the heart of the roaring fire, stars glimmered. Countless points of light embroidered the empty air, weaving a brilliant galaxy across the horizon. I was utterly captivated by that starlight. Beneath the azure sky, under the blazing radiance of the sun, I slowly reached out toward a celestial river that refused to fade. I opened my small, trembling palm, desperately trying to catch those magnificent stars.
The vessel known as myself was far too small, and gathering every single one of those stars would demand an eternity. And so, I fractured myself.
To seize every lone star scattered across that galaxy, I buried a piece of my consciousness within that frozen moment, living every day with a divided self. More than ten years had already passed since I first began deciphering the magic she left behind.
"Transcendence Sickness is the terminal fate born of excessive talent," Faust murmured. "And having suffered from that very ailment myself in the distant past, I recognized the signs immediately."
"..."
The Great Sage Faust had once succumbed to Transcendence Sickness. Whether he had overcome it purely through his own monstrous genius or cured it by binding himself to Mephistopheles, I didn't know. What mattered was that he understood the nature of the condition just as intimately as I did.
"At first, it was mere curiosity. My interest was piqued solely because the mole I planted failed to fulfill his role. Indeed, back then, it was nothing more than a passing whim."
Under Chain. Unbeknownst to me, that syndicate had kept their eyes on me from the very beginning. But just as Faust said, it had likely been nothing more than a minor annoyance to them—a noble discarded into Class F whose unexpected presence derailed their initial plans.
"However, my curiosity deepened when I realized that the one guarding your life was none other than the notorious assassin known as Safe Clown."
I felt Yuna's body flinch slightly against my chest. In a sense, she could be considered the catalyst for all of this. Well, none of that mattered now. Had she not intervened back then, Cult would have captured me and cracked my skull open long ago.
"Thus, I entrusted the chain to Melana."
"...And through that, you must have confirmed Mephistopheles's presence as well."
"My old friend does not choose just anyone as a prospective contractor."
Right. Not a single thing in this mess had been done by my own free will, yet somewhere along the way, I had been painted into an immensely suspicious figure tangled in layers of dark secrets. Too much time had passed to feel wronged about it now. Since I had actively meddled in a fair few events myself, I couldn't even claim pure innocence anymore.
"From that point, I looked into your history. Thought Partition... it is truly a formidable trait to carry."
"..."
"Yet past a certain incident, you became entirely unable to manifest it. An ordinary observer would have assumed you lost access to the power from psychological shock following that tragedy. However..."
Faust, who knew what I had witnessed that day, had drawn a vastly different conclusion.
"You did not lose the ability to use your power. Rather, from that fateful day onward, you have never ceased using it for even a single breath."
Transcendence Sickness. Also referred to as the Archmage's Affliction, it leaves behind something unmistakable at the absolute end of its victim's life.
"Was the magic you beheld that day... truly so beautiful?"
Yes. It leaves behind a spell. The moment an innate supernatural gift is fully sublimated into a completed magic formula marks the final, fatal threshold of the disease. Every discipline of magic that existed in this world had been birthed from the crucible of Transcendence Sickness. Naturally, countless spells must have perished without ever leaving a written record behind.
Tragically, the magic I was currently deciphering fell into that exact category. A galaxy that existed nowhere else in reality, preserved solely within a single, preserved landscape inside my mind. That was the spell she had left behind.
"Transcendence Sickness is a malady that murders its host through the sheer, uncontainable vastness of their talent. I reached my own mortal threshold around the age of fifteen. Do you comprehend the gravity of what that implies?"
Faust, revered throughout history as humanity's greatest sage, had stood on the brink of death from the sickness at fifteen. Ariel Aether, the most terrifying ally in Princess Lobelia's camp, had faced her own fatal threshold at eighteen. That alone was definitive proof of the monstrous talent both of them wielded.
"A mere child of five years. To reach the precipice of death at the age of five could only mean..."
"Enough."
Clutching my throbbing, splitting temple with one hand, I cut him off.
"That's enough."
My teeth ground together against the blinding headache.
"Death might be trivial to a creature like you, but it isn't to me. I'd appreciate it if you showed a shred of respect for that difference."
"Hmm..."
"And I apologize, but I won't be able to answer your question either."
"And why is that?"
"Because even I still have no idea what it is I'm analyzing."
"In other words, it is a spell of that profound a magnitude. When do you estimate it will reach completion?"
"Who knows?"
A crushing wave of exhaustion crashed down over me. The physical strain was severe enough, but my mental fatigue had reached its absolute limit. Pushing my mind and body any further than this felt like a recipe for permanent collapse.
"My entire lifetime might not be enough. If you did your research, you should know I'm hardly a talented guy."
"Is that so..."
Was it an insatiable thirst for knowledge, or some deeper, hollow yearning? Faust nodded slowly, an expression of quiet melancholy settling over his weathered features.
"Then we shall meet again when the time comes. I will look forward to what lies beyond your death."
With those parting words, the monster who had brought a tempest of slaughter down upon the Cradle turned and vanished. It was just like death itself—an abrupt, senseless departure that offered neither warning nor meaning.