Chapter 689
Chapter 689
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 689
Chapter Title: Relentless Pursuit (3)
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1.
After finishing the sparring match, Rinne knelt down and slipped into meditation.
The purpose was training within her inner imagery.
Reflecting on the battle that had just taken place, contemplating her path of the sword, and engaging in silent rumination to forge ahead on a better road.
The sanctuary that ought to hold only her sword and herself had lost its peace ever since she took on a new disciple.
More precisely, ever since she became convinced of his mana amplification ability, it was no longer a tranquil refuge.
Anxiety and obsession, like a noose around her neck, had bound Rinne tight.
Rinne's stigma bore an intentional flaw.
This defect wasn't unique to her.
It was the "Curse of Deficiency," occupying one of the twenty-two strokes in the stigmas borne by every Sword Witch in history.
Because of that curse, Rinne's five senses and emotional framework didn't function normally.
The exquisite taste of fine cuisine.
The peace of everyday life.
The soft comfort of a down comforter.
Even the pleasure derived from intimacy with a man.
None of it was permitted to Rinne.
They were all impurities.
Achieving a higher hierarchy and greater strength—that was a witch's fate and duty.
Peace made humans hesitate.
Pleasure made them weak.
Tranquility bred complacency.
Love rendered them irrational.
Only the pure craving born of deficiency could drive humans to blind obsession.
Grounded in this philosophy, generations of Sword Witches had collared themselves to fixate solely on one goal, never glancing elsewhere.
For Rinne, the only peace allowed was one sensation: the stability that came from the certainty of growing stronger.
That was it.
That was why she pushed herself through training bordering on self-abuse.
Why she braved battles against countless witches.
Her predecessors—and their predecessors before them—had lived the same life. Their mindset and efforts could undoubtedly be deemed successful.
Sword Witches had risen to be among the strongest of all witches.
But there was a reason the Curse of Deficiency was called a curse.
A witch's lifespan was self-determined.
Their spiritual bodies didn't age, nor did their vitality wane with time.
Thus, the average witch lifespan hovered around 150 years.
They completed their research at a leisurely pace before passing on their legacies and grand ambitions to the next generation.
Sword Witches were different.
Rinne's predecessor had lived just 42 years after becoming a witch before dying.
That one had passed on the stigma after a mere 27 years.
Excluding Rinne herself, no Sword Witch in history had exceeded 80 years.
The reason was simple.
Witches were human, after all.
The core of their psyche was no different from any human's.
The human heart balanced positive and negative emotions.
Even the harshest trials were offset by positive feelings, aiding recovery.
Yet every past "Samakiel" existed in a state of utter psychological imbalance.
All positive emotions were curtailed by the curse, while negative ones flooded in unfiltered.
The obsession triggered by realizing she'd stagnated far exceeded normal self-loathing or impatience. Painful memories and traumas from the past lingered undimmed.
An endless quagmire of despairing self-hatred.
A sense of loss that broke her down into a worthless shell.
Everything assaulted her without the slightest attenuation, turning inward as whips against herself. The fate of a human burning through their days under such relentless self-flagellation was plain to see in her predecessors.
Her master—racked by beastly screams every night, self-mutilating, her insides devoured by worms until only a husk remained—that was Rinne's future.
Rinne's exceptional talent and mental fortitude had endured for centuries without pause.
Even so, the world had its limits.
Lately, Rinne had glimpsed hers.
The first tangible sense of her own boundaries.
To her, it was a prophecy more horrific than anything in the world.
A herald of the nightmare and torment soon to descend.
Every move she made now was the desperate thrashing of someone backed into a corner. Even if the odds were slim, Si-woo's mana amplification was her sole path to salvation.
"……."
Rinne stared blankly at the cup before her.
A glass filled with clear sake.
She was acutely aware of the shame: coupling with her disciple, offering an orifice not meant for penetration, being toyed with in crude fondling, fawning like a courtesan.
Without the curse, she'd have died before stooping to such acts.
And yet, tonight Rinne would once more seek her bed with him.
Sober, it was utterly inconceivable.
Rinne felt that shame and humiliation more intensely than anyone.
With no pleasure or love to temper those feelings.
So, like yesterday, she'd rely on alcohol.
Intoxication would blur her reason and erase fragments of memory.
-Gulp. Gulp. Gulp.
The clear, potent liquor scorched its way down her throat.
Recalling only what she'd learned—ensuring she wouldn't forget—Rinne rose to her feet.
Now it was time to head to the battlefield.
2.
A day passed uneventfully.
Or rather, it was hard to call it truly uneventful.
Just three hours of sleep before being dragged to the training grounds and pummeled under the guise of sparring.
"Still, it's a relief."
His bones ached from the thrashing, but what settled in his heart was relief.
Because Rinne had acted exactly as usual.
She hadn't cut the spar short under the pretense of mana amplification research to drag him to the tea room.
Nor had she lost control of her strength in a fit of rage.
As if nothing had ever happened between them, Rinne had swung her sword with a blank expression.
Once the match ended, she'd sent him back to his guest room with a curt "Good work," betraying no hint of anything amiss.
The greatest potential threat had thus vanished.
Ever since his life in Hexennacht had stabilized, Rinne's thirst for mana amplification had been the biggest wildcard.
If he could hold out for another week or so, he'd receive the code for the magic circle governing the door Dorothy was bringing.
Then, three or four more days after that to finalize the dimensional transfer spell.
The only events left were to beat Rosie at Witchboard and claim Manya and Marisha.
"...Hmm..."
His routine had been to collapse into sleep right after sparring, but humans were creatures of adaptation.
Though the aftereffects of recovery magic and the extreme drain on stamina and mana left him utterly spent, he could force himself through it.
So he gave up on sleep and sat at his desk to study the Witchboard.
One might scoff—what grand "research" for a board game even apprentices could enjoy?
But his opponent was Rosie Alu.
A witch who took a mere game like Witchboard with deadly seriousness.
She had crushed Si-woo with pure skill, no tricks, despite his Demon Eye cheat.
Even if the loss stemmed from the disadvantage of move order, he couldn't charge in unprepared.
If turn order decided the rematch too, victory wouldn't help much.
After all, Rosie hadn't demanded only a rematch as the winner's prerogative.
To claim more than that—to demand Manya and Marisha—he needed to establish clear dominance.
She was saying he had to get serious too.
"Wow, she really is one crazy bitch."
Replaying the previous match in his head on a sheet of paper, Si-woo let out a sigh that was half admiration, half dismay.
The board itself was three-dimensional, offering an incalculable number of possibilities.
Branching points for tactical and strategic shifts cropped up constantly.
Yet no matter how many times he reviewed it, he couldn't find a single superior move to Rosie's.
She played with theoretical perfection every step.
The sheer hours she must have poured in without a Demon Eye—unfathomable.
"……."
To surpass this, he'd need moves that defied convention.
Deviating from the standard playbook to invent something better...
"Easier said than done."
As Diana had said, the meta was the great principle forged from countless players' trial and error.
Witchboard's meta had ossified over centuries without a single balance patch.
He was about to call it quits and head to bed without progress when the sliding door hissed open.
"Follow me."
Rinne had changed out of her training garb into an ornate, splendid black kimono.
He'd thought today would pass peacefully, but apparently not.
To think she'd come crawling back even after witnessing that brutal state.
Caught off guard by Rinne's indomitable spirit, Si-woo quietly trailed after her.
What on earth would it take to shake her off...?
If mana amplification still didn't happen after all this, he deeply worried her pent-up rage would boomerang back as karmic retribution.
-Creak. Creak.
The quiet groan of the floorboards underfoot.
Her steps were headed, predictably, toward the garden tea room.
But...
Rinne's gait was utterly off.
Unlike her usual ramrod-straight posture, she wobbled side to side.
One wrong step, and she'd go sprawling spectacularly.
The scent was too faint to notice at first, but she'd clearly been drinking.
"You seem a little tipsy. Want me to help you along?"
"No need."
"How much did you have?"
"...Three cups."
"Oh boy..."
As expected.
Her speech had that same odd slur, and a stolen glance at her eyes showed them glazed over.
-Hic!
A clear, chirping hiccup like a cricket's cry.
Her shoulders jerked with each one.
After a tortuous trek, they reached the tea room. Rinne immediately loosened her kimono's folds.
Her expression screamed annoyance at anything like sex—she just wanted to crash right then.
Three cups or not, she was thoroughly plastered.
"Undress."
Faced with Rinne's valiant resolve—recovering from yesterday's mental devastation in a single day to try again—Si-woo quietly swallowed his sigh.