Epilogue: The City of the Dead Mage (2)
Continental Mage Alliance Council.
These were mages who showed zero interest in worldly affairs unless it involved their own magical research or circle awakenings—social misfits through and through.
They holed up in magic towers or personal labs, never seeing the light of day. That was why most mages had such pallid, sickly skin.
Yet even these recluses had one day a year when they almost invariably stepped outside: the Continental Mage Alliance Council period.
A festival of mages, by mages, for mages.
They engaged in serious discussions on magic, held mock magical battles akin to knights' tournaments, and unveiled new research and spells in a grand exhibition atmosphere.
The fact that the entire 'Upper House' was composed of 8th circle archmages was proof enough.
Of course... when all these eccentrics gathered in one place, there were always big and small disturbances every year.
But this time was different on a whole other level.
"The council must immediately provide a proper explanation and investigation into these questions!!!"
"What is the Upper House doing right now?!"
"Come on, elders, you're all advanced in years—how can you act like this?"
"Is there no Cube in Nirvana? Stop holing up in your territory all the time and do some studying if you don't know better!"
"We're all gonna die at this rate!!!"
Mages were a race that never cooperated.
The very purpose of magic towers was less about collaborating on grand projects and more about like-minded individuals grooming each other.
People joined towers to learn under higher-achieving mages or seek novel stimuli.
Yet here they were, these mages banding together to denounce something.
Demands to halt homunculus ascension research, talk of the Day of Loss five hundred years in the future...
The council had initially ignored the incomprehensible nonsense, but as the event progressed, rumors began circulating even in the Lower and Upper Houses.
The Lower House reacted first.
With greater numbers and more sensitivity to new developments, it was no surprise.
"...They say Arkythia and her disciple created spatial magic. A portal connected to a world five hundred years in the future, apparently."
"No, that's wrong. I heard it straight from a close friend who got the explanation and experienced it firsthand—it's an incomplete dimension. Not a portal to that world, but a reconstruction of the disciple's memories?"
"The disciple—you mean 'Iridescent' Selaha Rosalyn, who's here right now?"
"No, there's an obscure male disciple. A librarian at the imperial capital's Central Imperial Magic Library."
"...If they stuck him in a library, he probably hasn't achieved much."
"Opposite. They'd only confine a talent like that to a library for pure research. Archmages always play it that way."
"What does the Upper House say?"
"No reaction yet. They're swamped with current agendas."
"Hmm... Selaha claims she knows nothing?"
"Yes. She just returned from a continental tour with her master. Far from friendly, she got all fired up just hearing the name Yujin."
Though divided into Lower and Upper Houses, the power disparity between them was like heaven and earth.
The Lower House had its own voting and enforcement rights.
But excluding a few exceptions, it mostly just decided which agendas went up to the Upper House.
The true heart of the council was the Upper House.
Using emergency powers, the Lower House pushed the agenda of 'Rumors of Homunculi and Incidents at the Central Imperial Magic Library' to the Upper House.
And right on cue, Arkythia—who had flown nonstop from the capital Romanium to the Nirvana Autonomous Region—made her appearance.
"Arkythia Piel Athena here. Long time no see, elders."
"Ah ha.... finally here at last...!! My... beautiful... little bellflower...@@! Do you... know... how I've... awaited... this moment...!?"
Aside from the Yellow Tower Lord leaping up in tears, everyone fixed her with icy glares.
"You never showed your face no matter how we called, so this must be quite the grave matter?"
"A discovery that shakes the entire continent."
Arkythia advanced to the center of the chamber with a relaxed smile.
The chamber was semicircular, with Upper House senators looking down from above.
A structure designed to intimidate and pressure those below.
Even high mages who bowed to no one elsewhere shrank in this place.
No wonder 'tension-relief potions' flew off the shelves at Nirvana shops during the month-long council.
But amid all those piercing gazes, Arkythia showed not a flicker of unease.
Naturally so. She was an archmage, just like the senators above.
She had no intention of dragging things out anyway.
She cut straight to the chase and dropped a meteor on the chamber.
"Commander Cassian Valerius of the 2nd Magic Corps has reached the 8th circle."
"?!"
"What...!?"
"And he did it inside the 'space' my disciple created."
What followed was enough to make the council quake and the empire gasp in shock.
"Other dimensions truly exist."
Arkythia knew Yujin's secret.
His soul wasn't originally from this world; he'd died there and been reborn here.
All the games and ideas manifested in the Dimension were knowledge unknown to anyone in this world except 'Yujin Feltro'.
This was quite the fresh shock even for Arkythia.
For her, who pursued ascension, the existence of another dimension was a key that might solve a lifelong riddle.
Perhaps that was why he had talent in 'space' magic of all things.
Maybe why he could communicate with the knowledge spirit—Wiki, as Yujin called it—from the start.
"Then... is that world the capital's mages spoke of truly a future to come...?"
"As Archmage Arkythia says, it might be another dimension."
"Even so, five hundred years from now? No one alive then, including that woman! It's just sophistry to dodge this incident!"
"Green Tower Lord, since the great sage 'Mercalga' who founded the council long ago, has there been any ascension in three thousand years of history?"
"...None."
"Then why chase phantoms from three thousand years ago? I'm doing it, Arkythia is, even the Red Tower Lord over there. Our magic and achievements weren't forged solely by our own power, were they?"
The three tower lords who held Upper House seats: Red, Green, and Yellow.
Like Arkythia, they were archmages pursuing ascension.
Red and Green—excluding Yellow—were the types born with bloodlines and 'tower privilege'.
"We inherited knowledge from predecessor tower lords and great pioneers, who inherited from their forebears. That's how we reached where we are. So isn't five hundred years just around the corner? I've lived over two hundred myself."
The other senators fell silent as mice at the words of Aldebaran Crotel, the council's supreme chairman and the mage society's greatest living figure.
"It warrants serious discussion and review."
After all, it was one archmage speaking to others.
Even if Arkythia's claims were lies, the council had to investigate.
And in the process, they uncovered even more suspicious circumstances.
"Green Tower Lord!! Green Tower Lord!! We got a testimony!!"
"...What'd they say?"
"It's real!! Someone was researching homunculi!!"
"What...!? Who the hell?!"
"A dark mage subjugated last year... A 6th circle mage from the Tadar Grand Duchy who joined the subjugation got hold of related research materials and kept them personally..."
"Son of a bitch. Where's that bastard now?!"
"En route to the council under escort."
He hadn't yet researched or created homunculi, but he'd hidden the forbidden knowledge.
Like stumbling into a rat while backing away from a cow.
They'd killed dark mages on sight, but absorbed their research and data wholesale.
One major agenda item had even been partial deregulation of certain dark magics.
Naturally, that was scrapped immediately.
Just the word 'dark' in dark magic triggered hysterics in both houses, leading to a decision that was pretty discriminatory by modern standards.
With evidence piling up, they couldn't dismiss it all as fiction.
Thus, the resolution of the incident:
Archmage Arkythia had, to a limited extent, restored spatial magic.
"Has Arkythia truly touched the 9th circle...!!!"
"Not yet. But close."
Her 2nd circle disciple (whom everyone dismissed as 100% bullshit) had manifested a world within a Cube via dimension.
"I wanna try it too! Other dimension experience!!"
"Proposing it now would just get shot down anyway... Wanna head to the capital and play that game?"
"Great idea! Count me in!"
And through that world, another archmage was born—a utterly insane conclusion.
"The emperor must be fuming. Finally got true archmage-level power, and the council got played..."
"Indeed. But where'd Chairman Aldebaran go?"
"Left for the capital with Arkythia at dawn yesterday."
"What...? In the middle of the council?!"
"He has no vote or proposal rights anyway—told us to handle the rest."
Aldebaran Crotel, head of mage society, had no choice but to prioritize heading to the Central Imperial Magic Library over official duties.
"The council chairman's coming? Right now? Suddenly?!"
Of course, for Yujin Feltro—who'd get swept up in a massive storm for one slip of the tongue—it was quite the misfortune.
