Selah Roselyn's Melancholy
Selah Roselyn's melancholy.
There were countless ways the world evaluated Selah Roselyn.
The acknowledged sole disciple of the notoriously picky Green Tower Master.
A prodigy and genius who had reached 6-Circle at the mere age of twenty-two.
Blessed with talent in five elements—fire, water, lightning, wind, and earth—earning her the title of Five Colors.
Naturally, she had claimed the top spot in her year at Philemon Academy, where the empire's greatest minds gathered.
The Continental Mages' Council had treated her with appropriate respect, hadn't they?
Had her relationship with her former master, the Green Tower Master, not been so strained, she would have secured a seat in the lower house long ago.
For an elite of the magic world like her to abandon the thriving Green Tower and place herself under Archisia's wing, the reason was simple.
A craving for recognition and perfection.
She had been born with the blessing of mana.
Five Colors was one thing, but if she delved deeply into dark magic, she likely would have awakened considerable talent there as well.
Yet there was one thing she alone lacked.
Colorless.
Space magic.
A rare attribute that only an extremely small number of people on the continent were born with.
It was only natural that it would capture Selah's interest.
To someone who pursued perfection in all things, the unknown was something that had to be conquered.
Moreover, the existence of Archisia was another reason Selah had cast everything aside to come to the Central Magic Library.
Space mages were already exceedingly rare, so there were virtually no proper curriculums or research papers on the subject.
Even then, using it in actual combat was impossible unless one had reached a certain level of mastery.
After all, among all the space magic spells established so far, there wasn't a single one that a mage below 3-Circle could use.
Yet someone with such flawed space magic had reached 8-Circle?
Someone evaluated as closer to Ascension than any other grand mage?
Selah Roselyn had become utterly captivated by the person known as Archisia. She had abandoned everything she had built up until then and followed in her footsteps.
As the sole disciple of the grand mage Archisia, Selah should have been on the path to becoming perfect as a mage…
But with the appearance of a single person, all those plans had turned to foam.
The academy's heretic, Eugene Feltro.
The incident where he thoroughly humiliated the student council president—who had been his senior—using space magic, Invisible Hand, had become a legend that spread throughout Philemon Academy.
Even when summoned before the disciplinary committee to be questioned, he had acted shamelessly and ultimately received a verdict of innocence.
To Selah, he was a vicious, perverted classmate she wanted nothing to do with.
So why on earth did her master show that guy so much favoritism?
“M-Master…? What did you just say…?”
“You're back, Selah. I'm sorry, I've been incredibly busy lately.”
“That's not what I mean! You just said you'd teach that pathetic fool Gaemun…!!!”
Selah rarely let her poker face crack, but this time she couldn't hold back.
Gaemun. It was a privilege granted only to space mages.
Each elemental magic possessed its own innate characteristics.
For example, fire magic, with its burning nature, took forms that dealt continuous damage to opponents or overwhelmed them with raw firepower.
In contrast, water and ice were somewhat more static, but that very quality granted them greater autonomy. They were utility-type spells. Water was flexible and possessed powerful resistance to physical force. Ice magic, an application of water, combined the properties of lightning and wind.
Lightning was similar to fire but with lower power and greater speed. It was famous for its piercing attacks, which worked effectively even against enemies with magic resistance.
Earth was solid. No attribute could overwhelm a rock mage who had committed fully to defense. Even an 8-Circle grand mage usually couldn't break through the defenses of a 6-Circle earth mage.
Wind was sharp. If lightning was about penetration, wind focused on cutting and flight. Attacks that couldn't be seen and could come from anywhere at any time were the most terrifying.
Dark magic… let's skip that. The deeper you dug, the more vicious the spells became.
But the nature possessed by space magic was space itself.
Forcibly dragging an opponent into your own domain.
In theory, within that space, a space mage could overwhelm someone two circles higher than themselves.
Since Gaemun itself was a spell one could learn starting from 5-Circle, it meant a 5-Circle space mage could hold their own against a 7-Circle mage.
Yet instead of her, a 6-Circle mage, that Eugene Feltro—who was only 2-Circle (though she didn't know when he had become 3-Circle)—was going to learn Gaemun first?
To Selah Roselyn, this was absolutely unacceptable.
However, Archisia simply looked at Selah with a troubled gaze.
Selah knew exactly what that look meant.
What more do I have to do…!! How can I earn Master's recognition…!!
She bit her lip hard in frustration.
In the magic society, she was widely known as Archisia's disciple, but in truth, the real disciple was that idiot Eugene Feltro standing beside them, blankly reading the mood.
Even this recent incident was proof.
While Archisia had sent her to attend the council, how many times had the capital of Romani shaken?
Wherever you went, you could hear talk of games, cubes, the City of the Dead Mage, and so on.
While she had been diligently handling chores, her master had been busy doing something with Eugene Feltro.
And what was with all that skinship?
Her master had always been physically affectionate, but the expression and tone she used with Eugene were ones she had never shown Selah.
It made something deep in her chest boil and churn.
Especially since that halfwit had happily buried his face in her master's chest. That made it even worse.
“……”
In the end, unable to contain her anger, Selah fled the library as if running away.
Even then, she stubbornly wiped away the tears that had welled in her eyes once her back was turned. It was her way of preserving what little dignity she had left.
Fucked. Once Selah got upset, her grudges were no joke.
A cold sweat broke out on its own.
Even Master seemed to realize she had made a mistake, staring blankly in the direction Selah had disappeared.
“…Eugene.”
“Yes, Master. What should we do? Should I go after her?”
“Hmm, I don't think that would help much.”
I agreed.
Unless we brought her some truly delicious dessert, she wouldn't let this go easily.
Besides, wasn't she the type who especially hated it when Master and I got physically close?
She probably wasn't a lesbian… it was more like a twisted case of affection deprivation. She just wanted to monopolize all of Archisia Master's love for herself.
In the end, Master and I quickly convened an emergency response committee.
Selah's tantrums were even difficult for Master to handle.
“By the way, what did you mean earlier when you said you'd teach me Gaemun? Were you serious?”
“Of course I was serious.”
“…Is that even possible? Isn't Gaemun originally a spell you can only learn starting from 5-Circle?”
“5-Circle is just a benchmark. It's not absolute. Especially for you, a spirit contractor bonded with Wiki, 3-Circle should be more than enough to pull it off.”
To me, that was jackpot news.
The difference between a space mage who could use Gaemun and one who couldn't was like heaven and earth.
No, more like the difference between the ground and the entire universe.
“But then shouldn't you just teach Selah Gaemun too? She's 6-Circle, unlike me. If you told her you'd teach her, I bet she'd come running like a dog.”
“…That child is still lacking.”
“She's 6-Circle, though?”
“She doesn't have a space of her own.”
Archisia Master spoke firmly.
She didn't have a space of her own.
In the study of space magic, that was essentially the same as saying she lacked a unique mental image.
Gaemun was the act of opening the world one carried in one's heart.
In that sense, the cube Master had created by materializing her own Gaemun…
It showed just how deep, vast, and solid her mental image was. No matter how great a mage, they couldn't properly destroy that world.
That achievement alone was more than enough to earn her the title of grand mage.
“The reason I took her on the circuit was to show her a wider world. It wasn't entirely ineffective… but compared to you, she's still lacking.”
A mage was someone who lived confined within their own world. Someone who didn't care what others thought of them and stubbornly carried out their will.
But Selah had a tendency to pay excessive attention to other people's gazes.
I didn't know what kind of pressure caused it.
Because she didn't consider her own world perfect, problems arose in constructing her mental image.
Where's the perfect game from the start? You fix things as they break.
“…This is going to be a headache.”
“Mmm.”
Master scratched her cheek.
But now that things had come to this, we couldn't just sit around waiting for time to solve everything.
Before the master-disciple relationship crossed a river that could never be recrossed, it was time for a mediator to step in.
“Master, give me exactly four days. I'll turn Selah into a proper person.”
Selah was burning with a ridiculous sense of rivalry toward me.
Calling it rivalry was generous; it was practically closer to contempt.
She's achieved 6-Circle at nearly the youngest age in history, so it's only natural she wouldn't treat someone who was 2-Circle until recently as a real person.
Still, I couldn't say it didn't bother me.
After all, she was the one spreading rumors about what happened at the academy.
This was a good opportunity to press down on that high nose of hers and make her behave.
The next day.
I headed to Selah's quarters carrying desserts that Liana had personally selected, along with an improved gaming cube.
“Did you come to mock me? Too bad. I don't feel anything from the mockery of a mere 3-Circle mage.”
“You've really got a talent for twisting everything I say.”
“What?! Have you said your piece?!”
“Whatever. Let's make a bet, you and me.”
“A bet?”
“You've probably heard about the cube and the games by now. The council was in an uproar over it, right?”
“…Yes, there's no way I wouldn't know. They say you implemented another dimension that Master saw.”
“Whatever. If you manage to clear these games without giving up halfway, I'll treat you with complete respect from now on. You can even get me fired from the library if you want. I'll do anything you order me to do like I'm your servant. I'll even give up my claim to Gaemun. I'll convince Master myself.”
“…!”
At the outrageous proposal, Selah's eyes flashed.
It was a clear glimpse into how she usually thought of me.
“But on the other hand, if you ever utter the word 'give up' from your mouth, or if the cube detects any health abnormalities and forces a shutdown…”
I pointed my finger at her.
“Then I'm your master. You'll have to do whatever I say. Got it?”
“Ha…! As expected of the academy's representative pervert, you put forward such a disgusting condition.”
“So, are you in or not?”
“I am Selah Roselyn. I don't know how amazing these so-called games are, but you'd better steel yourself.”
With a confident expression, she accepted the improved gaming cube.
There were three games installed inside the cube.
Dimensia: Lost Memories, City of the Dead Mage, and finally Queen of Maryland Maker.
And ten minutes after Selah activated the gaming cube—roughly one hour of in-game time later.
“Kyaaak! Kyaaaaaaaak!!! Don't come neaaaaar!!!!”
Selah Roselyn let out a seizure-like scream before eventually losing consciousness and fainting.
“I knew it would turn out like this.”
I had already prepared a recording crystal and captured Selah's fainting figure clearly.
Yep. I knew from the start she wouldn't be able to clear even Dimensia.
How could she possibly clear it with zero prior information?
Now, look at the crystal and tell me your age and name.