The Ring of Ephrasia
...Is it over?
I stared at Hellhest as it scattered away in ashes.
What was left of it was nothing more than a heap of bones, looking almost like some buried fossil unearthed after centuries underground.
I swallowed the sigh threatening to escape and kept my trembling hands hidden as best I could.
...I really came close to dying there.
I glanced back over my shoulder.
Rudine was still frozen in place, her face blank with shock.
The cause was none other than the pressure.
Its true nature was a psychic attack.
It was a skill higher-ranked magical beasts naturally spewed out, and Rudine had been caught in its aftermath, her whole body locked rigid.
No matter how strong Rudine was, that was why Hellhest was impossible to subjugate at this point.
Of course, I hadn’t taken any damage, since I had no mana.
But if I hadn’t absorbed the Time Rune?
We would’ve just died together, nice and friendly.
There was no other way to describe it except sheer luck.
When the final activation phrase succeeded, the relief of having survived surged through me so strongly that I laughed before I could stop myself.
Anyway, what am I supposed to do about this?
I had no mana.
I had given it up as the price of absorbing the rune.
And yet the reason I could still use my abilities was because the power I’d absorbed through the rune consumed not mana, but a special resource called Mental Image.
What mattered here was that Mental Image was a consumable resource.
Mana, once spent, could be restored with time; Mental Image could not.
The chain of Acceleration, Reversal, Time, and End was one of those sacred techniques that could kill most ordinary magical beasts instantly, without leaving room for variables.
Naturally, that meant the Mental Image it consumed was enormous, so I’d scraped together every last speck of what remained and used it all.
If I ran out of Mental Image, I would have no choice but to absorb another rune.
But that wasn’t easy either.
Runes weren’t common objects, after all. They were one of the few rare relics in this world.
Of course, there was one way.
If I obtained Mirrkdrasil’s hidden opportunity, I could replenish my Mental Image without needing to absorb another rune.
“Rudine.”
I walked toward Rudine, who was still standing there with that dazed expression.
It seemed the aftereffects of the pressure still hadn’t faded.
“Can you move?”
“...Yes.”
She barely managed a nod.
Her whole body was still trembling, but she looked like she could at least move.
“...How did you do that?”
As I brushed the dirt off my clothes, Rudine suddenly asked me the question.
Her eyes were as flat and lifeless as always, but for some reason her voice was shaking.
Is she asking how I managed to move?
Or was she asking how I’d dealt with that monster in a single blow?
Well, she was always curious, so I could understand that much.
Besides, being overpowered so helplessly was probably a foreign experience for her.
She’d probably never felt the emotion of danger in her life until now.
And look at those eyes, brimming with curiosity.
She hadn’t even been able to lay a hand on the magical beast, and I’d killed it outright with some strange technique, so of course she’d have questions about me.
She had followed along as part of the group, only to find that she alone had been unable to do anything. That must have stung.
Honestly, it wouldn’t have been strange if she were shocked.
But.
How am I supposed to explain this?
Should I say I gave up my mana in exchange for absorbing the rune?
Or that I knew how to use it because I’d read the original story?
After a brief moment of thought, I opened my mouth.
“Among magical beasts, those ranked Abyss-tier and above sometimes emit pressure simply by existing.”
“...Pressure?”
“Right. It’s something like killing intent, but closer to an instinctive fear that cuts a little deeper.”
Rudine stared blankly and blinked.
It wasn’t exactly an unreasonable reaction.
She’d never encountered an Abyss-tier beast before, so of course she wouldn’t know.
“But I don’t have mana.”
“You don’t have mana?”
“Yep. So it didn’t work.”
“...Liar.”
There was nothing I could do about her disbelief.
This was the most perfect explanation I could offer.
Her suspicious glances were useless too.
I didn’t have time to keep lingering here, and now that we’d reached Westmarch, it was time to find Mirrkdrasil.
“Follow me.”
“...Yes.”
****
I walked along the path running between the dead, withered trees.
After our encounter with Hellhest, thankfully, no other magical beasts had appeared.
Still, something felt wrong.
The forest was too quiet.
Not a single insect could be heard, and even the wind had gone still.
It really is a ruin.
The atmosphere was unlike the usual Blackmore.
Too silent, if anything.
Only the sound of our footsteps echoed into the empty air.
The one consolation was that...
We made it to the right place.
I slowly looked around.
The trees had all turned pitch-black, as if they’d been scorched by fire.
It wasn’t just the trees.
The soil, the gravel, the brush—nothing looked intact.
In the original story, this was how Mirrkdrasil’s corruption spread.
I checked the surroundings and gauged the direction.
As expected of the Elves’ homeland, even what should have been a mere village sprawled out to an absurd size.
...Where’s the temple supposed to be?
Mirrkdrasil was located at the center of a temple.
But my memory was fuzzy, and in the original, most of the process of finding the way had been glossed over anyway.
What choice did I have?
I’d have to brute-force it.
Rudine, of course, had no idea what was going on and just trailed obediently behind me with a slightly sulky expression.
After several turns through winding paths, Rudine came to a halt.
The place she was staring at was a dead end, but a faint crack ran across the wall’s surface like a hairline fracture.
“Rudine.”
“Yes.”
“Could you break that wall for me?”
Crash!
Before I’d even finished speaking, Rudine’s dagger tore through the wall.
Beyond it lay a gray ruin.
Broken pillars had sunk into the earth, and shattered statues were scattered here and there.
Not only was it vast, but the architecture was unmistakably Elven.
No doubt about it.
This was definitely...
Kazkazit.
Kazkazit.
A sacred site from an age long forgotten, where the Elves gathered to worship the World Tree, the source of life.
“...”
As we stepped inside, a cold wind brushed against my skin.
Every time I moved, broken stone fragments crumbled under my feet.
Honestly, the place was such a wreck that even walking was difficult.
On top of that, the ceiling had collapsed in places, dark weeds had grown up from every corner, and dried vines wound themselves around the pillars.
The atmosphere is insane.
Gulp.
I swallowed hard and forced down the chill creeping up my throat.
It should be around here somewhere.
I slowly moved forward, skirting around the debris.
Once I’d found the temple, there was no chance of getting lost, since the original story hadn’t skipped the information from that point on.
I turned down one winding corridor after another.
Then, after taking the last bend and heading straight toward the glowing point beyond...
“Ah.”
I found it.
When I raised my head, a colossal silhouette came into view.
Whoooooosh—
Each time the wind blew, the withered branches creaked.
The blackened trunk stretched all the way to the edge of the sky, and its roots fanned out in every direction, as though they were tearing the earth apart.
“Mirrkdrasil...”
At last, I’d found it.
The death tree that had fed on the blood of the Elves stood right before me.
“...A mural?”
Rudine murmured as she looked at the mural carved into the wall.
It depicted two trees embracing one another.
One was a tree of life reaching upward.
The other was a tree of death growing downward.
A form where life and death crossed paths.
Between the two trees flowed currents of light and darkness.
And at the center were ancient inscriptions.
Sephiroth and Qliphoth.
Symbols of the sacred rites the Elves once served.
“Luke.”
Rudine’s voice rang out calmly.
When I turned around, I saw her eyes beginning to stain red.
It meant the Heavenly Slaughter Star was reacting to this place.
And then...
[Pilgrim who bears the great deed, declare the purpose of your visit to this sacred ground.]
Just as when I absorbed the rune, an indescribable, grotesque voice sliced through my eardrums and reverberated in my skull.
Everything after that was exactly as I remembered from the original.
I recalled the line spoken by the protagonist and slowly opened my mouth.
“I come to perform the offering.”
Wooooong—
I steadied my swaying body with difficulty.
The violent gusts of mana sent my hair whipping wildly about.
[State the price of the offering.]
“I seek the rite of covenant.”
The moment the final words left my mouth...
Everything around me was swallowed by pitch black.
Countless stars filled the void overhead.
As though they possessed wills of their own, they moved and shifted, tracing the shape of a tree.
I slowly opened my mouth.
“In the name of Ephrasia eternal”
As I recited the first line, the space around us trembled faintly.
“Remembering the forgotten rite”
With the second line, the stars forming the tree began to glow dimly.
“I now perform the covenant of life and death”
With the final line...
The space warped like rippling water.
[Pilgrim who bears Ephrasia’s deed. May the grace of life descend upon you, you great sovereign of demons.]
...?
Sovereign of demons?
Wasn’t that the kind of title that only dragons and Elves were supposed to carry?
Kugugugung.
When the grand ritual ended and my blackened vision returned to normal, Rudine was staring at me with her mouth slightly open.
And then.
In the palm of her right hand lay a single ring.
“...Oh.”
The Ring of Ephrasia.
The only artifact capable of exerting even partial control over the Heavenly Slaughter Star.