Chapter 357: translated
I Killed the Demon King. It Was a Mistake.
Chapter 357
The sound of the rising city was soft but substantial, and its movement was slow yet difficult to measure.
The Eileen River, which had been flowing through Sapientia, threw itself entirely to fill the suddenly revealed void.
"...What the fuck is that."
"Are we dreaming right now?"
The bottom of the city was revealed more quickly than anticipated. Bluish-green magic stones were densely embedded in the center of the city's underside, and each stone had something like a gold ring fitted around it.
"Wh-what?! We're being pulled!"
People and objects near Sapientia were drawn upward toward it. People held onto each other to resist, but objects like shells and bricks had nothing to grasp onto and rose along with the city.
Sapientia rose into the sky and moved eastward.
***
Raven looked out the library window.
The sky was visible, but at a different height than usual. The clouds were not above her head but right in front of her eyes.
"How does it feel to have achieved the lifelong dream of your forefathers?"
Noah sat on a plush sofa, gazing at the sky.
"Surprisingly, I feel rather unmoved."
Raven was overwhelmed with the urge to slap Noah across the face. The reason Raven was restraining herself was less because of the anti-wizard handcuffs on both hands and more because she was mentally exhausted by this absurd spectacle.
"I find it incredible that you can say that after forcing all the residents of Sapientia to evacuate to the riverbank and demolishing all the buildings."
"Did you expect me to be jumping with joy?"
"Given that this Ark has been completed over 37 generations, I expected you to be far more elated than you appear to be."
"Let me tell you a small secret."
Noah took a sip of his drink and rose, heading toward where the Akashic Record was located.
"Before the singularity occurred, the Akashic Record stated that I would be the last Arch Duke. That was confirmed from the 1st Arch Duke all the way through to my father, the 36th Arch Duke."
The Akashic Record continued to write mystical words. Noah found these words difficult to discern.
This was because his eyes had become too clouded.
"Then let me ask one thing. Was it written in the Akashic Record that I would complete the Ark?"
"Wasn't it written that you, Noah, would complete it?"
"No, it wasn't."
"What?"
"The destruction of the Akashic Record preceded my death and the completion status of the Ark. It was originally written that the Akashic Record would be destroyed when the Arch Great Library was demolished during Niflheim's invasion."
"So you've been building the Ark all this time without knowing whether it would be completed?"
"Yes. Because it was the only solution to escape the devil overflow."
Noah smiled self-deprecatingly.
"Or perhaps we have been building the Ark under the control of the Akashic Record."
"Did you never consider abandoning the project? Or couldn't these magic stones have been made into artifacts or used for other purposes?"
"All our ancestors had such thoughts at least once. Is this all in vain? Why should we devote ourselves to an Ark project without a guaranteed future?"
"Did you think so too, Noah?"
"I considered giving up hundreds of times. But I had come too far to abandon it, so I inherited the family business almost out of inertia. And even though our ancestors tried to deviate from the Akashic Record, everything ultimately occurred as recorded. So I believed there was no meaning in rejecting the future written in the Akashic Record and simply complied."
"Then what did you think when Caesar appeared?"
Noah still remembers when his father, Laar Arch, called him to this study where the Akashic Record was kept.
-My son, infinite possibilities have opened up.
-We might be able to see the future beyond the completion of the Ark.
Laar Arch was originally a quiet person. But at that time, his father's face was flushed with excitement. Laar was grateful for the situation itself, imperfect and uncertain, but with infinite possibilities, rather than a predetermined future.
"Father thought that if we could control the singularity, we might be able to complete the Arch before Niflheim invaded Sapientia. But Caesar was not someone who could be controlled. And even if controlled, there was no guarantee we could create the future we wanted. Both my father and I were arrogant."
"Is that why you launched the Ark so recklessly?"
Noah smiled enigmatically. If not for the anti-wizard handcuffs, Raven might have understood the meaning behind that smile, but not knowing left her uneasy.
"With some variations, the average lifespan of an Arch Duke does not exceed 37 years. The longest-lived Prime Duke Arch survived until 83, but since then, few have lived beyond 40. I myself am only 28 years old."
"...You're that young?"
"Raven, you would understand this, using mystical words brings great strain. Especially words that damage causality, like peeking into the future and returning to the past, places tremendous burden on the body."
Noah firmly gripped his trembling hands.
"In other words, I don't have much life left. Since I have left no sons or daughters, the line of the Arch Duke ends here."
"Why didn't you adopt an heir?"
"The future was too bleak for that. I believed that in a world dominated by devils, forming human attachments would only deepen the pain."
Raven began to find this conversation rather tedious.
To be honest, Raven wanted to get off the Ark quickly. She was going crazy with worry about what had happened to Caesar.
"So what's next? Now that you've launched the Ark, are you planning to enjoy your retirement?"
At that moment, there was a commotion outside the window. Although Raven was in a state where she couldn't detect magic at all, just by the sound she could distinguish whether it was the explosion of dynamite or an explosion caused by magic.
That was magic.
"It's time."
Noah pointed to the grandfather clock.
"There's a key inside the grandfather clock that can unlock the handcuffs."
"...Why are you telling me this?"
"Because it's time."
"What time?"
When Noah pointed outside the window, Raven's gaze naturally turned toward it. Outside, Bassago and Andras were engaged in a fierce battle with the Blue Star wizards.
"Why are Bassago and Andras here?"
"They seem to have boarded secretly."
"Are you asking me to stop Andras and Bassago?"
"Would that be impossible?"
Raven disliked that look in Noah's eyes.
That look of absolute certainty that she would do it. But as Noah thought, Raven wasn't the type of person who would just let people die.
Raven strode over to the grandfather clock and opened it. As Noah said, there was a key for the handcuffs. If she unlocked these handcuffs, the echo would torment Raven again.
Click!
Raven unlocked the handcuffs and dropped them to the ground. The first thing she saw was the numerous incantations surrounding her. But no voices could be heard.
"...Huh?"
"I'll help you get out. Don't worry about coming back either."
"Wait..."
As Noah lightly waved his staff, Raven was transported to the front entrance of the Great Library.
At that moment, Andras and Bassago appeared before Raven.
Bassago blocked the magicians' fire magic with a swamp of decay while advancing his decay knights, and Andras was fighting with the Blue Star wizards by casting spells beside Bassago.
"...Raven?"
Bassago and Andras' gazes turned toward Raven. Raven raised her wand.
『Flame that annihilates devils』
White flames bloomed around Raven.
First, she would crush those guys and then return to question Noah. It wouldn't be too late to do so.
***
Homigraph, where Sapientia had disappeared, was in chaos.
Things like crumbled bricks from Sapientia kept falling, making it impossible to leave the building. Gloria, along with Pio and Aurora, watched Sapientia floating away while hiding in a large hospital.
Pio muttered while looking at Sapientia.
"The secret of Sapientia has been solved."
"What secret?"
"I heard there was a big difference between the amount of magic stones directed toward Sapientia and the amount actually used by magicians. I wondered why, but it seems they were preparing for something extraordinary like this."
Yugar, who had been lying in the hospital bed, limped toward the window. Bell hurriedly supported Yugar.
"Father, you still need to rest."
"Bell, when will I see this spectacle again? The pain is temporary, but this strange sight can only be seen now, right?"
At Yugar's words, Bell had nothing to say and handed him a custom-made crutch.
"But the doctor said you need to rest sufficiently to heal your knee and wrist, so just look for a little while."
"Alright. The older you get, the more you nag like your mother."
"I think I understand why mom nags so much."
Yugar chuckled and looked at Sapientia.
Sapientia, receding into the twilight, seemed like a brilliant golden city. At that moment, a man with an ashen face opened the door to the room.
Peculiarly, he didn't walk in but floated in, hovering in the air. Gloria was startled when she saw the man's face.
"Oh...? Wizard Smir?"
"I heard there was a patient, so I came."
As soon as Smir saw Yugar, he laid out medicine bottles on the desk.
"Do you perhaps have a preference for which medicine? One is an unverified external wound treatment that would heal everything in about a week, and the other is verified but requires consistent rehabilitation to heal."
"Why have you suddenly become a medicine peddler... Wait, weren't you supposed to be in Sapientia?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Sapientia is only accessible to magicians, and Arch Duke expelled everyone else, right? So I naturally thought you were in Sapientia."
"That's what they said initially, but I had no choice but to come out of Sapientia."
"Why?"
"The Blue Star wizards threw all the research materials from the magic tower outside of Sapientia."
"What?!"
Come to think of it, not only bricks but also strange books and medicine bottles seemed to have fallen from the sky, and those were all the research materials from the magic tower?
"So the magicians are now outside collecting the research materials?"
Gloria looked out the window.
She had been so focused on Sapientia that she hadn't noticed, but indeed, magicians were picking up books and artifacts while holding their aching backs.
"Is this mine?!"
"Hey! This artifact is mine! Here's the name... Not my name?"
"See!"
"But it's not your name either!"
"Anyway, it's mine!"
Thousands of magicians were moving between building rooftops and the ground, and some were using magic to retrieve documents that had fallen into the river.
"Anyway, which medicine do you prefer? Yugar Hironeel."
"The latter."
"You could heal in a week with the other one?"
"You said it wasn't verified, didn't you?"
"It's not verified, but its safety should probably be guaranteed."
Bell shouted loudly.
"You said maybe! How can you use something like that!"
"My goodness... Knights these days truly lack a spirit of adventure."
"Wouldn't it be better if you applied that spirit of adventure to your own body? Shall I break it for you?"
Boom, boom!
At that moment, a thunderous noise erupted, causing medicine bottles to shake and windows to rattle.
"What is that sound?"
Gloria, Pio, and Aurora quickly gathered their weapons and headed to the hospital rooftop. The source of the vibrations came from two locations. One was from the west, the other from the east.
From the west, trees and rocks were flying about as if a massive hurricane was approaching, while from the east, enormous tentacles were smashing through Homigraph buildings as they advanced.
Gloria recognized who was coming as she faced the sharp wind blowing from the west.
"...Master?"
At that moment, Aurora raised her shield to block a flying rock.
Gloria looked in the direction from which the rock had come. A black knight wrapped in dark tentacles was staring at Gloria's group.
"...It's Count Vex."
Come to think of it, she had forgotten about that devil.
As soon as Count Vex saw Gloria, he immediately charged at her.