Chapter 325
Chapter 325
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 325
Chapter Title: Overturn the Board (3)
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Stars often bestow their blessings upon humans.
Some are loved by the stars, others become apostles chosen by them, and still others serve as devout priests worshiping them.
"If you could have just one of those, which talent would you want, Ashen Mage?"
It was a question she'd received back when she lingered on the battlefield.
Out of the countless blessings, which one would she choose? Without a moment's hesitation, Raniel had answered.
Watcher, the one who reads context.
That was the talent Raniel had longed for, desperately.
'I whined to the stars every damn day, but they never gave it to me. After all the mana they stole from me. Shameless bastards...'
Grumbling inwardly, Raniel recalled the Watcher.
True to its title, the Watcher pierced through the essence of all things. It read mana flows and, at a single glance, grasped even unfamiliar circuits in an instant.
That alone was an extraordinary talent.
It was something any mage would covet, but Raniel knew the Watcher's gift went far beyond that. She had to know. She'd witnessed a fully awakened Watcher.
The Mage of the Ancient Dragon.
Yormun van Draconic.
The most renowned mage in history, and the only one to fully awaken the Watcher talent. He had shown her, just once, what "the one who reads context" truly meant.
"Watch closely."
"This is my magic."
Was it praise for Raniel after she subjugated the black dragon?
Or the guidance of a senior to a distant junior? She couldn't know his intent... but the sight she witnessed that day was etched deeply into her mind.
The God of Mages.
It was a scene worthy of that glorious epithet.
"...I was planning to teach you this a bit later."
Raniel looked at the girl before her.
"I thought it was too soon for you. To be blunt, it's tough even for me. It's not something an ordinary human can endure. So I wanted to test the waters a little more... but."
A child born with the Watcher's talent.
Her successor, the next lord of the Ashen Mage Tower. Gazing at her, Raniel let out a long sigh.
"Unfortunately, we're out of time."
So, let me ask you first.
Raniel stared straight at Resti and posed the question.
"It'll strain your body. You'll feel really dizzy. You might not even be able to open your eyes properly for a while. If that's okay with you..."
"It's fine."
Resti answered without hesitation.
"As long as I can learn it in time, I'll do anything."
The eyes of one who had already decided.
Raniel nodded in satisfaction at those eyes burning with fierce determination. After she left, the tower would be filled with nothing but fools who had lost the Ashen spirit...
'She's truly my successor.'
Resti was the exception.
'This is what an Ashen Mage should be.'
Raniel beckoned to Resti.
"Close your eyes."
Resti closed her eyes.
Raniel reached out and covered Resti's eyes with her hand.
Since the Watcher's talent resided in the eyes, Raniel could feel the flow of starlight passing beneath her palm.
"You know the true value of your talent lies in 'seeing' and 'understanding,' right?"
"Yes. You told me last time."
She had mentioned it once before.
Resti's talent wasn't limited to merely 'seeing'; it lay in 'understanding' the essence of what she beheld.
"But haven't you ever felt something was off?"
"Pardon?"
"When you look at the stars and read mana flows, their essence becomes so easy to grasp. Things mages have explored for hundreds, thousands of years... don't you think it's a little strange how you understand them in an instant?"
A question she'd never considered before.
The moment Resti opened her mouth to reply.
"What you've seen so far is just the surface."
Raniel touched the mana flow.
"So now, let's peer into the abyss."
The flow over Resti's eyes began to twist. A crawling sensation like bugs on her eyelids made Resti shudder.
"Remember this feeling now. I'll do it once, but from next time, you'll have to do it yourself."
Resti slowly replied, "Yes."
Finally, Raniel slowly lifted her hand from Resti's eyes. Then she stepped back, out of Resti's line of sight.
"One warning before you open them."
Raniel said.
"What I just did was disable the safeguard on your eyes."
"...Safeguard?"
"Yeah. Your eyes could originally see and understand far more, but they're restricted."
Why the restriction?
As Resti seemed to wonder, Raniel gave a wry smile and tapped her own eyes.
"You see too much."
Simple.
Because she saw too much.
Because too much became understood in an instant.
"Seeing so much overloads your brain. Your mind can't handle it. That's why the restriction exists. I've temporarily lifted it now."
"Then..."
"You'll see too much. Too much will be understood at once. So don't grit your teeth and try to endure it needlessly. If it feels unbearable, close your eyes."
Otherwise.
"You'll go mad."
Resti swallowed hard.
Then she slowly opened her closed eyes. The instant she did, Resti caught her breath.
She could see.
So very much.
The moment her eyes opened, Resti understood why Raniel had cleared everything from the room. Mana flowed within it. The mana naturally emanating from the mages present.
Resti's mana, and Raniel's mana.
Those two flows alone were visible to her eyes.
Since mana was tied to the stars, her eyes grasped it the moment she saw it. Understood it. The process was the same as before, but the depth was different.
It delved deep.
Things that shouldn't be visible appeared.
The form of the mana, its properties, the information recorded within, every transaction made with it—countless pieces of data forcibly flooded into Resti's mind.
"...Hic!"
Resti staggered and closed her eyes.
The moment she did, a click sounded, and the safeguards snapped back into place. With her vision returned to normal, Resti looked down at the floor.
Drip, drip.
Blood was falling. Her vision was tinged red.
Blood dripped from her nose, and droplets fell from her eyes. Amid the confusion in her head, Resti barely lifted her gaze.
"What... is this..."
"That's the essence of your talent."
Raniel said.
"If you don't want it, you'll only see and understand the surface. That's talent enough on its own, but if you wish..."
She crooked a finger downward.
"You can dive to the deepest depths, extract its core, and emerge. It's an utterly absurd talent. That's why I coveted it."
Raniel gave a wry smile and smacked her lips.
"One mage devotes their life to walking the path of magic... and you can understand its essence just by looking. You can make it your own."
For example, geniuses are described as those who leap across decades of others' paths in an instant.
But what about the girl before her?
'She can overwrite a person's entire life with a single glance.'
The world was damn unfair.
Grumbling like that, Raniel clapped her hands.
"So, steal it."
"...Pardon?"
Resti blinked.
Raniel grinned.
"Everything I've built up. All of it."
She undid the buttons of her shirt with a pop, pop.
"Go ahead and take it. I'll show you everything."
She pressed down on her chest.
Circuits crawled across her pale skin like wriggling worms. That circuit was everything to Raniel. The essence of her path in magic.
All she had.
Pointing to it, Raniel said.
"Over the next month, make this yours. This is how you'll kill the elder."
Resti nodded slowly.
Then she squeezed her eyes shut. A creak sounded as the safeguards unlocked. She exhaled slowly, opened her eyes, and...
"Eek."
Immediately spewed a nosebleed and collapsed to the floor.
It had lasted less than a second.
2.
This'll take a while.
Looking at the fallen Resti, Raniel thought so.
It had to. Even she herself barely remembered how she'd created this circuit. A circuit completed in her subconscious.
'How did I do it back then?'
At that moment when she'd offered half her lifespan, Raniel's brain had overloaded beyond its limits. Vision expanded to the brink, perceived time slowed to a crawl.
In a world that felt frozen, she'd wandered in search of answers. She'd crushed everything she'd built, rebuilt it, over and over.
She didn't know how many times.
Crush, build. Crush, build.
Mages say that when you crush the path you've walked, your life as a mage ends. By that measure, she'd experienced at least hundreds of deaths there.
Hundreds of deaths as a mage.
The answer found at the end of those deaths was this circuit.
How long would it take Resti to understand it? Raniel had no idea.
'A month won't be enough.'
She assumed as much.
If she could just get a feel for it, that'd be good.
But that thought didn't last.
The next day, Resti endured for 1 second. Two days later, 2 seconds; two days after that, 3 seconds, then 4...
"Hoo, hooo..."
On the day when day and night had swapped twenty times.
Increasing by 1 second every two days, Resti finally succeeded in enduring 10 seconds before Raniel. She pressed her bloodshot eyes and panted heavily.
'...She's a real monster.'
Watching her, Raniel clicked her tongue in amazement.
Her mind must be flooded with information, barely able to maintain sanity. Yet Resti had endured that pain fully for 10 seconds.
It was the kind of mental fortitude that made her want to tell Kalt to learn from her—someone who screamed at the slightest twist of his limbs.
"I think... I'm starting to get a feel for it, even if just a little."
As Raniel marveled at Resti, Resti too was astonished by Raniel's circuit. Trying to delve to the deepest part and draw out information, but she couldn't reach it.
Too deep.
The information contained in that single circuit, the path that mage had walked—it was so brutal and rugged. She couldn't even imagine what life she'd lived.
"...Professor."
Resti asked.
"How... did you even create this?"
"Who knows."
Raniel smiled wryly.
"It just happened along the way."
The same old answer.
At the words that might have started to feel nostalgic, Resti burst into laughter. Since Raniel had only half-joked, she gave a proper explanation.
"I crushed it. Crushed and crushed again."
Common sense, the path she'd built, everything she had.
"Even while crushing, something usable pops out here and there. I picked those out and kept piecing them together. Like a puzzle."
She'd built hundreds of towers, toppled hundreds of towers. From the piles of rubble on the ground, she'd extracted usable pieces and erected one final tower.
'...And now.'
She's showing it to me.
The most precious treasure to any mage.
Feeling gratitude anew, Resti bowed to Raniel. Raniel waved it off as if it were nothing and said to her.
"Go on. You should have dinner with the elder."
Resti nodded and left the lab.
By day, she received Raniel's teachings; by night, she conversed with the elder. That was how Resti spent her days.
The longest month of her life.
Not wasting even a single second, she fragmented her days to live them fully. And now, that time was nearing its end.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ "Elder, I'm here."
"Yes, you've come. Resti."
The sunset faded.
Crimson shadows rippled across the top floor of the mage tower.
"Come closer to talk. My hearing isn't what it used to be."
The elder's voice lacked strength.
The time allotted to the elder was racing toward its end, and his condition worsened by the day. Resti bit her lip.
Even prepared as she was, the pain was unavoidable. Resti exhaled heavily.
"Just a moment. Let me change the mana flower."
"Do that."
The air in the room felt unusually stagnant today.
The mana flowers meant for purification weren't working properly, it seemed. Thinking so, Resti walked toward the one by the window.
The moment she reached out for the mana flower.
She froze.
Resti's hand halted in midair.
"......"
The flower was withered black and twisted.
Resti's eyes narrowed.
She slowly raised her head. The window came into view, reflecting the elder leaning against the bed.
The elder was smiling.
At that eerie grin, Resti swallowed dryly.
"...Today, I learned more magic from the professor."
With her back to the elder, Resti spoke.
Pretending to replace the flower, she closed her eyes. A creak sounded as something unlocked. Resti steadied her breathing.
Then, still with eyes closed, she turned.
The moment she was about to open them.
"You've noticed, haven't you."
A thud echoed.
The bed shattered. The ground shook. A sudden hand shot out and seized Resti's throat.
"Those eyes."
Resti forced her eyes open.
What she saw was not the elder.
"They resemble that damned ancient dragon."
Resti's eyes captured the bizarre entity that had devoured the elder's body, now one with him. But the process that should follow didn't occur.
She saw.
Yet she couldn't understand.
Something incomprehensible existed there. Blood flowed from Resti's eyes. A click, and the safeguards blocked her vision on their own.
"You... monster..."
Her voice thinned by the gripped throat, Resti said.
"Who... are you."
At the question, the corners of the elder's mouth tore wide.
"Who? Your revered teacher and father, of course. Won't you call me Father, Resti?"
Whatever had consumed the elder called to her in a gentle voice, borrowing his memories. Revulsion filled Resti at the call.
"You asked who I am."
The elder's eyes fixed on Resti.
Those eyes were like an endless abyss. Shadows writhed within, whispering to her.
【The First Mad One.】 He laughed.
【The Nameless One.】 Mad laughter echoed.
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