Chapter 422
Chapter 422
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 422
>Chapter Title: The 31st Horse Overturns the Game Board
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The marble gradually moved away from the Night Raven.
Roll...
- Damn it...
It was the worst possible situation.
The Stone of Time, unaffected by the temporal rupture, had slipped from his grasp.
To dismantle this tricky spell required direct contact with the marble, but due to the mana leakage, his body's coordination wasn't functioning properly.
There was no one to blame. Not Ur, who had nearly been flung away, nor Kang Seol, who had mustered his final resolve to sever Mara Dum's hand.
Now, with almost no mana left.
Direct解除 was impossible.
In that case, it would be better if it fell off the cliff and shattered.
'Yeah, that might be for the best...'
Plop...
However, the god of fate despised Ur. Everything he wished for was denied.
The Stone of Time collided with something and came to a stop.
'...Damn it all.'
Not a single thing went his way that day.
His complaints were brief.
To salvage the situation, he needed to assess it first.
'That’s...'
The silver lining was that the object the Stone of Time had rolled into was clearly no ordinary thing.
'Sirion’s battle hammer. Could it be...'
What the Stone of Time had hit was a hefty battle hammer. It seemed to be Sirion’s cherished weapon, dropped on the ground.
Ur harbored a faint hope.
Sirion was the man called the Ash King.
Though he had clashed with the unfortunate foe Mara Dum and lost everything, an extraordinary power emanated from him.
And a similar power flowed from the battle hammer he had wielded.
The cherished weapon of the Ash King from the legendary era. It had to possess some special power.
Ur’s guess was spot on.
Whoooosh...
[The special ability of Ash activates.]
[Grants the Incarnation of Ashes effect to the nearest ally for a short time.]
[The Incarnation of Ashes resists all damage and all magic.]
A miracle described in a few lines of messages for Kang Seol or Han So-mi.
For Ur, it was a vivid sensation on his skin.
He instinctively understood what power the hammer emitted and how events were unfolding.
Even the cool-headed Ur couldn’t help but cling to hope in such a situation.
‘If Sirion wakes and grabs the hammer...’
Then everything would be resolved.
As long as the worst-case scenario he feared didn’t happen.
But...
The outcome, as always, thoroughly ignored hope.
[CollegeStudentDying enters the Incarnation of Ashes state.]
[The Incarnation of Ashes resists all damage and all magic.]
[Rolling the dice to resist the temporal rupture.]
[The temporal rupture resistance dice shows 4.]
[CollegeStudentDying resists the temporal rupture.]
"...Huh?"
The one who awoke was Han So-mi.
It just so happened she was closest to the Ash hammer.
'...Goddamn it!'
Ur hated himself for understanding the entire situation. Even without intending to, he naturally figured out what action needed to be taken to resolve it.
In his judgment, the group was now in a terribly sticky predicament.
The simplest solution—direct contact between the Night Raven and the Stone of Time—had failed.
Having Han So-mi pick up the Stone of Time and hand it to the Night Raven was dangerous too. Now that the temporal rupture had activated, the stone was unstable. A mage like Ur might handle it, but anyone else running with it in hand was a nightmare. Unforeseen disasters could occur.
That left the next best option: destroying the Stone of Time.
The problem was that Han So-mi was the only one who could move.
And another issue: the person who directly destroyed the Stone of Time would take the full brunt of the power contained within.
‘Probably... left behind in this temporal rift, either aged or youthened.’
Yes.
The rest of the group would return to their original timeframe, the Star Grave, leaving her alone in the temporal rift.
Of course, if they found a way back, it might resolve quicker than expected. In as little as ten minutes or an hour, she could return unharmed to the original timeline.
But... if things got even slightly complicated, it darkened considerably.
What should take a slight nudge of the clock hands might loop dozens of times without resolution.
In the worst case, a year.
No, decades, or even a lifetime without return.
In other words, abandoned.
That was the root of the crisis. The remaining issue stemmed from it—Ur’s dilemma.
‘...I can’t explain it. I can’t convince her.’
Ur had spent his life trying to understand everything. What he couldn’t comprehend, he dismissed as inferior or dissected through relentless effort until he did.
Living that way had bred its own obsession.
Ur couldn’t explain what he didn’t fully understand.
If someone told him, in under thirty seconds, ‘You stay behind alone in this temporal rift,’ he’d tear them apart on the spot.
Humans were creatures of distrust and denial, forever suspicious of one another throughout their long history.
They were born that way. Suspicious of others because they knew themselves to be suspect.
“W-What... Why am I the only one who can move...”
- ....
“Is everyone okay? Hello? Why... What should I do...”
Before Ur could organize his thoughts, the conversation began. He braced for pitiful, rambling nonsense.
- Hey, girl. You have a mission.
“This voice...”
The mage introduced to her by Kang Seol as Ur.
His voice echoed in Han So-mi’s ears.
- Time is short. There are countless things I need to tell you overnight. Why things unfolded this way. Why I had no choice but to let it happen. The efforts invested here, plus what you must do now.
“...What? What are you talking about?”
He knew it would be like this.
Even as her mind wavered and he rambled desperately, not a single word got through.
He tried acting crazy, making a proposal.
- Pick up the hammer and smash that stone.
“Why? Why do I have to? And you... I only hear your voice. Is someone mimicking...”
As expected, that didn’t work either.
Humans were like that.
Some say the human body is mostly water, but that’s wrong.
Humans are made of countless suspicions. Even doubting their own existence—that’s human.
Time was running out.
Han So-mi’s chance would soon end.
For a moment, the option of lying surfaced.
Lie to Han So-mi. Tell her smashing the stone with the hammer would simply dispel the magic.
That she’d suffer no harm. He almost went with that.
But his words caught in his throat.
- This Ur shall shun evil and embrace good, walking in the footsteps of my master Snowman. Should I violate this! I shall atone with the dissolution of my existence! Ohohohoho!
Those were words Bernoulli had uttered through Ur’s body back in Alcatron when submitting to Kang Seol.
In this situation, was lying evil? Would his existence vanish the moment he lied to Han So-mi?
Of course, it wasn’t just this worry that stopped him.
‘...I don’t want to stoop to lying.’
For the primordial archmage, who had existed through countless ages, the best plan to avoid being trapped in the temporal rift was to deceive a fragile human with falsehoods?
This wasn’t about justifying the lie.
It struck at the core of his being. So he said this instead.
- Wrong. I have no confidence in persuading you in the time left.
A conclusion drawn from knowing humans.
- Heh... Kekeke... Hey, didn’t I say it before? What did I call the goal of those fools who ramble on in front of someone, insisting they were right, ending up like this?
Han So-mi recalled his passing words.
“When they’re... forcing a sacrifice.”
- Exactly.
Sacrifice yourself.
He couldn’t say it outright.
She’d figure it out anyway.
With that, Ur gave up.
[The Incarnation of Ashes state will soon end.]
But right then—
- ...Han So-mi.
- Kang Seol?
This was unexpected.
Somehow, Kang Seol’s consciousness remained intact.
Truly, the uniqueness of the first warrior who had surpassed the wall and reached the supreme realm.
“Oppa? Kang Seol oppa!”
Ur gave up.
Even if Kang Seol’s will lingered, their situations were identical. No convincing her in time.
- Pick up the hammer.
“...Pardon?”
- And smash the stone.
Ur let out a self-mocking chuckle. He’d already tried that. It would only breed suspicion.
“What... happens then?”
- You’ll be left here. For a bit. Or maybe longer.
Since Ur and Kang Seol were one, Kang Seol read all of Ur’s thoughts.
“No way... Why me alone...”
Ur thought Kang Seol was a hopeless idiot. Why not lie, at least?
Yet Han So-mi asked Kang Seol just once.
“But... why tell me that? You could just trick me.”
Even Ur found that a bit odd. Kang Seol knew how to lie, unlike Ur himself.
- Wait for me.
The moment he heard Kang Seol’s words, every fiber of Ur’s being tensed.
‘This bastard...’
Kang Seol was now forcing a sacrifice. More viciously, more mercilessly than Ur.
- I’ll come get you.
Ur understood.
Everything.
Kang Seol’s words.
They were a lie, yet not a lie.
Promising to retrieve her was something never to be said lightly.
The peculiarities of time magic, the required resources, weighing Han So-mi’s value...
Yet Kang Seol said it.
He didn’t see it as a lie. He intended to make it truth.
Kang Seol would come for Han So-mi left in the temporal rift.
‘Ah...’
Ur chuckled hollowly.
Realizing Kang Seol’s reckless statement was the only true answer.
What Kang Seol could say, Ur could not.
Comrades trade in the currency of trust. Ur had never made comrades his whole life, so he didn’t know how to use it, earn it, or even care to learn.
He’d sought perfection alone.
But Kang Seol was different.
Kang Seol clearly understood this currency of trust.
The wealth he’d amassed through sacrifice of effort and time shone now.
Crunch...
“H-Heavy...”
Han So-mi didn’t hesitate and gripped Ash.
She trusted Kang Seol and his words.
That’s why she lifted the hammer.
Only he could make her raise that mountain-heavy hammer.
Whoooosh...
Sirion’s cherished weapon.
The hammer that upheld the Era of Hatred was now in Han So-mi’s hands.
Her body ignited with mystical energy.
“Ugh... Aaaah!”
The hammer rose vigorously overhead and struck the Stone of Time precisely.
Craaaaaaaaack-!
[The Incarnation of Ashes state has ended.]
Han So-mi froze in the pose of slamming down the hammer.
The Stone of Time...
Crack...
Craaaack...
Shattered amid countless fissures.
[The Stone of Time has been destroyed.]
[The subordinate, Disaster Mage Mara Dum, dies from the backlash.]
[Acquire additional rewards.]
[The temporal rupture has been broken in a special manner.]
[Acquire additional rewards.]
[Return to Origin activates.]
......
The hammer shattered time.
And in that instant of the hammer falling, the worldview Ur had built over a lifetime shook.
He was born to bestow teachings upon the inferior, perfect alone. Only the weak would join him.
Cracks formed in every sentence.
...He began to doubt the truth.
- ...I understand.
Kwaaaaaaaa-!
A massive temporal vortex sucked in everyone except Han So-mi.
Ur and Kang Seol, flung from the Night Raven, along with Mariju, were swept into the vortex and vanished.
Whooooosh...
It was done.
“Ugh... Mara Dum, where’s Mara Dum...”
“There! He’s down! The bastard’s down!”
“Check his breathing!”
The dwarves of the Ash Throne approached the fallen Mara Dum and examined his body.
“He’s dead.”
“Hmm...”
Sirion turned his head.
His cherished Ash lay on the ground, having smashed the Stone of Time.
And beside it hunched an old woman.
Sirion approached her.
He roughly pieced together what happened.
She had destroyed the Stone of Time. The others were gone.
She resembled someone from the group.
Her back was bent, skin sagging, teeth precarious.
Her eyes clouded, hair white.
“You...”
“Hehe... Hehehe...”
Tears welled in Han So-mi’s eyes.
“I... think I’ve been left behind here.”
“...I see.”
And so Han So-mi was left alone in the temporal rift. Whether abandoned or not, no one could say.