The Sixth Invention: A Door to the Original World
The Sixth Invention. I might actually be able to return to my original world. When I delivered the news to Arima, his reaction was surprisingly lukewarm.
Objective: Establish viable portal to Ardenia using Dragon Heart as core component.
Status: Requires Archmage support. Technical feasibility — unknown.
“Hmm♠ So you can go back to your hometown?”
“Yes. It’ll need the Dragon Heart and a bit of your assistance, Mr. Arima. Still, I believe it’s worth attempting.”
“Yeah, yeah◆ So. What kind of help do you need?”
I listened as Arima gave me a general overview of the spells he could cast. Among them was Restoration Magic—the very thing that had sparked the idea he might be able to return home. Or, as he called it, Time Regression Magic.
It was an utterly unscientific spell that rewound an object’s time to restore it to its original state. When even Earth’s technology had never achieved time travel to the past, this was nothing short of absurd.
A lone individual succeeding at time slip, even if only on a localized scale? If the scientists back on Earth ever learned of it, they would have come running with bloodshot eyes and drool dripping from their mouths.
“Using that time regression on the Dragon Heart or your own body to return to Ardenia is…”
“Impossible. There’s no way that would work, right? Strictly speaking, the spell only rewinds the ‘time’ aspect within spacetime, and it can’t be maintained for long. A few seconds is the absolute limit.”
“Hmm. There goes the easy route.”
It was a shame. If the only obstacle had been a lack of energy, we could have simply plucked the sun from the sky and put it to use. The universe was overflowing with wasted energy.
But if the problem was technical rather than energetic, then we had entered the domain of science, not magic. After all, science itself had begun when humanity, feeling a lack, created what it needed.
“I think it might work somehow… but I can’t make any promises. This is my first time mixing magic and science, too.”
“Ahaha. Now that sounds exciting? To think there’s a method I never found no matter how hard I searched.”
His words had thorns in them. Even someone as dense as me could sense that much. Still, it didn’t matter. Suspicion was preferable. I could dismantle it easily enough.
What was truly troublesome were the people who approached with pure, unsuspicious eyes. The ones who saw something strange and immediately demanded I make it because “this should be possible, right?”
I held out my hand, hoping the look in Arima’s eyes would change.
“I’ll be counting on you.”
“Likewise♠.”
We exchanged a light handshake. Then, as if only just remembering, Arima spoke again.
“By the way, how do you plan to cover the research costs? This isn’t the kind of thing you can do with pocket change.”
“It’s fine. I have plenty of money. I still have about a hundred million left from the research funds I skimmed recently.”
“…How much?”
“One hundred million dollars.”
“Whoa— You really are loaded, huh? Even I don’t drop that much on a single experiment…”
While he marveled at the funds I had diverted from Scholar, Arima seemed to realize something from the sheer scale of the sum and asked cautiously.
“With that much money, don’t you hold shares in the boss’s company? Shouldn’t you at least tell her about this?”
“Ah… Well, it’s technically my money for the moment.”
I paused to think. If I told the boss about this research, what would she say? I doubted it would be anything pleasant.
An otherworlder. One of only two such extremely rare collectibles in this entire world. If she learned I was researching a way to send one of them back to their original world, I could only imagine the fit Regalia would throw…
Just picturing it was horrifying, so I decided to keep the research hidden. After all, forgiveness is easier to ask for than permission.
“Let’s just try it first!”
“Now that’s the spirit☆.”
And so the experiment began. An experiment that would make the person living at the top of the same building faint from shock if she ever found out.
Arima had worried the experiment would offer me no benefit, but the truth was the complete opposite. This project would provide enormous help to my scientific abilities. In fact, it would help more than anything I had created before.
Unlike the previous inventions built solely from the scientific knowledge I already possessed, the device I planned to create this time would freely incorporate magic and ESP without restraint.
This was a world where satellite beam weapons, hypersonic fighters, and genetically modified monsters existed—things that should have been impossible with 21st-century science. I knew it was all because they had mixed ESP into science without the slightest hesitation.
After all, I only developed this technology thanks to Mr. Sten.
To be precise, it was a technique that could only be used by taking full advantage of Sten’s ability. I called Sten over and introduced him to Arima.
“This is Mr. Sten. You’ve probably heard of him? He’s currently the overall manager of Z City, and I brought him in specially.”
“Nice to meet you? I’m Arima.”
“Lord Arima… I know who you are. I once attended one of your performances with my wife.”
“Oh— Really? Thank you!”
Sten looked genuinely shocked to learn that Arima, the world’s greatest magician, was an executive of a villain organization. But the surprise lasted only a moment. True to his position as a combatant of the Evils, he obediently followed the executive’s orders.
“What would you like me to do?”
“You’ll be doing the same thing as last time, Mr. Sten. I’ll just need you to use your ability a little. Ah—not right now. I’ll give you exact instructions on how to use it, so it shouldn’t be too taxing…”
Thus the experiment began. The basic framework was simple: locate the corpse of the dragon that had originally owned the Dragon Heart and obtain the coordinates for Ardenia.
“How exactly are you planning to find them?”
“It would be nice if some revolutionary idea struck me and we succeeded immediately… but since that’s not happening, we’re left with the classic, scientific approach.”
“Scientific approach?”
“Trial and error.”
Fragment of Dragon Heart used as catalyst. Magic to locate original owner failed to activate.
Result: COMPLETE FAILURE
“It didn’t trigger at all.”
“What sort of case does this fall under?”
“Either the target is too far away, or the owner no longer exists?”
“Then it must be the former. After all, a dragon heart should normally seek out even the dragon’s corpse…”
Confirmed distance is not the issue. Target world is completely separate from this one.
Result: NO CONNECTION FOUND
By experiment twenty-seven we had applied the Haven-Croitz theory to collapse local space, punching a hole in reality and attempting to locate Ardenia within it. Selecting one specific world out of countless bubble universes was like trying to find a needle in a desert, but fortunately Arima possessed a spell that could solve the problem.
A low-level magic for finding lost objects, as Arima described it, raised our success probability from “needle in a desert” to “needle in a bucket of sand.” At this point, the only remaining answer was pure grinding.
The boss appears to be growing suspicious of our activities.
She has begun asking daily what we are working on.
Ardenia located. Direct influence still impossible, but observation confirmed.
Observation itself proves mutual interference is theoretically possible.
From here on it was pure labor. Only endless trial and error remained.
Successful transfer of finger-sized object to target world.
Observed local pig-headed lifeform startled by sausage falling from sky.
“─Mr. Sten! Hold the fixation a little longer!”
“Grrrrrrng—!”
While Sten used his ability to anchor the space in place, Arima cast his magic into that fixed region. The newly created matter inside the fixed space had to displace an equal volume of space somewhere else.
Yet it could not pierce the fixed zone. In the end the space began to tear in the pre-directed direction. Crack. A spiritual noise that no material ear could hear reverberated outward.
The torn space was caught and stabilized by the previously prepared rift maintainer. Through the newly opened gate, Ardenia—Arima’s homeland—shone brightly.
“Ahh… Ardenia—”
Arima stared beyond the gate with eyes full of disbelief. Even the people of a divided nation reuniting with long-lost family after decades of separation could not have felt such overwhelming emotion.
They had merely lost their families. This foreigner had lost his entire world—family, friends, acquaintances, the life he had built, the history he had lived.
We finally did it… The research budget was nearly exhausted, too.
Portal to Ardenia successfully opened.
Magic, ESP, and science have triumphed.