The Ring's Secret
[…….]
Damn it.
“……Ugh……”
Fucking hell. Was it all just baseless confidence?
I sat down hard on the floor, still frozen in the exact pose I’d been in when I struck the tree branch with all my might. My hand was clenched so tightly it trembled.
I’d thought I was hitting a rock. But the damn thing was far harder than it looked. I felt like an egg that had smashed itself against a boulder.
My whole body shook with rage at my own stupidity. When I finally lifted my head, I saw Rai stumbling backward with a panicked expression.
He looked terrified that the sparks of my fury might fly his way.
[I-It’s not… my fault… Eek! Master’s enemy! I won’t let you get away with this!]
He dramatically gnawed the tree branch to splinters, practically turning it into powder, then looked at me with shaky pupils and awkwardly wagged his tail.
[Heh… hehehe. I’ve avenged Master’s enemy! You can relax now!]
“……Who was it again? The one who told me to bring the enemy back in my mouth and beat it up?”
[I am indeed the greatest spirit Master cherishes enough to want to take to the grave… Rai, that is…]
My hand was throbbing like crazy, but since I was the one who’d gotten carried away by my own unfounded confidence, I couldn’t even stay angry. If anything, this had only reconfirmed just how fragile my current body really was.
After that, I tried all sorts of things with the ring, but its true nature only grew more mysterious.
I wondered if it boosted mental strength, but according to Rai, who could sense my mental state, that wasn’t it either. Then I thought maybe it helped with casting magic, so I poured in as much mana as my body could handle without strain. Still nothing.
At the very least, the fact that it didn’t absorb any mana at all told me it operated independently of mana.
After wasting so much time on dead ends, I was starting to feel like throwing the stupid ring away.
This impatient personality of mine really was useless. If I was going to be lazy, at least I could be relaxed about it!
“This is bullshit! Why doesn’t anything work?! If you’re going to hide a ring, you should at least include a damn instruction manual! Am I supposed to use it or not?!”
[Recognizing value is a skill in itself, isn’t it? There are plenty of items out there that people can’t use simply because they don’t understand their worth.]
“……Well, yeah. If it were Lox, he probably would’ve figured it out the second he saw it. But why are you suddenly sounding so reasonable? It’s throwing me off.”
Rai rarely ever acted serious or tried to sound profound. In the last ten years, I could count the times on one hand.
After all, he was a lot like me—a completely free spirit.
[One of my previous owners was like that. After contracting with me, he left me trapped inside an iron marble the whole time. Then he complained nonstop about how a metal spirit like me was completely useless!]
“What? There was someone like that? Only I’m allowed to bully you!”
[Exactly! That owner was also a talented summoner, so he had tons of other spirits besides me. Maybe that’s why he barely paid any attention to me and never even thought about using me. Even though I’m so versatile! Master at least always takes me everywhere…]
Now that I thought about it, this guy must have been seriously pissed off at his previous owner.
He’d never talked about it before, so I hadn’t felt the need to ask. It seemed he simply hadn’t wanted to bring up bad memories.
[He even forgot about me and left me abandoned for over twenty years! Then suddenly I got reverse-summoned because he died somewhere. I wasted all that time in the middle realm for nothing.]
“Yikes.”
[Of course, since I’m a special type, it’s possible to summon me and then forget about me. Still, once you’ve made a contract, I wish you’d treat me with a little more care. Human summoners strangely often forget that we have emotions too, you know? Elves and dwarves never do that.]
As I listened to him grumble, something he’d mentioned earlier suddenly came back to me.
“That story about a spirit sealed inside a ring… and how it drove someone insane. Was that about you?”
[No. That was another spirit who got abandoned with me. He’s probably still trapped inside that ring even now. Sealing a spirit’s soul somewhere like that is unforgivable. They go mad inside there for all eternity.]
“Still, that previous owner of yours must have been an incredible genius. These days, people don’t even know how to seal spirits anymore. After hearing your story, I’m actually glad that knowledge got lost.”
[I don’t really want to talk about that owner. He wasn’t a good master despite all his talent. He was so brilliant that he was a little insane. He treated spirits like trophies. He just collected them—he never gave them any affection.]
“I think I can picture the type.”
Maybe a bit like Robenin?
The kind of person so blinded by their own talent that they couldn’t see anything else. Someone who only ever focused on one thing and was as ignorant as a child about everything else.
[We want to repay those who love us. But humans only ever think about using us as tools. That’s what Undine asked Master for before, remember? It might not have seemed like much, but that kind of thing makes a huge difference. It means Undine trusts Master that much.]
“……I don’t get it. What’s so great about Undine asking me for a favor?”
[It means the distance between master and servant is that much smaller. It means she sees Master as her owner but doesn’t fear you—she willingly trusts and follows you. If Master ordered it, Undine would jump into fire without hesitation.]
“What? How does that follow?”
Who was it that said spirit magic was easy? Oh right, me—before I officially chose it as my major.
It was hard to imagine anything more profound than this.
Why hadn’t I realized back then that handling power from another world couldn’t possibly be simple?
Especially when that power was alive, with its own will and emotions.
[Sigh, you’re still so clueless! The fact that a spirit who is supposed to obey orders would instead ask its master for a favor shows it’s completely confident that its master loves it. It’s something they would never do otherwise.]
“Ah, I see.”
[And that certainty of being loved always draws out their limits. It lets them do things they normally couldn’t. You might get to see something truly amazing…]
“But Rai, you ask me for stuff all the time. ‘I want to eat that,’ ‘I’m going out to play,’ ‘Can I do this? Can I do that?’ ‘Why not?’ Is that also because you’re sure I love you? Are you testing my limits? Huh?”
[……Hehe?]
I had heard about cases like that before.
Spirits disobeying their master’s orders. It happened more often than people thought. The common theory was that it occurred when the spirit felt its own safety was in serious danger. In other words, it put its own well-being above its master’s.
It might not seem like much, but if it happened repeatedly, it could become a fatal threat to a Spirit Master.
The way to prevent it was simple.
One of the fundamentals of spirit magic was building affinity and a bond with your spirits.
But most Spirit Masters were already overwhelmed just gathering mana and honing their techniques with spirits. Adding affinity and emotional bonds on top of that was no easy task. That was why so many talented people chose to become regular mages instead.
Having your own power disobey you was a horrifying experience akin to betrayal.
But my kids didn’t just disobey—they went out and got torn apart by sword aura, or desperately blocked dragon breath while whimpering, all without me even ordering them to. So I’d assumed every spirit was like that.
Had I saved a country in my previous life or something?
I didn’t remember…….
[The reason Undine loves Master so much is because she receives that much affection in return. I’m the same. I don’t follow unconditionally just because you’re my master!]
“Hmm.”
[Master, our value never changes. That ring is probably the same. It all depends entirely on who uses it and how. Please don’t make the same mistake my previous owner did—failing to recognize its value and abandoning it. Of course, Master is a pretty good owner…]
“……Sorry, but you are pretty hard to use.”
[……That’s too much! This was supposed to be the part where you comfort me! It was a touching moment! Master really has no sense of mood!]
I picked at my ear and shot back.
“Plus you whine a lot, ask for tons of stuff, never get tired, and love teasing your master. And whenever I actually need you, you’re nowhere to be found… Don’t you remember? When I fell off that cliff at ten years old, you weren’t there. When I got kidnapped, you weren’t there either……”
[Can we stop? So, what experiment should we try next?]
“Why? I’ve got more.”
[No, I think that’s plenty.]
He really was good at changing the subject. Rai started noisily suggesting we try something else, but there wasn’t actually anything left to test. I’d already tried everything… Wait, no. There was one last thing that came to mind.
“Let’s try it. If this doesn’t work either, then I’m screwed.”
[What is it?]
I looked down at the ring on my right index finger, then quietly clenched my fist.
Raising it high toward the sky, I shouted.
“Transform!”
[……?]
Sometimes silence can be sharper than anything else.
Just like now.
“Yeah, that didn’t work.”
[What were you even……?]
“I figured it might work since I’m a magical girl.”
This wasn’t the first time I’d shown off my ridiculous charm in front of Rai, so there was no awkwardness.
Rai and I were practically family. No matter what ridiculous thing I did, it was just another day.
We’d already seen far too many embarrassing moments for me to feel any shame.
[Master sometimes does things that are impossible to understand……]
“Fallen for me yet?”
[I’d call it idiot-charm……? Of course, that makes me like you even more! You’re the first human who never gets boring!]
“That’s not a compliment!”
[Kyaa, as expected of a genius!]
While I was fooling around with Rai, the surroundings had grown dark.
A small wave of dissatisfaction washed over me.
I’d wanted to figure out the ring’s identity before heading to the capital, but it looked like I’d failed.
What if I still couldn’t figure it out even after reaching the capital?
Should I go find an expert? I wanted to keep the fact that I possessed this thing a secret if possible, so even if it took time, I preferred to solve it on my own.
One of my personal mottos was ‘Hide your power.’
Because doing so drastically reduced the chance of getting dragged into annoying situations. The more people knew you could do, the more they’d call on you!
Above all, there was nothing more satisfying than lightly crushing someone who had underestimated me and acted all smug about it.
[Master?]
“I know.”
I’d felt it too.
Someone was coming this way… The moment I sensed it, I knew it could only be Ash. That guy was as silent as moonlight.
“Jeanie, about dinner……”
“You scared me! Make some noise when you walk!”
I shouted the second I saw him come through the door. He looked even more startled than I was.
Ash hesitated in the doorway.
“I’m not joking. I’m serious. If you’re going to approach, at least make some sound!”
You never know when I might be doing something suspicious!
I tried to discreetly hide the hand with the ring behind my back and pull it off, but the damn thing wouldn’t come off. Maybe my grip was bad.
“I’m sorry. From now on, I’ll definitely make my presence known. I didn’t realize you’d be that startled.”
“You’d better. What did you bring?”
“I went out a bit far and found some herbs that are good for internal injuries.”
“You didn’t go far just to find herbs, did you?”
“……This is best taken before a meal. Please drink it before dinner, Jeanie.”
It was rare to see a man smile so softly, like dandelion seeds floating on the wind.
This guy was always bringing me medicine.
I kept my ring hand lowered so it wouldn’t be visible and accepted the bowl. It looked ridiculously thick.
It was still gently bubbling, meaning it had been boiled recently. And like most medicines good for internal injuries, it was a sickly yellow color that killed anyone’s appetite.
“Do you…… have a side job as an herbalist?”
“Not exactly, but it’s true that I’m very interested. There’s nothing quite like medicinal herbs that can heal everyone regardless of status.”
This was the third—or was it the fourth?—time Ash had brought me medicine. It happened so often I was losing count. Which probably meant I got hurt that frequently too.
“Whoa, this smells intense from the first whiff. Ash, this feels like a test of how much I love you.”
Even though I was grimacing because I really didn’t want to drink it, his gentle, kind smile as he encouraged me left me no way out.
I really was weak when it came to Ash. When had I become like this?
“Please don’t throw it away.”
Of course I wouldn’t. Not when he was looking at me with those terrifyingly warm eyes, and I knew all too well that his head was filled with nothing but worry for me.
I had no choice.
I went for my ultimate technique—drinking it without breathing! …But I nearly spat it out immediately.
Even without breathing, the taste was so vile it made me want to vomit. A hundred different horrible flavors swirled together until my vision blurred.
It was a miracle I didn’t spray it all over Ash’s face.
“Ughhhk.”
The moment I barely managed to hold back the nausea, a serious doubt hit me.
If the medicine hurt more than the internal injury, what was the point? I hadn’t even finished half the bowl, but the dry heaving was so bad I had to cover my mouth.
This was truly the worst taste imaginable—bad enough to make an internal injury feel pleasant by comparison.
I’d never thought of myself as someone who exaggerated pain, so this medicine had to be genuinely awful.
“Jeanie? What is this……!”
I was barely keeping my lips sealed when Ash suddenly widened his eyes and grabbed my hand.
The hand that was wearing the ring.