Another Guest Visits the Master's Dream World
I realized it at once.
That this was a dream world again. I wasn't merely dreaming—I had fallen into a world within a dream. That much I understood immediately.
The World Tree again?
I couldn't think of anyone else who would invite me like this, so of course I assumed it was her.
But the moment I opened my eyes, I knew at once that I was wrong.
“…Who are you?”
“Oh? Not startled? I expected surprise. Experiencing a dream world isn't something that happens every day, after all.”
On the battlefield, the one who panics dies first. Luck might let a man survive even if he freezes, but a mercenary has no business counting on luck. Anyone blessed with good fortune wouldn't be selling his sword in the first place. Believing you have luck while living as a mercenary is about as foolish as it gets—and I am not a fool. So I had trained myself never to panic, no matter what came. That discipline was serving me well right now. …Though whether staying calm would actually help in a situation like this was another matter entirely. An existence capable of crafting a dream world and dragging someone into it could probably snuff me out without effort, panic or no panic….
First I took careful stock of the figure before me.
My earliest impression was of a respected elderly lady from a noble house. She looked advanced in years, yet her posture was flawless, and the dignity and grace that radiated from her presence ran deeper than ordinary breeding. First impressions aren't always right, but they aren't something you can simply dismiss either. Anyone who could project that kind of presence and summon a person into a dream world…
…could not possibly be ordinary.
“I've had a similar experience…. So it isn't all that shocking.”
“Hmm? How curious. There aren't many who can do something like this. Did you survive a succubus, perhaps? Yet you don't seem particularly wary….”
“It was the World Tree.”
“…What?”
“The World Tree invited me. We spoke together in a dream world.”
“…Hmm. The sun must be rising in the west. For the World Tree to take an interest beyond her barrier…. Well, perhaps it isn't so strange. Looking at your soul, it seems entirely possible. Yes.”
As we talked I realized something.
The being before me was different from the World Tree. Of course she was different—she was a different existence—but what I meant went deeper than that. Speaking with the World Tree had felt like a direct conversation. With the figure in front of me, even though the words were passing between us, that same sense of immediacy was missing.
In the end I had no choice but to ask.
“Are you a living being?”
“Oh?”
At my question the elderly lady regarded me the way one might look at a newly discovered toy.
“You're truly surprised. Is it the World Tree's blessing? Or the power of that special soul of yours? Whatever the cause, it's fascinating. The ‘magic’ itself should be perfect.”
“Magic?”
“Yes. I am ‘magic.’ More precisely, a remnant of a soul left behind by magic would be the correct way to put it. The being that was me returned to the earth long ago.”
In that instant a possibility flickered through my mind.
A being able to leave a remnant of its soul as magic… one that had existed in the distant past….
Even a great mage would never use a spell that severed part of their own soul. No—they couldn't. A soul is such that a part is the whole and the whole is a part; it cannot be divided simply because one wishes it. Yet there was a race for whom such a thing was possible. A race whose souls were so vast they could not be compared to a human's, making the impossible feasible…. A race now said to be extinct….
Exactly….
“Dragon….”
At my words the elderly lady smiled gently and nodded.
“Clever, child of man. Yes. I am the last Dragon Lord, Roael.”
…Hahaha. First elves, then the World Tree…. Now dragons. And a Dragon Lord, no less….
…Why does this keep happening to me?
“What an amusing face you're making. Hohoho.”
“…So what business does a Dragon Lord have with an ordinary human like me?”
“Calling you ordinary is a stretch, but that isn't important right now. I invited you because there is something I wish to ask of you.”
“…A request? There isn't much I can actually do.”
“No. There is no one else. The fact that this magic—‘me’—which had not activated for seven hundred thirty-five years finally did so means that someone matching the conditions I set has appeared. And that someone is you.”
“So… for seven hundred thirty-five years no one met the conditions, the magic never triggered, and then a suitable candidate finally showed up… and that candidate is me?”
“You listened carefully.”
“…….”
…This is unfair.
I don't do anything, yet incidents keep centering on me. If I were blundering around and getting dragged into trouble, I could at least understand it. But even when I hole myself up somewhere quiet, the disasters refuse to stop. How am I supposed to feel anything but wronged?
And now the magic of a Dragon Lord that had waited seven hundred thirty-five years for a suitable person had decided I was the one and simply appeared in front of me, dragging me into this mess.
At this rate, every demon in existence would start showing up next. Angels too, probably? …In a flash of pure resignation I actually entertained that ridiculous thought.
Honestly… it felt as though the world itself was desperate to devour me.
They say an unlucky man breaks his nose even when he falls backward. In my case I was sitting quietly in a safe place and still managing to break my nose.
“Do I absolutely have to grant this request?”
“Hmm. Curious. When I was alive, no one ever refused a dragon's request.”
…That's because they were terrified that refusing would offend the dragon and get their entire region wiped off the map….
But that didn't apply to me.
The Dragon Lord was already long dead. The only reason we could speak at all was because the magic had been arranged that way. She couldn't do anything new here. The corpse of the Dragon Lord who could cast such magic had long since become part of the earth, and her soul was presumably living well in heaven or hell. There was no chance of her flying into a rage and taking it out on me. So if I could ignore her, ignoring her would be best.
“You may refuse my request.”
“Really?!”
“But then something very bad will happen to the world.”
…I almost swore out loud.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Unfortunately, once this magic activates, that is the end of it. The thing that has been kept in temporal stasis by this magic will simply appear in the world. And there is a very high chance that events will take a turn for the worse.”
“…What exactly is it?”
“A dragon egg.”
“…….”
So… the dragons everyone believed had completely vanished from this world had not completely vanished. And if I refused to look after the egg, it would appear somewhere in the world, and no one could predict what the hatchling that emerged from it might do? Was that roughly the situation?
“…This isn't a request. This is just a threat.”
“A dragon's request has never been much different from a threat, has it?”
The smile that accompanied those words was beautiful and yet somehow made me feel fear.
Wow…. What a rotten personality….
In other words, she knew full well it would feel like a threat and still deliberately chose the word “request.” The only conclusion my mind could reach was that her character was terrible.
“Weren't dragons completely gone from this world?”
“They were. More precisely, they destroyed themselves.”
“Destroyed themselves?”
“A perfect existence. It sounds magnificent when you say it aloud. But perfection is not nearly as wonderful as humans imagine. It is boring. Hellishly, endlessly boring. In the end we grew so bored we no longer wished to live, and we essentially destroyed ourselves. No one wanted to keep living. Calling it self-destruction is accurate.”
As a human who suffered constantly from having too little of everything, I couldn't understand the story at all. Yet I had once been so lacking, so weak, so pathetic that I had wanted to die. Perhaps this was the exact opposite? No—if the weak side wanted to die, then the opposite should mean the strong side wanted to live, shouldn't it? Hmm. Wrong way of putting it. In this case, maybe extremes meet? Whatever the truth, the tale simply didn't sit right with me.
“But one child… one dragon egg said it wanted to live. It wanted to leave its shell, see the beautiful world, meet humans, and experience everything for itself. As long as it was alive, that child had the right to live, and I had no right to stop it. So I placed it under a time-stasis spell and left this magic behind, waiting for someone who could properly care for the child to appear so I could entrust it to them. Doing so consumed my entire Dragon Heart… but as an old dragon with little life left, I could at least do that much for a new life.”
As expected of a dragon….
The scale was so far beyond human that comparison was meaningless. It wasn't even in the same league as a wealthy grandfather building a mansion the size of a castle because his granddaughter asked for one.
I wanted to refuse. I wanted to refuse with every fiber of my being. I sincerely, desperately wanted to refuse….
As long as it is alive, it has the right to live….
The moment I heard those words, I remembered what I had done for Sera.
I had thought the same thing.
As long as that child was alive, she had the right to keep living.
That was why I had given her my Aura Heart—hoping she would continue to live and exercise that right.
Hadn't the Dragon Lord done the same?
Being dragged into this was still a pain… but just as I had, the Dragon Lord had simply fulfilled her duty as an adult.
In that case…
…I could no longer deny the Dragon Lord, could I?
If I rejected her here, that would be nothing less than turning on my own kind.
“…Still, I really don't think I'm suitable. I've never properly raised anyone, so I'm extremely anxious. I don't feel I have any qualifications as a guardian. Wouldn't it be better to look for a more suitable candidate?”
I was Sera's master, true… but honestly, Sera had raised herself. If anything, I had received far more from her than I had given. I was a complete failure as a guardian. With so little experience, so little track record, so little know-how as a caretaker, I had less than a speck of confidence that I could look after a dragon egg—a hatchling—properly.
“Don't worry. The very fact that this magic activated means you are the living being in this world with the greatest talent for child-rearing.”
“…….”
Not the greatest talent for swordsmanship in the world… the greatest talent for child-rearing….
It was clearly meant as praise… yet somehow it didn't sound like praise at all. How strange….
When I woke from my sleep,
beside me… was an egg.
It was so enormous that anyone could tell at a glance it was no ordinary egg, possessing a presence that made cute little words like “egg” feel completely inadequate….