Chapter 1
Chapter 1
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Prologue
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The year I turned thirteen, the hero came to find me at the magic tower. She was a beauty with snow-white hair and golden eyes.
“The genius mage of the century, huh? And here I thought you’d be more... intimidating. You’re just a cute little kid!”
I remember being silently sorting books at the time.
“Um...?”
“......”
“Hey...?”
It wasn’t that I was ignoring her on purpose. I just had a lot on my mind.
“I’m no genius, and I’m no kid. My name is Lin.”
Feeling a bit sorry for her, I answered while shelving a book in the stacks. Her face lit up like the sun, and she started following me around like an excited puppy for a good while.
“No way! A thirteen-year-old 4-star mage? There’s no precedent in imperial history!”
“......”
“And you’re so short—you totally are a kid! What, you want me to treat you like an adult? But you still look like you need your diapers changed! Join our party, and I’ll do it for you every day!”
She covered her mouth and giggled mischievously. So I held out my palm and calculated a spell.
“Fireball.”
“Gyaah! Sorry, sorry! I was kidding!”
What a ridiculous woman. A hero like her? The world really must be ending.
I remember chuckling a little.
It was just a tiny smile, but strangely, she beamed back at me several times brighter.
“You’re smiling now...?”
That’s when I got curious.
To think there were people this bizarre out there. I’d rarely ever felt interested in anyone before.
“I’m Rista Alter Shyrfang. FakeWarrior of the Light Dragon Church.”
Summer had just begun in the current world, and the Abyss was rampant at the South Pole, so she needed my help.
It was what they called a hero party.
There were two other famous members.
Kies, the Bow Star, one of the Holy Human Empire’s Yellow River Administrative Officers.
And Fride, the Fire Dragon’s Shrine Maiden from the Dragonkin Republic.
“I don’t wanna die.”
“No one wants to die.”
“Are the other two as fun as you, Rista?”
Rista put a finger to her cheek, seeming lost in thought, then gave a weird answer.
“They’re both lunatics on my level... but there’s something even more fun.”
“What’s that?”
Seeing my interest piqued, Rista smiled like a girl sharing a puberty secret.
“The world.”
The world.
To me, who’d lived in the magic tower ever since the dean picked me up from the slums, that word carried a strange resonance.
And so, I joined the party.
Kies was a mute archer whose accuracy tanked unless he was drunk.
Fride, for a shrine maiden, was a massive chain-smoker who lit up every chance she got.
“You’d think the Fire Dragon’s Shrine Maiden could at least breathe fire.”
She’d blow thick smoke right in my face and cackle like a maniac. But their skills were the real deal, so we made good progress.
Five years. We fought for five years.
In between journeys, Rista would always tease me and say things like:
“Lin, you must never fall for me, okay?”
“Lin, wanna travel together once it’s all over?”
“Lin’s so pure, I worry you’ll get duped by some other girl later.”
And then, after five years...
Now, on the eve of the final battle, I was being devoured by soul-corroding dark poison, dying.
My remaining lifespan... wasn’t much.
“Lin, snap out of it! Lin! Please... Fride, do something!”
“Rista, the poison’s too strong.”
Fride shed tears.
“Even I can’t heal it... This might... kill you...”
“You’re not dying! No way!”
“I... don’t wanna die...”
“I know. I won’t let you. Just hold on a bit.”
Coughing up bloody phlegm, I pulled up my shirt with my blackened hand to bare my chest.
Juyeo Soge Daeban.
Right by my heart was the core of the immortality spell I’d perfected over four years of research.
“No... That’s why... I made that spell... before...”
It froze the body completely into forced hibernation, then fully healed it using healing amplification rituals and sacred verses.
Or so my calculations went.
Of course, I had no idea how long it would take. I might stay asleep forever. But what choice did I have?
“I’ll... come back... so win this...”
My remaining time was but a fleeting moment.
I activated the spell before it was too late. Ice began spreading from my toes, encasing my body.
Tears streaming down her face, Rista gripped my hand tightly.
“It’s a promise, Lin. We’ll meet again. You promised to come back, right?”
Rista was pretty when she smiled. But right now, she looked even prettier crying.
“Then together... all four of us... let’s see the world. Got it...? I’ll wait by your side until you wake.”
The ice—the deathly chill—crept up my body. Shin, thigh, pelvis, back, neck...
I smiled weakly.
Just like when we first met at the magic tower.
“Yeah, promise.”
Then consciousness sank into the frigid void. A floating sensation of sinking into a lukewarm swamp, a sense of emptiness...
I felt a strange lingering attachment to death.
In the Empire’s grand 7-star magic system, did I want to see its ultimate truth? Travel this vast world with my party...
Darkness.
Darkness.
Darkness.
Darkness.
Darkness.
After flailing in the dark so long I’d grown numb to it, my eyelids suddenly lifted.
Blinding sunlight.
And a refreshing spring breeze.
Warm, gentle life energies caressing my entire body.
“Rain, are you okay?”
I blinked dazedly as my mother grabbed my shoulders. A sense of wrongness instinctively flashed through my mind.
Mother?
Did I have a mother...?
The golden plaza was bathed in dazzling light. No scorching southern heat or the muddy wails of the Abyss.
Where... am I?
Deep in my mind, the memories of Lin, who died at eighteen, tangled chaotically with the memories of nine-year-old Rain.
“This place...”
“It’s the Papal Court’s Hero Plaza. That statue there was erected to commemorate Rista’s party. What, you don’t like it?”
I quietly looked up at the weathered statue, eroded by eons. I knew those faces all too well.
The hero, Rista.
The archer, Kies.
The shrine maiden, Fride.
And me... Lin.
A grief-defined pain welled up from deep in my chest. The pedestal bore an inscription majestically carved, telling of the flow of ancient time.
[Rista: 1082 ~ 1116]
[Kies: 1076 ~ 1154]
[Fride: 1079 ~ 1168]
[Lin: 1090 ~ 1107]
They’re all... dead?
The FakeWarrior’s lifespan was short due to body modification, so Rista’s death was somewhat expected.
I tried to brush it off.
“Mother, what year is it?”
“You rascal, why so formal all of a sudden? Don’t scare me like that.”
“What year?”
“It’s 1418 Tercia Calendar.”
1418...?
To explain quickly, it seemed I’d awakened in an era roughly 300 years removed from Lin’s time.
Reborn anew, or overlaid with memories...?
It felt like an indescribable nightmare. 300 years away from Rista’s laughter, Kies’s drunken ramblings, Fride’s cigarette smoke.
“Did we win?”
A meaningless question.
The statue proved we had, and this peaceful sky stretched above.
“See that tower at the Papal Court? They say Grand Mage Lin’s body is still there, perfectly preserved in ice.”
“I see.”
“And Rista stayed by his side until her dying day. Such a beautiful, tragic bond, isn’t it?”
Funny thing.
To me, the final battle was just moments ago, yet they spoke of it as legend from centuries past.
“Why are you laughing? It’s a sad story.”
“Just... she really kept her promise.”
I’d just promised the same, and her grip on my right hand still felt vivid...
“Rain?”
My mother tilted her head, not understanding.
“But someone else didn’t keep theirs.”
I muttered bitterly, caressing the inscription on the pedestal. Hot tears streamed down both cheeks, silent and powerless.
“You didn’t keep it...”
* * *
The history books had turned me into some monumental figure.
Elemental Master.
Master of Multiple Calculations.
I’d received a massive reward and plaque of gratitude from the Holy Human Empire’s Emperor, and various magic towers and great magic houses portrayed me as a saint.
The “11th Grand Mage”—a paltry moniker.
In 300 years, only one other had reached 5-star Grand Mage after me, and the title was currently vacant.
‘Now, truly, nothing’s left.’
I thought blankly.
All I had was magic.
The memories of our travels, the brilliant smiles of my comrades—they’d become legends from old tales, not memories.
Rista used to tell me memories are only memories when shared with someone.
So the memories I held weren’t memories.
Just echoes without answers, to carry alone until my dying day.
‘At least I remember regretting not achieving more in magic before I died.’
The Holy Human Empire had systematized vast magic into the Imperial 7-Star Magic System.
1-star common mage, Bandoran.
2-star intermediate mage, Limites.
3-star high mage, Atlas.
4-star extreme mage, Glados.
5-star grand mage, Aquizard.
I’d reached the 5-star realm. From 6-star on, they were called Sages—the pinnacle of truth, achieved by only two in imperial history.
‘If I hadn’t followed Rista, I might’ve reached Sage before dying of old age.’
But I’d regret it for sure.
Even if I could turn back time, I’d follow her a thousand times over.
‘But Rista’s gone now...’
Then I’d fulfill in this life the dreams left unfinished in my past one.
‘This time, I’ll behold the truth.’
Those who reach magic’s end, the truth, can pierce through every facet of the world.
- I hope this world is full of smiles.
That’s what Rista said.
Let’s see if the world we desperately protected still looks like that, with eyes of truth.
So, let’s give it our all.
To forget this stabbing grief and emptiness, I’ll whip myself onward.
Before leaving the plaza.
I looked up at the statue one last time, slowly closed my eyes, and recalled the voiceless echoes.
- Lin, over here! Look at these flowers!
Rista.
And Fride.
- Too romantic a flower field for a cutie like Lin with no charm.
Kies, who couldn’t speak, always expressing himself by ruffling my hair.
- Wasting time on this? Better read another magic book. What’s so great about...
And me, always grumbling.
I acted aloof, but truthfully, our travels together... were so much fun.
“Rista, Kies, Fride.”
I quietly savored their names, prayed my voice would reach their souls, and offered my final farewell.
“Farewell... now.”
The dead remain in the past.
The living can’t defy time’s flow, so we must move toward the future.
I convinced my reluctant feet thus.
And so my second life began.