The First Step
I stood there silently, watching. Alexandria laughed with an “Ahahaha!” and said, “You’re not thinking I’ll go first because of the bet, are you?”
“…A little.”
“Fine. It doesn’t matter. I could leave whenever I want anyway. I lost the bet. I just want to experience it for even a little while.”
She sounded like a kid standing in front of a roller coaster, eager and pure.
No talk of ending her blood feud, no cheating her way through the bet. Just pure curiosity about what space travel felt like.
Indeed, she was straightforward as always.
“I’m going first. If the battle outside is still going on, I’m more suited for it than you, Alexandria.”
“I saw you in the mirror, though. The Grand Duchess’s Far Sight Art reveals magical concealment. And if there was fighting, the outside mirrors wouldn’t be intact either.”
“It’s better to prepare for the worst-case scenario.”
“Hmm~ Okay. I’ll be patient one more time.”
Alexandria stepped back a step.
So that settles it.
“Leave the order to the Grand Duchess.”
“Me?”
I pointed at Fiona, and her eyes widened.
“Yes. The Grand Duchess will be last. If the mirror pathway suddenly cuts off while we teleport and our vision disconnects, it would be a problem.”
“…I understand.”
Fiona’s previously downcast expression brightened.
Was the role itself making her happy?
“Second from the back is me.”
“Third is me.”
Leaf and Ray were already walking over to book their spots next to Fiona.
As the two moved, everyone else hurriedly lined up beside Fiona, eager for their turn.
“This is it. The one who helps us is over there. Right?”
Amaya approached with a forced friendliness, though it was more her natural lack of restraint than anything else.
“Amaya aren’t you coming?”
“Me? Well, I can just take any remaining spot. The most dangerous positions, the front and the back, are being handled by those two incredible people, so the rest of us will be fine, right?”
“Yeah? Then I’ll go next. Third sounds good.”
Alexandria had already announced herself as fixed for second.
Of course. She’d openly competed for first with Arthur, and if she had any sense, no one would overbid for her spot.
“Roman, ready?”
“Whenever you are.”
“Then let’s go. It’ll be better to move quickly.”
“Would it be better if I held your hand?” Arthur asked.
I answered immediately. “No.”
Sorry, but I have no interest in holding a man’s hand.
“Just stay put. Don’t exert mana even if you feel strange.”
“Got it.”
Leaf and Ray activated Blink instantly and followed right along.
Fiona seemed to react to something, but I didn’t even have time to understand.
However, if a magic user of Arthur’s caliber deliberately resisted, Blink would either not trigger or fling me somewhere completely off-target.
‘One day, I might even be able to forcibly trigger it while holding down the caster.’
At that point, I might finally be able to return to Earth.
Pushing aside the half-baked thought, I pulled up my mana.
The mana flowed like Seir’s Tar, passing through the brain’s blood-brain barrier filter and lodging in the midbrain.
The brain recognized space.
And the moment I wished it to be there.
I was there.
“Done already?”
“Yeah. That was it. Simple, right?”
“…A little dizzy.”
“Motion sickness.”
Given Arthur’s heightened senses, it was no surprise.
The spatial displacement felt completely detached from the external senses the brain had been registering, leaving a heavy sense of disorientation. I lightly touched my forehead.
‘Ray adapted quickly back then.’
Maybe because we were only teleporting within the underground area at the time.
Or perhaps beastman senses were simply that advanced, able to adapt to anything.
“Then let’s head back slowly.”
“Already? You should take a break first.”
“I’m fine. My goal is to finish as quickly as possible and rest.”
I took a deep breath of the outside air and stared hard at the underground area reflected in Fiona’s mirror.
Then I teleported again.
Using it in succession made me feel a bit queasy, but I managed to endure it.
“Next is me.”
“Yeah.”
“Could we even do two people at once?”
No way.
For me, taking multiple at the same time would end it faster, but the output wasn’t enough.
Mana refilled continuously, but the maximum I could expend in one go was limited.
I hadn’t confirmed it yet, but the teleportation range was probably also restricted.
“Yeah, makes sense. If it were possible, we wouldn’t have bothered with this. Forget it. Silly question.”
“To that extent. Then I’ll go now.”
I reached for Alexandria’s shoulder to teleport, but suddenly she grabbed my hand.
“Huh?”
“This is better, isn’t it?”
“Ya!!”
A loud, echoing roar echoed in my ears.
It was truly a lion’s roar.
This was that lion’s roar.
“You, stop thrashing your tail.”
“Hmm? You’re amazing. Can I touch your tail once?”
“Are you kidding?!”
The spotted hyena who dared to step into our territory was growling like the dominant male lion here, fur standing on end.
She was definitely on high alert, given how she’d tried to pull me out of the team before.
“Anyway, let go and come quietly.”
Ray grabbed my wrist and Alexandria’s hand and forcibly pried them apart.
…It was soft.
“Release it quickly and come back. Got it?”
“Roger.”
Whatever.
Arms bent inward, and the crab walks sideways. My team was my responsibility.
In the end, Alexandria was the one who would go alone.
Alexandria, who had a massive nest in the Alexandria School, would return there, while I would have to dive straight into the wild Abyss.
If the bet’s prize was school membership, she would probably accept.
It wasn’t a difficult proposition from her perspective.
But if I went in as a parachute, all I’d get was mockery and dismissal.
‘And thinking about the future, my affiliation would be…’
The thoughts dragged on.
I decided to think about the future later and grabbed Alexandria’s shoulder to cast Blink.
“Huh?”
Suddenly, I was outside.
Alexandria stopped right there and fell silent for a moment.
After leaving the aftermath to Arthur, I returned to the underground.
“Third!”
“Me! Third, Amaya, going!”
Amaya raised her hand and dashed forward, then Blink again.
It felt like I was riding a constant yo-yo.
Then at the seventh, I sensed an abnormality in my spatial awareness.
My body swayed.
I didn’t know if I was spinning or the world was spinning.
When had I felt this before?
Before coming here, when I secretly drank soju at home and got drunk?
Or when I got my head hit in the slave days and the concussion made me dizzy?
It was some sense from somewhere in between.
“Mr. Roman!”
“Hey! Stay conscious!”
Leaf’s and Ray’s voices beside me, already dizzy from the constant spinning, cut through the ringing in my ears once more.
“Wait, be quiet…”
“W-wrong, sorry.”
“Are you okay? Let’s stop here and rest. The ones outside probably brought backup.”
“I think we’ll be in trouble.”
“Why?”
“The outside is a mess too.”
There wasn’t a single intact building.
The part I saw through Fiona’s mirror was only a portion.
The instructors probably died as well.
If they were fine, they would have already gathered with us.
“And there are injured people over here too.”
Davenford had already reached the point of almost unconsciousness.
I’d pulled him aside for a separate turn because I wanted to send him out when the outside was secured, but I couldn’t just leave him here.
We had basic medical supplies, but I couldn’t heal curses.
“Let’s move the instructors first this time.”
After resting a bit, the motion sickness settled and my balance returned.
Maybe because I’d used too much mana.
A whole-body stiffness ran through me, but a day of overexertion was nothing.
“Instructor.”
“Now that the numbers are pretty much filled, let’s split the group in half. I’ll take the instructor and scout the surroundings. You handle this side, Alexandria.”
Arthur selected a team of those with high mobility and versatile magic.
The process was very quick, as if they had already prepared in advance.
“…Don’t push yourselves.”
The obvious warning.
I waved at Arthur vaguely and returned to the underground.
The second crisis came when we’d moved eleven people.
The accumulated fatigue must have been heavy.
The body that had held until the seventh collapsed again after just a short rest, and within four turns it failed completely.
This time, the world spun like my semicircular canals were tangled.
I’d never experienced it, but wasn’t this the terrible vertigo that had been spoken of?
My head throbbed, dizziness hit, and nausea roiled in my stomach.
I shoved the people trying to support me aside and somehow made it to the wall to throw up.
Fortunately, my digestion had cleared everything, but it was still an embarrassing sight.
“Hoo… hoo…”
As I caught my breath after deep breaths, my vision gradually cleared.
Mana had refilled.
The body’s fatigue would require twelve hours of sleep later.
After checking my condition, I turned my body.
“Shall we go next?”
I said it lightly, but the eyes of those watching me remained heavy.
Then someone pointed at my face.
Worried something was wrong, I raised my hand to touch my face, and something sticky touched my fingertips.
I pulled my hand away and checked.
My finger was stained red.
Ah, nosebleed.
[Emergency: Nosebleed detected. Mana usage exceeded threshold. Risk of severe dizziness or mana backlash imminent. Immediate rest recommended. Current status: HP 87% / 100 | Mana: 92% / 100]
I wiped the blood away with the back of my hand and stared at the red stain.
The world was spinning again, but this time I was ready for it.