Wizard of the Abyss - Chapter 268

Chapter 268: Fake God (12)

TL/ED – Miso

“It was hard to believe even after seeing it with my own eyes.”

Elysia slipped quietly out of the library and looked up at the sky.

“The Void I saw in person was probably a little different from the one you saw. I knew, theoretically, that he could be killed, but it felt so unreal that the idea seemed like nothing more than a delusion.”

“He wouldn’t have been sitting idle for those five years.”

“Still, there’s one thing I’m sure of. He’d been wounded.”

“And you’re saying it was my teacher who did it…”

I started to follow up on her words, then shook my head, dumbfounded.

That Dersia? She’d chosen to stand against the one and only god left, all to protect the world?

The last time I saw her, she’d just learned that someone else had reached the Celestial Realm first, and she was sunk in heartbreak and despair. I’d half expected her to Fall into the Abyss right then and there.

“…How, why?”

“Don’t ask me.”

Elysia shrugged, her expression suggesting she found it just as hard to understand.

“All I know for certain is that the fountain pen your teacher used had been dragged across the Void’s body, leaving a long gash. And he looked like he was in tremendous pain.”

“So that’s why the plan was delayed over these five years.”

Only then did I understand why nothing had come to an end during my absence, why everything had been stalled.

It had looked like he was slowly weaving some scheme in the shadows, but in truth he’d taken a solid hit from Dersia.

‘And the reason he didn’t go out of his way to hunt me down and kill me even though he knew I’d escape the Deep Sea, the reason he set the trap called Elysia instead-‘

It was because, at that moment, he couldn’t move.

Even when I called up the Deep Sea out in the open in broad daylight like this, that thing in the sky couldn’t sense it.

The realization brought a wave of shock crashing over me.

‘What on earth did she do?’

Dersia was human… no, not human. She was an elf.

And probably the greatest wizard in the empire.

But even taking that into account, her opponent was an Outer God who’d absorbed countless worlds. Could it possibly make sense that she’d wounded such a being badly enough that he couldn’t even move on his own?

Something about it nagged at me, but Elysia had no reason to lie in a situation like this, so for now I accepted it at face value and nodded.

“Got it. Then let’s get out of here first. You said it’s dangerous to stay too long.”

“Ah, right.”

Elysia nodded quickly, but then her face fell as if she’d remembered something, and she shrank in on herself.

“…But I can’t leave this city.”

“What? Why?”

“It hasn’t been long since I became this city itself. If I go outside, then this time everywhere I touch will become dangerous.”

“…Hold on, you said you wandered around plenty as a witch.”

“That’s how I found out… and that word, witch, who came up with that name anyway? It’s a little harsh, isn’t it?”

“Then what should we call running around stealing knights’ memories?”

Linmel shot back boldly, arms crossed.

“There are nineteen knights who became farmers because of you. Do you have any idea how valuable that manpower is? And it’s all because you’re sitting here playing with dolls like this…”

“Playing with dolls?”

“I, I can give the memories back. I don’t need them anymore anyway. I’m sorry about that. I think I went too far, acting recklessly because I’d convinced myself everything was already over.”

Surprisingly, instead of arguing back, Elysia hurriedly admitted her own fault and showed a vulnerable side.

But even so, the fact that she couldn’t leave didn’t change, and she looked at me with brimming eyes.

“But I really can’t leave. Now that you’ve come back, Jern, even more so… my very existence is a flaw that pollutes the world. If I left here and stayed with you, that’s exactly what the Void would want most.”

“…”

“I’m fine. Just, please tell my dad something for me. Tell him I’m doing perfectly well. But since we can’t see each other again, ask him to treat me as if I don’t exist.”

That was, well, a pretty sad thing to hear.

All the more so because Elysia herself seemed to think it was no big deal. She must have finished saying her goodbyes in her heart a long time ago.

It was my fault. I thought it over for a moment, then shook my head.

“…No, Elysia. You can leave.”

“H, huh?”

“After everything’s over, I’ll come to kill you.”

“?”

At the sudden announcement of her death, Elysia made a puzzled face.

Of course, I didn’t mean it literally.

“Inside me, the worlds I’ve killed go on living. If you really are a World, a World I can directly devour, then instead of polluting this real world, you can act while polluting the Deep Sea.”

“B, but then your World would be ruined…”

“I don’t care.”

The Deep Sea or whatever, I truly couldn’t care less.

From what Nightchase said, gods seem to feel a sick pleasure in expanding their own worlds, but at least I wasn’t like that. Whether Elysia wiped out every drop of seawater or not, it was none of my concern.

“Not now, though. My World is still useful for the time being.”

“…”

“But once everything’s done, I’ll give you the Deep Sea then. So just bear with it a little longer until then…”

Wait for me.

I was about to say something like that when Elysia suddenly flung herself at me, and I caught her, flustered.

“Sniff, hic… even if it’s just words, thank you…”

Nearly crying, Elysia wrapped her small, childlike frame around my waist.

This was the second time, wasn’t it. I patted her back again and soothed her for a few minutes, and once she’d calmed, she gave a faint smile with tear tracks still on her face and looked at me shyly as she asked.

“S, so. If a day like that really comes, it’ll be just me by your side all the time, right?”

“No. There’ll probably be several of you…”

The chances that my World would remain a pure Deep Sea through the process of bringing down the Void were extremely slim. Several worlds had already dissolved into it.

But Elysia didn’t seem to hear a word I said. She smiled softly and took my hand.

“I’ll keep waiting right here. If you ever need me, come find me again. I’ll keep the door open anytime.”

“Keep it shut. Some stranger passing by could wander in.”

“Okay!”

Feeling a tangle of emotions, I stroked Elysia’s head.

She’d apparently forgotten that I could use Current Sense to perceive almost anywhere.

That’s right, even inside the library, where the door was already open.

[Hm, this wizard is trash. Setting up a Magic Formation like this…]

‘I was like that while reading a book?’

…It seemed the younger version of me that Elysia remembered was a bit of an odd one.

But if I demanded a correction from this Elysia, grinning away so happily, it felt like she’d put an end to herself before I ever came to kill her, so I said nothing at all.

In this world, there were some things it was better not to know.

***

After leaving the former capital.

I looked up at the sky with a slightly uneasy expression. The sky, a little gloomier than before, looked like it might soon rain, that was all. There was no sign of the Void’s face anywhere.

At the very least, it seemed true that he couldn’t come for me right away. As I let out a sigh of relief, Linmel sighed too and glared at the capital with a thoroughly sour face.

“I gave them a good thrashing, and I still feel lousy. Think I’ll get to hit them more later?”

“If you’re going to thrash anyone, thrash me. It’s my fault for being gone for five whole years.”

“No, Jern, you didn’t do anything wrong! You said you were tricked, didn’t you?”

“I was tricked… yeah. But if I’d known, I might not have gone in.”

Not might. Definitely.

Maybe that was part of why Cheon-hwa hadn’t said anything. Of course, whatever the reasons were, I could never accept it. As I stood there with my fist trembling, Linmel quietly spoke up.

“The witch subjugation’s done, so do you want to go see people you know now? The director and the kids would all want to see you.”

“I should go, I suppose. But there’s something I want to check first.”

Dersia wounded the Void.

If that was true, I wanted to find out by whatever means how she’d done it and how severe the wound was.

“My plan has a way to keep the Void from escaping, but no way to bring him down yet. I need to go find my teacher.”

“You just have to fight and win, right? I’ll help you!”

“And if I lose?”

“I won’t let you lose!”

Linmel grinned with full confidence. It was a smile that hadn’t lost its childlike innocence.

How wonderful it would be if everything could be solved that way. I smiled bitterly and stroked Linmel’s head.

“Thanks. But I need a more precise plan. This battle will probably be the last bit of strength I can muster. Let’s head to the forest where my teacher’s said to have returned.”

“Yeah. Got it. Want a piggyback?”

“…It’s close by, so I’m fine.”

Holding onto my last shred of pride against Linmel, who was innocently moving to crouch down, I set off on my own two feet toward the forest I knew.

In reality it was quite a bit farther than that, but now that I knew it was alright to show some of my abilities, I wanted to test them out.

“Let’s see…”

-Trickle.

I poured out the water bottle I was holding onto the ground around me, making a very small puddle.

And then, using my Current Sense, which had grown unbelievably vast by now, I looked at the entrance to the Elf Forest.

‘Focus.’

Slowly, I drew up my power.

If my Current Sense could reach it, I could use my ability. As I clenched my fist tight in the empty air-

-Trickle…

In some empty space tens of kilometers away, a stream of water fell.

A small puddle formed there too. With the two puddles made, I recalled the Door Magic that Dersia used so often.

A near-divine magic that let her reach any place she’d visited before, simply by opening a door.

Already a Demi-god, there was nothing I couldn’t do either.

“What are you doing?”

In front of Linmel, who was watching with curious eyes, I gently dipped a finger into the puddle.

The finger that went into the water sank slowly, slowly, then went far deeper than the puddle’s actual depth.

And at the entrance of the Elf Forest I’d seen through Current Sense, that finger was poking up out of the little puddle.

“So it works.”

“Huh?”

I grabbed the shoulders of the head-tilting Linmel, lifted her up, and dropped her straight into the puddle.

Linmel went into the puddle more obediently than I’d expected, and then, feet first, emerged from the puddle at the entrance of the Elf Forest.

Looking around, Linmel realized it was a completely new place and stared at the puddle in bewilderment.

“Whoa…! What is this?”

“Something like magic.”

I threw myself into the puddle too and moved the same way.

I shifted my body this way and that, but there was nothing wrong. It was an astonishing feat, copying in an instant a magic that had taken Dersia decades to create, yet my face naturally crumpled into a frown.

‘It means that thing can do this too.’

More than ever, I grew curious about just what method Dersia had used to wound the Void.

…Or maybe.

‘She really didn’t Fall into the Abyss, did she?’

Well, if she’d Fallen, there’d be no reason for her to fight the Void. And a great wizard on Dersia’s level wouldn’t have any way to Fall unless she fell of her own accord.

I convinced myself and looked at the forest. Linmel was already gazing at the surrounding scenery, eyes shining with wonder.

“Wow, the colors of the trees in this forest are so strange!”

“…”

And then-

Looking at the black forest, drenched in ink and plain to the naked eye, I clenched my teeth.

…She didn’t Fall, right?