WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

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◈ Omniscient First-Person's Viewpoint

Chapter 62

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Compulsion

The Abyss, the land Mother Earth declared she would no longer hold up. Slip even by accident, and you would fall forever. A real hell that exists in this world.

Darkness where you cannot see even an inch ahead, hope so faint it may not exist at all, and a future that only drifts farther from the sky. At a bottom that may or may not exist, things that sank unburied for over a thousand years are knotted together, staring back this way.

A horrific, bizarre land hundreds of years removed from peace and stability. That was what the Abyss was supposed to be.

‘Then why is nothing happening?’

A regressor, the only traveler who turns back time through death.

In the middle of this peace, only Shei was consumed by anxiety.

‘If the immortal was right, then something definitely happened here. The instructor tried to kill someone, the Beast King howled, the immortal cursed and scattered his own flesh, and there was an incident big enough to bring down the Abyss.’

The future she came from was a filthy drain where dozens of sewers fed into one another. Plug one, and untreated waste burst out somewhere else and fouled the world.

Shei was alone, and there were too many variables. Even with a thousand hands, she could not have stopped them all. The world failed to withstand its broken balance, and in the end opened the floodgates to ruin.

Ominous incidents kept presenting themselves as omens of worse tragedies to come. Monsters appeared out of nowhere and swallowed people whole. Villages vanished entirely without leaving even a single corpse. The Beast King met the end, howling as he rampaged in madness.

At the edge of the apocalypse, Shei had focused less on stopping it and more on finding its source.

The trail led her here, to the Abyss.

Inside, she found the Progenitor, the King of Dogs, and the immortal, all of whom would become seeds of disaster in the future.

But unlike what she expected, they were peaceful.

‘It is not that nothing happened at all. It is just that, compared to what comes later, this is not that bad... Is it because I came here and changed the past itself? Or is something enormous about to happen, something big enough to overturn this whole situation in an instant?’

Perched on the prison rooftop, Shei looked down into the yard below.

On a flat concrete yard, a dark blonde girl faced off against a man in an instructor’s uniform.

Azzy kept flinching as if something bothered her, while the instructor smiled unpleasantly.

"Heh heh. Why did I not think of this sooner?"

"Grrrrrrrrr."

"Kya-ha-ha-ha! Yes! I have finally found the answer, Azzy! You are no match for me now!"

From the way he talked, he sounded like a hidden mastermind. Shei did not react to that kind of act anymore. She had been fooled too many times.

Still shouting, the instructor pulled a thin steel disc from inside his coat, hammered and flattened into shape.

He lifted the disc and rubbed beneath his nose.

"Ah, this is what you call a disc. A wide, flat plate designed with air resistance in mind. Hang time is several times longer than a ball. Krrk-krrk-krrk! With this, I do not have to worry about my shoulder anymore. If I throw it right, it can stay up for thirty seconds!"

"Grrr! Bark! Bark!"

"Okay, okay. Tsk. You are so impatient. I wanted to show off a little, but I cannot even do that. Here, go fetch!"

"Bark!"

He wound up and threw it. The steel disc spun slowly and flew far into the distance. Azzy, who had been waiting forever, lit up and raced after it.

Cutting through the wind, the floating disc did not come down easily. It rose gently, and fell even more slowly. Azzy caught up in an instant and bounced below it, waiting for it to drop.

Meanwhile, the instructor flopped down where he stood and laughed loudly.

"Heh heh heh. Which means I can recover my stamina while I wait! It is basically a semi-automatic toy! Kiki-kik! I am not afraid of you anymore!"

"Bark!"

At that moment, Azzy sprang into the air and snatched the disc out of the sky with her mouth. The instructor’s face went blank.

"Hey, wait a second. Azzy. Jumping to catch it is cheating. We agreed to settle this fair and square in two dimensions. Also, what kind of dog does a standing three-meter jump? Give me a break, I need rest time."

"Bark!"

"No, hey."

But Azzy brought the disc back again, and the instructor stood with a sigh.

Watching them made Shei feel foolish for being tense. She glared hard, but seeing Azzy wagging her tail in delight and the instructor, looking annoyed but still playing with her, all that came out was a limp sigh.

She wanted to sharpen her nerves. She wanted to raise the blade of hostility.

She could not even bring herself to feel that way.

‘If I had to choose someone here with enough influence to cause that kind of disaster, it would only be that instructor.’

Azzy’s bright smile did not look capable of that kind of malice. Calm Tyrkanzyaka did not seem likely to suddenly lose her mind and rampage either.

At the same time, that man, that instructor whose name she still did not know, did not seem likely to cause anything either.

‘If only. If nothing happened at all. If someone would give me certainty and make me believe it.’

Then maybe she could put down all her burdens and allow herself a brief moment of rest.

But a regressor had seen the future. She knew some tragedy would happen in this Abyss.

So she could not relax. She had to stay on edge. Even if everyone else let themselves unwind, she alone could not.

There is no rest for one who has seen such a terrible future. Even this isolated peace feels like an omen of disaster.

‘I came this far. I have to gain something from this cycle...’

With one knee drawn up, sitting alone on the corner of the rooftop, she quietly watched the disc flying below. With a dog trailing behind it, slowly growing larger and smaller again, it looked like a symbol of peaceful daily life, rising and sinking in the natural order.

She sat in that uneasy peace when a calm voice called out.

"Shei. Could you spare me a moment."

Recognizing the voice, she quickly stood up.

A juniper coffin wrapped in dark crimson energy, and atop it sat the Progenitor Tyrkanzyaka, prim and proper beneath a pitch-black parasol. As Shei turned to face her, Tyrkanzyaka stepped lightly down onto the rooftop.

"Tyrkanzyaka! Uh, long... time no see? Where is that guy you always kept with you?"

"Finlay? I left him alone for a while. Do not concern yourself with him."

She sounded casual, but there was a strange chill in her tone. Shei swallowed. For the future’s sake, she needed a good relationship with the Progenitor, so why did every meeting feel so oddly cold?

Growing more uneasy, Shei spoke carefully.

"What brings you here? You do not usually come looking for me. No, I do not mean I am upset about it. I am just, uh, stating a fact.... I was curious, that is all!"

Tyrkanzyaka cut off Shei’s rambling and answered.

"Did you not say so before? That unique magic is stronger than formalized magic. You boasted at length that unique arcana, which manifests one’s own mystery, is overwhelmingly superior to the standardized spells anyone can use."

"Uh. I did say that."

"And you said your magic recreates the power of the sky. A mystery wielded through the aura of that sword."

"Y-yeah."

"In that case."

Tyrkanzyaka set down her parasol. With a dry rustle, the darkness scattered for an instant, revealing her pale figure in the light.

"You should be able to use lightning as well. Is that correct?"

"I can, but why?"

"Use it on me."

Even Shei, who had been through everything, could not help but question that.

"What? Why?"

"Do not ask why. Can you simply do it for me?"

"I need to know your intent before I can help."

"...You are right about that too."

Muttering to herself, Tyrkanzyaka spoke plainly.

"When the soil-kin rose again, do you remember?"

"Ah. That time."

When the immortal Rashy first opened his eyes. The instructor had clearly struck the immortal’s chest with electricity, and the immortal rose.

"Yes. His heart was restarted with an electric shock. If that worked for an immortal soil-kin, then it should work for me as well."

"You want to restart your heart with electricity?"

Shei understood what Tyrkanzyaka was asking.

Just as electricity had been run through the soil-kin’s chest to make his heart beat, she wanted her own heart revived the same way.

It had to be a desperate wish she had held inside that coffin for a long, long time. Shei knew that, but she still had to hesitate.

"I hate to say this, but that would be difficult with my power. The foundation of magic is the manifestation of a being’s inner image. One spell is one world. Using that to invade and alter someone else’s body is extremely difficult, and it should not be done. It is a violation of another person’s dignity."

"But the soil-kin rose with the magic he used, did he not."

"That was Level 0 arcane, phenomenon-grade arcane. A very minor form of magic that only calls up phenomena that already exist in the world. If the true essence of magic is changing the world, then Level 0 arcane is the furthest thing from it. With that, you can only raise someone who could have been raised in the first place."

Shei finished her explanation calmly, thinking that should be a refusal without being rude.

No matter how mysterious magic looked, its limits were clear. She hoped Tyrkanzyaka would not mistake her refusal for indifference.

Unfortunately, vampires were used to this kind of phrasing. At this point, it was almost the same as speaking bluntly.

"I know that as well. My heart beating again is nearly impossible. I understand how you feel. You do not want to involve yourself in something pointless."

Afraid she had been misunderstood, the regressor protested in a rush.

"N-no! It is just, I am worried it will hurt you!"

"Pain is no great problem. I have lived for twelve hundred years and endured all kinds of pain.... Though, of course, even those were not true pain."

Tyrkanzyaka smiled self-mockingly and walked toward Shei. As if showing she would not resist, she spread both arms and let them hang limp.

"I beg you, Shei. Even if your magic brings only pain, if that pain is real, I will accept it gladly. I do not believe this will revive my heart either. I only wish to feel."

Tyrkanzyaka was stubborn, and Shei was troubled.

She could not understand why it had to be lightning, but she could not refuse someone pleading so earnestly. In any case, Tyrkanzyaka was the one choosing to bear the pain.

It was not even dangerous for Tyrkanzyaka. Shei’s magic was powerful, but only to the level of a magic swordsman. If that level could endanger Tyrkanzyaka, she would never have survived this long.

"Ugh. It does not look like a major problem...."

After a long pause of thought, Shei drew out Skywarbler, which had been floating above her head.

She wielded Skywarbler like a sword, but its true nature was extremely compressed space. That was why it had no weight and no thickness. Skywarbler cut by splitting through space itself, sharper than any sword in the world.

Shei swept Skywarbler through the air and fed it magical power as she explained.

"My magic uses Skywarbler as its medium. The medium itself is so powerful that it carries a clear sky attribute, which is a drawback. But the sky contains countless phenomena, so if I prepare properly, I can reproduce all of them."

Wind flowed out of Skywarbler. Compressed space loosened and began to expand its presence. Space swelled abruptly. The air, chilled as it expanded, touched the skin, and moisture shivering in the cold seized the chance to cling when it met body warmth.

Vampire skin was the exception, of course. Their bodies were as cold as the swollen air.

"Wind, cloud, rain, dew, frost, snow, thunder, lightning. Wind forms clouds, clouds bring rain, dew rises from the earth and beads on blades of grass. Ordinary daily life soaked through with tiny droplets too small to see."

And then.

The air shuddered ominously.

The wind trembled as if seized by fear. Space sensed the sign of danger and scattered in a frantic rush.

Within it, Shei’s hair stirred. Not from wind, but in a sharp, regular pulse like a heartbeat.

Gripping Skywarbler tightly, Shei released her magic power. It surged from her whole body, shot into the air, and gathered in one place.

It looked exactly like a cloud. In the Abyss, where no sky existed, a fragment of cloud floated like a still-life painting.

"Frost, snowflakes, and thunderbolts. They are twisted ideals. When droplets fail in their duty as messengers, conflict between earth and sky races to extremes and casts down what is warped. What I call forth is wrath, the solemn rebuke the sky delivers to the world."

Lightning flashed inside the pitch-black storm cloud pouring out of Skywarbler. The cloud, heavy with immense force, drifted slowly above Tyrkanzyaka’s head. As clothes and hair rose at the sign of danger, Tyrkanzyaka stared straight ahead without a word.

"If it hurts, say so. I will stop."

Tyrkanzyaka gave no answer. Shei let out a deep sigh and carved her magic into the world.

"Celestial Sword Qi, Thunderbird."

In the next instant, lightning flashed.

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