WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Surviving in the Magic Academy

Chapter 128

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I glanced at Koite, who was sitting beside me. He was moving the crystal ball this way and that, watching the scene inside. Every time he gave it a light touch, the image it showed changed.

The crystal ball would show Lumira, then drift toward the tower and sweep lightly through its interior. In that way, Koite made a full circuit of the dream world, carefully checking for anything wrong.

His eyes were utterly serious as he controlled the crystal ball. With not a trace of laughter on his face, he looked like an artisan presiding over dreams.

I quietly watched the scenery inside the crystal ball too. As long as the dream flowed normally, there was not much for me to do here. After all, my puppets were the ones weaving the dream.

Unless something unusual happened, all I had to do was wait. I paused after thinking that. Usually, when things went like this, something happened. A faint sense of foreboding dug into my chest.

It was almost a premonition. I shook my head, trying to drive away the unease. What was there to worry about when Koite was here? How many times had he manipulated dreams by now? This place called Dream Theater had also been created by his hands.

As the name Dream Theater suggested, Koite arranged dreams like plays. Just like the scene inside the crystal ball right now. I quietly folded my arms. My puppets had not appeared yet. The adjustments were apparently not finished.

Had I first heard that name during the gathering? I remembered hearing about one-night dreams and mistaking this place for a simple entertainment business.

Of course, that kind of thing was possible inside a dream. There were people who came here wanting such dreams. They could arrange a decadent feast, or face someone they desired inside the dream.

But mages generally restrained their sexual urges. Only a tiny minority enjoyed that sort of amusement. The price was also extremely high.

That was why the mages who came here wanted to dream of something more valuable. Koite guided such people into the world of dreams. Just like now, so that their one-night dream would continue.

His magic made that possible, but puppets also played an important role. Puppets could easily slip into another person’s dream.

The puppets placed in charge of a dream differed in quality depending on the dream’s price. In the case of the entertainment I mentioned earlier, simple puppets made by Koite handled the work.

Were they called aces? Puppets treated as important, like Mira, did not appear in such low-grade dreams. They took the stage in larger dreams, when the owner of the dream could not maintain it alone.

Over the past month, I had walked around Dream Theater and seen all sorts of dreams. The owners of those dreams slept, just as the crystal ball showed now, and dreamed dreams of their own.

Some pondered new magic. In the space of a dream, there was no need to worry about the side effects of that magic, so they simply shaped it however they pleased.

Some predicted the future. They filled the dream with all sorts of conditions that existed in reality and tried to receive a kind of prophecy. Whether it would actually come true, I did not know. Others, in contrast, dreamed of the past.

And the most memorable of those dreams belonged to someone who faced their trauma. They repeated the moment of failure and changed it into success. Then they planted that dream into their own memory in an attempt to forget the trauma.

That person’s dream succeeded. They left the dream with certainty in themselves. Changing memories through dreams was quite something.

In this way, dreams flowed in all kinds of forms. Everyone dreamed their own dream, after all. As Koite had said, it was like a play. And the puppets stood at the center of those dreams, guiding the story forward.

The reason I could watch other people’s dreams like this was that Koite had opened all dreams. Any puppeteer affiliated with Dream Theater could check them.

Of course, they were not allowed to speak of them outside. Because of that, there was also a confidentiality option for those who disliked others peeping at their dreams.

It made it so no one except Koite could see the dream. The five-million-point dream occupying the largest room in Dream Theater was one such case.

I quietly fidgeted with my hand. Because of that dream, Koite had ended up giving this request to me. I had wanted to see what sort of scenery that dream held, so it really was a shame.

Still, I had roughly guessed how huge that dream was. In the case of the dream we were running this time, Mira alone could maintain its center. And as the crystal ball showed, this dream was very stable.

A single ace puppet was enough to maintain a dream. But Koite said all the ace puppets he had gathered were tied to that five-million-point dream. Had he said there were about fifteen of them?

He said that dream had already been going for four months. Over that time, an entire world might have been created inside the dream.

I glanced at Koite. Then I suppressed my curiosity. For now, that dream had nothing to do with me. I just had to handle this request properly.

I lightly placed a hand on my chest. Beyond it, I felt the tree sway. I had seen many different dreams. Then what kind of dream should I dream?

As Koite had said, I needed to descend deep inside myself through a dream. And through that process, I had to discover the root of my obsession.

I had to resolve this quickly before I could face Professor. Otherwise, I did not know what sort of accident I might cause again. As if agreeing with me, the tree lightly swayed its branches.

Of course, before that, I had to handle this job perfectly. That was the prerequisite for my own dream. Koite fiddled with the crystal ball. I stared at it. The crystal ball’s gaze was now fixed on Lumira.

I saw her calmly checking her body. After spending quite a while confirming her condition, she released a little magical power. That magical power created a large wave and spread in every direction.

After searching her surroundings that way, she confirmed there was nothing wrong and gave a light nod. Then she moved her feet and slowly began walking toward the tower.

The towering structure was so enormous that the crystal ball could not show all of it at once. Resting my chin on my hand, I slowly observed the tower. That was the dream she had wanted.

Inside it, my puppets and Mira would be waiting for her. As I watched Lumira walk toward the tower, I tilted my head slightly. A question had occurred to me.

“Why is the dream world so cramped?”

I spoke to Koite. He had received nearly two million points for this dream. What would a dream that earned such an enormous amount of points look like? I had been looking forward to it quite a bit.

I only knew the rough structure of the dream, and I had not experienced it beforehand. But contrary to my expectations, this world was very small. Other than the tower at its center, there was nothing.

It looked a little too shabby to have been made by gathering together the magic circles that had densely filled this huge cavern. Koite lightly tapped the crystal ball and laughed under his breath.

“The dream’s capacity is being eaten up by everything else, so it can’t be helped. It takes that much magical power to create trials. In that sense, your puppets are pretty useful. I didn’t think they’d suck up this much power.”

He lightly tapped his belly, then placed a finger on the crystal ball. Then he began pouring magical power into it.

“Hmm, now that I’m looking at it, it does look shabby, just like you said. Should I decorate the road a little?”

Koite’s magical power seeped into the crystal ball. When he lightly waved his hand, that magical power spread through the dream.

The magical power scattered throughout the place began changing the road Lumira was walking on. The plain dirt path disappeared, replaced by marble embedded with a gentle glow. Flowers and trees were planted around it like a garden.

That change happened in an instant, as if proving this was a dream. Lumira, the owner of the dream, glanced around, then cautiously moved along the road.

The path Koite created stretched straight toward the tower. It did not take long for Lumira to reach the tower as she walked along it. She opened the tower door and stepped inside.

At the same time, the crystal ball lightly rippled. It blinked several times, then showed a wide corridor. It had begun displaying the scenery inside the tower.

Was it because Lumira had entered the tower? The tower’s interior looked different from before. The passage that had been maintained so stably was gone without a trace, and the walls twisted and began to surge.

Koite frowned when he saw that. He tapped his slightly thinner cheeks a few times, then lightly scratched his nose.

“This one doesn’t seem deeply soaked into the dream yet. Is the stabilization incomplete? Let’s adjust it a bit for now. It might change once she meets the puppet.”

Koite muttered that and fiddled with the crystal ball. His magical power began scattering delicately. At the same time, the rippling walls fixed themselves straight.

The tower soon regained a proper shape. Lumira checked the walls, then slowly headed inside. Each time she moved, the lamps lining the walls began lighting the path one by one.

“This should do. Ugh, that was rough.”

Koite lightly stretched. His face had grown thinner by the amount of magical power that had leaked out. He rummaged through his clothes and took out several beads. They contained dreams.

He put them into his mouth and swallowed them down. Then his body began swelling again. I stared at him. I was starting to wonder what that body was even made of.

After smacking his lips for a moment, he grabbed the crystal ball again. Then he began carefully adjusting the dream. He looked very practiced.

Under his guidance, Lumira moved deeper into the tower. Her face was cold and stiff. It was probably because of what was coming. She slowly refined her magical power and sharpened it.

Soon, Lumira stopped. She had arrived at the center of the tower. In the middle of a somewhat spacious chamber, there was something emitting murky magical power.

It looked like a wolf and a person had been mixed halfway together. It seemed to notice Lumira, because it rose from its place. Then it looked at her and gave a low growl.

I calmly observed it and nodded. It was one of the puppets I had made at Koite’s request. It seemed to have adapted well to this dream.

I scratched the tip of my nose while looking at the murky magical power wavering from it. That had not come from me. My connection with it had already been completely cut.

That was magical power granted directly by the dream according to the role it had been assigned. Its appearance, eroded by that magical power, had changed into something quite grotesque. Its single head had become two, and its two arms had become four.

I quietly rubbed my chin. Once this dream ended, it would return to its original form, but seeing my puppet changed like that still felt strange.

Koite wore a broad smile. Inside the crystal ball, Lumira formed circuits and drew a magic circle. Koite watched her and lightly clapped his hands.

“Now they’ll fight. This should be fun.”

I looked at the crystal ball too. My puppets were all supposed to appear as Lumira’s opponents, just like the one inside the crystal ball now. Should I call it the Trial Tower? That was the theme of this play.

The puppet slowly began to writhe. Murky magical power leaked from its body.

There was a reason Koite had charged as much as one million eight hundred thousand points. Through this dream, she might be able to reach the 7th floor.

Thinking about it that way, this might actually be cheap. If I could raise my floor like this, I would have invested that many points too.

Tending to a dream was also tending to one’s own inner self and soul. In that sense, Lumira wanted to place the things inside herself into puppets.

Those puppets contained the hesitation, anger, and questions that existed within her. So what was bound to that puppet could be called a kind of inner demon that Lumira carried.

She would fight it, then kill that inner demon with her own hands and further solidify her realm. That was the reason this dream was being carried out.

In this way, Dream Theater could even artificially grant realization through dreams. Of course, as with Lumira, it would only be effective for those who were already prepared. Still, simply providing that kind of foothold was incredible.

I quietly nodded. This was a very interesting method. To think magic could be used like this too. I glanced at Koite. I could fully understand why he had been able to establish himself on the upper floors.

Koite seemed to notice my gaze and looked at me. Then he grinned and raised his thumb.

“Very good. Maybe it’s because a bit of ego is mixed in, but the puppet adapted well too. Other people can’t make puppets like this.”

“You flatter me.”

I gave a small bitter laugh. As he said, the way I formed a puppet’s ego was a little different from other people’s methods. Others usually awakened an ego by putting in careful effort over time.

They created a single puppet by using expensive materials and complex magic. But I did not need to go through such a complicated process. I only had to tear off a piece of my tree and plant it inside the puppet.

If Koite heard about that puppet-making process, he would definitely see me as a madman. Other puppeteers would be the same. No matter how much of a puppeteer someone was, they would not cut up that tree and plant it into a puppet.

I placed a hand on my chest. Of course, even I thought it was crazy. But thanks to that, I had been able to surpass my limits. Despite my lack of talent, I had reached the Young Tree realm very quickly.

Gaining realization was that difficult. So this too must have been flowing in the direction Koite intended. I looked at the crystal ball and gave a small nod.

“If the process of defeating an inner demon is simple, the realization must be shallow too. So I suppose you arranged the story with that kind of structure. I didn’t know my puppet could move like that.”

At my words, Koite tilted his head slightly. He lightly jerked his chin toward the crystal ball. He meant that I should look at it. The scene was that interesting.

Inside the crystal ball, Lumira drew a magic circle and poured out all sorts of magic. But the puppet facing her chewed up and swallowed every spell. The puppet let out a low growl, then rushed at her.

Lumira quickly wrapped herself in protective magic, but even that magic was torn to shreds beneath the puppet’s claws. She was caught by the puppet, and her neck snapped.

At the same time, her eyes turned hazy. She had experienced death once. It was only possible because this was a dream. She must have had to overcome that kind of pain to gain realization.

The puppet threw her body aside. Her body bounced across the floor a few times, then gradually began to blur. Scattering like mist, she was suddenly standing at the tower entrance.

Lumira felt around her neck and collapsed where she stood. Then she let out a dry cough. Watching her, Koite blinked.

“What was that?”

It took quite a long time for Lumira to gather herself. She took another deep breath and entered the tower again. Then she built up even stronger magic than before and poured it at the puppet.

And once again, the puppet snapped her neck.

Her magic did not work properly on the puppet. Koite’s expression stiffened as he watched.

He slowly turned his head and looked at me. I could see his eyes shaking wildly. The agitation inside him was plain to see.

“Why is that puppet so strong? The first floor is supposed to be something you just pass.”

At those words, I blinked too. That had not been what he intended? I looked at the puppet inside the crystal ball. It was once again throwing Lumira’s corpse away. She returned to the entrance of the tower.

The puppet let out a long howl. Watching it, I lightly scratched my head. It seemed my thinking had been wrong. If he had not intended that, then something had clearly gone wrong. No wonder I had a bad feeling.

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