WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Surviving in the Magic Academy

Chapter 132

──────

Dreams were things that vanished in an instant. Like bubbles. Lumira’s dream was no different. But cleaning up after that dream turned out to be a fairly complicated process.

I gave the room a quick look. Even though Lumira, the owner of the dream, had already left, traces of the dream born from her still lingered in the room, giving off murky magical power.

Those traces wavered between the circuits that formed the magic circle leading into the dream. Koite looked at the impurities and let out a small sigh. It seemed this was not the time to bring up my dream yet.

“This is why preparing a huge dream like this is such a pain. I have to make the magic circle all over again.”

Koite stretched out a finger and gestured here and there. Magical power rippled from his fingertip and spread in every direction. The puppets that received that magical power slowly woke from their sleep.

At Koite’s signal, the puppets slowly approached the magic circle. Then they carefully began dismantling it. Koite directed each of their movements with delicate precision.

Under his command, the magic circle was torn apart in the blink of an eye. By the end, the entire room had been neatly cleaned up. It was extremely efficient work.

After finishing the whole process, Koite headed toward the place where the coffin had been. He gently rummaged through it and took out a large orb. When he saw it, he smiled in satisfaction.

It seemed to be Lumira’s dream. Koite examined it from different angles, then nodded and looked at us. Then he gave us a bright, beaming smile. He seemed to be in a good mood after finishing everything successfully.

“Now, now, this room needs to be rebuilt, so let’s head out, friends.”

He lightly patted his belly and laughed heartily. Then he began walking with light steps. His easy confidence showed in that brisk gait. He stopped by the door and looked back at us.

“What are you doing? Come on. I’ll show you somewhere you can rest properly. The work is done, so let’s all relax a bit. And if there’s anything to talk about, we can talk.”

He jerked his chin toward us. Mira leaned slightly against me. I gave Koite a small nod, then guided Mira toward the door. He chuckled and left the room first.

The place he led us to was a room located in the deepest part of the theater building. He opened the door and stepped inside without hesitation. I followed him into the room.

I looked around. Pure magical power flowed from the many valuables decorating the walls and ceiling, and every piece of furniture in the room gave off an air of luxury.

At a glance, it looked like an office. I glanced at the enormous sofas in the middle of the room. Looking at those, it also seemed like a lounge. Either way, it was definitely Koite’s room.

He tossed off the robe he had been wearing. The many ornaments attached to it clattered. It was the ceremonial robe he had worn to deal with Lumira.

Now dressed comfortably, he sprawled out on the long sofa. After sinking his whole body into it, he gestured lightly toward us. He pointed at another sofa across from him and grinned.

“Sit down. Just relax.”

I nodded and headed to the sofa with Mira. Then I leaned back against it. The pleasant texture wrapped around my body. There was a reason Koite had melted into it like that.

Still sprawled out, Koite clapped his hands lightly. The door opened, and a puppet came inside. I glanced at it.

It was a familiar woman-shaped puppet. Perhaps Koite had not changed its clothes yet, because the rabbit ears sticking up from its head twitched lightly. It was carrying a small tray. On top of it was a single bottle.

The puppet smoothly turned the bottle and opened it. A pleasant fragrance began spreading through the room. The puppet poured it into glasses and set them on the table for us.

A shimmering red color caught my eye. Was it wine? Koite lifted his glass without hesitation and gulped it down. Then he gave a light burp and let out a pleased laugh.

“Now then, everyone, have a glass.”

As he said that, Koite held out his glass. I lifted mine as well and lightly clinked it against his. Mira smelled the fragrance and smiled faintly.

“Oh my, what a lovely scent.”

“It’s a celebratory drink. A celebratory drink. So drink as much as you want! It’s expensive.”

“Hoho, then I won’t hold back.”

Mira quietly brought the glass to her lips. Then she smiled softly with her eyes. I also took a small sip of the wine and nodded.

His claim that it was expensive was certainly no lie. I did not really know the proper way to drink wine, but the intense flavor rushed over the tip of my tongue. Its heavy body richly filled my mouth.

It did not even need food to go with it. The flavor was already incredible on its own. The slightly bitter aroma within the sweetness brought the taste to life even more. Admiring that smooth yet intense flavor, I began sipping from the glass.

The warm magical power from the alcohol heated my body just right. Along with it, the atmosphere of the room seemed to grow a little warmer too. I let the tension leave my body and sank deep into the sofa, just like Koite had.

As I rested and let time drift by, the haziness I had felt inside the dream faded quite a bit. I glanced at Koite. He was drinking the wine with a brilliant smile.

Maybe this was why he was making us rest like this. We needed to fully pull ourselves out of the dream, just as Lumira had. We had been inside that dream too, after all. As I sipped the alcohol, my mind gradually cleared.

“Ah, this feels fantastic. This job ended well too.”

Koite said that and lightly patted his belly. The sound was truly cheerful. He seemed to be in quite a good mood. That must have meant this dream had brought him a great deal of profit.

“How much will you earn from this? Seeing you so happy makes me curious.”

I asked with a slight shrug. It was something I had suddenly wondered. He also seemed to have been waiting for me to ask. At my words, Koite grinned broadly. He raised his thumb and nodded.

“Of course you’d be curious. Yes, naturally. After subtracting the cost of raw materials, roughly one and a half million? Ehehe, good. The points are piling up.”

My eyes widened at that. It was that profitable? I smacked my lips lightly. The smell of gold had wafted right up to the tip of my nose.

If I could do something like him, I thought, then shook my head. This Dream Theater was only possible because it was Koite. The unique magic he had as a dream demon was the source that formed that world.

Unique magic, huh. I lightly stroked my chin. Even so, I wondered if I could find some way to make something work. Just as he built a world through dreams, I had something similar too. My shadow tree.

Well, that was a dream in itself. I shook my head. If it were that easy to make, others would have already tried it. My own skill was lacking too.

“I’ll set aside a little for you too, so don’t worry. You worked hard playing the fairy in the dream, so I should repay you.”

Koite said that and chuckled. A fairy, huh. So he was bringing that up again. Mira put down her glass and began giggling beside me. She glanced at me, then smiled with her eyes.

“Hoho, Lumira’s face was quite something when it was revealed that Ian was actually Evron.”

Mira laughed lightly, her eyes sparkling. I scratched my head a little. I remembered how shocked Lumira had looked. Had it really been shocking enough for that reaction? I had only done my best.

Koite, who had been chuckling for a while, set down his glass and finally stopped laughing. He turned his gaze toward me and sank deeper into the sofa.

“Well, there will have to be a slight deduction. I don’t know the exact cause, but a problem did occur. It’s a good thing you handled the cleanup well.”

He glanced at me. I lowered my head slightly at that. If we traced the cause, this incident ultimately came down to a problem with my puppet. He seemed to have noticed to some extent that something was off with my puppet as well.

“Still, it was resolved well, so let’s end it here. It was fun too....”

After saying that much, he fell into thought and began stroking the flesh under his chin. Soon, he nodded and clapped his hands lightly. Then he grinned and tapped the table.

“Thinking about it again, it isn’t bad. A puppet that overcomes the owner of a dream by eating an inner demon. You don’t see that every day. Designing a dream in the form of an arena could work too.”

He took a piece of paper from inside his clothes and began writing and sketching on it. After filling the entire sheet, he tucked it back away and smiled in satisfaction. Then he looked straight at me.

“So that’s why I’m saying this. You should join our business now too. You’ve experienced it once, so you understand, right? You have talent for this work. You can claim a place here too.”

My reflection was clearly captured in his eyes as he said that. They were eyes soaked in greed. Claim a place here, huh. I looked around lightly. The dazzling gleam of expensive items entered my eyes.

“Hoho, that sounds fun too.”

Mira said while leaning against me. The scent of wine hung heavily around her. Seeing her eyes sparkle faintly, I gave a small smile. It seemed she had become interested in dreams.

That was only natural. She had enjoyed herself thoroughly in this dream, after all. She had eaten me, and she had eaten Lumira too. Even if it had been fake, she had satisfied that hunger, so of course she would be pleased.

Looking at them, I lightly shook my head. Preparing for this job had been fairly exhausting. I had to keep going back and forth between the tower and the city.

Of course, if I stayed only in the city, it would have been a tempting offer. But I had to assist Professor by her side. That was the contract, and it was also my own will now.

“Unfortunately, I have duties I must handle as well. So I will look forward to another chance next time. If there is anything you need help with, please tell me. I will gladly help. This job started from a request like that too.”

“Well, I figured as much. Come anytime. If you can’t come, then the puppet beside you, no, Mira, can come by herself.”

Koite said that and gave Mira a slight wink. Mira smiled faintly at him, her eyes sparkling.

“Oh my, that does interest me. Evron hasn’t been paying attention to me lately, you see. He always goes looking for Professor, so I’m truly sad.”

Hoho, Mira laughed and lightly raised her wine glass. She gently swirled it. Koite lightly touched his glass to hers. With the clear ring of glass, the two of them laughed softly.

Looking at Mira, I frowned slightly. Having only Mira come here was a fairly good idea if I only considered the points. As she had shown in today’s dream, she had an excellent talent for handling dreams.

But I felt my chest churn slightly at the idea. That faintly wavering emotion was jealousy, or perhaps possessiveness. She was my puppet, after all. Realizing that, I gave a small bitter smile.

Maybe this was why the other people in the guild did not join him. Having to put one’s puppet into dreams tailored to other people’s tastes. What a horrifying thing that would be.

If I had not known the plan in advance this time, I would have hesitated to participate until the very end. No matter how important checking my dream was, my puppet was just as important.

Seeing me frown like that, Mira laughed lightly. Then she held out her wine glass to me. I accepted it and drank a little.

“Hoho, it was a joke. How cute, getting jealous like that.”

Mira kept laughing as she looked at me. I could clearly see the mischievous look gathered around the corners of her mouth. She lightly hooked her arm around mine. Looking at her, I let out a small sigh.

More importantly, dreams. I blinked slightly. There was something I had forgotten for a moment while drinking. Since the thought had come up, I should bring that matter up too. I quietly looked at Koite.

Koite was tilting his glass while watching us. Feeling my gaze, he turned his head toward me. I lowered my head to him slightly. It was time to receive the reward for the hard work I had done earlier, and for that request.

“I would like to talk about my dream now.”

Koite blinked at those words. Then he sank deeper into the sofa. He put down his glass and crossed his arms.

“I was wondering when you’d bring that up. Your dream, right. Hmm, that will take some time. Roughly a week. There are some things I need to prepare.”

I stared at him. A week, huh. That was long enough to wait. The reason I brought up my dream was simple. I now had a clear reason to enter it.

I lightly placed a hand on my chest. Koite had said it before. While talking about my dream, he had said something else was mixed into me, or something along those lines. He had been right.

It was a clue I had gained while analyzing the puppets in Lumira’s dream. There was something in my tree, or perhaps in my soul. Some reason I was so easily swept away by desire and obsession.

I could not enter that realm of the soul by myself. Only by receiving Koite’s help and using that dream could I go deep into my own depths. Lumira’s inner demon had been engraved into that kind of soul too, after all.

Come to think of it, there was something I needed to ask him. At the sudden thought, I lightly snapped my fingers a few times and spoke.

“Come to think of it, didn’t you say you had noticed something about the source of my obsession? That if you dug a little deeper, you felt you might understand. Could you tell me what it is?”

Koite scratched his head at my question. I saw him lift his glass and give an awkward smile. Then he quietly began avoiding my gaze.

“That was just something I said to tempt you. Back then, I was in a hurry to deal with the dream, you know. I had to keep you there somehow.”

And I resolved it like this! He added that and burst into loud laughter. What? Then it had been empty words with no meaning at all? When my face stiffened, he quietly waved a hand.

“Well, that was a joke, so relax your face. Still, I do know roughly. I do. Dreams are my specialty, after all.”

Koite said that and raised a finger. Then he pointed it lightly at my chest. His finger circled around that area, then bent like a hook and made a light knocking gesture. Tap, tap.

“Did I mention this before? A dream only has one anchor. But there were far too many anchors inside you. That’s what’s strange. So I thought about it for a while.”

He paused for a moment. At those words, I placed a hand on my chest. The anchors inside me, huh. I immediately understood what that meant. It was about what I had seen in the dream I had accepted here as a trial version before.

That memory was still vivid in my mind. Of course it was. It had been a very impressive dream. The sight of a place filled with Professor was not something I could erase even if I tried.

Even more so when each Professor had been wearing all kinds of outfits and showing off different charms. I glanced at the puppet standing behind Koite. That rabbit costume was something that had come from my dream.

I liked that outfit quite a bit too. I nodded. Right, what if I managed Professor’s outfits too? If I had the chance next time, it would not be bad to have Professor personally wear an outfit like that at least once!

Then I flinched. Ahem, ahem. It seemed my obsession had surged for a moment. I carefully gathered my scattered mind. Then I gave a small bitter smile.

This was also why I wanted to get rid of my obsession. I could clearly feel the process of my actions being stained by obsession. The more this repeated, the harder it became to have confidence in my own actions.

No matter what I did, I would inevitably begin suspecting that it had come from my obsession. That was fatal for a mage, whose strong self-conviction became the driving force of growth. So I needed to resolve this problem.

Koite stroked the flesh under his chin and lifted himself slightly. Then he took out a piece of paper and placed it on the table. He began drawing several hooks on it.

He drew around fifty hooks in total. Then he tied them all together in a large circle. Looking down at it, he patted his belly and spoke.

“If this many anchors are gathered together, it means the connection between those anchors is extremely strong. I also met eyes with the being that dropped those anchors from beyond the crystal ball. If so, that means there’s a window connecting those anchors.”

He glanced at me. Then he continued.

“I think that’s you. You know, since they all appeared in Professor’s form. I don’t know how exactly your insides are structured. The ones inside would know that best. So you just need to meet them.”

It was a very vague explanation. So vague that it was hard to understand. Perhaps noticing my reaction, Koite chuckled and tapped the paper.

“Well, to sum it up roughly, it means there are as many things connected to your dream as there are anchors. Whether they’re wraiths or spirits. The things you met in the dream were those kinds of beings. Your abnormality probably comes from them too.”

I blinked at those words. Koite looked me up and down with curious eyes. Then he lightly tilted his head. He muttered, “You don’t look like it on the outside,” and shrugged.

“Well, that’s why I thought a lot about your dream too. About what form I should build it in.”

“Oh my, a dream? What an interesting topic. If it is Evron’s dream, I am interested too. I can enter it as well, right?”

Mira asked Koite with sparkling eyes. Koite glanced at Mira, then shook his head slightly. Mira puffed out her cheeks a little in displeasure.

“Why? I am his puppet, yet I cannot enter his dream?”

“That’s because only one person can enter this dream. That guy’s dream can’t be made into something like the play from before.”

After saying that, Koite glanced at me. Then he added.

“There are two kinds of dreams I make.”

As he said that, he crossed his arms. Then he raised two fingers, folded one of them, and continued.

“The first is the play you saw earlier. Since I plan it from beginning to end, it’s safe and easy to control. It’s the method I prefer.”

After briefly stopping, Koite folded the second finger, shook his fist, and tapped the table. Then he shrugged.

“But your dream is strange, so if you fall deep enough to explore your soul like Lumira did, I won’t be able to touch it. It’ll be hard to watch through the crystal ball too. So you have to explore the dream yourself. That’s the second method.”

I quietly looked at Mira. She was looking at me with eyes dripping with disappointment. It seemed she had really wanted to see my dream.

But was there some problem with me wandering through my dream alone? When I looked at Koite with that question, he lightly scratched the flesh under his chin.

“Well, dreams are basically irregular. I don’t know what dangers there might be in a wild dream like that. So it’s not a bad idea to prepare several safety measures. That’s also why I asked for four hundred thousand points before.”

After saying that much, he clapped his hands lightly. At that signal, the rabbit-eared puppet brought over the tray again and placed another bottle of wine on the table. Koite poured the wine into a glass and waved a hand.

“Well, let’s stop talking about dreams here. One week. During that time, I’ll prepare everything so you can dream properly. For now, let’s just drink this. We should rest as much as we worked today.”

Koite lifted his glass and gulped down all the wine inside it in one go. A powerful will to avoid talking about work radiated from him. I gave a small laugh and lifted my glass too.

After enjoying the wine so grandly, it did not take long to return to the tower. Mira quietly looked up at the tower. She lightly shook out her body and smiled warmly at me.

“Hoho, it has been a while since I came to the tower.”

“I suppose it has.”

I said that and nodded. For the past month, she had been away from the tower. I had been losing my mind going back and forth between the Dream Theater where she was and the tower. Still, I could not afford to leave the tower empty.

“It was truly fun. As Koite said, shall we go again next time?”

Mira said that and stretched widely. Watching her, I lightly scratched my chin. She had said it casually, but I was a little worried she really would visit the Dream Theater again.

Well, if she said she was going of her own free will, I would not stop her. She had free will too. Separate from that thought, a slight discomfort bloomed in my chest.

Perhaps it had shown on my face, because Mira gave me a mischievous smile. She looked ready to tease me. She leaned slightly against me and smiled with her eyes.

“Hoho, do not worry. Staying beside Evron like this is more fun than that dream. Then I will go organize my belongings now.”

After saying that, Mira lightly tapped my chest, then opened the tower door and went inside. I also followed her up the tower. Professor’s door was still firmly locked.

Like that, daily life in the tower slowly began to flow again. Amid those days, a week passed in no time. Had it really been a week? At noon that day, a delivery mage came to see me.

He delivered Koite’s letter. Inside, it said that every dream was ready, and all I had to do was come. Holding that letter, I stood up. Now it was time to enter my dream.

---

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried