WETRIED TRANSLATIONS

Wizard of the Abyss

[Translator – Aren]

Chapter 15 - Adoption (6)

Ciel could hardly believe her own eyes.

"I shall return in the evening. I might not be here, so don’t wait for me.”

"...Please wait a moment.”

"Hmm?"

Just as Dercia was about to open the door to leave, she turned to Ciel, question marks in her eyes.

"Did I leave anything behind? I doubt I did.”

"That’s not it, but…”

Ciel trailed off, her eyes wandering over Dercia’s attire.

She wore a mixture of dark blue silk that seemed to embody her, trimmed with laces of unknown origin, giving a slight personal touch.

It was quite the ordinary attire meant for outings. Indeed, for outings.

'She’s going out on her own accord?'

That was impossible. Even if the sky were to fall, she was sure that Dercia would stay holed up in her chambers, practicing her magic, unless someone resorted to physical means.

So Ciel, using her expertise as a seasoned maid, took what could have been understood as incredibly rude no matter who said it and softened it as best she could.

"To be honest, I thought the only close friends Milady had were the mold growing in the corner of your room. I’m quite sure you aren’t going out to meet up with anyone, so just where are you planning on going?”

"How incredibly rude. I’m just going to the library.”

"Didn’t you once say that you have already read every single book you could find in the nearby libraries?”

"History is the constant accumulation of records. So as time marches on, books tend to multiply.”

"I believe there are very few that would actually even start to pique your interest, Lady Dercia.”

"Haah..."

At that point, Dercia, having noticed Ciel’s extremely anxious gaze, realized that this would take a while, so she slipped off her shoes.

Reassuring her loyal head maid was part of a master’s duty after all.

"What exactly are you trying to say?”

Ciel hesitated for about three seconds before asking the question that bothered her the most.

"Is it a man?”

"?"

"No, I misspoke. Who are you meeting?”

"Is that something you need to know? Wasn’t it you who told me to go out and meet people to begin with?”

"I just wondered whether someone might be deceiving you, considering that your social skills are abysmal, Lady Dercia.”

"...I merely stumbled upon something rather interesting. It’s nothing more than an extension of my interest in magic.”

The corners of Dercia’s lips twitched slightly as she spoke.

A hint of anticipation, curiosity, and an almost unnerving hunger for knowledge.

Ciel was certain.

'So it was a man.'

Of course, she didn’t actually say that out loud. Instead, she slightly veiled her intentions, wearing a concerned expression, as she asked further.

"I see. But since you’ve been meeting them every day, they must be quite the interesting person, or rather, subject.”

"No."

Dercia shook her head.

"We don't meet every day. In fact, he hasn’t come around at all lately. I’ve been doing nothing but wait for him in the library, reading.”

"...!"

That was completely unexpected. Ciel fell silent, completely stunned.

That Dercia Aspandil was waiting for someone?

She couldn’t even imagine it. Ciel, staggering slightly, cautiously phrased her next question so as not to offend her master.

"But even so, if there is no promise between you…”

"There is."

Dercia answered with great conviction, fixing her eyes on the door.

"He will come to me on his own soon.”

* * *

"What the… He’s playing roulette like it’s a lottery?”

"Does he have that much money? No, that can’t be, right…?”

The dealer, shocked by the sudden call for an all-in, looked up all of a sudden. Not at us, but whoever was watching us from above.

He was probably waiting for some kind of signal from the second floor.

I didn’t even bother turning to check, since that would do nothing but raise suspicion.

Instead, I simply told the director to just go for it.

"Hurry up and spin it already.”

“Ah… Understood, sir!”

Perhaps because he had received the confirmation he had been waiting for, the dealer finally spun the wheel with slightly trembling hands.

Even a normal roulette wheel already had a measly probability of 1 in 36.

But they most definitely rigged it in a way that the probability was even lower.

As I expected. The ball rolled toward another number as if attracted to it.

'Are they doing it with a magnet or something?'

I couldn’t know for sure. And I didn’t need to. What mattered was that the ball was filled with water.

And I hadn’t actually learned any water spells.

Since I had something far better.

-Click.

The ball slowly drifted toward the number 21, spinning in complete sync with the roulette wheel.

"..."

"..."

The entire gambling den fell silent.

"It hit?"

"...It actually landed on it?”

"Wait, just what—"

"That sure was lucky, wasn’t it? I’ll be taking the chips.”

I moved faster than anyone else.

The first thing I did was sweep all the chips into the sack I had brought along.

I even used some magic to speed things up.

This absurdly lucky-seeming win was only the beginning. Now came the hard part.

"Master, how about exchanging these chips for money?”

"Ah, very well.”

I whispered to the director and sent him towards the exchange counter.

They wouldn’t just hand the cash over right away, so it was on me to buy some time.

"...Cheating!"

Suddenly, a loud voice erupted from the second floor.

A bald man, his skin flushed red, came stomping down the stairs, huffing. The moment he stood before me, he almost jabbed his finger in my face and shouted.

"What did you do to the machine, you brat?!”

"...?"

I just stared at the dealer with more bewilderment than anger.

First of all, it was him who did something to the roulette wheel. I didn’t even lay a hand on it.

And even if he suspected that there was some tampering involved, shouldn’t he be complaining to my master, not me?

Tilting my head in puzzlement, I tried to ask as innocently as possible.

"Might I ask why you’re saying that? Is there some sort of problem…?”

"A problem? Aren’t you quite the shameless one, little con artist?”

Hearing that, I asked him again, in a louder voice, not even bothering to hide my true nature now.

"If you’re going to accuse us of cheating, how about you explain how exactly we supposedly did that?”

"Obviously, you...!"

However, he couldn’t say anything more.

Of course, he couldn’t. We didn’t actually touch the roulette wheel after all. The dealer was the one to spin it and call the winning numbers.

Even the world’s greatest gambler couldn’t tamper with a roulette wheel without touching it even once. Unless they could use magic.

So the bald man, who obviously couldn’t answer my question, only glared at me with burning frustration.

I deliberately raised my voice to make sure that everyone around us could hear.

"I really don’t know why you’re acting like this… It was you guys who set everything up, spun the wheel, and announced the winning number, right? All we did was bet on the number that happened to win, so isn’t it quite unfair for you to accuse us of cheating?”

"Yeah, how is this cheating? I mean, it was surprising, but this just looks like luck to me.”

"How would they even rig it from over there? Unless they bribed the dealer or something.”

"...Tsk."

The bald man, noticing the reactions of those around us, clenched his teeth and tightened his fist, before forcing a twisted smile onto his face.

It seemed like he realized that if he pushed this any further, he risked losing all the gullible suckers he’d worked so hard to bait.

But even with that realization, he made sure to leave us one last whisper, steeped in venomous spite.

"... I will see you later."

Yeah, sure. How about you don’t? I’d be more than happy not to see you again for the rest of my life.

But still, why was he so fixated on me and ignored the director, who was the one actually cashing out?

"..."

It might be because he thought I was the easier target, but—

Something about all this made me feel unsettled.

I hurriedly activated my Tide Sense to check that guy’s movements.

It seemed like he had gone back to the second floor, but that was fine. For some reason I was in freakishly good shape today, so I could see him clearly even from the ground.

No. More like feel, I guess

'...What the hell is happening?’

I had noticed that my range and precision were slowly getting better and better, but now they had suddenly improved to a shocking degree.

Not long after activating it, I could see the entire gambling hall in my mind, as if I were hovering above it.

It really was absurd. I was able to see dice games being played dozens of meters away and feel the dice tolling inside the bowl.

I didn’t think it’d be right, but—

'3, 6, 2.'

“And the result is…3! 6! 2! Congratulations to Player Number 3, you have won.”

"Hell yeah! That’s what I’m talking about!!”

I actually got it right.

Still feeling quite flustered about all that, I moved my focus back to the second floor. It was just in time for me to see the bald guy pull out some kind of artifact from his pocket and issue some commands.

Of course, I couldn't hear what he was saying, but I managed to somewhat grasp some of it by reading the movements of his lips.

"Natural, can, magic. Prepare, capture, careful…”

...

No way… Could that bastard…?

Those words couldn’t be interpreted any other way. A chill running down my spine, I approached the director.

He was still standing there, slightly bewildered, clutching a bag full of silver coins.

"Master, no, director.”

"Ah, huh. Ahem—"

"Forget about acting. That much money should be more than enough, so let’s just get out of here right now.”

"...Huh? What’s the matter?”

"I'll explain later.”

That bald bastard.

He somehow knew that I was a wizard.

Ah. That explained it, right? That was why he spoke directly to me, ignoring the director. If the wheel had been tampered with, I, a wizard, would have been the one to have done it.

He didn’t seem to know what kind of magic I could use. Or maybe filling the balls with water had been some kind of precaution against it.

...No, this wasn’t the time to be analyzing this stuff.

I was that bastard’s target. And I was pretty sure nothing good would come of it if he managed to catch me.

"Where are you going in such a hurry, sir?”

Just as we made our way toward the door, the bald guy appeared before us, effectively blocking our way out, scowling at the director.

"I-I just felt like leaving. Is that a problem?”

The director still managed to sound quite firm despite the slight trembling in his voice, but it was all for naught.

"Yes. It seems you haven’t received all the money we owe you yet. Since we have no more cash at hand, we would like to ask you to wait for a while longer. It won’t take long.”

"No, I am leaving now.”

"That won’t do.”

The bald man flashed us a vile grin.

At the same time, his employees quietly moved to surround us.

It seemed like it was my turn.

"Haah..."

I took a deep breath.

Up until now, my currents hadn’t really affected humans that much. At best, I was able to tug on their clothes a little.

But today things seemed to be a bit different.

They had already found out that I was a wizard somehow. And for some reason it seemed like my condition was incredibly great right now—

"My apologies, but we are in quite the hurry.”

I took a step forward, meeting the bald man’s gaze.

"Could you please let us pass?”

"Hah..."

Seeing the guy scoff at my absurd words, I wasted no time and let my currents surge.

-Shhrrrrrrrk!

I had invisible hands made of water seize his entire body from each direction—up, down, left, and right.

"...!"

The bald man had his mouth fall open in shock at the sudden pressure crushing his body, but I made sure to clamp it shut for him.

After that, he only trembled slightly, remaining completely motionless.

I mean, I made it impossible for him to do anything else after all.

"...Sir Crain?”

So that was his name.

The guy who looked like the floor manager, bewildered by his sudden stillness, tried calling out to him, so I hastily added something to my earlier words.

"Would you be so kind?”

Confusion was swirling in Crain’s eyes as he felt his head slowly nodding, completely unable to comprehend what was going on here. I was the one who made him do it.

"S-sir Crain?!”

And I didn’t stop there.

Though still trembling, Crain raised his hand and gestured toward the door, as if he was politely seeing us out.

Still completely silent.

"Ah, thank you very much.”

I smiled warmly, thanked him, and guided the still-bewildered-looking director out of the gambling den.

The employees let us go without resistance, even though they felt that something was very wrong here, since Crain himself had made this decision.

The instant we stepped outside, I felt my heart pounding wildly in my chest.

"...Good."

I honestly didn’t expect this to work.

But it had gone even more perfectly than I could have ever imagined.

I clenched and unclenched my right hand, feeling the intoxicating rush of omnipotence that seemed to boil my brain.

I felt something close to invincibility.

"J-Jern? What just happened?”

I snapped out of it.

"I think we’re pretty much fucked. We need to get out of here as fast as possible.”

I could still maintain that pressure, but it wouldn’t last much longer.

At those words, the director clapped a hand over his mouth.

"Wait… Jern!”

"Don’t worry too much though. I’ve already planned out our escape route…”

"Where did you learn such bad words?! That’s truly awful. Don’t ever use it again.”

"..."

Saying such things in this kind of situation was really… How should I put it?

Very much like the director.

* * *

We rushed through the city’s alleys as I felt a growing sense of danger gnawing at me.

The range of my Tide Sense had widened by hundreds of meters. While it was quite useful for now, quite honestly, it was utterly terrifying.

'...There’s no way this is normal, no matter how I think about it.’

Something was very wrong here. I was sure of it.

I hadn’t planned on using these powers so recklessly, but the situation didn’t really allow me to hold back.

It had been 30 minutes, and those guys seemed to show no signs of giving up.

"Huff, huff… Jern, how much farther?”

"I think this is enough. We’re safe for now.”

I handed the director the bag of silver coins and pointed to another alley.

"If you head straight that way, you’ll reach the main road. Just take off that disguise and head back to the orphanage.”

"...And what about you?”

"Ah, I have someone to meet. Don’t worry about it too much.”

The director would only get in the way.

"Thank you for your hard work today. Go get some rest, and make sure to pay off those debts first. I’m off.”

"Ah, Jern…!”

Hearing the director’s words, I left, taking multiple different alleys.

If I didn’t take care of those guys, they’d just keep trying to follow me. So I had to do something about it now.

Annoying bastards.

When I reached a narrow alley leading to a dead end, I made the currents stir around me as I lay in wait. Soon enough I heard some shouting.

"There he is! We found him!”

"What? Where, where?!”

Crain, his bald head flushed red, stood behind a gang of thugs holding swords.

I smirked as I greeted them.

"We meet again. Why’d you bring all these guys just to catch one little kid? How scary.”

"How dare you humiliate me, you little shit?!”

It seemed like getting pinned down by water pressure had wounded his pride quite a bit. He looked about ready to rip me into tiny pieces, but I kept my calm.

"Let me ask you one thing, though. How did you know that I was a wizard? It’s not like I used some kind of spell for you to see.”

"...What?"

Crain looked at me in disbelief before spitting on the ground.

"Stop playing dumb, brat. You expect me to believe that one of those Crimson Abyss bastards doesn’t even know what a mana circle trace is? Even if you’re just some idiot borrowing their name, that’s just absurd.”

"Crimson what?”

"Drop the act. A kid your age pulling off this kind of stunt… There’s no way that you aren’t a Crimson Abyss bastard.”

Huh.

I didn’t really know what that guy was talking about, but I felt like ‘mana circle trace’ and ‘Crimson Abyss’ would be quite useful keywords.

I’d figure out what they meant later. For now, I had all the information I needed, so I simply waved my hand.

"Fine then. Go on your way. I won’t bother chasing you.”

"Looks like you’ve lost your goddamn mind. Don’t let that one successful ambush get to your head. You really think I went after you without a plan?”

Crain let out booming laughter, pulled out a strange-looking flask along with his sword, and smashed it against the ground.

-Craaaash! The glass shattered instantly, letting out some blue smoke.

"Why don’t you try using your fancy magic now, you stupid brat?”

Faced with that guy's sudden confidence, I felt an ominous feeling rise within me. I tried to create a current, and it worked without any problem.

“...”

I tried to use some wind magic as well, just in case, but nothing happened.

Feeling a bit startled, I asked:

"Just what is that? It’s not working.”

"It’s a trap made for third-rate naturals like you. What’s wrong? You’re nothing without your fancy magic tricks, aren’t you?”

Seeming certain of his victory now, Crain spat out taunts laced with clear malice.

"Seems like you want some information? Fine, I’ll tell you what miserable fate awaits you. Naturals like you will become nothing but stud horses, destined to rut every single day of your damn life. You’ll impregnate dozens of women, all hungry for mage’s blood, multiple times a day.”

"...What?"

"But don’t worry too much. You won’t die. We’ll assign you doctors to keep you nice and healthy, and you’ll only be given the best food, so you’ll live a long life. Just one shut away from the outside world…”

Hmm.

Should I just let myself get caught and not use magic?

While I was seriously considering that option, Crain chuckled.

"Of course, to stop you from ever even trying to run away, we’ll cut off your limbs first.”

"You should have started with that…”

What a waste of thought.

Sighing, I stirred the currents.

To be honest, I wasn’t that confident that I could take on dozens of grown men. Avoiding this fight would have been the smarter option, and an entirely possible one, at that.

But—my whole body was almost vibrating with exhilaration, which made me more inclined to make some rather reckless decisions.

Just how far could I go now?

I really wanted to find that out.

"We’ve got quite the high-quality coagulants and bandages ready for you, so just stay sti—!”

Crain’s words were instantly cut off.

Bam—! Since he was slammed into a nearby wall with enough force to crack the stone and knock him completely unconscious.

"...S-sir Crain!”

That was simple. I just grabbed him with the current and tossed him.

That alone was enough to crack the wall.

How should I even adjust my strength here? As I was troubled by such thoughts, his loyal men charged at me with their swords raised.

"He might know some combat magic, but he’s still just a kid!”

"Just one stab and he’ll die! No big deal!”

Well, they weren’t wrong.

"H-huh…? I can’t get close…”

"What are you doing? I’m standing right here.”

Their blades never even got close enough to me, though.

Before they could even touch a hair on my body, they slowed, then bounced off.

I had wrapped myself in a strong current. One strong enough that even those grown men wouldn’t be able to cut through it.

"...Then what about this?!”

A man with a spear roared as he stabbed at me.

He wouldn’t be able to break through the current either, but just to show how useless that endeavor was, I snatched his weapon.

"There we go."

The thug, whose spear I had just ripped from his hands, stared blankly as it spun through the air.

Remembering the times I had twirled around pens at school, I made it spin a few more times in the air before tossing it to the ground.

Thud! The shaft buried itself deep in the ground.

"..."

"Does anyone else want to try?”

"Uuugh..."

It seemed they weren’t loyal enough to keep challenging what was pretty much impossible to beat, so they all backed away one after the other, taking Crain with them.

"This was pretty fun.”

I chuckled, picking up a broken piece of wall and juggling it in the air using the current.

How did I become this strong even though I hadn’t done a single thing?

If things kept going at this rate, maybe there was some hope.

'Hope against what?'

It was quite the strange question that just popped into my head.

Against the abyssal sea, of course.

Against this deep abyss, by wielding its very power…

-Drip, drip.

"...Huh?"

I felt the world around me darken.

It was as if an eclipse had suddenly plunged the world into oppressive darkness.

Like I was staring through heavily tinted glass.

"..."

I carefully reached for my face.

I could feel something hot and wet flowing from the corners of my eyes.

When I looked at my palm, I saw that it was soaked in crimson liquid.

—Tears of blood were endlessly flowing down my face.

"Ah..."

That feeling of omnipotence completely left my body long ago.

Another sensation took its place instead.

My arms felt heavy.

...No, not heavy.

It felt like every motion was met with a slight resistance.

As if my whole body had been dragged underwater.

I’m sorry, director, but—

"...Am I screwed?”

It seemed like that time had finally come.

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