Black Badger

Chapter 409: Fifty Years (2)

The last thing I’d seen—Kyle’s golden eyes—wouldn’t leave my mind.

Those golden eyes filled with desperation.

I remembered our hands clasped together. And I remembered that I hadn’t been able to hold on to his hand until the end.

I tried desperately to move my body.

Kyle was dead.

No—he was probably dying.

‘Cecil, please.’

My body refused to obey me, and I begged her through tears.

‘Kyle and Rei are both dead.’

I lay there, staring up at the sky, tears streaming down my face—but Cecil didn’t react.

Her uniquely bright healing spell, harsh on the eyes. I forgot the shock of meeting her here. I forgot that I was supposed to use honorifics with her.

I pleaded again.

‘Let it all end cleanly, like it did for them.’

‘I won’t.’

The cold reply stabbed straight into my ears.

‘I can save you. And I will save you.’

‘So I’m supposed to survive alone?’

That was when I realized I’d fallen into another world.

My body was scorched black in places from inhaling to the brink of rampage, but the leaf-veins were still intact. I couldn’t sense anyone else. In this world, there were only the two of us.

A silent world where even Creatures couldn’t be detected.

I recalled Rei’s presence, cut off so abruptly.

I couldn’t tell which was more despairing—

Rei dying because he hesitated when he saw my sword,

or Rei dying to a human weapon without ever recognizing my sword.

I didn’t want to know which one ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) was reality.

If I hadn’t survived, it wouldn’t have hurt like this.

I wondered if he’d been lonely as he died.

Until Cecil finished that day’s treatment, I kept thinking about Rei’s end.

About my friend, reduced to ash.

***

For a long while, we repeated the same kinds of conversations.

A strange world where no biological urges existed. Cecil, who was already there, declared this would be a long-term affair—my injuries were too severe to heal in one session, and her magical skill seemed diminished as well.

I argued that treatment was unnecessary, but she still didn’t pretend to listen.

Time passed with both of us saying only what we wanted to say.

I had no idea how long that went on. In this world, I felt no biological needs at all. The day never ended, so I couldn’t gauge the passage of time.

A monochrome space where growth itself seemed frozen.

At first, I seriously wondered if I’d ended up in the afterlife without realizing it.

But it wasn’t.

Cecil explained that much clearly.

Back in the Empire, Cecil had been famous for being taciturn.

People even whispered that there might be something wrong with her ability to speak.

And yet, at some point, she began talking more and more.

When I asked if she had any intention of stopping the meaningless healing, she started tossing out disconnected remarks.

That was how she began talking about the world we were in now.

As I muttered to myself that this place felt like the afterlife, Cecil looked down at me and said,

‘It’s not the afterlife. Sometimes, people who say they used to live here show up.’

‘...What?’

‘I don’t know if I should call them people, though.’

And then she told me about the bizarre life-form she’d encountered here.

A being she could somehow communicate with.

The first life-form to appear before her, about two months after she’d fallen here through a dimensional gate.

Something impossible to name. It came to this place from time to time just to look at her, then left. It appeared in a different form every time—but since it was the only one of its kind, there was no risk of mistaking it for anything else.

She guessed it had been born in the ash-gray world, or had stayed here for an extremely long time.

She thought it had barely managed to escape from somewhere else...

In fact, every time it came, it urged her to leave.

‘The person you’re waiting for isn’t coming.’

‘You said this is a place that’s easy to reach through dimensional travel.’

Cecil always refused.

‘You said it’s easier to reach than other dimensions.’

‘I did. But the fact that he still hasn’t come means he’s in no condition to!’

‘He might be preparing. We can’t move between dimensions as easily as you can.’

‘Oh? Same here. Who do you think moves between dimensions easily?’

When it appeared as a woman, it twisted its fingers together as it answered.

Smiling as it peered at Cecil.

‘I just know how to come back here. Do you know how annoying the procedures are every time? Aren’t you grateful that I go through all that trouble just to come see you now and then?’

‘Why do you come to see me?’

When Cecil asked seriously, it laughed.

‘Because it’s romantic!’

That life-form loved drama.

‘A beautiful mage waiting for her prince in the ruins!’

‘Did you come just to mock me?’

‘That’s harsh. You know you haven’t gone insane yet because of me.’

This place was a world where memories flowing in from countless dimensions pooled together.

If you wanted to see color, you had to peer into other people’s memories.

Cecil warned me never to try it.

‘If you start longing for color, you’ll go mad.’

Scattered throughout the space, like a black-and-white filter, were crystals that shone with unnatural brightness.

If you picked one up, you’d see vivid memories.

Fragrance, sound, color—everything unbearably sharp.

The sensory stimulation was overwhelmingly intense. She said she’d tried it once herself, but it felt addictive, so she never touched them again.

‘So don’t miss color.’

Cecil murmured.

‘Not until the treatment is finished.’

‘Don’t worry.’

I smiled at the mage speaking in a sad voice.

‘I’m sick of the dynamism of life now.’

It should have ended on that same day.

Watching my immobile body slowly heal, I thought that.

Of course, I missed those who had believed in me. Every time I thought about their safety, it felt like I was suffocating. Until my duel with Kyle, I could sense everyone’s presence—but once the absorption began and the battle started, I couldn’t afford to pay attention to them.

I’d fallen here without knowing whether my subordinates were alive or dead.

Still, since both Kyle and Rei were dead, perhaps we had won in the end.

They were strong.

I was always sorry. They were few in number, and because they’d made what looked like a submissive choice, they’d been branded cowards.

Had they managed to settle somewhere safe?

Even as I worried, my thoughts always returned to Rei’s severed presence—and Kyle’s fading one.

The reality that I had killed two comrades and survived.

I wasn’t even sure that could truly be called surviving.

‘When the treatment is over, tell me what happened.’

Cecil made a cruel request of me.

‘I want to know how it ended.’

I wanted to run.

I wanted to avert my eyes from reality and disappear.

***

I regained the ability to move.

I was in a state where I could get up and run.

But Cecil wasn’t so easily fooled. Whenever it involved Kysis, she became obsessively rigid. She’d been like that in the Empire as well—the long years she’d spent waiting for Kysis had only deepened that fixation.

Which meant she’d already rummaged through my memories before I could even stand.

I realized that fact after suffering through a vicious fever.

She knew now—she knew what had happened.

‘I’m sorry.’

She apologized, clearly at a loss.

‘I’m sorry. I just....’

I should have said it was fine, but the words wouldn’t come easily.

I sat atop the ruins for a long time, saying nothing.

After wandering deep inside my own mind, I finally came back to myself.

Time had no meaning in this world, but—

‘I’m sorry. I ruined everything.’

‘No!’

Cecil was strangely agitated.

‘Not at all! Very few people could have done what you did. You did your best. Kysis chose the right person.’

‘No. He should have come himself.’

Blood spilled in vain.

At some point, I’d stopped being able to watch stories about time travel. Even knowing they were just fiction, I couldn’t bear it. I envied, to the point of nausea, protagonists who went back to the past and fixed irreversible mistakes one by one.

Games, books, movies, songs—anything with a return-to-the-past premise, I couldn’t touch them.

I kept dreaming of the moment the dimensional gate activated and a dragon burst through.

How many times had I begged the World Tree?

To send me back to that moment.

‘I couldn’t confirm whether Kysis was alive or dead.’

I looked into the mage’s restless eyes.

‘Anyway... may I stop now?’

Cecil stared at me for a long time with reddened eyes, then spoke.

‘Stay and wait with me a little longer.’

This time, she was the one begging.

Tears fell from her golden eyes.

‘You’re probably not curious at all, but... I’ll show you my memories too. Just stay a bit longer. One month—no, even just one week. Could you wait with me?’

Cecil knelt before me and began to sob openly.

As if releasing every tear she’d been holding back.

‘I’m really sorry.’

After apologizing with her whole body, she took my hand—still motionless—and murmured,

‘I’m sorry for looking without permission. I’m sorry for arrogantly turning your memories inside out, searching for traces of him without your consent. Hilde, no one could have done what you did.’

Drops of tears splashed onto the back of my hand.

‘You must have wanted to run away. How did you endure it? If it were me, I would have turned my back on reality and fought back-to-back with your friends.’

I agonized over it until the very end.

If I hadn’t cherished the subordinates who trusted and followed me, I would have done exactly that.

If not for people like Yoow, Igor, Rose, Yvon, Nol, and Deltei, I would have deceived myself into believing hollow hope was real hope.

But since I didn’t—maybe I was allowed to rest now.

I felt truly sorry for Yoow.

I’d left him with far too heavy a burden. Still, I trusted the strategist’s ability.

He would manage.

Even without me....

‘Memories must be agony for you.’

I acknowledged it in silence and remained unmoving for a long time.

***

I accepted Cecil’s request.

I truly waited with her.

For the Swordmaster of the Golden Eye.

More precisely, for a long while, I did absolutely nothing. Fortunately, I felt no biological urges and had no need to satisfy them. I could lie there blankly without anything breaking down or becoming soiled.

You could say I’d turned into stone.

I lived the life of a Hildebert Taleb statue.

Whether that could even be called living was questionable.

I didn’t react. I didn’t answer when Cecil spoke to me. When she treated me, I simply let it happen.

I just sat there in a world made only of black and white.

Sometimes I lay down. Sometimes I stood. But I did nothing.

Until one day, when the mage who regularly cast healing spells on me suddenly widened her eyes.

By then, I’d grown accustomed to the colorless space.

As I drifted like a jellyfish, having lost all sense of time—

It happened.

The archmage looked down at me as if she’d finally realized something.

‘Kyle.’

A name I hadn’t heard in a very long time.

‘You transferred it to Kyle, didn’t you?’

I didn’t answer.

But Cecil didn’t care. Even if I had said something, she probably wouldn’t have heard it.

Her golden eyes widened as she sank into thought.

‘That’s why it took twice as much magic to heal you.’

Even then, I didn’t react.

Only after Cecil, visibly excited, said it clearly did I regain some sense of reality.

‘Kyle is still alive!’

Cecil shouted.

‘Kyle is alive!’

I rose to my feet.

And for the first time in a very long while, I met Cecil’s eyes.