I strolled around the island with Sylvia. Sylvia guided me from place to place.
“That’s a curry restaurant. It’s popular.”
The island resembled a modern Mediterranean landscape. A blue, vivid sea and a peaceful village—so much so that I wondered whether it had been modeled after one as reference.
—Sylvia killed you, Professor!
Epherene’s message suddenly came to mind.
Thanks to 「A Villain’s Fate」, my death was practically an annual event. Just how many times had I died, and how many times had I come back to life?
“That’s a gallery. An art gallery.”
Sylvia pointed somewhere. It was a small wooden building.
“…….”
“…….”
After that, there was sudden silence. Sylvia, who had stopped walking, quietly looked up at me.
I asked.
“……Do you have something to say?”
“The paintings I made are in there.”
“And?”
“…….”
Sylvia puffed out her cheeks. Then she asked bluntly.
“Aren’t you curious?”
I looked at her gallery with 「Vision」. There were no particular traps.
“Let’s go in.”
“Okay.”
Sylvia nodded. We walked toward the gallery.
She opened the small door first.
Step—
I took one step inside.
I quietly looked around the gallery. There were many canvases—landscapes, portraits, still lifes, abstract paintings, and the like.
“How is it?”
“…….”
Sylvia asked. At that moment, I was steeped in a certain age-old sentiment.
The art hanging on the gallery walls. Through my 「Aesthetic Sense」, Sylvia’s paintings felt perfect.
“You will become a good painter.”
Sylvia silently shrugged. I walked across the gallery carpet, taking them in.
A still life of sunflowers. A landscape of a Magic Tower in a distant empire. A self-portrait of herself with blond hair and golden eyes.
“Quite long ago, my dream was to become a painter as well.”
“You had a dream too.”
Sylvia walked one step behind me.
“There is no one who has never had a dream.”
“A dream.”
“That’s right.”
Then, I turned to look at Sylvia. She had matured like a work of art.
Only a year should have passed since she left the Magic Tower.
“My dream was to be a painter. And so, now I envy you.”
“Envy.”
Sylvia echoed my words. I smiled faintly and looked at her canvases. I admired them with these two eyes.
“They are perfect works aesthetically, artistically, and popularly.”
“…….”
“The intuitive brushstrokes. The sense for using color. The way you interpret the subject and unfold it on the canvas.”
I turned my head. My eyes, which had been looking at the works, held Sylvia again.
“I like all of it very much.”
“…….”
Sylvia nodded. She gazed at me intently, then created another canvas and easel. She let brushes and paint flow onto it.
Scratch, scratch, scratch.
A painting she drew while looking at me.
“Sylvia.”
She peeked her face out from beyond the easel.
“I told you not to say my name with that mouth—”
“Let’s go back.”
“…….”
At that, her hand froze. She gave a small cough. Moving the brush again, she said,
“I can’t go back.”
“Why?”
“Because this island is a ‘wave spreading from one place.’”
“…….”
There was a very small clue in her words.
I felt as though I understood what it meant.
“I hoped you wouldn’t come.”
Scratch. Sylvia set down the brush. Then she turned the easel around.
Looking at myself captured on the canvas, I said,
“You are the center of the Voice.”
* * *
The ‘concept’ of a wave is a ‘phenomenon’ in which vibrations spread from a single point in matter or space.
Therefore, the Voice was a phenomenon, and at the same time, a concept.
However, the Voice had desires beyond that. It wanted to become an ‘entity’ it did not possess, and chose Sylvia as its medium. Sylvia also willingly accepted it.
Thus, Sylvia became the center of the ‘Voice.’
Clap—! Clap clap clap—!
A dark night. Light came on in the streetlamps along the road. The people gathered around them smiled brightly and applauded.
“Their level of technology is still remarkably low. Even streetlamps are astonishing to them.”
Sylvia explained their behavior. Since this island had not been born long ago, the residents rejoiced even at something as simple as streetlamps.
“There must be those who originally lived on the continent.”
“They’re busy. They’re scheming to return with the demonic power still remaining on this island.”
“A treasure hunt, then.”
“Yeah. Grimoires. Attribute books. Undead secret manuals. Necromancer robes. And so on. There are many all over this island. Are you interested?”
I shook my head.
“I was interested. However, I have come to a conclusion. There is no meaning in growing stronger by borrowing a demon’s power.”
“…….”
Sylvia also nodded. Then she looked up at me and asked,
“Hungry?”
I looked at her face.
Golden eyes as dry as gold, and lips firmly pressed together. She had no expression.
“Eating would not be bad.”
At my words, a faint change appeared around her eyes. They trembled slightly. As if she were a little pleased.
“Okay. Follow me.”
She spun around. I followed behind her as she went down the dark road.
“Sylvia.”
I called her name. In an instant, her steps stopped. She glared at me with narrowed eyes.
“That’s already the third time. I won’t tolerate a fourth.”
“Sylvia.”
“…….”
Deculein was not someone who would refrain because he was told not to. Whether an order, a threat, or blackmail, none of it worked on Deculein.
“I do not care whether you tolerate it or not.”
I approached Sylvia. I looked down at her from right in front of her nose.
“No, do not tolerate it.”
Sylvia remained expressionless. I also examined her condition.
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
Neither of us spoke for a long while, but Sylvia was the first to twist the corner of her mouth as if sneering.
“The demon won’t come out from inside me.”
At those words, I furrowed my brow slightly.
“Are you truly saying you swallowed the ‘Voice,’ Sylvia?”
“…….”
I deliberately called Sylvia by name. Sylvia’s shoulders trembled, but she said nothing more.
“How curious.”
In the gallery, Sylvia had confessed that she was the center of the ‘Voice.’
For that reason, she could not leave this island. She must not leave. The entirety of the Voice would spread to the continent.
However, amid that, Sylvia added one more thing.
That she had ‘swallowed’ the demon.
“That’s right. I didn’t lose. I won.”
Sylvia was not a Yukline. She did not have the objective of destroying demons.
However, Iliade was by no means a foolish house either.
Sylvia had accepted the Voice into her body, but she had not bowed to it. Rather, she had swallowed it.
“There is nothing for you to do here.”
Sylvia said. I nodded.
There was no demonic energy on this island. In other words, maintaining this island, reviving extinct races and the dead—all of it was Sylvia’s power.
“The echo phenomenon on the continent will soon disappear. I’ll make it that way.”
“…….”
Just then, we arrived at the restaurant. It was a dining establishment. As soon as we opened the door, a waiter guided us.
“Bison calf steak. One red wine.”
“Yes, Miss Sylvia.”
Sylvia ordered as she sat down. She pointed at the waiter entering the kitchen and said,
“He was an adventurer who originally lived on the continent. He settled here.”
“I see. He has no ambition.”
“I won’t bring in outsiders.”
Sylvia spoke as if negotiating. I tilted my gaze as I stared at her.
“I’ll make sure nothing else happens on this island.”
Suddenly, Epherene’s voice surfaced by my ear.
—Sylvia killed you, Professor!
Somehow, I felt as if I understood the reason.
“So leave it alone like this.”
Just then, the food arrived. It was a tender steak. I cut along the grain with my knife. However, Sylvia’s knife work was clumsy.
No, rather, that body lacked strength.
I switched her plate with mine.
“…….”
Sylvia looked at me with a slightly surprised face. I cut the steak again and said,
“It is efficient. Since your body seems to have no strength, if I cut it for you and switch the plates, then we can also prepare for the possibility that poison has been placed only in my food.”
At that, Sylvia’s face crumpled fiercely. It was the first rather intense change in expression she had shown.
“You lunatic. There’s no poison.”
As if to prove it, Sylvia ate the steak. I also picked up a piece of steak.
“Also, to answer what you said.”
I put the meat in my mouth. After swallowing it cleanly, I said,
“I cannot do that.”
“…….”
“I will certainly find a method to completely annihilate the ‘Voice’ and take you back to the continent.”
“……No.”
Sylvia shook her head. I cut off her words.
“I heard Cielia is here. Is it because of her?”
“…….”
At that, Sylvia’s hand gripping the knife trembled.
“Then I will ask.”
As if she knew what I was going to say, her breathing grew rough. She glared at me with eyes thick with resentment.
“If I kill her—”
Bang—!
Sylvia slammed the table and stood up. Tears had already gathered on her face.
“……What’s the problem? There’s no demon here anymore.”
“No. The demon is still inside your body. I will find a way to dismantle it, and when that happens, this island, the already extinct races, and the dead will all collapse. The death of the Voice and the death of Cielia are the natural course.”
“…….”
“Sylvia.”
I also rose from my seat. I looked into her eyes.
“Do not run away from reality.”
“…….”
“Cielia is already dead.”
“You killed her.”
Suddenly, pity for her welled up in me.
It was true. I had killed Cielia with these hands, and I had no intention of defending that fact.
Sylvia, clenching her teeth, muttered as if coughing up blood.
“You killed her.”
“……Yes.”
“It’s your fault. You—”
“Then live on hating me.”
I cut off her words.
Strangely, sympathy arose.
“Why did you run away?”
This was Kim Woojin’s heart.
In this girl now, I saw the old Kim Woojin. She was someone trying to run away, just as I had then.
“…….”
Her breath trembled. Sorrow settled in those deep eyes.
The waiter closed the kitchen door.
“Didn’t you want to run away?”
“…….”
Run away.
At Sylvia’s question, I thought for a moment. She was asking Deculein, not Kim Woojin.
However, in the end, it was a question that applied to both.
“The person you loved died because of Iliade.”
She already knew that fact.
There was no way a child this clever would not know.
“Flight is the easiest method. I know that as well.”
I answered. It was something I had never once confessed even to Yu Ara, but this girl had a ‘similar loss.’
“I did try running away a little.”
It was neither long nor short. Every moment of looking at her coffin felt unreal.
I slept countless times in a day. I forced myself to dream in order to avoid reality.
“However, in the end, I accepted it. I accepted that she was dead.”
“…….”
Now, standing before me was this girl, trying to run away for a little longer than I had.
“I looked at it as it was. And then I buried it in my heart.”
I took one step closer to her.
However, I did not think I could persuade her with mere conversation.
“The reason the demon resurrected Yu Ara here was likely because of me.”
Sylvia’s body flinched.
“It is probably trying to force me to choose. Just like you.”
I sneered. Shaking my head, I twisted the corner of my mouth.
“However, Sylvia. I do not run away. Whether dozens of times or hundreds, I will remember my love and kill her.”
Sylvia sucked in a breath.
“And so, I will kill Cielia here.”
She stepped backward, her face a little frightened.
“You will carry that grudge and live your whole life hating me.”
No. The small murmur scattered faintly, and I grabbed the shoulders of the girl trying to run away yet again.
“So do not run away.”
“…….”
“Listen carefully.”
I spoke to her. Living as Deculein, and living as Kim Woojin, I conveyed the utterly obvious truth I had learned.
“In no world does there exist a paradise that is only happiness.”