Sylvia pushed at Deculein, who was holding her shoulders. No—Deculein did not budge. His entire body was solid.
For a long while she struggled—wriggled and flailed—
“Let go. Let go of me. Let go.”
In the end, she had no choice but to tell him to release her, and Deculein nodded. Freed at last, Sylvia glared at him with resentful eyes.
“If there’s no paradise that’s only happiness, then there shouldn’t be a hell that’s only suffering either.”
Sylvia clenched her molars.
“I’m in hell right now.”
Before she knew it, there was a knife in her hand. She waved it as if to threaten him.
“I hate you, the person who killed my mother. And I hate that after doing that, you have the nerve to tell me to live on hating you. I don’t even know what you want from me, doing this.”
Deculein said nothing. He merely wiped the meat grease and bits of flesh from the knife with 「Cleanse」.
It must have been dirty.
“Are you joking right now!”
Sylvia shouted without realizing it. An exclamation point seemed to attach itself to her cry. Indignation flared up inside her.
“Sylvia.”
Deculein calmly called her name. It made her even angrier.
“There is nothing I want from you.”
“Then why—”
He spoke in a low voice.
“I pity you.”
For a moment, Sylvia stared blankly with her mouth open. The trembling of the knife in her clenched hand stopped. Deculein let out a small sigh.
“Let us end today’s conversation here.”
He wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin. He took the knife from her and set it beside the plate. With 「Telekinesis」, he straightened her disheveled clothes.
Deculein said,
“I will come again tomorrow, or the day after, until you are ready to leave. This journey will not be long.”
Step, step. Sylvia stood there blankly, watching his back as he left the restaurant.
* * *
……Deculein is poison.
Back at home, lying in bed, Sylvia was thinking that.
Deculein is poison.
A stupid poison that thinks I would put poison in a steak.
Deculein is poison…….
As she repeated it to herself, Sylvia suddenly sat up. She quietly looked around her room.
The countless books lined up on the bookshelf.
If she picked up one among them, Deculein’s name was there. Naturally, because it was a book of magical theory written by Deculein.
「The Magic of Probability」
「Orbital Revolution of Formulas」
「An Interpretive Theory of Magical Space」
Theory books coveted by any mage on the Floating Island. However, the number of mages whom Deculein had permitted to read or purchase them was extremely small, and Sylvia was one of them.
Even now, she still found that strange.
With what emotion, and with what thought, had Deculein given these to her?
Knock, knock—
Then came a knock.
Sylvia opened the door. Someone she knew well was there.
“……I heard Deculein came.”
It was Idnik, her magic teacher.
Honestly, it felt more like she had learned everything by herself than from a teacher, and Idnik felt more like an academy instructor, but still.
“Yeah.”
Idnik nodded.
“It’s time for you to go back now.”
“How?”
“That bastard should know the method. The problem is your will.”
Even in this world, where the mystery called magic supports providence (攝理), there are immutable laws. One of them is very simple.
No matter what happens, the dead cannot be revived.
Therefore, Sylvia knows that this world is fake.
That self-awareness (自覺) is tormenting her.
Would she be happy if she simply sank into oblivion instead?
“If I go back, the Voice will spread across the continent.”
Sylvia had lied to Deculein.
I did not defeat the Voice. It is still inside my body. If I return to the continent, the continent will turn into a hellscape where the living and the dead mingle.
Because right now, she herself was the very “source of the Voice.”
“Dad spread the demon in order to save me.”
The demon’s letter. Sylvia spoke of it. Idnik pouted.
“Right.”
The result obtained by torturing several members of the Intelligence Agency. And once one was on the back of something called Ether, there was no information on the Floating Island that could not be accessed.
……That was how she had explained it away to Idnik.
“I don’t want to do that, Idnik.”
Sylvia looked up at Idnik. Idnik scratched her temple.
“I’d rather forget everything.”
“……Then are you planning to stay here for the rest of your life?”
“If I can.”
“So that’s why you were designing Deculein?”
“…….”
At Idnik’s words, Sylvia pressed her lips tightly shut. Idnik shook her head.
“It’s Deculein, of all people. Do you think you can implement him just by designing him?”
“…….”
“You really are strange, Sylvie. Deculein killed Ciel. Yet you want to be with Ciel, and at the same time, you don’t want to give him up either?”
Sylvia wished to paint Deculein with her talent.
“I can do it.”
If she implemented a new Deculein, and then forgot that fact herself, she could be saved from this suffering.
She could erase the dark past and live like a human being.
“……Do you like him?”
Idnik asked. Sylvia answered.
“Yeah.”
“Then, do you hate him?”
Idnik asked again. This time as well, Sylvia’s answer was the same.
“Yeah.”
She liked him and hated him.
She loved him and despised him.
Fortunately for Sylvia, that emotion had already remained in this world as a word. It meant that countless other people besides herself had experienced this feeling.
It meant it was not some mental illness unique to her.
It was called love-hate (愛憎).
“Get some rest.”
Idnik shook her head and went outside.
Without a word, Sylvia picked up her diary and pen. She sat at her desk. Looking at Gomtaeng Panda, who was sleeping with an eraser as a pillow, she wrote.
—A work perfect aesthetically, artistically, and popularly. The intuitive brushstrokes. The sense for utilizing color. The way the subject is interpreted and released onto the canvas. I find all of it quite satisfactory.
She wrote down Deculein’s praise.
* * *
The next day.
I am looking down at Cielia from a high point on the island. She is hanging laundry with Sylvia.
Looking at that face, I tilted my head for a moment.
She is just as the benevolent impression that remains in Deculein’s old memories. A woman who sacrificed herself for Sylvia, and for her husband.
I asked the person beside me.
“Is that Cielia?”
“Yeah.”
Idnik, Sylvia’s teacher and Rohakan’s disciple.
She asked while eating some ice cream.
“Are you thinking of killing her now?”
“…….”
I shook my head without a word.
“Why?”
“It would have the opposite effect.”
“Why don’t you just kill her now?”
I glanced at the ignorant Idnik. She shrugged.
“What? If you kill the fake right away, Sylvia might at least think about leaving this island.”
“We still know nothing about this island.”
At that moment, Sylvia discovered me. She glared—sharply—then went into the house with Cielia.
“Even though you killed Rohakan in one blow.”
“…….”
There was a deep sense of hurt in Idnik’s words. However, there was no hostility. Rohakan must have said something to her beforehand.
“Let’s go to the sea.”
At my words, Idnik furrowed her brow. Still, she said nothing in particular.
And so, just as we were heading toward the beach together—
“Where are you going?”
Sylvia appeared. She trotted after Idnik and me.
I spoke as if warning her.
“Is it all right to leave Ciel alone? I might kill her while you’re gone.”
“Don’t say things like that.”
Sylvia narrowed her eyes sulkily. Idnik giggled.
At any rate, we arrived at the sea.
—Why the sea all of a sudden?
Idnik asked in a whisper so Sylvia would not hear. I silently looked at the waves of the sea. I observed their undulations.
—……Hey. I’m asking why we came here. Hey. Hey.
Idnik whispered several more times, but I remained still for a long while.
One hour, two hours, three hours, four hours…….
From morning until the sunset began to fall.
“What’s he doing? Hey, Sylvia. What’s this guy doing?”
Unable to endure it any longer, Idnik clung not to me, but to Sylvia. Sylvia grasped the hem of my sleeve with two fingers.
As if trying to pull me away from this sea.
“……What are you doing?”
Sylvia asked. I twisted the corner of my mouth without a word. I made a smile that looked like a sneer.
“There is no need to tell you. We are enemies, after all.”
“…….”
Sylvia’s expression tightened, and I turned away and walked along the beach.
However, a certain question echoed clearly inside my head.
Just now, I observed the “waves” of the sea.
Waves—that is, oscillations.
The waves that roll onto a beach are always irregular. Because they are nature. The time at which they approach, the shape in which they break, the strength with which they scatter—all of it differs day by day.
Not on this island.
The flow of the water, the shape in which the waves break, the strength of the waves—all of it is “regular.” Waves I have seen before approach, and break in patterns I have seen before.
Therefore, I can make one assumption…….
“……Sylvia.”
I called Sylvia’s name. She looked at me.
“Let me ask you just one thing.”
Sylvia’s face became somewhat ambiguous.
As if probing her, I asked again.
“Right now, which iteration of me am I?”
* * *
……Meanwhile, Sophien is thinking of Deculein. She is thinking of the bastard who has gone quite far away.
It is a strange thing.
Perhaps it is because of the woman sitting before her.
A woman glaring at the go board with the face of a puppy desperate to take a shit.
Yuli.
“You absolute fool.”
Hk!
At that verbal abuse, Yuli’s body flinched. Her eyes became wet with tears of defeat and resentment.
Not tears shed from sadness, but tears shed from frustration.
“Are you resentful?”
“……Yes.”
“What is there to resent? With your current ability, you would not be able to win even if you trained for decades.”
“I know. That is why I am not resentful over the defeat, but resentful toward myself.”
Yuli looked up at the ceiling.
Today, Sophien had deliberately summoned Yuli to the imperial palace. It was because of Deculein and the assignment.
“How far have you progressed with the assignment?”
Sophien asked. Yuli clenched her teeth.
“Though Professor Deculein interfered with me, I am proceeding steadily.”
“I see.”
Sophien gave a faint laugh. Even on this desk right now, there were many documents Yuli had brought. They were all materials tracing the mastermind behind the attempted poisoning of Sophien.
“By the way, do you know where Deculein is right now?”
“On the ‘Island of the Voice’—”
“Is it all right for you not to go?”
“……Yes.”
Yuli nodded.
“However, you seem to truly dislike Deculein.”
“Yes. However, it will have no influence whatsoever on Your Majesty.”
“I know. You do not speak ill of others.”
Sophien leaned back in her chair. With 「Telekinesis」, she collected the white and black stones.
“If I were you, I would report in detail the reason why I dislike Deculein. I would make that political move preemptively.”
“……No.”
“Politics is the path to victory. Do you not know that?”
“No.”
“Are you saying my words are wrong?”
“No.”
Yuli shook her head firmly.
“Your Majesty’s words are correct. Your Majesty is the one who defines what is right for the Empire. However, my victory will not be achieved through politics. It will be achieved through justice.”
“…….”
At those words, Sophien quietly toyed with her chin. With narrowed eyes, she peered at Yuli.
Then, with a small snort, she twisted the corner of her mouth and nodded.
“Good.”
The Emperor first placed six black stones on the go board. She had given Yuli five stones first before, but Yuli had lost, so this time it was a six-stone handicap game.
“In truth, I know.”
“……?”
Yuli looked at Sophien with widened eyes.
“Why you hate Deculein. Why you came to break off your engagement with Deculein.”
“…….”
Yuli’s clenched fist trembled. Inwardly, she shook her head.
There was no way His Majesty could know such trivial and intimate matters. That was what she thought.
“Veron. And Rockfell. The Freinheim Knights.”
However, Sophien struck the mark. Yuli’s heart beat heavily.
“Veron and Rockfell were probably killed by Deculein. The Freinheim Knights, too, must have been ruined by him.”
Sophien smiled brightly and placed a white stone.
“I shall tell you the rest gradually. Also, I shall hear the rest gradually. Hurry and place your stone. The longer this match becomes, the longer what you may hear shall become as well……”
Gulp. Yuli swallowed. Her face showed no small amount of reluctance, but Sophien firmly demanded the game.
“Hurry. What are you doing, not placing it? I, too, have things I wish to hear from you regarding the professor.”
At those words, Yuli had no choice but to nod. She picked up a black stone with two fingers and placed it on a star point.
She had occupied seven of the nine star points on the go board, but her chances of victory looked infinitely small.