A group met by chance at a shop in Ashes. Magic Tower mage Efrin and Grand Prosecutors' Office prosecutor Rose.
Al Ross guided them to her adventurer party.
In that place decorated like an ordinary office, Efrin and Rose took off their robes and looked at each other in surprise.
“You’re the professor’s disciple, right?”
“So you’re a bodyguard?”
At Efrin’s words, Rose slightly narrowed her brow.
“I’m not a bodyguard. I’m a prosecutor. A prosecutor affiliated with the Yuren Magic Grand Prosecutors' Office.”
“Ah~”
Grand Prosecutors' Office prosecutor.
Of course, she had no idea what that meant.
“No, more importantly.”
Efrin, roughly cutting off the conversation, turned to Al Ross. To be exact, to her ‘doll’.
“Do you know who stole the conversion formula?”
Al Ross shook her head.
“I don’t know, but it’s obvious. It’ll be among these wanted criminals.”
On the corkboard on the party’s wall were several wanted posters. Efrin peered at those faces with a zooooom—, then flinched in surprise and pointed at a certain name.
“Authority Kalla? Kalla is here?”
Authority Kalla. A once-in-a-generation prodigy who in the past had been called a promising next Archmage.
But whether she had fallen at some point, or had grown weary of the state of affairs, including the Floating Isles.
She suddenly hid her traces and achievements as a mage, and eventually fell into becoming a criminal who frequented Ashes.
“Yes. She’s here.”
It was Rose’s answer. Her face was quite displeased.
“She’s an enormous headache in both Yuren and Ashes. Need I even mention her younger brother Jakal? She herself has committed too many crimes as well.”
Saying so, Rose fixed her gaze on Authority Kalla’s wanted poster. However, there was no detailed appearance. Only the name ‘Kalla’ was written beneath the robe-wearing figure.
Fitting for the most mysterious mage in this world.
“The first time Kalla was discovered in Yuren was five years ago. We were pleased. Because Yuren has so few magic talents. We had expected her to nurture future generations.”
“And then?”
Efrin asked. Rose scoffed.
“Future generations my foot. She just steals, conducts strange magic research in Ashes, and that younger brother Jakal is a murderer. But they’re so absurdly strong that Yuren’s law enforcement can’t catch them at all.”
At that, Drent and Julie beside them—the two hothouse flowers—swallowed hard with terrified faces.
“Fortunately, Jakal went to Hadekain. I don’t know why, but Kalla was quiet too… and yet such an incident occurred again.”
Rose clicked her tongue and turned to Efrin. She asked in a slightly worried tone.
“Assistant. Is that research really worth one billion Elne?”
“Yes. But I’m not an assistant, I’m an associate professor.”
“And I’m not a bodyguard, I’m a prosecutor.”
Rose put her robe back on.
“Where are you going?”
“I have to go to the volcano. There’s word of someone following Dikailen’s trail.”
“I’ll go with you. Drent, Julie. What about you?”
The two scratched the backs of their necks and shook their heads.
“We have something to do… I think we need to go back to Yuren?”
“Really? Then do that. What about you, Dollmaker?”
Al Ross smirked. Then she slung a large duffel bag over her shoulder.
“Let’s go together. There are many dangerous folks in Ashes, you see. I also have a connection with Deculein, so the escort is free.”
* * *
…The volcano of Ashes existed even deeper than the village or the commercial district. The further underground one went, the more the surroundings turned crimson-black, and volcanic ash permeated the air.
Those who frequented these depths were lower-class people—miners, criminals, drug addicts.
Pathetic and disgusting souls who had no purpose in life, who had even thrown away the value of their own lives themselves.
I stood at the heart of that volcano.
Gazing at the magma churning within the earth.
“This is the end. There’s nothing beneath.”
The words of the man who guided me.
“But…”
“Take this and get lost.”
I tossed a purse of gold coins to him.
“Oh! Thank you! Kehehe!”
He retreated with a bright smile, and I silently gazed at the volcano.
“….”
Beneath this place flickered an aura.
The unmistakable energy of mana was visible to my ‘Naked Eye.’
I silently manifested Neck Steel. I wove together four steel pieces like a foothold and placed my feet atop them.
I slowly sank into the volcano.
Quietly, like an elevator, I flew through the heat of the magma, chasing the ‘aura.’
And I discovered some shelter carved into the volcano’s wall.
A long passage.
A cave heated hot by the magma.
Tak—
I stepped inside and looked around.
First of all, there was furniture. Sofas, desks, and such. Magic paper existed too, of course.
However, such things did not catch my eye.
“…So you were here.”
A bed placed at the end of the cave. A person lying upon it, motionless.
A woman I had seen once before, and one of the strongest beings in this world.
“Kalla.”
Authority Kalla. I slowly approached and looked at her.
She lay sprawled on the bed, drenched in cold sweat. Her black hair was soaked, and her entire body burned like a ball of fire.
“….”
Kalla silently looked at me. Her body, terminally ill by its very nature, was now as good as dead.
Overwhelming talent. Yet a body incapable of digesting it.
[Independent Quest: Kalla]
◆ Authority Kalla does not want to die.
“…You seem to be Deculein.”
Kalla’s very faint voice called to me. That tone pulled me back to Deculein’s past.
It was quite a distant past.
She who had displayed the talent of a great mage without reserve since childhood had once come to teach me under Dikailen’s sponsorship. That memory was vivid even in my head.
In other words, she was Deculein’s teacher before Rohakan.
—Why don’t you know this?
—Why can’t Deculein learn?
But the difference in talent had been overwhelming, and Kalla, puzzled by Deculein, who could not understand a single bit of her knowledge, left the mansion.
Her innocent question had been a great setback for Deculein.
“Yes. It’s Deculein. The first time since the Phantom Isle.”
“…Is that so?”
Kalla answered with a smile.
Meanwhile, I examined the various magic papers placed at her bedside and ‘comprehended’ the spells written upon them.
They were spells of the Harmony school that installed magic circles at the bottom of the volcano to cause artificial explosions.
“Kalla. Why are you trying to make this volcano erupt?”
[Main Quest: Volcano of the Yuren Mountain Range]
◆ Rewards according to choice
A main quest overlapping with the independent quest.
Right now, Kalla’s appearance was a signal flare announcing the latter half of the episode.
Because she was a named character cooperating with the Altar.
“…Did you come to stop me? Deculein.”
Kalla asked as she raised herself up. She barely leaned her back against the bed frame and looked at me.
“I came to ask the reason.”
“….”
She silently bowed her head. Sweat pooled on her face flowed down beneath her chin. Breathing raggedly, she spat out a sentence.
“I… seem to not want to die.”
A sobbing voice.
Within her body, which did not have much life left, mana was erupting like a volcano. Violently surging hot.
Her own mana was gnawing at her physical heart and blood vessels.
I asked.
“So you cooperated with the Altar. Because you don’t want to die.”
Anyone wants to live. Whether this world is a game or not, people who gladly accept death are extremely rare.
It is only natural.
Because we are all human.
“At first, I think I asked Dikailen. Was he conducting research for eternal life? But…”
“He died. Dikailen, that is.”
Kalla nodded. Then she looked somewhere. I followed her gaze.
“Did Dikailen leave behind a legacy? But was that legacy woefully insufficient to prolong my life?”
There was a ‘Demon Heart’ there.
A grotesque organism. Something like a giant heart with tentacles sprouting from it, but it was already dead and sagging.
“So, did the Altar tell me? Did they say they would give me life if I cooperated?”
Kuhuk— Kuhuk—
She stopped talking and coughed weakly. Blood mixed with mana flowed from her mouth.
I called her name.
“Kalla.”
“….”
She looked up at me.
“Do you want to live? Do you desire your own life, even if it means slaughtering tens of thousands?”
Then Kalla, her face rarely turning angry, answered.
“…What about you? You don’t want to die either!”
Words shot sharply as if chewed. A shout rather than a question, for the first time.
“No, you wouldn’t know, since you’re alive.”
At her decisive tone, I shook my head.
“I know too.”
“….”
Kalla furrowed her brow and looked at me. I matched her gaze and formed a slight smile.
“I too am dying.”
Having accepted Deculein’s memories in the Imperial Palace. Having taken in those decades of turmoil, I could not possibly be fine. It could not possibly be nothing.
Of course, I had told Sophien I was fine, but because I knew Sophien herself better than she did, I had deceived her.
I had told a lie.
“….”
Kalla silently looked at my heart. I raised her hand and placed it on my chest.
In that silence, Kalla nodded.
“However, I have a theory that can save you.”
“…?”
She looked up at me with round eyes.
“An artistic organism. By transplanting an artificial heart capable of enduring your mana, I can prolong your life. Of course, you must never use advanced magic or higher for the rest of your life.”
Kalla’s pathology was ultimately ‘bodily overload from mana.’ Therefore, she could be healed much more easily than Yulie.
Because the problem to fix was clear.
“Is it possible?”
“If my theory is completed.”
“It seems I don’t have much time left.”
“It is sufficient. Therefore, discard your slaughter magic.”
At my words, Kalla contemplated for a moment, staring into empty space with hollow eyes.
Watching her, I gritted my teeth inwardly. I secretly began to charge my mana.
“….”
If Kalla did not accept this proposal, my response was simple.
I would kill her.
“…Deculein.”
Then, Kalla pointed behind me. She pointed to the depths of the cave shrouded in darkness.
“Look there.”
I turned to look.
Thud— Thud—
In the darkness, someone moved.
Calmly, step by step.
I narrowed my eyes at him.
Meanwhile, he smiled at me.
“Greetings, Deculein.”
The uninvited guest who called me resembled Sophien but was somewhat more androgynous. His appearance itself was so.
He was beautiful.
“It is I.”
The bastard introducing himself as ‘I.’
Yet I thought I knew who that ‘I’ was.
“…So you are the self-proclaimed god.”
He smiled.
“Yes. I have merely borrowed a doll’s body to descend for a while. Neither a manifestation nor a descent. Just like you ordinary humans, I have come to briefly experience the world and its sights, the reality of the continent.”
I looked at him with my ‘Naked Eye.’
There was nothing particularly outstanding. Neither great mana nor a god’s aura.
He merely looked at me and spoke.
“Deculein. Won’t you take a moment to travel with me? There is much I wish to show you….”
* * *
Meanwhile, Efrin was eating.
Squid skewers, pork skewers, webfoot octopus skewers, crayfish skewers, and so on… Countless skewers were in her hands. They entered her mouth nonstop.
Indeed—though no one on the continent would have known—Ashes had been a street food paradise!
“Hey, Associate Professor. What are you doing with a volcano crayfish?”
Al Ross let out a hollow laugh as she looked at her.
“It’s just so delicious. Just a moment. Ah, let me buy one of those too.”
Ox tongue. A beef tongue skewer.
Watching her attempt to conquer every skewer stand in Ashes, Al Ross and Rose shook their heads.
“Let’s talk among ourselves. What does the volcanic eruption mean?”
“There’s word that Kalla lives near the volcano. No one’s seen her, but the rumors are rampant. So, I’m wondering if Kalla predicted the volcanic eruption, or if she’s trying to cause it. And…”
Al Ross sighed and pulled a wanted poster from inside her clothes.
“This. It’s a doll I made.”
Rose read the wanted poster. Then she nodded without much thought.
“The famous thief these days. But you mean this is a doll?”
A composite sketch of the criminal who had been stealing valuables and inventions in the capital of Yuren.
Having committed thirty crimes recently, it was a wanted criminal Rose knew well.
“Yes. But it’s no ordinary thief. This… is a masterpiece I crafted using a god’s body.”
“….”
Words Al Ross had spoken with great resolve.
However, Rose showed no reaction whatsoever.
Perhaps because it was too hard to believe.
“Wow, this is delicious! Munch munch— Ah, excuse me. What’s that? Huh? Whaaat—! Did you say Roahawk?! There’s Roahawk here too?!”
From behind, only the sounds of Efrin devouring something kept coming.
How could a Magic Tower mage like her love Ashes’ food so much?
Rose spoke.
“Ah, yes. I see. You must be a capable dollmaker.”
“I’m not merely capable. I can create life as well.”
“…You must be a fake god too?”
“Tch. Anyway, whether you believe me or not is your freedom.”
Al Ross said, scratching her temple.
“If a god’s consciousness is currently dwelling in that doll.”
She stopped walking for a moment and looked around Ashes.
A city-state living buried in volcanic ash. Despised and scorned by all continents as Ashes, yet a sacred ground of humiliation that had stubbornly nurtured its own pride.
She shook her head and handed a certain ‘scripture’ to Rose.
“This is the scripture that the Altar believes in.”
“Scripture.”
“Yes. Scripture. There, the very first ritual announcing the descent of god is this ‘volcanic explosion.’ Read it.”
At Al Ross’s words, Rose nodded for now but put it in her clothes without reading.
She had duties given to her right now, so she had no time to read the scripture of some fake cult.
“Roahawk. This Roahawk. Please give me a few more. No, pack me ten—”
“Excuse me, Associate Professor. Shall we get going now?”
She simply called Deculein’s associate professor, who was indulging in Roahawk or whatever behind her.
“Huh? Ah~ You should eat too, Prosecutor. Sorry, I ate too much by myself~ Here, say ahh~”
With her lips greasy from all kinds of oil, Efrin grinned and offered the skewer.