The top of the lighthouse.
At that infinite summit, Epherene gazed into the firmament. She lifted her head as though she might touch the stars.
Shaaaaaaa…
Reflected in her retinas was a celestial body descending from a height immeasurably far and distant. It sank like a pebble dropped by the edge of a pond.
“……”
It would be a lie to say she wasn’t afraid, to say she was certain.
To begin with, her body was too honest for even self-hypnosis. Her fingers kept trembling, she kept scratching at the sleeves of her robe, and her heart kept pounding.
“There’s no need to worry.”
Even so, she forced herself to hold on.
Right now, she believed.
In the self that existed here in the present, in the past self she had yet to meet, and in Deculein there.
In the me who would surely win and then run to Lokralen to see them.…
“……All the preparations are done, okay?”
Epherene deliberately murmured in a lively voice.
Gooooooo———
Just as she said, the 「Psychokinesis」 realized in its most majestic form through Deculein’s heart as its medium.
It was moving everything in this world.
Toward the 「outside of the world」, into the canvas, it was transporting all life.
The particles of mana rising here and there on the horizon, the people being rescued without even knowing it at the very brink of destruction—Epherene could see them.
Kkaddddddk———
Meanwhile, the lighthouse was freezing over.
Those contained in the 「outside of the world」 would be frozen by the knight who was the point of connection between the continent and the outside—‘Julie.’
Until the lifespan of the 「outside of the world」 came to an end.
“Time is a very convenient and subjective thing, you see.”
Of course, until then, ten thousand years might pass, or twenty thousand years might pass.
“Just like how, when you’re asleep, it feels as if time has stopped.”
But if one could not perceive that time, in other words, if one did not know the flow of that time, then that time would cease to be time.
Time depended only on a human being’s interpretation and perception.
“I’m confident.”
Therefore, Julie’s ‘miracle’ would freeze the outside of the world, and freeze all life for an appropriate amount of time.
In that way, all the life on the continent would be able to return safely, alive.
No—it would return.
“After that…… it’s our part, you know?”
She looked up at the sky again.
Whether blue, clear, or dark, no matter what color it was, that sky was always flat—but now there was a ‘wrinkle’ in it. It was distorting like some crumpled curtain.
It was because of the immense mana and atmospheric pressure raging from the meteor.
Kwaaaaaa…
The enormous celestial body approached moment by moment with a thunderous roar.
If that touched the continent, the continent would perish. That energy could not be reversed even with Epherene’s power.
“Professor.”
Because they had already known that, Deculein and Epherene had chosen acceptance.
They had regarded the meteor’s impact as ‘fate.’
“It’s a perfect formula.”
However, Epherene knew.
Even if it was fate, the path after it could be carved out by one’s own hands.
“Professor, you really are……”
Even if the continent perished, this lighthouse would not break. From the very beginning, it was a unique structure whose very existence was a miracle.
“……Really, the most perfect person in this world.”
That was why Deculein’s final miracle, the magic that was truth itself, was engraved into this lighthouse.
“Thanks to you, Professor, we’ll be able to restore this continent. As long as I do well.”
The essence of that miracle was ‘restoration.’
To return the continent, half-destroyed by the meteor, to the way it had been before.
To submit to the fate called destruction, yet never give up.
“……I can do it, you know?”
Suddenly, Epherene stuck out her lips sullenly.
It felt as though she could hear a voice saying something like, ‘As if an idiot like you could do it—’
“But before that.”
One last thing remained.
The most important stage.
That was……
———!
The clear ringing of sword song resounded. The sound of blades tempered by mana meeting each other. Rainwater splashing as it rose.
The fierce battle between Sophien and Quay.
There was no room for anyone else to intervene between them. She could only wait for the time to come.
Kudddddddk———!
At that roar, Epherene looked up at the sky again.
Indeed, the dazzling celestial body was crushing the world as it—
“Epherene.”
A voice brushed past her all of a sudden.
Was it an auditory hallucination? she wondered, but—
“……Idnik?!”
When she hurriedly turned around, there really was a person there.
Idnik was looking at her with a grin.
“H-How?!”
“Haha. Sorry. I was a bit late persuading him.”
“Persuading……?”
Come to think of it, there was one more person beside Idnik.
A man in a robe. Someone Epherene had once seen before.
“Mur……kan?”
The desert wizard close to Rohakan—Murkan.
The man who had handed her a pocket watch spoke with an expressionless face.
“This, too, is what Rohakan wished for.”
“Uh……”
Epherene quietly glanced over her shoulder.
She had hoped for one more person…… but he was not there.
“Demakan isn’t coming until the end?”
Demakan.
That great wizard who had left the secular world remained shut away to the very end.
“……Haha.”
“I’m here too!”
Just as Idnik smiled bitterly, a ringing voice came down from above. A bright shout.
She knew who it was without looking.
“Archmage Epherene! As a fellow Archmage, I’ve come to help too!”
A fairy smiling brightly. One of the members of Sanctuary ‘Time,’ and the former chairwoman of the Magic Tower, Adrienne.
“I’ll attack that meteor! If the meteor’s power weakens even a little, restoring the continent will become easier too, right?”
Of course—had they, like Luina, also understood Deculein’s lighthouse?
Pointing at the excited Adrienne, Idnik laughed clearly.
“Do you understand, Epherene? You don’t have to shoulder it all alone.”
“……Yes.”
Epherene nodded, feeling her heart grow easier because of them.
“Then I’ll, just for a moment. While there’s still time……”
For a moment, she turned her eyes and looked at the two people on the ground.
“……I’ll be with Her Majesty.”
* * *
……In the distant past.
In those old days, when one woke in the morning to birdsong, received God’s revelation, interpreted and studied it, recorded it as scripture, and spent a faithful and devout day.
In those old days, when everyone was the same believer, so there was no need to fight; when there was no need to kill animals or cut plants to live; when there was no need to worry about or grieve over an uncertain future.
Chang———!
In those old days, when one lived only for God, bearing the pride of having been created by God, and offered one’s life to Him.
“……There was no need for ‘me.’”
Murmuring so, Quay stared into Sophien’s eyes.
Into those crimson pupils that truly blazed like fire; into the human called Sophien, who held his body; into the ardor of the soul surging within that flesh.
“Because I belonged only to God.”
Tsrerererek———!
Mana sparked as sword ground against sword.
Sophien’s red and Quay’s darkness seemed to maintain a balance for a time, but the outcome of the decisive battle was already clear.
For Quay’s body was now breaking apart.
Kwaaaaa—!
When Sophien flicked her sword upward, a piece of Quay’s skin fell away like a puzzle piece.
Swaaaaaak——!
In the next instant, the sword thrust at him again.
Quay seized it with his hand. Gripping it by force, he smiled.
“Because I lived only for God.”
With a doll’s body, he could not defeat his own true body.
He could not push back this insolent human who possessed his flesh.
“……Was that wrong?”
Quay merely asked Sophien.
“Was it wrong?”
In those old days, to have served God.
To have lived for God.
To have offered himself to God.
“Was it truly wrong? So wrong that I deserved to be abandoned for eons like this?”
Sophien did not answer.
But to Quay, that silence was an answer.
“Sophien.”
This soul called Sophien within his body was different from him.
She had a goal.
She had a life.
She had a ‘self.’
Sophien was Sophien, and the principle behind all her actions was—because Sophien herself wished it so.
“You won.”
Quay could not defeat Sophien.
The difference in their bodies alone was simply that enormous.
“……”
Even so, there was no wavering in Sophien’s eyes. Not the slightest carelessness.
“Haha.”
For some reason, that sight was cute.
With a faint smile, being struck by the falling rain, Quay shook his head.
“But what you said…… Deculein was wrong.”
Rainwater clung to the corners of Quay’s eyes. It came as though flowing and touched him.
“Deculein says God’s name is ‘rain,’ but I feel no God in this rain. There is only my sorrow.”
Hwareureuk—!
Mana flared on Sophien’s sword.
At that moment, Quay’s hand, which had been gripping the blade, crumbled into ash, and then—
“God is already dead.”
——Quay’s chest was pierced through.
With a rustle.
Not with the sound of a human body being pierced, but with an echo like cutting through mere paper.
“……God will never return again. The only being who can say whose interpretation is correct is God, and He is gone now.”
Quay nodded plainly.
As though he would now acknowledge it.
“Perhaps I lost long ago. My faith, which worships a God already dead, cannot defeat your faith in yourself.”
Sophien wordlessly drove the sword in.
Deeper still, piercing through his body. She executed the final believer.
Pusssssss……
Skin scattered like dust. The doll’s body grew loose. Slipping free from Sophien’s sword, Quay slowly collapsed.
Just as she was about to finish him off for good.
“Sister.”
Someone called Sophien to a halt.
The address “Sister” was familiar.
She turned to look at him.
“……It is me.”
Creto.
Her good-for-nothing younger brother was walking here calmly. Even his face was so ugly she wanted to beat him, yet strangely, she found herself smiling.
As though even in this grave moment, she could feel the bond of blood toward that bastard.
“Damned fool.”
Sophien spoke. Creto laughed softly and looked down at Quay.
He stared at him as, piece by piece, his skin fell away and oxidized into dust, then suddenly—
He knelt on both knees.
“Please entrust the end to me.”
“……”
She was not even bewildered.
The reason this bastard had appeared at this moment was, without any need to think, solely because of Quay.
“He is one who will die anyway. Even if there is only a little time left, there is something I wish to say to him. After that, I will receive punishment for my sins.”
“Hmph. You have no sin.”
Srreung—
Sophien sheathed her sword. With a snort, she turned away.
“A man who has already admitted defeat. A man without himself. Death, at least, may be granted to him by his own hand.”
Sophien had something more important to do than concern herself with a mere loser.
Right now, above her head, in the sky, tumultuous heat and mana were being spewed forth.
Kwaaaaaaaaaaa────!
As Sophien observed the distorted atmosphere, thud—
A soft footstep approached her side.
“Please enter the lighthouse, Your Majesty.”
A command to enter the lighthouse.
Sophien smiled faintly.
“Your manner of speech has grown short, I see.”
“……”
The girl said nothing.
It meant she had grown up, no doubt.
“Child of the Moon. You still have Our power within you.”
“……Do you perhaps want regression?”
Epherene asked. Sophien shook her head.
“No. It was originally Ours, so should We not retrieve it?”
“There’s no need. Everything is already prepared.”
Answering so, Epherene pointed at the lighthouse.
That long tower-like structure was freezing solid, so much so that it looked cold even from the outside.
“Since Your Majesty has won, the miracle will soon be realized.”
“……You mean Deculein’s formula?”
“Yes. The Professor’s final theorem. The most perfect magic on this continent—that miracle.”
Epherene answered proudly. Her face was filled not only with respect for her teacher, but affection as well.
For some reason, that expression gave Sophien a sense of kinship.
So this girl, too, toward Deculein, felt something similar to herself……
“Are you all right?”
“Yes. I’m all right. Once the continent is restored, Knight Julie will freeze not only me but the entire continent as well.”
“Mm. Will the Imperial Palace be safe?”
“Of course. I’ll return it exactly as it was. As if only one night, or maybe two days, had passed.”
Because Lokralen must not disappear. Epherene murmured in a firm tone.
“……I see.”
Sophien silently looked up at the universe. The meteor, having already broken through the atmosphere, shone more clearly than the starlight in one corner of the sky.
“……Your Majesty. We’re only going to hibernate for a little while.”
Epherene’s words held a trace of worry.
“Yes. I know.”
At that, Sophien nodded as though she found it amusing.
“However, We are not so pliant a sovereign.”
“……Pardon?”
“When this is over, if it is brought safely to its conclusion, then at the very end, surely.”
Sophien stopped speaking and smiled brightly. It was a smile like sunlight.
“Something most amusing will happen.”
……Truly, light spread.
The whole world was drenched in that dawn.
Kwaaaaaaaa…….
An impact that shook heaven and earth. A comet striking the continent.
The roar that rang throughout the world, the rupture that shattered the crust, at some point was swallowed by the vacuum of space and faded away.
…….
As if——
The very concept of “sound” had been annihilated, the world fell silent.
A stillness close to emptiness and void.
Even in that moment of destruction, Epherene and Sophien still stood upon the ground.
The two looked at each other and smiled.
* * *
——Thud.
——Thud.
Meanwhile, Yeriel was walking through the interior of the frozen lighthouse.
With Deculein on her back, and the Sylvia doll that had turned into a statue tucked under her arm.
——Thud.
——Thud.
She was walking with remarkable diligence.
“……Ah, but. I understood.”
Yeriel muttered.
She repeated Sylvia’s final words—find the center of the bitter cold.
She understood what Sylvia had meant by those words, but…….
“Where is the center of the bitter cold?”
That was what she had to find.
If she froze Deculein there, if she put him into cryostasis, then even after their plan succeeded, there would be a possibility of reviving him.
“Yuli. Can you hear me?”
Yeriel called for Yuli.
The fact that she alone had not frozen, and that enough oxygen remained for her to breathe without difficulty, must ultimately be because Yuli was waiting for her.
She might be watching from somewhere.
“Yuli……?”
Crunch—
Instead of an answer, the sudden sound of ice crumbling echoed through the dark corridor.
Crunch—
No, it was someone’s footsteps.
“What…… Who’s there!”
As Yeriel shouted, the hair on the crown of her head stood on end. As if it had been charged with static electricity.
Crunch— crunch—
Even at her vigilance, the footsteps did not stop. Rather, they strode straight toward her…….
“Ah?”
Yeriel knew who “he” was. As he drew closer, she could see his face, and upon seeing it, she thought she understood.
A knight who moved despite already being completely frozen, transformed into a statue.
“Sir Keiron?”
—……Indeed.
Along with Yeriel, who had received Yuli’s permission, he was the only person in this lighthouse who could retain his reason and move.
For the statue was Keiron, and Keiron was the statue; a human completely frozen solid could indeed be called a “frozen statue.”
—Follow me. I shall guide you. Her Majesty gave the order.
“Ah! Yes.”
He was an unexpected helper.
Yeriel strode toward him.
Kwaaaaaaaaaa————!
But before she had taken even a few steps, an impact shook the lighthouse.
“What!”
It was a great tremor, but she barely felt anything.
“What was that?”
Yeriel walked on without much concern.
……Like this, even the celestial impact that destroyed the continent was only faintly felt inside the lighthouse.
—Yeriel. What is it you desire?
Keiron suddenly asked. Yeriel glanced at Deculein on her back.
“What do I desire?”
Thud, thud—
Following Keiron, she spoke.
“I don’t ask for much. I just…… want my brother to die well.”
—……Die well?
To Keiron, who sounded a little puzzled, she explained in a rather relieved tone.
“If wishing for him to live a long life is greed, then instead of dying like this. I want him to be even a little more at peace when he dies.”
Since everyone would curse Deculein as a villain, at the very least, he should be with those who knew of his devotion and sacrifice.
Even if he died when the time came, she wanted him to be a little happier.
—……A wish befitting close siblings.
Keiron answered.
Looking at his back, Yeriel shrugged.
“Not really. I just hate that he tries to shoulder everything on his own.”
* * *
“They’ll all freeze in an instant.”
……This was the “Outer Side of the World.”
The place where all life on the continent—every citizen, livestock, pet, and the like—had been confined.
“Please calm everyone down, and make sure no victims arise from people fighting among themselves.”
In her office, Sylvia spoke as she prepared for the end.
Soon, Yuli’s “Eternal Winter” would reach even this place, and everyone would freeze in an instant.
If saying they would freeze sounded a little harsh, perhaps “hibernation” was the right word.
“Zeit, I especially need your help.”
“……Huh? Uh. Ah…….”
Zeit nodded uneasily. He looked back and forth between Sylvia and Yuli at her side.
Yuli.
The young Yuli.
A Yuli a little younger than the one who had sacrificed herself in the outside world.
That young Yuli now seemed lost in thought with an expressionless face, and for some reason, Zeit’s heart felt guilty as he looked at her.
“Zeit. There are Altar agents in here too.”
Sylvia brought Zeit back to himself. Zeit quickly answered.
“Ah…… right. I’ll make sure to restrain them.”
“Don’t kill them. They have to face judgment under the law.”
“……I will. Ah, you haven’t forgotten your promise, have you, Iliade? If I cooperate with you—”
“I promise. I’ll hang an artificial sun over Puhairden.”
Sylvia’s talent would allow Puhairden to overcome its ice age.
As long as he could secure that promise, Zeit was satisfied.
“Good. And…….”
However, apart from that, there was one more thing he was worried about.
Zeit jerked his chin toward her, pretending otherwise.
Yuli.
Right now, she was so deep in thought that she could not even hear their conversation.
“……Please. She seems to be wrestling with a great deal.”
Sylvia answered expressionlessly.
“Don’t worry. She is one of the people who protected the continent. She’s far stronger than you think.”
The knight who protected the continent.
Those words were deeply meaningful to Zeit.
The girl who had said she would protect only Deculein had, in the end, come to safeguard the entire continent.
She had fulfilled “all of her wishes.”
“Trust your sister, Zeit.”
“…….”
At that moment, the tears that suddenly welled up—no, the tears already brimming in his eyes—
“—Haaahm. Mm. Mmm.”
Wiping them away as though he were yawning, Zeit thumped his chest.
“Understood. Just trust me, Iliade. I shall take charge of this ‘Outer Side of the World’…….”