Disciple And Master (3)

He woke in utter darkness.

There was no right or left, no up or down. There was no depth, yet it was not cramped. In that strange space, Kardia awakened.

But then, before Kardia—who stood there vaguely in the empty void—light gathered. It was like the phosphora, the crystal fireflies he had once watched with that child.

The lights swam smoothly and formed the shape of a person.

“…Master.”

It was Noi. Not the Noi who had lived with him until today, but the adult Noi whom Kardia had called “Master.”

The moment he saw her, Kardia bowed his head without thinking.

“I’m sorry… I could not defeat it.”

It had been sheer arrogance.

He had flattered himself that if he only watched his injuries, the Demon King’s awakening would still be far off.

Even so, having found and secured a vessel—Noi without mana—he believed he was ready to kill the Demon King at any time—ready to die.

Yet Kardia had piled up a few more “not yets.”

He had meant to save the world.

He had meant to avenge Noi.

(But—)

He had ended up wanting to live a little longer.

He was supposed not to care about life. He had supposed it was fine to die at any time.

(He wanted… to live just a little longer—with Noi.)

Because he had wished for that, Kardia had failed to kill the Demon King.

Noi—now light—only smiled and watched Kardia as he hung his head.

“I wasted a hundred years—only to meet you again at last.”

Remorse spilled out, unstoppable.

“And still… I couldn’t save you.”

When even his own weak voice made him nauseous, a voice reached him.

“—Kardia! You are not a Demon King!”

Startled, Kardia raised his face.

The light-formed Noi was still smiling.

“Remember! You are—a mage!!”

Noi kept that smile. She did not even open her mouth.

Yet the voice pierced straight into the depths of Kardia’s heart.

Kardia clenched his fists.

(You have always—)

From when he was small, only Noi had said that to him.

And only Noi had kept on saying it.

(To fail… to save her… again?)

To fail again?

Could such a thing truly be allowed?

(No.)

He could never accept that.

“…I won’t let you be killed again.”

The smiling light of Noi deepened her smile and thrust out a hand to Kardia.

At her fingertips—was a single thread.

“Master…?”

The instant Kardia grasped that thread, the light shaping Noi scattered into a thousand sparks.

“—Ka—!”

“What is this—”

“—rdia!”

“Ma—”

“—Kardia!!”

At that instant, Kardia woke.

“Kardia!!”

From the ground, Noi kept calling to Kardia.

Her hands were spread like a mage’s, her fingers moving without pause since moments ago.

—No, not “like.”

Noi Galenée was the kingdom’s greatest mage.

“You woke, didn’t you!? You can hear me, right!? Don’t let the Demon King swallow you—weave a circle!”

With grand, precise fingerwork, Noi smashed new magic into the spells the Demon King was weaving.

If the Demon King formed a dragon out of seawater, Noi wove a net out of seawater and returned it to the sea. If he birthed a terrible wave of darkness, she wrapped the darkness in a cloth of light.

Air collided in mid-sky, sparks bursting like fireworks. The shock of mighty magics clashing again and again shook the mountains and whipped the sea.

By hurling magic of equal scale at the Demon King’s spells, Noi was canceling them out.

Noi now had no mana.

But lacking mana did not mean she could not spin mana.

—Yes. Noi was now wielding the Demon King’s mana.

“…Ma—ster…”

A loathsome, many-layered voice, scarcely human, rolled down from the sky.

“That’s right!”

Noi answered at once.

“You can do it! I believe in you! You are the one and only disciple of Noi Galenée— a mage!”

Even as she spoke, the Demon King within Kardia began to weave a circle. Noi read the array in an instant and spun a fresh one to counter it.

Feet braced on a ground that would not stop shaking, Noi kept her fingers moving toward the sky.

A spell that wove magic circles with another’s mana—such magic had not existed in this world.

Magic that was not conceived may as well not exist.

And here, a new magic was born.