The brown-skinned woman… no, wait. The version of me from another world was glancing around in confusion while being wrapped in an overwhelming amount of mana.
What on earth happened to make her possess such a level of mana…? No, rather, am I still the child of a dragon even in another world? Those horns, tail, and eyes—everything is the same except for the color; it’s easy to tell that she’s a Half-Dragon.
However, the nature of her mana isn’t lightning like mine but instead carries the essence of earth and metal. Could she be the descendant of a Great Worm instead of a Thunder Dragon?
An immense wave of interest surged within me, one that couldn’t be concealed. Still, since I didn’t know whether she was friend or foe, I decided to hide. At that moment, our eyes met.
“There you are…! Demon Tribe scum, this time I’ll rip you to shreds!!!”
In that brief instant, mana so powerful it made the earth glow with a golden light gathered beneath my feet. Before I could even determine what was about to happen, something felt off.
I immediately teleported away from the spot. And then, a spine-chillingly massive pillar of rock erupted from the ground where I had been standing. If I hadn’t moved, I would’ve been killed instantly.
Still, why does she call herself part of the Demon Tribe? They’re gentle and kind people. What kind of world is hers if it makes her act so recklessly?
The other me crouched down, pulling a colossal sword of metal from the earth while spreading her mana widely like a bat, searching for me.
I should have set up a resistance spell against mana detection. As the electric mana clashed with the earth-based mana, more mana gathered beneath the ground.
Once again, I escaped using teleportation, but the pillars and thorns that sprouted from the earth suddenly turned golden and exploded. The fragments flew toward me at an incredible speed, colliding with my protective barrier and creating a crackling sound.
At that moment, jagged rocks aimed directly at my position, tearing through the air in an attempt to shred me. Of course, my barrier wouldn’t be broken by something like that—it’s strong enough to vaporize any ordinary creature that comes near.
But then the other me, upon confirming that her attack had been blocked, swiftly leaped and struck my lightning barrier with her sword.
As I began to wonder if calling entities from parallel worlds was truly the right thing to do, I noticed something strange.
Is she immune to electricity? By now, there should have been enough current flowing to kill her several times over. However, the thought barely crossed my mind before I realized that the iron sword was absorbing the electricity from my barrier—not absorbing it, exactly, but redirecting it into her body.
She grounded herself by planting her tail into the earth, though it shouldn’t have been enough to withstand such a massive electrical flow. Yet, she pressed down purely with brute force. What is she? A monster?
Before I could fully process my shock, her blade broke through my barrier, and the glowing red sword swung down toward my head.
“What…! Get out of here!!”
After putting some distance between us via teleportation, I decided to either calm her down or incapacitate her. Straining my heart slightly, I condensed the mana within me, compressing it to a level akin to a Breath technique before firing it through my staff.
Judging from the terrifying momentum with which the other me charged forward, she seemed to have been hit directly and tumbled to the ground, face down. Is she still alive? More importantly, how did she not evaporate despite taking a direct hit?
I decided not to dwell on it too much. Apparently, the me from her world is far tougher than the me from this one.
Bending the surrounding dimensions to ensure she wouldn’t move easily if she woke up, I cautiously approached her, trying to steady my wildly beating heart.
Up close, she looked somewhat like me, but almost every aspect of her contrasted sharply with mine, making me realize she truly came from a parallel world.
Having bent space to pin her down, even if she woke up, she wouldn’t be able to move freely. I grabbed some writing tools that were somehow maintaining their shape despite the distortion.
She was still unconscious, lying face down.
Then, suddenly, she twitched, and the sound of a heartbeat reached my ears. Wait a minute. Surely not…
“…It doesn’t matter who you are anymore… I won’t let you get to Myungho!”
A sound like the heavy steps of a giant resonated from the prone figure. Simultaneously, her skin tore open, revealing black metallic scales underneath.
Impossible? Even with remaining strength? As soon as I thought that, the other me pushed against the spatial pressure holding her down and attempted to rise.
“Wait, just a moment! Please listen to me! I’m from another world, just like you! I’m not part of the Demon Tribe…! It was an experiment with magic that accidentally brought you here! I don’t know what happened, but please, let’s try to resolve this through conversation…”
Will that work? As the distorted space shattered, the other me stood up again. Her body was covered in armor-like metallic scales, and her horns were now straightened.
It reminded me of the one time I saw Father when he was angry.
Do I have enough strength left to fight? Yes. Can I win? Unknown. Can I escape? Probably, but if I do, I’d leave myself here abandoned.
Even though we’ve never met, we’re still the same person. I didn’t want to leave things like this.
“…You claim to be me?”
The other me looked down at me with disbelief.
“Yes, yes! I don’t know what the Demon Tribe in your world has done, but I’m not one of them! Can’t you see the tail and horns?”
To show that I didn’t want to fight further, I put down my staff and raised my hands above my head.
Seeing my gesture of non-aggression, the other me growled but seemed reluctant to strike an unarmed opponent. After scrutinizing me carefully, she muttered bitterly.
“A kid like you? You don’t resemble me at all. Are you really me?”
“Yes, I’m Alterra! If you’re truly from a parallel world, you should remember the previous world, right?! If you hear that, will you believe me?”
“Huh, what? How do you know that…? I never told even Myungho about that!”
So, I am you, right? When I revealed information about the previous world that only I would know, the other me listened in astonishment.
“…And I was in the middle of my doctoral program when I died. Do you believe me now? I’m you, just born into a slightly different world.”
“Hold on. Doctoral program? I never did anything like that.”
“Ugh, that’s not important right now…! Ah, never mind. Just… tell me about your world and yourself. Put the sword down first.”
The other me hesitated but agreed to explain as much as possible, despite her suspicions.
“Just a moment. Can you return, right…? Actually, it’s not that… I need to go back immediately! Myungho is in danger…!”
“Don’t worry. I’ll send you back after hearing your story. Besides, time passes much faster here than outside. In your world, it’s probably been less than 0.01 seconds since you disappeared. So, talk. Who is this Myungho that has you so worried? Is she your girlfriend?”
“…Fiancé.”
Hold on. Fiancé? Thinking of getting married to someone of the same sex? There’s no way I’d fall for a man, so it must be a same-sex marriage. Still, I decided to confirm.
“Is she a girl?”
“…”
“Is she?”
“…He… He’s trustworthy and… a good man. Still, as a man, he leaves something to be desired…”
Good grief.
—
After telling my whole story to the smaller version of me, the other me expressed sympathy for what I went through, though she still looked down on me with disdain for having gone so far as to insert my tongue. But it didn’t bother me much.
She’s just a naive kid who doesn’t understand love. Even if she stems from me, growing up in a different environment means she’s practically a stranger.
“…Ah, and it seems that what came here wasn’t my body but my consciousness. In the end… I fell under the Demon Tribe member’s hypnosis and lost control of my body. But my consciousness remained. I could sense Myungho following me until… right at that moment, I got pulled here.”
“Your life sure is tragic… Still, things will surely improve if you keep going forward. Stay strong. Although I don’t quite understand it, I hope things work out well with this Myungho person.”
“They better. Since I’ve already killed my mother, I’ll kill my father too, and anyone else who gets in the way… Then, I’ll live happily ever after. This time, for real.”
The smaller me awkwardly chuckled as she kept scribbling something on paper. When I asked what she was writing, she willingly showed me.
Since this was literally the first encounter with someone from another world, she wanted to document everything. I’m not a scholar, so white is paper and black is ink, she said, handing me the papers.
“…Alright, that’s the end. So, how do I get back now?”
“Ah… Well, all you need to do is stand near me by the mirror without moving… Yes, stay exactly like that. Let’s go…! Though this is my first attempt, so I can’t guarantee it’ll work. Just stay strong!”
Wait. Didn’t she just say something ominous?
The return spell was just hastily put together?
Before I could protest, the smaller me unleashed a tremendous amount of mana toward the mirror.
As my reflection in the mirror grew blurry and eventually disappeared, I was simultaneously sucked into it.
—
“…But there’s still room for improvement moving forward.”
After cutting off the mana flow to the automatic recording quill, I placed the book I had just written in my study.
There’s still so much research to be done. I know this is neither the beginning nor the end. I’ve already met countless versions of ‘me’ and heard their stories and tales of their worlds.
We haven’t encountered a world with technology superior to ours yet. Nor have we seen one significantly behind us. I did meet a solitary survivor from a destroyed world, but they refused to speak about it.
Now, what will today’s mirror show me? And who will it let me meet?
Full of anticipation, I headed back to the lab.
