23rd Episode
By the time Davyd felt the sense of unease, it was already too late.
A brilliant Sword Aura emerged from a split in the air, lunging forward with its maw open.
Uuung-!
The Artefact deployed another shield, but the device, which had already been overloaded after its previous shield had broken, could not fully block the Spatial Blade.
The shield crumbled.
Prudddeuukk!
Davyd’s clavicle, now exposed without defense, came into contact with the sword aura and he began to collapse.
Only then did Davyd realize why his shield had been so easily penetrated when Ray landed his blow earlier.
“Harshia…!!”
His face was covered with belated shock and anger.
Davyd tried to make a desperate attempt, but a second blade emerging from the fractured void filled him with deep despair.
Jjaak!!
Davyd’s remaining arm was severed.
The Sword Aura, having crushed his clavicle and burrowed near his heart, destroyed most of the Magic Circle before fading away.
And Ray, from the moment the crack in the void appeared, had already been sprinting towards Davyd.
Ttad!
Having retrieved the sword he had thrown at Davyd, Ray squeezed out his last bit of Mana to generate a Sword Aura.
Ray knew little about Mages.
Their personalities, their physiology, and even the miracles they could bring forth were mysteries to him.
Because of this oversight, today’s crisis had arisen.
Thus, Ray decided there would be no room for variables this time.
“Too bad.”
Puuk!!
With a grin, Ray met the bewildered gaze of Davyd, whose eyes wavered uncontrollably as Ray plunged the sword into his heart.
“If I were a Mage, I could have extracted and processed your heart.”
Jjaak!!
Ray swung his remaining sword horizontally.
Tuck! Tuduk!
Davyd’s head, unable to resist, rolled across the ground.
His body, deprived of its head, staggered and fell to its knees.
The battle was over.
“Huh, damn it.”
Ray stumbled, unable to pull the sword embedded in Davyd’s chest.
The pooled blood between his joints trickled out of torn wounds.
Uuung-!
The Mana imbued within Davyd’s Magic Circle and the magic he had attempted to manifest lost control and expanded.
The air grew hot.
If his body had been intact, he might have managed, but in his current state, it seemed impossible to contain the sporadically rampaging Mana.
Ray asked cautiously,
“Is there any way to control this?”
“…”
The Circle glowed.
The Mana, which had irregularly coalesced and heated the air, began to gradually dissipate.
Standing still, Ray turned his head toward the orphanage.
Through the curtain of rain, Luna’s figure became visible as the auxiliary magics Davyd had set up just before the fight evaporated.
Her blue hair, soaked through, covered her face, hiding her expression.
Luna asked in a trembling voice,
“Are you… okay?”
“I’m fine. And I do appreciate it, but next time something like this happens, hide snugly under the covers. Once you learn some magic, we can handle things together.”
“Is it… my fault?”
“That I fought this guy? Yeah, it is because of you.”
Wobbling in his position, Ray fell momentarily before groaning and getting back up.
“But you should choose your words carefully. You may be the cause, but you’re not to blame. The one who went insane and got his head chopped off, that’s the problem. Don’t worry; I won’t let you get chased away.”
Leaning on the sword as a cane to steady himself, Ray tilted his head upwards toward the sky.
The rain continued to pour.
Though Ray didn’t particularly like rain, today he welcomed it.
The small traces would surely be washed away with the rainwater.
Using the sword for support, Ray dragged his knees, feeling like they would tear apart, toward the fence near the orphanage.
It was where the cart he occasionally used was located.
When he lifted the cloth, a single potion bottle he had swindled from Jimy was visible.
Though it lacked dramatic effects, he took a swig anyway.
True to its nature as a potion favored by mercenaries, it contained some anesthetic and narcotic components, improving his mood slightly.
“You should go inside now. Wipe off the rain and sleep. You’ll catch a cold. Today’s events are, of course, a secret.”
Ray patted Luna’s head gently as she continued to follow him.
After standing still for a moment, Luna grabbed Ray’s hand resting on her head.
“…Why do you protect me?”
“Hmm.”
Ray thought for a moment.
Although the reason why Ray wanted to protect Luna was quite clear to him, explaining it to someone else felt a bit awkward.
Smiling faintly due to the potion’s effect, Ray answered,
“It’s for future luxury.”
“…Luxury?”
“Yeah. When Luna becomes a great Mage, wouldn’t it be nice if I got a little something out of it?”
Having a Grand Mage as an acquaintance would certainly give him a lot of confidence.
That is, assuming Luna doesn’t end up with a corrupted personality like Davyd.
“Keep a good heart and treat me well later.”
“…Yes, I will definitely.”
“Good.”
Chuckling, Ray started dragging the cart but stopped abruptly, glaring suspiciously.
“Ah, by the way, Luna. Everything else is fine, but…”
“…?”
“If you ever make fun of me for being short, I’ll break your head.”
What kind of hobbit life is this, reincarnating and only reaching 170 cm?
Shaking his head while feeling his creaking joints, Ray muttered,
*
As he picked up Davyd’s severed head, he fervently hoped that Davyd wasn’t carrying any unknown-function Artefacts—like one designed to send a message if its owner’s heart stopped.
“He probably wasn’t worrying about his own head flying off when coming to the orphanage.”
After wrapping Davyd’s corpse tightly in cloth and securing it onto the cart, he covered it again with more cloth and topped it with straw.
This arrangement should prevent it from looking like a human body.
It was the middle of the night, and with the rain pouring heavily, encounters with people would be rare.
Even if someone did cross paths with him, at this point, only a Knight within the Baron’s Territory would dare challenge him and search the cart.
“For now… let’s hide it and think about what to do.”
After all, he had about a month of leeway.
He began pulling the cart up the mountain path.
While leaving the body deep in the mountains to be devoured by beasts wasn’t necessarily a bad idea, Davyd absolutely couldn’t “go missing.”
If it were judged that a high-ranking Mage had gone missing, several Mages would undoubtedly be dispatched to investigate, thoroughly searching the entire Baron’s Territory.
Moreover, since Ray was ignorant of magic, he had no idea how to escape the sight of Mages.
Thus, disappearing wasn’t an option.
In a month, he would have to reveal Davyd’s body without fail.
Whether he confessed to killing him or pinned the crime on someone else, it didn’t matter.
“Kenya’s storage facility should be around here.”
Kenya was one of the women who once led the dark underworld of the Baron’s Territory, known for her rather cruel methods.
Thanks to this, she was easily sentenced to execution under the watchful eye of Count Philips.
Nevertheless, in the past, Kenya killed people and created her own storage facility to evade tracking.
She dug caves in the mountains and put in a lot of effort to maintain an appropriate environment, ensuring that the bodies inside remained preserved with consistent humidity and low temperatures, slowing down decomposition naturally.
Kenya would store bodies for months, making it difficult to pinpoint the time of death, then place them elsewhere to establish alibis and confuse investigators.
“Jimy hasn’t used it, so it’s closed, but looks like I’ll have to use it now.”
Feeling the unpleasant dryness in his mouth, Ray threw Davyd’s body into Kenya’s storage facility, which smelled of corpses.
After covering the body with waterproof cloth to prevent it from drying out and becoming mummified, he stepped outside.
Emerging from the near-freezing storage while completely drenched made his body quite cold.
He stood still for a moment.
Today had been quite a tough day.
He wanted to drink another potion.
“They all get addicted this way, I guess.”
Shaking his head, he pulled the cart. There was a place he habitually visited whenever things got tangled up and his mood darkened, and it happened to be nearby.
“Hmm, I’ll need some alcohol and flowers, though.”
He hadn’t seen his father in a while.
*
Having pilfered a bottle of liquor from the shop Jimy protected, Ray headed towards the common graveyard while enduring the rain.
On the way, he picked a modest flower growing along the path and held it in his hand.
Upon arriving at the common graveyard, Ray stopped in front of a small tombstone.
Though mourning rituals in this world differed somewhat, Ray placed the bottle of liquor in front of the tombstone, bowed twice, and slightly lowered his head.
“I don’t know if you’ll be glad to see me, Father.”
Holding the bottle, Ray poured the liquor around the tombstone in three separate pours.
“Since I’m the only one who comes here to manage it, I hope you’d welcome me happily.”
Chuckling, Ray shook the empty bottle and felt a sense of strangeness.
It had been a few weeks since he last visited the tombstone, but the weeds around it had been trimmed.
Looking around, Ray noticed the area.
Given the heavy rain and the darkness of the night, detecting any presence nearby would be difficult.
Still, it wasn’t a significant issue. More visitors to his father’s grave was good news.
“Ahh.”
Leaning against the tombstone, Ray looked up at the sky.
It had been incredibly tough.
His skin was lacerated, his joints shattered, and his dream of being tall had collapsed.
Though he wanted to rush to the church and wake up Adel sleeping there to receive treatment, this time it was impossible.
The scars currently engraved on Ray’s body were clearly magical injuries.
These couldn’t be shown to others. This pain was something he had to bear alone.
“To Father, it’s not relevant, but trying to save the world is much harder than expected.”
Just when he thought he had drawn a legendary orphan, a 6th Circle Mage charged at him with fiery determination.
From now on, he preferred encountering rares and uniques. The normal drop rate in the orphan gacha was way too high—it was almost like a cursed gacha.
Chuckling, Ray slowed his breathing and closed his eyes.
“Please wish for things to go better in the future. Even if you don’t feel like it.”
*
Instead of reincarnating as a grown-up reader-fanboy in the fantasy world, I was reborn as a baby.
It was indeed a mind-blowing situation, but I couldn’t deny the thrill of excitement either.
The problem was that if I didn’t take action, this world would perish.
But did I really need to obsess over saving the world? If the world were to end, it would be because the transcendent being responsible didn’t handle things properly.
It wasn’t something I should feel guilty or responsible for.
Anyway, I was currently a newborn, and it was too early to decide on a course of action.
I couldn’t even see properly yet.
I had heard that newborns take a few months to open their eyes properly, but I never imagined I’d experience it firsthand.
“~~~”
“$$$”
At least the sounds were clear.
Though it was an incomprehensible language, over time, my decoding ability kicked in.
Until yesterday, only a few words in the sentences my parents spoke were interpretable, but now, whole sentences were starting to make sense.
It was like someone was whispering translations into my ear.
Listening to my parents’ conversation, I closed my invisible eyes. Babies sleep a lot.
“♡”
Damn it.
Moans could be heard.
It was positive news that my parents had a good relationship.
Sharing… love beside a newborn who might cause trouble seemed like a wise decision.
Who knows what a baby might do? It was prudent to keep them close regardless.
But why start heating things up in broad daylight? Excessive intimacy also needed consideration.
“~~~%$?”
My parents overlapped their bodies while chatting.
I had no interest in understanding what they were saying, but I wasn’t yet adept at turning off my decoding ability. Sometimes it activated automatically.
The man gasped and said,
How does it feel compared to your husband?
The woman moaned and replied,
You’re so much better.
“?!”
Is the ability malfunctioning? Damn, this dubbing is weird.
No, damn it, this dubbing is extremely weird.
