31. Stella Knights (4)
In Aether World, there were no fewer than three satellites in the sky. By Earth’s common sense, it was a phenomenon that made absolutely no sense, but since I’d never had much common sense to begin with and was especially weak when it came to science, accepting it was actually pretty easy for me.
And tonight, all three moons were full.
Even when a single full moon rose, the vitality of natural mana increased enough that the day was called the Day of the Mage, but when all three moons were full, there was even a proverb saying that the gate between heaven and earth opened, so the circulation of mana on such a night was truly extraordinary.
A day like this would be perfect for training, but instead I had come to see Alterisha.
“…To think a substance like this could really exist.”
“I didn’t know it would actually work either.”
The ceiling of the observatory opened, and three lenses each drank in the light of one full moon. Those lenses, crafted through a special kind of alchemy, gave form to the mana of moonlight, and then synthesized that form into matter and solidified it.
And so, I succeeded in creating an astonishing substance called Moonlight Stone (月光石).
Moonlight Stone was not especially hard in terms of durability, but it could hold enormous quantities of mana, making it little short of the finest material for crafting magical items—and it could only be created when all three moons were full.
Originally, with current technology it was impossible to extract Moonlight Stone, but since having all three moons full was not exactly a common occurrence, I had hurriedly taught Alterisha how to create a magic tool called a Lens Imbued with Moonlight.
Since it had been made in too much haste, it was unavoidably rather crude.
As a result, after extracting moonlight to the fullest, the total yield was barely enough to fill a small pouch.
“Use this to make the item you wanted, Assistant.”
“…Are you sure? Something this precious…”
As befitted an outstanding alchemist, Alterisha understood the moment she saw the Moonlight Stone just how rare a substance it was, and accepted the little pouch of Moonlight Stone dust with trembling hands.
“You’ll make better use of it than I will.”
Honestly, it did feel a little wasteful, but with this amount, there was not much I could do with it properly anyway.
‘Back in the old days, I used to make armor and weapons out of Moonlight Stone too.’
I could not even remember anymore how much grinding I had done to make gear items from Moonlight Stone.
“Thank you… I’ll use it well.”
Alterisha accepted it with a deeply moved expression and handled the Moonlight Stone as if she were on the verge of tears.
‘This really brings back memories…’
I stared blankly through the wide-open ceiling of the observatory at the three full moons.
Aether World.
A game I had played through tens, hundreds, thousands of deaths.
Who could possibly have imagined I would end up inside it?
I remembered the days when I loaded save data again and again, falling, dying, and yet still seeing the ending in the end.
Back then…
I suppose even death had not been frightening.
‘Because back then… it was only a game.’
—Read only on MugenCodex.—
The Constellatio Project, the Library of Stars.
Even hearing the name alone made a mage’s curiosity burn with thirst, greed well up, and passion for knowledge boil over—a mysterious library straight out of legend.
What secrets could possibly sleep in a library said to contain all the knowledge of this world?
And yet the Twelve Founding Families violently opposed access to the Constellatio Project, and Isaac of the Morf family had been no different.
But…
Aizel had heard nothing of it.
Isaac Morf had died, and all that remained behind were Morf blood and the symbol representing the family.
‘I can do it.’
Clutching the Morf family symbol tightly in both hands, Aizel slowly turned her head.
At the top of the tower—resembling a lighthouse—was a brilliantly colored magic circle. Did her friends know that this immense magic circle covering the sky in fact spread over Stella Academy itself?
That line of mana surrounding them had already wrapped itself around the world, so subtle and ingenious that an ordinary mage could not even perceive it with the naked eye.
To Aizel, it was a very unfamiliar kind of magic circle.
Whereas ordinary magic circles drew lines based on a circular form, this one quite literally linked together the stars in the sky…
like a constellation.
In the center of that constellation-shaped magic circle spread across the sky stood Aizel, and Arain placed something in her hand.
“One of the fragments of Constellatio lost long ago.”
It was a small octagonal stone. There were traces of writing on its surface, but she could not decipher them.
“…Is it really all right to use something so precious this casually?”
Aizel asked that as she carefully received it, and Arain answered as though it were nothing.
“I found it, so I may use it as I please. I cannot use it myself, however, so you will have to do so in my place.”
When she nodded with a stiff expression, Arain stepped back.
“Remember this. The information a human may read in the Library of Stars is extremely limited. The price of reading it is mana and willpower. The moment you feel you have reached your limit, you must come back immediately.”
“…Understood.”
How much information could a mere 3-Class mage possibly read? It was only because tonight happened to be the Day of the Mage, with all three moons full, that this was even possible. On an ordinary day, she might not have even been able to approach it.
Still, whatever the case, she was currently the only person in the world who could approach the Constellatio Project without interference, so there was nothing to do but believe.
“Hoo…”
Seeing Aizel close her eyes and focus, Arain reflexively started to take out a cigarette out of habit, then stopped after glancing around.
The greatest scholars of Stella’s Orion Magic Tower had gathered here and were concentrating with all their might to prepare for the most mysterious magic of all: access to the Library of Stars.
Even Arain himself was a little curious.
What exactly had the Twelve Disciples seen in the Library of Stars, such that they had trembled so violently in fear and sealed it away?
Of course, with a human brain, the act of reading all knowledge was likely impossible to begin with.
Which meant the thing they had seen was some vague but overwhelming terror that could at least be understood within the scope of human understanding…
‘I don’t know.’
The starlight in the night sky shimmered one point at a time, then began pouring down toward Aizel.
It was not the mana of nature itself, but another mysterious mana descending from above the heavens. The power of space itself—something mages had not yet conquered—wrapped itself around Aizel’s body.
The Library of Stars was not something one could simply access whenever one pleased.
Tonight was truly special: for the first time in ages, all three moons were full; the sky was perfectly clear without a single cloud; and by chance, the constellation of the Twelve Stars was visible as well.
Arain had come to find Aizel today not for some simple reason, but because tonight was the only opportunity.
Sharar…
As the sound of stardust falling reached her ears, Aizel’s consciousness drifted farther and farther away.
To a distant, very distant place.
A world that seemed like a dream, yet was not a dream.
A world that seemed like reality, yet was not reality.
‘Ah…’
When she opened her eyes—
she was walking above the sky.
Drifting upon a boundless sea of starlight, Aizel stared blankly into the void.
The starlight pouring from the sky became letters and began teaching her something.
[Aizel Morf]
9??
9999
99999 999999 99
999 9999 99
99 99 99 99 99
999 99
‘That’s… my information…?’
And yet, for some reason, no matter how desperately she tried to read it, she could not. Every attempt only made her mana drain away faster and faster, like pouring water into a bottomless vessel.
‘Forget it! I don’t need my own information anyway!’
She turned her eyes back toward the void.
Something, something…
An enormously high wave was bearing down toward her from afar. It was not a wave of the sea, nor a wave of starlight.
‘A wave of information.’
She understood it instinctively.
If that struck her head-on, she would die.
Not physically.
Mentally.
Squeezing her eyes shut, Aizel rejected it with all her might and summoned a single piece of information in her mind.
‘Tell me about Mana Leakage Constitution. Tell me the cure!’
But the wave ignored her words and continued moving straight toward her. It did not understand her signal at all.
At this rate, if she let herself be flooded with random information, her soul itself would be shredded to pieces.
If she gave up and went back, she would survive.
But she would gain nothing.
And so Aizel cried out one last time.
‘Tell me about Baek Yuseol!!’
Thud.
The wave that had been advancing as though to swallow the whole world halted, then collapsed like a sandcastle.
And then—
when she came to her senses, she was standing in the middle of a ruin.
‘This place is…?’
A massive structure that had clearly once been brilliant and majestic lay completely shattered, and the streets were lined with corpses.
Aizel soon recognized the clothing on those corpses.
‘Stella… uniforms?’
She hurriedly took in the ruined wreckage around her, and before long realized that this place was none other than Stella Academy in Arcanium.
‘Why…?’
She stopped.
Then, suddenly, Aizel looked up at the sky.
…An overwhelming number of meteors were striking the earth. There was no roar, no noise—only the quiet crushing of the world.
‘What… what is this…?’
Standing there and staring blankly at the ruined world, Aizel took an unconscious step backward.
And in that very instant—
Hwaaaak…!!
The place changed again, and now she stood in a vast plain.
Here too, everything had been destroyed by the meteor shower, and all around her lay the corpses of robed mages in mountains of corpses and seas of blood.
And in the very center of it all stood something towering high.
It was living terror.
It was living calamity.
It was black destruction.
It was…
in the form of a gigantic dragon.
‘Ah…?’
In that moment, Aizel’s mind went blank and she became incapable of thought.
Because the existence of that black dragon—covering half the sky—was simply too overwhelming for a mere human to stand before.
All the great architecture of the world. All advanced technology. All magitech. All the great figures of history…
Before that existence, all of it became infinitely meaningless.
No one had to explain it to her.
She understood.
‘This is the destruction of the world.’
Why?
Why would the Constellatio Project, which contained all information, hold the moment of the world’s destruction?
Surely the Library of Stars should only record events that had already occurred up to the present—
so why would it contain information from the future?
Unless…
what if it was something that had already happened once?
That question had only just surfaced in Aizel’s mind when—
Step.
Step—!
Someone walked past her and forward, forcing her thoughts to stop.
…
Aizel recognized him at once.
Wearing moonlike white armor that looked utterly out of place in the modern age, and holding a single mysterious White Blade (白刀) in his hand, the man walking toward the black dragon was none other than—
Baek Yuseol.
He looked at least ten years older than the Baek Yuseol of the present, and with no expression on his face at all, he simply kept walking forward.
Toward the black dragon.
‘N-no!’
Aizel shouted with all her strength.
Don’t go.
If you go there, you’ll die.
But Baek Yuseol continued approaching the black dragon without stopping, as though he could not hear her voice.
As though he meant to face it alone.
And astonishingly, for the first time, the black dragon reacted to Baek Yuseol’s existence.
It said something to him, but he gave no reply at all. He merely leveled his sword.
Flash!
He shot forward as a single streak of light toward the black dragon.
‘Nooooo!!’
The instant Aizel desperately stretched out her hand toward his back—
“…Stop it at once!”
“Hahhhk!”
The world inside the Library of Stars shattered, and reality was forced back upon her.
“Sta…! Stabilization… bring the potion…!”
Her consciousness drifted farther and farther away.
As the world receded, all she could hear was Arain’s urgent voice ringing in her ears.
