Volume 6, Chapter 58 – A Possible Third Curse

“Powerful magic fluctuations, yet it doesn’t shut people out. The main effect of this light screen should be to deceive people; it doesn’t actually have many functions.”

Her fingers stopped at the position where they were about to touch the barrier but hadn’t touched it yet. Claire explained softly. She raised her head, looking at the scale of the light screen again.

“It should be because the caster’s ability has reached the limit. After all, just covering such a wide distance is already remarkable. If the effect of shutting people out were added, the magic power required would probably be more exaggerated than what the Holy Tree consumes. It’s just that this light screen doesn’t have the ability to confuse sight like the Illusion Barrier. Making it so obvious, aren’t they afraid people won’t know there’s something unusual here? Anyone seeing this light screen would be curious, which instead goes against the original intention of setting up the light screen.”

“We’ll know the answer once we go in and look.”

“That’s true.”

Facing Fia’s simple and straightforward answer, Claire smiled bitterly. She was the first to extend her hand into the light screen. As she expected, the light screen didn’t refuse her intrusion. After the initial probe, Claire stepped into the light screen. Then, Fia also walked in.

In unison, both paused their breathing for the scene before them, pupils slightly contracting.

A very familiar scene.

Endless earth slopes stretching for several kilometers. Both the sky and the earth were a rust-like reddish-brown. There was no vegetation or animals on the ground. The rotten cold wind symbolizing death drifted in the air. Everything was like a dead planet covered by thick clouds under high temperature and pressure.

Fia and Claire had seen the scene before them. It was the desolate and dead silent land located on the other side of Blossom. It was just that the wasteland on the other side of Blossom was vaster, and things like mountains existed there.

Thinking stalled for two or three seconds. Fia came back to her senses, muttering softly with a complicated expression.

“Is this what Nola’s Goddess wanted to hide? But is there a need to hide a desolate world…”

Because of the absolute lack of elements and magic power, it was impossible for monsters to be born in the wasteland. Without hiding it with a light screen, showing it straightforwardly like in Blossom wouldn’t bring negative impacts to the surroundings either. Fia couldn’t figure out the meaning of the Goddess setting up the light screen.

“Maybe the light screen has the function of isolating the spread of the wasteland, just like preventing desertification. Before Little Fia and I came in, it was night outside. Here the sky became reddish-brown. Saying the light screen is a barrier isolating two worlds wouldn’t be wrong.”

“I hope so. I thought there would be a temple towering into the clouds hidden behind the light screen. It seems the Goddess doesn’t live here.”

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Fia turned her head to look around. The wasteland inside the light screen was fully a dozen kilometers long but only two or three kilometers wide—a narrow strip of land. Standing in the air, Fia could easily glimpse the end of the land—a cliff no different from an abyss. Further ahead from the cliff, there were only churning yellowish-brown thick clouds, making it impossible to see the scene below.

In the past, Anastasia said the place of exile where the Silvar Kingdom exiled prisoners was located at the End of the World. Standing on the cliff there, one could see thick clouds extending infinitely into the distance. It should be pretty much the same there as here.

Fia subconsciously looked at Claire beside her. Unlike herself, Claire would feel physically uncomfortable with this dead land.

“Is Claire okay?”

“Maybe the light screen doesn’t isolate the air; I feel okay. The feeling here isn’t as intensely uncomfortable as the wasteland on the other side of the Holy Tree brought me. Shall we split up? Little Fia goes left, I go right. If this place is like the wasteland on the other side of the Holy Tree, maybe this place will repeat the same mistake and fall down. Plus the recent frequent earthquakes and the fall I felt… If we can find traces of collapse on the edge of the cliff, it means my feeling wasn’t wrong. It’s just…”

By the end, Claire’s eyes revealed deep worry. She lowered her head, her expression exceptionally complicated.

For a moment, Fia had a feeling that Claire was hiding something from her, her heart heavy with worries.

Shouldn’t be an illusion…

Claire wasn’t someone who would deliberately hide her secrets. After all, she and Claire were already engaged; there was no need to hide anything at all.

She couldn’t help but take a small step closer to Claire.

“Does Claire want to say even if we know a fall happened here, we can’t change it? The wasteland lacks magic essence and elements. As long as we use magic that can restore magic essence and elements, we should be able to revive it, right? Like magic such as [Rain of Serenity].”

“That’s not what I’m worried about…”

Claire bit her lip. Her eyes full of complicated emotions hesitated for a long time before finally clearing. She showed a determined expression, staring intently at Fia’s face. Those clear and deep emerald eyes seemed to want to search for something from the bottom of Fia’s eyes, staring unblinkingly.

“Fia, I’ve always had a speculation. I almost forgot about this in the past few years, but the various things happening recently force me to pay attention again. Do you remember what I said about how falls often happened when I was in Dragonfall before?”

The solemnity emitted from Claire made Fia unable to joke. The invisible pressure made her only nod lightly.

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“Mm, I remember.”

“Originally I thought Dragonfall itself wasn’t stable enough, so it fell frequently. But when I went back this time, I found that since I left Dragonfall, Dragonfall never experienced a fall again. On the contrary, the wasteland of the Silvar Kingdom fell down, and now it has spread to Cold Night. The abyss is like chasing me. Maybe the curse on me isn’t as simple as being forgotten and feared; it might also include triggering the abyss… If the fact is really so, then I am the incarnation of disaster. I am not qualified—”

Before Claire could finish speaking, Fia covered Claire’s mouth instantly. This made Claire widen her eyes in surprise. She tried to push Fia’s hand away to continue speaking, but Fia extended another hand to stop Claire’s hands.

Fia raised her eyebrows, her eyes filled with intense displeasure, and even her voice was full of anger. She understood Claire wanted to say she would bring trouble to Fia, so she wasn’t qualified to be with Fia. Claire’s starting point was consideration for Fia, but precisely because of this, Fia was exceptionally angry.

“Claire wants to say you shouldn’t stay by my side, right? Where is such a strange thing! This is purely Claire’s baseless anxiety. Previously when Claire lived in the Holy Kingdom of Milcandis for a long time, didn’t nothing happen there? Not to mention when the wasteland fell, we had already left the Silvar Kingdom. The earthquake in the Weeping Mountains also happened before we arrived at the Fire Cat Tribe. The timing doesn’t match at all. If Claire says such things again, I’m going to get angry!”

That being said, Fia didn’t completely ignore Claire’s words.

Although as Fia said, when Claire was in the Holy Kingdom of Milcandis, the Holy Kingdom didn’t have an abyss appear, and the fall of the wasteland and the earthquake in the Weeping Mountains didn’t match the time of Claire’s appearance, but as soon as Claire left Dragonfall, Dragonfall stopped falling. This was indeed a difficult-to-explain phenomenon.

Both the Elf God and Davis had said that people from another world would destroy the order of the world’s operation by their very existence. For example, Darkborn Disease might be because the Holy Son’s existence affected the surrounding rules, making the originally normally operating rules disordered, thereby producing inexplicable errors like Darkborn Disease.

To describe it concretely, the rules of the world were like a stretched gauze, and people were spheres walking on it. People from another world had too much mass, causing the gauze to collapse downward. Everything around would be affected by this collapse and sink together, falling into rules that couldn’t operate normally.

Therefore, Darkborn Disease would always appear on people around Davis, and the abyss would always run after Claire. These were feedbacks of the order maintaining the world’s operation being affected by the two. Thinking further, when Claire was in Aurora City, there were a large number of people suffering from Darkborn Disease in the slums there, practically confirming the statement that Claire would bring misfortune.

However, this explanation was very one-sided and couldn’t explain where the Darkborn Disease of Erin Slate and others came from. Darkborn Disease exists widely all over the world. Because gods feared the threat of the Holy Son, they would always intercept the Holy Son upon reincarnation. If the gods hadn’t neglected protecting their status and lives, then the reports of the Holy Son’s appearance and the places where Darkborn Disease appeared wouldn’t match up.

Furthermore, she was also a transmigrator, with memories not belonging to this world in her soul. If the stronger the transmigrator’s power, the deeper the impact on surrounding things—for example, Claire could trigger the abyss that Davis couldn’t—then wouldn’t she, whose magic power was even more abundant than Claire’s, cause the world to collapse?

But the fact was that no such thing had happened. Even after she killed the Elf God, the sun still rose in the east and set in the west. The Elf God’s statement and the statement Davis heard from the God of Corona didn’t match the facts. Rather than believing the gods were worried about the world collapsing, Fia was more willing to believe the gods made up this trick to deceive children to consolidate their rule.

However, Fia couldn’t say the words she heard from the Elf God and Davis, otherwise Claire would likely believe their words. People only believe what they want to believe. Once believing one was at fault, it was hard to wake up from guilt. Claire kept the secret until today to speak out, indicating she cared about this matter internally to the point she couldn’t continue to wait and see. She thought continuing would be irresponsible to Fia. Such determination often meant danger; guilt would crush everything.

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Maybe before saying this sentence, Claire had already prepared herself mentally. Thinking carefully, Claire was indeed such a person. Because she had never been cared for by others, toward Fia who cared for her and wouldn’t forget her, Claire was gentle enough to sacrifice everything of hers for Fia.

Going further, the deeper reason why Claire always felt she couldn’t shoulder the burden of the future Empress alone and didn’t refuse Liti’s usual “I want to be the second queen” remarks was probably because she anticipated this step early. Because she worried bad things might happen, she felt more at ease when there were other people accompanying Fia, feeling Fia would pull herself together under their comfort.

Truly stupid.

How could I allow such a thing to happen? If the rules of the world force me and Claire to separate, then I will rewrite the rules of the world. This was originally my mission. How can the power of a mere planet restrict me who controls the universe—

Hmm?

As if splashed by a basin of ice water, the anger in Fia’s heart stopped abruptly. The thought just now made her soul shudder. It seemed she finally arrived in front of a closed door for a long time. Now she was separated from that door by only a layer of paper.

“Fia?”

Sensing Fia’s abnormality, Claire changed her previous hesitation, holding Fia’s hand and asking with concern.

Fia came back to her senses as if waking from a dream.

“Ah, I’m fine. Anyway, I don’t want to hear Claire say such discouraging words again. If Claire leaves me, whether using chains or magic, I will tie Claire by my side, and then cry for you to see.”

“This…” Troubled by Fia’s extremely serious words, Claire smiled bitterly. “I know what Little Fia said makes sense, but I can’t help thinking like before. Wouldn’t it be the same if Little Fia stood in my position? Worrying about bringing disaster to me, so feeling guilty toward me and so on.”

“Mm… I would feel guilty, that’s correct. But shouldn’t Claire also think from my position? If I leave Claire, what would Claire do?”

Would feel existence losing meaning, searching ceaselessly.

Claire answered in her heart. Someone who had seen the vast world wouldn’t be willing to continue staying at the bottom of a well. She had already experienced the beauty of getting along with people; it was impossible to return to her original life. Not to mention the original her was already on the verge of giving up on herself.

Silence was enough to explain everything. Fia spread her hands with an expression of “that’s how it is.”

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“Claire’s current thought is my thought. So don’t mention this kind of thing in the future. We are a couple; thinking of a solution together when encountering problems is the correct approach. Besides, leaving aside that Claire’s argument is full of holes, firstly, falling itself isn’t anything to be afraid of. People fear falling because everyone lives on the World Tree Continent. Then as long as all the Chaos on the Prime Continent is solved, everyone can live in the world below without fearing falling, right? Once and for all.”

“This statement is also…”

Claire smiled bitterly. As if acknowledging Fia’s words, she shook her head helplessly.

“Should I say as expected of Little Fia? Thoughts are completely different from ordinary people. Actually thinking of solving Chaos that even the cooperation of gods and Darkborn couldn’t defeat. If it were me, I would definitely only think about how to reinforce the earth.”

“Because Claire doesn’t understand my power. Speaking of which, Claire went to Dragonfall before and didn’t see my most powerful magic. Since there’s a chance this time, I’ll let Claire see it. The flow of Chaos is nothing at all; the Witch of Calamity Flame isn’t called for nothing.”

“I always feel it’s magic that can’t be shown casually.” After smiling, Claire moved her gaze away from Fia. She looked at the churning thick clouds under the cliff in the distance. Her clear emerald eyes were full of relief. Finally, she sighed long and deep. “I worried too much. Fia is right; even if we encounter difficulties, we should solve them together. Saying such discouraging words as an older sister, I am a bit unlike an older sister.”

There was no longer the previous melancholy in Claire’s words. Fia’s mood also became happy.

“Everyone has troubled times; as long as they are emotional creatures, it can’t be avoided. This is a wasteland where magic power can’t be restored. It’s more suitable for Claire to squander magic power than the ocean, and we don’t need to worry about accidentally injuring the innocent. Let’s use magic here—”

Before her voice fell, Fia tilted her head. Her excellent elf vision allowed her to glimpse someone breaking into the light screen in the distance. Although just a black dot, it was exceptionally obvious in the world covered in reddish-brown, like a candle lit in the dark night.

“No, I take back what I just said. Looks like it’s not completely empty of people. Claire, shall we go over and take a look?”

“Mm.”

Exchanging a glance, Claire took the initiative to hold Fia’s hand. Together, the two accelerated to chase the light spot on the right.