CHAPTER 6

At the End of an Eternal Sleep

01

This… This is a monumental breakthrough!

That night, Mariela stood trembling before a magical tool in the kitchen.

“Mariela? What’s wrong?” Sieg asked as he peered at it.

Mariela had flung open the door to a refrigeration device. It enabled long-term preservation of food items like orc meat by freezing them and was groundbreaking for Mariela. It was a huge refrigeration tool for business use that had been here before Mariela and Sieg moved in, so the interior was divided into several sections, which even had its own temperature control function. The existence of such a convenient thing made Mariela feel the incredible progress of the last two hundred years once again.

After all, the refrigeration tool had cultivated aurora ice fruit.

Aurora ice fruit was a medicinal herb that grew during a white night and bore fruit during a polar night. It was one of the ingredients in polymorph potion. There seemed to be a variety of theories on how it had gotten its name: because it was often found under auroras; because its transformation resembled the swaying appearance of an aurora; or because the fruit had aurora-like colors, among others.

The day Sieg and the others gathered the aurora ice fruit on the thirty-second stratum, Lynx had spoken fervently about how cold the stratum had been as he enjoyed freshly made pot-au-feu with everyone. Since they could gather aurora ice fruit there, he’d thought surely it would be a beautiful place where they’d be able to see an aurora, but apparently that wasn’t the case.

“The sky in the Labyrinth might look like a real sky, but it’s different, y’know?”

Mariela had gotten a flash of inspiration while listening to Lynx’s complaint about not getting to see an aurora.

Was the growth of aurora ice fruit unrelated to real auroras?

She was easily able to find out about the sky in the thirty-second stratum by asking Ghark.

Apparently, rocks called luminous stones glow during a white night, and moonstones glow during a polar night.

Luminous stones shone with magical power and were used in general household magical lighting tools. Moonstones’ brightness was low compared to the amount of magic they used, so they weren’t sold for general household use, but they could be easily obtained because they were in demand by lunamagia farmers in the imperial capital, among others.

To prepare a suitable environment for cultivation, Mariela put luminous stones in the magical refrigerator she had set to the same temperature as the thirty-second stratum’s white nights and put moonstones in the magical frozen storage unit set to the same temperature as the stratum’s polar nights.

She’d sifted through the aurora ice fruit’s seeds when she made the polymorph potion, so she sprinkled them on a tray with a thin layer of soil and placed the tray in the refrigeration tool.

They bore fruit in just five days. After that, she transferred the tray to the frozen storage unit for another five days. The aurora ice fruit completely matured and ripened in the frozen storage unit.

She’d so easily made high-grade materials for polymorph potions, worth two large silver coins each, at home.

Sieg was astonished to see the aurora ice fruit in Mariela’s hand and Mariela going “oh crap” while shaking in front of the frozen storage unit.

“Sieg, I grew aurora ice fruit…”

“Which means I don’t have to go collect it anymore.”

Apparently, collecting the aurora ice fruit had been extremely rough. Sieg suddenly clenched his fists tightly, a rare sight.

Last time, I could only give them thirty vials of polymorph potion due to the limited materials. But maybe, just maybe, I’ll get more orders for it. So I’m gonna grow a bunch of aurora ice fruit, just in case.

With her abundant resources, Mariela bought jumbo-size magical refrigerators and freezers and grew aurora ice fruit in large quantities in her cellar. Unfortunately, no additional orders for polymorph potion came, and the fruit remained in the frozen storage unit and turned into fertilizer. However, thanks to the high-capacity unit, Sunlight’s Canopy could now offer cold drinks and frozen desserts in the summer, and more and more customers who came just for the tea filled the shop, so maybe this was a good thing.

Even so, magical tools are sure useful…

Mariela couldn’t keep up with two hundred years’ worth of advancement.

Even without magical tools, she could manage anything with old-fashioned methods and alchemic skills, so she never realized there was a convenient tool for a particular task until someone suggested, “Why not use a magical tool?”

Surely there were many useful tools for making medicine that Mariela didn’t know about. Not just magical ones, for sure, but also techniques and implements that had been created over the past two hundred years.

One day, Mariela asked Carol a question while watching the mixer whip up skin-brightening cream.

“I grew up in a remote village, so I had no idea such convenient things like this existed. What other kinds of magical tools could there be?”

“Well, Mariela, if you’re that curious, how would you like to visit my atelier?” Caroline suggested with a smile. “I have a full selection of all the necessary implements. I think that would be just splendid. Please do come and visit. It pains me to constantly impose upon you.”

A certain something about her made it extremely hard to refuse.

If only Mariela hadn’t vaguely responded “Next time, then” to Carol’s pushy offer, maybe she would have continued to live as she had been, in blissful ignorance…

02

That day, a sudden downpour encouraged people walking in town to stop at nearby shops.

Beneath a cloudy winter sky, the people were pelted with a frigid mixture of rain and sleet. Those with no umbrellas waited in shops with roofs for the rain to stop.

Mariela and Sieg were among those people. They’d headed to the Seele Company in the northeastern part of the Labyrinth City to buy genea cream in bulk.

By the time they’d dashed into the building, Mariela and Sieg were soaking wet from the rain and chilled to the bone. Although they dried their clothes with the lifestyle magic Dehydrate, they could hardly warm their cold bodies. Mariela placed her order and shivered as the two of them waited for the rain to dissipate. However, it kept growing more intense, and they didn’t know when they’d be able to return home.

At that very moment, a lone carriage happened to pass by.

“Is that you, Mariela?”

Whether by divine providence, or just the usual path she took, Caroline happened to be passing through. She saw Mariela and stopped the carriage.

“Please, come inside.”

Caroline took Mariela’s hand to lead her to the carriage. Noticing her friend’s hand was ice cold, she said, “Gosh, you’re freezing to death! Any longer like this and you’ll catch cold. My estate is not far from here. By all means, come over and get yourself warm,” and invited her to the Aguinas estate.

The Aguinases were a noble family that managed potions in the Labyrinth City.

And Mariela was most likely the only alchemist in the Labyrinth City who could make potions.

She knew Caroline had no ill intentions, but she couldn’t so readily visit a place that risky.

Mariela tried to refuse, saying she shouldn’t intrude on Caroline so suddenly and she didn’t know proper etiquette as a commoner.

“But you simply mustn’t catch cold! And I promised I would invite you to my atelier. We can work together there, so please don’t think you are being a bother.”

A noblewoman and a commoner girl. Curious bystanders had started to stare at them as they talked, wondering what was going on. This, coupled with Mariela running out of excuses to refuse, led her to board Caroline’s carriage with Sieg, and they were whisked off to the Aguinas family estate.

 

03

The rain grew worse and worse, soaking Jack Nierenberg’s coat.

No one had been severely wounded in the subjugation of the Sea-Floating Pillar, so he’d been able to go home early these past few days.

The sky had looked like it would start pouring rain any moment, so Nierenberg had hurried along the road home even faster than usual, but it picked up before he’d reached his house.

Blasted rain…

He didn’t like this kind of rain. It crept through the gaps in his clothes and stole his body heat, reminding him of his fellow men who didn’t receive treatment in time and grew cold to the touch.

Nierenberg had no gift for healing magic. What he could do was probe the insides of living creatures and stitch them up. The only other thing he had was his training in martial arts, and those abilities of his were more suited to an assassin or one-on-one combat, but if he were to encounter a human-sized monster, he could probably find its weak point and hit that spot to defeat it in a single blow.

Nierenberg’s hands were always stained with the blood of the enemies he’d defeated. He didn’t know how many lives he’d mowed down with those hands. He’d given up on counting a long time ago.

However, after Weishardt discovered his abilities, he appointed Nierenberg as a medical technician, and the medic’s hands became stained with the blood of his comrades. The more blood flowed into his hands, the more his comrades escaped death. He couldn’t count how many lives those hands had saved.

One thing Nierenberg was aware of was that he no longer hesitated to touch his beloved daughter, Sherry.

When Sherry was born, he’d been reluctant to hold her. Would his bloodstained hands contaminate her? Would his own sinful deeds sully her?

Every time he stroked Sherry’s head and she said, “Papa, your hands are so big and warm,” Nierenberg felt grateful to Leonhardt and Weishardt for giving him work as a medical technician. Even when soldiers grew enraged with him or complained about his ruthless methods, the way his colleagues admired him as a medical professional reminded him that he was a fellow member of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces.

He fervently hoped they could reach the deepest part of the Labyrinth without losing a single person.

“Ah, such a despicable rain…,” Jack Nierenberg muttered. He’d been having thoughts that were out of character for him. His clothes were thoroughly soaked, too. He had to get home right away and change.

He had to get home before the rain took away his body heat.

When he finally reached his house, not a soul was inside. His beloved daughter Sherry had been taken away.

The unceasing rain painted the stone walls of the Labyrinth City black.

Few people were out in the cold, sleety rain, and no one was suspicious of a lone man who paid a visit to the Aguinas family estate at the edge of the aristocratic quarter.

“Welcome, Jack Nierenberg, sir.”

With a courteous bow, the steward of the Aguinas family led Nierenberg to their annex. The building had been constructed sometime after the Stampede two hundred years ago, and the wide entrance and the shape of its pillars and beams were characteristic of its age. However, it was well maintained from repeated reinforcement and repairs, and it could be used even now.

The current head of the family, Robert Aguinas, welcomed Nierenberg in a room at the back of the building.

“Tell me where Sherry is.”

“She’s sleeping in the back. What a lovely young lady. It’s a great pity she has such a terrible scar. Surely you have the authority to use potions, Medical Technician Nierenberg. Don’t you wish to use just one vial for your daughter?” Robert spoke to Nierenberg, who glared at him with murder in his eyes. “Meanwhile, the Labyrinth Suppression Forces have been doling out as many potions as they like.”

Nierenberg scrutinized Robert, who’d spoken as if he knew the true state of things. How much information did the Aguinas family have?

“Potions are strategic materials. They can’t be appropriated for personal gain. No exceptions.”

“Such devotion! You would sacrifice everything to destroy the Labyrinth?”

“Of course. What’s it to you?”

“If you mean it, if you yearn for the Labyrinth’s defeat, then you must cooperate with the Aguinas family.” Robert began to speak of the truth behind the Labyrinth City over the past two hundred years. “Even our potion storage facilities can only preserve potions for about a hundred years. Do you understand what this means?”

“A hundred years? Then… No…”

“Precisely. For generations, the house of Aguinas has continued to make potions—together with the alchemists who survived the Stampede.”

Two hundred years ago, when monsters had flooded out of the Fell Forest and attacked the Citadel City, some people safely escaped to the mountain range. Others had left the Kingdom of Endalsia by chance and avoided the disaster. Around ten alchemists survived the night of the Stampede.

“Are you familiar with the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation?”

Nierenberg grimaced at the words he was unaccustomed to hearing from Robert’s mouth. When they’d taken away Sherry and left a written invitation to this place, he’d had a rough idea of what the Aguinas family was after. They wanted to find the source of the potions that had been brought to the Labyrinth Suppression Forces for the past two months.

As if Nierenberg’s reaction was just as he’d anticipated, Robert continued. “As its name implies, the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation puts its user into a deathlike sleep. A person in this state will wake up only when the conditions for their revival have been met.”

Putting someone into this slumber was a complicated technique in itself. On top of that, how difficult was it to suspend biological functions while preserving the flesh for such a long period of time? How complicated must that single magic circle have to be to achieve that kind of power? Nierenberg, who led a medical team, understood the difficulty was off the charts.

“It’s said that two hundred years ago, before the Stampede, the then-head of the Aguinas family, Robroy, was given the opportunity to borrow the original Magic Circle of Suspended Animation.”

Robroy then supposedly had made an exact replica of it.

“As I mentioned before, the alchemists who assisted in the City’s reconstruction were the ones to identify that the potion storage facilities would not last two hundred years. Lamenting that the Labyrinth subjugation would reach its limit due to the lack of potions, they reproduced the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation and fell into this sleep of their own accord.”

The alchemists’ worries had become reality, but it appeared that waking an alchemist and having them make potions anew every time the current potions ran dry or deteriorated would solve the situation.

“The biggest miscalculation was that the duplicated magic circle wasn’t perfect.”

Robert looked toward Nierenberg. However, his gaze wasn’t on the older man, nor was it fixed in any one location; it was as if he were gazing at something far away.

“Half of the alchemists who went to sleep were never revived, turning to salt and crumbling away. Even those who did awaken had terribly short lives; one ran out of magical power and collapsed, never to wake up again, while another vomited blood and passed away less than a year later.”

Although the alchemists who woke up knew their own fate, they continued to make potions until their final moments.

“Did you understand the nature of the potions your Forces used?” Robert asked Nierenberg with his hands calmly raised.

“Then what’s this stuff you call ‘new medicine’? If there’s a surviving alchemist like you say, there’s no need for any of that.”

The corners of Robert’s mouth lifted in a smile that made him look entirely like a lunatic as he answered Nierenberg’s question.

“There is no longer anyone who can make potions. I don’t know how precise the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation created by the alchemist that the Labyrinth Suppression Forces captured was, but even the Aguinas family could only borrow the original, not obtain it. It’s not possible for that alchemist to have used the original. They may seem perfectly healthy, but don’t let appearances fool you. The Magic Circle of Suspended Animation is complex. No matter how accurate he tried to make it, even my ancestor Robroy Aguinas’s magic circle couldn’t compare to the original. I’m sure you also know that a distorted magic circle produces distorted effects.”

Robert was implying that the Labyrinth Suppression Forces’ alchemist would soon die. He seemed confident in this speculation.

“Have your alchemist create as many potions as possible, but put them back to sleep while they still have life remaining. We must not use them up until the Labyrinth is destroyed. We must have alchemists at our disposal no matter what it takes. Given how long you’ve been treating the Labyrinth Suppression Forces, surely you ought to know—the value of potions, the necessity of potions. You have to know.”

The same person who spoke of the tragedy of the alchemists from two hundred years ago also spoke of the alchemists as if they were tools.

“That’s the very reason that I, that the Aguinas family has gone so far as to make this new medicine—for the sake of my brethren and the alchemists who perished before accomplishing their goal. Until the day the Labyrinth is destroyed, until the day this land is returned to the hands of mankind, I—we—must preserve potions.”

Robert continued his incoherent speech as if everything he said were correct.

“For that reason—for that very reason—we must control the alchemists! You understand, yes? For us to continue to use potions, we have to make the alchemists create more and more, and then if those alchemists are still alive, if they have life remaining, we must put them back to sleep and pass them down to the next generation!”

In the midst of his perversion and madness, Robert Aguinas recalled the words of his father and grandfather, as well as the memory of an alchemist who’d vomited blood and melted into nothingness when Robert had still been a child.

Robert was facing Nierenberg, but his eyes weren’t looking at him.

He was remembering those who’d reawakened and perished these past two hundred years as if they were right there in front of him, delivering tales of their regrets and desires.

04

…He couldn’t allow her to wake up.

Every alchemist who had woken up from their suspended animation had expressed the same thing: “She is essential for the rebirth of alchemists in the new world.”

That was the truth. However, Estalia was most likely chosen as the First Alchemist for her youth.

Estalia had become an alchemist right before the Stampede. It was said that she’d been just six years old at the time. The alchemist who was her master had taken her on the back of a yagu and escaped to the mountain range. What awaited her afterward was the harsh reality of reconstruction day after day.

She had neither sufficient food nor a warm bed. She spent her nights sensing the panting of monsters on the other side of a thin wooden wall and holding her own breath.

During the day, she gathered medicinal herbs while staying out of the monsters’ sight and single-mindedly continued to make potions. Estalia was raised without being able to play like a child or even act like one, and she never laughed gleefully like a young girl.

It was said that the more beautiful Estalia grew, the more people became sympathetic upon hearing about the quality of her food, her clothing, and her miserable circumstances. That was how beautiful she was. If she’d been born in a different time—no, if she’d even been born in the imperial capital—what beautiful clothing she would have worn, and she would have had a wealthy, joyful life, surrounded by people who loved her.

But such a fortunate period of time did come to her. She fell in love. In the midst of a difficult life, people imagined a bright future for this young lady who smiled happily. If this girl were happy, surely the future of the Labyrinth City would be bright, too.

However, as if to mock this, Estalia’s beloved was attacked by monsters and abruptly left this world.

Estalia sank into despair. But she didn’t stop making potions. Day after day, she continued to make them until her magical reserves ran out.

So that people could reclaim this land.

All Estalia could do to fulfill the goals of the man she loved was to make potions.

Around ten years after the Stampede, the Labyrinth City had just barely returned to being a functional city. The most brilliant researchers in the imperial capital estimated that it would take two hundred years to subjugate the Labyrinth, which would reach fifty strata at most. And other researchers set forth a plan for storage facilities that could preserve potions for two hundred years.

They were unanimous: “It’s theoretically possible.”

In accordance with that theory, a huge storage facility was built in the Aguinas family cellar. The alchemists made as many potions as they could up to the limits of their magical power and filled the giant potion tank in the storage facility.

Small-scale storage facilities were also built in the houses of like-minded noble families who were determined to live in this land of monsters, including the Schutzenwalds, who had been selected to govern the Labyrinth City. All of the storage facilities were filled with potions.

However, this didn’t eliminate the concerns of the alchemists, including the Aguinases.

What if the Labyrinth wasn’t subjugated in two hundred years?

What if it exceeded fifty strata?

What if the potions ran out midway through?

What if the potion storage facilities couldn’t last for two hundred years?

The glorious Kingdom of Endalsia, which people believed would last forever, had been destroyed in a single night.

No one was dim-witted enough to believe the word of those who said “theoretically” without ever taking a single step outside the imperial capital, even if the scholars were absolutely brilliant.

Above all else, an alchemist master was needed to perform the contractual rite for other alchemists to connect to the ley line with a Nexus. So, the surviving alchemists put all their faith in one magic circle in the Aguinas family’s possession: the replica of the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation the Aguinas family had once borrowed.

The alchemists reproduced the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation. The magic circle was complex, and working on it was extremely difficult, but they reproduced and reproduced. They probably wouldn’t achieve an effect as good as the original.

Even if they woke up, they didn’t know if their original physical functions would be maintained, and they might not wake up at all.

But they took a gamble on the future.

All the potion storage facilities that had been built were full, and the alchemists couldn’t do any more.

“Using the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation, we will slumber in a secret cellar separate from the Aguinas family’s potion storage facilities. Should the magic circle function correctly and our coffins are sealed to cut off all oxygen, we most likely won’t wake up until the day our coffins are opened.”

Resolute in their decision, the alchemists exchanged last words in the Aguinas family’s cellar on the day everything was ready.

“To return the region to mankind.”

“So that alchemists can be reborn in the new land.”

Estalia was among them.

The rose-colored dress she wore was a gift from the alchemists out of the kindness of their hearts.

Her face, beautifully made-up, was no less stunning than Her Majesty the Queen of Endalsia, famed for her beauty.

The first time she’d worn beautiful clothes, the first time she’d worn makeup, the first time she was dressed up was in that place, right before she went to sleep in the coffin under the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation.

As Estalia lay in the glass coffin, the alchemists told her:

“The next time you wake up, a new world will be waiting. A bright, joyful world worthy of your clothes and your beauty. We wish you nothing but happiness in the new world, Estalia.”

Estalia was just like a daughter to the alchemists.

They couldn’t even describe how much the sight of this young girl continuing to make potions under these harsh conditions had encouraged them—or how it had made their hearts ache.

“Our fair, piteous daughter—our potions are sure to last until the new world of mankind arrives. We wish for you the greatest happiness when you awaken.”

Estalia replied, “Thank you, my fathers. I’m so glad…to have met you; to have been with him.”

After they watched her fall asleep, the alchemists went to sleep in their own coffins as well.

The single remaining Aguinas followed in their footsteps. And so did his child, and his child’s child.

Along with the alchemists who occasionally awoke, they continued to protect the coffins and the potions.

To deliver Estalia, the First Alchemist, to a new world.

05

At the moment when Robert Aguinas was giving his fervent speech in the midst of the madness that gripped his very soul, Mariela and Sieg were visiting the Aguinas family’s main building.

“Th-this is—!”

“A pelletizer—it makes pills. It works by adding moderately damp material and rotating this disk.”

“Oooh! You don’t even have to roll ’em by hand. S-so, um, what’s that?”

“That is a sieve shaker. If you set it with a specialized net and press this button, it will shake and sift for the designated length of time.”

“O-oh my gosh, how convenient! My arms won’t hurt anymore! Oh, and this thing here, what’s this?!”

“A vacuum evaporator. You simply pour water in here, and it gets suctioned from over here. You can set the temperature of the hot water here to dry it at whatever temperature you like.”

Caroline’s atelier was packed with experimental equipment Mariela had never seen before.

With Mariela’s alchemic skills, she didn’t need a single piece of equipment, but this was something completely different. To her, such implements and devices were the stuff of dreams and fantasy.

The two girls went over the devices one by one and giggled happily.

For girls their age, they should have been holding flowers or baked goods or accessories, but instead they gripped bundles of dried medicinal herbs and glass tools. It was enough to make one wonder just what was so thrilling about these things.

Caroline’s personal maid urged the giddy pair who kept oohing and aahing—“Wow!” “Incredible!”—to take a break. “You two must be thirsty. I’ve prepared some tea.”

Of course, she poured the (naturally) shiny tea in a stylish pose. Was this really the proper etiquette for an aristocrat’s maid?

The pair drank tea at a table set up at the edge of the atelier. Sieg seemed entirely devoted to guarding Mariela and remained behind her.

After the tea break, Caroline nervously asked Mariela a question.

“Mariela, I wanted to ask you about a rumor… Are you an Alchemist Pact-Bearer from the imperial capital? I was wondering if you might tell me what it was like to make a pact with a ley line.”

Caroline, a young noble lady of the Aguinas family, had alchemic skills. But since it wasn’t possible to connect to the Labyrinth City’s ley line through a Nexus, she could neither become an alchemist nor improve her proficiency with alchemic skills.

However, the Aguinases had been a family of alchemists since long ago, and Caroline yearned to be one herself.

For generations, alchemists had been summoned from the imperial capital in return for marrying into the Aguinas family. However, they never ventured from the Aguinas estate’s annex, so Caroline had only ever exchanged greetings with them. She’d never had a chance to hear stories about alchemy until now.

“One usually makes a pact at a young age. It may be late in my case, but after I marry in the imperial capital, I would very much like to make a pact myself if possible. I’m just so curious…”

Caroline was uneasy yet ever hopeful. Mariela told her the story of when she made her own pact while keeping the details vague.

06

Mariela had been eight years old, not long after being taken in by her master.

Before the Stampede two hundred years ago, Sunlight’s Canopy was the site of a place called the Spirit Sanctuary where many sacred trees grew.

Even now, Mariela clearly remembered the time she entered the sanctuary, led by her master.

It was a whimsical, wondrous place; flitting about in the air were what looked like fluffy clumps of snow that shone faintly. When she got a closer look, they resembled butterflies, or birds, or people with wings. They came in all different sizes and each one seemed to be playing, whether they were sprawled on flower petals, shaking tree branches, or appearing and disappearing.

“Mariela, I’ll be waiting here, so you go play. If you make a friend, bring ’em back with you,” her master had said, then sprawled out on a bench at the edge of the sanctuary and took a nap.

Mariela had helped out at the orphanage and looked after the younger children for as long as she could remember, so she didn’t know what to do even after being told to go play. She roamed around the sanctuary and saw other children who appeared to be fledgling alchemists. Led by their masters, they were saying something to the shining puffs of snow.

This seemed to be something that masters normally helped with. But Mariela’s was off in dreamland, out like a light.

Feeling somewhat uncomfortable, Mariela headed toward the back of the sanctuary.

Mariela followed one snow puff that lightly brushed the side of her face before flying away, then pushed aside branches as long as she was tall and came upon a child around the same age as herself. The child was alone, with no adult resembling a master in sight, and seemed to be searching for something in the clearing, crouching and using both hands to check plants one by one.

“…H-hello. Are you looking for something?” Mariela asked timidly.

“I’m looking for a seven-petaled flower.”

The child had green hair and green eyes with large pupils, and appeared to be glowing faintly. What a weirdo, Mariela thought, but since she had nothing else in particular to do, she told the child “I’ll help” and began to search, too.

“Fooour… Fiiive… Siiix… Nope, not this one.”

Mariela was just about to pluck the flower that had the wrong number of petals when the child said, “No, don’t. You only take what you need. Poor flower…”

The kid seemed sweet. Mariela really liked the child, and she did her absolute best to find a flower with seven petals.

“I found one! Look, it’s got seven petals, see!”

“Wow, thank you!”

“What do you do with it?”

“You use it to drink water.” The child cupped the flower in both hands and slowly lifted it.

Mysteriously, the child lifted the flower, which snapped at the roots and changed into a porcelainlike bowl.

“I bet you’re thirsty. Here, have some.”

The seven-petaled cup the child offered was filled to the brim with faintly shining water.

Come to think of it, Mariela was thirsty.

“Thanks.”

Mariela accepted the seven-petaled cup and gulped down all the shining water. It tasted slightly sweet and had a gentle flavor that seemed to spread throughout her body.

“It’s yummy! Water! Here you go.”

With the sole lifestyle magic spell she could use, Mariela filled the seven-petaled cup with water and handed it to the child. The child gulped down Mariela’s water in turn and said “Yum!” with a smile.

“Marielaaa…,” came her master’s voice from far away. Come to think of it, her master told her to bring back a friend, right?

“I’m Mariela. Wanna be friends?”

“Sure! I’m .”

What had the child said? Mariela should have remembered, but she couldn’t recall it. Mariela took the child’s hand and ran back to her master.

Perhaps the other fledgling alchemists had already made their pacts and gone home, because the sanctuary was deserted. Only Mariela’s master sat on the bench from before and greeted her. “Welcome back.”

“Master! Master! I brought a friend!”

Looking at her friend, Mariela’s master uttered, “Wow!” and then added, “All right, let’s make that pact!” and smiled at Mariela like always.

“You show Mariela down to that real deep place for me,” Mariela’s master told her new friend.

“You sure?” asked the child, to which Mariela’s master replied, “Yeah” with a laugh.

“Mariela.”

When Mariela turned in response to her name, her master hugged her tightly.

“Masterrr, that tickles! And you’re really warm!”

Mariela writhed around in her master’s tight embrace. She had almost no recollection of anyone ever hugging her. It was somehow really embarrassing, and warm.

“Okay, Mariela. Remember—this is where you belong. So, when I call you, make sure to come right back.”

“Yes, Master.”

She didn’t really understand, but she remembered something her master had said to her in their little cottage in the forest after taking her in:

“Starting today, this is your house. Welcome home.”

Despite being an incredible person who knew everything, her master couldn’t clean, do laundry, or cook, and the house was a mess. Mariela was shocked at how useless this person was for an adult. But every day she came back to that house, her master always greeted her with “Welcome home,” so if her master, a truly incredible person, said this was where she belonged, then it had to be true.

“Mariela, let’s go.” The child clasped both of Mariela’s hands.

“Okay!” Mariela replied. She didn’t know where they were going, but she turned to her master, waved, and said, “See you later.”

Plip.

Although they ought to have been standing on the ground, Mariela and the child were somewhere dark and dim. It somewhat resembled underwater, but it wasn’t hard to breathe at all.

When she looked up, she saw her master standing on the earth’s surface. This place appeared to be below the ground.

The child held on firmly to Mariela’s hands and smiled as if to say “It’s okay.” Mariela finally realized—this child was a spirit. Although they were in such a strange place, Mariela wasn’t scared at all. She thought it must have been because she could see a gentle light far below her feet.

To Mariela, the light looked just like a river of stars floating in the night sky. But it continued on and on and looked like a large river. Many lines of light softly floated up from it and disappeared, and sometimes particles of light smoothly streamed into it from above.

So pretty, thought Mariela.

Led by the child, she descended toward the river of light. From above, it really did look like shining water, but as she got closer, it seemed more like small beads of light.

Although she’d already entered the river of light, there was no feeling of a boundary like when one enters water. Her feet were just incredibly bright and warm, and the light grew weaker the farther up she looked. Pulled along by the child, Mariela ventured deeper and deeper. And as she did so, her surroundings both above and below were illuminated, and she was no longer even sure of the boundary where her own body ended and the light began. Still, the child clasped her hand tight, and she thoroughly understood that she and the child and the light were all separate beings. She understood, too, that the light was a very “huge being.”

“Mariela, this is the heart of the ley line. Tell it your True Name. Once you do that, the ley line will tell you its True Name, too. Then you can connect to it.” The child spoke with just a hint of worry on her face. But this was probably what Mariela’s master told her about “connecting to the ley line with a Nexus.” Mariela faced the light and gave her True Name.

“I’m Mariela. Who’re you?”

‘ .’

Was that someone’s voice? In that moment, Mariela connected to the ley line.

It was so, so very warm. Mariela felt like all her wants and needs had been filled.

Up to that point, she’d always been alone. Mariela didn’t have any exceptional talents, incredible intellect, or an abundance of skills. Plenty of people had alchemic skills, and many more children had other useful abilities as well.

Cute little girls, children blessed with talents and skills, and boys who could handle physical labor with ease quickly found someone to take them in and left the orphanage. Mariela was never chosen. Her young mind knew she was a child with no value. So, she became a good kid.

She helped out a lot. She did her utmost to look after the younger kids, too.

The teachers at the orphanage always told her “Such a good girl,” “You’re a big help,” “Thank you.”

But nobody came for Mariela.

Loneliness and isolation were Mariela’s constant companions from the time she was old enough to recognize them. But the moment she connected to the ley line, those feelings melted away.

No, actually, this loneliness, this isolation, was something she’d felt for much longer than that, since the moment she’d been born into this world. It had been healed. She instinctually sensed she’d come home. This ley line was the source of all life. She had been born from it and returned to it. She was finally one with it again.

It’s so warm.

In a carefree daze, she felt like she was melting into and blending with the ley line.

“Marielaaa……”

I can hear someone far away. Who…is calling me?

“Marielaaa……”

That’s…my master’s voice.

Mariela’s master had chosen her, the “good girl” whom no one else would take. And not because she was the only option; despite there being plenty of other children with alchemic skills, her master chose her, no one else. Her master had squeezed her tight.

The ley line was a source of life, a place to return to. A place where she could be released from the constraints of her physical form, be healed and fulfilled, and become one with once again.

But she was still “Mariela.” She could feel the alchemic skills that had taken root in her soul. Mariela understood those skills connected her to her master.

“Are you leaving?” the child asked. She’d held hands with Mariela this whole time. The warmth of those hands, their very existence had told Mariela the whole way that it wasn’t yet time for her to return to the ley line.

“Yeah. My master’s calling me, so I gotta go home. My master can’t do anything alone, y’know. If I’m not there, our room’ll be a huge wreck!” Mariela laughed. This place was very cozy, but her home was somewhere else.

“Okay. Bye-bye,” said the child.

“Let’s play again sometime,” Mariela replied. The child grinned, said, “See you!” and waved.

She had to get home. Curiously, with this thought, Mariela began to rise steadily. As she got closer to the earth’s surface, she sensed that something was flowing into her. It felt as if something were pulling her upward. Once she realized her master’s experience was flowing into her alchemic skills, Mariela was back in her own body. The child who’d held her hand from the beginning was gone, and instead, Mariela’s master was holding her hand.

Although she had felt amorphous and so fulfilled that it was as if she’d merged into the world, she felt completely cut off from everything after returning to her own body. She’d become a separate entity again. But she remembered that place. She understood in the depths of her heart that she was connected to it. Her alchemic skills had connected her to the ley line.

After returning, Mariela had come to understand that she was part of the world.

“Geez, how deep did you go? I was worried sick you’d never come back! You practically ran off with all my alchemic experience.”

With a look of both anger and relief, her master had one thing left to say.

“Welcome home, Mariela.”

“I’m home, Master.”

07

“And that’s what it felt like when I formed a Nexus with a ley line.”

Even if she subtracted her two-hundred-year slumber, it had been a very long time ago. And yet, she vividly remembered the brilliance of the ley line and the warmth of her master.

“With a spirit’s guidance, an alchemist leaves their physical body and takes a spiritual form to pass through the ley line. There, a Nexus is formed by exchanging True Names with the ley line. The act of connecting to the ley line without a physical form is actually very dangerous. It feels pleasant, comfortable. The ley line is a large current that acts as the source of life in this region, and the joy of returning to it makes you want to cast off all the loneliness you’ve ever felt in your life. Unless you’re very emotionally attached to your own world, you can’t shake off that feeling or return to your physical body by yourself, so that’s why you need a master there. The master sacrifices a part of their alchemic experience to guide their apprentice back. You’re told you have a physical place to return to, a place where you belong. Apparently, alchemists form pacts when they’re young because children are full of hopes and thus more likely to return rather than stay with the ley line.”

Apprentices who passed through a ley line with a spirit’s guidance returned to the world with their master’s guidance. The process was similar to rebirth. That was the reason masters and apprentices had a deep bond.

The master’s experience used in this ritual was transferred to the apprentice, and it became possible for the pupil to draw up Drops of Life from the ley line with the experience inherited from their master. It was said that the Library was shared with the apprentice through the bond created by the master-apprentice experience transfer.

“That’s what forming a Nexus Pact with a ley line is like. The bond between a master and apprentice alchemist is said to be thicker than blood. But as long as you make a Nexus, you have access to a Library, which means you can still get by through self-study. I lived with my master for about five years, not knowing if I was being taken care of, or if I was just being made to help out. But then my stupid master suddenly disappeared somewhere and is no longer—”

Mariela thoroughly bad-mouthed her master. However, Caroline was gazing at her with her large eyes brimming with tears.

“Oh, Mariela!”

All at once Carol hugged her tightly.

“That was so very moving. I am here with you, too, Mariela. You’re not alone anymore.”

Mm, she’s warm. And soft, too.

You could say the same thing about Mariela’s arms and belly, though. Squishy, squishy.

It’s really warm in here, thought Mariela as she looked between Carol and Sieg, who for some reason had started to beckon her closer with his hands.

Outside the mansion, it had gotten very cold, and the rain had turned to snow.

08

“There is one, isn’t there? Surely you’ve noticed—the Labyrinth Suppression Forces have obtained an alchemist!” Robert Aguinas declared to Jack Nierenberg. Robert believed without a shred of doubt that he was the alchemists’ keeper, and his speech and conduct was already close to that of a madman.

“We need to help them. Bring them back to the Aguinas family, for the sake of this ley line’s new world! What good has it done you to be part of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces? They won’t give a single potion to help you who has pledged your loyalty, nor to help your innocent daughter! But I, I can help you! Help your daughter! Let us go toward this new world together! We still have a Magic Circle of Suspended Animation!”

As if trying to grab something, Robert spread his fingers as wide as he could and extended the palm of his hand toward Nierenberg.

“We must put them to sleep, again and again and again! As many times as it takes! We can’t use that alchemist up just once! You understand, don’t you? You ought to understand—how many potions we need to conquer the Labyrinth! How many soldiers our new medicine has saved up to this point! You should know! You who have saved countless soldiers—you should know!”

“We’re done here. Give Sherry back,” Nierenberg spit out coldly.

“Why? Why, why, why?! You need it, don’t you? It’s indispensable, right? That’s why you used it up until now! My new medicine! The red and black magic medicine! You! Used them! Which makes you my accomplice! You and I must work together!”

Robert widened his eyes and raised his voice in his lunacy. As if fed up with the whole thing, Nierenberg moved to restrain the other man.

That’s when it happened.

“Whoa now, stop right there.”

A low, gruff voice caused Nierenberg to halt.

“Don’cha care what happens to your daughter? Wouldn’t ya rather at least half her face still be pretty?”

A man who looked to be the very picture of a bandit came out of the back room pointing a cutlass at a black-haired girl whose face was wrapped in bandages.

“Papaaa…”

There was no mistaking that face.

“Sherry…”

Nierenberg stopped in his tracks.

“You have no choice but to work with us,” said Robert, extending his hand toward Nierenberg as if inviting him. A black something trickled down from his palm, which appeared to be empty. The room grew dim, and it felt as if the temperature dropped several degrees.

A black stain burbled and rose from the carpet at Nierenberg’s feet. Like bloody pus that oozed from a wound no matter how many times its bandages were changed, the stain polluted the carpet as if boiling up from underneath, and sediment resembling rust lurked above the short pile carpet.

Nierenberg had seen this sediment before. It was the curse that had floated around the king basilisk’s body. No special skills were required to use this black magic. And, because of its characteristics, not only the use, but even the research of it was prohibited by imperial law.

The curse gushing up around Nierenberg wriggled and squirmed as if it were alive.

“Don’t…don’t move, or who knows what’ll happen ta yer daughter…!” The bandit kept his cutlass pointed at Sherry, but his voice shook as if something had frightened him, and his eyes darted to and from Robert.

“There’s no reason to be afraid. I’m just making a little connection. The same kind as with the people who work in this building.”

Laughing darkly, Robert refined the curse.

The curse’s sediment wriggled like a cut-off lizard’s tail, or like the limbs of an insect crushed to death, and narrowed in a circle around Nierenberg.

“Confirmed illicit use of black magic. And a forced-coercion type with no slave merchant or contractor qualifications, at that. Abduction, blackmail, and breach of faith with the Labyrinth Suppression Forces— This all oughta be enough, right, Papaaa?”

“You may have Sherry’s face, but the languid, creepy way you call my name is nothing like her.”

The bandit holding the beautiful girl hostage suddenly tried to use his right hand to cut off her head, and then he noticed there was nothing left of the hand that had been holding the cutlass from the wrist upward.

“A-ahhhhhhhgh, my hand, my hand’s…!”

Realizing his right hand had been severed without the least bit of pain, the bandit uttered a pathetic scream. The cutlass he should have been holding was instead in the bandaged girl’s hand.

“Hup!” The girl shoved the handle of the cutlass into the bandit’s stomach. The bandit, still holding his right wrist, fell forward with a groan and lost consciousness.

“Wha—? What?!”

She dispelled the curse enshrouding Nierenberg with nimble kicks. Cutlass in hand, the bandaged “girl” landed next to Nierenberg.

“Sheesh, aristocrats are a real pain in the butt. But hey, this evidence should suffice.”

The “girl” rummaged around in her pocket and pulled out a magical tool for recording. It could record not only conversations, but also magic that had been activated, down to its very technique.

Realizing what was going on, Robert began to edge toward the door to the inner room from where the bandit had come.

“Give it up. This estate is already surrounded,” Nierenberg stated coldly.

“No… Not like this…”

Robert violently gnashed his teeth, then put the entirety of his magical power into a shout at the bandit, who was lying facedown and holding his right wrist.

“Get up, and kill them!”

In an instant, the bandit’s eyes snapped wide open, and he leaped on all fours like an animal at Nierenberg and the “girl” from his position on the floor.

“Aaaaaaaaah!”

A single kick from Nierenberg threw the wide-eyed, beast-like bandit back to the floor. Looking at the man who had finally stopped moving this time and who had bloody foam dripping from his mouth, the “girl” spoke.

“What a cruel way to use a slave brand. I hope he’s back to normal once he wakes up.”

Robert’s Order had forced the man to get up and move in ways that surpassed the limits of his body’s abilities, even though he’d been struck down in a way that should have knocked him unconscious. Now, as he lay on the floor with his mouth dripping bloody foam, his limbs convulsed occasionally. Would the bandit still be able to function normally when he came to?

Robert seemed to have escaped to the annex’s inner room while the bandit was making his last attack.

“The lieutenant general’s waiting outside. I’m gonna report back to him and then go home. Any more than this is outside the scope of my contract.”

“Right, thanks for the help… How long do you intend to look like Sherry, anyway?”

“Hee-hee… See ya, Papaaa.”

Smoothly avoiding Nierenberg’s fixed gaze, the bandaged “girl” walked toward the annex entrance.

The Labyrinth Suppression Forces already had the building surrounded, and apparently the Aguinas family steward had also been taken into custody. Weishardt was on standby near the entrance. When the “girl” handed him the magical tool for recording, she reported something to him, and then left the Aguinas estate behind.

Snow fell on the Aguinas family’s expansive yard as the “girl” walked through it, unraveling her bandages. Although terrible scars remained on the face under them, they vanished completely when she passed through a gap in the trees. Her features were now completely different. When she reached the massive gate, she removed the long dress and stored it in a bag, revealing a young boy wearing trousers.

When he showed a sign to the guard protecting the gate and left the estate, the boy returned to the commercial district.

The boy hurrying to the commercial district on the snowy night road was probably a delivery person for a shop somewhere.

No one was suspicious of him. He returned to his own shop.

“I’m back, Auntie. I made the ‘delivery.’”

The boy said what he always did, and the shop owner responded in the usual way as well.

“I told you to call me Merle here in the shop, didn’t I? So, how’d it go?”

“You like gossip as well as coarse sugar, huh, Auntie? You’re as insatiable as an orc.”

“You don’t get to be sassy with me if you’re a rookie who can only change his face!”

No potion existed that let you completely transform into a specific person, but there was a skill that did this. It was not hard to imagine what kind of work people who possessed this extremely rare ability were hired to do.

The kindly owner of the spices shop, who dealt in everything from luxury items like rare spices favored by nobles and wealthy merchants to tea leaves and coarse sugar affordable to the general public, was influential among housewives, and she was a member of Margrave Schutzenwald’s personal intelligence organization.

A helpless young girl from abroad wouldn’t find it easy to settle into the Labyrinth City while paying exorbitant remodeling fees for a large house, unlike a high-ranking adventurer raking in easy money. It was Merle’s job to monitor and investigate such unique cases. Subsequently, Merle and the other housewives managed to spread inoffensive rumors about Mariela and Sieg, the kinds often heard in gossip circles (“an alchemist from the imperial capital,” “came here to help her childhood friend”). That gossip helped the pair to blend into the neighborhood as average, everyday residents. Of course, this spin on things came at the orders of Weishardt himself.

Merle would probably pay a visit to Weishardt tomorrow as well—to settle his “bill” and deliver new tea leaves, along with the information she’d just obtained today.

09

Hi, everyone, Mariela here.

Right now I’m in Lady Carol’s drawing room. Could you even consider this a drawing room, though? I mean, it’s huge. It’s got all these elegant couches and sculptures and a table that practically sparkles. Even the mantel for the fireplace is fancy. Also, the walls are decorated with paintings. Many of them have flowers or landscapes, but one features fruit. I wonder what kinds of fruit those are. I’ve never seen them before. They look delicious, though.

The carpeting is exquisite, too. For something made of fabric, it has all sorts of complex patterns. I bet it’s expensive. Is it bad that I walked over it with my shoes on? Everyone else is wearing shoes, though.

I’m sitting in a chair brought out for me in a corner of the room, and boy, this chair is fluffy. The cushions are incredible. Sieg was standing behind me when I started bouncing up and down on it, and he put a hand on my shoulder and chided me to “Quiet down.” Sorry.

Lady Carol is in the middle of the room talking to a blond-haired, blue-eyed man who looks just like a prince. They’re both so gorgeous that they look straight out of a painting, like I’m watching a love story between two royals unfold. The prince-like guy is smiling as he talks, but Lady Carol’s face is pretty grim. That alone makes it seem a bit like they’re in some sort of dramatic lover’s quarrel. But it’s no wonder Carol looks so severe.

That’s because this room is full of armed soldiers.

With too much time on her hands, Mariela narrated this stream-of-consciousness commentary in her head while dangling her legs from a chair in a corner of the room. Her escort, Sieg, stood at the ready behind her, and behind Caroline stood her personal maid and escort as well, but many of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces’ elite gathered around them, so it was simply a ceremonial act of “allowing their personal escorts to be there.”

They’d just moved to the drawing room. Mariela and Caroline had noticed a racket from outside the room as they’d been enjoying a chat in Caroline’s atelier. One of the maids came to bring news to Caroline in an extremely flustered state, and after hearing the details, Caroline explained it to Mariela with a bewildered look on her face.

“It appears Lord Weishardt of Margrave Schutzenwald’s house has arrived, apparently to investigate something… He has ordered everyone who does not wish to rebel against the margrave—family, guests, servants—to assemble.”

When Mariela followed Caroline out of the room, the blond-haired, blue-eyed man resembling a prince was standing by the entrance accompanied by numerous guards.

That person was probably Weishardt.

For some reason, a soldier questioned Mariela, who had followed Caroline to the entrance. “Are you a family member? Or a merchant? You go over here,” he said and tried to take her to a different room.

“She is my guest. I don’t know what business you have here, but she has nothing to do with it,” Caroline explained, covering for Mariela. “I will not tolerate such roughness.” Weishardt shot a puzzled look at Mariela and said, “Your guest?”

It was inevitable. Mariela’s clothes and general appearance practically screamed “commoner,” so she didn’t look at all like a guest of the Aguinas family. Even a servant might wear finer clothes as a work uniform. There’s no doubt Weishardt would have believed it if someone told him Mariela was a delivery girl who had come with medicinal herbs.

One of the soldiers standing next to Weishardt whispered something in his ear. Weishardt furrowed his brows just a little, then asked, “Lady Caroline, is this the girl you’ve befriended from the apothecary?”

“That’s correct. Mariela is a chemist authorized by the Merchants Guild’s Medicinal Herbs Division. My family, as well as Chairwoman Elmera, can vouch for her authenticity.”

A commoner’s rights were fragile things in the face of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces, not to mention Margrave Schutzenwald. Caroline was desperately trying to protect Mariela.

“If she is a friend of yours, we will not treat her poorly. All of you, mind your manners. Insolence will not be tolerated.”

Weishardt directed the soldiers to treat Mariela with respect in response to Caroline’s wish. Agitation showed in his eyes, but he didn’t express his inner thoughts in his words or actions, and no one noticed.

Apparently, the other family members had gathered in a different room, but Weishardt kept incomprehensibly insisting, “This is Lady Caroline’s guest,” Mariela quietly sat in a chair placed in the corner of the drawing room. Since her escort, Sieg, had been allowed to stay with her and even keep his sword, it may have been a case of special treatment. They were surrounded by the Labyrinth Suppression Forces’ very best, though, so Sieg and Caroline’s escort would be subjugated immediately if they lashed out.

Some sort of obstruction spell prevented Caroline and Weishardt’s conversation from being audible. Mariela might have been able to eavesdrop with Wind’s Whispers, but even she wasn’t clueless enough to do something like that.

Time passed without her learning any more about the situation, and Mariela grew hungry. It was already dinnertime. If she didn’t make today’s potions soon, she wouldn’t be able to fulfill tonight’s delivery. Come to think of it, would she even be able to get home before the delivery time? Lynx and the others might worry.

Guuurgle.

Mariela’s stomach made a noise. Although Caroline and Weishardt’s conversation wasn’t audible, apparently Mariela’s stomach was, because a nearby soldier rummaged around in his pocket, produced what looked like a huge cookie, and gave it to Mariela. She was going to give part of it to Sieg, but apparently he didn’t need it. For some reason, he gave a slight nod to the soldier as if to say “Please excuse this child.”

The cookie contained nuts, dried fruit, and a huge dollop of honey, so it was delicious, but it was a bit hard and dried out. It could have been emergency rations. Mariela held it in both hands, munching away in her corner. Caroline saw this from where she stood in the middle of the room, and her face softened from its previous grim expression as she giggled. “Hee-hee…”

“This reminds me, shall we have tea as well?”

Caroline had regained a bit of her composure, and smiling like a young lady, she instructed the maid in waiting behind her to make tea.

Unfortunately, though, news was delivered to Weishardt before the tea was brought out.

“We discovered the atelier for making new medicine in the annex cellar, but the current head of the family, Robert Aguinas, is nowhere to be found. There’s no evidence he escaped from the estate.”

“Lady Caroline, are there any secret passages or hiding places in this estate?” Weishardt asked upon hearing the news. Caroline thought briefly before answering.

“I’ve heard of a secret cellar, but only the family heirs have any knowledge of its location.”

“Hrm, then does the previous family head know?”

“My father, Royce…? I can’t say whether he is in a condition to speak…”

“Could we possibly meet with him?”

“…By all means.”

Caroline and Weishardt left their seats. By the time they returned, Mariela had finished eating the giant cookie. Thanks to the cookie, her stomach bulged, but the preserved food had been dry, and now her mouth was parched.

After coming back, Carol’s eyes were slightly red, as if she’d been crying. Weishardt had a look of bafflement and wandered aimlessly around the drawing room with his left hand stroking his chin.

Thinking something probably happened, Mariela gazed at the two of them and accidentally met Weishardt’s eyes. Weishardt gazed intently at her.

Wait, did she have cookie crumbs on her? As Mariela scrubbed at her mouth, Weishardt approached.

“You must be Mariela. Since you’re a friend of Lady Caroline’s, I had a bit of investigation done on you. I hear you are an alchemist from the imperial capital and an excellent chemist. I’d like to pick your brain just a bit.”

To a plebian like Mariela, Weishardt’s sparkling, noble aura was almost enough to give her a heart attack.

“Y-y-y-yes, sir. I’m Mariela. Um, er…”

She sprung up from her seat, tightly gripped the hem of her tunic, and bowed clumsily. Was she trying to curtsy?

“No need to be so nervous. Please don’t worry. It appears there’s something wrong with Lady Caroline’s father’s psyche. I wondered if you might know a way to cure him.”

Lady Carol’s father… So that’s why her eyes were red…

Caroline was her friend. She’d fervently stuck up for Mariela. Mariela didn’t know if she could cure something psychological, but if there was something she could do, she wanted to do it.

“I don’t know if I can help, but…,” Mariela answered with no self-confidence. Accompanied by her and Sieg, Weishardt headed for Caroline’s father’s bedroom again.

The room was dim. Thick curtains had been drawn across the window, and there was no light, not even from the moon, other than a small lamp on a bedside table. A man lay in a large canopy bed.

The old man standing with guards just outside the room must have been the family’s steward.

When Mariela entered the room, Caroline’s father, Royce, lying on the bed, opened his mouth.

“The…li…light…” “It…hur…huuurts…”

Royce writhed around, seeming to both reach for the light shining from the corridor and shrink away from it. His thin arms, like withered branches, moved in different directions separately from each other in the air. Although it was hard to tell in the dim light of the room, each side of Royce’s face looked like an entirely different person.

It was the same face, yet it was as if the left and right sides were two entirely different lives.

Mariela stood stock-still at the entrance to the room as she gaped at Royce. Her face was frozen in shock.

“Why…are there two people?” Mariela muttered without thinking.

Royce’s face lifted with a jerk and stared at her with a different expression on either side of it.

The dryness of her mouth wasn’t the fault of the cookie she had earlier.

Remembering her thirst, Mariela swallowed her saliva.

“Two people? Did you figure something out?” Weishardt responded to Mariela’s reflexive comment. As she stood motionless in the doorway, Sieg gently placed a hand on her shoulder as if he was worried about her. Mariela placed her own hand on his, took a small breath, and addressed Weishardt.

“Can I use a sleep spell on him?”

After receiving Weishardt’s permission, Mariela asked Sieg to cast Sleep on Caroline’s father, Royce Aguinas.

“H…he…lp…me…” “This…body…is mine…!”

“It’s okay, just go to sleep for a little bit,” said Mariela as she approached Royce’s bed with Sieg. Which face was she talking to? After looking at her, Royce nodded slightly and closed his eyes, then opened them again.

From the side, it was like watching a very leisurely blink.

“…The sleep spell didn’t seem to work,” said Weishardt.

“No, it’s working. Who…who are you?”

Lying in bed, Royce answered Mariela’s question.

“I aaam…Ruiz. Ruiz Aguinas. The…head of…this family.”

“Ruiz?”

“This man is the previous head’s elder brother,” answered the elderly steward standing just outside the room with the guards. “It’s been a long time since our last meeting, Lord Ruiz.”

“G…good…to see…you,” answered the individual calling himself Ruiz. However, only in that moment did he appear to be sane. The next instant, that eye stared into space, and he started shouting nonsense.

“Any time nooow! Not much…longerrr… It huuurts… The Sacrificial body…is stiiill……”

Watching Ruiz writhe around complaining of pain, the elderly steward’s face darkened as if it were his own pain, and he began to speak quietly.

“The previous heads of the Aguinas family were twins—Ruiz, the elder twin, and Royce, the younger. The Sacrificials adopted Lord Ruiz as a child.”

“The Sacrificials?” Weishardt asked, frowning. The Sacrificials. He’d heard the rumors.

And according to those rumors, the Sacrificials were a group of human offerings meant to protect the emperor.

Many people approached high-ranking figures like the emperor with malicious intent. It wasn’t a reflection of the emperor as a person. Consciously or not, some people were steadfast in their convictions by simplistically directing their resentment, envy, hatred, and scorn at those at the top. Numerous as ants crawling on the ground, they blamed those in power for their misfortunes.

They could illegalize black magic all they wanted, but if thousands of those with malicious intent and magic came together, these feelings could fester into a curse that reached the emperor. And not just an amorphous manifestation of malice—there existed people with clear hostility who would turn to acts of violence against the emperor as a result.

People from the Sacrificials were said to absorb all such acts of ill will, be they material or spiritual, in the emperor’s stead.

“I have heard rumors, but…,” muttered Weishardt, to which the elderly steward continued.

“Because the Aguinases create magic medicine in place of potions, they place children who won’t inherit the family leadership under the jurisdiction of alchemists or healing mages in the Empire. Originally, Lord Ruiz was the chosen Aguinas family heir while Lord Royce was to become part of the Sacrificials.”

The wise and brilliant older brother Ruiz, whom Robert resembled, and the kind younger brother Royce, who resembled Caroline. The two had been very close, and apparently Ruiz, who loathed to be parted from his brother, had accompanied him to the imperial capital. There fate showed its cruel sense of humor. Discovering Ruiz was extremely suitable as a sacrifice, the Sacrificials wanted to take him in, not Royce.

In exchange for as much knowledge as he could ask for, Ruiz was adopted into the Sacrificials.

“None of us ever found out if something had happened to Lord Ruiz after becoming part of the Sacrificials. However, we received correspondence from him a few years ago.”

The correspondence from Ruiz was apparently mixed among the unicorn horns the Aguinas family had coincidentally ordered for research purposes. It was a scrap of paper confirmed to be addressed to his brother Royce and wrapped around a vial. The vial was about the size of a pinkie finger and contained a liquid of a mysterious, dark red color shining with a dim light.

The scrap of paper stated Royce could drink the mysterious liquid to gain the knowledge Ruiz had acquired from the Sacrificials. There were many cases around that time where items sent to the Aguinas family had been lost. Ruiz had sent this liquid to Royce in a number of different ways, and all but this one vial had been prevented from reaching their destination.

Royce, who missed his brother dearly, ignored all attempts to stop him from the people around him and downed the liquid.

“That’s when it happened. Lord Ruiz merged with Lord Royce.”

At first, it had only been for a short length of time when Royce was sleeping. To not waste the short time Ruiz was there, he shut himself away with Robert in the annex’s atelier and told Robert the secret art of the Sacrificials.

However, as time passed, Ruiz began to complain of pain, and he started to appear for longer and longer lengths of time as if he were trying to escape from his suffering. Eventually, Ruiz appeared even when Royce was awake, and the two mingled together as if they were in chaos. They remained separate people, like water and oil that didn’t blend together no matter how much you mixed it, but their consciousness and thoughts came apart in minute pieces and recombined.

“Please, I beg you, put Lord Ruiz and Lord Royce at peace,” the elderly steward entreated Weishardt.

This wasn’t an illness. Everyone present could understand that.

“Is there any way to help them? Perhaps a curse-removal potion…?” said Weishardt, but Mariela shook her head.

Surely this body was the “closest” for Ruiz. Even more so than his real body now.

Mariela was an alchemist. If your alchemic skill was high, you could use it to discern the condition of materials. You could sense the state of the Drops of Life that dwelled in plants, animals, and every living thing.

That’s why she knew. Two kinds of Drops of Life existed in Ruiz’s body. It was very unnatural for two people to inhabit one body, so that’s probably why they’d lost their sanity.

However, their respective Drops of Life weren’t tainted like they’d been possessed by an evil spirit. Two different beings from the same source had entangled and intermingled, but existed as individuals in one body. In an absolutely distorted way, both conformed to this body. That’s how it felt to Mariela.

Ruiz, who hadn’t been affected by the sleep spell, was certainly not the owner of this body.

“You can’t return to your own body?” Mariela asked.

“This is…my body… Ahh… It huuurts…… This…is aaaaaaaah mine… S-soon, I’ll be released…from this pain… Aaaaaaaaagh!”

“If it’s not a curse, could it be some sort of evil spirit? Have you brought in a priest or an exorcist?” asked Weishardt.

“We most certainly have, but…”

The steward explained that Ruiz could not be exorcised like a demon, and Weishardt frowned, saying, “Is there nothing that can be done?” As a Schutzenwald, he didn’t want to ignore someone who was suffering, but he also had a duty as the lieutenant general of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces to capture Robert, who was hiding in the cellar of the annex even now. However, they couldn’t get information about the secret cellar’s entrance from the previous family head, Royce, in this state.

Just when Weishardt was wondering if it would be better to demolish the annex, Mariela timidly spoke up.

“Um, would it be okay if I talked privately with him for just a little bit?”

“Very well.”

Weishardt indicated the door to the steward, who had a puzzled look on his face, and left with him.

“Sieg, you too. I’ll be fine.” Sieg was the last to leave, and at last, Mariela quietly closed the door.

With the light from the corridor blocked, the room, now lit by only the small lamp next to the bed, was extremely dim. The oppressive atmosphere of the room that had long had its curtains closed reminded her of the inside of a deep cave.

“Gaaah… It huuurts… Ahhh…”

Mariela asked the complaining, writhing Ruiz a question. “Your real body is in pain, isn’t it?”

“Aaah… That’s…no longer…my…”

“You can’t go back to it, can you? Even if you wanted to, you’re not connected to it anymore.”

Mariela looked in Ruiz’s eye. It was clouded over with pain, but it didn’t look to Mariela like the eye of a madman.

“But this body isn’t yours. Even if Royce weren’t in there, even if you had this body to yourself, you would still be in pain.”

Watching someone in such agony would be heartbreaking for anybody. All the more true if the person suffering was their father.

How extremely sad must Caroline have been every time she looked at her father, who’d lost his sanity?

Mariela wanted to help everyone: this suffering man in front of her, Royce who was suffering along with him, and the elderly steward who couldn’t do anything but watch over them. She felt the steward’s words, “Please, put them at peace,” weren’t something he said lightly.

“H…elp…,” Ruiz begged in Royce’s body. He wanted to be saved, to be released from this suffering.

“If you can’t return to your own body, there’s only one place you can go.”

Mariela activated her alchemy and enclosed Royce’s body within a Transmutation Vessel.

“Drops of Life.”

Those drops were an overwhelming sight.

Water shining with white light filled the space around Ruiz like a spring gushing forth. Within the dim room, it looked like he was floating in a river of stars.

“Oh… Oh… Oh…”

The Drops of Life that were emitting a warm and gentle light lost their form and vanished as soon as they touched Royce’s body.

It was so very frustrating. Even though this person was so hungry and thirsty, even with this water enveloping his body, he still couldn’t touch it or feel it?

Even though he was so cold.

Even though he was in such pain.

Even though this was so cruel and sad and lonely.

Even though he wanted to return to oneness…

As if seeking the Drops of Life, to hold it, Ruiz’s hand searched for the light.

“Drops of Life flow into a ley line—a place where you…no, everyone returns to,” Mariela told him. It’s not a scary place. It’s a place where you can be released from everything, even the form known as your “self.”

Mariela didn’t even know this herself, but her Nexus that formed the pact with the ley line deep in the earth was thicker and stronger than anyone else’s. The reason she didn’t lose her “self” in such a deep place was because the warmth of her master’s tight embrace had permeated the depths of her heart. And because the spirit who became her friend firmly grasped her hand and desperately protected her.

Mariela continued to draw up Drops of Life from the Nexus that was stronger than anyone else’s, calling forward an incredible amount of magic without any reservation. No matter how much she drew up, the Drops of Life that touched Royce’s body came undone and vanished, as if she was pouring it into a bottomless bucket. Even as she remembered her dizziness from consuming a large amount of magic when she made the plate glass, Mariela didn’t stop.

She didn’t know how Ruiz had entered Royce’s body. A spirit had been the one who’d taken Mariela out of her body when she connected to the ley line with a Nexus, so she didn’t know how to take out Ruiz. All she could do was show him there was a place for him to return to after he left his physical form.

“Ah, ah, ah…”

Ruiz’s hand swam in the light of Drops of Life as if seeking what he couldn’t touch.

Somebody, please, show him the way…

Mariela didn’t have much magic left. Would this man suffer through a life of pain again after she’d shown him a little glimpse of hope?

Anyone…

“…E……lia…?”

Had Ruiz spoken someone’s name?

In that instant, Ruiz Aguinas melted into the light and returned to the ley line.

10

“Phewww…!”

Mariela breathed a weak sigh.

She’d used up too much magic. She didn’t pass out this time, but the room was spinning. This hadn’t happened since that time she’d had alcohol. Her body felt light, like she was floating. Had her diet been a success?

Mariela used the momentum of her stagger to collapse into a chair.

“Mariela! Are you all right?!”

She could hear Sieg’s voice from just beyond the door.

“I’m fiiine. C’mon in!”

In response to Mariela’s usual cheerful voice, the door burst open with a bang, and Sieg rushed over to her. After checking her face and body to make sure nothing was wrong, he let out a big sigh of relief at last.

“How did it go?”

Weishardt entered the room next and asked Mariela about the situation after confirming Royce was sleeping.

“What did you do?”

“Um, I talked to him about the ley line. I got the feeling he wanted to return to it. And it seemed like he did. Now Royce is alone.”

“M…Master!”

The elderly steward rushed over to the bed and shook the sleeping Royce. Maybe he thought he had died. After all, when the two men were in one body, they’d probably stayed awake for countless years.

“Mm…” Shaken awake by the steward, Royce spoke with eyes that were tired but clear. “Ruiz…returned home…”

“Master! Ohhh…!”

The elderly steward broke down crying upon learning Royce was safe and Ruiz had passed on.

Wasn’t this the kind of role a beauty like Carol was supposed to play? Something about this felt off to Mariela. With Sieg, she quietly left the room since they were merely bystanders. Weishardt seemed like he wanted to say something, but as his original purpose was to find the secret cellar, he approached Royce to ask about it.

“Father!”

“How I’ve worried you so, Carol.”

Caroline ran up to Royce, who was being transported in a wheelchair. It was a real tearjerker of a scene. Definitely the kind that called for a pretty girl.

Yup, definitely. Sitting in her designated chair in a corner of the drawing room, Mariela nodded her approval.

It was a trivial thing, but when they descended the stairs, someone from the Labyrinth Suppression Forces had easily lifted the wheelchair from both sides. So powerful.

“Wow, so strong! Nothing less from the strongest soldiers in the Labyrinth Suppression Forces,” Mariela said in admiration, whereupon Sieg went behind her chair and agilely lifted it for about ten seconds.

Mariela’s eyes sparkled as if to say “Higher!” It was an incredible difference from Carol’s eyes sparkling with tears. Perhaps this was what separated the itty-bitty girls from the pretty girls. Society could be so cruel and polarizing.

In contrast to Mariela, who was satisfied with a single lift of the chair, Royce, who had heard the general story from Weishardt, spoke seriously with him and Caroline in the middle of the drawing room.

“I’ll guide you to the secret cellar,” said Royce. “Carol, you come, too. As a member of the Aguinas family, you should know about this.”

Caroline nodded, and Royce turned toward Mariela.

“Young lady, I’d like you to come as well. You’re the one who released Ruiz.”

“Huhwhat?”

Mariela, who’d been relaxing in the corner of the room thinking her work was finished, straightened up with an “Eek!” at Royce’s absurd request. Weishardt, Caroline, and all the soldiers from the Labyrinth Suppression Forces turned to look at her.

This sure took a strange turn…

Even though the presence of soldiers from the Labyrinth Suppression Forces in the Aguinas family’s drawing room meant it was an emergency, was it necessary for a mere chemist to be present for every single important detail? Or was she supposed to be a representative of the commoners? Were they inviting her as an adviser with an outsider’s perspective?

No way any of that was true. At a loss, Mariela looked to Caroline for help. For her part, Caroline had a look of “What should I do?” when she was invited herself. Were she and Mariela in the same boat? No, this had much more to do with her than with Mariela.

Next to Caroline, Royce and Weishardt looked as if they knew exactly who Mariela was. That said, when she’d freed Ruiz, Royce had been asleep and Weishardt had been outside the room, so there was no reason for them to have known she used Drops of Life.

“Time is of the essence. Let’s go!”

At Weishardt’s command, Royce, Caroline, and several soldiers began to head toward the annex. Mariela just stood there flustered, so the soldier who’d given her the cookie urged her with a gesture to go with them. She briefly glanced up at Sieg, who nodded, seeming to say that she couldn’t afford to say no. Reluctantly, Mariela followed the rest of them.

A number of soldiers were guarding the area around the annex, so alert that even a single kitten couldn’t have gotten through.

A cold rain had been falling when Mariela and Sieg arrived at the Aguinas estate, but it had now turned into snow. If it continued to fall like this, it would really be piled up by the next morning. Think I could just sprint through this huge yard to my heart’s content? Nah, probably not, Mariela thought as she obediently followed along behind the rest of the group.

“We’ll go to the second-floor study first.”

In accordance with Royce’s directions, they all ascended to the second floor.

A stone staircase leading to the second floor lay at the back of the room where the confrontation between Robert and Nierenberg took place. The room beyond the stairs appeared to be a study. Many documents and books were lined up in a systematic fashion in this room, which Robert still used, and through this, one could infer Robert’s methodical personality.

Royce stopped his wheelchair in front of an antique bookshelf, took a book from the left edge of the middle section, and placed it in the same spot one shelf above.

Clack.

They heard a very soft sound. There seemed to be some kind of switch. On a closer look, she noticed on the floor to the right of the bookshelf had scuff marks from something heavy being dragged across it. And those scratches were the exact same width as the bookshelf itself.

Whoa. I bet that’s the entrance to the hideout in the story Lady Carol was telling me about!

The bookshelf’s mechanism excited Mariela, who’d become completely used to the stuffy atmosphere of being surrounded by soldiers, and she glanced at Carol. Carol apparently had the same thoughts, as she looked at Mariela with slightly red cheeks.

The pair nodded to each other, walked up to the bookshelf, and heaved to push it to the right.

“Hrrrgh. Huh?”

“It’s not moving?”

Although they’d built up a lot of strength from knead-kneading every day, the two of them couldn’t get the bookshelf to budge even a little. Robert wasn’t a warrior, either, so the girls’ combined power should be at least as good if not better than his.

“Ah… Only the switch is in this room,” Royce said apologetically.

“Then what are those scratches on the floor?”

“Everyone who sees the contraption for the first time has the same reaction. It was installed around two generations ago. In other words, it’s a fake.”

Mariela and Caroline exchanged confused glances.

“Then where is the entrance?” Weishardt asked calmly, and Royce answered, “Downstairs.”

Mariela and Caroline continued to look at each other as they trotted behind Royce, who was carried in his wheelchair to the first floor.

“…We were tricked.”

“Lady Carol, your ancestor was a mischievous one, huh?”

The group headed for the opposite side of the first-floor stairs in a somewhat calmer mood.

On the other side of the stairs, a large vase sat on a stand with a splendid lace tablecloth that ran all the way down to the floor. Upon closer inspection of the wall near the stand, a single stone was protruding just a little.

Surely this was the entrance. Mariela was certain the wall behind the stairs opened like a door to reveal a passage to the secret cellar. Since the vase was there, the wall behind the stairs might slide open.

Thanks to the trick a short while ago, all the prudent adults surrounded the wall at a distance and tried to avoid eye contact. It was very similar to the reaction of the participants in Mariela’s medicine-making seminars who didn’t want to be called on to answer a question.

“Carol, and you, young lady, could you pull on that protrusion for me?”

Mariela and Caroline had been called on. When they pulled on the stone together, it smoothly moved forward just a bit, and they heard a ka-chunk like a latch had been opened.

Now for the wall. Should they pull, push, or shift it?

“It’s under the flower stand.”

When the soldiers flipped up the tablecloth per Royce’s instructions, they found the floor under the vase had sunk about a fist’s width.

THAT’S where it was…?! It had nothing to do with the wall?!

Everyone had the same thought.

After moving the flower stand aside, they could see the corners of the sunken stones were rounded from long use. The tablecloth had been used to skillfully hide this fact, as it was obvious from one glance in sufficient light that they looked very out of place. The drape of the tablecloth was beautiful lace, and some of it could be seen through.

Apparently, when the soldiers of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces had lifted the tablecloth to check, there had been just the right amount of delicate shadows so that they didn’t notice. You could say it was a clever disguise, but the fact this was the door the hidden switch in the bookshelf opened ruined the hideout feeling. The kindhearted Caroline looked disappointed as well.

“In any case, he must be extremely agile to have ascended to the second-floor study, opened the entrance, and then returned here to escape to the cellar in the short time before the soldiers broke in. Stay focused, everyone.”

Weishardt called on the soldiers to brace themselves, but…

“Erm, most likely he left it open ahead of time…”

Royce’s brief comment further ruined the atmosphere. What an inability to read the room. Maybe the time he spent blended with Ruiz was still having an effect on him after all.

The sunken floor slid open easily. So easily, neither the power of knead-kneading nor the power of friendship was required to open it.

There was a ladder on the vertical wall that went down about two yards before the wall became a gently sloping corridor. A soldier carried Royce, and the others formed a line and went down one by one.

The light escaping from the back of the corridor was about to tell the end of the alchemists’ story that spanned the course of two hundred years.

11

“Estalia, Estalia, Estalia!”

After using the bandit to get away from Nierenberg, Robert had escaped to the cellar where Estalia slept.

He clung to her coffin.

Did he intend to betray the alchemists’ wish that spanned two hundred years and open the glass coffin, awakening Estalia?

But Robert gripped the coffin, looking at her while calling her name over and over, but didn’t try to open it.

There was only one entrance to this cellar.

This room was a dead end, the point of departure for the awakened alchemists, and the end of the line for Robert, who had given everything to Estalia.

“Estalia…”

All he did was call her name as he continued to gaze at her. How long had he been down here? It was as if time had stopped.

Robert slowly lifted his head at the sounds of the secret door to this room being flung open and the footsteps of several people coming down.

“Welcome to the graveyard of the ruined country’s alchemists.” Like a ghost, Robert stood and welcomed Weishardt and the others.

“Robert Aguinas. I trust you understand the gravity of your crimes. You’d best come with us,” stated Weishardt.

“Robert…”

“Brother!”

“Carol… Father? Have you returned to your senses? But how…?”

Royce captured his attention. Robert understood his father’s condition better than anyone. It wasn’t possible for him to regain his sanity.

“I see… An alchemist! I knew it, one has awakened! Where?! Where are they?!” Robert shouted as if he’d lost his mind.

“Stop this now, Brother! If you properly explain yourself, Margrave Schutzenwald will understand!”

“Understand? Understand what? Explain? It’s a little too late for that! All the margrave does is make demands! What does the margrave understand about the resolve of those individuals two hundred years ago, the hopes they had when they made those potions?! What does he understand?! He couldn’t possibly understand! They didn’t make those potions for his sake—they made them for Estalia! For Estalia’s sake! If you say the margrave will understand, then hand over the alchemist! Estalia needs this alchemist to awaken her—to lead her to the new world!”

Robert stood between them and Estalia’s coffin with his hands behind him as if to protect it. A black curse trickled from his body and formed a vortex, perhaps to shield the glass coffin.

However, Robert was no warrior. It didn’t matter if his curse was powerful or if it was one of forced subordination, his specialty. In the face of the Labyrinth Suppression Forces’ elite, this was child’s play compared to the King of Cursed Serpents. At Weishardt’s eye signal, a soldier leaped forth and dispelled the curse in a single blow, then twisted Robert’s arms behind his back and brought him to the floor.

“Let go! Let me go! Let go, let go, let go!! Stop! Don’t you dare lay a finger on herrrrrrr! She will awaken once more in the new world!! Just as they all hoped and dreamed of!!”

“She won’t…” Mariela mumbled so softly that Robert could scarcely hear her.

Next to her, Weishardt asked, “What do you mean?”

Mariela was staring at Estalia with incredible melancholy.

“Because…she’s already…”

The moment he caught on, Weishardt walked briskly toward the glass coffin and laid a hand on the delicately embroidered cloth covering.

“STOPPPPPPPPP!!!” Robert’s scream echoed through the cellar.

Beneath that cloth covering, the lower half of the sleeping Estalia’s body had crumbled away in her glass coffin.

Salt gently spilled out from the hem of her long, rose-colored dress.

This room was a dead end.

The place where Estalia’s story came to a close.

Mariela didn’t know when Robert had realized Estalia had died. He probably understood that she’d long since “returned home” and would never come back no matter what kind of magic medicine or secret art he used.

Although he realized it, although he understood it, Mariela felt he hadn’t been able to accept it. If he had, his plans would have come to a halt.

Several empty coffins lay in this cellar.

Looking at Estalia in eternal sleep in her glass coffin, Mariela wasn’t foolish enough not to understand what had happened.

She knew the potential consequences of an imperfect Magic Circle of Suspended Animation.

Her master had gone through great lengths to Imprint simple magic circles again and again in Mariela’s mind from a young age. It was all to build up her tolerance before burning the Magic Circle of Suspended Animation directly into her brain. This enabled Mariela to draw the three-foot magic circle precisely, down to the last speck. And all because her master knew the slightest distortion, gap, difference in a spot’s size, or difference in a line’s angle or length would lead to disastrous results.

The alchemists who’d slept in the coffins most likely knew their own fate.

It was all to lead Estalia to the new world.

There was no doubt Robert’s words echoed the alchemists’ hope.

She understood this just by looking at the glass coffin Estalia slept in. Glass deteriorates. The stuff in the ruins of the atelier where Mariela made the plate glass had turned white and shattered into pieces. Even in a cellar where the sunlight couldn’t reach it, the glass coffin had endured exposure to artificial light for two hundred years, which meant it must have used the highest quality of ingredients and created by those with advanced skills.

They must have hoped to see her again.

Though they couldn’t converse with the sleeping girl, it was as if they’d prayed they could see her again if she ever woke up, even if it was just a glimpse.

Hence the glass coffin.

The alchemists believed Estalia would find joy upon awakening in the new world. Not knowing how long they would live, those who sacrificed themselves passed their records down through successive heads of the Aguinas family.

Not a single one of the alchemists who were able to awaken lamented their fate, but continued to make potions until their last breath.

How had those hopes come to an end?

Lead Estalia to the new world. Even if they never woke up. The Aguinas family had spent two hundred years supported by that thought alone.

When they had no potions, they even involved themselves in forbidden activity.

All so they could bury the Labyrinth.

“Nevertheless, Robert, the hopes, the lives, of the alchemists who awoke were theirs. The same is true for those you sacrificed for your new medicine. They are not your playthings,” Weishardt stated.

Robert’s face twisted in a laugh.

His expression said it all. He’d already known this.

“But I suppose if you didn’t have an alchemist, you would have continued to use the new medicine despite knowing its ingredients,” Robert replied.

After the Labyrinth Suppression Forces hauled Robert away, a lone soldier asked Weishardt what should be done with the glass coffin.

“Leave it be. Keep it safe until the new world arrives.”

Royce bowed his head deeply in response to Weishardt allowing him to bury her in the new world.

After hearing the details from Royce, Caroline silently gazed at Estalia in eternal slumber. Mariela tightly grasped Caroline’s hand.

“Don’t worry; she made it back to the ley line. And I’ll bet she got to see the people important to her, too.”

“Estalia”—Ruiz had said her name when he left Royce’s body.

Mariela believed Estalia had heard the wishes of the Aguinas family and then came to take Ruiz home. She gritted her teeth tightly as she came to grips with the fact that she really was the only alchemist in the Labyrinth City who could make potions.

Caroline’s hand, which returned Mariela’s squeeze, was the only thing that brought her warmth in this cold cellar.

The snow blanketed the Labyrinth City and engulfed sound and scenery alike. It continued to fall silently and coat everything in its wake.