[87] The Crowd (3)
Arin had been starving for three days. Because of that, Kanis hadn't eaten anything for twenty days.
"Huff! Huff! I did it! I got it! Bread!"
Kanis ran blindly down the alley. Only after shaking off her pursuer did she press her back to the wall and let out a breath.
Her head swam; the only thing she felt was hunger. She could no longer tell how long it had been.
Then a single piece of bread caught her eye.
With eyes gone mad, Kanis swallowed hard.
I want to eat. I want to put this in my mouth.
Yeah, I have to stay strong so Arin can live. I can eat just this. Arin can hold out a few more days.
It felt like a brilliant idea.
Could anything be more rational? Eat this first, then use the strength left to find more food. That would work.
Kanis opened her mouth and brought the bread to it. Dried saliva streamed like a flood and her hands trembled.
"Ugh!"
She squeezed her eyes shut and tucked the bread against her chest. It was all a lie. One lousy piece of bread wouldn't restore any real strength.
I have to endure. It doesn't matter if my body breaks. If my mind collapses, it's over.
Kanis looked around like someone on the edge of madness. She even thought about stuffing stones into her stomach.
She crawled toward a pile of feces someone had dumped at the mouth of the alley. Before she could think it through, she reached out and shoved it into her mouth.
"Ugh! Ugh!"
Her tongue, her mouth, her stomach—her whole body rejected it. Still, Kanis swallowed.
Better than stones.
Feces were better than stones.
After a long internal battle she stumbled back to their hideout. Her stomach still churned, but when she saw Arin she plastered on a bright smile and held out the bread.
"Arin, ta-da! I found this."
"Oh—really? Wow, amazing."
"Haha, I've got the knack now. I'll be able to find more. Eat up."
Arin looked at the bread with sad eyes. She wanted desperately to go searching together, but going outside as a woman in Radum was suicide.
Arin had never spoken to anyone but Kanis. That had given her social anxiety, but what did that matter? At least she hadn't become somebody's food, shoved into a stranger's stomach.
"Kanis, eat with me."
"I'm fine. I picked through stuff while I was out. I even ate a big centipede earlier for nutrition. You can't eat those, so you have to have this."
"I can eat that too. How long are you going to treat me like a child?"
Kanis gripped Arin's shoulder with a tender look.
"Arin, I know you're brave. But you can't do that. Do you understand? The only reason I can survive in this hell called Radum is that I can at least feed you like a human. If you become like me, I might go mad. So eat."
It was something Arin had heard a dozen times. Whenever Kanis said it, Arin would always pretend to relent and take a bite.
But this time was different.
Arin stared at Kanis's mouth with trembling eyes. Something was smeared there, and a smell lingered.
"Kanis… what did you eat?"
Kanis froze, more flustered than she had ever been.
"Huh? Ahaha! It's cake. I licked the cream that fell off, so it must've got on me. Sorry I didn't say anything. I was so hungry…"
Smack!
Kanis's face snapped around. She'd taken countless beatings in the back alleys, but never had a slap hurt like this.
"Ah, Arin…"
Arin's expression was one Kanis had never seen before—cold and raw.
"You bastard… How could you do this to me? Am I livestock to you? Are you raising me? And then you tell me to eat this? What do you even see me as?"
"Arin, it's not like that! This is punishment for me! It has nothing to do with you!"
"I don't care! I don't want this!"
Arin threw the bread away. As Kanis watched the piece roll in the dust, she turned away in anger.
"Arin! What are you doing! How did I even get this—!"
Arin grabbed Kanis's face and kissed her. She licked whatever was on Kanis's lips, and tears spilled from her eyes.
It wasn't a sweet kiss. It wasn't a beautiful exchange of human affection. It was two beings born into sin, consoling one another.
Only then did Kanis realize what she had eaten. For the first time in her life, she cried. Years of suppressed sorrow broke loose at once.
"Huh—! Huuuugh!"
"Don't ever do that again. One more time and I can't stay by your side."
"I'm sorry, Arin. Don't leave. You're my only family. You're everything I live for."
"All right. Let's live, Kanis. We'll definitely live."
Overcome with grief, Kanis couldn't even speak; she only nodded repeatedly. But Arin did not forgive her easily. That day, Arin didn't relent until Kanis had eaten the whole half of the bread that had fallen to the ground.
Kanis told her past in a calm, detached way, as if reciting someone else's life.
"We lived in hell. But our master saved us from there. He gave us food, the power to protect Arin, and even the Harvist—the very essence of dark magic."
Eyes turned to the Harvist. Usually a talkative magical creature, it remained silent this time.
"I understand."
Shirone said.
"I know what kind of life you led. But that doesn't justify killing people. Living more painfully than others doesn't make wrongdoing right."
"Don't be mistaken. I'm not here to defend him. I'm here to teach you. To show you how shallow the justice you believe in is, how hypocritical the world you live in is. The thing that saved Arin and me was not your precious justice. I simply act on what I believe."
"You gain nothing from hurting people. If you don't try to understand others first, your past will never be comforted."
"Kik! Comfort? You still say stupid things. Want me to tell you the situation? Our master will wipe this whole school out. Your friends are included."
"No. You can't hurt anyone. No one—except yourself."
When Shirone summoned photons on his palm, the Harvist spread a broad hand and stepped in front of Kanis. It wasn't enough; it extended its other arm and wrapped around Kanis as well.
"What are you doing, Harvist? No need to be so scared."
"Dangerous. Temperament is strange."
Kanis snorted. After the fight in the forest, she'd already gauged Shirone's skill. For a magic academy student he was a decent talent, but still a greenhouse flower.
"Hah. Anyway, to me—"
Kanis's expression went blank. The photon cannon hovering above Shirone's palm vibrated with terrifying speed. It was stronger than the photon cannon Shirone had used in the forest. Given Shirone's injuries, Kanis had underestimated how formidable it could be.
How could this be? With a skill like that…
Kanis and the Harvist's analysis was mostly correct. But they'd missed a crucial fact: Shirone was an Unlocker who had opened the Realm of Infinity.
"Last chance. Release the mind control."
Kanis's face tightened. The realization that he could no longer look down on Shirone stung his pride.
"Ridiculous. Even if I die, I follow our master's will. You won't break my conviction."
Shirone's gaze turned cold. The photon cannon, amplified by the power of Immortal Function, had a potency on another level.
He didn't want to kill. But if Kanis harmed the students, Shirone would have no choice.
"Return everyone's memories. If you don't—"
The photon cannon flared and condensed into a blinding, ice-white sphere.
—I will have no choice but to harm you.
* * *
Sade, casting photonic magic over Alpheas's head, already had cold sweat beading on his brow. Viltor Arkein. An irritating man, but the magic he'd cast was beyond imagining.
"Whew. Such powerful mind control. This would work even now."
At first Sade had thought it would be easy. No matter how great a grand mage he'd been, forty years had passed. Magic had evolved over generations, and dark magic had been phased out.
But Abyss Nova was a complex mechanism whose essence even Sade—beneficiary of advanced magic—couldn't immediately analyze.
Twenty minutes later, he finally felt the light penetrate the core of darkness. From then on Sade pushed light in with all his mental strength. The veil of darkness lifted, and Alpheas's memories began to unfold brilliantly along the flow of light.
* * *
Forty years ago. The capital, Vashka.
A wave of magic fever swept through the kingdom of Tormia like never before. The twelfth king, Adolf XII, was intellectual and benevolent, unlike his predecessors who prized force.
Upon ascending the throne, he made the magic department independent from the military and gathered countless talents.
Students from provinces and foreign lands flocked to Vashka to study, and the capital's streets hummed daily with voices of intellect.
Freshly graduated mages would gather in taverns from morning to debate. It was an everyday scene.
Gypsy-style clothing with bold colors was in fashion.
For women, short hair that revealed the nape was a sign of intellect. Men, by contrast, wore their hair down to the waist.
Taverns bred factions born of scholarly clashes; petty brawls would erupt and fighters would be dragged away by the guards with some regularity.
The most famous tavern in Vashka was the rustic inn called "Home of the Ancient Gods."
A vast hall with over two hundred tables. People climbed the central lectern at any time to expound magical views.
All sorts of voices gathered there and the topics were diverse.
Magic debates took center stage, but gossip among nobles was also forged in real time at the Home of the Ancient Gods.
It was an age of romance.
Alpheas recalled his golden youth with that haze of nostalgia.
"Oh my, you lot! He's here, he's here! Lord Alpheas is coming!"
A woman at the tavern entrance made a fuss and the women at the tables squealed and turned to the door.
"Hello, ladies! It's lively as ever today!"
A handsome young man with golden hair to his waist—Alpheas—entered the Home of the Ancient Gods. Beside him was a young man with an unfashionable close-cropped haircut: Ozent Klump, Rian's grandfather.
Though Klump was a swordsman unlikely to cast invisibility, the women treated him like an invisible man and flocked to Alpheas.
"We've been waiting, Lord Alpheas! What magic will you teach us today?"
"First, we wet our throats. My tongue hardens if it doesn't get drunk."
"Ha ha ha! That's so funny. Lord Alpheas is such a character."
If his current disciples heard those jokes they might sneer at their cheesiness, but back then Alpheas was popular with anything he said.
He was the scion of a first-rank house, top of his class at the School of Magic, gifted, handsome, and refined—who could dislike him?
Men, on the other hand, looked at Alpheas with resentment. Even those not petty enough to be jealous regarded him coldly; that showed how much ire he drew from other men.
The light of the Mirhi family.
That was Alpheas's official title at the time, though among those who knew him he had another nickname.
Arrogant Alpheas.