Retire 522

522 To Remain a Magician (6)

A powerful wave radiated from Michelle.

Mana spread out like mist. It didn’t feel threatening, but neither was it so beautiful that one could just stand there, entranced.

And yet, astonishingly, nothing happened.

“Don’t get any closer.”

I grabbed my father’s arm.

It wasn’t a landmine that would explode if touched, nor did there seem to be any sign of another spell being cast.

But the mana, surprisingly, did not waver and simply stayed in place. It was… like a wall.

Michelle turned her head again. The haze of mana obscured the view somewhat, but I could still see her hands slipping again and again.

Han Tae-kyung and Hope approached, followed by Kim Chae-min. Even if they couldn’t see mana as I did, they could feel the surge in the air.

Seeing how tense Kim Chae-min and I were, my father decided not to approach any further.

Michelle ignored us and focused on checking the books again. Even as her hands fumbled in the air, she repeated the same actions she’d been performing since we arrived, guided by Kim Chae-min.

As if to say, this was all she had left to do.

“Noah Michelle?”

My father called out to her.

“Miss Michelle. Isn’t it time you answered me?”

The others, who hadn’t seen the standoff between my father and Michelle’s doll, looked bewildered. My father hadn’t explained in detail what had happened, even when they asked. Maybe because he knew I’d been there.

He extended his spear. The tip struck the wall of mana, and sparks flew, bright as a welding torch.

“I came all this way to hear your story.”

Behind my father, we exchanged glances. Han Tae-kyung and Hope, who’d spent more time with us searching for Kim Chae-min, had a rough idea of what had happened, but Kim Chae-min did not.

He glared at me.

But what more could I explain? I’d already said everything there was to say.

In truth, I was more curious about what Michelle was feeling as she rifled through those books than about what she was looking for.

My father said Michelle was “human.”

But just because someone has human flesh and blood, does that make them human?

“You just have to say one thing. Then I can’t promise we won’t interfere anymore, but… You know why we came looking for you, don’t you?”

Unlike the sharpness of his first call, my father’s voice softened, as if soothing a child throwing a tantrum over a toy.

A low voice, mixing irritation and gentleness.

I doubted it would reach Michelle.

He didn’t withdraw the spear that pressed against the wall of mana. The places the blade touched would repair themselves immediately, but anyone could see it wasn’t perfect.

Why? Why?

With such extraordinary control over magic, she could have threatened us easily. Even if that threat didn’t succeed, at the very least, she wouldn’t be surrounded, relying only on mana as she was now.

“…Don’t.”

Michelle murmured, eyes never leaving her book.

“Don’t interfere.”

I wondered if it hadn’t been a doll that Hope provoked at first.

Had Noah Michelle been here all along, searching for a book among the countless volumes of Mont-Saint-Michel, trying to find the one she’d once taken?

Never mind whether she could recognize the book at a glance after twenty years.

“I won’t do anything else. So don’t interfere.”

The book she finished checking and dropped appeared behind us. The whirlwind that had been raging suddenly stopped. The books that had been flying through the air now lay scattered on the floor.

The new book joined the pile.

Michelle raised her head. Still, she didn’t look at us. With bloodshot eyes, she glared at the empty air for a moment, then turned another page.

“I’ll show you the way out.”

On the opposite side, a blue shimmer rose. The swirling mana soon took shape—a gate.

“So please, just don’t interfere. Don’t. Why are you all tormenting me?!!”

“Come on. Even if you’re an archmage, get your story straight. We’re the ones being tormented here.”

Han Tae-kyung pointed out with a sly tone.

Hope? No, it was Han Tae-kyung?

“People should have a conscience. Or maybe you’re not a person. Was it Henri Lehmann? He was born human, but these days, he hardly seems it.”

“It’s Henry, not Henri.”

“Just a difference in pronunciation. If you get hung up on trivial things like that, you’ll end up like our master.”

My father raised an eyebrow at Han Tae-kyung.

Amazingly, Michelle reacted too. She looked at Han Tae-kyung with a dazed expression.

Han Tae-kyung winked at her, not bothering to hide his golden eyes.

“So you’re just human on the outside?”

“…I won’t become a monster like that.”

“You hate humans, don’t you? But you like having a human body?”

Even now, I found myself doubting Han Tae-kyung’s sense of language.

There’s no reason for a hunter to have good social skills. They don’t deal with people. When I get back to school, I’ll have to reconsider whether to keep Han Tae-kyung as a teacher. I should have listened to Han Eun-young. After she found out her brother worked at the school, she threatened to drop out and spent a lot of time trying to get his teaching credentials revoked rather than quitting herself.

Han Tae-kyung… At first, I only meant to use him as a security guard. When did he start teaching classes?

…Every time I was away from school, I made him do it. It’s all my fault.

“I, I…”

Michelle looked at Han Tae-kyung with a half-crazed expression, then shook her head.

Despite Han Tae-kyung’s wild choice of words, Michelle looked more like a lost child than someone her age.

“I’m human.”

Still just a child.

“Then why do you hate humans? Do you hate yourself?”

“……”

A child.

Her hand tightened on the book she was pulling out.

Suddenly, all of this seemed absurd. That I’d been bested by… a kid like this.

I didn’t even know what I’d been expecting. A terrifying fairy like the one at Mont-Saint-Michel? A naive façade hiding a psychopathic mind, like in Marseille?

Or someone who wanted to become the start of a new humanity, like a cultist?

It would have been better if she had been a mad monster’s fanatic, as she first appeared.

At least then, there would have been some sense of tragic resolve.

I’d known all along that Noah Michelle wasn’t the perfect, overwhelmingly gifted magician we’d imagined.

I’d even prepared myself for the possibility that facing her wouldn’t be a fight. Especially after seeing her memories.

But this… this wasn’t it.

This wasn’t what I wanted.

If only Noah Michelle had been a little younger. At least a teenage girl, like the kids.

If only she’d been blindly…

I clenched my teeth.

There’s no way Noah Michelle had anything to do with how I was born. My biological parents were little better than cultists, even when they made my brother.

But I can’t believe she had no influence on how I grew up.

I was one of the lucky ones. So was Woo I-rok. Kang Tae-woo and his sister, too.

But in the timeline I lived through, I don’t know what happened to Kang Tae-woo and Sophia. They probably never lived as siblings. If they were lucky, they survived. But with all the dungeons breaking open, they probably died. There’s no way anyone could survive long in a world like that.

I thought, too, of the children I’d seen in the lab. Kids born inside, like me. Kids dragged in by their parents, like Kang Tae-woo. Kids who were outright kidnapped.

No matter how much I call this nonsense, at the very least, I should be able to say there was a reason for it all. To have some kind of blind faith, no matter what, that would let me follow.

So I could hate, curse, blame, and make her pay for her sins.

What am I supposed to do now?

“Humans are useless.”

Noah Michelle spoke as she looked at her book.

“Useless. Hopeless. It’s no good. Humans are no good.”

The book fell from her hands.

“That’s why I have to check.”

Now, I was certain that nothing we said could reach her.

Mana layered itself over the barrier again. My father didn’t lower his spear, even as sparks flew.

“I… I promised. Again and again. I promised.”

If only she’d cursed us, mocked us as savages, or at least pretended to try to kill us, I wouldn’t feel so hollow.

Even Kang Tae-woo, dreaming of revenge, had a more realistic sense of things. Even if it was childish, those feelings—revenge, anger—are the source of all action.

Maybe, wandering this dungeon, I’d realized this was how it would end. Maybe that’s why Han Tae-kyung’s words struck me so hard.

If only every villain in the world were unambiguously evil.

I looked at Noah Michelle—a small magician, endlessly muttering about “promises.”

Her mind was not as strong as we’d expected.

I thought about who else might be sitting in that chair. The first to come to mind was Oh Hyun-wook, crying with his swollen, ugly face. But he was the least likely. He was much more remarkable than he thought. Even if his friend hadn’t died in Myeong-dong, even if he’d never had a teacher to scold him, he’d already chosen his path. The memorial guild was in his heart before he ever entered the special high school.

Of course, I thought of Seo Han-seong, too. In a way, he was even more like me than Kang Tae-woo. But unlike me, Han-seong had always known his parents’ guilt. I separated myself from my parents’ sins and hated them, but Han-seong still loved his parents and felt guilty. As long as he had that love, he could never sit in that chair.

Kang Tae-woo? Yes. Kang Tae-woo would sit there. Usually so quiet, but terrifying when he snapped. He’d sit there and collapse, just like Michelle. He’s not that hard-hearted. He’s just like her.

No matter how much the fairy influenced Michelle’s thoughts and actions, the little Noah in her parents’ arms wasn’t cruel enough to kill people.

She wouldn’t have ended up like this just because a will was found. She must have had doubts before that.

If there had been no will, those doubts would have faded, and over time, they would have twisted. She would have come to follow the monster and hate humanity.

By then, the will would no longer have shaken her.

But twenty years ago, Noah Michelle was still a dreamy girl, wandering through her own illusions—a child who never grew up.

“I promised… to become a great magician.”

Noah Michelle knows what happened, even without checking the book.

But that’s why she has to check.

“If I become a magician… Mom and Dad…”

It’s not because she’s worried about the troublesome aftermath.

Even if I don’t want to harm another human being, I know there’s no such thing as a world where everyone can be happy.

But still.

“If I become a magician…”

This wasn’t the ending I wanted. Regardless of my feelings, Noah Michelle opened the book. Inside, it was packed with runes.

Unfortunately, I recognized them.

The same runes drawn on the fairy’s wings.