Chapter 17

Chapter 17

“Stop right there! Hey!”

“Hm?”

At the end of a chase in the dead of night, the young man reacted to my shout, which I had forced out almost desperately - perhaps because I usually had no occasion to raise my voice, it did not come out well - and stopped creating aura poles, turning back toward me. Then he landed as if hanging from one of the nearby trees, wearing a puzzled expression.

“Were you following me? Why?”

Why was I following him? To stop him from changing the future however he pleased. Just as I was about to blurt that out while landing on the top of another tree near the one where the young man had landed, I suddenly thought it would be better not to say anything that might provoke his resistance. The completion condition for the research assignment, “Be sure to seek the collaborator’s cooperation,” came to mind anew.

So it would be better to phrase it indirectly....... The problem was that I had no skill with words whatsoever. I did not have the ability to smooth things over with speech, and in the first place, I had no idea what to say.

As I stayed silent and struggled, the young man seemed to grow tired of waiting and once again drew aura into both hands.

“If you have no particular business with me, I shall be going.”

“Huh......? Ah, no, I do! Business!”

As if asking, “What is it?” the young man glanced at me and raised one eyebrow. Barely fixing my reflexively flinching body to the tree, I quickly blurted out the words that came to mind.

“Y-You said you’d repay your debt! Then why are you just leaving? You haven’t repaid it yet!”

“That is...... I intended to repay it later. There is something I must urgently confirm right now.”

“When later?! B-Besides...... how am I supposed to believe that? You won’t even reveal who you are, saying something about personal circumstances. How am I supposed to trust the words of someone like that?!”

“That is.......”

At my shout, which poured out at random, the young man wore a stunned expression for a moment. Then, seeming to accept something, he nodded and bowed to me politely.

“That is certainly true. I cannot gain your trust with only the words that I will repay you later. I was discourteous. At the very least, I should have introduced myself. My heart was simply too rushed. Please forgive my rudeness.”

“Huh? Uh...... well...... You don’t have to be that sorry about it.......”

As I stammered, not knowing how to react to his unexpectedly polite attitude, the young man smiled softly, took on a posture that looked formal - I was not sure, but it seemed to be some kind of etiquette - and began introducing himself.

“Let us begin by exchanging names. I am Edelred Leofrid. The kingdom’s army...... no, no. Around now, I am probably merely a wanderer drifting aimlessly and looking around the world. I should have been on my way toward the Marquisate of Richelieu....... Yes, I stayed for quite a long time at an inn in the central district there. So if you wish to find me, you can go to that inn. Its name was Lindbell...... no, was it Lindrad? Hm, I am suddenly confused. Do you happen to know?”

“Uh......? Huh, ah, no. I don’t know.......”

In the first place, the Marquisate of Richelieu was a place name I had never heard before, so how was I supposed to know the name of an inn there......?

More importantly, this had become troublesome. Since the young man had introduced himself like that, I now had to introduce myself too. Of course, I could simply ignore it and not respond, but the thought that “when the other party introduces themselves, it is proper etiquette for oneself to introduce oneself as well” would not leave my mind, so I could not possibly do that.

The problem was...... I had no idea how to do that damned self-introduction. That was only natural, since I had never once introduced myself until now.

No, perhaps I could not say never. When I met Master for the first time more than nine hundred years ago, I had said my name exactly once.

-Student, what is your name?

-My name is Reu Rel, sir.......

-Reu Rel....... Ah, I feel as though I have heard it before.

......But is it not a bit of a stretch to call that a self-introduction? It feels like all I did was answer the question I was asked. I could not simply toss out only my name to a complete stranger and end it there. On top of that, the other party had added a simple explanation about himself along with his name. So I should add something similar to my introduction. But what should I say? Wow, this is unbearably awkward.

“Uh, well...... I am...... R-Reu Rel, and...... a mage......”

As my face heated and I felt my vision spinning, I barely managed to speak. Edelred mouthed my name to himself, then tilted his head with a strange expression. Wondering if I had made some kind of mistake, I stared at him, and Edelred shook his head as if it were nothing before hurriedly asking me,

“Then may I address you as Magi Reu?”

“What...... what are you talking about? Why are you cutting off the back half of someone’s name as you please?”

“Hm? When addressing someone respectfully, is one not supposed to call only the given name, excluding the surname?”

So why was he cutting off the back half of my name when it was not a surname? My name was “Reu Rel,” not “Reu.” In the first place, I was not of precious status, so I did not even have anything like a surname.

After grumbling to myself for a moment, I suddenly came to my senses. Ah, this was not the time to be making useless small talk. In any case, the self-introduction seemed to be over, so it was time to think about how to bring up the main point.......

Around the time I thought that far, green light began gathering in Edelred’s hands again.

“Then, Magi Reu Rel. Please go to that inn and wait. As soon as I finish my urgent business, I will go there immediately. I will definitely go and repay my debt, so I hope you will believe me and not doubt it.”

“Huh? W-Wait.......”

Thinking, oh no, I hurriedly tried to catch him, but before I could, Edelred resumed his pole-vaulting. Around him as he sped away, a strange force field spread out and began distorting nearby things at random.

Damn it, he was already starting to negatively affect the present. I hurriedly disassembled the contaminated things down to the design code stage and dealt with them, then hastily deployed a formula toward Edelred. It was the capture stone wall magic I had improved through a research assignment not long ago.

Stone walls appeared in an instant and completely surrounded Edelred. And then they were shattered into pieces by the aura he lightly swung, scattering in every direction.

It was not a particularly bewildering result. If he had been low-level like those mercenaries back then, that would be one thing, but Edelred was a swordmaster - and one presumed to have gained all sorts of experience in the future - so he was more than capable of breaking through stone walls like these in no time.

In the first place, I had not expected to capture him with something like this. The reason I used this magic anyway was because I calculated that if I kept obstructing his movement with it, I could guide the direction of his path to some degree as I wished.

However...... unexpectedly, Edelred did not change his direction and simply kept moving in one direction. As though he was not trying to leave this place blindly, but had some definite destination.

Apparently, his urgent business had not merely been an excuse to leave this place. But the strange part was whether Edelred knew in which direction the place where he had to attend to that urgent business was located. Considering he did not know the Magic Tower existed at all, he should not know where he was. So what was he using as a basis to determine the direction of his destination?

The answer could be found in Edelred’s strange little actions. Whenever he erased the fully tilted aura pole and created a new one, Edelred briefly seemed to glance up at the sky.

What in the world is he looking at? Curious, I raised my head and followed his gaze. A deep blue night sky, studded thickly with stars and the moon, spread out before my eyes.

And in the middle of that sky, there floated an utterly black mass that contained not even a trace of light. Unlike the other celestial bodies, it did not have a round shape but an irregular one. It was another moon, called <Wraith’s Shadow> since ancient times.

Though it was called a moon, in truth, <Wraith’s Shadow> was closer to some unidentified thing than a moon. Some considered it “the manifestation of all the darkness in the world gathered together,” others considered it “a hole pierced in the sky and proof that this world is incomplete,” and still others considered it “the seed of disaster where the demon that will bring about the end of the world sleeps.”

I had once heard from Master that, based on the third claim, a cult advocating the apocalypse had become popular for a time....... In any case, to mages, <Wraith’s Shadow> also served as the basis for the perception that “one must not do anything that goes against the order of the world.” They said that <Wraith’s Shadow> was the trace left behind by some archmage of old who committed a taboo against the order of the world, or something like that.

In any case, apart from the various stories passed down about its origin, <Wraith’s Shadow> was often used among mages as a kind of positional indicator. This method of use was inspired by the fact that, because of its irregular shape, the appearance of <Wraith’s Shadow> differed depending on the region.

Of course, this method was used only among mages above a certain level. Since <Wraith’s Shadow> had an extremely complex and subtle shape, it was impossible for ordinary people to memorize how it appeared in every region. But it was possible for mages, who normally stored numerous formulas in their minds.

Well, even someone who was not a mage might be able to use <Wraith’s Shadow> to determine their position after going through countless training and experiences. But there was no way Edelred, who was still only a young man, could do something like that...... No, he might be able to. That bastard had regressed from the future. He had also said he knew several high-ranking mages.

“No, but...... why doesn’t he know the Tristein Magic Tower, then?! When he knows how to read that thing!”

Had the existence of the Magic Tower truly been completely forgotten? I felt unsettled for a moment, but soon had to pull myself together. The force field that had formed along Edelred’s movement path was contaminating animals, plants, and the like, transforming them into strange grotesque creatures.

“$＃%^%^&＊%＠$＃^&!!!!!”

With unintelligible roars, the grotesque creatures swung their bizarre bodies and attacked Edelred and me. Formulas I quickly deployed and aura blocked them, and the bodies of the grotesque creatures that were knocked away or sliced apart disassembled into the form of formula code and gathered in my hand.

Hmm, as expected, their designs were a complete mess, just like those monsters from before. It seemed the contamination affected even the formula code. The one fortunate point was probably that I had seen what they had been before they were contaminated. If I knew what they originally were, I could attempt to restore them to their original state.

Wait, hold on. Then could Edelred’s causal relationships perhaps be restored from their current overlapped and distorted state back to their original state? Or at least isolated to some degree.......

It was the moment I thought that far.

***

[Research Assignment] No. 703083-456 ☆★Newly Added★☆

＃001. Check Whether Distorted/Altered Designs Can Be Restored

→ Collection of a sample from the main experimental subject’s distorted/altered design is essential!! Be sure to confirm what state it is in!!

→ If complete restoration is impossible right away, devise at least a way to prevent the spread of contamination!!

☆★Warning★☆ Take care, as simply deleting it because it is bothersome will be treated as failure.

＃002. Collection of Related Samples and Case Collection Through Design State Restoration

→ Collect as many cases as possible to increase the success probability of Item 1!!

***

No, Master. Why at a time like this, of all times.......