(Nanahoshi POV)
The pen clicked against parchment. Once. Twice. A dozen times more, until the blotches of ink in the corner looked like a constellation of nervous stars.
I should have been working. Summoning equations don't write themselves. But every time I tried to line up another rune, something else intruded—black fur, a fractured fox mask, shadow bleeding into smoke.
Sumizome.
Crumpled on my lab floor, claws digging into stone, words rasping from a throat that shouldn't have been able to speak.
"Warn… Orsted…"
And then—gone.
I dragged a hand down my face. Logic couldn't scrub the image away. If the familiar had died, it wasn't just a broken spell. It meant something had gone very, very wrong.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
The pen hadn't stopped. My hand jittered like it was scratching out a rhythm for my nerves.
"Enough," I muttered, slamming it down. The silence that followed was worse.
I needed air.
***
The university's halls were nearly empty, lanterns casting a golden glow across the marble floors. Voices drifted from around the corner.
"Hold it steady, young one. You'll never master it with your hands shaking like that."
That's when I recognized the little dwarf girl, the one the masked man left for Ryuta at his house, gripping a chalk tablet, lips moving silently as she copied lines with a piece of chalk.
Beside her, the prince from the Shirone Kingdom, Zanoba, was teaching her at a nearby table at a vacant space.
"Yes, yes, straight first, then the curve," Zanoba coaxed. "That's it!"
She blinked up at him, then at me—wide-eyed, but not hiding.
"Ah! Lady Nanahoshi!" Zanoba beamed. "Out from your sanctum at last."
"…Something like that," I muttered, though feeling a bit of brunt from that blunt yet nonoffensive comment.
"Why are you teaching her here instead of a vacant room?"
"Because of this," he replies, pointing at a nearby object.
"... a pillar?"
"Not exactly the pillar itself, but the falcon figurine with its wings spread at the top end of it. The little one here needs to study examples similar to that one for when she starts to craft figurines with Earth Magic soon."
Right. I heard about that from Ryuta. Apparently, this is a two-way project involving the ripe age for people to learn chantless Magic.
To think that this little girl is supposedly capable of learning the things Ryuta does in his sleep seems surreal.
Due to being a little bit shy of me, especially since I'm still wearing my mask, the chalk slipped in her hand, leaving a crooked mark. Her shoulders hunched as if she'd ruined everything.
"It's fine," Zanoba soothed, ruffling her hair. "Mistakes mean you're trying. Even Master Ryuta started with mistakes when he created his first fugirine."
Seriously. This guy may as well be one of those guys in my world who hoards shelves full of figures. Actually, now that I think about it, he is a prince, so he probably has enough money to do that.
I knelt beside the little girl and used a much calmer voice this time as I took a piece of chalk from beside her.
"Here—slow. One motion, not too fast." I guided the chalk, tracing the curve. Her trembling eased. She copied me, the wobble smaller this time, until she managed to write the letter decently.
"There. Much better."
Her lips twitched into a smile, faint but proud.
"Does she…" I hesitated, nodding toward her. "Does she have a name?"
Zanoba tilted his head, as if surprised by the question. "Not yet. Dwarves don't receive names until they are seven. A rite of identity to determine their characteristics to think of a proper name suiting them best."
"Seven…" I frowned. She couldn't be more than four. Three years nameless—it unsettled me.
Zanoba's expression softened. "Still, I thought of one. Julius."
I blinked. "Y-You do know that's a boy's name."
His smile faltered. "Yes. It was my younger brother's. My dear baby brother. He passed away before he could grow up properly."
Silence weighed heavily. His grief pressed sharply against my chest.
"…That's a lot to put on her," I said finally, clearing my throat. "Maybe something lighter. Julie, perhaps. Close, but hers—not borrowed."
He blinked. Slowly, his lips curved into something thoughtful. "Julie… yes. Gentle. Fitting."
"Julie," I said softly. "That suits her."
Zanoba blinked. "…Yes. Julie. Fitting."
The girl—Julie—looked up, wide-eyed. She didn't grasp the weight of it, not really. But when Zanoba repeated, "Julie," her cheeks pinked, and the smallest smile tugged at her lips.
Then the hall erupted.
"Today is the day!"
Cliff stormed in, and the staff raised a banner. Linia and Pursena slinked behind, smirks sharp as knives.
"Didn't ya say that last week?" Pursena teased.
"Yeah, what is this, attempt number five?" Linia added.
"Those are just simple mishaps, natural to anyone, even to a genius like me."
"You say that, but what the boss wrote about age being a factor, so I thought you had trouble counting your numbers properly," the cat-girl snickered.
Cliff went scarlet, shouting over their laughter. Julie ducked behind Zanoba's robe.
I slipped toward the exit before he could draft me as his "witness." Only Julie noticed, her small eyes following me like she wanted to escape too.
The evening air outside was crisp, laced with wet stone. It cleared my head, but not enough.
Even though that little interaction was a change of atmosphere for me, the thoughts circled back—Sumizome's mask death message.
What I needed wasn't just air. I needed warmth. Steam. A real bath. Which meant… his house.
"…Clear my head. Nothing more," I told myself, already walking.
***
Steam clung to my skin as I wrapped a robe around myself, toweling damp hair. For the first time in days, my shoulders eased.
It might just be because of my home world's advanced development in hygiene, but this one is bringing me to the edge of trying to start working on more cleaning products.
But for now, having a bath is more than what I could ask for.
As I walked down the hallway towards the kitchen to see if there were any snacks Ryuta may have left here.
That's when I saw someone standing there in the hallway. White hair caught the lantern light. Pale strands glowing faintly.
My breath hitched. My hand went for the rings I'd left on my desk.
The person hadn't noticed me yet, so I slowly stepped away, but they noticed my presence anyway and quickly turned to me.
"Nanahoshi?"
The voice froze me. Could it be?
"…Ryuta?"
Relief came over me, but then I saw his eyes, mismatched blue and green with silver slit pupils, looking dim and hollow. Not gone, but dulled, like a lantern burning low.
"…What happened to you?" I whispered.
He didn't answer. And silence wrapped as he struggled to answer me at all.
***
(Ryuta POV)
Seeing her there, stepping out of the bath, wrapped in a robe… I felt a pang of guilt.
I didn't think I would meet her at this hour, especially not with her coming out of the bath in only a robe.
But it's like she is a ninja trained specifically to target me. I really need to work on my skills in a person's presence around me without the help of fluctuating mana.
"I… I should take a bath as well. I haven't washed myself in like weeks," I muttered, forcing my voice casual, until I heard myself speak.
"Not… not for weird reasons," I corrected myself immediately, forcing a laugh that came out hollow. Right after her, sure… but that didn't mean anything. Nothing.
Nanahoshi's voice was soft, cutting through my mental excuses. "Ryuta… what happened to you?"
I froze. Her gaze met mine, the kind that pierces through lies and pretense. I swallowed, feeling the dryness in my throat.
"Things… happened. Stuff I had to go through," I said carefully, each word measured, vague. "Some… complications against the first wave." Not lying outright, just omitting the worst.
Her eyes lingered, searching, but I shook my head slightly. "It's… better if I handle it alone."
That was enough for her to pause. I didn't wait. I spun toward the bathroom, not looking back.
The door shut behind me with a soft click. Steam hung thick in the air, clinging to every surface. My fingers worked quickly at the leather robe. When I peeled it from my shoulders, my back caught my attention—a crunching, dry resistance beneath my skin. I froze, fingertips tracing the ridge. Dried blood, I realized. The hook implanted into my spine… the memory of what had happened the other day hit like a fist.
I exhaled shakily and conjured a stone bucket from thin air with Earth Magic, keeping my motions precise and almost detached. Before I could stop myself, the first wave came—blood, bile, and other fluids that had been injected into me. Some… possibly even what the elderly lady had forced me to ingest. I let it spill into the bucket, leaving it there, uncleaned.
The weight of it pressed down on me. I stripped off the rest of my clothes and dipped into the bath before it had even fully filled, wincing as I felt the wounds of my wounds stinging from the water.
But that's when I realized another disturbing thing.
The bracelet. It was no longer welted into my left forearm. In fact, there was no trace of it at all.
Learning the back of my head over the edge of the bathtub.
I let the water soak into me, warm against skin that had become too accustomed to pain. My mind, however, refused to follow the comforting rhythm.
What had I done?
The knights and soldiers... I didn't give them a chance to defend themselves. I had torn through them with no hesitation, no mercy. Every strike precise, every scream silenced. The blood I washed away in this bath was nothing compared to the flame tide I had left behind elsewhere.
And then… the apostle of Hitogami. Perhaps a noble of the King Dragon Kingdom, cloaked in wealth and authority, hiding behind the door of a lone chamber.
The joy I felt from dropping him from the sky... it felt so surreal.
Why was I using Gravity Magic so intensely anyway? I even used it for flying over the area in search of the three-headed Black Dragon.
In the end, all the traces left by that monstrosity were leading to a massive Teleportation Circle further away in an area where the mana density was much higher.
The circle had already ceased functioning by the time I found it. There had been no way to reactivate it, and no way for me to reverse it.
The undead Black Dragon was gone. Into who knew where. Out of my reach.
The realization gnawed at me so much that I went into a rage, destroying everything around me until I felt fatigue overtake me and fell to my knees, oddly, with a clearer mind.
Everything that was left to do was to go back and report to Orsted about the events that had transpired. And since he wasn't at the headquarters, I went to my home, where I coincidentally came across Nanahoshi.
I grumbled under my breath, bitter and low. Things were only getting worse. The tension between the two countries festered like an open wound, and my own mental stability—what little I had left—was fraying at the edges.
There was no reprieve, no absolution. Only the echo of what I had done… and what I would have to do next.
I finally rose from the bath, my muscles loosened, but my mind was still taut. The warmth had barely penetrated the knots inside my chest. Dressing quickly, I tugged on a simple shirt and leather vest. The fabric felt foreign against my skin, an attempt at normalcy, but it did nothing to ease the weight pressing down on me. I didn't feel better. Not one bit.
Just as I was about to leave the bathroom, a familiar pulse prickled at the edge of my senses—a signature I hadn't felt in days. Orsted. Entering through the teleportation circle in my basement. My chest tightened.
Anxiety coiled in my stomach. I was obligated to inform him… to explain what had happened. To relive it. Every detail, every atrocity, every scar carved into me by the events I'd endured. The thought made my throat constrict.
I drew a slow, steadying breath and stepped into the hallway.
Orsted was ascending the stairs, his form large and imposing even in the dim light. His eyes locked on mine instantly. A single moment stretched too long, the weight of unspoken words filling the air between us.
"When did you come back?" he asked, his voice calm, but every syllable carried the quiet pressure of expectation.
I glanced to the side, and there she was—Nanahoshi, standing silently in the hallway, fully clothed again, watching the exchange. Her presence added another layer to the tension, a quiet witness to the storm I was trying to contain.
I exhaled slowly, fingers brushing the back of my neck. "We… should take a seat," I said, forcing the words past the tightness in my throat. "It's… kind of a long story."
The three of us stood there for a heartbeat, the quiet before the storm of conversation, each of us knowing that what came next would peel back layers I wasn't certain I was ready to face.
///