Under Izayoi's fingers, the Great Mage's wrist felt like a condensed sunbeam—hot, vibrating, yet strangely pliable. Flamme stared at her own hand with an expression that mingled horror and awe. She was a memory, an echo recorded in mana a thousand years ago. She could not be touched.
But this kid held her as casually as one holds a basket of bread.
"You ask me to convince you?" she asked again, and her voice, having lost its otherworldly hollowness, became quieter, more human. "You stand in the middle of a sanctuary that men have sought for centuries, holding the hand of a ghost, and the only thing that concerns you is boredom?"
"Exactly," Izayoi tilted his head slightly, and his cat-ear headphones slipped down to his neck. "In my world, I've seen it all. I know how wars end, how empires are built, and why stocks crash. It's predictable. And predictability is poison. So go ahead, Flamme. Sell me this world. If it turns out to be a dull sanatorium, I'll smash this tomb and go find the exit back."
Flamme peered into his violet eyes. There was no bluffing there. There was an abyss, craving for a stone to be cast into it. She realized: this was not a savior standing before her. This was a force of nature. And to direct this force against humanity's enemies, she needed to offer a worthy target.
She straightened up as much as her position as a captive allowed.
"This world is no sanatorium, child of the stars. It is a slaughterhouse that has been running for a thousand years."
Izayoi raised an eyebrow; his grip loosened slightly, but he didn't let go.
"Go on."
"Demons rule here," Flamme's voice filled with steel. "But these aren't the mindless beasts you might have seen in legends. These are predators evolved to hunt us. They speak our language not to negotiate, but to deceive. They know no pity, no honor. To them, humans are just food and resources."
She paused, watching the youth's reaction. A spark of interest flared in his eyes.
"In the north, in Castle Ende, sits the Demon Lord. A being of absolute power. No one—not the Empire's armies, not the greatest heroes, not even I—could destroy him. He dreams of 'coexistence,' which in his understanding means chains for some and death for others."
Izayoi chuckled. The corner of his mouth crept upward.
"An invincible boss in the final castle? Classic. What about magic?"
"Magic here is not just formulas," Flamme nodded at the ruined slab. "It is will. The world of magic obeys visualization. If you cannot clearly imagine the result, nothing will happen. But if your will is harder than diamond, and your imagination knows no bounds... you can rewrite reality."
She finally saw what she had been aiming for. The boredom on Izayoi's face cracked, giving way to pure, predatory excitement. It was the look of a gambler who had just spotted a table with the highest stakes.
"A world where reality depends on how crazy you are to believe in the impossible?" he said quietly, and the air around him trembled with anticipation. "And a pile of 'invincible' monsters who think they're the top of the food chain?"
He abruptly released her hand.
Flamme stumbled back, rubbing her phantom wrist.
"Sounds like a great sandbox," Izayoi grinned broadly, adjusting his shirt collar. "I'm buying this tour."
The mage felt her time running out. The anchor was gone, and the laws of the universe took effect once more. Her body began to disintegrate into myriads of golden particles.
"I don't know who you are," she whispered, looking at him now with relief. "You are no hero. You are, more likely, a calamity. But perhaps a calamity is exactly what is needed to crush another calamity."
"Easy on the drama, grandma," Izayoi snorted, rolling his shoulders. "I'm just a guy looking for some entertainment. Now beat it. You've done your job."
"Good luck..." her voice became a whisper of the wind. "And remember: demons always lie."
A final flash of light—and the hall was plunged into semi-darkness. Izayoi was left alone.
He stood for a minute, listening to the silence of the ancient tomb.
"Demons lie, people die, the Overlord sits on a throne," he listed, counting off on his fingers. "The ideal scenario. Well then..."
He turned toward the exit. Or rather, to the place where the exit should have been. The corridor ended in a massive stone slab covered in a script of blue runes. Flamme's barrier. A multi-level defense designed to hold back an army, survive a nuclear blast, and let no one in but the chosen ones.
Izayoi walked up to the slab and tapped it with a knuckle. The sound was dull, dense.
"'Visualization,' you say?" he muttered, recalling the mage's words. "So, if I imagine this thing is as fragile as a cookie..."
He didn't take a combat stance. He didn't concentrate his ki or look for weak points in the spell weave. He simply drew his right arm back.
For Izayoi Sakamaki, the world was divided into two categories: things that can be broken, and things that can be broken if you hit them a little harder.
"Open," he threw out lazily. "Sesame."
Impact.
Fist met stone.
For a split second, the runes flared with blinding azure light, trying to absorb the kinetic energy. The magic of an ancient era howled as it collided with a physical anomaly—untamed power hidden in the body of a teenager.
KRA-A-A-ACK!
The sound was as if the firmament itself had cracked. The barrier couldn't hold. It wasn't calculated for brute force of this magnitude. The three-meter-thick stone slab simply detonated from the inside.
Granite shards, turned into shrapnel, shot outward, mowing down bushes and stripping bark from trees for a hundred meters ahead. A cloud of dust and magical sparks burst from the passage like a genie from a bottle.
Izayoi stepped into the breach, lazily waving away the gravel flying into his face.
Bright sunlight hit his eyes, making him squint. The smell of damp earth, pine needles, and... freedom hit his nose.
He stood on the slope of a hill, which was actually the overgrown tomb. Around him, as far as the eye could see, stretched a primal, wild forest. Giant trees with crowns propping up the sky, intertwined roots resembling frozen snakes.
Izayoi took a deep breath. The air here was delicious. Clean. Saturated with mana.
"Well, hello, new world," he put his hands on his hips, surveying his domain. "I hope you're ready. Because I plan to have fun to the fullest."
He picked up a fallen branch from the ground and tossed it in his hand.
"Wherever it falls, that's where I go," he smirked.
The branch flew up, flashed in the sun, and fell, pointing its sharp end to the northeast. Towards where the sky was slightly darker, as if gathering a storm.
"Excellent choice," Izayoi nodded, shoved his hands into his pockets, and took the first step toward the catastrophe he intended to cause himself.