[CHAPTER 149]
Thud.
The Mage Tower Master collapsed weakly onto the floor.
He muttered something to himself, but it was impossible to make out the words.
The raging vortex of mana gradually began to subside as well.
Sylvia, Ian, Linen, and Vincent looked down at the Mage Tower Master with complicated expressions of their own.
I also stepped a little closer to get a better look at him, but Vincent smoothly stretched out his arm and blocked me.
When I looked at Vincent, he shook his head.
“It’s still dangerous.”
“……”
In the end, I had no choice but to stop there and look at the Mage Tower Master from a distance.
The Mage Tower Master, whose white hair had fallen out in clumps, lifted his face, now utterly aged, and looked at me.
“S…so then, what… is the truth…?
This world is….”
He spoke in a voice completely dried out, like the brittle bark of a dead tree crumbling away.
Unfortunately, I could not answer his question.
Not here.
Just then, Derrick, who had been outside, entered the mana stone cavern with the knights.
“Your Highness, we have apprehended all of the Mage Tower Master’s subordinate mages.”
At the same time, he pointed toward the now diminished Mage Tower Master.
“Put on mana restraints and escort him!”
“Yes!”
Though he looked like an old man on the outside, he was still the Mage Tower Master.
Since there was no telling what kind of hidden card he might have, thorough measures were necessary.
With mana restraints fastened around his wrists and ankles, the Mage Tower Master was bound with ropes and dragged away.
As I watched that scene, many thoughts crossed my mind.
Why did the Mage Tower Master become a villain?
In the novel, he was simply depicted as a villain who colluded with Duke Wentworth to shake the imperial authority and throw the world into chaos with dark magic.
And that description was not entirely wrong.
In reality, he truly was a villain.
However, through the brief conversation I had with him, I learned that there was a question he had relentlessly pursued.
This world repeating itself, the existence of an outside world, and the fact that I can sometimes see the future….
It seemed that even before I came to this world, he had sensed a kind of déjà vu here and tried to uncover the secrets of the world.
In that process, he would have needed far more mana, magical test subjects, and time than common sense would allow.
To achieve that, he slowed his aging and preserved his mana through dark magic, and to maintain that dark magic and continue his experiments, he sacrificed countless lives.
Such acts could never be justified by mere curiosity, so his end being destruction was only fitting.
And yet,
It feels a bit hollow.
Even though capturing him had been anything but easy, that was how I felt for some reason.
As I stared in the direction the Mage Tower Master had been taken, my thoughts in turmoil, a warm sensation settled on my shoulder.
When I turned around, Vincent had approached at some point and wrapped an arm around my shoulders.
“Your Highness.”
“Amelia, you did well.
If it hadn’t been for you, we never would have caught him in the end.”
“It’s not like I did much.
Everyone else worked far harder than I did.”
“No, Lady.”
Sylvia, who had been organizing the mana stones around the magic circle, stepped closer while refuting my words and continued with a serious expression.
“If it weren’t for you, the mana of the mana stones wouldn’t have recovered, and the flow of purification would have been cut off.
No matter how well we prepared the magic circle, you were the only one who noticed the gap.”
“That’s right.
I only thought something felt off earlier, but I couldn’t even grasp exactly what was wrong.”
Ian nodded as he spoke while looking at the center of the magic circle.
Feeling the lingering tingling sensation in my fingertips, I looked back at them.
Vincent looked down at me and narrowed his eyes slightly.
“You accomplished something remarkable.”
I bit my lip without thinking.
His low voice sounded strangely gentle.
Something deep inside my heart trembled.
As the tension suddenly unraveled, my emotions came flooding out all at once.
My eyes stung as they grew wet.
Vincent seemed about to say something, then closed his mouth instead.
His profile looked briefly lost in thought.
After glancing at me, he answered in a low voice.
“Let’s go to Briarden.
To the Rois family’s villa.”
“Yes, understood.
Please step onto the magic circle here.
You two, stay behind and finish tidying up.
I’ll follow along and check on the Lady’s condition.”
“Alright.
Go on ahead.”
As Sylvia stepped onto the magic circle with us and softly recited the activation chant, a storm swept through along with a momentary spatial displacement.
It seemed that I briefly lost consciousness then.
When I opened my eyes, I was facing the ceiling of the Rois family’s villa.
When I shifted my body slightly, a warm sensation came through beneath the thin sheet, and the back of my hand throbbed with a dull ache.
“You’re awake.”
At the familiar voice, I turned my head.
Vincent, who had been leaning against the window, quietly approached me.
As always, he looked neat and composed, but his gaze had softened noticeably.
“Sylvia used healing magic before she left.
She said it would be best for you to rest well for a while and avoid using that hand as much as possible.”
“…I see.”
I slowly closed my eyes, then opened them again.
My eyelids felt heavy.
Vincent sat beside me and gently placed his hand on top of the blanket.
“The Mage Tower Master was transferred to the Imperial Palace.
I reported directly to His Majesty the Emperor as well, and he is firmly under control now, so he is no longer a threat.”
“……”
His words reassured me, but my mind was still complicated.
The Mage Tower Master still knew too many things.
The questions he left behind at the end—‘What is the truth? This world….’—refused to leave my head.
Vincent looked down at me quietly, then carefully reached out and slowly brushed my hair back.
“You did well.
Thanks to you, many people were not hurt, and the Empire was protected.”
“Because Your Highness listened seriously to my plan.”
I said it out of habit, but there was sincerity in it.
Even so, my voice lacked strength at the end.
He seemed about to say something more, but then closed his mouth again.
I did not resist his touch.
If anything, I felt so at ease that I wondered if this was really alright.
Vincent’s hand was careful and warm, and that gentleness strangely made my throat tighten.
