Chapter 123
The inside of the warehouse looked like a red disaster zone after a massacre.
Avoiding the gang members coughing and gagging, spewing sticky red liquid from their mouths and noses, I calmly slipped out through the broken wall to escape the sickly-sweet smell.
“Serzan~”
I looked around for Winter — no, Serzan.
He wasn’t far. I found him crouched in the shadow of a wall.
He slowly lifted his head, red liquid dripping from him and forming a small puddle at his feet.
“So… sweet…”
He covered his mouth with a hand, unable to go on speaking.
Even with jam covering him, I could see his face turning pale.
“Unbelievable…” he finally muttered.
I gave him an awkward smile.
“I thought the sweeter it was, the more effective it would be. So I made it extra sweet.”
I had guessed right — the traffickers were awake now but still rolling on the floor with pounding headaches.
“…Your creativity is perfect. What on earth is in that little head of yours?”
“Hmm… overflowing love for humanity, justice, shining morals, and wit?”
Feeling a little bad for him, I offered,
“You look like you’re suffering. Want me to summon plain bread for you? It’s magic-made, so it won’t taste good, but maybe it’ll help clean your mouth.”
“No need. I just want to leave here quickly.”
With a snap of his fingers, Serzan’s messy, jam-covered appearance instantly became spotless.
The strawberry jam that had clung to him floated in the air, gathered into a big red sphere.
Two of the gang members lying on the floor groaning seemed to notice. They staggered toward him.
“H-Hey… me too… Please, help me too… ugh.”
“Get this stuff off me!”
Serzan snapped his fingers again, and the floating jam ball split in two and smacked them both square in the face.
Then he shoved them back into the warehouse and, in the blink of an eye, restored the broken wall.
“When we come back, we can hand them over to the capital guards. I sealed it so no one can open it and no sound escapes.”
“Won’t they starve to death?” I asked.
“How kind. But no — there’s enough jam in there to keep them alive.”
True. They could just lick the jam off the walls.
Nodding, I grabbed the restored door handle.
“Could you open this for a moment?”
“Why?”
He asked but opened it anyway.
“It’s open!”
“It’s open, let’s go!” the gang inside shouted in joy.
“[Masrio Strawberry Jam].”
The moment the door opened, I poured another wave of jam inside — carefully calculating it so they wouldn’t drown.
Their cheers turned into screams.
I shut the door again and shrugged at Serzan.
“It might take more than two days before we’re back. I didn’t want them running out of jam. I’m a thorough woman.”
A flicker of pity crossed his eyes as he glanced at the warehouse.
“They say it’s better to have too little than too much… but those men have no right to refuse your kindness, so this will do.”
[They’ll die of diabetes or stress — one or the other!] my bracelet spirit muttered.
I twirled it on my finger and followed Serzan with a lighter step.
***
“Ugh…” I groaned.
“Looks like you have teleportation allergies,” Serzan said.
“…You’re joking, right?”
But he shook his head seriously.
“It’s rare, but real. And there’s no cure.”
I lifted my head from my vomit, feeling wronged.
“Why does a world that runs on magic have an incurable disease like that?!”
We had been planning to leave the capital through a teleportation array Serzan had set up.
But the moment we went through the first one, it happened — a dizzy rush, like chugging an entire bottle of liquor, swept over me.
I collapsed and vomited everything I’d eaten.
“Hah… hah… How many more arrays do we have to use?”
“None. We can’t use teleportation anymore.”
He supported my pale, trembling self as he explained firmly,
“Teleportation allergy must never be taken lightly. The symptoms worsen each time, and in some cases, it can cause a heart attack and death. From now on, you mustn’t even go near a teleportation array.”
Heart attack?
So… I almost died just now?
“There’s a saying that the more magical talent someone has, the more likely they are to have one or two magic allergies.
Since mages are proud, they tend to hide such weaknesses, so it’s not statistically proven — but it might be your case.”
…Then what do we do?
I blinked and looked around.
We’d only teleported once — we hadn’t even left the capital yet.
Long-distance teleportation arrays could alert the watchtower mages, so we’d chosen the slower but safer route… and now that plan was ruined.
Riding Serzan in his dragon form was an option, but if Igrio suddenly appeared somewhere, rumors would spread across the whole Western Empire in a day.
Flying at high altitude to avoid detection could make me faint from lack of oxygen, so that was a last resort.
“Should we get horses or a carriage?”
“A carriage to the Valt Plains would take at least a month.”
After a moment’s thought, Serzan said casually,
“There’s a spirit who can help us. If I summon him, we can reach the Valt Plains in an instant.”
“A spirit?”
“The Spirit of Wind — a high-ranking, ancient one capable of creating continent-wide storms.”
Ancient spirit? I was about to say “Let’s summon him right now!” but stopped, unclasping my hands and speaking coldly:
“You’ll need an elemental stone, won’t you?”
Serzan nodded toward the distance.
“The nearest Wind Elemental Stone is in the underground prison of the Western Empire’s Magic Tower. It’s hanging around the neck of prisoner ‘Agricen.’”
I followed his gaze — to a lone tower standing between mountain peaks.
“Since you have teleportation allergy, we’ll need the high-ranking wind spirit anyway.
Might as well get it now. With him, we could travel even faster than flying.”
Prisoner Agricen.
In this world, no matter how terrible the crimes of a mage, they are rarely executed.
The stronger the mage, the less likely they are to be killed.
That was because of an incident in the Eastern Empire’s past.
A notorious mage, before execution, condensed all his magic into his heart, turning it into the equivalent of a suicide bomb.
On the day of the execution, the moment his head was cut off, his heart exploded — killing countless spectators and even the Crown Prince.
After that, mages sentenced to death began imitating the method, and it became an unspoken rule: you cannot execute a mage.
Agricen was one of those — sentenced to death but left to rot for life in the Magic Tower’s underground prison.
But in other timelines that no longer exist… Agricen had once seen sunlight again.
***
[
“Crossbreeding, illegal body modification using ancient black magic, interspecies limb attachment… quite the filthy list of crimes.”
“……”
“Agricen, is your goal truly the creation of a new lifeform?”
“A human who smells of a snake… interesting…”
“I’ll lend you my body.”
“The price?”
“The death of… not just this body… but the person standing before you.”
]
It had all happened thanks to a visit from one regressor who longed for death.
