[Oh]
[What the heck did you write?]
[Hahahahahaha]
[Look at him copying the technique right away]
[Copying techniques is so infuriating, haha]
[Is there no limit on that?]
[What happened to the mole?]
[He copied Black’s palace but can’t use a single one of them, lol]
[That blue spear throw looks super cool]
[For real, lol]
The warrior collapsing due to his own technique.
Everyone seems surprised, but replicating a technique isn’t that hard.
Unless you specifically create something to hide the technique, as long as you understand the flow and structure of that technique’s mana, it’s easy to use.
The harder part is the high-difficulty magic thrown at the beastman, “Many-colored Birdcage.”
As you can tell from the name, it’s not a technique of the Celestial Race.
It’s a spell related to a Young Lady who was known by the alias Many-colored Bird that I met a long time ago.
That encounter, though very brief, is still one of the memories that sticks with me.
“No! If there’s a skill seal, that’s cheating!”
Gah!
The beastman, unable to move his hands at all, shouted at me.
No matter how many times he tries to use his skill, it absolutely doesn’t work.
[Could it be a skill seal?]
[Crazy, hahahahaha]
[They’re really coming up with everything, lol]
[A seal sounds a bit scary]
[Wow, can’t use skills in front of Lily, lol]
[?]
[It does seem a bit like cheating, but you still have to hit it first]
[It seems quite significant that you have to get the spear in there]
[But can’t those with field-type skills also create an environment where they can’t use skills?]
[That just blocks movement skills]
[If you’re talking about the Swamp of Confusion, then it only blocks movement-related skills, yeah]
[Wow, a skill seal is a bit frightening]
[Ugh, I want to skip class]
“Such a pity.”
“It’s cheating! Cheating! Where is this even fair?”
“It’s right here.”
I pulled out the spear and pierced straight through the beastman’s heart.
She exits in a void.
[But where did you get that?]
“I got it.”
Should I say I obtained it or that I created it?
“A lot has happened.”
Half of a kingdom was lost to the Demons.
Due to that, the royal family couldn’t function properly, and the Marquis family, on the verge of collapse, was trying to stand on their own.
“Saintess!”
There was a child born with the remnants of the Demons.
■
A successor was born to the Marquis family, who were on the verge of collapse.
The child born with many-colored hair, not the dark blue hair symbolizing the Marquis family.
Because of this, the Marquis doubted the child’s lineage, but under the judgment of the remaining high mage, it was proven that she was indeed of the Marquis bloodline.
However, it was not a ‘pure’ bloodline.
The hair color was so unique it felt almost strange.
Hair color.
And the remnants of power, the same as that hair color, resided within the Young Lady’s body.
Those remnants were fragments of the wicked Demon Race that had razed half the kingdom.
The nobles of the Marquis family, who had few numbers left, wanted to rid themselves of any aftermath, claiming the Young Lady had fallen into evil, but her father, the Marquis, naturally refused.
Instead, he sealed the energy within the Young Lady’s body, borrowing the strength of himself and the Mages.
Even if it was a Demon Race with tremendous power, it was merely discarded remnants that he didn’t bother with at all.
He firmly believed that if he and the Mages paid close attention to the Young Lady, the wicked power wouldn’t burst forth.
Thus, on the day of the Young Lady’s 15th birthday, the thing they dreaded finally occurred.
The demon of color, Colorr, that spreads ‘color’ throughout the world.
The Young Lady, who had been living cautiously, paying attention to ‘color,’ welcomed the long-anticipated splendid birthday party, and the venue was incredibly vibrant.
In that moment, her seal shook.
Colors burst forth.
All sorts of ‘colors’ melted around her, and the door of the cage containing the birds began to rattle.
If this continued, everything around would lose its ‘color’ and face the same terror that had taken half the kingdom before.
“The Demon Race… it wasn’t.”
I met her.
To be exact, I came to find her.
The Young Lady, losing her sanity, lunged at me after seeing my blue.
“…Ugh?!”
Bam!!!
She flipped over and crashed to the ground.
Hmm, clean.
“Atana! What is the meaning of this…!”
“You, the disappeared Saintess…! Why are you with Atana!”
“Rest assured. She won’t die.”
Ugh…
“…That’s right.”
Did I do it too hard?
■
The bird in the cage returned inside.
This bird must not come out.
“The remnants of the Demon Race… I see.”
I looked at the sleeping Young Lady while listening to the Marquis’s circumstances.
The injuries had already been healed by the Holy power.
The war between the Demon Race and the Celestial Race leaves countless casualties.
The problem is that it doesn’t just leave material damage but also something that could inflict secondary harm.
Among those are the lucky ones who stumble upon remnants of the Demon or Celestial races and act as if they are gods themselves.
But this child isn’t one of them.
I looked at her arm.
A colorful feathered bird was tilting its head, and a drawing of a cage hindering its movements was depicted.
It’s not the greatest of magic, but it’s quite elaborate.
However, it’s somewhat lacking to seal the powers of the high-class Demon, Colorr.
“Somehow, there haven’t been any accidents until now.”
“Y-yeah. Since the child was born, we’ve erased most of the colors around her.”
Sure enough, even looking around, it was definitely not a landscape bursting with various colors.
In reality, even if you look around, the scenery is definitely not filled with diverse colors.
It’s obviously a space filled with dull colors.
Even the grass outside is gray.
“Then why such a party?”
“…I made a promise. If I hold on until I’m 15, they will throw me a grand party…”
“I don’t get it. If you’ve only seen a colorless world from the beginning, you wouldn’t even know what that is.”
A person who has never seen blue wouldn’t know what blue is.
Unless someone tells you, you wouldn’t care at all.
At my question, the marquis sighed.
“The child saw a fairy tale book in the corner of the study that they couldn’t put away. It was a colored fairy tale book.”
“Ah.”
“But I thought if the mages paid close attention, they could deal with it… but we were too arrogant.”
What a foolish thing to do.
To act like that knowing the disaster it would bring.
Truly ignorant people.
“Truly.”
“…But it seems the Saintess I knew has changed a bit.”
“I haven’t changed at all.”
“No. Saintess, you have changed a lot. Most of all, you weren’t such an extreme person…”
Extreme, huh…
Well, I guess I have become a bit like that.
“I’ve smashed my head around too much.”
“What?”
“Exactly. Me and now I’m not a Saintess anymore. I’m just a vagrant.”
Just a vagrant who barely survives.
That’s all there is to refer to me.
“That can’t be true. The Saintess saved over a hundred thousand people; what are you talking about?”
“All past stories.”
“As far as I know, just three months ago, you appeared in the Thebes area and saved people. And just a moment ago, too.”
“…You seem to know a lot of useless information.”
Didn’t we just say we’re done for?
Then what are you still listening to?
“Believe it or not, I’m a mage. I’ve been continuing research with numerous mages from various regions and magical teleportation gates to save this child.”
“……It’s not something I want to do. I didn’t come here to save this child either.”
“I know. I’ve heard roughly about the movements of the Saintess.”
My actions may change swiftly depending on my emotions, but they broadly fall into two categories.
One is to see an end to the ‘main quest,’ which I have no idea when it’ll end.
The other is to eliminate those who can misuse the remnants of the Demon Race and Celestial Race or cause problems in the world.
The reason I came here is because I felt the energy of the Demon Race while passing through the area.
“I plead to the Savior of humanity and the great Saintess, Lily Elbrite.”
The marquis stood up and bowed his head until it touched the ground.
“I will make sure such a thing doesn’t happen again. So please, could you overlook Atana?”
“Can you just let it go?”
“Is there a guarantee that this won’t happen again?”
“Well…”
“Once the seal is broken, it will surge forth like a tidal wave. Naturally, at this level of magic, there’s no hope of stopping it.”
Even if it’s just remnants of the High-class Demon, it’s miraculous that human magic managed to contain it this far.
But now, the seal has been released.
Just a little glimpse of color, and it could burst out at any moment, and when that happens, it won’t be stopped again.
“…How is it possible?”
“Why didn’t you kill it? If I hadn’t come, today, the Marquis family would’ve been completely wiped out.”
If it couldn’t be stopped, it should have been killed long ago.
Moreover, even without a birthday party, the seal was precariously close to breaking free in a few years.
The Marquis shook his head firmly.
“How could a father kill his own daughter? That’s something only a demon would do.”
Only a demon would do that, huh.
For a moment, I let out a small laugh at the Marquis’ words.
He gulped at that response.
A suffocatingly sharp killing intent spread subtly in the room.
“The same goes for the Celestial Race.”
“What?”
“Never mind. I actually had no intention of killing it.”
If I were going to, I would have done it earlier.
I have no intention of killing an innocent child who hasn’t abused their power.
I touched the pattern.
The blue cage shook, and the “color” trapped inside twitched.
“Ah, you shouldn’t touch that recklessly─”
Clank!
The cage emitting many-colored light changed to pure white.
The many-colored bird sensed the revelation and began to pound on the iron bars, but it was of no use.
The bird glared at me, electricity crackling in its eyes.
I smiled back at it smugly.
“If you’re tough, come and face me, you paint-happy brat.”
Though I’m sure it would never dare to come.
It probably wouldn’t even care.
Turning to the side, I found the Marquis looking at me with a dejected expression.
“Is there a problem?”
“…I spent 15 years creating magic, and you broke it all at once.”
“Of course. I’ve even been offered the position of headmaster at the Empire’s Academy; this level of skill is basic training.”
“…..I’m starting to doubt if I’m seeing things.”
“Shall I slap you to get you out of it?”
A harsh reality is always the best cure.
“Oh, no, that’s not necessary.”
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