Chapter 308
What I Want
The space created by her imaginary scenario is gradually shrinking.
The pure white sky, which colored the black space of despair like a light of hope, and the white space drawn on the ground also quickly diminishes.
Even the spirit Amaterasu, which had materialized, loses its form in an instant and gets sucked into the umbrella.
My hand trembles uncontrollably at his response.
I bite my lip.
‘Was it because of me?’
In the end, it was because of me.
Because I possessed him.
To survive, I obtained Durandal and twisted the original story.
I occupied and monopolized this world instead of the protagonist Yuji.
I provoked the Messiah.
Everything was due to my actions and the resulting butterfly effect.
“Come on! Mr. Kim Deok-Sung. Please kindly offer your limbs. I won’t kill you, since it’s the Master’s order… but the Master also didn’t say to bring you back in one piece. I’ll make you a well-behaved puppet that can no longer resist or seduce my teacher.”
The Professor raises his sword.
“Abyss── Generator!!!”
As he shouts the skill name, a black darkness writhes.
The writhing dark mass quickly condenses into a sphere of oblivion and shoots out at high speed.
Abyss Generator.
A skill used by the Professor in the original Volume 11.
It’s powerful even when used with ordinary mana, but the Abyss Generator, enhanced with the abyssal dark correction during an imaginary scenario, boasts a destructive power worthy of EX rank.
In the original, Seira in her prime mode blocked it, but now…
Neither I nor Seira can stop it.
The remaining space of Seira’s imaginary scenario is also dwindling.
If this continues, we will lose.
No, the issue isn’t merely losing.
If I get hit by that attack, I will definitely die.
Just as I reached that hopeless conclusion.
“…Little one…”
Seira speaks in a faint voice from beside me.
Her crimson eyes gaze at me.
“You… you must live… You…”
Seira grits her teeth.
[Big sister…]
The Black Prince speaks in my head.
White mana flickers to life around Seira’s body.
She begins to float toward the sky.
“I… I will protect you. I couldn’t protect you ten years ago… I cannot let that happen again! I will save you! Absolutely, I will protect you!”
“I couldn’t do it… but I still can’t let you go! I will save you… I will definitely protect you!”
Whoosh!
White flames ignite from Seira’s body.
[My sister… My sister…]
The Black Prince trails off his words.
I know.
I know that Seira is pushing herself too hard right now.
She’s exhausting her injured Magic Core to draw out mana.
Perhaps… she…
“By the name of the Five Crowns, the White Empress, and the President of Shuo Hero Academy!! Kim Deok-Sung! I shall save you!”
With this attack, she might cross a river from which there’s no return.
She won’t die, but permanent damage to her Magic Core is a certainty.
She might even lose all her abilities.
Damn it.
I grit my teeth.
I have to do something.
I should, but there’s nothing I can do.
Charging in now would only benefit the Professor.
But there’s no other way to defeat him either.
Ever since that bastard showed up with a strange weapon, everything has gone awry.
It sucks.
A thorough sense of powerlessness engulfs me.
“Teacher!”
At that moment, the Professor shouts, surprised.
Bam!
A white flash erupts from Seira’s body.
Crash!
The white glow that enveloped her clashes with the Black Sphere of the Abyss Generator.
A blinding light obscures my vision as black and white collide.
“…Ah…”
A faint sigh escapes.
Swoosh.
She falls from the sky.
Yoshizaki Seira.
It seems she’s returned to her black gothic dress after her combat mode was deactivated, collapsing to the ground while coughing up blood.
As Seira’s mental projection fades, the pressure of the dark void reasserts itself on her body.
But I forcefully channel mana and move.
I move to catch her as she falls from the sky.
Thud.
Seira lands in my arms.
“…So this is when you finally hug me, isn’t it… You mischievous little brat…”
Seira gives a faint smile.
She removes her helmet.
Her bare face is revealed.
With bloodied hands, Seira touches my cheek.
“…Don’t worry about me, little one. You’re worried about me a hundred years too early… Just live. You must live. That is my last…”
Thud.
Seira’s head drops.
Her mana fades, and her breathing grows shallow.
Another sacrifice.
Foolishly.
Throwing away her own life.
Just to protect someone like me.
Why are all the humans living in this light novel world such foolish muggles?
My hands tremble.
“…Kim Deok-Sung… You made my teacher like this… I can no longer forgive you. Today… I must go against my Master’s orders. I will… kill that Professor…”
I hear the Professor’s nonsense ringing in my ears.
“Abyss!! Generator!!”
The Professor screams in a desperate frenzy.
The Black Sphere is fired again.
I see the black sphere in my sight.
He said he would kill me.
Then this attack must be powerful enough to genuinely do that.
[Partner…!]
I hear the sorrowful voice of the Black Prince in my head.
He said this was the only time he would help me.
From now on, I would have to face everything alone.
Thinking back since the possession until now…
I strutted around acting like I knew the future, like I knew the original story, but I accomplished nothing on my own.
In almost every battle, I relied on others’ help.
Olivia, Hoshino Kasumi, Makoto, Eri, Mayuzumi Mayu-sensei, Shinozaki Ichiro, Rin, Beatrice, Evangelin, Aris, Haru, Yuji, Ishihara, Han Seo-Jin, Bella.
Every time it got tough or a difficult enemy appeared, I just passed the hardship onto someone else.
I had never truly faced a crisis alone.
‘I… I…’
Was what I did until now really a good thing?
The story had already drifted light-years away from the original.
Heroines who would have been unhurt if it weren’t for me were getting hurt instead.
The karma I incurred in the name of possession, the selfish things I did under the guise of “refreshing,” I might finally be paying the price now.
Just like Olivia thinks, just like those nationalistic YouTubers chatter on…
I am not a hero.
I was just an ordinary otaku who got frustrated reading light novels and possessed.
Yeah, that’s all.
I close my eyes as I see the approaching Black Sphere.
There was no cliché vision of my life flashing before my eyes like in common reincarnation web novels.
Is this the end?
Just as I was thinking that…
[Wake up, partner!]
I hear the Black Prince’s voice in my head.
[You can do this. I guarantee it, the Black Prince is here! Don’t you remember? When you fight against death, you might awaken your mental expansion. That time is now! Partner!]
‘What nonsense…’
Sounds like a shonen manga.
This is a light novel world, but it’s real too.
And I am not the protagonist.
Such convenient, favorable awakening events won’t happen to me.
It’s ridiculous.
Yeah.
Maybe it’s better to just disappear.
I was just a possessor, so perhaps if I disappear…
Everyone might go back to how it was.
Just like the original.
Just as I thought that…
[…Everything you’ve done until now, everything you’ve achieved is not meaningless.]
The Black Prince speaks in my head.
‘What…?’
[Partner. You’re a kind man and a true gentleman. What you’ve done is not wrong. My sister, everyone has been saved by you. Regardless of your intent…!]
The Black Prince continues.
[Hypocrisy is still a virtue, partner. Regardless of your intentions, they have been saved. So, are you really going to give up here? If you give up just like this, my sister and all the girls who love you will cry! And I won’t allow that! If you make my sister cry, you better be prepared to shed blood tears, because… so…!]
“Well, I have to do this, so…”
The Black Prince speaks.
“Don’t give up! Remember the sensations of that day. And confront it. You can do it, partner! I, the great Raul Napoleon Bonaparte, a member of Five Crowns, guarantee it! Recall the feelings of that day!”
With the words of the Black Prince, the experiences of that day are forcibly etched into my mind and body.
It’s transmitted through unity.
“Partner, listen closely. Imaginary development is… It’s about overlaying your beliefs, the landscape you create in your own little universe, and what you truly desire onto reality. And showing it to your opponent, saying, ‘This is my belief’.”
Belief?
What I want?
At that moment, the Black Prince’s explanation hits me like a truck.
Suddenly, enlightenment strikes.
Belief.
Yes, what I truly want is…
That…
The sphere approaches.
In that moment, as the magic energy tingles, I close my eyes.
And I remember.
My belief, the wish I really wanted.
It was something so obvious, yet I had forgotten it because it felt too embarrassing to say.
That is…
“…that nobody gets hurt or dies because of me.”
A world where no one steps up to take a hit in my place.
That was the scenery I sought.
Something like a boy manga or a light novel…
“No, this isn’t just a boy manga or a light novel.”
This story doesn’t just apply to boy manga.
“It’s a web novel.”
When you think about it, it makes sense.
In web novels, the deaths of side characters and heroines are taboo, a complete disaster.
If a side character or heroine dies, an avalanche of comments and messages demanding a character’s exit and cries of ‘I’m done!’ flood in.
In web novels, protagonists never let heroines or side characters die.
Protagonists crush enemies from the start with overwhelming power and eradicate the very existence of threatening situations, known as ‘The Crisis’.
Perhaps web novels are kinder than light novels.
What I need is…
That kind of soda.
To shatter the disaster of death and manifest a world where everyone is happy into reality.
“Yes! That’s it! Partner!”
As the moment rings with the voice of the Black Prince in my head.
The Magic Core and Black Sphere resonate.
Brrrrr! My heart heats up.
This is different from Beppu.
Unlike before when I was forcibly elevated, my consciousness expands on its own.
Sensations, awareness, and spirit expand endlessly, feeding countless pieces of information into my mind.
It’s omnipotence.
It’s exhilarating.
A feeling of omnipotence wraps around me like I’ve shattered barriers and gained enlightenment.
In the midst of it all, a mantra suddenly arises.
It’s the trigger that engraves my beliefs, my imagination, and the little universe I’ve created into reality.
I open my eyes.
The black sphere seems to come to a halt.
In that moment, I declare.
“[A reality that saves everyone]”
【Break the Fourth Wall】
The mantra symbolizing my belief etches itself into reality.
And then.
The world turns upside down.
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