Chapter 41: Upheaval (9)
Chapter 41: Upheaval (9)
Side. Jin
It was a day of piercing winds, sharp as blades. As the year drew to a close, Jin received an urgent telegram from the northern border. A giant wielding magic had appeared, and immediate reinforcements were requested.
He set out at once to handle the situation. The crisis was swiftly resolved after his arrival, but by then, a great number of soldiers had already perished. The casualty list was so densely packed with names that he’d never seen before, it seemed endless.
And then…
「Aynkel Elias.」
‘Elias?’
Spotting that familiar surname was purely coincidental, yet somehow, also inevitable. It was a name he could never forget. The reason for his existence, his purpose, his will to live. A fragment of his master’s name. It was a word that, if it appeared before him, his eyes could not help but catch.
And it was on the list of the dead.
‘Dead…?’
Again?
Recognition came quickly.
Even though it was the death of someone he had never met, Jin felt once more as if his world were collapsing. An emotion he thought he could no longer feel because of others surged back up, bubbling like magma. Just seeing that surname, Elias, was enough to bring guilt and sorrow flooding to the surface, as if they’d never left.
Why had it never occurred to him that Aska might have family? For someone so utterly bound to Aska, why had he never thought to look into the people connected to him?
“…Aska.”
His voice escaped in a whisper, the name long forbidden even in his thoughts slipping out like a groan.
The once-clear sky turned overcast. And instead of rain, snow began to fall through the bitter cold.
* * *
The bodies of the fallen were returned to the unit. Before they were taken to the temple, Jin combed through them quietly, but relentlessly, with his eyes.
It didn’t take long to find the one he was looking for among the blood-soaked, mutilated corpses. A head of platinum blond hair, identical to Aska’s, instantly caught his gaze.
The lifeless man it belonged to was a young man with a solid build. The once-brilliant strands were matted with clotted blood. His face, with eyes closed, barely resembled Aska, but the name tag on his bloodstained left chest read clearly: Aynkel Elias. The right side of his body had been crushed beyond recognition.
At the grotesque sight, Jin felt as if both his brain and heart had been shattered. His face remained unreadable, he’d long forgotten how to make expressions, but he could barely breathe. He was consumed by shame.
The northern border was his primary battleground. And yet… he had no idea. That someone connected to Aska was here. None whatsoever.
He had been given the chance to protect something in place of what he’d lost. But he hadn’t realized it, and now he’d lost it again. It was unbearable. A wave of helplessness toward himself surged through him.
Even after nearly twenty years, a voice remained vividly in his mind.
[“Please, I hope you’ll use your power willingly for the sake of others.”]
That voice, Aska’s, was the very reason he had survived this long. And yet, he had failed to protect the family of the one who had spoken those words. How cruel the irony.
Jin clenched his teeth. He was overwhelmed with fury at himself. The storm of emotions he hadn’t felt in so long left him dizzy.
He instinctively knew that if he continued staring at the corpse, a lightning strike would fall. If it struck without a target inside the barracks, it would be a catastrophe.
Jin turned away and vanished from the spot.
* * *
Some time later, Jin heard that the casualties from that day had been transferred to Zenith. The moment he received the news, he was plunged into torment.
Should I go? Or not?
No, do I even have the right to go?
He repeated those questions to himself again and again. Thought and rethought them. Before he realized it, an entire day had passed.
Unable to sleep, he finally made his decision before dawn and set out for Zenith. With his status and the reputation tied to his name as an Elder of the mages, he had no trouble securing an airship outside normal operating hours.
And there, he saw Aska.
No. A woman who looked exactly like him.
That was the first time they met.
* * *
After returning from Zenith, Jin was unable to pull himself together for some time. Whether he was doing something or doing nothing at all, Aska’s face, no, the face of that woman who mirrored him exactly, kept surfacing in his mind like breathing.
He had to protect her.
Only then did Jin regain his composure and begin to return to his routine. He started looking into her and whether any other members of the Elias bloodline still lived.
As an Elder representing all mages, he had unrestricted access to the registry of the Mage Association. He began his search from Aska Elias, and delved into the Elias family records. The investigation did not take long. Only one blood relative of the Elias line remained: Ariel Elias. No one else.
“Ariel.”
He spoke the name into the air and recalled the woman he had seen in Zenith. Her lemon-colored hair swaying softly in the sun, her red eyes clouded with exhaustion and despair, her frail figure on the verge of collapse.
That must be her name.
This time… I wanted to protect her.
Please.
* * *
At first, he tried to help her without disrupting her life. She was a librarian in Tarantella. Unlike her soldier brother, she lived a quiet, ordinary life. Jin feared that barging into her world would only bring her confusion. He didn’t want that.
But that resolve shattered the moment he saw her name, Ariel Elias, on the list of mages who had enlisted in the military.
Why? Why is your name there?
A question he couldn’t ask rose unbidden. The unthinkable situation left him disoriented, and the fear that he might fail to protect her again wrapped around him like thorny vines, tightening around his ankles and crawling upward. It overwhelmed him, spilling over uncontrollably. The sky itself seemed to respond, instantly darkening with storm clouds.
He couldn’t sit still. That very day, Jin went to see Eden Jeriem, the Supreme Commander. For someone like him, a single warp spell made such travel trivial.
“What on earth was so urgent that you came here yourself?”
“Ariel Elias.”
The name came out of nowhere, and Eden’s face twitched slightly.
“…Excuse me?”
“There’s someone by that name among the applicants. Send her to the north.”
Suspicion flickered across Eden’s face, but Jin said no more. Eden soon dropped his questioning and nodded.
“You mean to your unit?”
“Yes.”
“Understood.”
And before long, the day came.
Normally, Jin took little interest in who entered or left the military base. He worked alone, so it made little difference. But this time, he couldn’t stay indifferent. It wasn’t just anyone. It was someone tied to Aska.
The day before new recruits arrived, the senior officers who weren’t out on missions held a meeting to review the incoming roster. Jin had never once attended such a meeting before, so when he showed up, everyone was visibly startled. Without a word, he took the seat that was originally his.
General Michelle Frey, who had been occupying the seat, didn’t look pleased, but Jin had no reason to care. He glanced at the list passed to him, still holding onto a sliver of hope.
He had asked Eden Jeriem to send Ariel Elias north, yes, but until he saw it with his own eyes, there was still a chance.
That fragile hope shattered immediately. Her name was there. At the very top.
It felt like a final blow. Jin’s eyes locked onto her name. His fingers trembled, and he hid them beneath the table.
Sitting across from him, Michelle noticed exactly where his gaze had landed. She cast a sideways glance and asked.
“So, you’ve heard the rumors too?”
“Rumors?”
What rumors? Jin turned his head slightly to look at her. Michelle, sensing his gaze, met his eyes with a conflicted expression.
“Isn’t that why you’re interested in her?”
A faint wrinkle formed between Jin’s brows. Even that minor change was rare, and tension immediately filled the room.
Michelle, as the commander, was the only one able to speak in that atmosphere.
“That mage. She made quite a spectacle during the Phema test. People were talking about her long before she got assigned anywhere. Didn’t you know?”
“…”
“If you didn’t know that, then why… No, never mind.”
She trailed off and turned her eyes away. Jin’s gaze dropped again.
Ariel Elias.
The name pierced into his eyes, his heart, his mind, like a needle.
It was real.
* * *
On the day she finally stepped into the military base, Jin could not control himself and summoned her. The result was disastrous. All he did was make her suspicious of him.
And yet…
Jin reached for the application he had set aside on his desk: Ariel Elias. Her name was written there, beside a photo. It was black and white, yet the features were so familiar that she appeared vividly colored in his mind.
He traced the photo with his fingertip.
Eyes like crimson fire, dimmed by grief but unmistakably alive. She was still here. Still alive. This time, he knew. This time, he was close. All he had to do was keep watch and ensure nothing happened. He had everything he needed to do just that.
…He had to protect her.
He could.
He would.
Jin stood up.
* * *
The place he headed next was the Erpheus estate, the wealthy mage family who had taken him in for a time when he was about fifteen. The city of Erpheus sat on the southern edge of Dantella, but for Jin, distance within Dantella meant nothing.
With a single warp spell, he arrived in Erpheus in an instant. There, he met the family head, Cafena Erpheus, without difficulty. Cafena was still recovering from the shock of Jin’s unannounced arrival when Jin’s next request left him even more stunned.
“You’re asking for the rights to Flame?”
“Yes.”
Jin had come to Erpheus for one reason: aside from the Tarantella Library, Erpheus possessed the largest collection of magical texts in private ownership across Dantella.
“But you’ve already mastered that magic. There should be no need for you to…”
“I have need of it now. I’m willing to pay whatever price is required. Please.”
……
T/N: His desire to protect far exceeds expectations
