Rine’s magic beast released mana that created a powerful force field around them.
It covered Rine, Ludger, and a part of the surroundings completely.
Forming the shape of a massive sphere.
The moment the force field’s energy reached its limit, Ludger felt his body being pulled somewhere with great urgency.
It was clearly something he had never seen before, yet the sensation did not feel alien.
On the contrary, Ludger even felt a strange familiarity in it.
‘This is... similar to when I leap across space with coordinate designation.’
When the dazzling light before his eyes vanished, Ludger felt the ground sink away beneath his feet.
“Where is this...?”
His boots sank into snow up to his calves.
The sight of a white snowstorm and freezing winds made Ludger’s face stiffen.
“The Yuta Kingdom?”
If one had to name a place where such fierce blizzards raged even at this season, there was only the Yuta Kingdom.
Sheer cliffs and villages scattered with crimson lights glowing.
It matched the scenery of the Yuta Kingdom that Ludger remembered.
‘How could she cover a distance of hundreds of kilometers from Rederbelk...?’
But Ludger’s doubts did not end there.
Wooong.
Rine’s magic beast vibrated again, and repeated the same process as before.
As his body was pulled somewhere else, Ludger now saw suffocatingly humid jungle air.
‘A jungle region of the southern continent?’
From the Yuta Kingdom to here, it hadn’t even taken three seconds.
Three seconds.
In that short span of time, they had moved from the far north of the continent to the far south.
A distance of thousands of kilometers.
‘So that’s what it was. Rine’s mana isn’t some kind of non-attributed energy.’
Mana unknown until now.
Now he understood why it had been called a curse, not a blessing.
Rine’s mana was [Space Attribute] magic.
And right now, Rine had awakened her mana in full.
But this was not something fortunate for her.
If anything, it would shorten the already limited span of her life even further.
“Rine! Stop! If you keep doing this, it will be dangerous!”
Ludger shouted, but Rine did not listen.
Her head hung low, mumbling something, looking as if her soul had left her.
Kuung!
With another vibration, the scenery shifted once more.
This time, they had arrived at a sheer cliff.
Ludger’s eyes caught the sight of jagged, towering mountain ranges all around them.
‘This is... the Giant’s {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} Spine?’
A place said to be where ancient monsters had vanished beyond.
Because of the harsh environment and steep mountains, what lay beyond was still an unknown world.
Ludger, though he had wandered the world, had never been here.
But that wasn’t what mattered now.
‘No. My voice won’t reach Rine right now. Then...’
He had to somehow stop the magic beast causing this phenomenon.
Ludger gathered shadows into his hands, shaping them like beast’s claws.
Striding toward Rine’s magic beast, he grabbed it with both hands.
“Stop.”
He gave the command-like word and forced pressure down to suppress the beast’s power.
It was coercive, but if he didn’t, Rine’s mana would spiral out of control.
In truth, it was already on the verge.
The magic beast struggled against Ludger’s force.
Each time it resisted, the scenery whipped and changed.
A factory where laborers walked.
A dense coniferous forest.
A luxurious mansion room.
A country village with children running about.
The rapidly changing scenes finally stopped.
The exhausted magic beast dispersed naturally, and Ludger finally exhaled the breath he had been holding.
‘If I hadn’t granted coordinate designation to Ater Nocturnus, I wouldn’t have been able to stop it.’
Fortunately, Ludger had a deep understanding of space magic.
Otherwise, he too might have been swept away by the beast’s power.
He hurried to check Rine’s condition.
“Rine. Are you alright?”
But there was no reply from Rine, her head still lowered.
Just as Ludger reached out slowly, Rine slapped his hand away.
Smack!
More than the pain on the back of his hand, Ludger was struck speechless at her expression.
Tears welled in Rine’s eyes.
They soon streamed down her cheeks.
But more painful than the tears was the hostile glare directed at him.
Suddenly, memories of her childhood overlapped in his mind.
“Rine. I—”
“Don’t talk to me!”
Rine turned her back and tried to leave quickly.
It looked like a pitch-black alleyway, but for Rine now, where this place was didn’t matter.
All she wanted was to get as far from the man before her as possible.
She weaved through the alleyways searching for an exit.
By luck, she saw light beyond.
There’s the exit.
The moment she stepped toward it, one of her legs gave way.
Huh?
Rine realized she was standing on a high place.
And she had just misstepped into a fall.
Too late to react, her body froze.
Ludger, who had been chasing after her, grabbed her hand and pulled.
“Are you alright?”
“...!”
Rine immediately drew away from him.
She shot Ludger a glare, then looked at the precipice she had nearly fallen from.
If before her eyes only held anger, now they showed shock.
That was how alien the scenery before her was.
“Where is this place...?”
Chiieeek!
Before her words even ended, white steam erupted.
The pressure was so great the heat rose more than 100 meters.
Even from far away, the scorching air could be felt on their skin.
Columns of steam jetted up everywhere.
Hot springs? No. This was no natural place.
Clank! Clatter! Hissss!
The sound of massive steel gears turning, compressed steam rushing through thick drains.
Turbines spinning, cylinders interlocking in a roar that seemed both bizarre and harmonious.
Steel machines.
In a space larger than several of Seorn’s training fields combined, countless machines filled the vastness.
“To end up here of all places...”
Ludger muttered in a low voice as he looked at the familiar sight at the end of random space travel.
“[Isla Machia].”
Some called it the Moving Island.
Some called it the City of Future Technology.
Others said it was the future of magitech.
The headquarters of the New Mage Tower, an island of machines and steel.
This was Isla Machia.
‘Should I call this bad luck, or fortune?’
Isla Machia floated across the sea, drinking in vast amounts of seawater, refining and boiling it, using the steam energy to move the entire island.
This was not a place one could come to at will.
Its coordinates shifted regularly—without caution, one could easily have ended up dropped into the open sea.
Ludger intended to tell Rine they should leave this place.
But then her eyes lost focus, and she staggered.
Ludger quickly caught her.
“Haa... haa...”
Rine breathed heavily. Ludger felt the extreme heat radiating from her body.
‘Her fever is severe.’
At this level, fainting would be natural, but Rine endured.
Not only that, she even tried weakly to push him away.
‘Even in this pain, you still want to reject me.’
Ludger felt a dull ache in his chest.
Of course.
The pain of betrayal from someone who had killed her mother, sealed her memories, and pretended ignorance must be far greater than any physical pain.
Knowing that, Ludger could not offer excuses.
He couldn’t.
Rine’s faint resistance ceased.
Her body went limp, about to collapse.
Ludger held her and examined her condition.
‘Her excessive mana is rampaging inside her body.’
And not just any mana—space mana.
Ludger placed his hand on her forehead and invoked mana.
“Hold on just a little.”
A magic circle appeared above her forehead.
Ludger carefully adjusted his mana, suppressing the rampaging mana within her.
Rine’s expression eased, though Ludger’s face remained grim.
This was only temporary.
For now her mana was stabilized, but if it rampaged again, how long could she endure?
‘Once mana rampages, it tends to keep doing so. The caster must calm their own heart to subdue it.’
Looking at Rine fallen into unconsciousness, he doubted it would be easy.
‘Of all places, Isla Machia...’
Perhaps this too was the pull of fate.
At least this was not a place without connections. There were people here he had to meet.
“Just endure a little longer.”
Ludger lifted Rine in his arms and moved.
Kiiiing.
And in the shadows, a lens was watching them.
Its aperture narrowed and widened, recording the scene.
* * *
In Isla Machia, Nicolai had just received a report about recent movements.
He had been expanding influence while clashing with black mages of the underworld.
At first his expansion had been rapid, but as the black mages banded together, the situation changed into a prolonged war of attrition.
So now, this new report drew Nicolai’s attention.
‘Someone appeared without any record of entry onto the island?’
Nicolai immediately picked up the crystal orb that came with the report.
The palm-sized artifact stored scenes and displayed them when activated.
When he used it, light flared and an image unfolded before his eyes.
An alley in a neutral district untouched by people.
Suddenly, a flash of light—and a man and a woman appeared.
‘What?’
Nicolai was stunned.
They had appeared as if dropped from the sky.
No, even if they had fallen from the sky, he wouldn’t have been as surprised.
He could have assumed a mage using flight magic had landed there.
But the two had appeared too quickly.
In just an instant? If they had flown that fast, they would have crashed and died.
Even slowing down the recording, the only explanation was “they suddenly appeared.”
‘As if they crossed space itself...’
Wait. Crossed space?
Nicolai frowned at the peculiar sense of déjà vu.
Recently, there was a man he knew who had shown similar magic.
Nicolai replayed the scene.
The recording still had much left.
The man and woman were shown in conflict.
The light was too dim to see their faces clearly, but it was obvious their relationship was strained.
The woman turned to flee, the man chased after her.
Then, in another angle captured by a different device, Nicolai’s eyes went wide.
‘John Doe!’
The face revealed under light was someone Nicolai knew well.
The Black Dawn’s First Order, John Doe.
Currently hiding under the false identity of Ludger Cherish, instructor of Seorn.
And he was here, in Isla Machia.
‘Wait. Something doesn’t add up.’
Nicolai felt his head tighten.
Seorn and Rederbelk were in chaos with sudden natural disasters.
And only a few days ago, reports confirmed Ludger Cherish was still in Seorn.
‘It shouldn’t be possible to travel from the Empire to Isla Machia in mere days.’
Especially since Isla Machia hadn’t “docked” recently, no outsiders could have entered.
But here was the man who should be in Rederbelk.
‘And the girl with him... a student of Seorn?’
What was going on?
Nicolai tapped his temple with his finger, then smirked.
Whatever the truth, the opportunity remained unchanged.
Now was his chance to kill him.