Ludger thought of the girl named Rine.
He had met her not long after leaving the Holy Kingdom while holding the hand of his teacher, Grander.
Confined on the island called the Bretus Holy Kingdom, Ludger had been suddenly exposed to a wider and more beautiful world.
Ludger walked forward holding to a certain conviction, and he met countless individuals who lived within that world.
And among those connections, Rine’s name was written at the very front.
‘When I first saw her, she was just an innocent, bright child.’
Naturally bright, Rine had received her mother’s love in abundance—she was like the warm sun of a spring day.
The complete opposite of Ludger, who had resembled the cold forest at night.
The paths they had walked, and the paths they would walk, were entirely different.
So Ludger had given Rine no attention. He had thought she had nothing to do with him.
But the warmth of the sun seeps into even the darkest places eventually.
Rine became curious about Ludger and approached him with her innocent, guileless smile.
For someone to approach him with goodwill like that had bewildered Ludger greatly.
In the Holy Kingdom, everyone except a single friend he’d had had tried to kill him.
So at first, he’d answered her half-heartedly, brushing her off.
For most people, that alone would have made them stop approaching him.
But Rine wasn’t like that.
Maybe her sense of meddling was too broad—or maybe she just lacked awareness.
She clung to Ludger and even pleaded with him to play with her.
If Ludger had exploded at her then, their relationship would never have grown further.
But Ludger wasn’t the type to yell angrily at someone.
And back then, he hadn’t had much to do either.
So in truth, Rine coming to him and begging him to play—meddlesome as she was—had been something Ludger had quietly welcomed.
It had been a long, long time since he’d formed any connection with someone other than his teacher, Grander.
Perhaps deep down, he had wanted the child to keep pulling him along.
‘At least in those moments, I forgot every anxiety and worry and simply enjoyed myself.’
Yes. Even for Ludger, those were beautiful memories.
During that time, he’d also met the arrogant brat-wolf, Freuden Ulbrück.
Their relationship hadn’t been particularly good, but with Rine serving as a buffer between them, the three maintained a tolerably decent bond.
But the end of those memories had been the worst.
Even now, the memories from that time—despite the years that had passed—felt like a blade scraping through his heart whenever he recalled them.
Even if it had been unavoidable.
Even if the entire truth had been revealed.
Even if he had received Rine’s forgiveness.
The [N O V E L I G H T] heavy weight of the past never disappeared.
‘Even after losing her memories and living without knowing anything, then being confronted with the heavy truth and suffering for it, Rine still endured.’
Rine was not simply a bright child.
She possessed a heart incomparable in strength.
A spirit that might tremble but would never collapse.
It was that spirit that had allowed Rine to rise to where she was now—and had given her the chance to save Ludger, who had fallen into the imaginary space.
And now.
Rine was staring at Ludger, clearly wanting to say something.
It was night and dark, but faint moonlight illuminated just enough to discern shapes.
Even under the blue moonlight, Rine’s face burned red.
Her cheeks were flushed with heat, and her eyes wavered with nervousness.
It was the expression of someone who had mustered great determination to say something significant.
Ludger silently waited for her to speak.
He didn’t rush her, nor ignore her.
He simply gave her the space to collect her heart and express her thoughts fully.
He was used to waiting.
Had he not endured three years alone in an empty place?
Rine’s lips moved several times, opening and closing as she debated with herself.
Her tightly clenched fists balled up and loosened repeatedly.
The sight reminded Ludger of the Rine he remembered from her student days.
She had become more mature and grown her hair long like her mother, yet traces of the old Rine still remained.
“Oppa! I...!”
At last, Rine lifted her eyes and stared straight into Ludger’s, as if she had resolved herself.
“I...”
Flutter!
A loud flapping of wings echoed from somewhere.
Focused entirely on Ludger, Rine startled violently at the sound, her shoulders jerking.
“No need to be scared. It was just a pigeon.”
“Oh.”
Realizing belatedly that she had been far too tense, Rine blankly nodded.
Her precious determination scattered as easily as dust in the wind.
“So then, what was it you wanted to say?”
“That... um...”
Rine squeezed her eyes shut.
“I—I discovered a new magic!”
She blurted it out—and instantly regretted it.
No, that wasn’t it. That wasn’t what she wanted to say.
‘Sh-should I tell him now? What I really wanted to say?’
Yes, quickly—before she lost her nerve again.
She must say the feelings she had been holding all this time.
Of course, he might reject her. That thought alone terrified her, but doing nothing scared her even more.
But before Rine could resolve herself again—
Ludger reacted faster.
“You discovered a new magic? Truly?”
“Y-yes.”
“Congratulations, Rine. A new magic... judging by the way you said it, it must be something that truly didn’t exist before.”
Ludger praised her with pure admiration.
It was a voice that held excitement—something rare for the always-calm Ludger.
“U-um... r-right?”
“The new magic—does it relate to your spatial mana? Something beyond simple spatial transition, perhaps?”
Rine’s mind went blank.
Her heart screamed to confess her feelings.
But her head shouted that she must answer the question first.
Caught in this conflict, Rine chose the simpler path.
“S-so... um... it happened while I was creating a dimensional passage to reach the imaginary space to save you, Oppa.”
Rine calmed herself and began telling Ludger exactly what she had seen and discovered.
“My mana is related to space, right? So I needed to open a door to the imaginary space. It wasn’t that hard. After all, beyond most dimensions lies imaginary space.”
She had realized it then for the first time.
That the unseen, unknown world was this vast.
If the world she lived in was a small island, then the imaginary space was a massive ocean.
An endless sea whose depth, width, and horizon could not be measured.
From that endless ocean, Rine had to pinpoint Ludger’s coordinates using the materials he had left behind.
More difficult than carving open space or creating protective artifacts for the hostile environment was locating exactly where Ludger was within the imaginary space.
The only clue she had was the point where Ludger had fallen from the Hall of Crystals—using that as the origin and only being able to infer downward.
But in imaginary space, “downward” didn’t necessarily correspond to moving along the z-axis of coordinates.
Entering wrongly even once risked Rine becoming lost in imaginary space while trying to rescue him.
So she dedicated herself even more to narrowing that margin of error.
Again and again she peeked into dimensional gaps with her spatial familiars, updating countless coordinates.
And during that research, she stumbled upon something—
“Just what was it?”
Ludger’s fascination grew deeper.
Dimensional movement related to spatial magic had been Ludger’s lifelong research, the very path he had walked to meet his mother.
Even though he had fulfilled that wish, his interest in spatial magic had not disappeared.
Even after taking on countless identities, the one thing in him that never changed was the essence of a mage.
A mage with the greatest mage in the world as his teacher.
Ludger loved magic.
So the new horizon Rine spoke of piqued his interest intensely.
“It was a world just like ours.”
“Like ours?”
“I don’t know the details. I only saw it vaguely through the dimensional barrier. But if my eyes weren’t mistaken, it looked similar to our world. Isn’t that fascinating?”
“Indeed. Very fascinating. To have seen a world the same—or similar—beyond the dimension.”
“At first, I thought I messed up the coordinates and was just seeing our world as if reflected in a mirror.”
“But that can’t be right. The chance of peeking at one’s own world across a dimension is extremely low. It’s like seeing your own eye with your own eye.”
“Then... if it wasn’t a mistake...”
“Yes. It must be another world beyond a different dimension—one similar to ours.”
Just as Earth and this world were separated by dimension—
Other worlds must also be separated.
Why had Rine been able to find something no one had discovered before?
‘First, because Lumenis’s restriction over the world has disappeared.’
Lumenis had constrained those born with spatial mana, trapping humanity in a cage so they could not escape.
The divine curse disguised as excessive blessing had eaten away at their bodies, killing them near adulthood.
Not only that—
He had twisted coordinates so they could not travel long distances instantly, and especially prevented them from going outside the cage created by divine power.
‘Second, because Rine kept searching beyond the dimension with her awakened spatial mana.’
The world they lived in was a small island floating in the middle of an endless ocean.
Rine was the only one who could see the waters outside the island—and the one who could check what lay beyond.
Though her primary goal had been to find Ludger, and this discovery had been an accident—
It was still undeniably a discovery of the century.
Because now they knew there were other islands—other worlds—similar to theirs.
“Though... it felt different from Earth, the world you lived in. Similar to ours, but subtly different?”
“Hmm. You said you glimpsed a dimension, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Then perhaps what you saw was a branching point of this world.”
Rine’s eyes widened.
“A... branching point?”
“Yes. Worlds all exist in their own forms. Just as Earth and this place differ, other dimensions must differ as well. But you said you felt familiarity, some similarity. That intuition isn’t wrong. What you saw was likely a different outcome of this world—a different direction it could have taken.”
“That’s...”
“Dimensional power is infinite. In a place where space-time is twisted, it’s not impossible for there to be worlds that are the same yet different—worlds that met a different conclusion.”
Multidimensionality.
Perhaps what Rine saw was a fragment of that.
“Of course, everything I’m saying is just a hypothesis. I didn’t see it myself. But the fact that you brought this up means you want confirmation.”
Rine nodded seriously, completely forgetting what she had originally intended to say.
“Yes. I can try investigating alone, but the more people the better. Especially someone who stepped into this field long before I did—like you, Oppa.”
“You overpraise me. I’m nowhere near your level now.”
“That’s modesty. You’re the one who founded this theory first. Besides... you look like you’re really interested.”
“...I can’t deny that.”
“It’s still just a possibility, so I can’t be sure yet. But if I really do start researching this—Oppa, will you join me?”
Exploration of new magic.
For Ludger, who hadn’t yet decided what to pursue next, it was a tempting proposal.
This kind of variety—this array of choices—was the freedom he had always wanted.
“I’ll do that. I want to taste the glory of the first discovery myself.”
“Great!”
Rine bounced in place, overjoyed.
“Huh?”
Only then did it occur to her, wait? Something feels wrong. This isn’t what I wanted to say...
But by then, it was already too late.