Chapter 454

Cain was stunned like a man who had been punched in the back of the head with his balls.
He blinked, dumbfounded, and then opened his mouth.
“—You have a knack for picking out words, and you’re so shallow.”
“It’s genetic, so let’s move on.”
“How do you mean you can fire–no, grab it?”
I could tell she was being careful with her words in front of her sister.
Luckily, my sister was too busy watching the sunrise to hear our conversation.
I replied, keeping my voice low.
“The sunrise made me realize that unlike the sunset, the sunrise sows life into the world, and Akasha is searching for life, and I can be the first to get it.”
“Wait a minute. I need you to explain that a little more clearly.”
“That was a bit promiscuous, wasn’t it? Hmm, where do I begin?”
Even as I thought about it, the explanation needed to be refined.
I thought about it for about ten seconds.
“So far, I’ve traveled through two parallel worlds, and my goal has been to destroy the rift Akasha created, and ultimately destroy Akasha. So what is Akasha’s goal?”
“Have you not destroyed the future of the whole world?”
“Yeah, I can’t say for sure, but that’s the most likely, but whatever his end goal is, he seems to have something he needs to get there, and in every parallel world he’s been going through all kinds of shit in search of ‘it’.”
“What is that?”
“A Ceniel in each parallel world. I’ve explained what a Ceniel is before, remember?”
Cain’s eyes widened. The warm morning sunlight was now fully illuminating the world. He turned to face me and nodded.
“Is it not said that the stone, imbued with the power of the stars, shot down the first king of the giants—?”
“Yes. If Ceniel hadn’t captured the Bald One, my father wouldn’t have been orphaned, and in all likelihood, he would have died in the village you showed me last night, living the high life. Of course, our star would have been destroyed then, too.”
“Right–that’s what you say. So what does Akasha intend to use Seniel for?”
“Fuel, I suppose. Fuel for my powers. Like I said, I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do with the power, and at first I thought it would be to heal myself or destroy the future world—.”
“Wasn’t it?”
“It’s vague, I realized as I was going over my memories, but he didn’t spend his life force on healing even when he was severely wounded. If he’d devoted himself to repairing his body, he’d be long gone by now. Oh, and I don’t know if his severed limbs would stick.”
The life force in Ceniel’s body could literally revive a dead star. Given Akasha’s injuries, the percentage of his life force invested in healing would be less than one percent of what he had absorbed. The other nine percent was being twisted to fulfill his purpose.
“—There are too many things he’s done that don’t make sense for him to simply be aiming to ruin the future, but I can predict that whatever it is, it’s going to require a lot of power, because he’s drained power from every Ceniel he’s ever met.”
I remember it like it was yesterday.
First, the first parallel world.
In a red-and-white world ruled by giants, Akasha levitated Seniel and smashed him to pieces.
The life force in Ceniel’s body restored the broken star, but he had absorbed an equal amount of life force in return.
The second parallel world was the same.
Akasha dragged her wounded body to find Seniel, and somehow, despite the fact that her hiding place was different from the first world, she managed to find him.
It held Ceniel in horrible chains, draining his life force until he was stopped by me and my companions.
It was in the second world that I began to question Akasha’s purpose.
“The giant was all a trick of the eye. Was it really necessary?
In retrospect, the bald heads were always a time killer.
Akasha did not fight with the giant, not when he burst pillars of light in the jungle, not when he tore the sky over the Pale Castle. She played with us for a moment, and then left to find Ceniel.
In this world, at least. Akasha did not invite the giants to invade the future world or steal the Source. They fought me off for three days before the Source was destroyed and they perished.
Why?
If Akasha’s goal was to destroy the future world, she would have been much more organized in her use of giants. Giants that could open portals and descend from anywhere in the stars were an intimidating weapon.
“Fuck—.”
Suddenly, goosebumps broke out all over my body.
What are we trying to accomplish by baiting the giants of the three dimensions?
What is your ambition so great that you need to fuel it with the soul of a star?
Just to destroy the future of the world I live in? Really?
“Woohoo.”
My thoughts were running in circles. I flicked my bangs out of my face to clear my head.
The conversation with Cain wasn’t over yet.
“Anyway, the point is this: Akasha needs Senniel to fulfill her purpose, but she has no way to find him with certainty.”
“Are you sure.”
“Yes. I can assure you of this: every parallel world has spent a great deal of time searching for Ceniel, and the fact that they’ve torn the world apart is proof of that. But I’m different.”
“——No?”
“Just as you expected. I can find Ceniel, wherever he is.”
I lifted the bead around my neck.
It was a mana tracker, a rare invention of the Akalusian mother and daughter. Like sunsets and sunrises, this invention was similar to a blood needle, but with a crucial difference. It required mana instead of blood to track a target.
This meant that it didn’t matter if the target was an inanimate object as long as it had mana.
“Good.”
I reached into my inside pocket and grabbed a small shard. A spontaneously formed mineral polyhedron glistened like gold in the sunrise.
“That’s—.”
“That’s right, it’s a shard of Ceniel.”
Life sizzled on the surface, warping the atmosphere.
It had absorbed the energy of Ceniel from the last parallel world, making it even more concentrated.
I pressed the button on the mana tracker. Akasha’s mana emptied, and Ceniel’s filled the void. The needle that had been hovering in place locked in one direction.
“Again.”
I clenched my fists. I was sure I was the one who’d secured Seniel’s location first. If Akasha had already found him, she wouldn’t be running around like that.
‘I would have found it long ago and drained its life force. Like a mosquito.’
Every ten minutes or so, the mana tracker that had been assigned to Akasha would change direction or hover in place. This meant that he was traveling from dimension to dimension.
To fulfill some grand purpose I don’t know.
Of course, you’ll also need to heal the mortal wounds from the last world.
The fact that he hadn’t shown himself and was fighting guerrilla-style was a testament to the severity of his injuries. Akasha had not yet recovered from her wounds in the last parallel world.
The introduction was long, but the conclusion was short.
Shoving the shards into my pocket, I put my hand on Cain’s shoulder.
“So, this time, I’m going to hit first.”
“So that’s what you meant by grabbing your balls.”
“Yeah. If I get Ceniel first, he’ll have no choice but to come. I’ve been getting the shit kicked out of me by that asshole every time, so why not give him a run for his money at the end?”
He clicked and raised his thumb.
In retrospect, I was at Akasha’s mercy. He had the ability to travel freely between parallel worlds, and he had a world to escape to.
But not anymore. Akasha had lost the other three parallel worlds, the Refuges. Her ability to travel between them was not gone, but it was effectively lost.
“In the end, the severed legs and arms didn’t stick.
Besides, the last wound he sustained was not a minor one, and as I suspected, once the life force was drained, it could not be used for healing. If it could, it would have come to kill me with its own hands, not through a trap.
“He’s a wounded tiger, as ferocious as ever, but surely dying, and it’s my job to finish the job.”
“Wait. You mean you’re going to take on Akasha by yourself?”
“It has to be, Dad, the world is too perfect just the way it is.”
With those words, I looked around. Dawn was turning to full morning. I could hear the rooster crowing from the nimble nimbus.
“Coo—coo—.”
She dozed off in Cain’s arms. Ronan3, who had initially fainted, was now drooling and sleeping soundly. Cain and his sister were the family they had always wanted to be.
“I don’t want this perfection to be disturbed, and I’ve wandered the world five times if you count my life before I regressed. If one of us came to help me and it went wrong, I’d shit my pants in shock, and no father wants his son to be an asshole, right?”
“Well, yeah, yeah, yeah.”
“It’s okay, really. The only thing that’s not perfect in this world is me, a stranger from another world, and Akasha, that motherfucker.”
“—Ronan.”
“So, Dad, you’re going to protect the perfect world with your friends, why, with people like Sister Navardose and Adrian and the reformed Abel?”
I meant it. I needed someone to protect the world, to make sure Akasha didn’t pull any stunts. Cain and his connections were the perfect fit.
I held out my right hand to him as he stood there dumbfounded.
“Then I’ll go before it’s too late. Someone has to do this, you know?”
“——That’s ridiculous.”
Cain raised one corner of his mouth in amusement.
I didn’t realize that expression was genetic.
“Okay. Okay. I’ll be waiting here. Even if you defeat Akasha, you’ll at least come to say goodbye, right?”
“If possible,” he says, “and I have to protect this perfection, not just wait for it.”
“Don’t worry about that. I am the Savior. I am the first teacher of Nebula Clasier, and I have lived longer than anyone else in this world. I will protect you.”
“That’s not very convincing, don’t you have an introduction that would give you a little more credibility?”
“What the—ah.”
Cain raised an eyebrow, as if realizing my point in hindsight.
He pursed his lips, then opened them again.
“—Yes. I am Kasha’s husband, Abel’s brother, and, crucially, the father of Iril and Ronan. This time, I will prove to you that I am not the kind of father who would break a promise to his children.”
“Put ‘abandoned’ in front of the child, too, or ‘hand in hand with a wicked curse’.”
“You’re being naughty, you’re my child after all.”
“Then whose son would it be?”
Cain took my hand in his. His calluses were as thick as my palms.
After shaking my hand, he hugged me.
“Finish it and come back. Everything.”
I smirked instead of answering. Kissing my sister’s forehead was the last thing on my mind as I walked away. It didn’t take me long to realize where the mana tracker was pointing.
Holy Land da Konya.
Mentioned by Sarante in the past,
It was the continent’s most deserted shrine, where the statue of Senniel was made.