Genius Wizard who sees Rainbows- Chapter 134

#134. Leap (3)

 

—

Curiosa, who had been waiting in the center of the magic circle, looked at Ray and spoke.

“All done with your goodbyes?”

“All done. We can go.”

“You don’t look particularly regretful. Then again, you said you don’t feel emotions.”

The voice behind the mask sounded lifeless and weary.

Ray glanced around at the magic circle that covered the open area, formed of tens of thousands of lines and intricate patterns, and spoke.

“You did well. You and Veronica both.”

Curiosa went blank for a moment.

Soon realizing Ray’s words were meant as praise, she chuckled softly.

“Yeah. Damn right I did well. This is my magnum opus. You’re lucky, you know. There’s no one else in the world who could design and draw such a large-scale spatial transportation circle.”

Radiating confidence, Curiosa suddenly paused.

Then she lowered her voice.

“…But you should know, there’s still a chance it could fail. If that happens, you’ll be torn apart in the rift between spaces and die a gruesome death. It’s an accident that sometimes happens even with short-distance teleportation, let alone long-distance like this.”

“……”

If she really wanted to scare them, she should start by getting rid of that massive ego first.

‘So, it’s safe to assume a very high success rate.’

Ray remained calm.

Seeing that, Philip and Veronica showed no signs of agitation either.

As Curiosa stood there, slightly flustered by their unexpected reaction—

“Curie-nim.”

Veronica spoke.

“Please don’t worry too much. I’ll definitely find a way to break the curse.”

Her vessel was filled with a pure, white emotion—concern.

Ray saw it. Curiosa felt it.

Genuine and overflowing emotion.

Breath quickening, Curiosa stepped up beside Ray and whispered in his ear.

“Tell her something for me. That shortening my name like that probably isn’t a good idea.”

“……”

“It’s a nickname that really doesn’t suit someone with dignity and class.”

“……”

“Something that sounds stronger, like Curietron or MegaCurie—”

Why not just tell her yourself?

Ray shot him a strange look.

At any rate, preparations to activate the magic circle proceeded swiftly after that.

“Is everyone ready?”

Curiosa, now outside the magic circle, amplified her voice and shouted.

Ray met her gaze and answered.

“Start it.”

And then—

Wooooong───!

The enormous hum of mana resonated as the magic circle began to glow.

Starting from the outer rim, beams of pale violet and dark brown light surged like boiling blood, racing outward along the tens of thousands of lines and patterns.

Wooooooooooooong───!!

A resonance so loud it numbed the ears.

Light so intense it was impossible to keep their eyes open.

The overwhelming energy almost made the ground seem like it was shaking.

Philip’s face turned pale as he saw the beams rushing toward the center.

“H-Hey, guys! We haven’t known each other that long, but meeting you two was the greatest luck of my life!”

“Philip, don’t say weird stuff. I helped design this magic circle! There’s no issue with the design—”

Wooooooong────!!

“—probably? I, I think?”

The beams grew ever more ominous, ignoring Philip and Veronica’s anxiety.

“Oh Almighty God, please watch over us here in this place…”

“Philip, praying to a voyeuristic being isn’t going to do anything.”

Just as Philip began reciting a prayer he picked up somewhere—

Paaah───!

Light engulfed the world.

And a few seconds later—

Nothing remained where they had been standing.

*
*
*

Wasteland beyond Sector 37’s outskirts.

Zzzzt!

The air split open and spat something out.

“──!”

“……!”

“……”

Nyaa─

Crack! Snap!

Three humans and two animals.

They appeared about two meters above the ground.

Tap─! Thud─!

Ray and Nero twisted midair like acrobats and landed safely on two legs and four paws.

Whoooom── Thump!

Wind gathered around Veronica, gently guiding her to the ground.

“Heehee! We made it! We’re alive!”

Held aloft by the wind, Philip shouted in glee while doing a handstand in midair.

“I’m gonna live a good life from now on!”

While adjusting his posture with wind magic—

“Thank y—UURGH!”

He threw up.

“I told you not to eat breakfast just in case… Ugh!”

Veronica, rushing over to help, saw Philip’s vomit—and started throwing up too.

…She had a weak stomach.

“Uweegh!”

“Hueegh!”

The two of them hurled in harmony.

Besides the vomiting, there didn’t seem to be any other side effects from the teleportation.

Ray turned away from the pair and surveyed their surroundings.

“……”

An endless wasteland and road.

Scattered piles of scrap metal.

In the distance ahead, silhouettes of sector buildings.

…and a sky still shrouded in haze.

‘Nothing’s changed at all.’

Ray took out Walter’s ring and checked the directional arrows created by the binding spell.

Two pointing upstream along the river.

Two pointing downstream.

‘One of the downstream arrows is Curiosa.’

Curiosa had reconfigured the spell himself.

So the other officers still couldn’t track them—but the two of them could track each other.

‘The rest of the arrows belong to the other three officers.’

Vicious, Obsess, and Ragey.

Which arrow pointed to which officer was unknown.

Also, Curiosa didn’t know much about those three.

*“The curses were engraved and the magic was learned after we were dragged to separate labs. We couldn’t see each other after that.”*

What type of magic they used.

What emotions their curses were bound to.

Those things could only be found out through direct encounters.

*“What about before you were taken to the labs?”*

*“Before that, we all lived in the same orphanage. We weren’t close, but what I remember about those three is…”*

Curiosa hesitated.

*“…They were cunning.”*

*Cunning?*

They bullied others.

Created cliques.

Gave out orders.

They were the kind whose sharp minds leaned toward the unpleasant.

*“Be careful, kid. Your strategy of exploiting emotional weaknesses might not work on them.”*

*“And don’t forget—4th Circle mages are already beyond the level of human weapons. You beat Allager easily, but that was an exception, not the rule.”*

“……”

Ray had no intention of avoiding the remaining officers.

They might know more about the Doctor and Murcred than even Curiosa did.

…Chances were high that “negotiation” would involve combat rather than conversation.

‘Doesn’t matter.’

The more he smashed the organization, the likelier it became that the Doctor would appear.

For now, there seemed to be no immediate encounter with the other three officers.

Ray put the ring away and approached the two still recovering.

“You two okay?”

“Ugh, I don’t think so! B-Bleurgh!”

“N-No! Ray, don’t come this way! H-Hurk!”

“……”

The commotion lasted a while.

Ten minutes later—

Philip, slouched over a discarded couch nearby, spoke.

“Thought I was really gonna die back there.”

“See? I told you we should’ve come on an empty stomach.”

Veronica still looked exhausted but didn’t sit, probably worried about dirtying her clothes.

The group checked their conditions.

“Other than some aches, I don’t think there are any real aftereffects.”

“Yeah. Not too bad. I think I’ll be fine after a day.”

Spatial travel was known to leave noticeable aftereffects.

Even Curiosa had said that skipping just one sector left him bedridden all day.

‘He really must’ve gone all out designing that magic circle.’

Ray made a mental note to thank him properly later.

That was when Curiosa, cleaning up the circle, suddenly darted his eyes around, sensing some unknown chill.

Once they finished resting, the group stood and walked toward the sector.

Tap— Tap— Tap—

It wasn’t far; soon they reached the outer edge.

“Doesn’t look much different from the 40s sectors yet.”

“No, Curie-nim said the 30s and 40s are definitely different.”

The children looked around as they passed through the outskirts.

Dilapidated, damp buildings.

People with lifeless expressions.

The all-too-familiar slum scenery—almost boring in its sameness.

Then Philip noticed something different from the previous sectors.

“That street sign… Is that for real?”

[Street 192-2]

A disturbingly large number.

Veronica’s mouth dropped open.

“Sector 46 only went up to Street 61. So if we think about it simply, this place is more than three times as wide…”

The endless slum landscape lent credibility to the idea.

Tap— Tap—

“……”

Unlike the others, Ray focused not on the scenery but the emotions within the residents’ vessels.

Depression, anxiety, regret, despair,

Loneliness, hopelessness, wariness…

‘Guess it’s the same after all.’

Gloomy colors.

Common in any slum.

Maybe the forms of fear and poverty didn’t vary much, no matter where you went.

Tap— Tap—

Maybe due to their high-end clothes, the number of pick-a-fight types was relatively low despite the dense crowds of vagrants.

Most judged them as people not to be messed with.

The few who didn’t—

“Keehee, hey, stop right th—”

Whoosh! Thud! Crunch!

“Aaaaagh!”

—Had their hand crushed under Ray’s boot.

Crack!

“Aaaaargh! P-Please! My ha—hand!”

“This really is Sector 37?”

“Y-Yes, I swear! P-Please, my ha—Hrk!”

Ray extracted information from vagrants like squeezing lemons.

Was this really Sector 37?

How wide was it?

Were there factions occupying the streets?

Other minor details Curiosa hadn’t remembered.

Crunch!

“Aaaargh! Y-Yeah! I-I know what magic is! Gack! Magic tools aren’t common but they *are* used…! Hrk—!”

Thud!

Unable to endure the pain, one vagrant collapsed unconscious, slamming his head beside a fallen knife.

“……”

Ray slowly lifted his foot from the man’s mangled hand.

Philip and Veronica exchanged looks.

‘He’s harsher than usual, right?’

‘Yeah. He’s always been harsh, but it’s worse now.’

Maybe he was reacting more sensitively to external threats in a new environment.

A larger sector also meant more threats and variables within.

Crunch!

“Aaaargh!”

And their guess turned out to be spot on.

But the *real* reason Ray had become harsher was different.

It was because—

The black malice in the vagrants’ vessels had first stirred not toward him…

…but toward Philip and Veronica.

“G-Gh… The strongest faction in the east street is—! Ugh!”

By the time the fifth vagrant’s hand was crushed—

Ray and the others had a rough grasp of Sector 37’s layout.

After repeating this info-gather-and-move cycle for a while, they noticed something.

The buildings were growing taller.

The area cleaner.

It was the boundary between the slum and a regular city zone.

Philip, looking worn out, said—

“Whew. We’re finally out. If the sector’s this big, getting around without a car is gonna be rough.”

Their current top priority was to reach the Ignis ATM said to be in the sector’s center.

To check the balances on the black cards they got from John and Skyll back in Sector 48’s wasteland.

Then they’d plan accordingly based on the amount.

…But at their current pace, it might take hours to reach.

“Hmm, should we use body-enhancing magic to move faster?”

“Wait.”

Interrupting Veronica, Ray looked toward one side of the street.

“Might not be necessary.”

A bicycle-like rickshaw with a large rear seat.

A shabby man dozing on the saddle.

“Uh… can we ride that?”

“Hmm. They did have rickshaws now and then in the city back where we lived.”

“Yeah. Mostly for tourists. But since it’s human-powered, I doubt it’d be that fast…”

Philip trailed off and glanced at Ray.

In that moment, Ray was seeing something different from the other two.

Streams of colored mana flowing through the rickshaw’s steel frame.

 

 

 

 

---