**#168. Melting Point (4)**
—
“Put this on before you go out. It’s freezing outside. If you go like that, you’ll definitely end up frozen and get frostbite.”
—I’m fine.
“Ray hyung! How can you give away your share?! You need to eat something first to have the strength to do anything!”
—I’m fine.
“Ray, isn’t that a little dangerous? That’s Molton’s street. If you get ambushed while going that way for no reason… are you sure you’re okay?”
—Yeah. I’m fine.
I’m fine. Really.
*I* am.
Short sentences spoken in a dry tone to the children under the bridge.
Now, those voices from a past where no listener remains echoed endlessly in the boy’s heart after circling back over a long time.
—I’m fine.
It wasn’t something he had heard from someone else.
It was a phrase he had habitually used in the past, back in Sector 50.
…Why had he only now unraveled such a simple riddle?
“I’m fine, if it’s for Ain.”
In the end, the sense of déjà vu he felt from Ayla’s words stemmed from no one other than himself.
*It was a phrase I used out of habit.*
The sheet of ice Ayla had created with her blue mana, which he had studied so intently.
Before he knew it, his own reflection was mirrored back at him like a mirror.
*I thought I had been observing Ayla all this time.*
But that was a massive delusion. In truth, he had been observing himself all along.
Realization flowed like water.
Ayla, who remained unbothered even after cutting her fingers.
The way she always prioritized others over herself when doing anything.
Her indifference toward her own life, her lack of fear in the face of death.
All of those traits weren’t Ayla’s alone—they were his as well.
*Now I understand.*
Why Ayla’s ice sheet glowed blue every time she said she was fine.
Why blue mana was so hard to find someone compatible with.
And ultimately, what emotion blue mana was tied to.
The revelation surged through him.
Ain’s sky-blue mana—an emotion of self-love and cherishing oneself.
The mansion children’s navy mana—an emotion of self-hatred and self-abuse.
And the medium-toned blue mana that formed the foundation of Ayla and himself—
*A complete indifference toward oneself.*
In that moment, the ice sheet under the boy’s vessel glowed with a brilliance many times more radiant than the girl’s.
The boy understood.
“I love myself enough, don’t I?”
That thought had been a ridiculous misconception born of narrow thinking.
[Crack! Craaack!]
The ice sheet thickened, emitting an even colder chill.
The point of mana racing toward the third circle left a searing pain in his chest.
But it was fine.
He was used to pain—and since he was indifferent to himself, it would soon become like anesthesia. He wouldn’t even know if it hurt.
More than anything…
*There’s someone like me.*
Knowing that he wasn’t the only one with an ice sheet gave him a strange comfort he had never felt before.
*Ayla.*
As he stared into the girl’s vessel, the boy’s thoughts came to a halt.
With the formation of the third circle, his senses expanded, and he could now perceive even the tiniest details that had eluded him before.
In Ayla’s vessel—currently facing Laqria’s wide-open jaws—there was a faint trace of fear.
Not fear of Binjin, nor fear of Laqria.
But fear of *death*.
*Why?*
A crushing wave of disappointment engulfed the boy.
The slight upward curl of his lips vanished.
The subtle interest and curiosity that had lingered in his gaze toward the girl evaporated without a trace.
In an instant.
*…*
The boy suddenly found everything around him completely uninteresting.
He only wanted to bring this pointless situation to a swift end.
In a fleeting moment, Ray shoved the frozen, immobile Ayla aside and whispered:
“You didn’t actually plan to die anyway.”
Ayla’s blue eyes widened as far as they could go.
The white worry within her vessel also flared dramatically.
Holding the ball of electric current he had originally intended to throw, Ray leapt straight into Laqria’s mouth.
**Crunch—!**
The fangs grazed his back, and Laqria’s jaws snapped shut just a beat too late.
**Boom—!**
The spiral staircase and rear wall he collided with crumbled in a cascade of stone.
Laqria then reared her head high, and something yellowish and thick could be seen flowing downward inside her long body.
“……”
Sitting on an intact part of the nearby staircase, Ayla stared blankly at the sight.
Perhaps she was paralyzed by the shock of seeing her friend get eaten.
Or perhaps her mind had drifted somewhere else, overtaken by a storm of thoughts.
From below came a deranged shout:
“Kehahaha! Hahahaha! *Cough!* Yes! No matter how someone inferior like you struggled to run, it was always going to end like this! *I* have won! This is *my* victory! *Cough!*”
Binjin’s laughter echoed wildly.
─────!
Some commotion could be heard through the rain outside the tower, but—
There was no one inside the tower with the awareness or capacity to pay attention to it.
“Kuhuhaha…?”
As he basked in victory, Binjin suddenly witnessed something bizarre.
In the air before him, a tiny ice crystal, no larger than a fingernail, had formed.
Its quality was so exquisite, so flawless, that it was clearly far beyond imitation.
His first reaction was deep confusion.
Then, what came over Binjin was—
“What… what is this…?!”
Overwhelming shock and horror.
He turned his head—and saw that the ice crystal had not formed alone.
The entire tower was covered in a dense spread of crystals.
From floor to ceiling.
Countless—perhaps tens of thousands.
**Thud!**
Binjin collapsed with a pale face, his teeth chattering violently.
The suffocating cold made it nearly impossible to breathe.
*W-Who cast this kind of magic…? A-Ayla? No, no way. There’s no way that inferior thing could perform magic bordering on a miracle…*
Only one person came to mind.
His identity unknown, but clearly a high-ranking magician—the boy who had impersonated an elf to receive the treatment.
*B-But that boy’s inside Laqria…*
Binjin’s eyes widened in shock.
“L-Lawria!”
Laqria remained frozen midair, head raised.
Her entire body was rigid—as if it had been flash-frozen in an instant.
And that wasn’t a metaphor.
**Crack!**
A shard of ice sprouted on one of Laqria’s central scales.
**Craack! Crack-crack!**
In an instant, it spread outward in all directions.
In the blink of an eye, Laqria became a towering ice sculpture.
**CRASH—!**
Then her body cracked and shattered into pieces.
Countless shards and chunks of ice glimmered as they fell through the air.
And Binjin—
“……!”
Caught sight of black, emotionless eyes among the blue fragments.
He instantly dropped to the ground, lying flat.
**BOOM—! CRASH—!**
Chunks of ice rained down like hail, pounding the protective barrier that had been shielding Binjin.
He trembled nonstop.
Not from the cold.
Not from fear of the hail.
But from the primal terror of a prey facing its predator.
Barely, he managed to look up.
The boy was standing in midair.
His body wrapped in an aura of chilling blue mana—but what felt truly cold was the boy’s blank, emotionless face.
Not a single wound marked his body.
*H-How…?*
A burning question surged in his chest.
Laqria’s digestive fluid was supposed to be lethally acidic—it should have dissolved him immediately.
*Did he use protective magic close to his body? No, impossible. Laqria’s digestive fluid dismantles elemental bonds—no protective magic, no matter how strong, could withstand it.*
There was only one way to protect oneself from that acid.
A specially formulated, modified barrier made from a precise combination of elements.
But there was no way the boy could have known that formula.
Binjin had only discovered it himself after long research post-contract.
Yes—
Only *that* specific elemental combination… elements… elements…?
“Ah…?”
Binjin suddenly realized something terrifying.
He couldn’t recall the formula.
It felt like the memory itself had been plucked clean out of his mind.
The image of the boy twisting the cap of the fountain pen just before the extraction spell activated flashed in his head.
*That bastard…! He stole my knowledge…!*
And in that moment—
All the fear that had bloated inside Binjin’s vessel twisted into a deep, vicious hatred.
**BOOM—! CRASH—!**
“Guh…! Khh…!”
He gasped under the relentless hail.
He knew his life wouldn’t last much longer.
The last ember of his life force was fading rapidly under the surrounding cold.
But still—
Before he died, just once—
He wanted to unleash his fury on the bastard who had ruined everything.
Binjin looked up.
He saw the girl, staring vacantly at the ice spear she had conjured.
And the boy, watching her from above.
Both of their mana circles were active—and their number…
*Three circles…!*
Binjin was horrified.
Both of them had reached the third circle—a level he had long coveted.
He could understand it in the boy’s case—he had assumed he was a high-ranking mage.
But Ayla?
That was unacceptable.
*Ayla? You, that inferior, dull creature, gained enlightenment in such a short time? When I whipped you for your own good, you never made any progress…! You even refused to follow my order to get eaten by Laqria…! And now you dare…! A useless wretch like you…!*
A wave of deep betrayal and inferiority swelled violently within Binjin’s vessel.
And then—
───!
From the direction of the tower’s entrance, a faint presence and voice were felt.
*Yes, maybe…*
Binjin’s face lit up with twisted joy.
Perhaps that inferior disciple up on the stairs might actually prove useful now.
As Binjin strained with all his might to move—
“……”
Ray looked down at Ayla from his icy platform in the air.
*She’s reached the third circle.*
Ayla was shaping the ice spear she had created with her mana.
So focused she had completely forgotten her surroundings.
Ray knew this was a moment all mages went through—a helpless, irresistible immersion.
After all, a mage who reaches a new realm can only gasp at the sudden expansion of the world.
*But to reach the third circle all at once…*
Ray recalled the words he had spoken when pushing Ayla aside.
*”You didn’t actually plan to die anyway.”*
From the circumstances, it seemed Ayla had realized her true feelings in that moment.
And that had led to the formation of her new circle.
For mana always responded to those who were honest with themselves.
*…So right now, Ayla must be aware of her own fear of death.*
She had to be.
Because—
“……”
Ray’s gaze shifted to the emotion of *worry* hovering above Ayla’s vessel.
The white lump that had only ever been directed at others—never at herself—was beginning to melt.
Drip, drop.
Falling.
Touching her blue ice sheet.
Creating a *sky-blue* spot.
…The ice sheet was melting.
The once-frozen emotions began to flow freely across her vessel.
The pool formed by the melting ice evaporated into a sky-blue wind.
The ice sheet was gone.
In that moment, Ray knew.
Ayla had become someone capable of loving herself.
