CHAPTER 73: HAPPY BIRTHDAY
“What a selfish goal,” she chuckled. “But maybe that’s exactly what this guild needs—someone who isn’t as invested in our goal as everyone else… Even with all my readings into the Orbits of Fate, some things are just impossible to predict…”
She glanced at the nearby bookshelves behind the balcony and lifted her wrist. A large tome was magically pulled out and levitated toward her hand.
“Before you leave for lunch, I do think you still deserve some punishment—mainly for going behind my back and undergoing a Soul Search.” She giggled while handing the book to him.
Soren frowned and glanced down at the title, “Intro to Runology” was spelled out in bold Vinuan lettering.
“Alongside the other books I gave you for homework, read this one as well and report back to me by the end of the week.”
Figures… More reading. He smiled, “Alright, I won’t disappoint you.”
“Ah, and don’t think for a second that Myrin is getting away with this scott-free. He too needs some punishment—allowing his junior to take a Soul Search so soon, what was he thinking?!”
Hearing this, he couldn’t help but frown. He at first assumed that the order to allow him to take the Soul Search was done by Sienna, but it turned out that Myrin was acting alone all along.
Why didn’t he say anything when I questioned his motive then… His frown deepened.
Soren stepped away from the platform and said his goodbyes, but not before receiving one last sentence from her:
“By the way,” she said. “Happy Birthday, Soren.”
His eyes narrowed. It’s my birthday? He glanced once more at his status page.
Status
Name: Soren Andersen
Race: ???
Age: 23
Ah, I am 23 now… With all the happenings and stressful things he was busy preparing for, he had failed to notice… Doesn’t that make it January 30th back on Earth? Today was the 30th in the Vyak calendar.
Just as he was about to turn around to thank her, she was already gone. The balcony was empty, except for a few sparkles of stardust left behind in her wake.
Talk about an exit… He smiled with a sigh as he headed back to the library once more.
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Deep underground, surrounded by an oasis of greenery and cyanary, was a stone marble canopy drowned in mountains of books and scrolls. Within this academic mess, a woman wearing an enchantingly beautiful robe was glancing down at the book in her hands without a care in the world. Her silver hair swung on its own, as if enchanted by an invisible wind.
Suddenly, a whisper approached her ear.
“Why did you not tell him about the last ending to the story? The one where Yasini is said to be dead.”
She glanced to her left and frowned. “Noctharn…”
After thinking about his question for a bit, she smiled.
“Myths are meant to spread hope, not despair… Regardless of the truth.” Her eyes trailed down to the page of the book she was reading.
“Besides, mythology is best left to scribes and travelers… I am neither of these things. ”
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Before heading back to the lounge, Soren decided to take a stroll through the lower levels of the library and managed to pick up a few more books to read:
Anthology of Elven Myth, Epoch-World-Celestial: The Three Orbits, Avalon: Fall of an Empire… As he read the titles, he couldn’t help but sigh. There was just so much he needed to read this week.
His reasoning for these picks were simple. After hearing the story Sienna had told him, his curiosity peaked. He needed to find out more about that story, especially since it somewhat related to him.
His fate was objectively tied in some manner to Yarian’s Celestial Fate. No matter how much he complained about it, there was no changing this outcome. Since it was an inevitability, Soren chose to simply understand the phenomenon than to idly wait in the darkness for whatever was to come.
Yarian was dying. He had seen enough to come to this conclusion. Sienna also knew this. Because of the Celestial Fate hiding itself away, stagnation was prone to happen. Stagnation that was impossible to notice without special abilities like the ones that Sienna had.
In all honesty, he somewhat pitied her. How much did she suffer when pursuing this goal? A goal she herself wasn’t even invested in, but had to out of necessity. He couldn’t imagine what burden she was carrying.
Focus, Soren… He knew that there was nothing he could do for her even if he wanted to. He was nowhere near powerful enough to change whatever will happen to this world in the future. If it was inevitably doomed from the start, then the best he could do was simply to learn everything there was to know and chronicle it all.
That way, the world won’t die in his memories.
Wow, that’s an extremely bleak conclusion to make, he thought to himself with a light chuckle. Here he was, planning to [Record] the death of an entire dimension. When did I start taking my role as a scribe so seriously?
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Aside from that, he also knew that Yadria as a nation, was more important than that. The Spirit Blossom Willow and its creation myth was fascinating for a number of reasons, but one was more important than the others.
“A Forgotten Rune,” he murmured. He remembered the words Sienna used to describe the magical seed the war was fought over.
From what he understood, he too was in possession of such an inheritance. His [The Faerie Court] ability was a result of him merging with one—at least, a fragment of one.
If he wanted to understand his own forgotten rune fragment, what better place to look than another forgotten rune. One that had an entire war fought over its existence. From his understanding, Yasini must have been the ancient name that the Flower Maiden went by, which meant an actual goddess participated in this war. The forgotten rune was truly that powerful—even the very gods coveted it.
Good thing no one but me and Unknown knows about its existence… Wait, no. He paused.
What about the Knowledge Demon? A shiver ran down his spine the moment he thought about it. If he was able to pry into the secrets of his Soul Weapon to send him a message, could he not have been able to also figure out what runes he had obtained or merged with? It was definitely possible.
But at the same time, he knew there was evidence that went against this notion. After all, his entire Soul Chain itself was a fake—the real one was nowhere to be found. The most he could have learned was about his Abstract Rune, which showed up on the result sheet of his Soul Dive test.
I need to grow stronger, quickly… He was surrounded by monsters on all sides. Unfortunately, for the next two weeks, he was limited in his ability to even use his Soul Realm.
I’ll have to make do with studying the axioms more…
Before a magi reaches the first circle, a smaller step has to be made: Rudimentary magecraft. This was magecraft that demanded incomplete spellforms. Usually, they were disjointed into separate axioms that could be utilized individually to perform limited effects. In most cases, Rudimentary magecraft was mainly something used for learning or experimenting with material runes.
Before creating his first complete Spellform, Soren needed to first conduct numerous runological studies to discover what runes matched with his affinity, then, he would need to compile them into axioms to experiment with rudimentary magecraft to find out what effects they could make. It was truly gruelling work.
This is not how I imagined magic to be… In his delusions, he assumed it was as simple as screaming, “Avada Kedavra!” while doing a cool pose.
I guess Soul Weapons fit that mold better, in a way. Unlike regular magecraft, Mysteries only really needed the person to use their Soul Weapon to activate an ability on the fly.
As he was walking down the steps to the next bridge interlink to reach the stone platform elevator, Soren spotted someone familiar. A short girl wearing a mage dress paired with a violet cone hat. A repitilian tail swung around happily as she read the book in her hands. She turned around and noticed him—frowning.
“Hey, Soren,” Cassia said awkwardly.
Soren sighed, “Hey…” Soren had completely forgotten their brief exchange before Myrin helped him with his Soul Search.
Ugh, I suck when it comes to these kinds of scenarios… He says this, but he too had also made things awkward with the others only an hour or so ago. How ironic, he thought.
Before he could get a word out, Cassia bowed to him slightly and spoke first, “I want to apologize. I shouldn’t have said that to you two days ago. That was unbecoming of me as your senior apprentice.”
Soren was shocked to see this. He was expecting her to make excuses.
“It’s fine… You were clearly going through something back there…”
“Still,” she insisted. “I did act out of line. I am very sorry.”
“.....” At this point, Soren wasn’t even sure what to say to that. The air turned awkward again. Seeing that she was awaiting a response, he scratched the back of his head.
“How about this? Since you feel so bad about it, why not help me in my studies after lunch? I plan to dive into learning about runology.”
Soren could almost spotted sparkles in her eyes as he mentioned runology.
“Really?” She asked fervently. Her cheeks puffed up with confidence as she folded her arms. “I’ll have you know, I am even better than Myrin when it comes to this field! That dummy is always focused on drawing and music! Leave it all to me!”
Soren smiled, “That’s good to hear…” He couldn’t believe how easily the mood shifted. I guess she really is a child… In a way, he was kind of jealous at how easy it was for her to move on. He was still trying to figure out how he was going to talk to Tina and Myrin again.
Although they did say some insensitive things, I also was somewhat wrong for placing so much blame on them for no reason… Myrin agreed to help me even though he knew he would get in trouble for it as well…
He sighed to himself. Seeing this, Cassia tilted her head, “What’s wrong?”
Soren decided to explain what happened with his Soul Search and the drama that followed.
“... I see.” Cassia frowned. “It’s kinda their fault, you know? I remember when we first talked during the interview. Don’t you remember what you said to me about the Mistress’ goal?
“You said that you found it interesting. That wasn’t the word of someone that was truly invested. You simply found it ‘interesting’ and wanted to find out more. That’s why I was a bit apprehensive about you joining at first…”
Kinda hurts when you put it that way… He couldn’t help but smile.
“Not to blame you for that or anything,” she followed. “If I too came from another world, it would be hard for me to invest myself that heavily in a problem that’s this unrelated to me. Still, the mistress weighed the matter regarding your Star Fate and included you anyway… She even spent ten years of her life for it…”
“Are you sure you are okay with that?” Soren asked. “Are you sure you are fine knowing that the person being taken care of this well still isn’t invested in your goal? Your mistress sacrificed ten years of her life to spare mine, and yet I don’t plan to repay her fully for it.”
She sighed, “It does frustrate me a little bit. But at the end of the day, I don’t think the Mistress sacrificed anything. I believe it to be an investment.” Her eyes sharpened as she stared at him, “She invested ten years of her life on you knowing it will steer this world in a different direction than where it's heading currently, regardless of your interest or disinterest.”
Her grin grew, “It doesn’t really matter what you want, fate will have its way regardless.”
Soren chuckled, “That’s definitely true… I don’t have a choice in the matter anyway. I plan to witness what will happen. Who knows, it might prove to be interesting. In the mean time, I plan to find out more about the topic.”
He showed her the books he had picked from the library earlier. The title at the front caught her eyes: Epoch-World-Celestial: The Three Orbits.
“I see! That’s definitely a good idea. Better to know then to not know.”
Soren nodded in response.
“Speaking of which,” she said. “Since we're on the topic of me tutoring you, how about you become my magi partner?” Her grin widened as she placed her hands on her hips confidently. “Become my research assistant!”