Chapter 56 – The Last Lesson (One)

A dim, abandoned warehouse bathed in moonlight.

A group of boys holding clubs looked down at a man collapsed on the floor.

Among them, the boy who seemed to be the leader moved his lips.

“Fred.”

The man on the floor flinched.

Though beaten so severely he could barely stay conscious, the other’s voice pierced his ears with startling clarity.

“8th Street.”

His heart pounded.

“Bookstore Veronica.”

He desperately wanted to escape this terrifying presence.

“Don’t touch it. There won’t be a second warning. Your family, your shop, your car. I know where they all are.”

A tear trickled down.

Fred squeezed every ounce of strength from his body and nodded with all his might.

Ding-a-ling—

“Welcome!”

Veronica energetically greeted the customer entering the bookstore.

The unpleasant incident at the bookstore had happened a few weeks prior.

That day’s events had been quite a shock to Veronica.

Until then, she had only dealt with things like stones thrown by kids her age; it was the first time a group of burly adult men had stormed in.

However, Veronica was quick to recover and didn’t dwell on the shock of that day for long.

She ate meals as usual.

She ran the bookstore as usual.

She struggled to build her Circle as usual.

In the peaceful, static atmosphere, the clock hands repeated countless movements.

Ray had made progress in many areas.

Funds had accumulated to a point where they wouldn’t be a problem for at least the next few Sectors of travel.

His reading skills had improved to the point where he could now read most books alone, without a dictionary.

He read books in the bookstore to acquire essential knowledge for the journey.

Things like car maintenance or emergency treatment for wounds.

「Ray-nim. Here are the results of the inquiries about 28th Street.」

He also continued to have his subordinates collect clues about the Rainbow and Mercread.

He hadn’t acquired any useful information, but Ray didn’t consider it a wasted effort.

After all, it greatly reduced the probability of missing something and moving on in the 49th Sector.

Time faithfully fulfilled its duty, and the seasons changed their colors.

From the hot summer.

To the autumn of falling leaves.

It also meant the boy was slowly getting ready to rise and depart for the next Sector.

“I’d like to have a word.”

And it also meant the old man’s final moments had arrived.

Evening, as the sun was setting.

The curtain fluttered in the wind.

The darkened room had long shadows cast everywhere, giving the feeling of looking at a black-and-white photograph.

In a moment when everything seemed to have frozen into the scenery.

“Have you decided when you’ll leave?”

The old man opened his mouth.

“In a few days. It’s not certain, though.”

“I see. It seems I’ll be leaving first after all.”

The old man chuckled softly.

It was a jest, but the boy didn’t understand and showed no reaction.

The old man hadn’t expected any particular reaction either, so he didn’t particularly mind.

Instead, he slowly turned his head and stared at the firmly closed bedroom door.

‘That kid. Not showing her face again today.’

Veronica, the red-haired girl, hadn’t visited the old man’s room for the past few days.

The old man knew the reason well.

‘She probably doesn’t have the courage to watch my final moments.’

A personality prone to fear and timidity.

A personality that hated even more to show it outwardly.

A personality that would rather avoid a painful situation altogether than face it.

Though their time together was less than a year, the old man knew a lot about Veronica.

Having acted as both a father and a teacher, he had formed a bond of sorts.

‘Even if I leave, she’ll manage her path well. She’s a smart kid.’

My death might make her sit down for a while.

But before long, she’ll brush off the depression and anxiety that have settled on her shoulders and get up.

And she’ll walk forward.

With a steadier gait than anyone.

Having finished his thoughts about Veronica, the old man shifted his gaze back to Ray.

“I want to say thank you. The suggestion to learn Magic might have felt sudden.”

“I just think our interests aligned. You needed someone to accept your teachings. I needed someone to impart teachings.”

The old man gave a low laugh.

It was closer to a simple transaction, so there was no need for mutual gratitude.

Indeed, the boy hadn’t changed a bit from when he first saw him.

“Right. Our desires simply matched. But still, thanks to you, isn’t it true that I can leave my Magic in the world?”

The Magic the old man had used, researched, and developed throughout his life—Magic that was essentially his own history.

If not for this boy, no one else could have absorbed it all in such a short time.

Even if they were a high-ranking Wizard with multiple Rings.

Because the number of Rings and understanding the operating principles of Magic are distinctly separate realms.

The ability to mimic Magic simply by seeing it was a talent that defied common sense.

“So I want to express my gratitude to you.”

“…….”

Seeing the boy remain expressionless again, the old man asked with a faint smile.

“Well. Don’t you have anything you want to say to me?”

The old man didn’t have much time left.

Yesterday, the time he was awake was 4 minutes and 32 seconds.

According to the records the old man had collected, the final waking moments of Eternal Slumber patients were all between 3 and 5 minutes.

It wouldn’t be strange if he fell into eternal sleep today itself, and at most, his end would come within a few days.

The boy was also aware of this fact.

‘Something I want to say….’

The boy had had many conversations with the old man but had revealed almost no information about himself.

The fact that he couldn’t feel emotions.

The fact that he could see Mana’s Color.

Things like his reason for seeking the Rainbow.

That was the boy’s most intimate information about himself.

Revealing it felt like exposing a weakness.

But it was also true that his wariness towards the old man had lessened considerably.

The old man was a person who possessed more knowledge than anyone he had met so far and had also answered many of his questions.

And perhaps.

‘This might be the last chance to ask.’

The boy, having steadied his breath, spoke.

“I can’t feel emotions.”

“I see.”

The old man nodded with a quiet gesture.

He didn’t show great surprise.

As if he had been expecting it.

Thinking about it, the old man had always been like that.

Except for when the boy showed great achievement in Magic or when thugs invaded the bookstore, he had never shown emotional agitation.

“You knew?”

“I might have been thinking it was possible. Not certain, but I had a guess.”

And he seemed to see through everything even without being told.

…Was this also Magic?

“I can’t feel any emotions normally. I can only feel them if I concentrate my mind. And even then, only a few kinds. Is this an illness?”

“What do you think? Do you think it’s an illness?”

“…….”

The boy recalled the definition of the word ‘illness’ from the dictionary.

「Illness」

「A phenomenon where an abnormality occurs in the whole or part of a living organism, preventing normal activity and causing suffering.」

It was clear his emotional system was not normal.

However, if asked whether it caused him suffering, the answer was ‘no.’

‘I’m not sure about suffering. But judging by the dictionary definition, shouldn’t it be considered an illness?’

Having reached a conclusion, Ray answered.

“Yes. I think it’s an illness.”

“I see. An illness of the heart can also be considered an illness.”

“Illness of the heart?”

“This is just my speculation, so filter the information as you listen.”

The old man began his story slowly.

In his youth, while wandering through various Sectors, he had met people who couldn’t feel emotions.

“There is a difference from you. In their cases, they said they couldn’t feel specific emotions.”

Long-time colleagues.

A drunkard who happened to sit next to him at a tavern.

A fellow traveler he journeyed with, and so on.

Various kinds of people confided their stories to the old man.

「I grew up being abused by my parents. Thanks to that, I became a person incapable of love. Love? What’s that? How can someone who doesn’t know what love is love anyone else?」

「I might be afraid of the very act of feeling pleasure. That’s why I don’t enjoy anything I do.」

No falsehood or pretense was visible in their attitudes.

And there was something he learned through conversations.

“They all seemed to have lost the ability to feel that emotion starting from some event.”

“An event?”

“Yes. They were all negative kinds of things like abuse or parting. I thought perhaps their emotions had shut down due to trauma.”

“…….”

“Of course, your case, where you can feel emotions selectively, is likely a different story. But still, I think it could serve as a reference for tracing the cause.”

Ray fell into thought for a moment.

The idea that emotions had shut down due to a past event was something he had never considered before.

He had only thought that emotional incapacity was due to an abnormality in the body or mind.

But no specific memory came to mind.

To be precise, he had no past he could recall.

His oldest memory was a moment wandering the streets, embracing hunger.

Memories before that did not exist in his mind.

As if someone had intentionally carved out a part of his memory.

‘Some event in the past….’

It was then that a certain scene flashed through his head.

A sphere of light transforming into an egg shape and splitting in half.

Hundreds of colorful rays of light spreading to every corner of the world.

A black-and-white landscape being dyed in all sorts of colors upon contact with the light rays.

It was a momentary flicker.

The series of scenes flashed through Ray’s mind at lightning speed, leaving no trace behind.

What on earth was that.

Those things just now.

Ray couldn’t remember the scenes.

He only recognized the fact that some images had flashed through his mind.

He pondered for a while, but no particular answer emerged.

Ray stored the old man’s words in a corner of his memory and, recognizing that time was short, moved on to the next question.

“…You knew everything even though I didn’t speak normally. What situation I’m in. What I’m thinking. I want to know what kind of Magic that is.”

The old man was silent for a moment.

Then he burst out laughing.

“Kehehe. To think of that as Magic, there’s probably no one as peculiar as you.”

“You mean it’s not Magic?”

“Of course. It’s not Magic. So, you’re curious about how I saw through your thoughts and situation?”

Ray nodded without hesitation.

The old man, with a smile on his face, continued.

“You don’t necessarily have to know about someone only through conversation. All humans unconsciously scatter, spread, and drop pieces of themselves.”

Expression. Gestures. Tremor of the pupils.

The degree of flowing sweat. The roughness of breathing.

Every other trivial body movement, all of it.

“Among those, the one containing the most information is expression.”

“But I’ve never made an expression. What did you see in my…”

At the moment of his rebuttal.

The old man uttered his next words.

“Do you really think you’ve never made an expression?”