Chapter 215: The Cause and The Solution to All Problems (1)

As soon as Keter saw the man, he immediately took off his shirt.

Seeing that, the man grew even more frantic and shouted, “A perverted thief!”

Keter had only taken off his clothes because he didn't want to ruin his favorite shirt, but he grinned slyly and said, “You’re standing so calmly in front of a perverted thief who likes balding middle-aged men.”

“Huh?”

The man hastily raised his staff, and mana began to gather at the tip. Though he looked like a washed-up loser who had gambled away his fortune, he was in fact the master of this ruin and the creator of sticker magic.

“The flames of wrath that turn the world to ash, burn—Fireball!”

At the end of his chant, a blazing sphere the size of a human head shot from his staff toward Keter.

Keter was dumbfounded for two reasons.

“Casting a three-circle spell with a chant, and your aim is off, too.”

Keter hadn’t moved at all, but the Fireball went flying wide to the left. He calmly took two steps left and let the Fireball hit him. After all, that was the reason he had taken off his shirt. The man trembled with terror as he watched Keter throw himself into the spell.

“You’re throwing yourself into the Fireball? What kind of insane, perverted thief is this?!”

Normally, a direct hit from a three-circle Fireball would turn a man into charcoal. Yet somehow, when it struck Keter, nothing happened, as if it had just hit a rock.

“W-what?!”

Not even a scorch mark remained. It was as though the spell had simply been blocked. Keter was circulating his aura forward while reversing his mana flow, leaving his body in a constant reinforcement and immense resistance. On top of that, he was hardened like steel. To put it in perspective, Keter was like a high-speed rotating drill made of hard; no ordinary aura or any spell below four-circle could scratch him.

Keter walked toward the man without a word. That alone was enough to smother him with dread and pressure.

“C-cold ice, freeze and sh-shatter—Ice Sp...urk!”

He was so tense he bit his tongue before finishing the chant.

Boom!

For a mage, a failed chant meant death. His staff exploded, and the middle-aged man collapsed, his hands injured.

“Aagh! My hands! My hands!”

Keter crouched in front of him, his face full of disdain.

“So you’re only a three-circle mage, and you can’t even cast without a staff? You weren’t born a mage, were you?”

“Ugh...”

“That makes you a second-rate mage at best. Why don’t you show me your sticker magic?”

At that, the man suddenly burst into tears.

“You damned bastard! You’re an assassin sent by Marcnosse, aren’t you? Then hurry up and kill me already!”

“Huh? Marcnosse?”

Marcnosse was known as the Grand Mage of Paper, famed for inventing the magic scroll that let anyone cast a spell just by tearing it.

“Why would Marcnosse bother killing a balding old man like you?”

“Cruel fiend! Even knowing I am Denison, you still call me an old man instead of a mage! Marcnosse, you truly are heartless!”

Keter stared at the man, who introduced himself as Denison. His original intent had been only to obtain the blueprint for sticker magic, but if the creator himself was alive before him, that changed everything.

I was going to recruit a mage into Sefira and have them learn sticker magic, but if the creator himself is alive, things will be much faster.

While Keter considered how to win him over, Denison thought he saw an opening. He thrust out his left hand with a shout.

“Got you off guard! Take this!”

Peeling a lightning-shaped sticker from his palm, Denison slapped it onto Keter’s chest with a triumphant grin.

“Four-circle blitz attack, Lightning Shock! A direct hit—you’re going to die of a heart attack!”

Crackle crackle crackle!

“Ow. That stung.”

“....”

Keter calmly pulled Denison’s hand off his chest. Sparks still danced from his palm, which was proof that the magic had activated; it simply hadn’t worked on Keter.

“So you can only do three-circle magic, but your sticker magic lets you use four-circle spells? Interesting. Any more tricks up your sleeve, mister?”

“Uh... I do, but I have to go grab them...”

“One minute.”

“One minute? What...?”

“...”

Keter simply glared at Denison; he had no patience for the slow-witted. Denison, who had lost all will to fight after seeing Keter emerge unscathed from a direct four-circle spell, only pierced it together ten seconds later: it was an unspoken warning that he would meet a gruesome end if he didn’t bring it within a minute.

Pitter patter!

Not even caring about his unsightly state, Denison hastily ran and brought his best sticker.

“Two seconds...

Tsk,

what a shame.”

“T-this is the best sticker I have... sir.”

Denison found himself treating Keter with respect. Keter didn’t care; he simply examined the stickers Denison had brought out. There were only three: one shaped like wind, another like flame, and the last like a water droplet.

“Show me what kind of magic each of them contains.”

“Uh... each one of these costs at least ten thousand gold to make. Using one just for a demonstration is a bit... I could just explain instead...”

As Keter clenched his fist, Denison hastily held up the wind-patterned sticker.

“There are two types of stickers: those that activate when applied, and those that activate when removed. This one activates the moment it’s applied. Like this, when I stick it to my palm...”

Whoooosh.

A gust of wind suddenly burst out of the sticker, strong enough to send his hair flying.

“This is a wind-emitting sticker. The effect lasts for about a month.”

“Can it be made stronger? Or last longer?”

Denison found that question strange.

What the hell? Why would an assassin ask something like that?

At first, Denison thought Keter was just a thief, but he soon thought Keter was a perverted thief and assassin that Marcnosse had sent to kill him. Yet something was off. An assassin would have just killed him right away, then burned or taken everything. There would be no reason for him to show genuine interest in the stickers and stay for demonstrations.

Maybe... he’s not an assassin? That might be even worse.

Even if Keter wasn’t an assassin, to Denison, he was still a perverted thief. Denison could not hide his emotions; it was obvious that these thoughts were running through his head. Seeing this, Keter chuckled.

“Forgive the late introduction. My name is Keter, and I’m not the kind of man you think I am.”

“Ah, excuse me, but... from your name alone, I can’t tell who you are...”

“I didn’t say on purpose. Depending on how you act, I could be your savior... or your undertaker.”

Keter’s calm yet chilling threat made Denison break into a cold sweat, despite the frigid air of the underground.

* * *

Denison showed Keter every sticker he had and even demonstrated them. But Keter, who had already experienced sticker magic before regression, frowned. Denison’s face fell, thinking Keter disliked his magic. And he was right. Keter didn’t like what he saw.

Before I regressed, it took a while for sticker magic to start gaining popularity. That means it underwent years of research and refinement.

The reason Keter had wanted sticker magic was because of its convenience, its performance, and its perfect compatibility with archery, but that was before. In the present, sticker magic wasn’t just unpopular; it was practically useless in real combat. Its efficiency was abysmally low.

Compared to what it was before my regression, it's at least ten times weaker. And it’s even more expensive than scrolls.

In his previous life, a Wind Sticker that produced gusts of air lasted an entire year and cost only three thousand gold. It could even be moved around without issue, and it wasn’t damaged by heat or moisture.

“Mister, this Wind Sticker of yours... If I wanted it to last a year, drop the production cost to one thousand gold apiece, and make it decently durable... how long would it take?”

“W–what? A month is the maximum duration. Asking me to multiply that by twelve, and even cut the cost... that’s just...”

“Answer.”

“Ugh... at least... maybe eight years?”

“...”

At that, Keter rubbed his temples as if he had a headache.

Too long.

It was far longer than he had hoped, but it wasn’t bad news. If the inventor himself estimated eight years, then another mage starting from scratch, learning only from a book, would have taken sixteen at the very least. This meant finding Denison alive was a stroke of good fortune.

However, Denison had already prepared his death, as this ruin was meant to be his tomb. Bringing back someone who had already resigned themselves to death would take a great deal of patience and effort, but Keter firmly believed that no one in this world truly wanted to die. And if he was the one handling it, then it wouldn’t take long.

“Mr. Denison, do you really want to die?”

“...!”

“You may have built this ruin to die here, but you don’t truly want to die. I know that much.”

“...I don’t know who you are, but I now know you must be Macnosse’s assassin. Still, why ask me such a thing? How did you even know this place existed, or find the hidden passage to get here? I can’t understand it.”

Even though Keter was showing kindness, Denison didn’t lower his guard, which Keter expected. It would be insane to trust someone who had just walked into a place no one else knew about, and through a hidden passage no less. Nothing Keter said would convince him otherwise unless Keter revealed the truth: that he was a regressor who already knew Denison’s story.

However, only Dork was allowed to know that. Keter had no intention of revealing this to anyone else ever. Threats would be meaningless too. Threats might force Denison to submit, but they wouldn’t persuade him. He might cower for now, but without true conviction, he would rather die miserably than cooperate.

So Keter chose not to persuade. Instead, he would give Denison a reason to live.

“Why does it matter who I am?”

“...?!”

“What matters is that you and I met here.”

“What nonsense...”

“Whatever your story is, in the end, you want revenge against Macnosse, don’t you?”

“W–what? That’s absurd! Macnosse is a true Grand Mage, a seven-circle one at that! How could I ever hope to defeat him?”

“Then why did you make this ruin? Why try to preserve sticker magic, a pitiful art compared to scrolls? Where did the money come from to build this place?”

“That’s...”

Denison faltered. The moment Keter saw the crack, he pressed harder.

“You don’t have any friends, do you? Just tell me everything. I’ll listen.”

That merciless yet sweet temptation shook Denison, but he still hesitated. Then, Keter delivered the finishing blow.

“Let me guess: this was all because of Macnosse, that greedy old bastard, wasn’t it?”

At those words, the resentment Denison had buried deep exploded outward.

“Y–yes! It’s because of my damned teacher that I ended up rotting in this forsaken underground!”

There was no better way to break someone’s defenses than to curse the object of their hatred on their behalf.