Overpowered Archmage Doesn’t Hide His Talent

Chapter 155:

Translator: MarcTempest

Proofreader: naturallyInconsistent

Chapter 155 You will burn for a lifetime.

“You’re here.”​That was his only greeting.​Rustle, rustle.​In this quiet place, the only sound was Flan turning the pages of a book. His gaze was also fixed on the magic book, not on Trixie.​When he reached the last page, Flan picked up another book and quickly scanned it from the first page to the last.​He spent a long time looking at the magic books, until he muttered at some point.

“I don’t understand.”

Flan couldn’t understand Isaac.​A mage is someone who proves himself.

Flan had always lived with that thought, so he couldn’t understand Isaac’s mind, who burned himself for his daughter’s proof.​If Louis, Trixie, Becky.

If those he recognized as gems had tried to do such a thing, he would have tied them up and stopped them.

“But.”

“I’m not against it.”​A calm remark.​He quietly placed a flower in front of the tombstone. It was a jasmine, the symbol of the von Fritz. It was dark, so she couldn’t see well, but his face seemed softer than usual​“…”​Trixie just stared blankly at Flan.​She didn’t know what to think, what to say or do, so the only thing she could do was that.

“You did well.”​Flan murmured that.​But it was not a word for Trixie, but for the tombstone. His distant gaze seemed to look beyond the tombstone at something.​“I’ve seen such a fool before.”​The previous world.​The woman who loved Flan despite being born as a witch.

The woman who only wished for Flan’s happiness and researched things for his sake all her life.​The woman who broke the witches’ oath in the end.​“Why are there so many fools…”​They were not satisfied with wishing for their own happiness, but regarded others’ happiness as their own.

There were always such fools.​“You’re lucky.”​Flan knelt on one knee and placed his hand on the remains of the tombstone.

“You managed to leave a trace of the magic, and there’s someone here who can decipher it.”​The woman from the previous world left nothing behind.​She turned to dust and scattered the moment she broke the witches’ oath, and received the punishment of not leaving her name or appearance, so Flan couldn’t remember her name or face clearly.​He only vaguely remembered her existence.​But these people wouldn’t be like that.​“Rest. Trixie will become a great magician.”​Flan began to draw mana.​The dark space was filled with the blue light of mana, and soon hexagonal magic circles began to unfold in the air.​Hiss, hiss, hiss─​He concentrated his best.​He started with curiosity about the ancient runes, but now he was determined to awaken the magic completely, with compassion for the woman from the previous world mixed in.​“Trixie.”​The broken tombstones returned to their original places and stuck together. But they didn’t stick together in the previous rectangular shape.​The pieces of stone resonated and changed their positions, and then stuck together like magnets to form the shape of a jasmine flower.​“Don’t miss a single moment and watch.”​This time, he didn’t mean to look at the magic and the principle.​What he wanted to convey was just the shape of the magic.

At the same time, a small reward was given to the woman who surpassed him.​The jasmine-shaped tombstone burned blue and then changed the space.

It created two people in a form that was very familiar to Trixie.

“…!”​They were Trixie’s parents.​A mother whose face she had never seen.

A father who was always strict and seemed to hate her.​They were holding a newborn baby.

Trixie had never known this scene, never seen it, never heard of it.​But Trixie knew who that baby was.​Herself.​They smiled radiantly as if they had taken over the whole world in their room.

No, to them, the small creature in their arms was a world of its own.​“Ah…”​Trixie closed her eyes without knowing. But the scene that the tombstone’s magic spewed out became clearer.

“Dad.”​A landscape that seemed like a fantasy, but was not a fantasy, but a real one that existed in the past.​“Mom.”​There was no lie in their smiles.

They were genuinely happy when they got Trixie.​

At first, her eyelids trembled, and then the vibration spread to her whole body.

A tear rolled down my cheek as I bit my lip. 

Just as it reached the tip of my chin, I heard Flan’s voice.

“Burn yourself if you want to protect something.”

His voice was calm and gentle as always.

“Isn’t that von Fritz’s motto?”

I barely opened my eyes. In the bright world, Flan was looking at me.

“There’s nothing to fear or hesitate.”

His red eyes were full of sincerity.

“You will burn for the rest of your life. Definitely.”

Stumbling, I hugged Flan without realizing it.

“…Just lend me your shoulder for a moment.”

The tears that I thought would stop soon didn’t stop.

The girl’s tears soaked the man’s chest, but he didn’t blame her. He just stood firmly in his place as he always did.

“Just for a moment, really just for a moment.”

She was going to burn brightly from now on.

Until she got out of her mother’s shadow, until Isaac’s death was not in vain. Until her father, who had lost his emotions, could smile again.

She would burn fiercely.

For life.

For a lifetime.

◈

A week later.

The inner chamber of the second princess, Aurora.

Two days before the collection of dawn butterflies began at Reheln Hill, Aurora was resting her chin as usual.

“Princess!”

A courtier came to Aurora’s front with a desperate face.

It wouldn’t have been strange to ask him for his responsibility, but his face looked so urgent that Aurora asked him first.

“Why do you look like that? Like a rat on the run.”

“She, she’s back!”

“Hmm?”

Aurora tilted her head. But after a moment of thought, the second princess’s face turned cold.

“Is it such a big deal that Yushia is back?”

“No. No, it’s not. It’s not the third princess…!”

If it wasn’t the third princess, who else could make such a fuss?

As if to answer Aurora’s question, someone entered the inner chamber with a steady footsteps.

“…?”

After confirming her face, Aurora unconsciously furrowed her brows.

A calm-looking woman. 

No, rather than calm, it was more appropriate to say that she was deeply sunken.

Her long hair falling in a pale purple and her dark eyes made it easy to guess the personality of the protagonist who appeared in the inner chamber.

Cold.

An ordinary person would say that.

But Aurora didn’t see it that way. Anyone who knew who this woman was would say this.

‘Empty.’

Naomi.

The first princess of the royal family.

The one who cuts off emotions, the monster who is considered the closest to the sword spirit among the existing knights.

Naomi stared at Aurora with her empty eyes for a while. She acted as if this was a normal place.

“You may not have emotions, but you should have manners… Stop coming as you please. I told you that before.”

“I’ve been away from the palace for a long time, but I have the manners.”

It sounded like there was no problem at first glance, but that was just ‘learned’.

In reality, when you face and hear it, it’s bizarre. 

A voice without any intonation. 

A word that is empty except for the concept of ‘sound’.

The emptiness that humans shudder at was melted in Naomi’s voice.

“Manners…”

“Tsk.”

As Naomi muttered that word and started to frown, Aurora just clicked her tongue. 

There was no use getting angry. The other person had no emotions anyway.

“So, what’s the matter with the palace?”

Then Naomi nodded her head.

“Reheln Hill.”

“Why that hill?”

“I heard they’re collecting dawn butterflies from three days later.”

“So. What about it?”

“I’ll watch.”

Naomi rummaged through her bosom and took out a scroll. She showed it to Aurora as if to show her something. Still expressionless.

It was a familiar thing to Aurora’s eyes.

“That’s Flan, that bastard’s hologram… Aha.”

She lifted the corners of her mouth as if she understood.

“I guess you’re interested too.”

“Interested.”

Naomi muttered that word.

“Interested.”

“Interested.”

“Interested.”

She repeated it three more times.

“I don’t know.”

That was all she said.