Chapter 74
I slowly climbed down from the castle wall.
…
The inside of the castle was wrapped in an eerie silence.
The cheers and screams that had echoed just moments ago were gone.
The soldiers had all stopped what they were doing and stared blankly down at the sand pit beyond the wall.
The spot where nothing remained, as if a giant tidal wave had swept through.
It was so clean it was hard to believe an orc horde had ever been there.
The silence was broken by the sound of a soldier dropping the sword in his hand.
Clang-.
That tiny sound became the signal flare.
Someone burst into tears.
"W-we're alive...."
Starting with that, the suppressed voices erupted.
"Waaaaaaa!"
A cheer that seemed ready to shake the entire wall loose.
The soldiers threw their arms around each other and shouted.
Relief at escaping death, excitement at witnessing an unbelievable miracle.
Soon, all that fervor converged in one place.
Right at me.
"It's the Great Sage!"
"Wouldn't Little Sage suit him better than Great Sage?"
"Is that so? The Little Sage saved us!"
People crowded around me.
But no one dared touch me; they only looked at me from a few steps away.
Their eyes were full of pure worship.
Some even knelt right there and began praying.
A very awkward situation.
"How can such power come from such a tiny, slender body...."
"That isn't human strength. He must have received a divine blessing."
"Could he actually be an angel?"
"Indeed!"
An angel?
I had to hold back the grimace twisting my face.
Just hearing it made my whole body cringe.
So they say you can't handle too much praise. It really was true.
Just as I was worrying that my face might be red enough for them to notice,
Seymour, the other commanders, and even the crowned king hurried over to me.
They all wore expressions that couldn't hide their excitement.
The king came up to me and, forgetting he was a monarch, bowed deeply from the waist.
"I don't know how to repay your kindness, Great Sage. You have saved our entire kingdom."
"Ahem. Please raise your head."
I gave a small cough.
Just then,
"N-no way...."
A dying voice came from behind the crowd.
It was Gerard, the court mage.
He was barely standing by bracing himself against the wall, wearing a dazed expression.
Gerard's gaze turned toward me.
His pupils shook violently as if an earthquake had struck them.
"This... this isn't magic...."
Gerard screamed, pointing at me.
"Don't be fooled! That is neither a sage nor an angel! That thing isn't magic, I tell you!"
An even fiercer reaction than in the conference room.
"It is impossible to cast magic on this scale in an instant! It is a power that ignores every law of magic!"
"...Sir Gerard?"
"An angel? No, that is a demon! A demon in a child's guise is deceiving us!"
At Gerard's scream, the area went silent.
The soldiers stared at the court mage as if he were insane.
There was no way they could understand him shouting "demon" at the benefactor who had just saved them.
The king shouted angrily.
"Court Mage! Have you lost your mind? What nonsense are you spouting at our benefactor!"
"It isn't nonsense, Your Majesty! Open your eyes! That man is beyond what we can handle! We must seal that demon at once...!"
"Take him away. It seems the shock of battle has made him lose his mind."
"Your Majesty! Your Majesty! Let go of me! Mmph, mmph...!"
Before Gerard could even finish, two soldiers acting on the general's orders covered his mouth and grabbed both his arms.
Even as he was dragged away, the court mage struggled desperately and shouted incomprehensible things at me.
"Why is he suddenly acting like that?"
"Wasn't the court mage always a little... petty?"
"His jealousy must have exploded at the appearance of a younger mage more talented than him. Tsk tsk...."
People clicked their tongues and watched the scene.
It seemed they thought the kingdom's archmage had gone completely mad from jealousy and shock.
Watching that, I felt oddly uneasy for no reason.
He was annoying, sure, but seeing him like that left a bad taste in my mouth.
Besides, there was a good chance he'd have an effect on the next floor, or the one after that.
No need to make an enemy for no reason.
I spoke up to the king.
"Please be lenient with him. I'm fine."
"Indeed, the true Sage has a broad heart. If that is the Sage's wish, so be it."
The king bowed to me again.
"Once again, I thank you with all the power of our kingdom. Your name will be forever recorded in our history."
Hardly had he finished speaking when a system message appeared before my eyes.
[You have saved a kingdom on the brink of destruction.]
[The people of the kingdom worship you as a 'Sage'.]
[Title: [Little Sage of the Desert] obtained.]
"I don't need the 'little' part...."
I muttered as I stared into empty space.
In one corner of my vision, a timer showed the time remaining until Floor 32 was cleared.
[Time remaining: 21 minutes 17 seconds]
A 30-minute defense quest.
The timer had only just crossed the 8-minute mark.
[Congratulations on clearing Tower Floor 32 (EXTREME).]
A moment later, a golden skill book floated up before me.
I already knew what would happen next.
[The first-clear bonus has been applied!]
[The rank 1 bonus has been applied!]
The promised second-stage evolution.
In a wash of light, a thick book was placed in my hand.
The cover was shining brilliantly in rainbow colors.
[Active Skill: Mirage]
[Grade: Rainbow]
[Conceal the truth with light.]
***
The moment I got home, I headed straight for the basement training room.
I was tired, but my mind was full of curiosity about the new skill.
My third Rainbow skill, Mirage.
There was one thing I'd recently noticed.
The higher the skill grade, the snarkier the description got.
So I had to test every effect myself to figure it out.
"Well, it's not like I have no guesses."
This skill was probably one that created illusions.
I activated Mirage on the sand floor.
What kind of illusion should I make?
I pictured Seymour, the knight commander I had met inside the tower, and tried to create his likeness.
"This doesn't seem to work...."
No shape appeared at all.
This time, I tried making an illusion of an inanimate object like a computer or a cell phone.
The phone worked, but the computer failed.
"Ah. So the real object has to be in my line of sight."
Having figured out the condition, I repeated a few experiments.
Before long, I had worked out the skill's exact conditions.
"It only activates on sand, and the real object has to be in my line of sight."
I moved to the living room and sprinkled a little sand on the floor.
I selected Chohogi, who was sitting on the floor looking at his phone, as my target, then activated the skill.
On the sand, a perfect copy of Chohogi appeared.
"…!"
Chohogi's eyes widened at the sight of another version of himself appearing in front of him.
The little guy cautiously approached and reached out toward his illusion.
Poke. Chohogi poked at it.
His hand passed through the illusion without any resistance.
"…?"
Chohogi looked back and forth between his hand and the illusion, seeming confused.
This time, he touched the illusion a little harder.
But the result was the same.
"…!"
He reached out into empty air, toppled over, and looked bewildered.
I burst out laughing at the sight.
It was like a cat lunging at its reflection in a mirror.
After playing with him for a bit, I moved on to the next experiment.
I focused my mana on the illusion once more.
Chohogi's illusion instantly began to grow huge.
The illusion transformed into a giant figure, becoming so large its head nearly touched the ceiling.
"!!!"
Seeing his own image suddenly grow bigger, the real Chohogi was startled and fell backward.
He looked up at the giant version of himself with wide eyes.
It seemed I could freely enlarge the illusion however I wanted.
I controlled the enlarged illusion and made it walk around the living room once.
The illusion moved smoothly according to my will.
But the moment its foot touched the living-room floor, where no sand had been spread, the giant shape vanished like smoke.
The illusion couldn't be maintained once it left the sand-covered area.
"How much sand do I actually need?"
I cleared away all the sand on the floor except for a single handful.
And then I cast the skill once more.
Surprisingly, a perfect illusion of Chohogi sprang up again from just a single handful of sand.
"It's basically like a screen."
In other words, as long as I had a handful of sand, I could use this magic anywhere.
A genius idea suddenly popped into my head.
"Could I make an illusion from a photo?"
I rummaged through the gallery on my phone.
There happened to be a photo I'd taken recently.
It was a photo of the Magic-Cutting Youth flashing a double peace sign.
"It works...."
There was the drawback that I couldn't change the pose, but an identical illusion was created all the same.
I looked at that unpleasant grin, then swept my hand to disperse the illusion.
***
Having finished experimenting with the skill, I sat down in front of the computer in high spirits.
It would have been a waste to keep to myself the fact that I'd obtained a new Rainbow-grade skill.
News like this had to be posted in the Mage Gallery first, of course.
Just as I was about to write a quick post,
[Title: Want to Visit the Research Lab This Week?]
"Huh?"
The refrigerator had written a post.