Chapter 137
After mailing the newly developed Doctor's Crystal to Wuxian Group headquarters, we left Shenyang. It was back to another stretch of travel by steam locomotive.
Shenyang, Beijing, and Wuhan in China are connected by rail. Railway construction west of Wuhan is still under way. China's economic development is concentrated in the east, where there are many plains suitable for farming and livestock raising, so development is prioritized there as well. The mountainous west has been left for later. There are still many de facto lawless regions in the west that remain paradises for monsters.
The eastern region was supposed to be safe, but an ominous announcement came over the train's speakers on our way to Beijing.
A matter-of-fact voice came through the speaking tube installed in the first-class cabin.
"We will soon be entering the Everdark Plains. For approximately the next hour, please keep your windows closed. If a ghost approaches within arm's reach of a window, please call a staff member."
That was the entirety of the announcement. The speaking tube fell silent without any further explanation.
Since they had mentioned the windows, I pressed my face against the glass and looked outside. A gigantic black dome lay ahead in our direction of travel. The pitch-black hemisphere was large enough to swallow an entire city the size of Tokyo, and it rejected every bit of light despite it being the middle of the day.
What is that? Creepy.
The route makes it look like we're going straight into that thing. Is that safe?
"Hiyori, Hiyori. What's that black thing? It looks dangerous."
When I shook Hiyori's shoulder and pointed out the window, she glanced at my fingertip, then returned her gaze to the letter she had been writing to Professor Okojo.
"The Everdark Plains. They just announced it."
"Why are you so calm about this...? Is that thing normal, or something? What even is it?"
"Hmm? Oh, right—you don't know. The Everdark Plains are, uh, simply put, terrain created by runaway magic."
According to Professor Hiyori's all-knowing explanation, the Everdark Plains were a special region created when Midnight Magic ran wild.
Midnight Magic originally belonged to the Night Witch of the Tokyo Witches' Gathering.
The Night Witch's strength varied greatly between day and night, but by using Midnight Magic to deploy a gigantic black dome, she could operate during the day as though it were night. It was always midnight inside the dome, and the stars were visible.
Bai Lingxian, a Chinese Transcendent, tried to use that Midnight Magic. As someone with a ghost's body, Bai Lingxian functioned better at night, though not as much as the Night Witch did.
However, Midnight Magic ran wild. Since Bai Lingxian had boosted it with a staff and expanded its range, the spell blasted apart and swallowed an entire city before solidifying in place. Bai Lingxian also exploded and died at that time.
People abandoned the city, where sunlight no longer reached, and ghost-type monsters gathered there instead.
And that was how the colossal black-dome region known as the Everdark Plains came into being, providing midnight around the clock, 365 days a year.
"So, like the Hell Witch's Hell Magic...?"
I asked while recalling the Hell Witch's magic, which had once destroyed Adachi Ward, and Hiyori nodded.
"Yeah, the principle is the same. Unlike that one, though, it doesn't expand over time. The ghost monsters that gather there are all docile, too. They won't approach as long as the train lights are on. The magic itself is harmless."
"So it's safe?"
"Safe enough to be a tourist attraction. They wouldn't run a train through a dangerous area."
"True...!"
It looked terrifying, so I had panicked, but obviously public transportation wouldn't pass through a dangerous area. That made sense.
While we were talking, the train entered the Everdark Plains, and it abruptly became night the moment we passed beneath the dome. The temperature dropped a little as well, and here and there in the distance, I could see ghosts wandering in the gentle moonlight outside the windows.
When the semi-transparent ghosts were illuminated by the train's brilliant lights, they melted smoothly into the darkness and vanished.
Somehow, rather than a horror space, it felt more like a test of courage. It was scary, sure, but I didn't feel in danger.
"What if a monster strong enough to ignore the light appears?"
"That's when exorcism magic comes into play. Exorcism magic is especially effective against ghost monsters. Even if it can't defeat one, it'll run away."
"I see. Are there other magical terrains like this?"
Once I knew it was harmless, my tension eased. I asked while feeling like a tourist and gazing at the various ghosts drifting far off beyond the dark window, and Hiyori counted them off on her fingers as she recalled them.
"Let's see... Hmm, there are quite a few. The ferry from Japan to Korea took a route that avoided the 'Maelstrom of the Sea God,' and last year's Ireland-Britain conflict must have increased the amount of magical terrain in Britain. Grand Magic is prone to running wild and creating magical terrain. Hell Magic is a good example.
Ah, right. There's also a snowy mountain created by runaway Grand Glacier Magic."
"Wait. Hiyori, do you lose control of your magic too?"
I had imagined Blue Witch-sama as having impeccable mana control, but perhaps that wasn't the case.
When I looked surprised, Hiyori shook her head.
"It wasn't me. There was a mage who died after making Grand Glacier Magic run wild. The blast center is now a world of snow and ice all year round. I've heard they're gradually restoring it and decontaminating it with dispelling magic. I wonder how much of it has been restored by now..."
"So using Grand Magic you aren't suited for tends to make it run wild?"
"Exactly. That's the idea. If I used Flame Magic recklessly, it would probably run wild too."
Foresight Magic causes severe brain damage when used by anyone other than a Foresight Mage, and even Hiyori herself finds Grand Glacier Magic difficult to control.
Being able to use every incantation spell as long as you can chant it and have enough mana is convenient, but "being able to use" something and "being able to master it" are entirely different matters.
It's a tricky business. The Everdark Plains are kind of fun in a test-of-courage sort of way when you're just watching them pass from inside a train, but knowing they were created by the explosive death of a Transcendent is chilling. Terrifying.
"Also, incantation magic is more prone to losing control than non-incantation magic."
"Oh?"
As we talked, Hiyori seemed to have switched into magic-theory mode. She set aside her letter to Professor Okojo and gave me a more technical explanation.
This is useful. Give me more of that. I can never hear too much about magic theory.
"For example, I've learned to reproduce 'Frozen Javelin' without an incantation. I'm not creating the same effect through a rough imitation. I've completely reproduced the mana movements of the incantation spell without chanting it."
"So the incantation itself isn't powerful; the incantation creates a pattern of mana movement, and the magic activates as a result of that movement?"
"You catch on fast. I'm still waiting to hear Kei-chan's opinion, so an expert on incantations might have a different view. But that's what I think."
Then Hiyori's interpretation had to be right.
After all, no one surpasses the Blue Witch in mana manipulation.
I had seen Hiyori reproduce on the spot, even more imperfectly, the non-incantation magic that Iruma had imperfectly reproduced from a spell used by Octameteorite. Her sense for manipulating mana was exceptional.
"I think incantation magic is an instant-casting method for non-incantation magic. It works even if you don't understand the principles, can't control mana, or don't use a non-incantation mechanism. As long as you pronounce and recite it correctly, the magic activates. Efficient, right?
On the other hand, since you don't understand the principles and leave mana control to the incantation, it's prone to running wild. If you fiddle by feel with a packaged black box, of course you'll cause bugs and make it malfunction. Even more so if you're fiddling with magic that wasn't originally yours."
"I see...?"
In short, it was the difference between an app and a program.
Incantation magic was an app.
It activated easily with a tap.
But if you carelessly fiddled with an app's program, it could crash or malfunction.
Because you didn't really understand what was inside an app's program in the first place.
Non-incantation magic was a program.
You had to write and run the program yourself every time.
It was a hassle, but it was easy to modify, and even if it malfunctioned, you could fix it.
Because you understood what was inside a program you had made yourself.
"I understand the logic. But it still doesn't quite sit right with me.
Like, why do we even have incantation apps like that in the first place? I mean, they're convenient, sure, but...
Why are convenient incantation apps forcibly hammered into the brains of people with a static-prone constitution?"
"Who knows? In the end, I suppose every problem traces back to the Gremlin Disaster. Why did the Gremlin Disaster happen? Where did the magic stones come from? Where did the Shantak meteor shower that rained those magic stones down on Earth come from? Or, for that matter, why did it come at all? The root of it all must lie there."
An underlying mystery lay before us, and we pondered it while watching the black Everdark Plains fly past outside the window.
It was always like this. Whenever I thought I'd figured something out, the number of things I didn't know only grew.
"Hey, has magic theory really advanced during the eighty years I was dead? I feel like the things I don't know have increased tenfold for every new thing I've learned."
"That's what scholarship is like. Isn't that what makes it fun? I wouldn't know."
"!? So if you like something even when you don't understand it, learning more about it is even more fun! Is that why I've started feeling happy every time I learn something about you, Hiyori? I get it now."
"O-oh. How did you get from a discussion this logical to that? What is going on in your thought process?"
Hiyori scratched her cheek, a little embarrassed, then returned to writing her letter to Okojo as if to cover up her embarrassment.
The journey still had a long way to go, and life did too.
We could take our time learning.
About magic, and about Hiyori.