Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 563

Zone 25, a designated restricted area, was completely isolated from the outside world. A past space-time, detached from a timeline decades ago, had become isolated.

However, this phenomenon wasn’t caused by Kaise’s successful space-time fixation research. It was the result of a study that should have ended in failure, the continuation of a past time by someone using the restricted area as a cradle.

Lenox and Kaise intended to find the entity dreaming this dream within this space-time and completely resolve this anomaly, but even after making such a serious resolution, the two were still bickering about how to handle the fixation device.

“I’m telling you, you can’t completely stop the fixation device right now. Have you even been listening to me?”

“As long as the power source exists here, it can be reactivated at any time,” Lenox retorted, manipulating the control panel instead of Kaise.

“It’s better to stop the device once and find the problem. Why are you interfering?”

“No, it’s not interference, it’s correction. From the perspective of mana particle observation theory, it’s irreversible from the moment you observe the internal particle flow. We need to find the cause before stopping the device.”

“The non-determinacy of mana particles isn’t significant in a space where time is fixed. That’s an outdated theory that doesn’t explain the spiritual resonance phenomenon of mana in the first place.”

Kaise frowned at Lenox’s answer.

“……Damn it. It hasn’t even been five years since the observation theory was published at the Trabah Magic Tower, and it’s already considered trash?”

“If you understand, step back and wait for my instructions. It’s exhausting to explain to a researcher who’s been lagging behind for decades.”

Kaise’s eyebrows twitched in frustration at Lenox’s words.

“Ho, hooo…… There wasn’t a single researcher who could talk to me like that to my face……”

“Now there’s one, so you can be happy.”

“……”

Kaise, speechless, grumbled incessantly behind Lenox.

“I guess this is what they mean by saying you get bad luck when you meet a future person. I’ve learned an unnecessary truth I didn’t want to know……”

“Who do you think is really unlucky here right now?”

Even while arguing without giving an inch, their hands moved busily on the control panel.

Kaise was also moving busily around the pillar of light, constantly adjusting the power unit to minimize the recoil.

Kugugugu!!

“Still, I don’t think differently. Now that things have progressed this far, it’s dangerous to stop the fixation device ambiguously in any way,” Kaise said, sweating profusely from the outer edge of the fixation device where light was bursting out.

“Do you think I backed up the fixation device data for no reason when you blew up the power room?”

“Whether the fixation device is operating or not is likely not significantly related to this phenomenon. I told you,” Lenox retorted, also manipulating the control panel incessantly.

“This space existed even before we completed the research. Now, the possibility of something going wrong if we stop the device is one in ten thousand—”

“It does exist, one in ten thousand. Doesn’t it?”

“……”

Lenox raised his gaze at Kaise’s unsettling reply.

“What happens if the device stops working, and we end up in a situation where we’re neither dead nor alive?”

“Kaise.”

“After this is successful, I will disappear along with this space. But that’s not just because I sincerely want it,” Kaise said quietly.

“It’s because I know there’s no other way, and more than anything, it’s just to end it in the most certain way. I can’t tolerate such a half-hearted compromise.”

“A half-hearted compromise……”

Lenox quietly pondered the words Kaise had uttered.

Because he was certain that he was a being of the past. Because he understood that this situation itself was a space created by someone other than Kaise.

Kaise was trying to put a definite end to this timeline, putting everything else aside.

But that didn’t mean he had given up on his will to live, or that he no longer sought answers.

Knowing that he still had lingering attachments to himself, he wanted to take measures to ensure that no room was left.

Because otherwise, even Kaise himself couldn’t guarantee how he would act in the final moment.

Reaching that point, Lenox inadvertently turned his gaze and muttered, “You don’t trust yourself.”

“Is that even a question?” Kaise chuckled and roughly tapped the parts of the fixation device.

Clank!

The device’s joint broke with that touch, and the light from the light source gradually dimmed.

“Since embarking on the journey to find answers, I’ve never once believed in the answers I’ve come up with,” Kaise started walking, watching the giant pillar of light gradually fade and disappear.

Crack!!

As he tore off the power joint and overloaded the output, the pillar of light gradually faded.

The shape of the fixation device, which had bloomed like a flower, shrank and gradually returned to the shape of an egg each time the light went out.

Kaise walked around the fixation device incessantly, speaking.

“Alkaid knew a lot, but most of it was just knowledge of failed results. In the end, it was entirely up to me to move towards the answer.”

“……”

This was the first time Kaise had spoken about what Alkaid was like with his own mouth.

“Every moment was a time of shaking off and clearing away doubts and delusions. I was overwhelmed just by falling, breaking, and failing. After decades like that, I created the city of Balkan…… I gathered infrastructure and resources, and finally, I’ve come this far……”

Kaise, who had been unable to speak for a long time, slowly struck down and broke the last power joint.

Shuuuung……!!

The appearance of the fixation device, which had returned to the shape of a giant egg in front of the two of them.

Kaise stared at the egg-like device with an indescribable expression, then slowly walked down from between them.

Kaise, who had been silently gazing at Lenox, smiled weakly.

“But sometimes, you have to finish your journey in an unexpected place. Isn’t that right?”

“……”

Lenox couldn’t answer. He didn’t know what to say to him, who was trying to put an end to his own time.

If the ending that came to Lenox one day was in this way, would Lenox be able to accept and agree to that situation?

The strength to accept even the irrationality and absurdity that was unrelated to his own will as his own will.

Kaise’s self-righteousness was a resolution to never share even such pain and suffering with others.

As Lenox manipulated the control panel in reverse to shut it down, the joints of the fixation device fused and broke off.

The giant egg shape slowly losing its light and sinking.

Kaise stood in front of it and slowly closed his eyes.

“Completely cut off the backup power and format the system. At that moment, I will deploy the magnetic field and find the entity dreaming the dream directly.”

Only his voice echoed quietly from the top floor of the ventilation tower.

“If I use my technique to reverse the time itself where the fixation device existed, there will definitely be a crack somewhere in this space. And, next is you……”

“Are you saying to wake them from the dream?”

“……If we can find them, ending it in the dream itself won’t be difficult. Especially if the entity that created this space is who I suspect.”

Only then did Lenox realize the real reason why Kaise needed someone who was not affected by the reverse mana.

It wasn’t just that he needed help to stop the fixation device.

The image drawn by Kaise Bajir’s magnetic field would basically be a landscape based on reverse mana.

The only person who could help Kaise without being affected in the midst of an image where all the flows of power were reversed.

From the beginning, what Lenox had to do was already decided.

“Wake them from the dream, huh……”

But instead of mentioning that fact, Lenox turned the topic by fiddling with the control panel.

“When I asked if the one dreaming the dream was an Outer God, you only said they were comparable to them. You avoided giving a concrete answer,” Lenox said, looking at Kaise, who didn’t answer.

“That’s proof that this situation is not related to the Outer Sea [a realm of powerful, often malevolent entities], but at the same time, it’s somewhat related to you.”

With Davi’s help, Lenox entered the format codes into all the systems on the control panel one by one, and asked, leaving only the last backup power unit.

“It was Alkaid, wasn’t it?”

“……”

“When you realized that you were a person of the past, you knew that the entity dreaming in this space-time was him,” Lenox continued without waiting for an answer.

“That’s why you could accept it ending like this. Because you knew that this situation was one of the failures that started from yourself.”

An endless silence flowed.

But Lenox didn’t lose his composure and waited for Kaise’s next words.

The roar of battle echoing around them gradually faded, and the shockwaves that had been bursting out from all directions subsided.

“Yes…… That’s why when you first said that name, I didn’t doubt it at all,” Kaise quietly opened his mouth, facing the night sky that was gradually, but surely, becoming quieter.

“I was feeling a sense of unease about this situation itself, and I thought he had sent a helper to resolve it. I thought maybe you were another being who had obtained that qualification.”

“……”

“But that wasn’t it. If you were truly a being who had obtained that qualification, the space-time fixation research would never have succeeded in that way. At that moment, I……”

Was he thinking that everything surrounding him might just be fragments of the past?

From the beginning, Kaise knew that the cause of all this phenomenon was from a dream that the entity called Alkaid was having.

“I see.”

As Lenox finally shut down the backup power system and started the format, the joints of the giant egg began to close completely.

Squeak……!!

The shape of the closing fixation device. The giant pillar of light that had been shooting up into the sky disappeared, and a clear crack was visible above the night sky.

Kaise stood in front of the fixation device, watching that scene, and Lenox raised his mana in front of him.

Woo-oong!!

At the moment the magnetic field was deployed, he had to keep his consciousness clear without being consumed by the reverse mana.

“You have to be careful,” Kaise said quietly, looking at Lenox, who had come closer.

“Even when I was devising this research with Alkaid, he wasn’t that kind of person. But the fact that things have turned out like this is proof that either me or Alkaid in the future has changed.”

“……”

“In the worst case, it might be both of us……”

At the same time as Lenox raised his hand and placed it on Kaise’s shoulder, the surrounding air began to distort slightly.

The reverse mana was twisting the entire space-time and turning it into a stepping stone for deploying the image.

Kaise, standing on the faint ripples spreading out from under his feet, continued to speak.

“Even if we successfully resolve this, you must return to reality and confirm the truth. Aside from the people involved, only a very few powerful figures, including the mayor, knew the whole story of the project at the time.”

“I remember.”

The mayor of the great city.

Come to think of it, a considerable amount of time had passed since Lenox had been active in Balkan, but he had never seen the mayor’s face directly.

If there was no news that the mayor had changed or died, it meant that the person who had risen to the top of the city decades ago was still holding that position.

No, was it even possible that such a person was still alive and well, carrying out public duties?

Even though he knew that John Meyer’s ultimate goal was the position of mayor of Balkan, Lenox had never really thought deeply about the position of mayor itself.

Perhaps that itself was a clue.

While Lenox was lost in thought, Kaise hesitated for a moment and fell silent.

“And, and…… yes, I have to say this much.”

With a look as if he had let go of something, Kaise slowly closed his eyes as if he had made up his mind.

“Alkaid is……”

Poof!!

Kaise’s body trembled greatly once and then stopped abruptly.

His face, with a slightly dazed gaze, lowered.

A dark hand that had emerged from the center of his chest pierced through his chest and was aiming for Lenox’s heart.

But in the end, it couldn’t reach Lenox’s heart, and the arm, unable to penetrate the shield, subsided.

The giant eggshell that had been behind Kaise had already been shattered into pieces.

A dark shadow that had burst out from inside the fixation device, which they thought had been completely closed and broken.

Something that seemed to resemble a human form, yet had an infinitely alien atmosphere as if it were not human at all.

It was as if it had condensed the starlight and the Milky Way of the night sky and was imitating a human.

[Dreaming is ultimately what it means.]

The shadow whispered in a tone as if gently caressing Kaise’s heart, which it had shattered.

[While chasing an unattainable ideal, it can disappear like a bubble at any time.]

“You are……!!” Kaise, trembling and convulsing with an expression of disbelief, turned around.

[This is the last promise left to us, and the first message sent to the failed timeline.]

Thud!!

The shadow, nonchalantly wiping away the pouring blood, slowly raised its gaze.

The gaze, which could not be directed, was not towards the collapsing Kaise, but towards Lenox, who was standing beyond him.

[From now on…… I will deliver the will left behind by Kaise Bajir before he died.]