Chapter 240: So It Was You All Along
The thought was deeply tempting.
It represented a path that might allow her to complete part of her mission more easily, a choice that might perhaps be more beneficial to her people.
And yet that cold, calculating thought existed for less than a single full heartbeat.
In the next instant, countless images burst forth like a flood breaking through a dam, washing away that icy calculation.
Deep within the ruins, before that opened stone door, when Ryan saw her, the way his shoulders loosened, and that plain yet genuine line: “I finally found you.”
Under the Illusion Spider’s frenzied assault, the way Ryan had moved without hesitation to block her, taking the scythe blade with his back, and that low warning: “Do not lose focus.”
When Randall held Lillian hostage, the flash of killing cold in Ryan’s eyes, and the calm profile with which he laid out the rescue.
Before the ball had begun, when she accidentally discovered that he had not prepared formal clothes at all, and for reasons even she could not explain, had gone out of the city to buy him a suit and found some excuse to stuff it into his hands—the strange expression he had worn then.
And even earlier, back at the academy, under the Royal Princess’s command, all those moments of cooperation in which he had seemed indifferent and yet had never shirked anything, the silent protection he offered to burdensome teammates, the concern that would occasionally slip out toward that little maid, Cosette, so utterly at odds with his cold exterior...
He was not the arrogant, scheming northern noble son described in the intelligence reports.
Nor was he merely a temporary companion with whom she had no choice but to cooperate because of the mission.
Ryan Velt was cold. He did not speak much. His expressions were few.
But he would block fatal attacks for his companions. He would risk himself to save others. He would erupt with unimaginable strength to protect the people around him. And when he confirmed that his companions were safe, he would let some small trace of relief show through.
He was a living, complicated, trustworthy...
companion.
Could she really, for the sake of a relic, for the sake of that faint and uncertain possibility, stand by and watch this man—who had just fought at her side and had even saved her—fall into the destroying flames below and vanish without even bones left behind?
No.
The last trace of hesitation vanished completely from Ilyss’s violet eyes, leaving behind only a clarity as pure and resolute as snow and ice.
The elders’ warning echoed in her ears.
“You must conceal your identity at all costs. You must not use the secret arts of the elves. Above all, you must never reveal Starleap or Radiant Glory before humans!”
But there was no time to care anymore.
Ilyss suddenly bit through her lower lip, and the metallic sweetness of blood spread through her mouth.
Both hands came together before her chest, forming seals at a speed that surpassed the understanding of any human magical system, filled with an ancient and mysterious rhythm. At the same time, a difficult, ancient elven incantation, as though it drew resonance from the stars themselves, flowed from her lips. Her voice was soft, yet it carried a strange power that pierced straight through all else.
“By the flowing stars as my guide, by the unfinished promise of our journey as the covenant...”
As she chanted, the magical fluctuation around her, which had seemed ordinary before because of exhaustion and restraint, suddenly became incomparably powerful and profound.
A vast, mysterious aura, as though it came from the deepest reaches of the starry sky, erupted from her small body.
Her black hair rose without wind, and at the tips of it, tiny brilliant points of silver starlight began to glow and drift away.
Most shocking of all, under that silver radiance, the outline of her ears became clear—
sharp and long.
They were the exquisitely beautiful pointed ears of an elf.
“Ilyss, you...?!” Vera, who was closest, widened her gray-green eyes in utter shock. She felt that utterly different magical essence, filled with pressure, and saw the clearly inhuman trait upon Ilyss’s body. Her astonishment could not have been greater.
But Ilyss had no attention left to spare elsewhere.
The instant the incantation was complete, starlight burst from her in a dazzling flash.
In the next moment, her figure vanished from the back of the blue bird as though she had dissolved into the stars themselves.
Ryan could feel only that he was falling.
The wind roared past his ears. Below him surged a wave of destructive heat so intense it seemed capable of melting even his soul.
His body... no longer obeyed him. Every inch of muscle and every bone felt as though it had been crushed completely, then soaked in magma and burned over and over again.
That power which had just moments ago surged like a boundless tide was long gone, leaving behind only the deep, marrow-level pain of something that had been utterly wrung dry.
Was this the backlash from overloading the Gospel?
Mana could not appear out of nowhere. That eruption far beyond his own limits had always been bound to demand a price.
From the Illusion Spider, to Parker’s group, to the final battle with the Witch...
The amount of Mana he had consumed was probably dozens of times greater than his body’s original total, perhaps even more.
This body, this vessel, should have collapsed long ago.
So...
was he going to die here?
The thought surfaced abruptly.
There were still so many things left undone. The rotting mess of the Velt family had not yet been settled. His dangerous cooperation with the Royal Princess had only just begun. And there was the promise he had made to Cosette, that he would go back.
Scene after scene from since his transmigration flashed before his blurring vision like damaged strips of film.
He was unwilling...
but his body no longer had even the strength to move a single finger.
The sound of his heartbeat grew fainter and fainter, farther and farther away, as though separated from him by a thick wall of water.
Darkness bit into his vision little by little. A cold weariness rose like a tide, trying to drag him into an endless sleep.
And then—
at the very edge of that vision being swallowed by darkness, a brilliant starburst exploded without warning.
It expanded in an instant into a slender yet familiar figure, piercing through the searing waves of heat and appearing out of nowhere beside him in his plunging fall.
Silver hair danced wildly in the hot wind, glittering with starlight.
Long pointed ears, belonging to no human, came clearly into view before his fading eyes.
That face...
It was Ilyss, and yet also...
A forgotten corner of his memory lit up violently. The mysterious silver-haired figure from that night overlapped in an instant with the beautiful face before him, now stained with blood and filled with resolve.
“So it was you...?”
His cracked lips moved, the broken breath of the words almost swallowed by the wind.
At almost the exact moment he recognized her, that star-bright figure extended a slender yet powerful arm without the slightest hesitation and wrapped it tightly around his waist, pulling his powerless, falling body firmly into her embrace.
She felt cold to the touch, chilled from loss of warmth.
Ryan’s eyes had already closed. His face was pale as paper, and his breathing was so faint that it seemed as though it might cease at any moment. Only the tight knot in his brow showed how much pain he was enduring.
Without even the slightest hesitation, without even lowering her head to confirm his condition, Ilyss held Ryan close as starlight blazed from her body once more, swallowing both their figures together.
In the next instant, the starlight flashed, and the two of them disappeared from the path of that fatal fall as though they had never been there, leaving only the destruction below, where the flames still raged as though intent on devouring everything.
The two of them reappeared on the back of the blue bird.
Ilyss staggered the moment she landed. Her face turned even paler than Ryan’s, and her breath became chaotic. It was clear that those two ultra-short Starleaps had drained her terribly, perhaps even bringing some forbidden backlash down upon her.
But she did not stop.
She carefully laid the unconscious Ryan down on the bird’s back, where the still-shaken Lillian and Rex hurried to catch and support him.
Ilyss took a deep breath and forced down the metallic sweetness rising into her throat. Then she brought her hands together once more before her chest, fingertips meeting in a seal even more complex than before, as though it encompassed the pathways of an entire star chart.
She closed her eyes. Her long lashes trembled as more starlight poured out of her body, enveloping her, the blue bird beneath her feet, and everyone riding on its back in a hazy, brilliant radiance.
“Radiant Glory: Starrealm Guidance!”
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