NOVEL NEXT WORLD Chapter 153
At that moment, a memory spontaneously popped into my head.
It was the conversation I had had with Lord River when we had stopped by the stream on the way to the Bouser residence.
He had admitted that he had approached me on purpose, and at the same time had said something like this.
— “Until I met you, Dahlia.” — “I knew it from the first time I saw you, but you look like someone I know, and that’s part of what caught my eye.” — “Yes. Someone I was briefly indebted to when I was younger…”As he said that, he gave me a strange look, so I felt uncomfortable and couldn’t help but ask.
— “Do you still think of her when you see me?”I remember what he said.
— “No, I know it’s someone else.” “That’s what you said before…” “Yes?”At my little mumble, Cecil, who had been fixing my hair behind me, looked up.
Shrugging it off as nothing, I turned my attention back to the road ahead. In the mirror sat a woman with a grim expression.
And to match the expression, I was actually quite unconcerned.
Of course, I guess that O’Neill was the person Lord River was referring to, and I don’t know his true feelings…
Still, his behavior in the past hasn’t been one to leave any stone unturned.
‘He said he was looking for a woman.’
Actually, I had a feeling before that. But it wasn’t until I heard the words that I prepared myself.
When I realized that Lord River was looking for a woman, I immediately thought of someone I knew who looked like me.
As I watched him come north, desperately searching for someone, I wondered if this day would come one day.
‘But I never thought it would be O’Neill…’
Indeed, I had no idea.
In the original novel, Lord River’s meeting with O’Neill was supposed to take place after the celebration of the founding of the country.
After all, that’s when the story begins.
But the person we saw yesterday didn’t look like he was meeting O’Neill for the first time.
‘You said you were indebted to her before, so does that mean you already knew her?’
It wasn’t as if the future had suddenly changed, it had always been twisted. Where did it start to go wrong?
After a moment’s pause, I asked, “When did you say she came?”
“What?” “The wizard.”Cecil shook her head at my short answer, and the other maid, who had noticed, replied coldly.
“If you mean the silver-haired woman, she’s only been here a few days…” “Really?” “Yes. When she first appeared, everyone was quite surprised. Suddenly, a large magic circle was carved in front of the mansion, and then a burst of white light and a person appeared. I’ve never seen such a sight in my life.”‘A large magic circle.’
Listening to her description, I narrowed my eyes.
It was common knowledge that magic could not be used in the north, where the magic fields were unstable.
To be able to use magic at will despite such conditions, and to be able to use spatial magic, which was said to be difficult to cast, so freely…
“What did you say, the next master of the magic tower?” “Yes. She certainly said so, and then she showed me a letter from the Princess, if it wasn’t for that, I might have been in real trouble…”Cecil, who had been listening to the explanation beside me, asked in surprise.
“What?” “The knights came out in droves, and the lords themselves drew their swords.”Well, it wasn’t just Lord River who was strange.
‘The next Master of the Tower?’
That seems impossible. If I remember correctly, O’Neill was…
‘Wasn’t she a saint?’
Usually in fiction, heroines are often called saints.
Not unlike many such heroines, O’Neill had a great deal of divine power.
She didn’t realize it, but through a special event, her divine powers manifested and she was declared a saint.
And the ‘real’ next Master of Magic Tower was not an ordinary extra in the first place. He was also a subordinate male lead who became involved with the heroine…
‘What happened to him?’
Where did the sub who was supposed to be there disappear to, where did O’Neill learn magic, and when did she improve enough to be considered the next Master?
There were so many things that didn’t make sense.
And if I wasn’t the only one puzzled by her identity, Cecil added, shaking her head.
“For someone so young to be the next Master of Magic Tower… I wonder if she’s hiding her true age? Maybe she uses magic to change her appearance or something…” “Well…”It wasn’t as if I hadn’t thought of that when I heard about O’Neill.
I wondered if she wasn’t just hiding her age, but if someone else was pretending to be her.
But why would anyone want to imitate O’Neill, even if they did happen to look like her, I wasn’t sure if it was really a
‘coincidence’.
Eventually, I had to put my nagging doubts to rest.
‘I’ll know when I see her in person.’
After all, she was a wizard of whom I had summoned myself, and aside from being the original heroine, she was a wizard with a purpose.
Whether she realized it or not, she came to see me first.
“You said she was in the reception room?” “Yes. She’s already waiting for you there.”Cecil, who had finished dressing me, stepped back.
I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. My neatly styled appearance was as usual, but my face was strangely rigid, showing how nervous I was.
Managing to keep my expression straight, I stood up. I followed Cecil where she led me, muttering to myself.
‘So, is everything going to be okay?’
There was something. I looked at her, unable to hide my embarrassment.
‘What did she just say?’
I headed for the reception room, where O’Neill was waiting, clearly on edge.
When I reached the door, I hesitated for a moment, but then gathered myself and slowly opened it.
Soon enough, I saw O’Neill sitting in a chair in the room.
O’Neill looked familiar, yet still strange.
It was as if she had been reunited with Rudrick after a long absence, and there was a woman in front of her, a gloriously beautiful woman who seemed out of place.
She looked back in the direction of the sound, made eye contact with me, and said something like this.
“Dahlia!”‘What?’
She turned to see if I wasn’t the only one startled by the sudden call, and even the people listening in turned to look at her.
She blinked, puzzled by the sudden attention. Then, as if realizing what she’d said in hindsight, she clapped her hands over her mouth in surprise.
Looking at the cute little thing, I thought, ‘That’s adorable.’
Instead of being angry that a fairy could do that to me, I felt like, ‘That’s understandable.’
In a way, I could understand the men who were drooling over her every move.
She clasped her hands together and fidgeted, then looked up at me with her bright eyes and said in a small voice.
“I’m sorry, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you, I can’t help it…” “It’s okay, it could be…”I said, mesmerized by her face.
‘Long time no see?’
“Have we met before?”I asked, unable to hide my embarrassment.
No matter how much I thought about it, no. I hadn’t seen a trace of O’Neill, let alone met her.
I couldn’t believe I was so nervous about my first meeting with the original heroine.
But the person who said it didn’t seem to mind.
On the contrary, she just shook her head in disbelief and asked back.
“What? You don’t know yet? But I thought you did…” “What?” “Oh.”O’Neill mumbled something unintelligible, then stared at me. Then, as if realizing something, she let out a short exclamation.
“I see, so that’s what happened.” “What do you mean…”She smiled apologetically at my inability to follow the conversation.
“No, I must have gotten the wrong person, and I’m sorry for the embarrassment.” “What? Oh, right. Okay.”I nodded nervously, thinking to myself.
‘But didn’t you exactly call me by my name?’
You don’t expect me to believe that the person who mistook me for someone else just happened to have the same name as me, do you?
But O’Neill, smiling broadly in front of me, didn’t seem inclined to tell me the truth, and I had to stifle a sigh.
Seeing me like that, O’Neill spoke up again, sounding excited.
“I’m afraid it’s too late, but I’m going to give you an offer again. I’m O’Neill, a mage from the Magic Tower, and I hope you’ll take good care of me.” “Yes, me too… By the way, do you have a last name?” “No. I abandoned my last name when I entered the tower, so feel free to call me by my first name.”I don’t remember the details, but I’m pretty sure in the original she had a last name…
But I’d already changed a lot of other little things, so I simply nodded and moved on.
“All right, O’Neill. Have you seen my proposal?” “The proposal? Um….”O’Neill scrunched up her eyebrows as if she was thinking about something, then nodded.
“Uh, yeah. It says you have some research to do on magic, and you need someone skilled in alchemy.” “I mean exactly what you say, as a matter of fact….”From there, I outlined to her what I had found out.
Without going into too much detail, I told her that I’d stumbled upon the cave, that it was actually a demon tomb, and that I’d discovered that when demons die there, they become magic ore.
She listened to me in silence, and then she replied bluntly.
“It’s been discussed amongst us that the source of the magic ore is a demon, and you must have confirmed it yourself.” “Yes. The corpse of the demon I saw was halfway through turning into magic ore and merging with the cave, so I was thinking…” “What?” “Maybe we could use the demon to create a new power source?”O’Neill’s eyes widened slightly.
“A new power source?” “Yes. If the source of the magic ore is a demon, then that means there’s a lot of potential magic within it.” “That’s right, and it sounds like when they die and become magic ore, the magic power inside them doesn’t disperse, but instead solidifies…”She paused in thought for a moment, then grinned at me.
“That’s a good idea, to extract the magic power inside the demon and use it as a power source…” “Is that possible?” “In theory, it should be possible, but I guess we’ll have to try it to find out, and I think it’s more likely if the demon is alive…” “Would it be harder with a dead one? I’m thinking that if we have to capture them alive, they might be harder to come by.” “I’ll take that into consideration and research it.”O’Neill nodded, and we talked for a while about the future direction of the research.
When I realized that the original heroine was actually from the Magic Tower, I felt a strange sense of unease, as if I was about to be disrupted.
But she seemed pretty confident that she wasn’t lying about being the next Master of the Tower.
Then again, on second thought, O’Neill had a lot of things going for her with the protagonist buff.
Relieved, I spoke up in excitement.
“I’ll do what I can to help you with your research, and since Bouser is amid a full-scale extermination right now, I’m sure you’ll have no trouble finding the creatures you need for your experiments since the Duke and I are well acquainted.” “I suppose so. It’ll be easier to ask His Excellency since he’s your partner…” “Yes?” “What?”