Chapter 78

He walked among hundreds of withered, fallen trees. Even the trees that had seemed like they’d run forever couldn’t survive on nark alone.

Quilbion examined the sky-barrier that severed the world.

The cohesive force of the nark had weakened.

It was the result of trees cloaked in nark ramming the sky-barrier for over four months.

He gripped the concretized rake in his hand and scraped the barrier vigorously. The barrier rippled and was drawn toward the rake.

Cracks appeared in the sorcery system.

Quilbion planted both feet in the ground and continued pulling at the barrier. Fine fissures spread along the barrier’s surface.

Whooong.

The barrier made a gloomy sound.

The firmly bound nark suddenly loosened, then changed form.

Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of spears made of nark pointed at Quilbion.

His sixth sense remained quiet. They’d merely aimed but seemed to have no intention of attacking.

His mouth dried slightly. After looking at the elongated spears generated along the barrier, he applied force to his entire body again.

He pulled at the rake made of nark. His body that had transcended humanity long ago exerted explosive force.

The moment the sky-barrier rippled greatly, his sixth sense screamed.

They’re coming.

A staggering number of spears shot toward Quilbion.

RUMBLE!

He scattered the rake made of nark and threw his body backward.

Dust billowed up. A massive hole appeared where he’d just been standing. It was believable enough that a small star had fallen.

His sixth sense, which had been making a racket telling him to flee, became docile. It was right after the tens of thousands of spears disappeared.

The rippling sky-barrier regained its stability.

Quilbion looked up at the massive sorcery called the sky-barrier.

“Tenacious, so tenacious.”

Goblins on the same level as Sheryl had placed their karma there. Even Winte couldn’t freely come and go, and once he left, he had to spend considerable time creating a hole in the sorcery.

A barrier rivaling structures designed by the Designer.

Quilbion approached the sky-barrier and tapped it lightly.

The barrier that hadn’t even responded at first now seemed to feel threatened and took countermeasures.

The situation had changed. Escape was drawing near. Before long, he would leave this place.

He swung his arms wide and leaped. He advanced forward while feeling air resistance that seemed ready to tear his skin.

Screee.

The hawk’s resonant cry caught Quilbion’s feet. He stopped briefly and looked up at the sky.

“Rapfa!”

The hawk circling in the sky dropped vertically.

It elegantly landed on his shoulder while folding its fully spread wings. With eyes and beak that had become fierce, as if the days full of down feathers had been ages ago, it greeted him.

He lightly stroked its head.

Its growth was eerily fast. Even pigs didn’t grow this quickly.

Though it was small enough to perch on his shoulder now, would it become massive like its mother who’d returned to Twella’s side as time passed?

“Grow moderately.”

As if refusing, it pecked his cheek with its beak before ascending to the sky.

Quilbion walked around the empty dormitory once, then began searching the area inside the sky-barrier.

His main objective was finding naturally occurring goblins.

When visible, he killed them immediately.

No goblins possessing intelligence had been born here in the past 130 or so years.

Perhaps, like humans, they required some degree of learning.

Who would give them time to grow for their benefit? He crushed them on sight and absorbed their nark.

Two months since Winte had left to bring coffee.

Quilbion’s lifestyle had become extremely simple.

Walking around, hunting and killing, pounding the barrier.

With a body that needed neither food nor sleep, he merely repeated the same tasks like a mechanical doll.

When goblins ran dry, he’d return to the rooftop and repeatedly use the sorcery he’d mastered.

He performed phenomenon induction countless times while adding slight variations. He’d change hand seals or twist the direction of flowing nark.

The sorceries Sitpin had created all contained docile Karma, making it easy to alter the sorcery structure.

He’d never thought he’d use the word ‘consideration’ for a goblin. But the more he examined and handled Sitpin’s sorcery, the more he couldn’t help but admire its kindness and inclusiveness.

As Winte had said, it was the great Sitpin.

Sitpin’s Karma carried no foul odor. Only the pure will to research sorcery could be felt.

In contrast, the sorcery the centipede had left behind reeked terribly.

Separate from the remnant karma transformed into a ring, Quilbion grimaced at the malicious emotions contained in the sorcery itself.

The name of the transformation art that turned him into a centipede was ‘Kill.’

Killing intent toward all things.

The goblin who’d created the transformation art must have wanted to kill everything.

Quilbion applied the transformation art only to his left arm. His skin turned black, then soon his entire arm transformed into a centipede.

He examined the coiled nark closely.

The nark moving according to the sorcery system was making small voices.

Kill, kill, kill.

It was an irritating whisper. It didn’t particularly affect him, but still, one never knew.

If he heard the voice the sorcery made when his willpower hit rock bottom and he’d half-lost his mind……

Quilbion gave a bitter smile.

When he lightly shook his hand that had transformed into a centipede, thick skin formed, then the skin split and returned to a human arm.

It felt like all the nark inside his body was being sucked out. The transformation art consumed more nark than the sorcery that made hundreds of trees run.

The nark recovered quickly, but he had to be careful since it created a temporary nark void.

Quilbion looked up at the sky and snapped his fingers.

A small flame generated about 5 meters ahead gradually increased in size. Flames spreading while scattering heat all around.

He spread the flames while thinking of the waves of fire Winte had shown.

Nark extended in all directions.

Though it didn’t become a conflagration covering the world like Winte’s, it covered about 500 meters with fire.

It had been a small cooking sorcery used in kitchens, but its purpose changed completely depending on the user.

Sitpin’s sorcery had good expandability because it was simple. Perhaps he’d created the sorcery with such considerations in mind.

Quilbion considered creating sorcery himself. He even tried. After experiencing nark convulsing and his body bursting several times, he reached a conclusion.

Humans couldn’t create sorcery. No—some humans might be capable, but the current Quilbion was not.

Condensing nark to manifest a fixed form. That was as far as sorcery creation was permitted to Quilbion.

Quilbion tried scattering the nark gathered in his left hand without any plan.

Nark without structure only scattered while emitting blue light.

Like the blue lightning that used to form at the end of talismans long ago.

Rake and lightning.

Was the mental world Winte had mentioned exerting influence?

It was a sorcery world that seemed simple yet was profound.

Quilbion pulled out one talisman tucked in his pocket and folded it in half. He gripped the talisman and slightly extended only his thumb and pinky.

The talisman in his hand bubbled.

The talisman transformed into liquid dripped down his fingers drop by drop to the floor.

The fallen droplets bounced slightly after hitting the floor, and at that moment transformed into cats smaller than fingernails.

Over a hundred tiny cats were born in an instant.

Quilbion steadied his breathing.

‘Joyful Cat Outing’ was sorcery he couldn’t get used to no matter how many times he manifested it.

The cats that landed on the ground wandered around emulating real cats.

At first glance it seemed like ornamental sorcery, but once connection began, it was advanced sorcery that made one lose their mind.

While watching the cats rolling around, hissing, and licking themselves, he changed the form of the hand seal. He slightly folded his extended thumb.

The nark that had been held within his body poured out and reached the hundred cats.

Meeeeoooow.

His head filled with cat cries. He squeezed his eyes shut.

Having suffered from mental illness while seeing hallucinations for a long period, he’d prided himself on not going mad over most things.

But.

Quilbion slowly opened his eyes.

Different scenery appeared before his eyes.

The world turned upside down. Shock that felt like his brain would cook transmitted through him.

He clenched his teeth hard enough to shatter his jawbone.

The clustered cats scattered. Over a hundred overlapping views simultaneously showed different places.

Various perspectives rushing into his head.

Just before losing his mind, Quilbion plucked off one of the personality buds he’d cultivated.

Another him appeared externally.

A self split in two.

The main body half-lost its mind and collapsed under the influence of Joyful Cat Outing.

Though the main body lost its thinking ability, the generated mental entity looked down at the main body while maintaining its established self.

“Can’t use it while sane?”

Quilbion looked down at the main body whose eyes kept moving in bizarre directions.

He could generate a mental entity with thinking power identical to the main body, but the prerequisite was ridiculous.

The main body had to be incapable of normal brain activity.

He’d challenged this after getting inspiration from the main body fainting when a Quilbion in a crack opened his eyes, and was able to succeed without much difficulty.

His past life of unconsciously generating countless mental entities had helped.

Though it was a mental entity separated from the main body, there wasn’t much difference from the main body.

Only that the available nark was less, and that nark was continuously consumed to maintain it.

Creating a mental entity was similar to fashioning a rake from nark.

Quilbion took his gaze off the fainted main body.

Leaving the main body behind, he wandered beneath the sky-barrier.

Last time, after about ten days, the flow of nark became tangled and he couldn’t maintain the mental entity, but this time it functioned normally even after over a month.

Quilbion went up to the dormitory’s second floor and picked up a pen.

After recording information obtained while active, he stood beside the main body that was still collapsed while holding the notebook.

He tapped the main body’s forehead with his fist.

The two black pupils that had been moving separately fixed at the exact center in an instant.

The moment Quilbion came to his senses, the mental entity lost its form.

He extinguished the cats he’d released.

The views that had been messily sweeping across his vision also unified in an instant.

Quilbion grabbed his throbbing head and picked up the notebook that had fallen to the floor.

“Can’t improve efficiency further?”

What he’d obtained while active as a mental entity wasn’t completely transmitted to the main body. Most memories were hazy, and some had vanished cleanly as if carved out with a knife and wouldn’t surface.

In the end, core information had to be left in writing.

He brewed coffee with the few remaining coffee beans while reading the mental entity’s records.

Living with a dragon who couldn’t live without coffee, his hobbies had become identical.

Quilbion could no longer imagine life without coffee. He’d enjoy coffee until the moment he lay in his grave.

It was when he’d come up to the rooftop and was leisurely drinking coffee.

A premonition arrived.

Quilbion summoned his mental entity. Another Quilbion with a dazed face looking only at the floor.

Though it stood there stupidly now, the moment the main body headed to a crack, the mental entity would take the main body’s place.

His body grew languid.

It was the nostalgic scent of sleep.

Of course, sleep wouldn’t come.

He would merely awaken in a crack and continue.

“Sheryl, let me see your face.”

He had many things to ask that damned goblin.