Chapter 171: Correction (2)

The stranger stopped several paces away, his gaze went first to King.

King’s tails began to move more sharply. The regal calm remained, but each sweep cut through the air with the impatience of a blade leaving its sheath.

Only then did the stranger examine Russel. His eyes traveled from Russel’s face to the classification window and back again. The inspection was brief, yet Russel had the unpleasant sense that it reached deeper than sight should permit.

Russel inclined his head. "You are Caleb, brother to Misha."

A crooked smile touched the white-haired man’s mouth. "That’s one way to introduce me."

"She spoke your name with considerable hostility."

"Then she was feeling affectionate."

King gave a low, contemptuous huff. [His family possesses no proper understanding of decorum nya.]

Caleb glanced at the floating cat. "You threaten to skin me twice a week."

[I have shown remarkable restraint by not acting upon it nya.]

"And that’s why we work so well together."

King’s wings lifted slightly. [Do not include me in your delusions nya.]

The exchange confirmed what Russel had already suspected. King did not speak like a servant addressing his master, despite the title attached to Caleb. His resentment was too old, too confident, and too freely expressed. Caleb, in turn, showed none of the vigilance of a ruler tolerating a dangerous subordinate. He provoked King because he knew precisely how far the hostility could travel.

Russel’s gaze returned to the collar. The jewel glowed more brightly in Caleb’s presence.

Caleb noticed where he was looking. "You’re observant."

"A king survives by noticing the chains others hope he will overlook."

King went utterly still.

The silence lasted no more than a breath. Caleb did not look at the cat, and King did not acknowledge the remark. Yet the jewel at his throat pulsed once, flooding the collar’s engraved symbols with the cold blue light.

Caleb tucked one gloved hand into his pocket. "Then you’ll survive this conversation."

Russel regarded him with formal composure. "King informed me that you are responsible for correcting the irregularity in my admission."

"Responsible is generous. I noticed a mess, and now I get to clean it up."

[You created several new irregularities while extracting him nya,] King said.

"Temporary irregularities."

Russel glanced between them. "I take it my departure from the Floor was not straightforward."

Caleb’s crooked smile widened by a fraction. "You were tied into the place like a load-bearing beam because of the curse and the Manacite. Removing you without collapsing the Floor took some work."

[His first proposal would have collapsed it nya. And once that happened, the Hunters would have found your position.]

"It was the fastest option."

[There were living challengers inside nya. Your sister’s one of them. Are you willing to risk the Hunters finding her too?]

"And that’s why I used the second option."

King’s stare carried the accumulated disgust of an ancient ruler forced to negotiate with an exceptionally gifted nuisance. Caleb met it without concern, then looked back at Russel.

"Anyway, you’re out. We got what we wanted, and nothing important exploded."

[Two repositories exploded nya.]

"It’s nothing important."

King bared his fangs. [When this collar breaks, I will stop calling you ’Master’, and your reign will end beneath my claws nya.]

Caleb glanced at the blue jewel. "You’ve been saying that for a while."

[Because inevitability, Master, does not become less certain with repetition nya.]

"No, it just becomes less dramatic."

Russel suppressed the beginning of a smile. Caleb spoke with the loose confidence of Misha’s world, clipping solemn matters into casual phrases that would have been unthinkable in Russel’s court.

Caleb stepped toward the classification window and tapped the line marked [Class: NONE]. The words rippled outward.

"This is the main problem. You should’ve awakened when the Tower recognized you, but you were already dead and stapled to a funeral bell."

Russel’s eyebrows rose. "Stapled?"

"Attached in an ugly and unnecessarily permanent way."

[He means bound nya,] King said. [Master’s vocabulary deteriorates whenever he becomes impatient.]

"My vocabulary is fine."

[It is vulgar nya.]

"You still understood me."

King turned his head away with stately disdain. [Regrettably.]

Caleb dragged two fingers through the window. The review split into bands of light, each rearranging itself around Russel. New symbols appeared, measured him, and vanished before he could interpret them.

"Normally, the Tower would build a Trial. Sending you through one now would be risky."

"To me?"

"To the trial."

Russel studied Caleb’s face for mockery. The man’s lips formed a sly little smile, but his red eyes remained attentive to the shifting bands.

King supplied the explanation. [Your soul contains several centuries of accumulated Floor authority. A conventional trial might mistake the remnants for active sovereignty and reshape itself around them nya.]

"Or implode," Caleb added.

[That possibility was implied nya.]

"I like clarity." The bands of light contracted. Caleb caught one between his fingers, examined the symbols moving through it, and released it. "So we’re skipping the trial and letting the compatibility process offer you a direct selection."

Russel absorbed this without protest. "Will that choice bind me permanently?"

"The Class will become part of your soul, so yes."

King descended beside the window. [Choose with the care you would give an heir, not a weapon. The strongest appearance often conceals the poorest future nya.]

Caleb gave the cat an amused glance. "That was almost helpful."

[I am a Guide. Unlike you, I honor the obligations of my office nya.]

"You spent the first five minutes insulting him."

[I assessed him nya.]

Russel addressed Caleb. "Will you offer counsel?"

"I am not allowed to tell you which one to choose." Caleb raised one hand before King could commend. "And before His Majesty starts celebrating, yes, that’s an actual restriction. If I influence the selection too directly, it will become useless. I can tell you not to overthink it. Pick the one you keep looking at after you’ve already convinced yourself another option is smarter."

Russel’s mouth tightened in restrained amusement. "You advise a king to disregard reason."

"No. I’m advising you to notice when reason is being used to avoid an honest choice."

The casual phrasing did not lessen the accuracy of his words. Russel studied Caleb more carefully, but the Administrator had already turned toward the empty space.

He snapped his fingers, and cards formed in a wide circle around Russel.

They were taller than ordinary playing cards, each composed of translucent light. One showed a crowned wolf standing beneath a red moon. Another bore a hawk descending through storm of clouds, its wings edged in lightning. A shield split by a flowering branch appeared upon a third, while farther along the circle, an armored figure held a ruined gate against a faceless enemy.

Russel walked among them.

Each card stirred some familiar part of him. The wolf answered the duelist who had survived his youth through steel and instinct. The hawk called to the exhilaration of height, speed, and the freedom he found in his second Beast Aspect. The lone sentinel appealed to the ruler who had stood between his kingdom and every threat until neither kingdom nor ruler remained.

The cards offered no full descriptions. Images shifted across their surfaces instead: possible futures, suggested abilities, and new paths that might open if chosen. Russel examined each with the patience he once brought to treaties whose consequences would outlive their signatories.

Caleb leaned toward King and spoke without lowering his voice. "He’s taking this seriously."

[He is choosing the shape of his continued existence. Only a fool would hurry nya.]

"Shasha picked her Class in under a minute."

[She has none to choose nya.]

Russel ignored them and continued around the circle.

Near its end, he found a card that felt quieter than all the rest.

A blue aster flower floated upon dark water. Its petals deepened toward violet at the center, where a small golden light trembled above the surface. Gentle ripples traveled outward, though the flower itself remained still.

Russel stopped before it, and memory arrived without invitation.

Lavinia sat beside the eastern garden pond with several unopened petitions resting on her lap. Rain had ended moments earlier, leaving silver droplets along the leaves and darkening the stone path beneath her sandals. Blue asters floated in a shallow bowl at her side.

She had once told him they were loveliest after rain. Water weighed down the petals, she said, yet they lifted again when the sun returned.

Another memory followed.

A bouquet left outside her chamber after an argument. Russel had included no note, believing the flowers sufficient. Lavinia accepted them, arranged them beautifully, and refused to speak to him until he apologized with words.

And so, Russel touched that card.

The circle vanished, and blue petals burst across the vestibule and hung suspended in the white expanse. The card dissolved beneath his fingers, sending a current of cool light through his hand and into his chest.

Pain followed, swift and intimate. It did not tear flesh, but it opened memories

Then—.

「 Congratulations! A Ultra Rare (UR) ability has been inherited! 」

「 Class Acquired: Memorist 」

「 Rank Promotion Complete!

☆☆☆☆ → ☆☆☆☆☆ 」