Chapter 380

We all understood immediately what he was getting at. How could we not?

Elias shouted, “Our existence is that significant…?!”

I was taken aback as well and waved my hands.

“No way. What would they even use us for?”

“The numbers line up perfectly. Only they know what they intend to use us for.”

“There are plenty of groups of seven in the world. Or they might simply be gathering seven people from all over.”

“Let me explain. What bothers me is that Pleroma is trying to pair you with Ismailov. And Eszett—originally there were supposed to be six of us, but Heike Einsiedel joined, making us seven.”

That was Abraham’s doing. Abraham…

“…….”

Just in case, I should arrange to meet with that bastard. Despite Leo’s calm reasoning, Elias leaned against the table, staring with an incredulous look.

“But Narke said seven can also mean all, didn’t he? Maybe this does too!”

I’d already concluded that particular interpretation probably wasn’t the case, but I wasn’t about to argue with him. I wanted him to be right. Just then, Leo, who had been staring down at the table, spoke quietly.

“What if that’s just wishful thinking? What if we’re only convincing ourselves because we want to believe nothing’s going to happen to us?”

“…….”

Elias and I both looked toward Narke, but he offered no answer. It was a hypothesis worth considering. We couldn’t ignore it anymore. But if the targets were all of my friends…

If it were only me, I could accept the risk. But asking six more people to shoulder a danger this immediate and this great was another matter entirely.

‘…Then again, can I really say we’re not already standing in that danger? And even if we refuse to take the risk and walk away, it’s not as though that would change the ending…’

A crystal-clear thought struck me. Then, almost at the same time, another followed—a habit-driven one. Rubbing my face with both hands, I muttered wearily, “…Tomorrow, I’ll meet with the seniors and ask them to keep me away from Ismailov somehow.”

“You already know it didn’t work, even when I tried.”

Leo answered calmly.

“The government sees you as the best person for the job. Whatever the truth may be underneath, outwardly Ismailov’s attention is fixed entirely on you, and he won’t speak to anyone else. No matter what happens, they’ll want your help.”

“You saw him talking to Elias just now. If we guide him properly, he might eventually start talking to other people too.”

“The only reason Ismailov spoke to us today was because you were there, Lukas. He interacted with us because he was trying to get closer to you.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I know. How could I not?”

Leo looked me straight in the eye. He offered no long explanation for his certainty, yet he was already right. I knew he was.

I’d spent long enough wrestling with whether I should be the one to handle Ismailov. There was no point wasting any more time on that question. It was better to think through the clearer idea I’d arrived at earlier. Leo spoke again before I could ask anything.

“Sure, Ismailov might eventually warm up to people besides you and start talking to the rest of us on his own. But that doesn’t matter when all of us are supposed to keep our distance from him.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“Besides…”

He paused, slowly sweeping his gaze across all of us.

“What if, by distancing ourselves from Ismailov, we allow Pleroma’s prophecy to come true—and the world comes to an end?”

“The world ends?”

Elias forced a crooked smile, as if the very idea were ridiculous. Leo just nodded.

“No. The world itself won’t end. The heavens will keep turning as they always have. The sun will rise in the east that day, and the tides will still follow the moon before returning to the shore. But what about the people of our age? Will we still be looking up at the same constellations traced hundreds of millions of years ago that night?”

Leo had arrived at the same conclusion I had. Pulling back to keep ourselves from being used in the prophecy wasn’t a solution. He knew it. I knew it. Elias would realize it too. And perhaps Narke had understood it from the very beginning.

“The moment magic appeared in this world, any notion of a shared common sense disappeared. What if they really succeed in creating the ‘Lord we seek’ just to satisfy their own ambitions? Then it’s over. By that point, not only the people, but we won’t be safe either. If we avoid the danger right in front of us just to prolong our lives a little longer, we could end up facing an irreversible end.”

Elias no longer wore the expression of someone trying to deny reality. He sat with his head held high, staring straight at Leo, while Narke remained silent with his head bowed and his eyes closed.

I shifted my gaze from them to Leo. Hearing those words from him was the last thing I expected. More than anyone else, Leo valued safety and longed for peace. He was never one to make reckless decisions if he could avoid them, and I’d seen that side of him countless times in the care he’d shown me.

“We have to deal with it now. We were lucky enough to catch it before it became irreversible.”

“…….”

How could I not be surprised?

And yet I knew this much about him. Precisely because he wanted peace for everyone, when the decisive moment came, he was capable of being bolder than anyone else. That was the Leonard Wittelsbach I had read about and analyzed.

He continued calmly, “We’ll handle it. It’s the right thing to do.”

That was the right thing to do. It was the very reason the nobility existed.

Modern civil society was born because people could no longer entrust the natural rights of all to the personal virtue of the aristocracy. Yet in this world, that struggle had become nothing more than an old growing pain—a distant chapter of history. Within this second Ancien Régime brought about by a society of mages, the best we could do for now was ensure that the authority entrusted to us through our bloodlines would not be squandered. At least until the older generation handed power to ours, and we gained the strength to change the system. Perhaps even until that very day arrived.

Leo was someone who understood exactly when a risk had to be taken.

‘How did I end up here, anyway…?’

I wasn’t even supposed to be part of a ruling house. I had just been an ordinary commoner…

Sometimes that fact still struck me as something new.

But even if I returned from this capitalist society under absolute monarchy to the democratic capitalist society of the 21st century, could I honestly claim I hadn’t benefited from the system there as well? I couldn’t. The form of that privilege might have been different, but I had always owed a debt to society. The responsibilities that came with being a member of it wouldn’t disappear just because I returned to my own time. One way or another, every era demanded that you carry its own burdens. So I could willingly shoulder the weight of this life as well.

To put it plainly, I wholeheartedly agreed with Leo. If noblesse oblige demanded it, he was willing to cast aside his instinct for safety and face any danger. And as always, I didn’t particularly think it was unfair. If I expressed what I truly felt, it’d be what I said earlier. Put more simply, ‘Let’s stop thinking about running away and do everything we can.’

‘I’ll have to be more on guard this time.’

Leo had just said he wanted me to stay alive, yet he was steeling himself more than anyone. If anything, it was precisely because he wanted me to survive that he might throw himself into this with the resolve to live only if victory was won.

It was only March, but the weather was already beginning to warm. I brushed my hair back as the breeze passed over me. After sending Abraham a letter, I stopped by the largest bookstore in Bavaria, bought a book, and returned to Nymphenburg Palace. I didn’t really need to go myself. I simply wanted to.

Anyway, back to the matter at hand. What I thought would be nothing more than a short-lived effort to get acquainted with Ismailov had instead become our objective.

‘Why?’

You keep your enemies as close as possible—close enough to watch everything they plan, every move they make, twenty-four hours a day. I doubted Ismailov was the mastermind behind their scheme, but we needed to observe even the signs he showed unintentionally. Besides, there was still more information we had to draw out of him.

“Sir Ismailov.”

This was the only place in the palace where roses bloomed year-round. I set the thick book tucked under my arm on the table, pulled out a chair, and sat down with a grin.

“Thanks to you, I get to stay at the summer pavilion a little longer. The truth is, I would’ve had no choice but to return to Brandenburg before long.”

“…….”

Having sobered up, Ismailov had gone quiet again. I’d sent him a letter first thing in the morning asking him to meet me at one of Nymphenburg’s small pavilions. He had come, at least, but none of yesterday’s willingness to engage remained. His eyes drifted to the leather-bound book I’d brought before returning to me.

Resting my chin on one hand, I smiled.

“Now that we’re actually here, I can’t think of anything to talk about. Shall I tell you something that crossed my mind on the way over? Do you enjoy history?”

“…….”

“When we were in the library, one of the books we opened contained an account of the French Revolution written by a scholar from our Empire. I only skimmed it, but one passage fiercely condemning the Ancien Régime stuck with me.”

“…….”

“As you know, the phrase literally means ‘the old regime.’ But these days it no longer refers to old systems in general. It’s become a proper historical term—the political and social order of France before the Revolution.”

He just stared back at me. Carrying a conversation alone wasn’t easy. Small talk only got you so far, so I’d deliberately steered us toward something less ordinary. Even so, it wasn’t exactly effortless. Pretending not to mind, I continued.

“Still, anyone who completed a proper education in this country would hardly be unfamiliar with French. More importantly, anyone could recognize that ancien ultimately traces back to the Latin ante. A word that immediately evokes what came before—how could it be carelessly confined to French history alone? Even though its very name openly declares, ‘This belongs to the past, not the present,’ people speak of that era as though it were merely some long-buried problem that happened in someone else’s country.”

“…….”

“To me, it isn’t a relic of the past at all. Once the Third French Empire came into being and New Humans appeared across the continent, it became something ongoing. That’s why I’ve started thinking of our present age as a Second Ancien Régime. The more I thought about it, the more fascinated I became by the contradiction in the phrase itself. I simply had to tell you.”

“Is magic truly the problem?”

He might have stared blankly the whole time, but he’d listened to every word I said. He’d even realized that what I meant was that the old evils had simply returned wearing the mask of magic. It didn’t seem like Pleroma had given him much of an education, yet he had a knack for grasping the heart of an argument.

Smiling, I replied, “Even without magic, human nature wouldn’t be any different.”

“I see.”

“Well, those were just my own thoughts. What do you think?”

“I do not know much about the Ancien Régime. However, I was taught that although France and Germany are both part of Europe, the course of their change differed because French citizens won their rights for themselves, while Germans did not. The Ancien Régime in France may no longer be the old order in its original sense, but I believe that is even more true in Germany’s case.”

“Hmm.”

Not bad. That was a fairly long answer. Maybe I could actually have a conversation with him like this without getting him drunk first. I nodded to show I was listening.

“That is why, in Pleroma, we believe the Day of Judgment must save our oppressed people—”

“Let’s stop there.”

I smiled, though I could feel my blood run cold. This was exactly why Pleroma had spent years proclaiming, We can turn non-mages into mages. They gained influence by claiming they could fill the void in people’s lives—offering themselves as the answer to their deprivation.

Ismailov didn’t seem particularly interested in proselytizing—or rather, it sounded as though he was simply repeating what he’d been taught. He answered with a brief, “Understood,” then glanced at the thick book I’d brought.

So he’d been curious about it all along. I held it out to him.

“It’s a gift.”

“…….”

“Augustine’s On the Trinity. It didn’t seem like you’ve had much exposure to books, so I picked an edition intended for younger students. If you’d prefer something more advanced, I can bring the copy I use.”

Ismailov said nothing. His lips parted slightly as he carefully brushed a hand over the leather cover, tracing the embossed letters one by one with his fingertips. Resting my chin on my hand again, I quietly watched him touch the book.

“Read it, then let’s discuss it. Doesn’t it sound like it’d make for an interesting conversation?”

“Yes.”

“Please answer in full sentences.”

“It does sound interesting. Have you read it as well?”

“Already have. You’re the only one who needs to.”

Ismailov looked up. For a brief moment, sunlight lingered beneath his pale blue eyes, and I raised an eyebrow. He replied in his usual flat tone.

“I’ll make sure to read it thoroughly.”

“Excellent. Then we’ll have plenty to talk about. I’m already looking forward to hearing your thoughts on On the Trinity.”

Watching him bury his nose in the book again, I muttered, “Well then, we’ve got the whole day ahead of us. What should we do now?”

Today, I intended to indulge him. First, I was going to keep an eye on the Change Probability. Ever since the negotiations began, I’d been keeping track of it every time something happened, committing each change to memory. Surprisingly, it hadn’t decreased in the slightest. Since I’d decided to approach things differently today, I’d first see how far I could go without jeopardizing my safety, then adjust the line from tomorrow onward.

In any case, I assumed Ismailov—completely absorbed in the book—would either ignore me or simply tell me what he wanted to do. Instead, he lifted his head and stared straight at me. An instinctive sense of unease flashed through my mind. Then a crimson glow seeped out from beneath his gloves.

“…Wait!”

Beep, beep, beep—

“I knew this would happen.”

Mecklenburg appeared almost instantly, resting a hand on my shoulder with a wry grin. Albertina Hohenzollern—apparently interrupted in the middle of breakfast, judging by the glass of water still in his left hand—had come with him and let out an exasperated laugh. I couldn’t decide whether to feel grateful or embarrassed, so I just laughed awkwardly along with them.

“I’m not even the hostage, and yet I feel like I’m the one under surveillance…”

“Do try to show some restraint, Lord Askanien.”

Mecklenburg casually patted my shoulder. I brushed his hand away.

“Why are you telling me that? You should be saying it to Sir Ismailov.”

“I meant, show some restraint around him. We’ll be going now. I’ll adjust the heart-rate threshold. If the alarm goes off again, I’ll let you know just how high you raised it.”

“There won’t be a next time.”

I said it through gritted teeth, Mecklenburg simply ignored me and disappeared with Albertina Hohenzollern. I turned to Ismailov, who was staring at me expressionlessly, and began to feel a little uneasy.

‘He’s expecting something.’

I’d gotten the same feeling with Heike before. The problem was, I had no idea what kind of activity would actually satisfy him. Was he excited at the thought of spending the entire day together? I needed to give him some kind of new stimulation…

‘No. That’s not the problem right now.’

Let’s pick up where I left off. If our hypothesis is correct—that Pleroma intends to use Eszett as the “messengers of the churches”—then there’s no telling how they’ll make it happen. What exactly are the “messengers of the churches” supposed to mean? Maybe they’re literally just the messengers of the churches. What else could they be?

But assuming the hypothesis is true, one thing is clear: those “messengers of the churches” would become instruments of destruction. We have to find a way to seize control before that happens. If simply spending time with Ismailov is enough to turn us into those messengers, then the Change Probability would plummet.

The problem is that our opponent is far too powerful for us to spend our days like this forever. Granted, these days aren’t exactly peaceful—but at least we’re not in immediate danger of dying. We need information, and we need it as soon as possible.

‘First, when and how will the “seven stars” be fulfilled? Second, if our hypothesis really matches the truth, why is Eszett the chosen candidate? Just because I’m part of it? More importantly, why am I being singled out in the first place?’

I needed answers. As I watched Ismailov silently alternating his gaze between me and the book, I continued thinking.

‘Hmm.’

The Labyrinth. If someone rampages, can’t I enter their Labyrinth? What if I made Ismailov rampage?

‘…That’s completely insane.’

The chances of someone like him going on a rampage were slim. He might have already received vitriol, which would shorten the duration even if he did rampage. At best, everything we’d built between us would be reset—more likely, it’d end up in the negatives. And if he outranked me, I might not even be able to enter his Labyrinth. Besides, hadn’t I already concluded that treating him as less than human was hopelessly shortsighted?

‘Hmm…’

What about Extra Chapter? If I could get some blood…

Thud—

I slammed my forehead against the marble table, the impact ringing through my skull. As if to prove that it was really true that he couldn’t read my thoughts, Ismailov suddenly asked, “What’s wrong?”

“…I’m sleepy.”

“Then go to sleep.”

“I can’t do that. Let’s make the most of the day.”

I lifted my head and brushed aside the bangs that had fallen over my eyes. Despite what I’d just said, my thoughts drifted right back where they’d been.

‘The Extra Chapter.’

It wasn’t a bad plan. Still, if Abraham’s hadn’t unlocked, would Ismailov’s?

Getting the blood wouldn’t be difficult if I bent the rules a little. If I asked Leo, he could probably claim he needed Ismailov’s blood for research and borrow a vial or two from the samples the government had already collected. Now that we’d moved into Nymphenburg Palace, I was outside Leo’s surveillance network, so I’d have more than enough freedom to poke around the Extra Chapter.

I couldn’t allow myself to drink blood simply because I’d developed a craving for it. But if it meant getting the best possible outcome…

‘…No. I still hate the idea.’

My basic human instincts rejected the idea outright. It was revolting. Still, although I might not be able to enter the Extra Chapter the way I did with Abraham, it was worth trying, wasn’t it?

‘…Well, getting the blood is one thing. Maybe I should ask Leo to make me drink it.’

If he beat me up first, the anger would probably outweigh the revulsion. Maybe that would soften the psychological blow. But remembering the utterly hollow look on Leo’s face that day…

No. I couldn’t do that to him.

“I’ve given it some thought, but I don’t know what we should do.”

Ismailov’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts. The moment I looked into his pale white face, I felt sick over everything I’d just been considering. Deliberately turning my gaze to the magically preserved roses around us, I asked, “Then I’ll decide. Have you looked around Nymphenburg Palace yet? It’s huge. There’s plenty to see.”

“No. I cannot leave my room unless you summon me.”

“I thought as much.”

I closed my eyes for a moment before speaking again.

“Sir Ismailov. Did you ever have friends your own age in Pleroma?”

“As I told you before, I have never spoken with people in their teens. I have only listened to them.”

Only listened to them? That was an odd way to put it.

Still, the important part was that he’d never had friends. Stroking my chin, I nodded.

“Since we’re already here, let’s do this the proper way. We’ll start with the things New Humans your age usually do.”

Ismailov closed the book. His face remained as expressionless as ever, yet even that small gesture made it obvious he was looking forward to whatever I had in mind. I rose from my seat, pointed toward the vast hunting grounds surrounding Nymphenburg Palace, and smiled.

“Want to go hunting? We can keep score with the others.”