Mage? Magic Engineer!

Richard couldn’t comprehend or recall what had happened at the very end.

The foul, crimson ooze abruptly reversed its flow, surging outward instead of inward and churning up a giant wave more than a dozen meters high right before his eyes.

But something even faster was expanding. Before the massive wave could engulf Richard, it was struck by a pulse, vaporized, and vanished without a trace.

This was the last thing he saw, the final image he remembered. The last frame was an endless white that consumed him.

What followed was a dream.

At first, Richard thought he had arrived in the Netherworld or the Divine Kingdom of some Divine Spirit. He found himself involuntarily drifting to the base of an immense tree, its canopy shimmering with light. In the distance stood magnificent buildings...

His first reaction was that an afterlife truly existed. His second was a question. ’How strange. I’m an unbeliever. What god would be bored enough to take me in?’

But now he had woken up in a bed, so what he’d seen before must have been a dream.

He was in an unfamiliar infirmary room, with Rorschach sitting by his bedside.

"We meet again," Richard said, forcing a smile for his friend. "And once again, it’s while I’m on the verge of death. It’s strange, Rorschach. You’re always the one to rush over. Why don’t I ever see Bart?"

’Because Bart is an innocent party in all this. He’s currently playing the part of the man behind the senator—contentedly, but not without some reluctance...’

Rorschach smiled as well, but his words were chilling. "You’re wrong. It’s not ’on the verge of death.’ It’s ’dead and gone.’"

"Huh?"

"To put it bluntly, you’ve already died once, both in a medical and a mystical sense. This wasn’t a near-death experience." Facing his friend, Rorschach decided to come clean. "I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you were in Ovord at the time..."

"You were caught in the blast. Your physical body was utterly annihilated, just like everything else. Fortunately, I was able to find your Soul, and I used a special Magic to reconstruct your body."

"I’m sorry, but whether you wanted it or not, you are now a Magical Creature. As compensation, all Magic from the Tree of Law at the Ninth Ring and below will be open to you."

Richard’s current body was a product of [Axiom Creation]. Its physical strength and Magic Circuit configuration were comparable to, or even stronger than, that of other Great Mages. But his original body was gone.

"No, no, no, what are you apologizing for?" Richard was just now realizing he felt no pain at all. In fact, his body was overflowing with Magic Power. "Rorschach! Good heavens! Just listen to yourself, talking so nonchalantly about:"

"Bringing me back from being turned to dust and ash, and even making me into a Magical Creature on par with a Great Mage! You... you... how did you even do that?"

"It’s a long story."

Rorschach was still shaken after returning to the Boundary Land, but then something even more terrifying happened. The "Soul-Return Protocol" he had instructed the Tower Spirit to preset delivered another sphere of light, also from Ovord.

Rorschach almost destroyed it, mistaking it for some kind of "virus" that had slipped through. Luckily, he took a closer look... ’Shit, it’s Rick!’

He scanned Ovord again. His operation, despite its many complications, had been highly effective in the end—all of the contamination had been concentrated at the core of the explosion, leaving behind nothing but a clean crater.

’Great,’ he thought. ’Not even a single strand of DNA from Richard’s original body was likely left.’

"Your resurrection was the result of many coincidences," Rorschach confessed to Richard, his voice heavy with guilt as he analyzed the situation.

"Back at Mongcato Fortress, I used a [Reversing Beam] on you. I reconstructed you based on my own memories, and that process must have been recorded by the Tree of Law."

"Furthermore, your use of the Tree of Law is profound. Your Soul must have established a strong enough connection for your Spirit Body to be incidentally drawn to the base of the Tree when you lost your physical vessel."

"And that soul-tethering protocol was something I had preset for myself."

Rorschach didn’t dare to imagine what would have happened if even one of those conditions had been absent. The final result was good, but could it be replicated? Was it even a viable method? Rorschach knew it would be incredibly difficult to research any further.

’There were only a handful of people with circumstances similar to Richard’s. Counting myself, only Caroline’s and Andre’s connection to the Tree of Law could match Richard’s, strong enough to establish a link with the Boundary Land. With so few test subjects—and for a destructive experiment at that—how could I possibly control the variables?’

Richard chatted for a while longer, mentioning Paul and Pascal.

The mention of their names made Rorschach break out in a cold sweat.

As the black hole began to absorb and control the Flesh and Blood Carpet, the Mother Goddess’s influence started to wane. Looking back, Rorschach realized the Mother Goddess had likely begun to focus her power on dealing with him and the Miniature Black Hole he had created.

This had given Paul and his group an opportunity to escape. They ultimately established a safe teleportation portal and left Ovord before the explosion.

’If they hadn’t escaped, they wouldn’t have shared Richard’s fate. If that had happened... I would have become a killer of my fellow apprentices, and the greatest enemy of Kano and his group for the rest of their lives.’

’That was close, so close... Things really got out of hand in every conceivable way.’

Finally, Richard asked about the fate of his namesake, Hench. Ilysov had mentioned that after Hench fell unconscious, he was carried away by a Priest of the Earth Mother Goddess.

"I did encounter a crazed Monk. Instead of fleeing from the black hole, he threw himself right into it. He was carrying a sack, yes... a bulging one. It’s very likely it contained the person you’re talking about."

"They were at the very epicenter of the explosion. Their chances of survival are practically zero. I’ve already confirmed it—nothing living remains in that dead zone."

A look of guilt crossed Rorschach’s face again as he spoke. Although Richard was heartbroken, he spoke up to stop him.

"You don’t have to apologize again. I was just asking. To be honest, I’d already suspected a similar outcome."

"Hench was my good friend, but Rorschach, you don’t need to apologize for someone you didn’t know."

Richard’s survival also solved a major problem:

He had survived until the very last moments of the Ovord disaster, making him the sole witness to the entire ordeal. Only Richard had a complete understanding of the incident and could report the truth to the Magic Guild and the Empire.

For the Guild, he could help prove that the final measures Rorschach took were both necessary and a last resort.

Of course, this testimony to the Guild wasn’t particularly important.

For one, Rorschach had indeed let things get out of hand. He already planned to submit a formal self-criticism to the Elder Council, partly as a wake-up call for himself.

For another, a chief from one of the Thirteen Magic Towers had managed to rush to the vicinity of Ovord and witness the final "spectacle." If it was confirmed that the black hole and the subsequent super-explosion were Rorschach’s handiwork, then... no one would dare insist on holding a man of his stature accountable.

It was more important, however, that Richard had survived to explain to the Empire—and especially to the Emperor—what had happened within his territory.

From the Empire’s perspective, an anomaly had appeared in Ovord while two armies were engaged in battle, with Casters active in the city.

Then, a clearly unnatural fog had sealed off the entire city. Later, Mages from the Guild arrived from all directions and imposed another layer of blockade around the perimeter.

As for the Guild’s efforts—damming the Oder River to prevent contamination from spreading downstream, eliminating escaped monsters, and so on—William II turned a blind eye to it all. All he knew was that after the blockade was lifted, a prosperous, populous city with a long history in his Empire had been reduced to nothing but dust.

It was foreseeable that the relationship between the Imperial Palace and the Guild would continue to deteriorate.

"I’ll do my best to explain, but I can’t guarantee His Majesty will believe me."

"Thank you, Rick."

After these words were spoken, the infirmary fell silent. The atmosphere, which had been steadily growing heavier, now hit rock bottom. Rorschach himself looked utterly dejected.

Seeing his friend’s state, Richard feigned a casual sigh. "Sigh. I guess I’ll have to cut ties with Libus."

As expected, Rorschach’s spirits lifted slightly. "Hm? Who’s Libus? Why do you have to cut ties?"