Ch#107
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In the Lord's Castle chamber on the second floor, where the fireplace blazed fiercely.
Veil pulled the curtains tight and anxiously opened his mouth.
"What exactly is mana depletion? How dangerous is it precisely?"
Lucarion, who had been checking on Tie, lifted his head.
His red eyes, returned to boy form, were deeply sunken.
"I don't know much about human mana depletion either."
"Ppup......"
Ppuppu soon leaned his head against Astie's cheek and wiped away tears.
Lucarion let out a sigh.
"All magic starts with mana. When mana depletes, the caster naturally enters a state of extreme thirst."
Basto approached closer to the bed.
"I know that much. But she's never been like this before."
Tie had cast countless enormous spells up to now.
But she'd never been this exhausted before.
"......Manifesting the departed originally requires tremendous mana."
At that moment, Lucarion muttered.
He looked around at the other members.
"Remember the spirits Astie summoned in Pearl City?"
Raoul and Enzo nodded.
How could they forget?
The wrecked ship slicing fearlessly through the stormy sea.
And the blue spirits densely filling the area around it.
"The wrecked ship, the spirits, and today's skeletons—all were Astie using remnants to 'partially' revive something."
"Partially?"
"Yeah. You can tell just from the principle of summoning skeletons."
Basto's brow furrowed.
He recalled what Tie had often said about her bone friends.
"......Yeah. She said she could only summon them if there was a graveyard nearby."
"Exactly. That's only possible because there are physical remnants like bone fragments or corpses around."
"I see......"
"The same goes for the wrecked ship she summoned in Pearl City. She called up the ship sunk in the depths and temporarily controlled it. The spirits were the same in effect."
"In effect?"
Lucarion pointed out the window through the curtain gap.
"Spirits exist everywhere originally. We just can't see them."
Veil swallowed hard.
"The problem is they lack consciousness. No basic memories like who they were or what they did in life."
"So...... they're souls wandering without knowing who they are?"
"Right. What Tie does is infuse them with mana to gain temporary control. Literally creating minions she can command briefly."
Raoul and Enzo's eyes met.
From earlier, Lucarion had been speaking as if all this was nothing.
But Tie was the only mage who could communicate with the departed and infuse them with mana.
The first ever.
Meanwhile, Lucarion continued.
"But bridging the afterlife and the world of the living is entirely different."
"......"
"It's not completing something by adding mana to remnants—it's something the caster must do from start to finish."
Soul manifestation.
It was an attempt nearly impossible, to perfectly recreate the past life of something already dead.
Yet Tie had not only manifested the dead before the living but enabled conversation too.
"She restored the departed's memories, emotions, personality—even physical traces—so of course her body suffers."
"B-but didn't something similar happen in Pearl City?"
Basto opened his mouth in confusion.
"In Pearl City. Karl Warben saw my dead wife. They even seemed to talk. Though I couldn't see her......"
"That wasn't manifestation. It was resentment."
"What?"
"Your wife showing herself to Karl Warben wasn't Tie's will. Eve did it on her own."
Basto, at a loss for words, shut his mouth.
Lucarion sighed.
"Plus, Karl Warben was on the brink of death then. With his body and soul nearly severed, he could see your wife vividly."
The memory from that day revived before Basto's eyes.
The surging waves.
The Deathhound ship摇摇晃晃.
And Karl Warben trembling like an aspen amid the spirits.
"I see......"
Basto slumped into a chair.
Silence settled in the room, and quiet lingered for a while.
"It's my fault, damn it."
Veil muttered.
He stared down at his knees with a pained face.
On his lap lay his hand tightly bandaged, clutching a silver necklace.
"There were other ways. I just couldn't stand listening to that bastard Reginald......"
Basto stared blankly at Veil instead of replying.
He had no desire to blame Veil now.
But he was still puzzled.
Why had Veil, utterly indifferent to others' affairs, lost control this time and charged at Reginald?
"......I worked in the mines too. When I was a kid."
But at that moment, Veil muttered softly.
Head bowed, he gripped the necklace in his hand until his knuckles whitened.
"My parents sold me off at two. To human traffickers."
A hollow laugh escaped Veil's lips.
"But what that bastard Reginald said...... it was exactly like the mine overseer where I first worked, damn it."
'Narrow tunnels like this are for kids your brother's age, rookie.'
'The narrower and lower the tunnel, the easier it is for kids to work.'
Hearing those words, Veil had felt his blood run cold.
Was it because it recalled working until vomiting blood to keep his siblings out of the mines?
Or remembering how he eventually left the mines and started dirtying his hands?
When he snapped back to his senses moments later.
Reginald lay unconscious beneath him.
Veil's gaze turned to Tie, filled with guilt.
"......I should have held back."
He had thought that as the soldiers dragged him away.
He should have endured. Or sneaked into the castle late at night instead.
Then he could have killed the bastard quietly, without anyone knowing.
Just like how he had ended that mine overseer's life before leaving his hometown.
"All because of me, the kid......"
His gaze grew ever darker when.
"Uuun......"
A small groan came from the bed.
Veil jerked his head up.
Tie had faintly opened her eyes sometime before.
"Kiddo?"
"......Tie!"
Everyone jumped to their feet.
But the awakened Tie first stared at Veil.
"......Oppa."
Veil froze before replying in a trembling voice.
"Y...... yeah, kiddo. A-are you okay?"
But the child slowly scanned Veil instead of answering.
Then, gazing at his bandaged hand, she said.
"Is oppas hand okay?"
Veil's eyes reddened sharply.
Tie reached out worriedly and gripped Veil's hand tightly.
"Sorry, Tie is the leader but came to rescue you so late......"
Veil drew a short breath.
'Oppa, did it hurt a lot?'
'Sorry for making you do dangerous stuff every day, hyung.'
The faces of siblings left in his hometown overlapped with Astie's.
Something plopped onto his lap unbeknownst to him.
"O-oppa. Crying?"
Startled, Tie struggled to sit up.
But Veil roughly wiped his eyes instead of answering and pulled Tie into a fierce hug.
"You idiot. Even so, how could you push yourself like that?!"
Contrary to his gruff voice, hot tears kept streaming down his cheeks.
"Your cold isn't even fully gone, and you go manifesting spirits?!"
Tie soon pouted her lips too.
Soon, the child sniffled in reply.
"Uwaaaang, Tie just wanted to let Adelin sis meet her mom......"
