Chapter 113
The long-awaited sixteenth birthday.
I’d been up since the crack of dawn, pacing restlessly around my room.
Anxious feelings kept bubbling up, and I just couldn’t sit still.
“Got it, Suspi?”
“Peep!”
“A magic pigeon will come later. It’ll be carrying a letter from Dad. But since the recipient won’t be here, it probably won’t try to put the letter down, right?”
“Peep!”
“So I’d like you to steal that letter while avoiding people’s eyes. You’ve done it before, so you can do it again, right?”
“Peeep!”
Suspi perked up her ears and answered confidently.
But my heart, thumping fast, still refused to calm down.
Would I be able to read the letter all the way through this time?
There’s no way I’ll regress again, right?
Yeah, that won’t happen. Sapphire is alive and well.
…But what if—there’s absolutely no way this would happen, but still—what if something sudden were to happen to him?
“…No, this won’t do! Suspi, let’s go out for a moment!”
“Peep?”
“We’re going to see Sapphire!”
Clutching the confused, head-tilting Suspi in my arms, I impulsively rushed out of the room.
The corridor was silent as a grave. Naturally so—it was still early dawn.
I dashed across the wide hallway toward Sapphire’s room.
It seemed he was already up too; I could hear faint sounds from inside.
I took a deep breath first, then raised my hand to knock.
But before I could, a loud bang—an explosion—echoed from beyond the door.
“Sapphire? What was that!”
Startled, I hurriedly grabbed the doorknob and twisted it.
It rattled again and again, as if locked, so I put strength into it and yanked the door open.
“Hari, wait—don’t come in yet…!”
Sapphire tried to stop me, a beat too late.
I was already inside his room.
The moment he saw me, he flustered and hid one hand behind his back.
It looked suspicious at a glance, but checking his safety came first.
“Are you okay? What was that sound just now? Did you use magic again?”
I fired off questions one after another.
Since the day it rained, Sapphire had become able to use magic.
According to Suspi, his sudden aptitude meant the power latent within him had awakened.
Sapphire was a human reincarnation of the Goddess’s child.
And the energy he absorbed from the bottom of the lake was divine power meant for the Goddess’s child.
Two fragments that had originally been one found each other again, creating within him a wellspring of magic that would never run dry.
“Sapphire will become a great archmage remembered in history! He is the First Witch herself!”
One lazy winter day,
Suspi had chattered like that, nodding proudly.
…Of course, it only sounded like peeping noises to my ears. Sapphire had translated it for me.
Anyway, Sapphire had practically turned into a great mage overnight.
“…Well, not exactly overnight. He’s been trying to learn magic for years.”
From age eight until now, at sixteen, he’d spent nearly half his life practicing magic.
The fact that he could handle such enormous power beyond human limits was surely the fruit of all that effort.
Yeah. If it had ended as a happy ending, it would’ve been perfect…
But there was a problem.
In inheriting Ra’s blessing bestowed on the Goddess’s child, Sapphire had also inherited Ra’s curse!
He’d already been the type to cause all kinds of incidents whenever he used magic.
Now that he could use even stronger magic, it also meant he could be swept up in even more terrible disasters.
“Still, don’t worry too much! The curse won’t last long!”
Suspi chirped comfortingly.
Naturally, I didn’t understand her; Sapphire told me.
“…The curse won’t last long? Why?”
Startled, I stopped stroking Suspi’s back.
Suspi squirmed, wriggling under my other hand.
And answered:
“Because Hariela keeps calling Sapphire’s name!”
“His name?”
“Yeah! Being called by your name is a wonderful thing. It means someone recognizes and affirms your existence!”
Suspi looked dreamy—like someone reciting sweet poetry. Or rather, like a wildcat.
…I’m not even sure what a poetry-reading wildcat is supposed to look like. Anyway, that kind of feeling.
“The curse on the Goddess’s child is meant to eliminate something that shouldn’t exist. So the more his name is called, the fainter it gets. He stops being something that shouldn’t exist!”
“…Ah! So that’s why you like being called by your name, Suspi?”
“Yep! The more Hariela calls my name, the stronger and more complete I become! Isn’t that amazing?”
Grinning broadly, Suspi rubbed her cheek against my palm.
Only then did I understand why she was so obsessed with names.
After that, I developed a habit of chanting Sapphire’s and Suspi’s names a hundred times each before going to sleep.
Even when Anna looked at me strangely, it couldn’t be helped.
But I wasn’t sure if all that calling of names was having any effect.
Sapphire still got caught up in accidents, big and small, every time he used magic.
“Are you hurt anywhere? Why are you hiding your hand? Did you injure it?”
“Hari, wait! I’m fine. Sorry, but not now—later…”
“What do you mean later!”
I grabbed the hand he was trying to hide behind his back and pulled it forward.
And immediately noticed what he was holding.
“…What’s this? A music box?”
“Hari, please.”
Sapphire let out a long sigh and rubbed his face.
“You’re great in every way, but you tend to lack a bit of romance.”
He scolded me.
“Peep! Peep!”
Suspi backed him up.
Hey, what did I even do?
“…So what is it?”
“What do you think?”
“…A music box?”
“Of course it’s a music box. And it’s a birthday present I wanted to wrap nicely and give you.”
“Birthday present…”
Come to think of it, a birthday was a day to celebrate being born and receive gifts.
I’d been so focused on the letter that I’d forgotten that basic fact.
I’d just ruined Sapphire’s early-morning efforts, all for the sake of giving me a special present.
“Hahaha… sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
Smiling awkwardly, I apologized.
I really thought he’d hurt himself and was trying to lie about it…
“It’s fine. At least I achieved my goal of being the first to give you a present.”
With a resigned expression, Sapphire handed me the music box.
It was shaped like a small boat floating on blue water.
“I wanted to give you a real boat, but there just wasn’t enough time.”
“I see… but a boat? Why a boat all of a sudden?”
“Your maid said the thing you want most in the world is a boat… She said she’d never seen you hesitate so much over buying something.”
“Anna? Why would Anna say that?”
Tilting my head, I soon remembered something from long ago.
Eight years ago, after falling into the lake and suffering once, I still wanted to go boating with Sapphire again, so I tried to buy a boat.
Of course, I didn’t even know how to buy one or how much it cost, so I gave up right away.
I couldn’t believe Anna remembered that fleeting moment all this time.
“…Can I wind it up?”
“Of course.”
I gently wound the music box’s spring. A soft melody rang out, and the figure on the boat began rowing.
“Wait—are those supposed to be us?”
The two thumb-sized dolls looked strangely familiar. They were meant to be me and Sapphire.
They were made entirely of jewels, so it took me a moment to recognize them.
The sparkling jewel dolls suddenly stopped the boat, shared a lunchbox, and read a book.
It was movement far too delicate to be possible with this world’s technology.
The earlier explosion must’ve been Sapphire enchanting the music box with magic.
“They don’t fall into the water?”
That’s the highlight, isn’t it?
Smacking my lips slightly, I asked.
“Is that really what you’re focusing on? There’s no way I’d drop you into the water again.”
Sapphire looked utterly dumbfounded.
I pressed down on the wrinkle between his brows and giggled.
“Thank you. I really love it.”
“…I’m glad. Next time, I’ll definitely give you a real boat.”
“Yeah. Sure.”
I wound the music box once more.
The dolls repeated the exact same scene, without the slightest difference.
Ah, I don’t want to regress.
That thought suddenly crossed my mind.
This time, I absolutely didn’t want to go back.
Looking back now, I’d grown more attached to this fourth life than any other.
Maybe even more than my previous life.
I still vividly remembered how I felt when I’d rushed into the burning mountain to find Sapphire.
I’d been terrified that this time I’d lose him, imagining the bedroom engulfed in flames.
Without ever thinking that I myself had burned to death in my past life.
From the start, even the phrase “past life” had been strange.
Until recently, my past life had felt real, and this current life had felt like nothing but an illusion.
So when had I come to accept this world?
I wound the music box again. The dolls played out the same scene once more. No matter how many times I repeated it, it would be the same.
But I wasn’t like those dolls.
Even if I regressed thousands of times, I wouldn’t be able to create the exact same life as this one.
The fourth life was the hardest of all, but at the same time, the most precious.
For the first time, I found myself wishing that the letter I’d been waiting for wouldn’t arrive.
But as always, the world wasn’t that kind to me.
“Miss! Miss! You’re here, right? Come out! Quickly!”
Anna called out urgently, pounding on the door.
A carrier pigeon with a red string tied to it must have arrived.
