Chapter 220 : Chapter 220
Chapter : 220 ‘
BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG.
From far away, a sound like something in agony echoed out.
Even while hearing it, I pressed my lips tight and kept casting Analysis Magic like a man possessed. It did not work properly, but I clung to it obsessively, as though it were the only thing I could do.
《Theo, calm down.》
“But—”
Lewen was suffering.
That same senior who had smiled and said he would not mind if returning to being human meant enduring the pain of his body being reconstructed… was suffering.
How could I possibly be calm?
SLAP!
A sharp sting exploded across my cheek.
That damned lizard had struck me with its tail.
“Albedo.”
《Get a grip! If you lose your head now, how do you expect to save him?!》
The sharp scolding nearly made me cry.
He was right. My panic would not change anything.
If anything, now was the moment when I had to be calmer than ever to break this curse.
《And look carefully.》
Albedo whispered.
《To me, it does not look like he is being swallowed by the curse. It looks like he is enduring it.》
Then there was something I could do.
I had to place the Thread of Ariadne in his hand.
That was the one thing I could do—had to do—so that Lewen could hold the thread himself and find his way out of the labyrinth.
《You know the method.》
Of course I did. I had spent the entire past week learning nothing but demonic magic.
I needed to put Ouroboros to sleep. That was the only way.
Demonic magic could not do more than that. But even a brief moment would be enough.
《The mana flow is becoming unstable.》
“…I know.”
I never imagined I would use demonic magic in this way. Complaining would not change anything, though.
Taking a deep breath, I began to inscribe intricate magic circles, layering them again and again.
If I could not cast one complex spell, I would simply layer many smaller spells together.
Ordinary mages would never attempt this; the flow of mana would tangle and collapse.
But I had the Writer’s Authority. Even if no one else could do this, I could.
“…”
My fingertips trembled, and the shaking transferred into my staff. But I refused to show it.
Everyone else was risking their lives to buy me time for Lewen. I could not run away because my hands were trembling.
Tears welled from the strain, but I completed the final stroke of the spell.
The next instant, I felt as though I was falling into a bottomless pit, and I closed my eyes.
When I opened them again, I saw him at last.
I saw Lewen—and the massive serpent coiled around him.
The snake appeared to protect him, but I knew the truth: this was not protection.
“Ouroboros.”
All that the obsessive serpent desired was the gaze and love of God.
To it, Lewen was nothing more than a tool—a vessel through which it could once again descend upon the world.
For the primeval serpent, who no longer possessed even a body, a thousand years might have been a blink of an eye, but the fact that the world had forgotten it must have been unbearable.
And above all—
“Lucius is not the god you speak of.”
At my question, both Ouroboros—and the lizard on my shoulder, who mistakenly believed he could hide his presence—fell silent.
---
The only god worshiped by the Empire: Lucius, God of Light.
But I had suspected that the god Iris spoke of—the god Ouroboros loved—was not Lucius.
It was obvious in hindsight.
Iris would never refer to Lucius as “God.”
The word “God” carried reverence, distance, and hierarchy—an acknowledgment of an absolute being beyond humanity.
Iris knew that.
And yet, she insisted on calling Ouroboros’s beloved “God.”
That meant something.
It meant there truly was a God.
A being who created and managed this world.
And that being was most likely—
“Status Window.”
The system that was always beside me.
The Status Window had never once failed to appear before. Even if I rarely called it, it would still pop up occasionally, usually when I was irritated.
But ever since Iris declared she would swallow the power of Ouroboros, and began moving in earnest, the system had not appeared even once.
Which led me to one conclusion.
The system might represent the true god of this world.
Call it ridiculous if you want.
But who else could reset the entire world, and grant the ability to rewrite reality through writing?
That was not the power of a human. It was the power of something divine.
“Hissss.”
The serpent glared at me warily.
I did not think Ouroboros sensed the system itself. If it had, it would have swallowed me long ago.
Which meant the system was deliberately hiding.
“Let him go.”
The serpent refused. It would not yield what it believed belonged to it.
Of course it would not. This was the same creature that decided to devour the world simply to earn the love of a god.
Instead of stepping closer, I threw the thread with all my strength.
The thread passed through Ouroboros and landed against Lewen’s body.
Like a marionette with severed strings, he had been standing lifelessly inside the serpent’s coils. But the moment the thread touched him, he gasped in agony as though his mind had snapped back into place.
《Get lost!!!》
The serpent’s enraged cry slammed into my ears like a physical blow. Blood dripped from my ears as the world seemed to drop away beneath my feet.
But despite the pain, Lewen clutched the thread and hurled the other end back toward me.
I grabbed it—and was dragged back into the darkness.
---
My insides burned and churned.
Fear and agony overwhelmed me, and tears spilled uncontrollably.
My body alternated between burning heat and icy cold.
I fell into the abyss, then floated upward, then plunged again.
Heaven and hell blended into one long, unbearable sensation.
“It hurts… it hurts…”
Was this what it felt like to have your body torn apart and rebuilt from scratch?
The pain was beyond comparison to when the curse was first removed.
Nothing remained in my mind, and yet, at the same time, the faces of countless people I loved appeared again and again.
I felt like a child, whimpering in pain.
It hurt so much that I wanted to bite off my tongue and end it.
If I died now, would it be peaceful?
If so, I would have no regrets.
And just like that, a strange comfort washed over me.
If I stayed like this, I would be free from pain forever.
But then—something nudged me.
Like being doused in cold water, my senses snapped back.
The pain, which had begun to fade, surged violently once more.
It hurts. It hurts so much. I cannot take it.
But even so, I wanted to die as a human.
I desperately reached out and grasped the thread that had rolled away.
Clutching it tightly, I threw the other end toward Theo.
Watching the thread fly away, regret crashed over me.
Was I too late again?
“Hah…”
He was always too late.
Always too weak to endure even a moment longer.
He wanted to give up.
He wanted to be forgiven for it.
Just let me stop. Let me rest. I’ve had enough.
But the moment he almost let go of the thread—
“I will not allow that.”
A voice thundered like lightning.
It was stern, and it forced me to hold on. I hated it… yet I was grateful.
Even though I wanted to die, I wanted to live. Even though I had given up being human, I still felt relief at the thought of remaining one.
“I… will become dangerous someday.”
He had once taken Ouroboros’s curse into his body and barely survived. But the world was not kind. And Ouroboros was relentless.
Eventually, the serpent would find a gap and return. And then, the world would be in danger again.
Even so—
“I will bring you back again.”
A warmth—like a demon crawling up from the abyss—wrapped around my hand.
It was far too much warmth for someone like me.
Tears spilled freely.
“Really?”
For a moment, Theo almost lost his grip on the thread. But even then, he gritted his teeth and held on.
“Yes. I promise. No matter what happens, I will bring you back.”
“I won’t let you die as a monster.”
“I swear it—on all of my mana.”
For a mage, that was the same as staking everything.
It was strange, almost miraculous, that he would say such a thing for me.
“Why?”
The question came from a man who never learned to trust, a young man abused by his adoptive mother, a boy who killed his own parents.
Why?
The answer was simple.
“Because I got involved in your life.”
The same answer as last time.
And hearing it brought comfort.
If there truly was a God, and that God had placed Theo Risitoel in front of him—
Then at this moment, Lewen felt nothing but gratitude toward that God.