Wizard of the Deep Sea

TL/ED – Miso

Manganji Kingdom.

In the dark room of a small manor, a woman peered outside through a gap in the window.

Her serpentine eyes watched a group of white-clad Fallen wandering happily outside the manor grounds, Piercing Blood among them, and her fists clenched tight.

“…I can’t take this anymore.”

Damyu. She made her decision inside the hideout where Undercurrent had concealed her.

She couldn’t stay hidden here any longer.

It wasn’t that she lacked supplies. It wasn’t particularly uncomfortable either.

Undercurrent did seem to be up to something strange, and given that he’d even handed over Piercing Blood, perhaps this had been his goal all along.

But this crossed the line. “What on earth…?”

Even if she wasn’t all that amazing, she was still a keeper.

Damyu had made acquaintances with quite a few Fallen.

So she couldn’t help but notice. Recently, the number of Fallen in Manganji Kingdom had increased at an alarming rate.

Those who had sworn they’d rather die than serve under Dark Night, rationing their World-Sealing Pills down to the last crumb back when she was still in the Lower Tier, they were now wandering around with stupid grins on their faces.

Judging by their state, they clearly weren’t in their right minds. As baffling as it was, these people had walked here of their own accord and thrown themselves into a fate worse than death.

‘C-Could they have been taken by force…?’

She considered the possibility that Dark Night had used her power to abduct other Fallen, but soon shook her head.

Even so, the risks would be too great. No matter how lightly the Upper Tier looked down on the Lower Tier, if they’d truly treated them that way, the Lower Tier would have ceased to exist long ago.

Anyway, the danger remained.

The number of Fallen in Manganji Kingdom kept growing at an absurd rate.

And Undercurrent hadn’t come to find her. No, she hadn’t seen hide nor hair of him.

The latter was the problem. Damyu was confident she could escape on her own if she tried.

But.

“I absolutely can’t lose him…”

Crack- She gripped the window frame with bloodshot intensity.

Escape? Easy.

What came after wasn’t.

Over the past year and several weeks, Damyu had learned that even hell could contain a paradise.

She couldn’t even remember when she’d last had to walk around scrounging for World-Sealing Pills to make up for shortages. Undercurrent was, quite literally, the most perfect employer in the world.

Having dunked her head completely into the honeypot that was Undercurrent, she had no intention of leaving. She was determined to take him with her when she escaped, no matter what it took.

‘He’s probably been captured.’

Even so, she assessed the situation rationally.

There was a high probability Undercurrent had been taken by enemies. Otherwise, there was no way he would have gone this long without any contact.

She made a plan. Rescue him by any means necessary, get him out, try escaping beyond the range of Dark Night’s abilities at least once, and if that proved difficult, ask other Fallen to help find a way.

With the plan set, all that remained was action. As she prepared to move, something suddenly came to mind.

“What was this again?”

Undercurrent had left her a letter.

Could it contain some kind of contingency for this situation?

She debated whether to open it, then remembered he’d never actually told her not to, and casually broke the seal.

And.

“…What is this?”

Dumbfounded by the single unremarkable sentence inside, she folded it back up.

“I don’t think showing this or not would make any difference…”

Still grumbling about her betrayed expectations, she stepped out the door.

*

Damyu wasn’t a fool.

She knew this was enemy territory, and that nothing good would come of being discovered as a Fallen with no ties here.

The fortunate thing was that the World-Sealing Pills Undercurrent had left behind were still plentiful.

“…”

She kept only her head above the ground, wearing a washbasin over it.

By peering through the gaps in the basin while moving cautiously, she achieved a perfect disguise.

No one would assume there was a person underneath a washbasin, after all.

Her breath caught in her throat whenever guards passed by, but in the end, they just chatted amongst themselves.

“What memory did you get?”

“You won’t believe this—I had a wife.”

“What? Seriously?”

“I’m serious. I don’t know the details yet, but…”

She let the incomprehensible conversation pass and arrived at the castle.

Walking through her swamp, Damyu swallowed hard.

“…I won’t find him unless I go inside.”

Undercurrent was somewhere in there.

Pushing aside the idle thought of wanting to borrow even a fraction of his detection abilities, she entered the castle far more carefully than she had moved outside.

Her swamp turned even the marble into mud. As she walked through the silent corridors with bated breath, she realized a major problem.

Unlike the bare ground, a washbasin lying upside down in a corridor was extremely conspicuous.

She had no choice but to move along the edges, and whenever that wasn’t possible, she checked her surroundings before standing up and running.

“Hm?”

“…!”

Despite her best efforts to minimize noise, someone seemed to have heard her footsteps—a questioning sound reached her ears.

She held her breath. She desperately wanted to submerge her head completely into the swamp, but she felt like she’d never be able to emerge again if she did.

Damyu had never once fully immersed herself in the swamp in her entire life. Even now, keeping just her head above the surface had required considerable courage, made possible only by the World-Sealing Pills.

“What was that?”

The footsteps drew closer. Her heart pounded as if it might burst.

One step. Just as the person was about to reach the point where her head would be visible—

“Ah, Number 1-nim.”

“Number 13, it was you.”

Someone walking from the opposite direction saved Damyu.

Unable to even feel relieved, she gasped for breath as the man called Number 1 clicked his tongue in apparent dissatisfaction.

“Good grief, I’ve been too on edge lately.”

“Is something the matter?”

“Of course there is. Some nobody who crawled in from who knows where is muddying the waters.”

“Is that so? I’ve actually found things more comfortable.”

“…What do you mean by that?”

“That man has monopolized all of Dark Night-nim’s attention, so she no longer gathers us or demands as many sacrifices. This is the most peaceful it’s been since I became part of her Family.”

“Don’t get too comfortable. I’ve been by her side the longest, and I know. This is the calm before the storm.”

“Do you really think so?”

“Yes. Just look at the absurd thing that man has created. Trading memories with the children? What even is that? A Lower Tier beneath the Lower Tier? It’s so ridiculous I can only laugh.”

“But thanks to that, we have much more autonomy, and our workload has decreased, hasn’t it?”

“That’s exactly why I’m saying we need to be careful. The safest times are when we’re doing the difficult, tedious work…”

Number 1 ground his teeth as he spoke.

“So, where is that Undercurrent fellow right now?”

“…!”

Damyu, who had been about to snap back to her senses and slip away, froze in place.

The person they’d been badmouthing and tearing apart was her master.

‘Well, not exactly my master, but…’

Anyway, as she listened closely, Number 13’s sardonic reply told her what she needed to know.

“He’s probably in the rear garden doing ‘that work’. As always.”

The rear garden.

That was all she needed. Damyu moved quickly.

She knew where the garden was. From outside the castle, there was an area clearly landscaped with grass and trees.

Even without that knowledge, she would have found it soon enough.

“Ah, ahhh…!”

Groaning sounds drifted through the night air.

Not a woman’s voice, but a man’s. She furrowed her brow as she approached—

“…What?”

A long line filled the garden.

People waiting politely approached the boy standing at the front and knelt before him.

Naturally, it was Undercurrent.

As she watched this cult-like scene in disbelief, someone at the front of the line approached with an excited expression and knelt.

“What do you desire?”

“Um, can I choose?”

“You can choose the type. Something about family, about a lover, about success… Though of course, everything else is left to chance.”

“Family, please!”

“Very well.”

Undercurrent raised his hand and traced something in the air a few times—

The man’s eyes flew wide open as he clutched his head.

“Y-Yes. That’s right… Mother…”

“Congratulations. However, there are others waiting, so please step aside now that you’ve received your revelation.”

“Oh, yes!”

The man rose with a blissful expression, bowing repeatedly as he left.

And Damyu understood absolutely none of what she had just witnessed.

‘…He wasn’t captured?’

She’d assumed he was being tortured in some dungeon somewhere.

Instead, he’d founded a religion.

His life seemed to be going remarkably well. Just as she was wondering whether she’d made a pointless fuss—Undercurrent suddenly rose from his seat.

“Something has come up. We’ll end here for today.”

“Ah…”

The people looked disappointed but expressed no complaints whatsoever, instead bowing their heads respectfully as they dispersed.

Undercurrent waited until every last one of them had vanished, then—

“Who’s there.”

He murmured.

Damyu cautiously stood up. She hadn’t expected to evade Undercurrent’s detection in the first place.

And there was no reason to hide from him anyway. She asked with a surprised expression.

“You’re perfectly fine? What a relief…”

“…”

“I came all this way because you hadn’t contacted me at all, so I thought you’d been captured somewhere. I was doing everything I could to rescue you, but I guess there was no need. But still, you could have at least sent word…”

As she started to air her complaints, she noticed something was off.

“I asked you a question.”

His face looked slightly different.

Undercurrent’s expression had never been particularly pleasant to begin with. It always hovered somewhere between sullen and scowling.

But now she realized that had been nothing.

With no one else around anymore, Undercurrent was calm.

Unnervingly so.

“Uh, gkk…!”

“I asked who you are.”

-Squeeze! Damyu felt her breath cut off as she was lifted into the air.

Some kind of force was strangling her neck. Struggling desperately, she managed to force out words.

“I-I’m… D-Damyu…”

“Do you know me?”

“Y-Yes…”

He loosened the grip on her throat just enough for her to answer while keeping her suspended, and asked flatly.

“Can you explain in a way that would make me trust you?”

“L-Letter…”

“What?”

“I have a letter… that you gave me…”

Coughing and wheezing, Damyu pulled the letter from inside her clothes and handed it over.

Undercurrent took it and opened it immediately. Inside was written a single sentence.

[What you’re doing now is correct. Continue as you are.]

“Hm.”

Undercurrent released Damyu without hesitation.

“Cough, cough…”

“That checks out. This is exactly something I would write.”

“H-Have you lost your memories??”

Damyu asked in shock from where she’d fallen to the ground, and he nodded.

“Some of them? So I’d like to ask you something. What was our relationship?”

“…!”

Even amid this incomprehensible situation, something sparked in Damyu’s mind.

‘This is my chance!’

If he’d truly lost his memories.

And if he was somehow still maintaining his sense of self despite that—she could redefine their relationship going forward.

Her rapidly spinning mind quickly reached a conclusion.

“Yes. We were in a relationship where we couldn’t live without each other. That’s why I came all this way to rescue you, Undercurrent-nim.”

“…”

Undercurrent’s expression twisted with genuine disgust as he propped up his chin.

“My past self must have had bizarre taste.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. Anyway, if we knew each other, there’s something I want to ask.”

Undercurrent gazed into the empty air.

His eyes seemed to be tracking something—

But Damyu couldn’t see anything there.

“Did the me you knew ever mention, um, ‘fish’?”

“F-Fish?”

“…”

Undercurrent looked at the bewildered Damyu, pinched the bridge of his nose, and sighed.

“What in the world do I do…”

A sigh she couldn’t hear escaped his lips.