Wizard of the Deep Sea

TL/ED – Miso

“…”

Dark Night looked at Undercurrent, frozen like a stone, and let out a sigh.

It was over.

No mere Fallen could withstand that much Burden.

“If I’d just had a little more time…”

She pouted, her expression sullen, and stared regretfully at the ruined Undercurrent.

Losing a body with such talent was a shame. She had only expected him to possess the other children and launch a surprise attack at best.

Yet even with all his memories gone, starting from a blank slate, he had gathered what information remained, identified what needed to be done, and made it happen.

Dark Night thought to herself. If she could somehow turn him into an idiot and use him, perhaps… He really could have been a dependable older brother.

“…?”

Lost in that thought, Dark Night noticed that the Burden hadn’t disappeared yet and glared at Undercurrent.

He knelt with his eyes closed, slumped over, arms hanging loose with palms facing upward.

He clearly wasn’t in his right mind. The problem was that the Burden was still being updated moment by moment.

It wasn’t just Undercurrent’s Deep Sea. The Burden from the other Fallen was still being forced onto her as well.

In other words, Number 1 had failed to eliminate the other Fallen.

“Tch.”

She didn’t know why, but if she didn’t deal with Undercurrent decisively right now, the Burden would flow back to her. Clicking her tongue, she cast an annoyed glance at the Deep Sea Creatures still swimming about, then took a step forward.

[…]

The Deep Sea Creatures showed no reaction. With their master in that state, it was only natural.

Without a trace of concern, Dark Night approached Undercurrent and pressed a dagger made of Thread against his throat.

She was about to kill someone she had called Family just moments ago, yet she felt no emotional turmoil whatsoever.

She could just give the name to someone else. There was no problem at all…

“…What a horrible feeling.”

“!”

-Crack.

The dagger was caught.

Dark Night recoiled in shock, stumbling backward, but Undercurrent refused to let go of the Thread.

“H-how…!”

She stared in horror at Undercurrent as he staggered to his feet, her expression like she might vomit at any moment.

She should have killed him. Even if it was a waste, that had been her judgment, and she hadn’t held back in the slightest.

She had slammed the strongest Burden she possessed directly into Undercurrent’s head without any restraint.

Yes, the strongest Burden.

“…”

“Ugh!”

But there was no time for questions and answers.

At such close range, with the Thread caught in his grip.

The silver lining was that Undercurrent didn’t seem to be in normal condition either. She hurriedly pulled back, but—

She didn’t see something coalescing in his hand.

-Boom!

“Oh, this is rather interesting. I didn’t know I could do something like this.”

“…”

Undercurrent extended his hand from his seated position and conjured a spell.

A spear of wind pierced Dark Night’s abdomen.

At point-blank range, she took an attack powerful enough to easily tear a person apart in her mere woman’s body. Dark Night clutched her stomach.

It was meaningless.

“However.”

Undercurrent looked at her abdomen with sympathetic eyes.

A hole had been punched through, but no blood flowed. Instead, what had been flesh became a hole that merely wore the color of flesh.

Soon the hole closed up. Watching Dark Night grind her teeth, he replied with a bitter tone.

“You’re no longer human—you’re a phenomenon.”

***

I got up, tapping my head. My memories were still muddled, but at least I had grasped all the important things.

There was something I realized at the very end of my fight with Wihwa.

When a Fallen uses their abilities too excessively without dying, they become part of their World.

Deep Fusion. Assimilation. That’s what that state is called.

I still don’t know how I survived that state. I should have become part of the Deep Sea…

But to get back to the main point.

“Actually, there was something I couldn’t quite understand.”

Transferring Burden.

Was this really an ability a single individual could possess?

No, in the first place—was this even an ability that fell within the domain of a World’s Burden?

Dark Night was far too versatile, and despite using her abilities on such a massive scale, she showed no signs of suffering from the Burden, let alone taking any World-Sealing Pills.

If this had truly been within the scope of her abilities, at the very least Dark Night herself, as both the medium and the user, would have needed to take tens of thousands of World-Sealing Pills every day.

She had never done so.

The reason was simple.

“You’re not a Fallen—you’re a World itself. It makes perfect sense that you don’t bear any Burden. A World inflicts Burden; it doesn’t receive it.”

“…”

Watching her maintain her silence, I came to realize several other facts as well.

“Then the Upper Tier aren’t Fallen at all—they’re all beings who have Assimilated with their Worlds? No, calling them ‘beings’ doesn’t seem right either.”

Literally, my enemy was a World.

A Fallen at least has Burden to worry about, but what the hell was this?

It was as stupid as believing you could win by smashing your head against a glacier or taking a shovel to a mountain.

As I sighed, Dark Night quietly asked.

“How do you know about Assimilation?”

“I nearly went through it once.”

“…What?”

“That’s how I was able to withstand what you just did to me.”

Just now, my mind was split strand by strand, turned into Threads.

It was the kind of sensation that should have left me a vegetable, but perhaps because I had experienced it once before, or maybe there was something else at play.

By the time Dark Night approached at close range, I was able to regain awareness. Thank goodness for that.

“What I don’t understand most is—how are you maintaining your humanity?”

“…”

“In my experience, Assimilation is like a human turning into seawater. Naturally, seawater isn’t any kind of sentient being—it’s just that substance. I can’t believe you’re having a conversation with me like this.”

“I’m still human.”

“Oh, would you look at that. A ball of Thread can talk.”

The response was immediate.

No longer bothering to hide it, her body split and fluttered from her feet up to her waist. Her expression twisted as if she might devour a person whole, and the Threads came crashing down.

“So what!!”

There was no dodging that speed. My body was too exhausted to even control the Deep Sea Creatures, and in an instant I was wrapped up like an insect caught in a spider’s web.

“If you know that much, you should know there’s no chance of victory for you! What difference does knowing make?”

-Squeeze! Unable to breathe under the pressure that cut off my circulation, I found Dark Night’s blood-red eyes glaring down at me.

“All your struggling amounts to nothing but struggling! Even if I’m ruined by taking on the Burden, that’s not true death! Void will remake me!”

“…Void.”

“You were never my enemy, not from the start until now. Even if you kill all my children and Family. It means nothing to me. I can just attach new ones.”

Listening to her words, I nodded with all my strength.

Now I was beginning to understand. She was a World trying to imitate a human.

If I had to describe it…

“You. All. Were. Once. Human.”

“…!”

“Kh.”

It seemed I had struck a nerve. The binding grew even tighter.

There was something about Dark Night’s behavior that I simply couldn’t comprehend.

Increasing the number of Fallen to expand her own power and influence—fine, I could understand that. Before even considering good or evil, it was logical behavior.

Distributing their Burden to the humans called Livestock was also a rational way of managing risk.

Then what about this business of Family and children?

Genuinely believing that the Livestock who had lost their memories would be happy, unable to even distinguish their genders while simply slapping the label of Family on them, outwardly cherishing them yet not caring whether they lived or died, replacing them with new ones—why?

What was the purpose of wanting to make the entire world like that?

I couldn’t make sense of it. I couldn’t find any reason, logic, or rationale behind it.

But now that I knew she was a World, the picture became clear.

The Puppet was imitating a human.

The human called Dark Night.

“Die.”

“…”

As my vision gradually faded to white, I watched her expression and became certain.

Void, the one likely at the very top of the Upper Tier, was somehow turning Worlds into humans.

Certainly—a Fallen without Burden. That had quite the sweet ring to it.

They might wield power comparable to a wizard who had reached the Celestial Realm.

“Hey, you…”

Well, seeing how Decay had been defeated by Master time and again, they probably couldn’t compare to the Celestial Realm after all.

And the Lump didn’t seem to be at the level of being treated as a phenomenon yet either.

“How…are you still alive?”

I set those thoughts aside and broke free.

The Threads binding my arms and legs had already come undone.

It wasn’t Dark Night—no, the Puppet hadn’t released them. She stared at me with disbelief in her eyes as I walked through the Threads.

I shrugged and answered lightly.

“You’re right. Honestly, I don’t have confidence that I can beat a World while remaining human.”

“…You!”

“But I told you, didn’t I? I’ve had that kind of experience too.”

The graceful step I took didn’t touch the ground.

As I drew breath through my mouth, seawater rushed in and filled my lungs, but instead of pain, I felt omnipotence.

I had never used it since fighting Wihwa.

But now that I knew my opponent was a World, I had no choice.

I had to end this as quickly as possible.

“…Ah, now I can finally see.”

It couldn’t have been the case, but if I had activated Deep Fusion the moment I saw the Puppet, I never would have mistaken her for human.

Compared to my usual Current Sense, which felt like seeing shadows in the darkness, the Current Sense in Deep Fusion state slammed an overwhelming amount of information into my brain.

Within that information, the Puppet did not appear as a human woman.

Instead, there was a writhing mass of Thread mimicking a human form, sucking something from all the Fallen and Livestock.

An insect’s cocoon… that would be the appropriate term.

“…Ugh.”

Once again, I felt that unsettling sense of omnipotence.

Wasn’t this good enough? To perceive, learn, and understand everything that mere humans could never grasp, to feel this sensation for the rest of my life…

“Shit…”

It took time to suppress that impulse. Watching me struggle, the Puppet smiled with relief.

“Ha, haha…! You think someone who just became a World can stand against me, who’s lived as a World my entire existence?”

“We’ll have to find out. Please, teach me a thing or two.”

“You little…!”

The Threads could no longer catch me.

Instead, they wove themselves together at will and pierced the floor. Watching the space close in where not a drop of water could pass through, I glanced at the sharpened Threads as they stabbed down.

She wasn’t trying to catch me. Her goal appeared to be riddling me with holes until I could no longer maintain a human form.

“…Hm.”

Each time, I kept getting swept up in that impulse.

I had thought that in the Deep Fusion state, any attack would be like cutting water with a knife, but I was wrong.

If I truly lost my form, I would be consumed by the World. I couldn’t call that defeat exactly, but I would certainly lose the will to fight.

…Which meant defeat. As I frowned at my constantly shifting perception, the Puppet took a few steps back and sneered.

“You picked the wrong opponent. You think Thread will crumple inside your Deep Sea?”

“…”

“Worlds may have no hierarchy, but they do have compatibility! I don’t need someone like you anymore—you’re not even an Ocean anyway. Just get out of the Material Realm already!”

“You seem to be misunderstanding something.”

I took a step and dodged the Threads.

It was only natural. From the very beginning, the trajectory of every single Thread was visible to me.

The reason I let myself get hit was curiosity. I wanted to know why she was using attacks that didn’t even work on me.

But the Puppet didn’t take it for granted. She flinched in surprise and increased the number of Threads.

Watching it impassively, I swept my hand through the air.

“Water Pressure is just a characteristic of the Deep Sea. It’s not really my attack.”

“…Huh?”

-Slice!

Fluttering, her arm—or what served as one—was severed and swept away by the current.

The Puppet stared at it in bewilderment, then desperately scanned her surroundings. Trying to figure out where and how I was attacking.

It was meaningless.

“Kyah, kyaaaah!!”

Screaming like a human, the Puppet’s arms, legs, neck… even her torso were sliced apart indiscriminately.

Only then did she realize.

“This is…”

“Yes.”

Blades were everywhere—above, below, left, right.

Watching her expression drown in despair, I explained with a hint of pity.

“Your compatibility with me is just too poor.”

It was unfortunate.

But the Puppet had simply been unlucky.