Ch.233Side Story: Dragon Lord – 3

The place the woman who called herself the Dragon Lord guided us to was a room in an elegant mansion. Every piece of furniture was of such high quality that even Charlotte wouldn’t have found fault with it.

“Where is this place?”

“Since we must receive guests, this is a place created to mimic human dwelling structures. We dragons feel comfortable in pure mana, but humans don’t. We can’t exactly keep our guests standing in mana.”

“So you’re saying all of these things are made of mana.”

“You figured it out correctly.”

I glanced at Christine. Her mana nullification wasn’t activated. Yet earlier, even the aftermath of the dragon’s breath had been completely nullified by her ability.

Noticing my gaze, the Ancient smiled slightly.

“I think I know what you’re thinking, child. But there’s no need to worry about that. I’ve already made arrangements for it.”

“Made arrangements?”

“The power of that ability returns the flow of mana directed at oneself to nothingness. The solution is simple. Just ensure that the mana flow doesn’t direct toward that child.”

“…That was possible?”

I was incredibly surprised inside. Temporarily excluding Christine from one’s thoughts might have been possible for the old Serena and Charlotte, but it never lasted semi-permanently.

“There’s no need to be so surprised. This ability doesn’t work on the children beside you either.”

The Ancient’s long, slender finger snapped. A mana sphere formed in her hand and shot like an arrow toward Christine, bursting above her head with a pop and scattering snowflakes.

“I’m not sure about those children from before, but at this point, it’s essentially a non-existent ability. The same applies to me.”

The snowflakes that touched Christine’s head and face instantly sublimated into air and disappeared. Christine silently accepted the snowflakes settling on her body with her hands folded in front of her lower abdomen.

“Now then, let’s continue our conversation.”

At the Ancient’s gesture, teacups floated up into the air and flew toward the four of us. The aroma and color were undeniably top-grade. I lightly grasped the handle of the teacup.

The Ancient, who had transformed the room’s structure to naturally seat the five of us around an antique table, brought her teacup to her lips and said:

“Where should I begin explaining? Would you like me to start with why I summoned you all here?”

“You mentioned earlier that opening the lair had something to do with Charlotte. I’d appreciate a more detailed explanation.”

“I don’t have much more to explain about that point. That child made many efforts for your sake, and calling me was just one of those efforts. She may not have been targeting the existence of a Dragon Lord, but the result is that she met me like this, so it doesn’t matter, does it?”

I glanced slightly at Charlotte. She was wearing a faint but clearly proud smile. I waved my hand slightly at her and turned my head back.

Somehow, the gazes coming from Serena and Christine’s direction were painfully sharp.

“I discovered hope and talent in that child, and that’s why I invited her to our dragons’ lair.”

“So Charlotte came here because you invited her?”

“That’s correct.”

The Ancient took a sip of the steaming tea. Then, frowning deeply, she moved her mouth around before stroking her throat. Ahem, a cough escaped from her mouth.

After massaging her throat for a while, the Ancient’s cheeks turned slightly red.

“How embarrassing to show such a side of myself. I find it difficult to adapt to the sensation of swallowing something with a human throat. Especially the feeling of hot liquid going down. It’s an unnecessary action for us dragons.”

“It’s polite to serve tea and refreshments at gatherings like this, but you don’t need to force yourself to consume them. It’s rude for a guest not to taste what the host has prepared, but no one faults the host for not doing so.”

“Just consider it my stubbornness, child. Now, let’s return to our topic. Where were we… Ah yes, I explained why I called you children here. I glimpsed a fragment of tremendous talent in the child beside you, so I wanted to invite her here. But the child came sooner than I expected. I thought I would need more time.”

“If you met when I was kidnapped, that was at least a few months ago. Do you dragons also have a strange sense of time?”

Well, even for someone like me who has lived barely four digits worth of years, a few months pass by so quickly that they feel insignificant. How much more so for a being called the Dragon Lord?

Having found common ground, we looked at each other and smiled lightly. Perhaps displeased by the fact that I was smiling with a woman, the gazes from both sides became fierce.

The Ancient received those gazes impassively.

“So, you only invited Charlotte?”

“I didn’t know about the other children. However…”

Those blood-red eyes swept over the other two.

Serena clenched and unclenched her fist upon seeing the crimson eyes that looked like a copy of Charlotte’s, and Christine’s eyebrows twitched, apparently finding the sensation quite unpleasant.

“Facing these children now, I feel that fate has led all of you here. This was destined to happen. Not just one, but two more… indeed…”

The Ancient suddenly mumbled about fate and other things I couldn’t understand.

And it seemed that Charlotte, Christine, and Serena were equally clueless about what those words meant.

“It’s truly a pity. If dragons possessed such talent, I would have gladly passed on the position of Lord.”

“What exactly do you mean by ‘fate’? What were you planning to do after inviting Charlotte here?”

“You seem to have many questions, so I’ll answer them in order. To be honest, there’s very little I can seriously teach you.”

The Ancient took another sip of tea.

“What more could I teach children whose souls have already transcended human limitations? At most, I could teach you how to understand dragon language and how to acquire a dragon’s eyes.”

After savoring the taste and aroma of the tea in her mouth, the Ancient swallowed it and was about to bring the teacup to her lips again when she suddenly paused.

“And one most important thing: how to bestow talent upon your past self. Once you’ve gone through that, there would be no reason to stay here any longer.”

“…?”

I tilted my head, not understanding what it meant to bestow talent upon one’s past self, but Serena, Charlotte, and Christine seemed to grasp it.

The three of them, each in their own way, appeared to understand the Ancient’s words, as their expressions gradually became serious. Only I remained dumbfounded, wondering what it all meant.

“What do you mean by bestowing talent on the past?”

“It means exactly what it sounds like. Those children will slightly interfere with their own past.”

“…Interfere with the past?”

“Don’t worry if you don’t understand, child. I’ll explain everything from the beginning.”

Clank. The Ancient set down her teacup.

“That concludes my explanation. Do you understand what I’ve said?”

“…More or less.”

As the lengthy explanation ended, I leaned back against the sofa and let out a deep sigh.

Serena, Charlotte, and Christine also wore even more serious expressions, their minds clearly troubled. I felt much the same way.

“So to summarize in one line, you’re saying that you’ll teach the current Serena, Charlotte, and Christine how to gift talent to their past selves?”

“You’ve grasped it precisely.”

That was the core summary, but I still couldn’t fully comprehend it.

The idea of gifting talent to one’s past self was not only incredibly far-fetched, but even if it were true, the action itself created a paradox.

“I have a question, if I may ask?”

“By all means.”

“According to you, you discovered talent in Charlotte and invited her here, right?”

The Ancient nodded.

“But if they’re interfering with their own past selves, doesn’t that make the cause and effect ambiguous? Which came first—the past Serena, Charlotte, and Christine developing their talents, or receiving talents in this moment? They developed the talents they received to give themselves talents? Does that make any sense?”

I wasn’t sure how many times the word “talent” had come up. It was a concept too complex to explain in words.

The Ancient watched my confusion and wiggled her finger. The empty teacup refilled with green tea. Steam rose from the cup.

“You’ve hit the nail on the head, child. Your perspective is correct. If those children follow my instructions, a kind of repetitive causality forms between talent and its development.”

“One more thing. What happens if I command them not to learn from you how to interfere with their past selves?”

“Would you do that?”

“…”

“Now that you’ve heard my explanation, even the possibility of rejecting the future is bound by causality. Even if you try to change the past here, you would achieve nothing except the mental satisfaction of having fulfilled your stubbornness. And…”

“In the worst case, I might become fixed in time again.”

Instead of an answer, a smile returned. A smile of affirmation.

That was exactly it. Now that I was aware of the loop-like causality formed for Serena, Charlotte, and Christine, I couldn’t break it.

Whatever the outcome, it was strange, but conversely, whatever the outcome, it wasn’t strange. My thoughts became incredibly complicated. There were too many possibilities to consider.

“Let me ask a few more things. If you knew all along that these three would act this way, couldn’t you have just come to find us? Why did you wait for us to come to the lair?”

If the Ancient had known about this loop-like causality from the beginning, it would have been much easier and simpler to just call the three from the start, without going through all this complexity.

But the Ancient didn’t do that, and even acted as if she was seeing Serena and Christine for the first time when they arrived here. It didn’t add up. It was hard to determine what she knew and didn’t know.

“There’s no need to think so hard, child. There’s one more by your side, isn’t there? A being who rivals those children and has already twisted their own causality.”

“One more person? Who… Wait, do you mean Olivia? What did she do?”

“A great many things.”

She took a sip of tea.

“For instance, she shattered her own causality.”