Chapter 387: A Reversed Story (3) |
From the highest spire of the Ice Spirit Plateau Fortress, the entire city unfolded like a tapestry beneath her gaze.
It was a view unlike any she had ever known.
The Ice Spirit Plateau Fortress, a stronghold she had only ever glimpsed from a distance through the eyes of Grand Duke Selphram, had always seemed like a cold and unfeeling monument to duty.
But now, it thrummed with vitality, filled with hope and the hum of life.
‘If this illusion is a lie... perhaps it’s one I wouldn’t mind believing forever.’
“Hmph!”
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon focused her gaze, and the colors of the world faded, leaving only black and white.
No matter how skilled the Class 9 dark mage who had crafted the Persona Gate was, they could not hide the truth from one of the Twelve Divine Moons.
One by one, the truth began to reveal itself before her.
He was actually a magical weapons depot guard.
— The young man picking flowers with a grin?
He was a soldier who had been stationed at the 19th outpost on watch duty.
— The man dancing in the streets while others clapped for him?
He was a platoon leader from the rear support division.
— And the elderly woman applauding him?
She was the commander of the forward assault division, tasked with repelling monsters on the front lines.
‘All of them... have been fighting hard here.’
But even as she observed their struggles, their weariness masked behind bright smiles and laughter, she felt her heart tighten. Could this false bliss truly be called happiness?
No. It could not.
Every soul here had a duty.
From low-ranking soldiers to commanders responsible for thousands, they all carried the same duty—
To defend this fortress. To hold the line against the monstrous threat clawing at the northern edge of the continent.
They looked happy, but none of them truly were.
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon saw beyond the mask.
She could feel their despair, buried deep beneath the fabricated joy. Their hearts cried out in anguish, muffled beneath the heavy shroud of a lie.
‘This is my fault.’
Her thoughts weighed like iron chains. It was because of her fleeting exchange with a soulless, callous dark mage that these people had become ensnared in this hellish mirage.
‘I have to set them free.’
Her golden eyes burned with determination as she lifted her hand skyward, her index and middle fingers forming the shape of scissors.
She could see it.
The faint, shimmering ‘threads of the mind,’ weaving through the city like invisible puppet strings, binding everyone in this web of deceit.
She could also see the energy form that made up the Persona Gate.
‘… I can cut through it.’
Snip!
Like cutting with scissors, she closed her fingers, and one of the laughing townspeople suddenly collapsed to his knees, trembling.
“A-Ah… What is this…?!”
Confusion swept over his face as he clutched his head, the illusion dissolving like morning mist. But Pale Yellow Autumn Moon didn’t stop to comfort him. She couldn’t afford to. The others needed her.
Snip! Snip!
One by one, she severed the threads binding them, releasing each person from the false reality.
The liberated townspeople reacted in various ways. Some collapsed, dazed and overwhelmed by their return to truth. Others, sharper of mind or stronger of will, rallied those around them, leading them back to their posts as soldiers of the fortress.
Snip! …Ting!
Suddenly, her fingers stopped.
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon frowned as she encountered a thread that wouldn’t break.
‘What is this…?’
It shimmered softly with a pink glow, unlike anything she had encountered before. The energy was unmistakable… this was the power of Pink Spring Moon.
‘… Ah.’
Turning her gaze, she saw a High Elf floating in the sky with fairy-like wings, her presence illuminating the world with a pink light.
She didn’t cast her power at random.
Instead, it selectively protected the minds of the crazed people, those who laughed madly without reason.
‘… That’s right.’
If those broken souls were released too hastily, the fragile balance holding this situation together would shatter, plunging everything into chaos. But that worry was already being handled.
The creatures - the ones she had feared the most - were being held in check by Baek Yu-Seol and Florin.
So all Pale Yellow Autumn Moon needed to do was free the humans trapped here.
Snip!
Of course, it wasn’t easy.
Sweat beaded and rolled down her face, though she had no true physical body to tire. The strain was mental, crushing in its intensity, but she pressed on.
‘I am one of the Twelve Divine Moons, a master of the mind.’
‘If I can’t even handle this, then I’m not worthy of my title.’
Determined, Pale Yellow Autumn Moon shifted her approach. Cutting threads one by one would take too long.
She reached deep into her mindscape, summoning a colossal pair of scissors forged from her willpower. Their weight was staggering, and even lifting them brought pain, but she forced herself onward.
With a single, decisive motion, she raised the giant scissors high and…
Snip!
“Huh? Why am I here…?”
“Ha-ha! Hah…? Wait—what? I was supposed to prepare for deployment. Why was I running a fruit stand?”
“Huh? Captain? Why are you… holding my arm?”
At once, the mental control over hundreds—no, thousands of people shattered.
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon swayed on her feet, the monumental strain of freeing so many at once threatening to overwhelm her. She was moments away from collapsing when a steady hand caught her from behind.
Startled, she turned to see the face of the one she had watched over, protected, and cared for as if he were her own child.
Grand Duke Selphram.
“… Pale Yellow Autumn Moon.”
“Oh… Uh… Looks like you’re back?”
“Yes. Thanks to you.”
He gave a faint smile as he looked around at the brightened and lively Ice Spirit Plateau Fortress.
“I don’t know what happened… But you’ve saved us.”
“… Not entirely.”
Her guilt weighed heavily on her, and she felt compelled to confess. After all, she had been the cause of this nightmare. But as she opened her mouth, Selphram shook his head gently, silencing her unspoken apology.
“It’s fine.”
“I actually like this scene. And… Even though it was brief, those moments when all I knew was laughter… They weren’t so bad.”
“B-But…”
“I’ve spent my entire life thinking only about war. I learned the names of monsters before I learned my father’s name. I learned destructive magic before I even learned how to write.”
His life had been a constant battlefield, devoid of solace. Stability had been a distant dream, one he feared more than he dared to admit. Like his father before him, he had accepted the inevitability of dying in battle.
“And yet…”
His eyes lingered on the vibrant fields of flowers that blanketed the world, their beauty a stark contrast to the cold and desolate reality they all knew.
“Sometimes… Maybe a little change isn’t such a bad thing.”
Despite his words, a bitter smile crossed his face.
“If you return us all to normal... this beautiful scenery will disappear too, won’t it?”
That much was obvious.
This blooming paradise was nothing more than a false world.
If Pale Yellow Autumn Moon erased the Persona Gate, everything would return to its cold, desolate, and harsh state.
But Pale Yellow Autumn Moon shook her head.
“No. That’s not true.”
For once, she wore a confident smile.
“Whether people want it or not… the life that has bloomed here will remain.”
Because Baek Yu-Seol had said so.
… Even if the odds were only 17%,
It didn’t matter.
Because it was his words, and that was more than enough for her to believe.
With renewed determination, she raised her arms once more. The colossal, invisible scissors of her will took form again, slicing through the intricate mental threads that bound the people like marionettes.
Snap! Snap! Crackle!
The web of control began to crumble. Perhaps her earlier efforts had weakened the threads, for now even those she hadn’t touched began to unravel on their own. The domination magic that had gripped the minds of everyone within the Persona Gate was losing its strength, its hold slipping away.
Freed from its purpose, the immense energy that had fueled the mental control now clashed violently with the Persona Gate’s barriers.
And the vast energy that had been used for mental control began colliding with the barrier of the Persona Gate.
“… Look at that…!”
The world of flowers, once confined within the Gate, started to stretch outward, using the released energy to transform the bleak and barren landscape into one teeming with life. The cold, lifeless tundra began to bloom with vibrant colors, as though the very earth had been reborn.
The boundary of the Persona Gate, once impenetrable and ominously black, began to waver. Its edges grew faint, translucent, revealing glimpses of the real world beyond.
Just as Baek Yu-Seol had predicted—
“… I can’t believe it… You’ve created a miracle…!”
Grand Duke Selphram wasn’t the only one witnessing this miraculous transformation.
The soldiers of the Ice Spirit Plateau Fortress, now restored to their original selves, began noticing her.
One by one, their eyes turned upward—
Toward the top of the spire, where she stood, bathed in golden light, scattering hope across the world.
“Look! Up there, on the tower—she’s with the general!”
“Is she the one who brought us back?!”
No, that’s not right.
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon wanted to shout—
‘I may have done the work, but this was never my plan. The one who saved you all is Baek Yu-Seol. He’s the one who made this possible.’
But no words came.
Her body had reached its limit, her strength entirely spent.
Snap!
With one final cut, the last thread fell.
The bond tying them to this false reality was severed, and the magic unraveled completely.
Pale Yellow Autumn Moon collapsed where she stood, her legs giving out beneath her.
“Haa… Haa…”
“Pale Yellow Autumn Moon! Are you alright?!”
Grand Duke Selphram’s voice was thick with panic as he rushed to her side. He knelt, his hands trembling as he tried to support her frail form.
She couldn’t muster the energy to respond. All she could manage was a weak shake of her head, her pale face etched with exhaustion.
And yet—
She forced herself to look up as she felt the presence of someone waiting nearby.
There, atop another distant spire, stood Baek Yu-Seol.
He gazed in her direction, and with a slight nod, signaled his approval.
Then, he pointed toward the horizon.
“… Ah.”
Only then did she finally understand.
‘It’s over.’
The Persona Gate, a mistake born of her carelessness, had been undone.
The oppressive black boundary that had divided truth and illusion had vanished entirely, leaving behind a world transformed… a realm bathed in the warmth of spring, brimming with life and vibrant flowers.
It was a sight nothing short of miraculous.
Could such a frozen, desolate land have ever borne life?
Not even the Class 9 dark mage Maran Kaltz, who had created the Persona Gate, could have accomplished this.
Because he had created this world as a lie, it could never have been made real.
But Pale Yellow Autumn Moon’s powers—
The true abilities of the Twelve Divine Moons—
Made it possible.
One of their greatest abilities—
Interfering with reality itself.
And it was Baek Yu-Seol who had awakened her to this hidden power.
‘I… Created this… Miracle.’
For the first time in her life, she felt genuine pride. She had achieved something extraordinary with her own power, and the elation of success coursed through her.
In that moment, she thought she could die without regrets.
But—
‘No… I’ll stand by Baek Yu-Seol and be his strength.’
The Twelve Divine Moons were fractured, split into two opposing factions: one aligned with Fawn Prevernal Moon, and the other drawn to Baek Yu-Seol.
Initially, she had sided with Fawn Prevernal Moon, her pride unwilling to accept following a mere human.
But she had been wrong.
Fawn Prevernal Moon had never valued her as a person. To him, she had been nothing more than a tool, a title to wield… the Twelve Divine Moon, Pale Yellow Autumn Moon.
Baek Yu-Seol, however, was different.
He had helped her uncover her true potential.
He didn’t see her as a title or a symbol of power; he saw her for who she truly was.
What kind of human would dare treat one of the Twelve Divine Moons with such casual sincerity?
And yet—
Now she understood.
Why so many of the Twelve Divine Moons were now gathering around him.
‘The end is approaching.’
Slowly but surely, the Twelve Divine Moons were turning away from Fawn Prevernal Moon. Their eyes, once fixated on destruction and despair, were now shifting toward the hope embodied by Baek Yu-Seol.
And Pale Yellow Autumn Moon thought—
If the end of the world were truly to come one day—
It wouldn’t be the destruction that Fawn Prevernal Moon desired.
But the hope that Baek Yu-Seol believed in.
She felt certain of it.
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