Back to Familiar Ground

This time it was a rather spoiled voice, and it sounded very familiar.

Upon hearing the voice, Rovey's eyes widened slightly. He turned around and saw a scantily clad Ishtar emerge from within. Although her posture was somewhat awkward, it was easy to see that she was trying to climb from the other side to Chaldea.

"I'm so sorry, I called you the wrong person, Ishtar. You should go back to your temple and sleep. There are limited spots available, and you can't come out now."

"Hey hey hey? You were the one who summoned me! Don't push my face! That's disrespectful! Utterly disrespectful! Don't step on me!!"

Rovey wiped away his cold sweat, pushed Ishtar, who had appeared out of nowhere, back, and then locked the summoning circle to prevent her from climbing out again.

At this moment, his mind was filled with doubts.

How could I have summoned that disgraceful goddess Ishtar? Shouldn't it have been Tiamat?

Could it be that this time we're just really compatible?

Impossible, absolutely impossible.

How could someone like me be so compatible with that useless goddess? It must be because the signal is unstable now that we've just connected to the Seventh Singularity.

Keep summoning, yes, just keep drawing cards.

So, Rovey began using this physical return method to keep searching for the cards he wanted in the card pool.

"Call!"

"You piece of trash, what do you want from me? Shouldn't you be calling for your mother?"

"Sorry, wrong person. You can go back for a moment. Next, continue summoning!"

"Oh my, I didn't expect to see you so soon! Did you miss your big sister? How about a wrestling match of body and soul?"

"No, go wrestle with Merlin! Summon again!"

"Evening Bell..."

"You've come to the wrong place, please go back!"

--Continue the summoning!

Under Da Vinci's astonished gaze, after repeatedly summoning out almost all the Servant from the Seventh Singularity and then putting them back in, Rovey once again slapped his palm on the summoning circle.

And after failing more than ten times, even the nature of this summoning had changed.

Another flash of light appeared.

This time, a girl with long, azure hair appeared in the summoning circle. She spoke in a gentle voice, "Ahem, I am a god, and even more so, a mother. Although I shouldn't answer humans' summons, if it's you... Waaaaaah?! Hey, why are you suddenly pressing my head!?"

"Huh?"

Rovey paused, because he had summoned almost everyone he knew from the Seventh Singularity, including King Hassan. So, almost instinctively, he wanted to suppress the summoned entity. But upon hearing the other's voice, Rovey realized that the Heroic Spirit appearing before him, being frantically patted on the head, was...

It was Tiamat.

Upon seeing her, Rovey and Da Vinci felt a sense of relief.

After working so hard for so long, we finally succeeded!

Another very important thing is that Tiamat, who could only utter syllables before, can now speak.

Stroking her soft hair, Rovey carefully examined Tiamat, who had the petite figure of a loli, and a smile appeared on his face.

Because the vocal organs within the original body are not divine syllables, but rather simulated human speech, Tiamat was able to communicate using human language immediately after possessing the body, making it easier for her to interact with others.

"Great! We finally succeeded! It's so good to see you again, Tiamat."

Seeing that he had finally drawn the SSR he wanted after so many bad draws, Rovey was filled with emotion.

"Yes, I'm very happy too. It's so good to see you again."

Tiamat jumped up happily, hugged his neck, and exclaimed, "This is my first time being summoned as Servant, it feels quite strange. And my class is Alterago!"

"Another personality? That's a pretty good class."

Rovey patted her little head, then placed her back on the ground and nodded gently.

As long as it's not a Beast class, it's fine.

"Phew, it's finally over."

Da Vinci breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing Tiamat summoned.

Although the process was somewhat bumpy, the result was ultimately good.

However, just as she was about to step forward to examine Tiamat's possessed body...

Swish!!

Suddenly, a burst of colorful light erupted before her eyes once again.

The next moment, three colorful halos emerged from the summoning circle and began to spin rapidly.

"Oh, what's this?!"

Da Vinci stared in astonishment at the summoning circle that had appeared before him, now surrounded by a halo.

"Chain summoning? I didn't expect to see such a rare scene on my first visit. I'm really lucky!"

At that moment, Sion, who had come to watch, also entered the summoning room. She looked at the colorful halo emerging from the room, as well as another powerful magical force.

Even from a great distance, she could sense the extraordinary magic within.

Immediately afterwards, an even more intense light filled the room, forcing Tiamat to temporarily avoid it.

Swish!!

A few seconds later, the light disappeared.

All eyes were drawn to the summoning circle.

There's nothing on it.

No?

Doubt filled the hearts of everyone present.

"Where is the summoned Servant...?"

Sion had just arrived, raised the question that had been on her mind.

"I can't see it. Is it Presence Concealment?"

Da Vinci also began searching for the Servant had just summoned.

"That's not the point! Where did Rovey go?!"

Tiamat looked around at the empty area and expressed her confusion.

"Ah?"

Upon hearing her voice, Da Vinci suddenly realized what was happening.

He looked toward where Rovey had been and found that Rovey, who had been with Tiamat, had suddenly disappeared, and there was no trace of him in the entire room.

Volume 7: Revisiting the Old Place

Chapter 354 Returning to the Old Ground

"Ugh, this is really too much trouble."

On a street in a certain city, Rovey was leaning back in a chair that, although hard and obviously not very comfortable, inexplicably made him feel at ease.

"I only asked you to do a small favor, and you're acting like this, constantly bothering people... It's a bit annoying."

Looking around at the bustling crowd, Rovey sighed deeply, as if talking to himself.

"This is really tiring."

After muttering a few words to himself, as if remembering something, Rovey pulled a book out from the lining of his clothes. Looking at the words on the cover, his thoughts drifted away once more.

"Do as you please, and I will make it your way."

Do what you want to do, and weave the stories you want to weave.

To live without regrets, to not suppress oneself, to not deceive oneself, and to trust one's own heart—that is one's principle.

Originally, I was just learning some seemingly plausible things, but after experiencing some things firsthand and gaining some insights, what I finally learned truly became my own.

He went from a swindling thief to an ambitious man plotting to ascend to the throne of a demon god, a hypocritical saint, and then to an ordinary person who simply wanted to make himself happy and have his thoughts clear.

The journey has been quite bumpy.

Moreover, the further you walk, the more you move forward, the more you will discover something called fate. That invisible hand, like a freak following you, is constantly pushing everything forward.

Even though the other party only pushes things along without interfering, and many things are experienced and chosen by oneself, the feeling of being watched by parents must still be very unpleasant, right?

It feels like I'm living in someone else's script the whole time.

So, in the very end, even though he only needed to agree to achieve his initial goal and completely transcend the boundaries of this world, he still refused. Was this also a form of silent resistance on his part?

From the very beginning until now, where have all these coincidences come from?

Ultimately, everything that is happening now was inevitable.

"So, what exactly do you want?"

Rovey raised his hand and picked up an empty soda can that someone hadn't thrown away, which was next to a park bench. Then, he raised his finger and easily tossed it in a perfect arc. It landed precisely in a trash can a hundred meters away, completely ignoring the astonished looks from passersby.

"Didn't we already agree that my life from now on belongs to me? We can talk about working overtime for you after I die of natural causes. Is it really necessary to create a new world and bring me in to chat? What do you take creating a world for, anyway?"

Rovey, propping his chin on his hand, couldn't help but criticize the other party's hasty creation of a world.

"This behavior is as sloppy as a child assembling a building block toy."

That's true.

As soon as he finished speaking, a hollow voice suddenly came from not far away, followed by a gust of wind blowing past his ear, and an ordinary-looking middle-aged figure sat down beside him without him even noticing.

"Creating a world, or sculpting an independent universe World Line, is as simple to me as adding another branch to a tree called a world. Although creating one isn't difficult, in your words, it's a fake one, not the original, and therefore meaningless. So I'm not so bored as to do something like that."

"You, my child, the successor I chose from the very beginning, although you are very intelligent, you are extremely disobedient, always doing things that are completely unexpected at crucial moments, and what's worse, you succeed in most of them."

"That doesn't sound like something you'd say. Didn't you advocate that phrase—"

Is there no such thing as chance in the world, only inevitability?

Rovey pulled a few crumbs from his pocket and tossed them to the pigeons on the ground. He didn't look up; he simply answered the man beside him with these words.

"So you really couldn't predict it? Aren't you a true... god?"

"Gurgle--"

As he was speaking, a pigeon that had been running around on the ground suddenly hopped to Rovey's feet, and he turned his head back to face the pigeon.

"Yes..."

The unremarkable man gave a rather bland smile, then took out a piece of bread he had hidden behind his back and waved it in front of Rovey.

"So I predicted you must be hungry, that's why I came to save you. How about that, isn't I a great god?"

"Huh... why did the topic suddenly change like this?"

Hearing his nonsensical words, Rovey sighed helplessly, "So you brought me here, and I just reunited with someone, just to treat me to bread, right? You're being a bit stingy. Can't you exchange it for something more valuable, like a divine artifact or a blessing?"

"It's not a good thing to always value external things so much, and I remember you were quite resistant to my power before, weren't you?"

The man shook his head slightly, then ate the bread in his hand.

"I may be resistant, but if I don't take it, it's a waste."

Rovey: "And didn't you say you were going to give it to me?"

"Didn't you refuse to eat it yourself?"

"I'm just being polite. Who told you to keep spouting these high-sounding principles since you showed up?"

Rovey gently shook his head. "Well, my adoptive father, is this the first time we've met like this?"

"Yes, that's right. This is the first time I've met you in my human form, aside from under the tree."

The man touched his chin. "How do you feel? Do you think I look handsome or kind?"

"Huh? Aren't there mirrors in the sky?"

Rovey covered his face and complained, "Also, watch your image. If Jeanne Martha saw you like this, they would go crazy."

Don't worry about such trivial matters.

The man suddenly pulled out a rather luxurious-looking cake from behind him and gently waved it in front of Rovey.