Mr. Rabbit

After turning in midair and changing his angle of view, Angel finally saw who was sitting at the dining table. Judging by its appearance, it probably could not be called a "person."

More precisely, it was a little rabbit dressed in gentlemanly attire. Or rather, it should be called Mr. Rabbit.

Less than half a meter tall, its fur was as white as snowy silk satin. The inner rims of its long pink ears were trimmed with shy little tufts of fur, and its eyes, like pigeon-blood ruby gemstones, were set in its adorably tiny head. Its rabbit ears were nearly half the length of its body. Setting aside those slightly fantastical embellishments, it was absolutely an incomparably cute rabbit that could make little girls squeal with excitement.

In another setting, if their places had been exchanged, Angel believed he would have liked this rabbit too. But in this unknown space, his vigilance had been raised to its utmost limit, and he had no mood to care whether the rabbit was cute or not.

Most of his attention was fixed on Mr. Rabbit's peculiarities.

The greatest difference between Mr. Rabbit and an ordinary pet rabbit lay in its attire. It wore no lower garments, but its upper body was clad in a lace-trimmed tailcoat patterned with red diamonds. Between its two large ears sat a black top hat, its brim bearing a badge with a smiling human face. Most eye-catching of all was the tiny golden monocle on its face, which lent this adorably styled Mr. Rabbit a few extra touches of gentlemanly grace.

Besides that, what made Angel cast it a sidelong glance most of all was that Mr. Rabbit was not sitting in an armchair as he had previously guessed. Instead, it floated before the table, its eyes fixed motionlessly on the thick purple-covered book upon it.

Angel drifted around Mr. Rabbit several times and discovered that, just like the other creatures, it turned a blind eye to him. Or perhaps Mr. Rabbit was simply too absorbed in its reading to notice this uninvited visitor.

Angel wandered around the hall for a while longer, and his curiosity about this world only deepened.

Was this really a parallel world? Had he crossed over? Angel could not think of an answer. More importantly, he was no longer even certain whether he had passed the wizard aptitude test.

Just as Angel was at his wits' end, a flash of inspiration suddenly crossed his mind.

It had come from nowhere. Angel even felt that it had not arisen from his own thoughts, but that some other mysterious force was using his mind to tell him... return to the storage room.

That was right. The meaning of that flash of inspiration was to return to the storage room where he had first crossed over.

Go back? Angel accepted that flash of inspiration without the slightest hesitation. He did not know where it had come from, but instinctively, he believed it.

Just as he turned to leave the hall, he heard the rustle of pages as Mr. Rabbit turned them nearby.

Angel turned back to look at the purple-covered book Mr. Rabbit was flipping through on the table. On a sudden whim, he stopped in his tracks and quietly floated to Mr. Rabbit's side, his gaze drifting over the book's contents.

The purple-covered book stood upright, allowing him to see its cover clearly. There was nothing particularly unusual about the cover; it rather resembled the romance novels noble young ladies liked.

At the very top was a row of strange symbols that Angel could not understand, presumably the title. Below was a somewhat cartoonish illustration. The background was a castle sketched in only a few strokes, while the foreground showed a slightly blurry cartoon girl: a red hat, long curly brown hair, a blue dress, and white shoes. Neither the girl's features nor her clothing had been drawn with much care, like a child's doodle. Its only redeeming feature was its riot of colors.

A castle and a girl on the cover—was this one of the "princess fairy tales" his mentor had told him about as a child? When Angel was little, Jon had told him bedtime stories, most of them ancient anecdotes carrying lessons on how to conduct oneself, with only a small number being Grimm's Fairy Tales. Though Angel did not particularly like them, he still remembered most of their names. The most famous among them were "Snow White" and "Cinderella."

So the moment Angel saw such a girlish cover, he thought of the princess stories his mentor had mentioned.

Angel did not dwell on the cover for long. Since he could not read the words on it anyway, he simply floated behind Mr. Rabbit and began reading the book's contents.

He had inadvertently glimpsed this book before and only remembered that it was a picture book.

Standing behind Mr. Rabbit, Angel could not understand the writing on its pages, but he could still infer some of the story from the illustrations.

It was probably a fairy tale.

A girl accidentally entered a wonderful world. There, one sip of red wine could shrink her to the size of a mouse, while one bite of cake could turn her into a giant. From the same bowl of mushroom soup, drinking from the left side made her shorter, while drinking from the right made her grow taller. Amid her astonishment, the girl began a marvelous journey with one magical creature after another.

Angel read with great relish, though he inexplicably felt a sense of familiarity. But he quickly cast aside those unnecessary feelings and continued immersing himself in the story.

Bit by bit, time passed, and Angel did not notice in the slightest that things were beginning to go off the rails.

Not only did Mr. Rabbit turn the pages from beginning to end according to Angel's reading pace, but the owl plushie, card soldiers, teacup rabbits, and colorful dragonflies in the hall had suddenly gathered around him. Yet Angel himself noticed none of it, utterly captivated by the resplendent journey within the story.

Angel paid no heed to any of this strangeness and incongruity. Instead, with joy in his heart, his spirit became one with the heroine of the fairy tale.

Angel felt that he had become the protagonist of the fairy tale, running after a talking rabbit.

Everything was wonderful. Though every creature he encountered looked strange, they were all kindhearted. Angel even felt that this place was Wonderland.

Just as he was immersed in the beauty of Wonderland, a piercing laugh rang out from the distant castle.

"Damn it, Queen of Cards is coming after us! Shava, you have to leave this place at once, or Queen of Cards will turn you into a playing card!" the rabbit said anxiously.

Queen of Cards? Leave this place? Shava?

Confusion flashed through Angel's eyes. Who was Shava? Wasn't I called An... huh? What was my name?

A trace of something wrong surfaced in Angel's heart.

He remembered being in the manor's castle, where he saw a rabbit dressed like a gentleman. Then he discovered that the rabbit was... what was it doing?

The beautiful, fantastical journey shattered into fragments within Angel's heart at that moment. Something was wrong. He felt as if he had forgotten something. Angel's expression hardened. He had to remember!

Angel screamed inwardly, but his memories kept breaking into fragments, so badly that he forgot even what he had been doing just a moment ago.

"Hehehehe—"

"Shava, what are you standing there for? Run! Queen of Cards is already here!" The rabbit grabbed Angel's hand. "The situation is urgent. Only by going to my rabbit hole can we escape safely!"

In his daze, Angel was pulled forward unconsciously by the rabbit.

The distant mountains were still verdant, yet their earlier dreamlike quality was gone. Looking at them now, Angel found them lifeless and jarringly out of place.

"There's my rabbit hole. Hurry and hide inside. I'll deal with Queen of Cards." The rabbit gave Angel a shove.

Staggering, Angel fell to the ground.

The rabbit was still urgently urging him into the rabbit hole, but Angel suddenly felt a surge of alertness.

"Return to the storage room."

That message abruptly appeared in his mind, like a flash of inspiration.

Storage room? The confusion in Angel's eyes suddenly cleared. He remembered the storage room! He remembered testing his talent, accidentally entering a strange parallel world? And Mr. Rabbit... reading a book!

The moment Angel's gaze turned lucid, heaven and earth shifted, and everything dissolved into nothingness.

Where the rabbit hole had been was now replaced by a gigantic maw lined with sharp fangs and dripping blood. And the cute rabbit behind him had turned into a battered old rag doll covered in patches.

Angel backed away step by step, swiftly putting distance between himself and the territory of that gaping bloody mouth.

Once he had moved away from that area, he found himself back in the previous hall—the hall where Mr. Rabbit was.

The ease vanished from Angel's eyes, because he discovered that he was surrounded by a group of playing-card soldiers...