Choice

Far away.

In that narrow, crude yet warm and brightly lit bar cellar...

[I probably can't escape, but they can survive...]

A ragged, battered boy forcibly clenched his fists.

He raised his head and looked across at the red-haired girl with twin blades thrust through her legs, dashing yet faintly surprised, and squeezed out a defiant smile:

[I have to go.]

[To Red Quarter.]

That was...

he thought hazily.

"Boom... boom!"

Amid the rumbling thunder, his thoughts cleared, and he saw another scene.

It was a grand, magnificent semicircular hall, before a crowd of richly dressed, solemn-faced, steady-mannered nobles and important ministers...

Likewise, it was that boy who seemed to be dressed in finery, yet was still covered in wounds beneath it all, standing atop the stone steps...

[That's right, Duke Kevendell... I saved your life...]

He stubbornly and proudly pursed his lips at another young, round-faced man whose expression was one of shock:

[So you owe me a word of thanks.]

This was...

Tales's breathing quickened. Some emotion seemed to be brewing inside him.

His consciousness trembled, and those visions that had once confused him appeared again—the realm he could touch merely by reaching out his hand.

The supreme.

The omnipotent.

The perfect.

That alluring call.

But those temptations could no longer shake what he saw before him.

Tales's vision blurred for only a second before he firmly shook his head and cast them aside.

[Wait!]

It was still the boy's voice.

This time, he was covered in dirt, his hands bound, yet he still forced a smile as he sat atop a black coffin, smiling at a charming and seductive yet incomparably dangerous woman.

[I heard there's a Magic User here? One who can even be released?]

The boy arrogantly kicked the coffin lid:

[Want to meet him?]