For Sale. Fallen Lady. Never Used.-Chapter 357: A Promise Of A Thousand Years, A Wait Of A Thousand Years (2)

“He’s gone.”

“Yes, he really went.”

Right after Yandel threw himself into the time warp, crossing the door opened by the Circulating Life, Iris mumbled blankly, and Elisha nodded with an even more exhausted expression.

Perhaps the sight of them looking so pitiful moved her. Carla gently took Elisha’s hand and said,

“Elisha, right now…”

“I know, Carla. We’ll do what we have to do. That’s what Yandel asked of us.”

A determined voice. The others also firmed their resolve and stood up one by one.

Everyone firmed their resolve. The Circulating Life, who was a little tired from supplying massive amounts of life force to Yandel even at this moment, lightly reached out and said,

“Are you leaving? If so, I will open the way for you.”

Another door was created in the position facing the door that Yandel entered.

Solaris, who had been watching this for a while, whispered to the Circulating Life.

“Please take care of my husband.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll do my best as if he were my own child.”

The Circulating Life, still looking tired, nodded her head greatly as if to reassure her.

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Solaris also nodded in response and headed outside the sanctuary.

The others felt the same, lightly bowing their heads to the Circulating Life and entering the door one by one.

Finally, Iris looked at the door Yandel entered with a complicated expression… but in the end, she took a step along with the others.

Just like Yandel, to continue their respective battles in their respective places.

The inside of the time warp was a little different from what I had imagined.

I had wondered if I would be enduring on the endlessly connected infinite circular staircase that I had seen when I first came to the Circulating Life’s sanctuary…

“Huh?”

The space that actually unfolded before my eyes was the landscape of a vast forest. There was even a cabin placed there for convenience.

This was probably the result of the adjustment that the Circulating Life was talking about.

I heard that in addition to this, it also maintains a forced awakening state that allows you to feel the pain a little more clearly, but prevents you from going completely insane.

It also prevents you from feeling hunger, and temporarily stops physiological activities such as bowel movements and sleep.

And when you leave here someday, it will prevent the things that happened inside from slowly being forgotten, thereby preventing the current mind from being damaged.

It’s an adjustment that took care of even minor details. Perhaps it’s a trap created to break down the spirits of enemies, so they may know the dangers even better.

With a smirk, I entered the cabin, and a desolate sight with only one bed caught my eye. She probably couldn’t take care of other furniture. Or she didn’t have enough time.

“Well, it doesn’t matter since I didn’t come here to play.”

Nodding my head, I sat upright on the moderately hard bed. Then, slowly concentrating on my breathing, I began to observe my inner self.

Woooooh.

The amount of magic power, which was considerably consumed in the battle with the Grotesque Proliferation, was rapidly recovering with the help of the endless mana trait even at this moment.

However, no matter how much it recovered, it wouldn’t be able to exceed the limit of the vessel I had… the limit of mana stat 28.

Stats become harder to increase as you go further, and accordingly, the increase of each one jumps exponentially.

Therefore, unless it is a special case, in order to go beyond 29, it is necessary to reach the level of a grand mage.

In order to gather magic power that exceeds one’s capacity, proper preparation or sacrifice is required.

For me, who had no time to prepare, there was only sacrifice left as an option.

Just in case, I tried to see if I could fill the mana core that had been 80% recovered through mana breathing…

Whether it was true that one couldn’t gain enlightenment or accumulate magic power in distorted time, no matter how much I breathed, the mana didn’t fill up.

Rather than the mana in the atmosphere trying to respond to me, it felt like it was running away in fear.

As expected, there was only one way.

“Hoo.”

I lightly sighed and prepared myself mentally.

Converting life force into magic power is basically a very inefficient thing.

Putting aside the pain in the process, the conversion rate is low, and the magic power obtained in this way is only disposable, unable to expand the vessel, and if you stop even for a moment in the middle, all the magic power you have forcibly gathered will be blown away.

In other words, it means that you must continue to convert without stopping no matter what happens from now on.

It is usually impossible. It’s not for nothing that other people tried to stop me.

Consciously aware of my body that was full of energy, unlike the mana that showed no signs of recovering, I concentrated my mind.

Now, the mana circuit, which had become one with my blood vessels, reacted to this and began to accept life force instead of mana into it.

“Keuh!”

It felt like sharp pieces of glass were rolling around inside my blood vessels. My eyes opened involuntarily, and my hands and feet trembled.

I wanted to roll around on the floor with a scream…

But I had to do it.

I must do it.

In order to defeat the Grotesque Proliferation, in order to protect me and my women, there was no other way.

The life force that was circulating through the mana circuit gradually changed into magic power, and then headed towards the place where my mana core was located along the path.

Originally, the magic power should have been accumulated in the core as it was, but now it couldn’t do that and just hovered around my heart like smoke.

But it was definitely magic power under my control.

Feeling the energy that was still only a handful, I raised the corners of my trembling lips.

“It’s worth a try.”

It was a statement full of bravado, but now that bravado was a necessary moment.

While concentrating on mana conversion for several hours like that. I suddenly felt a sense of discomfort in my body.

Pain is also a kind of stimulus. So if you keep feeling it, you can’t help but get used to it.

“Kkeueuk….”

But I could not get used to the pain in exchange for awakening.

The glass shards were still tearing my body apart from the inside, and the pressure that felt like squeezing my heart was not weakening at all.

It had probably been about a week. There were days and nights here, but I didn’t have the leisure to pay attention to that, so it wasn’t accurate.

Anyway, after about a week, the pain intensified.

In addition to the feeling of being torn apart by glass shards inside, there was an added sensation of being slowly sliced from the extremities of my body toward the center.

The reason was simple.

In the meantime, I’d developed my own know-how, and the conversion speed and efficiency had improved even more.

It was only natural that the pain would be aggravated as more life force was converted into mana.

Still, this degree was bearable.

It was a misunderstanding. How could I endure my lungs being painful as if swallowing fire every time I breathe, and my whole body being sawed off by a saw?

I was just afraid that my mind was so clear even in all this pain.

Of course, I didn’t stop even then.

I used the Return to Origin.

In truth, I had intended to avoid using Dragonization until the very last moment.

While transforming into a dragon greatly enhanced all my abilities, making it easier to withstand the pain, maintaining it indefinitely was impossible.

I was afraid of the backlash when I returned to my original form someday… it was too hard, so I ended up using it.

Now that this had happened, I had no choice but to maintain it as much as possible.

I almost lost my mind.

The recoil that came as I released Dragonization was more severe than I thought.

However, thanks to the forced awakening, I didn’t really lose my mind. I just felt like I was holding on to a lifeline in the fading consciousness.

But thanks to holding on to that lifeline tightly, I was able to not stop the mana conversion in the middle.

I’d gathered a little over twice my maximum mana so far, and it was a bit of a waste to blow it away like this.

I vowed never to use Dragonization again, no matter how hard it was.

How much time had passed?

The converted mana had increased tremendously.

The smoke that hovered around my heart was not only filling my body but also overflowing, enough to flow out of my nose and mouth in handfuls every time I exhaled.

Of course, the smoke that flowed out like that was not disappearing as it was, but hovering around me.

But it wasn’t enough. At this degree, I’d be able to cast Punishment at most a dozen times.

No one dies from being stabbed a dozen times with a needle.

The Grotesque Proliferation would be the same.

I was so thankful for the excellent memory trait.

Whenever it was hard, I always recalled the appearance of my women and firmed my will, and thanks to the excellent memory, I could not forget no matter how much time passed.

Okay.

Is it a big deal that every moment is as painful as dying?

As long as this memory remained, I could die again and again.

Just because there was a cabin, I didn’t just stay inside.

If I wandered around outside and received other stimuli, I could forget the pain even for a while, so I often strolled through the forest.

Then one day. For some reason, the appearance of the vast forest visible in my sight felt smaller than usual.

So I climbed up a suitable tree and looked around properly.

“Ah.”

It was actually smaller.

The vast forest, which once stretched endlessly, was slowly turning into a desert from the edges inward.

It meant the Circulating Life’s power over this space was weakening.

The battle outside must have intensified.

The overflowing mana was wrapping around my body like fog, but it was still not enough.

The forest was completely gone. The cabin, the bed—everything that had once provided even a semblance of comfort had crumbled into dust.

Thankfully, the Circulating Life continued to supply me with life force, but that was all.

There was nothing left here.

Perhaps that was why, for the first time in a long while, I felt truly exhausted.

I wandered the desert aimlessly.

Sitting still had become even more unbearable.

By now, I had accumulated so much mana that I could no longer estimate the total amount, but it still wasn’t enough to bring down the Grotesque Proliferation

How much longer would this continue?

I had realized something during this time: the Circulating Life’s forced awakening didn’t grant me any advantages beyond keeping me from going insane.

…To be honest, I was getting tired.

I wanted to see the others.

Gazing at the darkened sky, which no longer even had the strength to distinguish night from day, that was the only thought in my mind.

I had endured by replaying my memories over and over, but even that had reached its limit.

I didn’t know how many years had passed in this place, but it had undoubtedly been far longer than the time I had spent on the Eurelia Continent.

Yet, no matter how many years were buried beneath the weight of agony, my longing had not faded.

If anything, it had only grown stronger.

I lay still, staring up at the sky.

Even moving had become difficult. It wasn’t that my body was exhausted—rather, my spirit had worn down to nothing.

All I could do was gaze blankly at the sky and count the stars.

No, there were no stars in the ashen sky, which had collapsed along with the darkness of night.

What I was counting were my memories.

The faces of my women, their warmth, their voices, their touch… and the final promises we had exchanged.

Each time I recalled them, a memory became a star, decorating the empty sky.

I clung to those stars to survive another day.

And when that wasn’t enough, I reached deeper into the past, bringing forth new stars to light the sky.

How many times had I repeated this?

At some point, the once-empty sky had become filled with stars.

Cautiously, I reached out, as if grasping my longing itself.

It was time to leave.