Chapter 2740 Reflection Within the Mirror <TOC> Chapter 2742 Inside and Outside
Translator: SumTLMan
「I don’t know whether there was any 『good stuff』—anyway, I didn’t touch anything at all.」Angel shrugged and spread his hands.
Angel’s words made the eyes of the Gray Merchant’s group opposite him dim slightly.
Daus, however, wore a look of utter disbelief:「Truly nothing at all? Not even the shadow on the mirror’s surface?」
Daus’ follow-up rekindled a glimmer of hope in the Gray Merchant’s gloomy eyes.
Unfortunately, every time Daus chimed in, the fire of expectation he gave them was mercilessly doused by Angel.
「Since I said I didn’t touch anything, that definitely includes the Gray Merchant’s shadow along with it.」Seeing Daus still skeptical, Angel narrowed his eyes and, in a coaxing tone, said:「How about this: I send you in, and you go see for yourself whether there’s any good stuff?」
「Let me in? You can really send me in?」
Angel:「Haven’t tried—but we can try.」
Daus froze for a moment and actually began weighing feasibility. The more he thought, the deeper his brow furrowed. In the end his face went pale, cold sweat beading across his forehead.
At that moment, the Black Count suddenly let out a cold snort at Daus.
To outsiders it was nothing, but to Daus it was like spring thunder erupting on a clear day—rumbling straight to the clouds, yanking him violently out of his own thoughts.
When Daus came to, his face was still ashen, and he was gasping for air, looking for all the world like he couldn’t catch his breath.
Daus’ abnormal state left everyone bewildered—Angel most of all, his face full of confusion. He hadn’t done anything; he’d only egged Daus on a bit with words—so how had Daus been rattled like this?
Angel turned to look at the Black Count, hoping to get an answer.
「Mental Obstruction.」The Black Count offered a terse and clear reply.
Mental Obstruction? Angel mouthed the term, finding it utterly unfamiliar.
He had heard the word「demonic obsession」before—a kind of sudden psychological illness, essentially a fit of mania. Within mind heart illusion spells there are quite a few ways to forcibly drag a mentally sound person into a state of demonic obsession.
But the term 『Mental Obstruction』 was new to Angel.
Nor was Angel the only one; the vast majority present looked baffled.
After a brief silence, the Black Count gave a simple explanation:「Put simply, it’s… thinking too much.」
Thinking too much? While Angel was chewing on what lay behind the phrase, Daus finally recovered. The first thing he did upon returning to himself was let out a long breath, shoot the Black Count a grateful look, then turn to Angel in righteous indignation:「You almost set me up!」
Angel:「? ? ?」
Daus continued his accusation:「I was wondering why you suddenly suggested I go into the mirror. You weren’t up to any good—you were deliberately goading me.」
What followed was Daus pouring out his grievances. His words were somewhat jumbled, with hints and vagueness. The Gray Merchant’s group across the way listened half-comprehending, but Angel and his companions, through Vai’s translation over the mental connection, more or less grasped what Daus was saying.
It must be said, the Black Count’s summary was spot on: Daus was simply thinking too much.
Daus’ talent for inspiration usually needed some time to recover, but with aid from the Sunlight Sanctuary it not only returned, it snapped straight to its zenith. Because the recovery was too fast, it gave him no gradual period of adaptation, which led Daus—when using his inspiration talent—to still rely on his past methods and habits.
The moment he heard Angel’s prodding, he reflexively began pondering: Is there any danger in this? If there is, how do I avoid it? If the danger can be avoided, how do I maximize benefit? If the danger can’t be avoided but isn’t fatal, how do I extract gains? How much gain makes it worth the ticket price?… These and other questions flooded into Daus’ mind all at once.
Some of these problems sound incredible, even absurd, but in fact they are Daus’ habitual mode of thought. In the past, his inspiration talent—being passive—would vaguely point him in a general direction, and in a turn of thought he could resolve most of the above questions.
Now, though his inspiration remains passive, after its sublimation it no longer offers a hazy general heading. It has become more detailed, more comprehensive, synthesizing more information so that Daus can obtain more accurate and richly specific intelligence.
However, the consumption is correspondingly immense.
It consumes brainpower, panoramic insight, and tremendous computational capacity.
A single question is enough to leave Daus a bit dizzy; now, with so many questions surging up at once, his cognitive load exploded.
His sublimated inspiration talent—and boarding today’s「new ship」with yesterday’s old ticket, setting sail without acclimation—brought about Daus’ present tragedy.
Fortunately, the Black Count noticed Daus’ condition immediately and snapped him out of it. Otherwise, Daus would likely have wound up seeing golden stars, white smoke puffing from his ear-holes, mosquito-coil spirals flashing in his eyes, and collapsing flat on the ground.
It wouldn’t have killed him, but without half a year to a year of recuperation, he could forget about using his inspiration talent again.
After understanding what Daus had just gone through, Angel wanted to offer sympathy; yet the twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed his true feelings.
Angel now understood why Daus’ thinking was always so jumpy: he had been leaning on his talent, whirling his thoughts madly, so that many times others had no idea what Daus was doing.
Now, though, with the inspiration talent sublimated, that jumpy thinking was temporarily shackled. It probably wouldn’t bind him long; at Daus’ rate of mental extrapolation, adapting to the new inspiration talent would take ten days to half a month, give or take.
Though a short window, during their stint in the underground sewers, getting Daus to think fewer inexplicable thoughts was no bad thing.
「Even though I just fell into—that, that uh… Mental Obstruction—I still perceived a few things. If your goading had worked and I’d drilled into the mirror, odds are I wouldn’t have been able to get back out!」
Daus began describing the terror he had sensed.
「Everything was blank—whether before my eyes or in my mind, all blank. As if nothing existed, and as if nothing should ever have existed.」
「In that feeling, I couldn’t even tell whether I was dead or erased. But one thing was certain: consciousness was grinding away, the soul would be torn apart… In the end, even if I didn’t die, I would no longer be me.」
Daus’ righteous fury at Angel stemmed largely from this. The mirror’s inner world was that horrifying—and Angel had actually tried to egg him into going!
Rubbing his chin, Angel mused:「So the world inside the mirror is very dangerous?」
Daus snapped:「Of course it’s dangerous! Don’t tell me you didn’t know!」
Angel spread his hands, all innocence:「I truly didn’t know—I’ve never gone in.」
「You’ve never gone in, yet you can stick your hand in? Who are you fooling?」Daus was still fuming.
Angel:「I think it’s a small matter, but if you insist that I’ve been inside and set you up on purpose, I’ll permit you to use the True Word spell for a confrontation. I really haven’t gone in.」
Angel spoke with utter candor, opening his heart right now—an air of letting Daus probe him at will.
Seeing this, Daus muttered under his breath, but inwardly he was convinced.
Angel:「As for how I could put my hand in……I sought guidance from a senior and studied a similar kind of spell.」
Angel didn’t say who that「senior」was, but a name instantly surfaced in Daus’ mind.
The most famous senior in the Savage Grottoes isn’t a wizard—it’s that Book Ancestor of near-encyclopedic lore. And there are two others on par with the Book Ancestor in the Savage Grottoes: one is Tree Spirit, the other is Mirror Lady.
A senior of the sort Angel spoke of—and one who would know such an extremely esoteric spell—was most likely「Mirror Lady」.
Seen this way, the logic was self-consistent.
Angel:「Besides, I wasn’t egging you on in secret—I said openly that you should scout the way, and I’d follow right after. Since it’s confirmed there’s danger, I’d certainly drop the idea.」
Daus had rolled his eyes so many times in his heart he’d lost count:「That doesn’t make it sound any nicer.」
Having said his piece, Daus folded his arms and stewed on the side, while also「preaching」to Vai over the mental connection—recounting Angel’s checkered past and urging him to change his idol.
Angel also heard the slander over the mental connection, but seeing Daus still pale, he let it pass.
After all, Daus still owed him a major favor. There would be a chance; 『blessing』 would one day descend upon his head.
……
No sooner had they finished than the Gray Merchant stepped forward from the opposite side.
「Can Mr. Eremy send people into the mirror? If so, might you send me in?」
It doesn’t take much imagination to know the Gray Merchant’s intent: he wanted to enter the mirror world and retrieve his sealed memories.
Angel:「You just heard the Red Sword Wizard—going in very likely means never coming back out.」
The Gray Merchant was about to voice fearless resolve, but Angel cut him off:「I know you’re going to say that even if it’s dangerous, you’re willing to try… That’s confidence in your strength—I won’t deny it.」
「But if I tell you that once you go in, you will definitely die—then will you still choose to go?」
If death is certain, would you still go? Faced with this question, the Gray Merchant fell silent.
Though he said nothing, the answer was obvious. Compared to a death notice, what was a sealed memory?
Only after a long while did the Gray Merchant speak again:「Then would Mr. Eremy be willing to make a trade with me?」
He didn’t want to die, but he didn’t want to give up either.
Angel:「As for a trade… Are you sure that once you get this fragment back, you have a way to recover your memories?」
Confronted with Angel’s question yet again, the Gray Merchant’s reaction was just as before—silence.
Not only the Gray Merchant—Shrew and the apprentices of the Traveling Merchants Organization all wore uneasy expressions.
They had, of course, considered this problem.
The Mirror Dweller had only laid out the task, saying that upon completion he would return the Gray Merchant’s memories. But there was no contract in between, no binding force to guarantee his words and deeds would align.
It wasn’t that they were unwilling to sign a contract; it was that the Mirror Dweller’s overwhelming strength and weird, intangible abilities left them no time to sign one and no room to resist. They were forced to accept the terms.
All along they had tacitly avoided the topic, simply unwilling to think about the worst outcome.
They could only pray that the other party’s reputation was good.
After all, the other party was powerful—a senior strongman, a big figure. He shouldn’t deceive juniors like them, should he?
Besides, the sealed memories would be useful only to the Gray Merchant. Even if others obtained them, they would, in all likelihood, only suffer mental anguish with no gain.
So he should return them, right? He should… right?
Clinging to this rootless hope, they had come to this point.
Angel’s words now ripped that flimsy veil of fantasy, forcing the Gray Merchant’s group to confront an outcome that was all too likely.
Seeing the palpable shift in the group’s mood, Angel understood they truly had no contingency plan. They had gone all in, handing their fate over to Aedannis’ credibility.
But would Aedannis keep her word? Personally, Angel felt… it would be difficult.
Aedannis had clearly been observing Angel up close from within the mirror earlier; the Gray Merchant’s memories must have been right there. Yet until Aedannis departed, she had not released them.
And afterward, the male voice Angel heard explicitly told him he could take the mirror shard—but not to enter the mirror.
The implication was plain: Aedannis would not return to this fragmentary mirror plane.
If she wouldn’t return, then how to lift the seal on the Gray Merchant’s memories? Have the Gray Merchant go in person to her old haunt and find her?
So pinning hopes on Aedannis to unseal them was, in all likelihood, a broken dream.
「I cannot be certain that obtaining the fragment will definitely unseal my memories. But if I don’t obtain it, it’s even more impossible to unseal them.」The Gray Merchant’s voice began bright, but by the end it had grown low, almost a mutter:「And even if she doesn’t keep her promise, I can go find someone else……」
Angel:「Finding someone else—well, that is a path. But who exactly could you find?」
The Gray Merchant held his tongue.
Just then, Shrew still suppressed in the birdcage said:「Whoever you look for, there’ll be a chance. But if it stays in your hands, there’s no chance at all.」
Pink Jasmine, whose voice had been silenced, bobbed her head furiously, wearing an expression of「I agree, too」.
Angel did not respond, but Daus—the professional backer—sang a counterpoint from the side:「For all you know, taking it outside to find someone is what gives you no chance at all.」
In other words, leaving it with Angel might offer the greater chance.
Daus’ words caused no great ripple; neither side took them to heart. Up in the sky, however, the Sovereign of Wisdom’s expression beneath the cloak held a trace of amusement.
Angel:「I can tell you plainly that our aims for the mirror shard differ. What you want is the memory; what I want is the shard. In that sense, we can each get what we need.」
The Gray Merchant said bitterly:「Yet without the shard, there’s no way to obtain the memories.」
Angel pondered a moment:「That much I understand. But thinking it over, it’s not entirely impossible to obtain your memories.」
Chapter 2740 Reflection Within the Mirror <TOC> Chapter 2742 Inside and Outside