Volume 4—Chapter 106: This doesn’t make any sense.
What is this? What the hell is this?
Everything changed too fast for me to process. One moment led into another without pause. Someone appeared, someone vanished, and now only two people stood in front of me. One was a girl dressed like a witch, long silver hair flowing unnaturally still. The other looked like an ordinary girl, with shoulder-length hair, familiar in a way that made my chest tighten.
The witch’s name was Emilia, I think. The name sounded almost identical to Amelia, the girl I met earlier. The other was my classmate, Miyazaki Aria. Also, the one I had long suspected to be my first love from my previous life.
I always believed I was not the only reincarnated person in this world. Hearing the two of them clash just moments ago, seeing their existence collide like this, I was convinced.
Aria is definitely my first love. At this point, did I even need confirmation?
Anyway, the two girls were in the middle of a fight. Power clashing, intent sharp enough to tear the air apart. And yet, why was I so calm?
The answer was simple.
Time was stopped.
Not everywhere, but within a specific boundary, I could feel rather than see. This was the first time I had managed to stop time in this way. I did not even mean to do it. That sphere in between them. There’s no doubt it would explode at any moment.
Both girls were frozen mid-motion, expressions locked in place.
As I exhaled, something felt wrong.
I saw movement.
It was subtle, almost imperceptible, but unmistakable. The air shifted. Fabric rustled. Both of them moved.
That should not be possible. It should be absolutely impossible.
Before I could even turn fully, a voice spoke right behind me.
“Hmmm… I see. You have the same power as Amelia. Although it is a lesser kind. This world keeps catching my interest.”
I froze.
Emilia was standing behind me.
“You should leave her alone and focus on me, you know. It kind of hurts that you ignored me in a heartbeat like that.”
Aria’s voice came from my side.
I stiffened. She was suddenly there, standing beside me as if she had always been there.
“Carol, you should stay… far, far away from this.”
Before I could even react, Aria grabbed the back of my dress collar and threw me away from her without hesitation.
Then, time began to move again.
Not naturally.
It resumed in a dragged, distorted way, like the world was struggling to remember how motion worked. Everything moved in slow motion. And just as I feared, the sphere suspended in the air was not harmless at all.
It detonated.
Even with time slowed, the light expanded violently, swallowing everything in its path. The brightness bloomed outward, overwhelming and absolute. I was already flying away, but it still caught me. There was no escaping it.
I shut my eyes, bracing myself for the impact.
But it never came.
When I opened my eyes again, everything had changed.
The three of us were no longer together. I found myself in a pure white room. In front of me was a stage, and beyond that, a raised judge panel.
Only then did I realise something even stranger.
I was sitting in an audience seat.
“Huh… this is really weird.”
On the stage stood Emilia, still wearing her witch-like attire, completely out of place and yet perfectly composed.
Then I looked toward the judge panel.
There were three Aria.
I repeat. Three Aria.
Each one is seated behind the panel.
My head started to spin.
This is so confusing.
From my seat, I could see it clearly.
Emilia took a step back on the stage. Her posture shifted, subtle but obvious. She was looking for a way out. An exit. Somewhere to escape to.
Then she stopped.
I could tell she realised it was pointless. Whatever this place was, it was sealed. Not just physically, but conceptually. There was nowhere to go.
She turned her head slightly, eyes narrowing, then spoke. “So… what is it you want to do with me?”
Silence answered her.
The three Aria sitting on the judge panel did not respond.
That was when one of them tilted her head and looked at me.
Her eyes widened just a little, more surprised than alarmed. “Wow… even though I threw you away because I didn’t want you getting caught in the mess, you still ended up here.”
I swallowed.
She really did mean to keep me out of this.
Before I could say anything, her attention shifted back to the stage. Back to Emilia. The air itself seemed to tighten as all focus returned to her.
“Alright then,” Aria said calmly. “Perform your talent.”
From where I was sitting, I could see Emilia hesitate.
Her brows knit together, just slightly. Confusion flickered across her face, the kind that comes from not knowing whether this is a joke, a trap, or something far worse. I could almost hear the question in her head. What talent?
For a brief moment, she looked toward the judges. Toward the three identical Aria. None of them explained. None of them moved.
So Emilia exhaled.
“…Fine,” she muttered, more to herself than anyone else.
If this were a farce, then she would treat it like one.
She raised a hand, palm up, and light gathered above it. Actual magic. Symbols flared briefly in the air, precise and controlled, then dissolved into shimmering particles. Flames bloomed, twisted into elegant shapes, and vanished without heat. Threads of mana wove themselves into floating constructs, beautiful and dangerous at the same time.
I forgot to breathe.
This was not a stage trick. This was the kind of power that belonged on a battlefield, casually repurposed into something almost graceful.
Then, mid-performance…
BZZT.
One of the Aria pressed the red buzzer.
The sound cut through the room like a blade.
Emilia stiffened, her magic faltering for half a second before she forced it to continue. She glanced toward the panel, irritation flashing across her face, but she did not stop.
She changed her approach, her magic shifting form, becoming more refined, more deliberate. The air itself seemed to respond to her movements, bending just enough to obey.
For a brief moment, I thought she might actually be winning them over.
Then…
BZZT.
Another buzzer. A different Aria this time.
The magic dispersed, fading into nothing.
Emilia slowly lowered her hand.
She raised her palm toward Aria… and then stopped hesitating.
“Let there be light.”
The words were simple, almost casual.
A blinding radiance erupted in front of me, so intense that my vision went completely white. I heard the sound of something breaking, not shattering like glass, but collapsing, as if space itself had been torn apart.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
When I opened them again, the stage, the panels, the impossible courtroom were gone.
We were somewhere else.
I recognized it immediately.
Times Square, New York.
Or at least, it used to be.
The towering screens were cracked or dark, streets fractured as if struck by invisible claws. The air trembled with distant roars and metallic screeches. All around us, dimensional cracks yawned open, tearing through the sky and the streets alike. From them poured creatures that should never exist together. Beasts that looked torn from fantasy, things that made my skin crawl just by looking at them, and shapes that felt cold and mechanical, as if they belonged to some far future rather than another world.
Chaos everywhere.
People were nowhere to be seen.
I let out a slow breath, my head throbbing.
…Ever since I stalked Aria that day, nothing that happened afterward made any sense. Not the powers. Not the girls who appeared and vanished. Not this endless escalation from one impossible scene to another.
I pressed a hand to my temple.
Did I collapse back in the forest back then?
Am I unconscious right now, piecing together a dream that refuses to end?
Staring at the broken skyline and the monsters crawling out of the cracks, I honestly could not tell anymore.
Author's Note
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