Skin burned and blood boiled. Shei narrowed her eyes at the lightning she had created. As though Tyrkanzyaka’s small body had become a lightning rod, the bolts pouring from the storm cloud coursed through her and sank into the ground. She looked almost as if she were training beneath a waterfall.

But the pain beneath that torrent could not even be compared to a waterfall. This flood of lightning coursed not merely over the skin, but through the entire body.

Through blood vessels, muscles, skin, blood, and nerves. It raced through them as though along a straight road, violently destroying everything in its path.

Like having thousands upon thousands of needles pierce every part of your body? Even that was no comparison. A single bolt of lightning was faster, finer, and more powerful than any needle.

“Scream if it hurts! If you keep enduring it...!”

Even Tyrkanzyaka, accustomed as she was to pain, would not last long. Anticipating that, Shei tightened her grip on Sky Cherry Blossom, ready to cut through the spell at any moment.

But then.

“I do indeed feel pain.”

Tyrkanzyaka was perfectly composed.

Her skin burned. Her nerves scorched. The immense electrical power originating from Sky Cherry Blossom used the vampire’s body as a rod to bore into the ground.

“Yet pain is all it is.”

The lightning, however, could not harm the vampire.

Her blood manipulation—the ability to control blood—had already reached the very limits of the heavens. Beyond merely “moving” blood, she could shape flesh with it and regenerate her body.

So long as blood was in contact with her, so long as any blood remained, no one could harm her.

And the sea of blood accumulated over twelve hundred years was no paltry thing, to be damaged by mere lightning born from a scrap of cloud.

The lightning ended. Residual sparks occasionally leaped from what remained after the torrent had spent itself. Yet Tyrkanzyaka had not suffered a single wound. There were no branching lightning scars such as should have formed, no unpleasant smell of scorched skin, no blackness from burned blood.

Before any of those could develop, Tyrkanzyaka had set everything right.

“It is certainly more powerful. Yet something is lacking.”

Tyrkanzyaka coolly assessed the lightning that had coursed through her, as though she were an examiner.

“It does not reach my breast, my heart. I feel nothing but a little pain.”

Her voice was full of disappointment. Something about it made Shei uncomfortable.

Was it because the Progenitor had endured her lightning? No, that was not it. Shei had not used her full strength to begin with, and Tyrkanzyaka had taken no defensive measures whatsoever.

That discomfort came from somewhere else.

Her manner of speaking, as though she had been subjected to an electric shock before. Her attitude, as though she were comparing the two. Shei had noticed something that did not quite add up.

“... Has that man ever done anything to you?”

“That man? Ah, you mean the Instructor.”

Tyrkanzyaka spoke with such perfect ease that it was hard to believe she had just been struck by lightning.

“Come to think of it, we do not even know his name. With so few people in the bottomless pit, I never bothered to ask, but perhaps it is time we learned it...”

“Please don’t change the subject. Did you ask him to run electricity through you, too?”

“How perceptive.”

Gathering the darkness into a parasol once more, Tyrkanzyaka rested it lightly on her shoulder and answered.

“Yes. I have availed myself of his services several times.”

“Several times?”

“He was deft and delicate. Not powerful, but skillful. When he touched my heart with his fingers, my still heart beat again, if only for the briefest moment.”

“... We’re still talking about electric shocks, right?”

Even as she asked, Shei caught something in Tyrkanzyaka’s words and questioned her again.

“Wait, what? Your heart beat again?”

“Yes. Briefly, but unmistakably. So brief that I could not mistake it for anything else.”

“What did he do?”

“Hmm. It is a little embarrassing to tell, but having said this much, there is little point in hiding the rest.”

Tyrkanzyaka briefly explained what had happened. How she had sought out the Instructor after seeing the earthfolk return to life, and asked him to run electricity through her chest. How, afterward, she had requested massages again and again, wanting to feel her heart beat for just a moment.

Having learned the whole story, Shei replied.

“Then all those times you two met alone...”

“Were to ask him for a massage. I troubled him often.”

“Ugh. Then that means...”

Shei put a hand to her head.

Where was she even supposed to begin explaining? She could not readily decide.

Vampire or not, exposing her heart to someone who was both an alchemist and a mage? How utterly lacking in a sense of danger could she be? Shei could almost understand why the Instructor had held that lesson on danger or whatever it was...

And the Instructor, too.

Doing something like that, even at her request. Using magic to control someone else’s body was taboo.

So far, he did not seem to have done anything particularly wrong. Level 0 magic did fall just barely outside that taboo, and someone as powerful as Tyrkanzyaka was unlikely to fall victim so easily.

But Shei still could not trust the Instructor completely.

Because something terrible that would surely have happened in the future had yet to occur.

“Tyrkanzyaka. The next time you see the Instructor, ask him this.”

That was why Shei had to test him.

The Instructor of Tantalus, the one currently closest to the Progenitor’s heart.

Was he harboring ill intent, or was it simple kindness?

“The homunculus dilemma. Ask him if he knows it.”

If he readily explained it, she could take that to mean he had at least some awareness of what he was doing.

* * *

“... You turn up out of nowhere, and... What? The homunculus dilemma?”

“Yes.”

The homunculus dilemma was a story that served as a kind of warning.

Why had the Regressor told her to hear it from me?

She could have told it herself. Going out of her way to send her to me meant one of two things.

Either she had passed the job to me because she was not confident she could make the story interesting.

Or it was a warning directed at me.

Hmm. In the past, I would certainly have taken it as a warning and watched my step, but lately, the first possibility was gaining a little weight. There ought to be a limit to how bad someone could be with words.

This was why the impression you made on people mattered. Indeed.

“It’s not a particularly pleasant story. It’s more of a horror tale, with origins no one can even pin down. Do you still want to hear it?”

“Should a listener be so particular about a story’s contents?”

“Fair enough. All right, then. Here goes.”

I hurled the disc into the distance and began to explain.

There once was a father with a sick child.

He traveled from city to city in search of renowned physicians, but none could identify exactly what ailed the child. It was what people commonly called a rare disease. In those days, it was also called a curse.

If there was a difference between the two, it was whether physicians were troubled or frightened. Even the most eminent doctors slammed their doors in his face, and each time, the father’s head drooped helplessly.

The child’s symptoms grew steadily worse with age. Unable to bear watching his child sob in pain every night, the father ignored everyone’s pleas and sought out a mage deep in the forest.

The way to the mage was long and arduous. Trees and bushes, eager to take root wherever there was the slightest space, resembled a porous wall more than vegetation. Every step he forced through them left scratches all over his body. Hacking at branches with an axe and carrying a small lamp, the father pressed on in the direction the smoke drifted.

After hours of this, a small cottage appeared beyond the dense trees. Having found the mage’s dwelling, the father immediately pounded on the door.

The mage listened to the father’s desperate tale in silence. When he finally spoke, he told him in an ominous voice to bring the child.

Perhaps it was because this was his last hope. At the promise that his child would be returned to him healthy, the father promptly nodded without any particular suspicion.

Returning home, the father took his sick child on his back and retraced his steps. As though twice along that long, treacherous road had not been enough, he traveled it once more, this time with a feverish, moaning child clinging to his back. It was a grueling march that could have left him collapsed from exhaustion, yet even in his weariness, the thought that came to him was how fortunate he was to have already traveled this road.

Had he not cleared the branches on his journey there and back, every scratch on his own body would have been inflicted on the child instead.

He reached the mage’s dwelling with the child on his back. In the darkness of night, the mage laid the child on a bed. Then he told the father to return in three days and closed the door. The father dragged his weary, exhausted body home.

Clearing away the remaining branches as he went.

As agreed, the father visited the mage’s dwelling three days later. The moment he stepped inside the cottage, he witnessed an unbelievable sight.

With a lovely smile, the child ran into his arms. The unmistakable signs of illness and the face contorted by pain were gone. Seeing that innocent, childlike smile, the father was happier than he had ever been. He paid with the money he had raised by selling everything he owned, then walked home hand in hand with his now-healthy child.

Then one day, a year later, the father looked at his healthy child and decided to visit the mage again. He wanted to show how much the child the mage had cured had grown, and tell him how grateful they all were. Once again, he took the child by the hand and visited the mage’s dwelling.

A year had passed since they had last traveled that road. The branches had grown thick again, as if mocking his previous efforts. But the father was not worried. Unlike before, the child was healthy enough to endure a few scratches.

Perhaps because the father led the way, the child came through the thickets without so much as a scratch.

The mage happened to be away. The father waited and waited, but grew uneasy as the sun sank beyond the western hills. The child was still full of vigor, but worried that the journey might have been tiring, the father risked being rude and opened the door to the dwelling.

Then the father heard a faint moan. Wondering whether there was another patient, he suddenly stiffened with a sense of foreboding.

Sadly, premonitions of disaster have a way of proving uncannily accurate. Perhaps it is because living things are naturally more sensitive to danger.

That moaning sounded all too much like his child’s sobs of pain, which he had last heard a year ago. The only difference was that it was weaker and more agonized.

As though entranced, the father followed the sound and opened a thick iron door underground. And he saw it.

A child suspended from a few threads, trembling in pain, without even the strength to cry out.

The child he loved so dearly had been crudely taken apart with saws and knives, as though pieces had been removed to be used somewhere else...

“And that’s it. Just an ordinary horror story, really. Later, some mages who loved naming things claimed it contained a truth about magic and gave it a grandiose name.”

Azi returned with the disc in her mouth. I calmly took it from her, sent it flying into the distance again, and continued my explanation.

“Magic is the manifestation of one’s own will. Releasing your own world, your own principles, into the world outside. That makes it an intensely personal thing by nature.”

I could read minds, but the only magic I could use was the standardized level 0 magic available to everyone. Even mind reading could not reproduce magic attained through personal experience.

“That’s why magic can’t heal another person’s body. If someone does claim to heal it, that’s no different from discarding the original body and making a new homunculus, just as in the old story... That’s the lesson behind the grand principle they teach as the homunculus dilemma.”

I trusted that would be enough of an explanation. The vampire was no fool.

Or was she? Who asked to be struck by lightning? That thunder had come out of nowhere and startled me so badly I’d dropped to the ground without thinking.

Watching the disc return once more, I brought my explanation to a close.

“You have a good pupil, Trainee Tyrkanzyaka. She must have been worried about you. I’m sure of it.”

“... Yes.”

With that acknowledgment, the vampire left without another word. I watched her go, but Azi’s pestering forced me to throw the disc again.

Hmm, this was strange. Was using a disc really an improvement? It seemed like it had just extended my working hours without making anything better.

“Woof!”

Right. If I built up her affection now, perhaps it would come in handy someday. I should put up with it a little longer for that day. This was an installment savings account.

Though I had no idea whether it would ever mature.

“Huh. Come to think of it, she didn’t ask for a massage today, did she?”

What had gotten into her? She had seemed a little upset after yesterday’s lesson, so I’d meant to cheer her up before she started sulking.

I hoped she would not sit alone in some secluded room and get carried away with strange thoughts.

She would be all right, wouldn’t she? Fool or not, surely she wouldn’t do anything stupider than getting herself struck by lightning?

The disc came back again. I stared down at it for a moment, then simply rolled it along the ground.

Azi barked in protest.

* * *

“I have made my decision, Finlay.”

“O Progenitor...”

A voice filled with emotion came from the darkness. Finlay let out a sobbing exclamation of awe. Had he not been a vampire incapable of weeping, tears would already have been dripping from his eyes.

Progenitor Tyrkanzyaka sat still and watched him. Stern words issued from her bloodless lips.

“Neither of them could offer a path forward. They merely said it was impossible. In the end, it is clear they cannot accomplish it.”

“That is because they are not nobles of the night. What could lowborn creatures bound to life possibly know?”

“I do not believe it myself. How could one who has died regain a heart that beats of its own accord? That is why I am also doubtful of your claim that my thralls possess a method. You move through my power. How could you bring me back to life?”

It was a valid point.

Confronted with the Progenitor’s question, Finlay bowed his head once more.

“O Progenitor, time has passed. The world has moved on, and everyone has found their own way. Blood magic has grown more powerful than ever before. Unlike ordinary magic, it is sorcery wrought from life and blood. With that art, which the ignorant lowborn cannot and must not understand, we will surely be able to revive your heart.”

It was a lie.

Without changing his expression, Finlay uttered a falsehood no thrall was ever permitted to tell.

There was no nervousness or excitement. He, too, was a vampire whose heart had stopped. Of course, he felt guilty about deceiving the Progenitor, but that was something he could repay with his death someday.

And Finlay was certain. With this lie, he could lure the Progenitor outside.

Besides, who knew? The Elders and Ein of the Principality of Mist, those powerful and wise vampires, might be able to discover a way to restore her heart.

How could the lowborn dare comprehend the mysteries of blood manipulation? They knew nothing. Going outside to be with vampires would be a hundred times better than staying here with them.

That made this loyalty. Finlay might have deceived the Progenitor, but he remained loyal to her.

That was how he managed to deceive himself.

After gazing silently down at Finlay, the Progenitor spoke a beat later.

“I shall trust you this once. Restore my heart with that method.”

“Of course! If you would only return to the surface, I shall personally see to—”

“Now.”

“... Pardon?”

Finlay echoed her blankly.

“Try this method you know. It matters not if you fail. I am the root from which you all sprang, and my power exceeds all of theirs combined. If the blood magic you use has merit, I will be able to recognize its potential.”

This was bad.

If Finlay could sweat, he would have been drenched from head to toe.

Right now? She wanted him to demonstrate it?

Impossible. It was a lie he had made up on the spot.

Faced with a demand for proof, his flimsy falsehood was about to be stripped crudely naked.

Finlay bowed his head still lower and pleaded.

“But, O Progenitor, I have little knowledge of blood magic. I fear my clumsy spell might harm you.”

“It matters not. Did I not say I would merely assess its potential? If you have seen that magic, surely you can imitate it.”

The Progenitor’s commands were absolute. Finlay had to obey. But because he had lied, he lacked the ability to carry out her order.

What was he to do? Should he confess his falsehood even now and pay for the sin of deceiving her?

No. If that were his intention, he should never have lied in the first place.

He was riding a tiger now. Already astride the lord of the mountains, he could do nothing but race onward, wherever that might lead.

Clouded eyes flashed in the darkness.

“As you command, O Progenitor. However, my strength is paltry. While your power remains in place, mine can accomplish nothing. Therefore...”

In truth, Finlay was deeply versed in blood magic. His specialty was domination: the power to inscribe a Brand of Blood and control something with his own blood.

He might be a mere Yealing, but if—if the Progenitor allowed him the slightest opening...

“Please relinquish all your powers for a moment, and bare your heart to me.”

It was blasphemous, but not impossible.

Just as she wished, the Progenitor would gain a heart that beat of its own accord, without obeying her will.

It would certainly not beat as she willed it.