◈ Episode 576: The Wizard of Time (1)
Gariel Cosmo.
His expression, which had been filled with excitement due to the success of his gambling, suddenly became serious.
“Is that true? “It’s faster than expected!”
“Something happened.”
Ludger said that and took a quick look at the chips placed in front of Gariel.
“Your bad hand habits are still the same. “Didn’t I tell you to stop cheating and gambling?”
“No, that’s… … .”
Gariel became restless at Ludger’s point.
The dealer who was overhearing the conversation spoke cautiously.
“Hey, sir. It may be presumptuous to say this, but this casino never commits fraud. “You are saying too much.”
The dealer’s expression showed even a little pride in his work.
If it had been fraudulent gambling in the first place, they would not have lost any money.
In a way, it is natural to react a little sensitively to Ludger’s words.
“When I say fraud, I don’t mean what they do.”
“yes?”
“Rather this way.”
As Ludger pointed to Gariel and spoke, the dealer’s expression became mysterious.
“No, wait a minute. That can’t be possible. Here you can sense the wizards’ use of magic. We check everything ourselves, so there’s no way that’s possible… … .”
The dealer who was talking kept his mouth shut.
The moment I saw Gariel’s anxious and helpless expression, a strange thought occurred to me.
Seeing the sight of him quietly sweating, suspicions that I had never had before began to well up in me.
“customer? “No way, right?”
“Yes? Uh huh! What do you mean! What a fraud! I won it rightfully! Everyone saw it, right? Besides, you won’t know whether I used magic or not through magic detection!”
Rather, my suspicions were soon confirmed by the sight of Gariel screaming violently.
The dealer’s expression hardened, and the guards who were watching around him slowly began to surround the table.
Onlookers realized that the situation was going strangely and distanced themselves.
Gariel glared at Ludger.
“Is it really like this? “I almost got it all!”
“It’s all about picking. “I don’t understand why you need money in the first place.”
“For research, of course!”
“If it was money needed for research, I would have continued to give it to you until now, right? Even if you wanted to spend it all, it would have been difficult to spend, but was it not enough?”
“Well, that’s… … .”
Seeing Gariel pouting and avoiding his gaze, Ludger let out a small sigh.
“So, I told you so. It’s just a habit. “It’s right to fix things like gambling quickly.”
“Ac! Noisy! Don’t give advice by acting like you’re older than me when you’re younger than me! “If it weren’t for you, I would have won everything and gotten out safely, right?”
Meanwhile, scary looking guards came and surrounded Ludger and Gariel.
Ludger asked why he was looking at him, but since he was close to Gariel, he could not avoid being considered a suspect.
“The guards these days are fearless. “You probably don’t know that we are wizards, right?”
As soon as Ludger finished speaking, the guards took out their equipment from their belts and equipped it.
In one hand, a steel bar for suppression.
In the other hand, a small shield.
The moment I was about to ask what could be done with something like that, blue magical energy flowed out of the rod and its length became more than three times longer.
Now its length is closer to a spear rather than a pole.
Likewise, a bluish magic shield was formed around the shield.
“… … Do guards these days also carry artifacts?”
“It’s a casino with a lot of money, so this is natural. Did you forget? This is Isla Machina. “It’s an island where wizards commonly roam the streets.”
If an incident occurred on Isla Machina, there was a very high probability that wizards were involved.
Once wizards cause an incident, the damage and aftermath are on a different level from that of ordinary criminals.
This is a situation that, if done incorrectly, could result in massive casualties.
In order to prevent such accidents, a way to subdue the wizard on his own was needed.
Those are the items that the guards are using now.
An artifact exclusive to great wizards.
Magier Jäger (Magier Hunter).
“You look pretty sick.”
“If you hit it right, it wouldn’t be at the level of saying it hurts, right? “These are items made with cutting-edge magic engineering.”
“Have you guessed it?”
“I’ve seen a lot of people get hit. “Everyone was shedding tears and snot.”
“That sounds reassuring.”
As the two were chatting comfortably, a guard who had seen an opportunity from behind rushed forward.
“You handle it. [Faust].”
“So don’t call me that strange name!”
Gariel was irritated but ready to move.
Just before the guard’s club hits the back of Gariel’s head.
“Gotcha… … !”
Swish!
The club swung by the repentant guard split the air.
Before the guard could even panic at the sight of Gariel disappearing like a mirage right in front of his nose.
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Tuk.
“uh?”
Suddenly, the guard, whose legs were caught on the chair in front of him, was unable to overcome his weight and fell forward.
Gariel, who appeared behind the fallen guard, was whistling.
“Holy shit! Jimmy! what are you doing!”
“That idiot. Did you miss that?”
The other guards complained, but some with good eyesight had stiff expressions on their faces at the movements Gariel showed.
“What was that just now? “Didn’t that wizard suddenly disappear?”
“The chair that Jimmy tripped on. “There were no chairs there originally.”
“What kind of magic is this? “You’re casting it without any magic?”
The guards exchanged looks.
If they couldn’t do it all at once, they planned to attack them all at once.
“This is your job, do it yourself.”
“… … “Even if you hadn’t come, I could have successfully won money and gone?”
While grumbling at Gariel, he pointed his finger at the guards.
“Come on. “Because you can fight him with just one hand.”
“Everyone attack at once!”
The guards moved at the same time.
They moved as one body without tangling or twisting each other, as if they were used to working together.
Even if it was Gariel, it seemed like it would not be easy to escape from this siege.
The guards, who were so confident in their hearts, began to question themselves when Gariel disappeared from his seat again.
It was almost a moment before he disappeared.
The same thing happened when they appeared at the same time.
As if leaping through space, Gariel disappeared and reappeared.
All kinds of chairs and miscellaneous objects fell down around the guards who were running at once.
“Ugh!”
“What is this!”
The guards were unable to come to their senses due to the unknown situation.
The same happened to the people watching the scene around them.
“big. “What on earth did you do?”
“What kind of magic did that young man use?”
Only Ludger was able to remain calm because he knew Gariel’s magic.
‘also. No matter how many times I see it, it’s such a strange magic.’
It is a sight as if time itself has been cut and compressed.
Should I say that, unlike others, I alone move in a completely different timeline?
‘That’s not wrong. Gariel Cosmo. ‘That’s exactly the magic that man uses.’
Gariel Cosmo.
A man who has mastered [Time Magic], a unique type of magic in Japanese folklore.
The effect of the magic he uses is extremely simple.
─That is, to stop time in the world except for yourself.
So-called time stop.
The moment he uses magic, everything in the world stops.
Both living and non-living things.
Bugs crawling on the floor, birds flying in the sky, people talking, and falling objects.
Everything.
The only person who can move alone in the frozen world is Gariel Cosmo, who uses magic.
‘To others, it will seem like he is performing incredible miracles.’
In fact, considering the deceptive nature of time magic, it was safe to call it a miracle.
Nothing else, just stopping time?
Such magic was unheard of in the history of the wizarding world.
‘The reason he was able to keep winning at betting was because he changed the eyes of the dice in a short period of time. ‘It’s the same with blackjack and poker.’
If you stop time for just a few seconds and check your opponent’s hand, you can never lose in gambling.
It may be strange to have such great abilities but only make money at gambling tables.
Such fraudulent magic was bound to come with a correspondingly large penalty.
“ha. Write it. ha.”
Although it is not visible to others, it is evident just by looking at the way he is breathing.
Because even the atmosphere stops in frozen time, it is impossible to stay still in one place.
Naturally, Gariel must move endlessly and even suck in oxygen that is suspended in the air, putting her in an environment that is more difficult than normal breathing.
‘At least this is closer to a miracle that deceives the world rather than a true time stop, so it’s not like you’re going blind because you can’t receive photons.’
Just the slightest movement consumes a lot of stamina.
In addition, there was more than one penalty to this time-stop magic.
first.
Living things cannot be touched directly.
When time is stopped, magic user Gariel must not come into contact with living things.
This is because the moment a stationary creature and a moving Gariel come into contact, the laws that deceive the world are broken and the collapse of time occurs.
The good news is that if it is not direct contact, it can be contacted indirectly.
In the case of inanimate objects, you can touch them as much as you like, so you could use them as before by placing an object on a person’s head, canceling the suspension, and attacking.
However, because the atmosphere stops and breathing becomes unstable, just carrying and moving something like a chair consumes a lot of physical strength.
That was the reason I was out of breath.
second.
No magic can be used while time is stopped.
It is impossible to have a one-sided fight where you activate magic alone in frozen time and win by canceling time.
All Gariel could do in the frozen time was to move hard on her own.
Even though he is a wizard, he has to move with his two legs and move objects with his two arms.
third.
It is impossible to reverse time or make it flow faster.
The only thing that is possible is ‘stop’.
Although it is time magic, it can only stop, which was the limitation and disadvantage of the magic he used.
And in stopped time, the time of the user’s body continues to flow.
If he lives with time stopped for a few years, others will not age, but only he will grow old.
Therefore, even when Gariel Cosmo used time magic, she preferred to end it very briefly.
Otherwise, he will age twice as fast as others.
In some ways, the time magic that Gariel used seemed to make very little sense, but in reality, it was not very helpful.
‘But, well, the guards in a place like this can be easily cleared out.’
The moment Ludger thinks so.
bang!
The entrance to a distant casino exploded, billowing out clouds of smoke.
The guards rushed out and stood in front of the entrance, glaring at the cloud of dust.
“Who are you?”
When the dust cleared, what emerged was a pale-skinned man wearing a black trench coat and fedora.
It seemed to be two meters tall, and its fluttering eyes moved independently, creating a bizarre appearance.
The direction in which those eyes moved was toward Ludger, who was standing beyond the guards.
“found.”
Smirk.
The sight of him smiling while showing his teeth was creepy and disgusting.
“what. “Do you know each other?”
“This is my first time seeing your face.”
“It looks like he knows you?”
The pale-skinned man raised his leather-gloved hand and pointed at Ludger.
Looking closely, the leather gloves were stained with red blood.
They say they’ve already killed someone.
“Juk, open it. “Kill everyone who gets in your way.”
As soon as the command was given, shadows came rushing in from behind.
They were pale-skinned people wearing only straw.
“W-what is that!”
“Everyone stop it first!”
“You bastards! “Where am I?”
Pale-skinned humans and guards clashed with each other.
The guards were not easily pushed aside. As if they were not using expensive artifacts for no reason, they formed a formation and blocked the pale people or repelled them with clubs.
But pale-skinned humans were more than that.
They showed movements that transcended humans.
He ran on all four legs like an animal, made incredible leaps, and even displayed incredible strength.
It was obvious that if the guards had not worn the artifact, a one-sided massacre would have occurred.
“What are those again? “Why did I come to see you?”
“You must have mistaken someone.”
“Ugh, I don’t know. “This is not my job, so handle it yourself.”
As soon as Gariel left those words, he sat down and disappeared.
* * *
An alley outside the casino.
Gariel, who ran away to a safe place, breathed a sigh of relief.
“You came all the way here, so I guess I can’t chase you.”
Ludger spoke from behind Gariel who was mumbling like that.
“Is this a safe route?”
“Ay! It’s a surprise!”
“Why are you doing that?”
“How did you chase me?!”
“I followed your shadow.”
Ludger took a part of Ather Nocturnus’ shadow and attached it to Gariel before she disappeared.
As soon as Gariel ran away, he calculated the coordinates and immediately followed him through the shadows.
Of course, Rine too.
A look of astonishment flashed across Gariel’s face as she realized what Ludger had done.
“Hey, crazy. Are you sure they use spatial movement? “Are you a monster?”
“I don’t want to hear from the guy who stops time.”
“for a moment. “And what about inside the casino?”
Ludger muttered as he looked in the direction of the casino, where an explosion sounded in the distance.
“Well, I’ll take care of it.”
“It looks like those weirdos were chasing you, but it’ll be okay.”
“That’s the question. “I didn’t do any dirty work here.”
“I am? I am!”
“So you said it was here?”
Gariel glared at Ludger and spoke with a sigh.
“Just those guys. “I think it’s a new force that recently appeared in Isla Machina.”
“Those guys… … ?”
Gariel’s expression hardened.
“I don’t know why they’re targeting you, but things aren’t going well. “If they are targeting you, you can never escape as long as you are on this island.”
It was something that might have a huge impact on future work.
