Calia, the eldest daughter of the Zenonia family, had just arrived at the estate and reached the Count's office. As she stood there, the image of a certain man she had recalled several times already crossed her mind once more.
Alon Palatio—the man who had recently killed all his brothers and seized the position of successor.
'…Famous, he said.'
Calia remembered the look in his eyes as he watched her.
Those eyes were unreadable, indifferent to everything as if staring into the abyss beyond the North. Even now, the memory made goosebumps prickle across her arms.
It was through that gaze that Calia had realized the truth.
That he was the same 'kind' as her.
In truth, if that had been all, Calia would have stopped caring about him the moment he rejected her proposal. Rejecting the offer meant they could never be allies, which was essentially the same as becoming enemies.
Yet, the reason Calia's curiosity persisted was because of what he had said.
"Famous… is it?"
The Zenonia family was indeed famous. Even if they didn't involve themselves in politics, the wealth and power they possessed were formidable enough to overturn the current state of the kingdom at least once.
However, that fame ultimately belonged to the individual known as Count Zenonia, not to Calia herself.
Despite that, Alon had spoken those words.
He had referred to her with absolute clarity. He had said it in a situation where most nobles didn't even know her face, as she had only attended two balls in her life.
He said she was famous.
Not the Count, but her.
…Of course, Alon had simply spoken those words while thinking of her reputation as a famous mastermind from the original story's beginning, but to her, those words carried immense weight.
"…How strange."
Calia turned her gaze toward the Count sitting in the office.
The Count was silently processing documents. He kept his head down, working wordlessly as if she weren't even there.
Tap— tap—
As she walked toward him, the Count's gaze naturally drifted upward.
Eyes as red as her own looked back at her. Though he remained silent, anyone could see that the Count looked full of life.
—Snap!
Until Calia snapped her fingers.
The moment the sound echoed, the light of reason vanished from the Count's eyes. The eyes that had been sharp just a moment ago turned dull and vacant like an idiot's. His firmly set mouth fell open slightly, and a trail of drool escaped.
To any observer, the Count was no longer sane.
Looking at 'it,' Calia muttered to herself.
"How did he know? No one should have known."
She wore a look of intense curiosity, recalling Alon, who had spoken as if he knew the secret she had kept hidden since the day she turned her father into a vegetable.
'Or was he just testing me?'
With that suspicion lingering, she stepped out of the office—the place where she had performed her act for the past five years—only to be met with a frantic voice.
"Ca-Calia!"
"What is it?"
"In your room… a co-corpse…!!"
Startled by the sudden news, she hurried to her quarters.
And there.
"Ha…"
She saw it.
The informant she had sent to tail Alon about two weeks ago was there, his neck twisted twice around, eyes wide open in a gruesome death.
"…Seeing as the Engraving didn't trigger, it seems he didn't leak any secrets."
The knight's testimony followed.
'The informant didn't talk, yet he went out of his way to deliver the body to my room…'
Calia processed the thought.
"Ha…"
Feeling her suspicion turn into absolute certainty, she whispered with a smile.
"…It seems I've had a major weakness seized the moment we met."
*
Evan frowned as he looked at the golems, their forms emitting a vivid red glow in the deepening darkness of the night.
Having lived as a mercenary for over fifteen years since childhood, his eyes moved busily, searching for the golems' weaknesses, yet he couldn't hide his anxiety.
He was confident in his skills, but that was exactly why he was so wary of the unknown entities before him. He had experienced far too many times how dangerous something could be when you lacked information.
Furthermore, he had someone to protect. It was the worst possible situation to face an enemy whose characteristics were a total mystery.
Moreover, the enemy seemed to number well over twenty. As Evan agonized over how to break through this situation—
"I'll handle this."
"…Pardon?"
At the sudden voice, Evan responded with a dazed expression and watched as Alon stepped forward.
Alon's face was as indifferent as it had been when they entered the Labyrinth.
Once again, Evan found Alon to be incredibly bizarre and fascinating. He was genuinely amazed at how his master could maintain such an expression in a situation like this.
At least by Evan's judgment, they were in a significant crisis. There were over twenty humanoid golems that clearly needed to be dealt with, and each of them undoubtedly possessed formidable combat power.
Yet, in such a situation, Alon had stepped up to handle them himself.
"…."
To be honest, Evan didn't think Alon could actually defeat the golems before them.
Of course, Evan knew Alon was no ordinary person and that he had a talent for magic. He was a proper mage who had reached the 2nd Tier through self-study without a master.
Unfortunately, that was only impressive by general standards; that level of greatness didn't necessarily apply here. While he was a talented mage for reaching the 2nd Tier at a young age, a mere 2nd Tier would struggle to take down even a single one of these golems.
Rumble—!
As his thoughts ended, the golems, which had been silent as if assessing their enemies, all began to charge toward Alon.
And then.
"I enact the Constraint."
Alon's voice rang out like a sentence being passed.
*
As Alon muttered the activation word, the world came to a halt.
His vision turned black and white, and the movements of the charging golems slowed down as if viewed through a high-speed camera.
And then.
[O fragment that inherits the great will of Niakula, state the two constraints you shall enact.]
A grand, resonant voice that shook the entire space echoed in his head. It was a voice that sounded like a man, a woman, a child, and an old man all at once.
Hearing it, Alon broke into a brief cold sweat.
'It really is different from the game.'
The 'Constraint' he had obtained from the Labyrinth of Whispers was an artifact that, true to its name, imposed a restriction on the user in exchange for a corresponding reward.
In the game, using the item would bring up numerous options—a notification window to choose which constraint to set and what reward to receive.
However, as if to remind him that this was reality, what appeared before him was not a window, but a voice. A voice that made his head spin just by listening to it, making his heart pound as if it might explode—a voice that birthed a bizarre sense of dread.
Exhaling a long breath, Alon forced his trembling heart to steady and spoke the constraints he had prepared.
"One."
[Speak.]
"I shall make the use of Babiloia's hand signs 'absolute' for the casting of magic."
[What do you seek to gain through that?]
"The power to further twist the laws of the world."
[Granted.]
"Another."
[Speak.]
"I shall make the use of the great Babiloia's phrases 'limited' for the casting of magic."
[What do you seek to achieve through that?]
"My desire remains the same."
[….]
The voice fell silent for a moment at Alon's words. It lasted until the foot of a golem, moving with agonizing slowness, lifted into the air and touched the ground again.
Alon wondered if he had done something wrong, but—
[Accepted.]
As if to prove his worries groundless, the grand voice echoed from the heavens with words of affirmation.
[O human who remembers the hand signs and mysteries of the forgotten Great God. I offer my thanks to you, who inherits the will.]
"?"
Alon wore a bewildered expression. Of course, his face remained outwardly stoic, but his eyes were filled with questions.
'Inherit the will? What is that supposed to mean?'
Naturally, Alon had no clue. The reason he had chosen Babiloia's hand signs and phrases as his constraints was simple.
In the game, choosing those two provided the highest increase in magic attack power. Furthermore, because he had chosen these constraints so many times, he had naturally memorized the hand signs and phrases of Babiloia.
He wasn't a genius, so he hadn't memorized every single sign and phrase from the game, but he didn't feel burdened by that. Alon knew exactly where the records of Babiloia's hand signs and phrases were located.
Alon questioned the voice from the heavens, but only for a moment.
[I shall be watching always. O successor of the will.]
Realizing that the black-and-white world was slowly returning to normal, Alon recognized the shift the moment it happened.
He looked at the golems charging from a distance and raised his hand to test the constraints. Simultaneously, the mana activating within Alon's body flowed through his heart and began to gather at his raised fingertips.
The mana gathered at his fingertips was meager. Even though he had drawn every bit of mana from his body, the sphere of lightning—which, according to the book's description, should have shone brilliantly—emitted a light as faint as the fading life of a dying old man.
However, Alon felt neither depressed nor surprised. He already keenly realized that this was the limit of the third son of the Palatio family.
But.
"Refraction."
The moment that phrase left his lips, in accordance with the verse he enacted—
"Repulsion."
The small sphere scattered into chaotic lines.
"Clear Light."
With a crackling sound, it began to emit a blue radiance. What had been a mere small sphere transformed into hundreds, thousands of lines, creating a non-linear light source of crackling electricity.
A light source that shifted from the glow of dawn to a piercingly cold blue light.
At the same time, Alon's hand formed a seal.
The thumb covered the middle finger. It was a posture as if he were about to flick someone's forehead.
However, by turning his hand over, Alon created a posture resembling the Dharmachakra Mudra of a Buddha. He looked at the golems that had reached him and—
"Linear Diffraction."
He uttered the final phrase like a declaration.
When the blue light momentarily drove away the darkness—
Snap!
With a flick of his finger, a flash was unleashed.
Zzt—!
No sound followed. The only things to be heard were the low whistle of the wind after the flash and the sight of the golems, appearing as if time had stopped after the brilliant light illuminated the canyon.
And then.
Cr-crack— Crash!
Over twenty golems collapsed helplessly into piles of stone without a shred of resistance.
Evan, who had been charging forward to peel the golems off Alon just moments ago, stood frozen with his mouth agape.
"What the hell…"
He muttered under his breath.