Chapter 250
The chessboard was made using a wooden board I found in the dimensional bag.
There was no better hobby to pass the monotonous days.
I think I made it about ten years ago.
But even this was starting to get boring.
Thousands of repeated chess games.
Both Han Siha and Basilus had reached the level of chess masters by now.
And their tricks were evolving day by day.
“Checkmate.”
“Hmm?”
Han Siha tilted his head and swallowed nervously.
He had just seen Basilus swap a piece when he wasn’t looking.
Basilus thought this was some kind of card game where cheating was acceptable.
“Are you bottom dealing?”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“I saw you. What, you pulled a fast one and now it’s ‘checkmate’?”
“Kwoo?”
“Kwoo my ass. If you don’t want your head turned into a checkerboard, you’d better put that piece back where it belongs.”
At Han Siha’s words, Basilus shook his head vigorously, even scrunching up his face as if angry.
“No, I won’t.”
“What?”
Basilus was now thirty-three.
In other words, Basilus was going through puberty.
The stormy, emotional period of adolescence.
Han Siha smiled fondly and opened his mouth.
“Our dear Basilus. I served you soup this morning, and it seems you ate your manners along with it.”
“That’s not true!”
“You can act up all you want if you feel like fasting from tomorrow.”
“…!”
Basilus flinched.
Quietly, he returned the chess piece to its original spot.
Basilus wouldn’t starve to death even if he stopped eating, but threatening him with food still worked best. Not that it stopped his chattering mouth.
“Tamer… I hate you….”
“That’s not why I taught you pronunciation.”
“You’re bad! You’ve got a rotten personality!”
Bickering like this had become part of their daily routine.
The magic circuit endlessly running in the corner of the room beeped annoyingly.
Han Siha drew a line on the paper he had stuck to the wall.
“Time for bed, you scaly brat.”
“…You’re mean!”
And just like that, another day passed.
* * *
By now, Han Siha had dabbled lightly in nearly every field of magic over the years, reaching the point where he had tried his hand at just about everything.
Recently, he had taken a keen interest in digging deeper into individual fields.
Lately, Han Siha was fascinated with herbalism.
It was a crude space for proper research.
He had to experiment with the few materials he had brought in his dimensional bag.
But those limitations no longer mattered.
Professor Bruce Miller of the Magical Society, who once wanted to take him as an apprentice, would now consider Han Siha his equal.
Given that he had spent decades doing nothing but this, it was only natural.
“Basilus! What do you think would happen if I sold this on the market?”
“Sold out!”
“You think so too? I must be talented in herbalism, huh?”
He had created a potent poison resistance potion.
Far stronger than anything available on the market, it would keep someone alive even when exposed to a lethal dose of poison.
For the sake of safety, the potion should undergo clinical testing, starting with animal trials.
However, the ‘Void’ contained only himself and Basilus.
So, the test subject would be…
“Do I have to try it on myself?”
Han Siha tilted his head and took out a poison sample from the dimensional bag.
To test the detox potion, he first needed poison in his system, so he had prepared a deadly toxin extracted from an undead creature.
Han Siha opened the vial with a resolute expression,
and downed the poison in one gulp.
Then—
“Gah…!”
As Han Siha coughed up blood, Basilus rushed over in a panic.
This wasn’t the first time Han Siha had pulled this kind of stunt, so the scene felt like déjà vu.
Once again, a smack landed on his back.
“Kwoo! You blockhead!”
Thud.
Han Siha collapsed.
Basilus frantically pounded on his shoulder.
“Get up! Get up!”
“Nngh….”
“Crazy idiot! Get up!”
Even knowing he wouldn’t die, Basilus always panicked.
If there were ground here, he’d have tried burying himself alive by now.
Eating poison like this wasn’t even the weirdest thing he’d done.
In reality, he’d fully recover in about ten minutes.
Han Siha lifted his head, panting.
Then, he gave a sly smile.
“Hah… feels tingly.”
Smack.
“Ow.”
Of course, he deserved the hit.
Basilus scolded him with a flushed face.
“I told you not to do stupid things!”
“Ugh, I’m fine, see?”
“You’ll regret it when you’re older!”
“I’m already old, you brat.”
“Y-You… Ugh!”
Smack.
Basilus snatched the vial from Han Siha’s hand and threw it away, but Han Siha had already recovered.
At this point, he had built up such a resistance that he no longer needed the detox potion.
Aside from feeling a bit dizzy, he was in perfect condition.
Han Siha quietly stared at the empty vial.
“Hmm….”
Sometimes, he wondered.
Not aging, not dying. Never collapsing.
An endlessly regenerating body.
Living a life isolated in a space disconnected from the world.
“Am I even human?”
These thoughts weren’t helpful.
Han Siha sighed, tossing the empty vial aside.
* * *
Another hundred years passed.
Crackle.
Sitting in front of a burning campfire, Han Siha faced Basilus.
Basilus wasn’t as restless as he used to be, but he remained active.
He was stacking burning logs into a tower.
The kind of pastime only a Red Dragon could enjoy.
Han Siha watched him quietly before pulling one of the burning logs out.
There weren’t many logs left.
Once they all burned, they’d eventually regenerate into their original form.
At first, he had been grateful for the endless regeneration.
Now, it was just unsettling.
“I’m not hungry.”
Han Siha poked at the fire and began grilling some meat over the flames.
He wasn’t hungry, but it was mealtime, so they ate.
It was a way to feel that time was still passing.
Sizzle.
The sound of meat sizzling filled the air, along with the mouth-watering aroma of well-cooked meat.
Even without being hungry, the smell was irresistible.
Unable to wait, Basilus grabbed a piece and stuffed it into his mouth, even though it wasn’t fully cooked.
Nom nom.
“Good?”
“Kwoo!”
Han Siha chuckled as he watched Basilus answer cheerfully.
Fwoosh.
As Han Siha stared blankly at the flickering flames, memories of long ago started to resurface.
The survival test at Ardel Academy.
That time when I got into a massive fight with a senior and was thrown into the jungle without even a single bottle of water.
But even then, we all hung on stubbornly, managing to hunt down a wild boar.
I was there, cleaning it.
We went through all sorts of hardships, but they were all fond memories now.
Sitting around the campfire, Adela and I exchanged words like this:
‘Why did you become an earth mage?’
‘Because the ground feels closer to me than the sky.’
She was mocking her own status as a commoner, yet it was the first time she opened up to me about the Katablam incident.
Back then, I was trembling on the inside, thinking the girl next to me was plotting to kill me.
Who would have thought that one day, that girl would throw her life away for me?
“Adela.”
To avoid forgetting that name,
Han Siha sometimes murmured it.
Basilus blinked his wide eyes and asked again.
“Adela?”
“Yeah, you remember her, right?”
Basilus nodded vigorously, as if it were obvious.
The time was just as long and tedious for him, but Basilus was holding up better than Han Siha.
Maybe it was because dragons had such long lifespans.
Han Siha looked at Basilus with sad eyes.
It’s been just over a hundred years, and the name is already becoming blurry….
How much crueler is the passage of time for a dragon?
Han Siha thought about that and offered some advice.
“You’re enduring a long, long time, but get used to it.”
“Huh?”
“Humans don’t live that long.”
The words carried the meaning that his Tamer couldn’t be by his side forever.
As if he understood,
Basilus’s expression hardened.
* * *
Three hundred more years passed like that.
Counting time had long since become meaningless.
Han Siha had forgotten the flow of time.
His swordsmanship had reached a high level long ago, and he had mastered every kind of magic and even the techniques to counter them.
Honestly, there was nothing left for him to learn.
Having nothing more to learn is tantamount to despair for a human being.
So Han Siha began writing a diary.
Ah, that was about two hundred years ago.
He had started writing at the back of his books, and by now, he had filled over a dozen magic tomes with his writings.
These were tomes that he no longer needed because he had memorized everything in them.
Some of these tomes spanned hundreds, even thousands of pages.
Yet, every single one of them was filled with handwriting….
Han Siha wrote, erased, and wrote again.
And when that wasn’t enough, he sometimes revisited his earlier entries.
He’d often go through the autobiography-like accounts of his life, which he had written down when his memories were still relatively clear.
By now, more than half of those memories would be forgotten unless he reread them.
“Basilus.”
Han Siha called out to him, tapping the floor beside him.
“…?”
Everything had changed, except for that one constant.
Basilus, still in his hatchling form, ran over and plopped himself onto Han Siha’s lap.
“Kwoo!”
“Ugh!”
Just like before, Basilus landed without any regard for his weight.
Han Siha chuckled as he began flipping through his diary.
Flip—
Flip—
Countless years had passed,
and recounting these old stories felt like reciting ancient folktales from a distant past.
But Basilus loved hearing the old stories.
Han Siha began speaking in a weary voice.
“Once upon a time, there was a crazy guy who wanted to conquer the world with a Cube.”
“The crazy guy?”
“Yeah, the one you fought… What was his name… Ba… Ba…”
Ah, I can’t remember.
“Was it Evadon?”
“No, that’s wrong.”
“Anyway, there was a madman, and we had to save the world by fighting him… After a fierce battle, I ended up winning.”
Basilus scowled at Han Siha’s words.
“No, you lost.”
“Nope. Your memory’s off. I won.”
“…?”
Slam.
Han Siha closed the magic tome and patted Basilus’ head.
Though he was smiling, his eyes looked somewhat sad.
“Time for bed?”
“Kwoo….”
Basilus sat there with a sullen expression before speaking.
Sometimes, seeing his Tamer look at him with those empty eyes made him anxious.
On those occasions, Basilus felt the need to ask questions, to gauge his Tamer’s state of mind.
“Then what about…”
“Hm?”
“The name of our academy.”
“….”
“Your estate.”
“….”
“If not that, then Fretera. Don’t you remember her name?”
Han Siha was silent for a long while before he finally let out a small laugh.
“Basilus.”
“Huh?”
“There’s no way I could remember.”
Too much time had passed to remember such trivial things.
Han Siha straightened up, looking directly into Basilus’ eyes.
Han Siha was finally starting to accept it.
Even if it didn’t show on the surface, he was clearly losing his mind.
He didn’t know how much time had passed, or how much longer he would have to endure.
There was no way he could stay sane.
His mind, filled with new things he had learned, slowly began to push out his old memories.
He discarded memories he deemed unnecessary.
However, even among those fragments of memories,
there were things he still remembered.
Adela.
Yoon Haul.
Han Si-hyuk.
Won.
The four people who lost their lives because of him—he could never forget them.
“I have to save them.”
Han Siha smiled sadly and added,
“That was my promise.”
* * *
In the sunless void,
where morning came only when one opened their eyes,
Han Siha awoke for what felt like the thousandth time.
“Ugh… Ugh…”
With creaking joints, he stretched and stood up.
After that, light meditation and making breakfast were the usual routines.
Han Siha closed his eyes reflexively, following his set pattern.
But today, something felt different.
“…!”
Wind.
It felt like a breeze.
“What…?”
Han Siha rubbed his eyes with his sleeve and stood up.
Then, he murmured in disbelief.
“No way….”
Before his eyes, a door had appeared.