Chapter 279: This is Death

“There’s… no upper limit…” Kismet murmured, as if sleepwalking. “That’s not a real page.”

“Is that so?” Saul smiled. “That’s great! I wasn’t sure before, so I’ve been using it very cautiously.”

Kismet stared blankly at Saul, muttering unconsciously, “Wizard Towers… are they really this dangerous?”

Before Saul could respond, Kismet suddenly kicked off the ground and leapt three meters backward.

Boom—

The next second, a silver wide-bladed greatsword stabbed into the ground right where he had been, nearly grazing his nose.

“You again, you silver-haired bastard! If you’ve got the guts, stop running and fight me fair and square!”

Following the shout came the dashing figure of Kira, looking every bit the valiant warrior—completely unfitting her unladylike words.

Kismet hugged his harp, smiling as he looked at the war goddess Kira, who had planted herself squarely between him and Saul.

“Fighting is so uncivilized. How about this, Miss Kira—why don’t I play you a tune instead?”

His only answer was Kira yanking the greatsword out of the ground and slashing toward him once more in a bold arc.

But just as the sword fell, Kismet suddenly leapt back again. Kira didn’t miss a beat—her blade, though slicing through empty air, spun around smoothly as she launched a second strike.

Yet Kismet never struck back. He simply kept retreating.

The chase continued—her attacking, him fleeing—until their silhouettes nearly disappeared over the horizon, far beyond Saul’s line of sight.

Then, in the distance, a massive burst of light suddenly exploded, forcing Saul to turn his head and shut his eyes.

Even then, the brilliance left his vision spinning, the flash burning into his eyes until they went black for a moment.

“A powerful light-based spell, though it doesn’t seem particularly offensive,” Saul muttered as he recovered. When he looked again, both Kismet and Kira were nowhere to be seen.

Who knew where their fight had taken them.

Just like that, things had once again drifted away from him.

Saul turned his head, looking at the old madman still lying unconscious in the distance. He sighed.

No matter what happened next, it seemed the old man would never return to normal.

Maybe, in his memories, his little sister was still clinging to his back, and they were still fleeing far away together.

Saul raised his hand and summoned Mage Hand. The spectral palm turned upward, gently lifting the unconscious old man off the ground.

And so, across the desert, two figures—one upright, one horizontal—made their way toward the blood-red Grind Sail Town.

As he walked, Saul turned toward the Dead Wizard’s Diary.

With just a glance, the diary flew from his left shoulder to hover before him.

Ever since building the mental realm, the diary had been much more obedient.

Now that it was just him and an ordinary person nearby, he recalled his conversation with Kismet, a spark of curiosity rising in his heart.

“Interact with the past… If I understood correctly, Kismet was suggesting I use Observe the Past on the diary. That would affect my connection to it.”

The diary didn’t reject the thought.

That only boosted Saul’s confidence.

Though Kismet’s true motives remained unclear, Saul believed most of what he’d said was trustworthy.

Especially regarding the diary—if Saul could glimpse into its past, wouldn’t that mean he could uncover more of its secrets and deepen their bond?

Saul raised his left hand, and a silver light began to form in his palm, slowly solidifying into a silver mirror.

He looked into the mirror but saw no change in his eyes.

However, when he circulated his mental energy through them, a chill flowed from his pupils, and a glimmer of silver light appeared in his gaze.

Unlike Penny’s eyes, which sparkled like a galaxy, the light in Saul’s dark pupils resembled a lone Polaris in the night sky—just a single point, but strikingly clear.

Having made up his mind, Saul didn’t hesitate. He turned to look at the diary.

But the moment his gaze landed on it—

Boom!

It was like something exploded inside his skull.

A searing, splitting pain shot through his head, so intense that his knees buckled and he nearly collapsed.

Yet the moment he gave in and tried to stop channeling his mental power, the pain vanished instantly.

And then—

The world around him began to flicker rapidly between light and darkness. The climate shifted with dizzying speed. Time surged forward, then reversed.

Grass sprouted in the desert, followed by springs of water, then a flourishing forest. The forest withered and died, water levels sank, and the land once again turned to arid wasteland.

As Saul grew lost in the endless cycle of time, the world shifted once more.

Suddenly, he wasn’t himself anymore. He had no idea what he’d become—only that his perspective, his form, had completely changed.

Yet in front of him was still the Dead Wizard’s Diary. Only now it was far, far closer. So close it felt like being a nearsighted person without glasses—he had to be within ten centimeters to see the text clearly.

Then, a beautiful silver feathered quill suddenly drifted down next to his face, loosely held in a hand.

As the fingers pressed down, the quill’s tip touched the diary, and began writing line after line.

Saul didn’t recognize a single word.

But the moment the first character was written, the world before the diary began to change.

It started with birds nesting in the forest, suddenly tumbling from branches to the ground.

Then a young deer strolling through the woods suddenly buckled at the knees, collapsed, and lay still—eyes wide, staring vacantly at the air.

Another line was written.

A lively town fell silent in an instant. People on the streets, in their homes, working in shops—all dropped to the floor.

Their eyes were still open, locked on wherever they’d been looking when they fell. Their expressions frozen in time.

Whether they had been smiling, grieving, or indifferent—now, every face looked like a death portrait.

The quill didn’t stop.

The vision shifted again—mountains collapsed, floods surged. The land scorched, then froze. Continents cracked. Corpses littered the ground.

The diary—and Saul’s vision—suddenly soared into the sky.

He saw the world fall into stillness.

All life, all things, even the inanimate… all faded into silence.

Light slowly disappeared. Even darkness no longer existed.

Saul was completely captivated, unable to look away.

He asked without thinking, “What is this?”

And then, a flat, emotionless voice echoed from within his body.

“This is death.”

Saul shuddered violently and collapsed.

Thud! Thud!

The first sound was him hitting the ground hard, utterly unprepared. Fortunately, his magically-enhanced body was tough enough that he didn’t get hurt.

The second was the old madman falling—Saul had lost focus, his Mage Hand vanishing, and the unconscious man dropped like a sack.

Saul still hadn’t fully recovered. He simply rolled onto his side and found a comfortable position to lie in for a bit longer.

The madman, he figured, was used to sleeping on the ground anyway.

“I just witnessed the death of an entire world… Was that the past diary record?”

But then he recalled—the quill wrote first, and only then did death follow.

A chill crept into his heart.

Could it be that the diary caused the death of that world?

“Could the diary really be that powerful? If it had such a terrifying ability, how could its master have only reached Fourth Rank?”

“Wait… that info came from Ralph. And Ralph probably got misled by Kismet.”

“What level of existence is this diary? And why did it choose me to be its master?”

As the thought struck him, Saul instinctively looked toward his left shoulder.

Instantly, he shot up with a gasp, panic finally breaking through on his face.

“Where’s my diary?!”

(End of Chapter)

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