Ch. 1
Chapter 1
I had lived my whole life as a slave.
After my master died, his son—the new head of the house—set me free.
“If you go north,” he’d said, “you’ll see the aurora you always dreamed of.”
The pitch-black past could turn pure white; a new beginning was possible.
Eight years ago, the day I prepared to head north with my first-ever taste of freedom—
—that day, war broke out.
“Our commander’s definitely insane.”
“Yeah. His nickname’s Mad Dog, you know.”
“I’m not joking....”
Two soldiers in navy uniforms whispered among themselves.
“No sane person could dream up an operation like this.”
“How would a raw recruit know what goes on inside the commander’s head? I don’t even know.”
I turned toward them.
“Dogs have sharp ears.”
“S-sorry, sir!”
Both soldiers ducked their heads in unison. The recruit lifted his eyes first.
“Sorry, but... Commander.”
He suddenly raised his voice.
“Commander, this operation—! I-it violates every precedent, every ethic... I can’t understand it!”
His outdrawn plea drew a short sigh from me.
“Recruit.”
“Y-yes, Jin Roadmain!”
“Right, Jin whatever. Thousands of goblins are about to swarm up this slope. We’re outnumbered ten to one. Those bastards have big feet for their height; they climb slippery, steep ground like it’s flat.”
I drew a breath and went on.
“You were briefed: we’re outnumbered and physically outmatched on this terrain.”
“Still...!”
“My duty isn’t to teach ethics—it’s to complete the mission.”
The instant I finished, a horn flute shrieked.
A goblin war cry answered it.
Green demon beasts began scaling the hill.
It was only a matter of time before they reached the Imperial trench.
“Fire!”
At my signal the soldiers yanked their triggers.
Black smoke and gunfire blossomed outward.
Goblins tumbled mid-climb.
But those in the rear ranks pressed forward, relentless.
Like a tug-of-war drawn taut, the distance between goblins and Imperials refused to shrink—
—not until the muskets revealed their limit.
“Commander! We’re running out of time...!”
“We’ll be overrun before we can reload...!”
So I lifted my right hand high, where every man could see.
Hold position.
A clenched fist would be the next command.
Tension rippled across the soldiers’ faces.
The goblin tide lapped at the defensive line.
“Throw.”
I closed my fist.
The men hoisted corpses from the trench.
“Throw them!”
The bodies rolled downhill.
Comrades in navy uniforms—already mangled—snapped grotesquely as they bounced.
“All of them! Let our fallen fight to the last!”
Goblins struck by the corpses lost footing and slid.
Crushed. Buried.
The muskets gained precious seconds to reload.
“Sorry....”
The recruit lifted a corpse with tear-filled eyes.
“I’m sorry....”
I stared blankly at his muttered apology.
Who could stay emotionless?
“Shut it, recruit.”
Eight years of war had carved me into this.
* * *
“Hey, rookie.”
“Jin Roadmain, sir!”
Jin snapped a crisp salute.
“Heard you yelled at the commander?”
“I-I didn’t yell....”
“Then don’t gab. Watch it—commanders turn on you fast.”
“Sorry.”
“Apologize to him, not me. Go find him.”
“M-me, sir?”
“Yeah. Want me to go for you?”
“No, sir. Sorry, sir.”
“Huh.”
The senior clicked his tongue.
“The corpse I threw was my hometown friend who enlisted with me. I can’t face his family.”
“Worry about that after you survive. Bottom line—you think the commander’s insane, don’t you?”
Jin sealed his lips.
Silence equaled consent.
“Picture being singled out by a man like that. You’d be tossed in alive, wouldn’t you?”
Jin nodded, slowly.
“...Yes, understood.”
He saluted again and went to find the commander.
He stopped at the door, knuckles poised to knock—
THUD.
Something slammed hard inside; the jamb shivered.
“What’s he up to now...?”
The crashes came at steady intervals.
“Damn... should I just leave? If I butt in and it goes sideways—”
“Who’s there?”
The commander’s voice leaked through the wood.
“R-Recruit Jin Roadmain, sir!”
“Ah, Jin whatever. Come in.”
Jin drew a breath and opened.
The instant he stepped inside, a flash of light clawed at his eyes.
He threw up crossed arms to block it.
When he lowered them, the office swam into view—
—and it glowed, though not a single lamp was lit.
Hundreds of military tags carpeted the walls, silver as unrefined ore, dazzling him mute.
“What’d you come for?”
The question never reached his brain.
“Doesn’t... doesn’t it hurt your eyes?”
“Bright? Looks pitch-black to me.”
The commander scratched his white hair, voice flat. Emerald irises paired with a lifeless stare—like discovering a “gem” was only gravel.
A hammer rested in his right hand.
“You’ve been... nailing tags to the wall, sir?”
A nod.
“May I ask why?”
“Just a hobby.”
“...A hobby, sir?”
“I asked twice already—why are you here?”
“I—I’m sorry! For that day, truly sorry!”
Jin bowed until his spine creaked.
“That day?”
“During the hill assault, sir. I sincerely apologize.”
“Hm. That your entire business?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Fine. Dismissed.”
“...Yes, sir.”
Jin saluted, turned, and gripped the handle—then pivoted back.
“Actually, Commander.”
His gaze swept the glittering wall.
“I pretended not to know, but every member of the 63rd knows this place. The Silver Tomb. No one builds a grave from dog-tags for fun—unless they’re cracked.”
“Yesterday I was crazy; today I’m not?”
“What’s on that wall... is it all your regret, sir?”
The moment he asked, a sound like thunderheads rolled in, pressing every breath from his lungs.
“Recruit.”
He didn’t need to look; he knew the whistle of incoming shells.
“Hit the deck.”
* * *
Bodies lay snagged in netting like fish dragged ashore.
The earth split, buildings collapsed, and the commander’s office—eight years of silver memories—shattered over me.
I’d dug my own grave.
My past crushed me inside it.
“Commander...!”
I knelt, holding the rubble back with my spine.
It wouldn’t hold long.
A splintered beam had skewered me; its tip jutted from my abdomen, dripping blood onto the recruit’s cheek.
“Commander... why me...?”
"Over there... those are my Training Center comrades."
I shifted my gaze to the crumbling wall.
"I had no family, so my batch-mates were the first I ever had. We never shared blood, but we bled together."
Especially the first to die at my side.
His blue eyes surfaced in my memory.
"He was a gifted mage. Possessed Clairvoyance Magic, but—cruel luck—lost his sight. The injury killed him in the Center."
I swallowed the copper rising in my throat and went on.
"Next to him, the scion of a Prestigious House with a Unique Magic. Died before he even learned to wield it."
"Commander, you mustn't say any more!"
"Then the blood-mage who paid in crimson for every spell. The prodigy who ran a forge at sixteen. The Hunter who could stitch wounds with herbs. Had they lived, they might have seen the war's end—my batch was the strongest. Except for me."
I lowered my head, staring at the splintered beam skewering my gut.
A wooden blade, sharp as steel.
"Recruit, I've got Weapon Phobia. Can't stand sharp points. A quill is torture; swords or spears, worse. And since we didn't train with muskets back then, I couldn't even dodge."
Spine and blade—two lines converging on a single point.
That point felt ready to gouge my eyes out.
Sometimes I swore a graze would shatter bone.
Just the tip of something—yet to me, the start of terror.
"I was half a soldier."
"But... Commander, you can fight with your eyes closed, can't you?"
"That's how it looks to you. Two weeks before you joined 63rd Platoon—only then could I finally fight like that."
"Only then..."
The recruit chewed on the words.
"Yes, I asked if you regretted anything."
Slowly, he nodded.
"All I have is regret. If I'd learned to fight properly sooner, this grave wouldn't exist. I'd have held a sword, not a hammer—stood beside them before they died..."
"Commander..."
"One favor, Jin Roadmain."
"You... remember my surname?"
Instead of answering, I surveyed the ruined walls.
"Stay alive. Live to remember them all. You be the one who remembers."
"No—Commander, you can still—!"
"My name is Mago. No surname."
"Commander!"
"Only two syllables—surely you won't forget."
My eyes drifted shut.
"Or forget it if you must. Just know—I tried. I truly tried..."
To the ones who left first and wait for me—
I'm coming back to you now.
* * *
A white curtain shot skyward.
Rippling in the wind, it looked like wings.
Free, fluttering flight.
It soared over the garden wall.
What am I seeing?
How—how am I seeing?
"Mago."
I even heard my name.
Then a whinny filled my ears.
"Mago! Quit gawping and help!"
Curtains, clothes—white cloth whipped everywhere by a sudden gale.
The gust smashed the rotted stable door.
A brown horse tried to bolt.
My master's darling, reared like a child.
It shoved aside the servant blocking the gate and galloped in circles.
"The gate—shut the main gate!"
Two servants by the manor doors heaved them closed.
The iron teeth of the gray gate groaned shut.
"Mago, hurry!"
Can't let it escape.
I stamped the ground on instinct.
As the horse reached the driveway, the gates clanged sealed.
I snatched the reins of the bewildered brown mare.
The servants exhaled in unison.
"Mago, you—did you just outrun a horse?"
Left hand gripping reins, I wrapped my right arm around her neck.
Before she could kick, I flipped her clean over my shoulder.
Hooves flailing, I carried her back to the stable.
"Mercy... I knew you were strong, but..."
"Mago, hang on tight!"
A servant rushed up with a lasso.
He slipped the loop over her neck and tied the other end to a post.
"Good—got her."
The servant stepped back, palms open.
Whispers slid into my ears.
"That's not just 'pretty strong'..."
"What was the master thinking, keeping Mago? Slave or not, if a man like that ever decides to..."
“Don’t worry.”
The rest was obvious.
“Mago can’t pick up a weapon.”
“Can’t? With strength like that?”
Weapon phobia.
That was my sickness, my wall, my regret.
Yet being unable to do anything because of it was already the past.
Just like everything now filling my eyes and ears, it belonged to yesterday.
I scanned the surroundings slowly.
Every servant wore black.
The sudden gale that had ripped through the yard earlier.
The horse that had bolted.
“It’s exactly like the master’s funeral.”
The day I gained my freedom.
The same moment I lost it, I could see it again.
I clenched and unclenched my fist.
The slick coat of the horse, the hair brushing my fingers, even the heavy pain lodged in my shoulder—
I felt it all.
“...This isn’t a dream.”
I looked toward the mansion lobby.
Black-clad mourners sobbed over the coffin.
The master had been a vicious man; if there is a hell, he’s surely on his way.
While one soul is being sent there, this place can’t possibly be hell itself.
“What a sudden gust... complete chaos.”
Just then the eldest son—now the new lord—approached.
The master’s death hadn’t freed me; the young master before me simply inherited the chain.
Before leaving to study at Magic University he’d been notorious as the worst sort of rake.
“Mago, I was looking for you. I’ve a gift.”
I lifted my head and met his gaze—those glittering blue irises I remembered all too well.
Top-left corner of the north wall in the commander’s office.
“I... was searching for it too.”
“Hmm?”
The first military tag.
A mage whose special gift, Clairvoyance, had been lost when an arrow pierced his eye.
“A chance you won’t regret.”
Neither dream nor hell.
Eliminating the impossible left only one answer:
The past.
I’m reliving it.