Every Morning, My Mirror Saves the World - Chapter 12

Chapter 12

After learning that the mirror was actually a divine artifact belonging to the God of Darkness, Ruiyin was indeed surprised for a moment. But then she thought of the sinister atmosphere she had seen inside the mirror when she met Holy Archmage Lars, and she quickly accepted it.

After all, he was a final boss who dreamed of destroying the world. It would be unreasonable if he did not have one or two dark divine artifacts in his hands. And if the heroes defeated the boss at the end and got no drops, that would be even more unreasonable, wouldn’t it?

“Where are we going now?” Galahad, whose mental strength had been replenished by a legendary divine artifact, rose to his feet in high spirits, looking radiant as he gave his hair a handsome, dramatic toss.

“We?” Ruiyin raised an eyebrow. “Sorry, when did I ever say I was traveling with you?”

“Lord Xisaluo… Ruiyin! Please allow me to guard you at your side!” Lars, stopped halfway through the name by Ruiyin’s threatening raised brow, forcibly changed how he addressed her. His eyes, however, were still filled with reverence. “Even if you are not the God of War, you must be Lord Xisaluo’s divine envoy. That must be why you can suppress the power of a dark divine artifact no matter what happens. I’m right, aren’t I? Hey, aren’t I, Galahad?”

Galahad looked as if he had swallowed shit. Even with his dignity already fallen through the floor, he still felt that answering either yes or no would be terrible.

“Yes…” he forced out, his face green. “So I absolutely have to travel with you, right?”

Ruiyin irritably raked a hand through her hair. “Travel together, my ass… I don’t even know where I’m going myself!”

When she had come to this world, the only things she had brought with her were a mirror and a notebook. Now the mirror had been proven to be a dark divine artifact, an essential tool for destroying the world. Did that mean there was something special about the book too? Ruiyin took out the Western fantasy work that had been abandoned right after its opening, and was shocked to discover that despite the author already having kicked the bucket, this ten-thousand-year pit had actually updated!

The opening passage, that long-winded, self-pitying, self-introduction full of sighs, seemed to have been wiped away by some miraculous hand without leaving a trace. New content had appeared on the blank pages that followed. This time, the content was so concise it made her want to smash the book. There were only three phrases: Sea of Roses, dragon, Sword of Shadow.

“Sword of Shadow!” Galahad let out a deafening shout beside Ruiyin. She turned toward the sound and only then realized that a head like a ball of green algae had, at some point, leaned in beside her. Both his eyes were radiating an even brighter golden light than before.

“…” Ruiyin swiftly snapped the book shut, lifted her expressionless face, and asked, “When did you get over here? Is the Oracle something you can look at?”

“The Sword of Shadow!” Galahad’s eyes sparkled wildly, completely ignoring what Ruiyin was saying. “That is… the only relic the legendary sole Paladin, War God Xisaluo, left behind in the mortal world. The divine artifact, Sword of Shadow! Looking at it now… could it be… Oh, I am truly too happy. To think I would learn the whereabouts of two divine artifacts in a single day!”

Galahad cupped his face in both hands and rolled around on the ground in excitement.

“Oh? You know quite a lot,” Ruiyin said coolly. “Then do you know where we should go to find this thing?”

Delusion Emperor Lars cut in from the side. “Since the words are Sea of Roses, dragon, and Sword of Shadow, could the meaning be that we have to go to the Sea of Roses, defeat the dragon guarding the divine sword, and only then obtain the Sword of Shadow?”

“Exactly!” Galahad gave a thumbs-up. “That has to be it! Let us set out at once to find Xisaluo’s divine artifact!”

“Yes, yes, let us leave immediately! As a believer of Lord Xisaluo, I naturally ought to help my lord find the divine artifact!”

Two pairs of eyes, shining with expectation, stared at her together. Ruiyin froze for a moment before finally finding one somewhat reliable point in Lars’s divine delusion. It seemed… before she had been dumped here, that Holy Charlatan had indeed mentioned the Sea of Roses.

“My treasure lies at the border between the Sea of Roses and the Black Forest. Go and find it…”

Why did this feel so much like being possessed by the Pirate King? Was she supposed to assemble an entire ship’s crew before setting off?!

Ruiyin steadied herself and asked, “Do you know where the Sea of Roses is?”

“I do!” Unexpectedly, Galahad rubbed his nose smugly. “The Sea of Roses is at the southernmost end of the Aode Empire. Cross the Sea of Roses, and you can reach the Sunan Empire. But the Sea of Roses is an extremely dangerous stretch of ocean. In the middle of the sea live merfolk whose songs can bewitch sailors, and it is also home to settlements of Dark Elves, assassins of the night. Before continental teleportation magic arrays were invented, only the toughest people could cross that region!”

“Amazing!” Lars, who had no idea what was really going on, looked at Galahad in admiration. “You know so much about it. Galahad, you must have been one of the people who crossed that region before, right?”

“Of course!” Galahad proudly puffed out his chest. “I spent a very long time there, and in the end, I successfully crossed the Sea of Roses and reached the Sunan Empire.”

Ruiyin silently stared at him for a long while, then said slowly, “The correct answer should be: you once spent a very long time there because you were lost, and in the end, you successfully crossed the Sea of Roses by somehow stumbling through it while being chased, reaching the Sunan Empire, only to still miss the time you had agreed on with your employer. Right?”
“…Don’t worry about those details! Irrelevant things don’t need to be filled in. Let’s hurry up and begin this fascinating adventure!”

Ruiyin stood up, brushed off the dust, and said to Lars, “Go find out where the nearest continental teleportation array is. I have a bad feeling that any normal person would end up dead at the hands of the legendary Silver Knight.”

Lars said, “I… I’ll become a Silver Knight too! Don’t worry, Ruiyin, I’ll definitely be reliable! I’ll go check right now!”

Galahad said, “Hey… before you insult my character, could you at least stop acting like I’m already dead, you bastards? Wait for me!”

The preliminary content in A Girl’s Tragic Record of Another World about Lars being a pervert really had disappeared.

Ruiyin leaned against a rock beside the campfire and carefully flipped through the heavy parchment-bound volume. The first few pages had turned blank. The newly appeared writing began right beside those blank pages, as if this were a book whose contents vanished after being read. Once its effective time passed, it would fade back to its original state.

If that was the case, then what exactly was this so-called “effective time”?

“Ruiyin? Aren’t you sleepy… haah… sleepy yet?”

Ruiyin looked up, a little speechless. The boy sitting ramrod straight across from her with both hands wrapped around his sword had barely managed to stay alert through the first half of his sentence, but by the last few words, the yawn he’d been desperately holding back had routed his forced composure completely. Lars rubbed his eyes in a rather childish way, and hazy drowsiness veiled his emerald-green eyes with a thin sheen of moisture, making him look as docile and harmless as a puppy. In this world with no television or internet, aside from people whose nightlife was rich in vigorous bed activity, normal people were already deep asleep at two in the morning.

“You really don’t need to wait up for me.” Ruiyin closed the book in her hands. “Didn’t you see Galahad? That guy’s been asleep on his back for ages. This place is safe. There’s no need to worry.”

“N-no!” Lars forced his drooping eyelids open and rallied his spirits. “I’m a knight! How could I let my guard down before a lady has gone to rest? Besides, Ruiyin is the divine envoy I swore to protect. Even if there’s only the slightest possibility of danger, I must not be careless!”

“I’m not a divine envoy,” Ruiyin interrupted his speech. “And I have nothing to do with the god you worship. I approached you for a different purpose. Being locked up together with you was pure accident, and even now, we’re only traveling together because we have the same goal. Don’t trust me so much. Otherwise, sooner or later, you’ll go through the same grief Maxen brought you all over again.”

Looking at Lars as he flinched as if he’d been stabbed, Ruiyin continued calmly, “Didn’t that incident teach you anything? A knight’s loyalty and righteousness, who are they offered to in the end? His liege? His faith? Or neither, and they’re simply a pure ideal? Lars, wake up. Neither a liege nor War God Xisaluo can redeem evil. What you need to do isn’t protect someone else, but protect your own heart. You have to learn to be your own liege, your own king, and your own god.”

“But… no one has ever taught me that…” Lars stammered. “If my liege and Lord Xisaluo no longer exist, then what meaning does a knight’s existence have?”

“Your existence is your meaning. Even if everything you believe in is overturned, as long as you still exist, there is meaning.” Ruiyin looked into the campfire and spoke softly. “In my homeland, there were once knights similar to you. But in the end, what they left behind was not who had once been loyal to which liege, but more of an image: justice, resolve, kindness, courage. For humanity, the role of an indestructible image is far more important than a lifetime of foolish loyalty.”

“You don’t understand, do you?” Ruiyin glanced blandly at Lars. As expected, the already sleepy boy’s eyes had turned into two spirals. She shrugged. “It’s normal not to understand. Remember this: many people, including me, will tell you many grand principles. But never believe the shape of the world as described by someone else’s mouth. What humans, magic, and the world are truly like is something you have to learn for yourself. Don’t trust easily. Don’t make decisions lightly. Not every decision comes with a chance for regret.”

She held the parchment book in both hands and placed it before Lars. “Do you know what this is?”

“Isn’t this… the Oracle?”

“Yes. This is the Oracle. It records your future, and the futures of all of you. But remember, the point of recording the future is to change it. It is not a command, but a tool.”

“One day, you will become a very great person. When that time comes, everything you write will become an Oracle. By then, you will understand that there is nothing in this world that cannot be changed. Neither evil nor goodness can rule the world itself.”

“It’s very late. You should rest.” Ruiyin gently patted his head. “Remember, I will never need a child to protect me. Good night.”