Chapter 4

Chapter 4

“Finally!” I exclaimed as I heard the sky cracking. I had waited for years for this. It was finally here. I had tears in my eyes. It was the tears of happiness. It wasn’t the same as the tears I had shed in despair this afternoon. Now they were of relief.

Cold raindrops hit my forehead and tumbled down my cheeks. I was soaked with it. I didn’t mind. This felt good. This was the best feeling in the world. I couldn’t take my eyes off the sky. The light that had substituted for light in the sky vanished as the sky was torn apart to be replaced by glowing dazzling moonlight. The sky that had not changed for a hundred years, filled with the same stars, disappeared and rain pelted down from the sky covered with black clouds. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. The sky separated into two and fell away. The rolling black clouds were a vision of beauty. The rain pouring down was refreshing!

In the middle of that heavy rainfall, a golden man stood tall. “Did he deceive me again?” said the low voice in irritation.

Even the voice sounded godly in my ears. A real voice from a real, breathing human uttering real words. Is this the coming of the angel? Is this it? Something like an angel sent down from heaven to alleviate the suffering of humans. The savior!

Of course, I knew it wasn’t as dramatic as that. But I also knew that this golden figure was the grand wizard Kaichen Tenebre. The one I was waiting for to come and save me. Even if I have spent the last hundred years cursing and swearing at him for not appearing on time, I was immensely grateful for him saving us. He indeed looked like an angel. 

In this stupid world of the novel, Kaichen was the only person who had the ability and the power to break the forbidden magic surrounding Acrab. The only one who could enter the place to break it. I had been waiting for this man for the past one hundred years. He was the only one who could get me out of here. And finally, he was here.   

I bit down on my quivering lips. I inhaled. I was finally able to breathe the air of the new world for the first time in a hundred years after being possessed into the body of a crazy alcoholic. I exhaled. The cool pouring rain was testament to it. This was real! I cried. How could I not shed tears? This was the moment I had longed for a century.

It has been hundred years since I finally opened my eyes to the real world after my death. How lonely I was! How sorrowful! I had tried numerous times to kill myself, but the body always returned to how it was before, and I would always open my eyes in the dilapidated mansion. I had endured this for one hundred years. I had been neither able to live nor able to die.

This is salvation, and I love it. 

* * *

I opened my eyes wide and shouted out in glee. What a joyous day! I looked around but Kaichen was nowhere to be seen. He had stood there, resplendent like an angel. He was now gone, nowhere to be seen. 

Perhaps he had taken one look at me, saw me as a drunk and a crazy person and went his way. It was exactly like in the novel!

“Ha… But I know where you’re headed!” I hurried along and took long strides. 

The beginning and end of my grand plan that I had honed for a hundred years all depended on Kaichen. It would be quite unfortunate if I was unable to make my plans come true just because Kaichen had disappeared, never to be found.

I walked through one of Acrab’s many alleys. I knew them so well that I could navigate with my eyes closed. Spending hundreds of years in a place can do that to you. I found him easily enough.

He glanced at me icily, so in contrast to his warm, golden eyes. “It took me such a long time to find you,” I said. Obviously, it didn’t. But I was panting as I had run all the way here. His energy was so strong that the hair on the back of my arms stood straight up. 

He was about three paces away from me. But his glare was so dangerous that I felt like he would slit my throat if I went near.  

“Bahahaha,” I laughed as I realized that this time if I was killed, I would die. I was no longer in magical Acrab. Cold sweat dripped down my back.

If I got hurt, I wouldn’t heal. My body wouldn’t magically reset. The magic was broken. I can’t die in vain after all these years. Not after enduring this for one hundred years! 

Kaichen was the most difficult hurdle I have to overcome for now. “Please don’t hurt me,” I said, “It has been so many years and you are the only new person I have seen in a hundred years.”

If you mix some truth in a lie, people usually were more inclined to believe you. I needed to gain his trust. Although the magic was broken, there were many things to know about what actually happened in Acrab. Maybe he would be curious about that. 

In the original novel, it had taken Kaichen a long time to discover whatever had happened to Acrab. The reason was that the magic was triggered through a medium. And that medium was none other than Dalia, the crazy, alcoholic woman.  

What explanation could anyone expect to get from a crazy alcoholic? But the tables had turned. Who the hell cared what happened in the original novel anyway?