Five days before Corvis and Tessia Eralith's birthday.
Corvis Eralith
Almondlings were peculiar instruments.
Not only were they built with the wood of a Watchful Almond of Eidelholm, their bodies carved from the living branches of those ancient, sentinel trees, but they also required the hair of an Elenoi Highcolt as strings—each strand carefully harvested and treated to produce a tone that could make the heart ache or soar.
The wax, too, was special, taken from a peculiar species of bee-like mana beasts that nested in the hollows of the oldest trees, its golden sheen protecting the wood from the ravages of time and moisture.
I sat on my bed, a soft whistle escaping my lips, as a light summer breeze howled through the open window. The curtains billowed like pale ghosts, and the scent of blooming flowers drifted in from the gardens below.
I wanted to play some music today, seizing the free time I currently had—I had just returned from an Unraveling as Finn Warend with Ashton and Albold.
We had gone to an E-Class dungeon close to the Elshire Forest; it was just a den of some mana beasts, and a Reset hadn't even happened when I stepped inside, making it a rather relaxing Unraveling.
No death, no fear, no river. Just a quiet walk through the dark and the satisfaction of a job well done.
Now, as I finished applying the bee-wax to my Almondling, with Berna lazily sprawled on the floor, her massive form rising and falling with each slow breath, I wanted to do something other than fight.
Avicenna would be proud, I thought. I was keeping the Vaultlamp inside my storage ring now—I wanted this moment to be just for myself.
I put the Almondling under my arms and graced some strings. The notes reverberated clearly, clean and pure, the instrument working perfectly. The sound filled the room, wrapping around me like a warm embrace, and for a moment, the weight of everything I carried seemed to lift.
With sound magic, I could mimic almost all kinds of instruments just with an Almondling. That was the reason why they were so popular even outside Elenoir—they were the greatest tool for a musician.
A single musician could play like a whole band if they were talented enough with sound magic, and I had practiced very, very much with this peculiar application of it.
But with sound being only an affinity for elves and humans, I had never seen one in Darv. Perhaps I could bring some new instruments to the dwarven Kingdom after asking Avicenna about Djinnic music... a thought for another time.
"I read the news today, oh boy," I sang, the words flowing from me as if they had always been there.
REtrocurrent itself reminded me of the words and melody of "A Day in the Life" by The Beatles—that meant Earth was real and not just a way Fate had gifted me to cope with the knowledge of the novel, right?
Or was it just the umpteenth fake knowledge I had of a world that existed only in my fantasies? I gave up on having an answer to that long ago. Earth—my Earth, not Arthur's—would remain a mystery for the rest of my life. A ghost that haunted the edges of my consciousness, a dream I could never fully grasp.
"About a lucky man who made the grade," I continued, struggling to adapt the words to Common Dicathian.
For how much English and Common Dicathian shared an eerie amount of similarities, they remained completely different languages.
Actually, I could draw similarities not only to English and Common Dicathian, but also between the latter and many other Earthen languages: French, Spanish, Romanian, Italian, Portuguese, even Ancient Greek and Latin.
The Asuran language—the source of Common Dicathian, as Avicenna had told me that the language I spoke to him with reminded him of a simplified dialect of Asuran—shared a lot of similarities to other ancient human languages: Sanskrit and tiny bits of Old Chinese.
How did I even know these things? I asked myself. Was it REtrocurrent feeding me useless Insight about Earth? Never precise and deep enough to actually help me, but encompassing all things about Earth I could think about?
What a useless side effect; the only thing useful was that if I focused, I could remember very well many details of the novel. Only that.
"And though the news was rather sad," I continued to sing, the melody carrying me forward. "Well, I just had to laugh."
I wondered from time to time what would happen if I shared this music with the world. On one side, I really wanted to; the world deserved to know about Earthen music too.
But on the other hand, I didn't want to get the credit for it.
Yes, perhaps I could say I discovered that music during my Unravelings, the songs and ballads of the Ancient Mages brought back to life thanks to the Unraveler's Company. It would bring even more prestige to the already prestigious Company, helping in our strange war with the Adventurer's Guild.
But anything regarding the Ancient Mages was a double-edged sword. Not only could I risk the ire of Epheotus, but of Dicathians too. Djinnic lost technology was the base of modern Dicathen, and everything about them was myth, religion almost for some.
Obviously Epheotus saw that no Dicathian ever started to pray to the Ancient Mages: they needed to remain a curiosity, something worthy to study for their technologies, but nothing more so that no other lesser would ever discover something on aether.
That was the Indrath's Dogma.
"I saw the photograph," I kept on singing, the notes flowing from my Almondling and being modified by my magic—my Ars Ariamorph, as sound magic fell under it. "He blew his mind out in a car."
Indrath's Dogma... Vritra's Design...
In the novel, Seris had spoken to Aldir Thyestes about Indrath and Vritra, mocking the Pantheon by asking if they were the only things in the whole world worthy to serve.
Aldir Thyestes had mocked the Scythe back, asking if she was proposing herself as some sort of new queen. The fact was that... the novel had alternatives to the Indrath's Dogma and Vritra's Design: Arthur Leywin and even the Asclepius Clan.
In this timeline I found myself in, the former didn't exist while the latter was a Clan that had lost their Lord and so many more to Agrona Vritra. But Fate remained, and acting following Fate's instructions was its Arbiter—me.
A stupid, naive, weak kid.
"He didn't notice that the lights had changed," I sang, my voice growing softer, more introspective. "A crowd of people stood and stared. They'd seen his face before, nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords."
The music wrapped around me, a cocoon of sound that shut out the world.
"I saw a film today, oh boy... The English army had just won the war. A crowd of people turned away. But I just had to look. Having read the book. I'd love to turn you—"
I suddenly stopped singing, the music fading as a knock on the door broke me from my artistic trance.
"Little prince," Master Kamiel called with his infuriating tone, knocking on the door. "Is this music what I am hearing? Are you practicing to impress your teacher? I am flattered, boy."
It's just Master Kamiel, I sighed in my head, standing up—being extra careful not to step on Berna—and opening the door to my music teacher.
"Hello, Master," I said, and the slacking musician of Sister House Rennoux gave me a playful curtsey, his orange hair waving like the waves of the river itself.
"Corvis, Corvis," Master Kamiel said, clasping his hands together. "Tell me about what you were playing—I have never heard such a melody in all my life."
"So you can play it in front of Alea?" I teased him, and the Rennoux just grinned.
"I would never steal from my pupil," he said with a laugh. "I know how important acknowledgments are for artists."
"...Thanks?" I said, not knowing how to reply. "Perhaps you are not as bad with people as I thought."
"How many flatteries, boy," Master Kamiel said before he turned and wished me goodbye.
I watched him leave, the door clicking shut behind him, and I let out a long, slow breath.
The music still echoed in my mind, a reminder of a world I could never return to.