From there, Katia's words continued.
The ritual of peeling away, one by one, everything he carried on his shoulders went on.
"You might feel guilty about abandoning this fight halfway through… but honestly, there's no need to feel that way."
This time, it was about one of his reasons for continuing the fight—about this country, and the battle for its future.
She spoke thus:
"Because, honestly… you can't bring yourself to fight for this country's nobles, can you?"
"!"
With words that struck, without exaggeration, at the very core of things.
"Right now, Lucius is out there trying to restrain the nobles and the people from the Church, but… it's awful. Most of them aren't the slightest bit worried about the Pope who suddenly vanished—the very first thing out of their mouths is whether their own interests will be protected.
Even I'm thoroughly fed up with it. You, of all people, would feel even more so."
It was a fact, and so he could only fall silent.
Just as Katia said, he had never really had anything you could call a strong sense of noble duty. "For the future of the country" was never a reason he could fight for.
"And… about the magic you were pursuing, the magic you were trying to create. If you've become uncertain about it, you don't have to force yourself to keep going. It's fine to stop. You know better than anyone that it's not the kind of thing that will come together if you just push through it."
"…"
She continued, peeling layer after layer away.
One after another, gently, she removed them.
"Even if you stop here, none of us would blame you. If anything, we've been placing far too much of the burden on you alone all this time. We need to have the resolve to carry on by ourselves from here—and honestly, all of us are prepared to do exactly that."
His reasons for moving forward. His reasons for trying hard.
His reasons for someone else's sake… and perhaps, his reasons for his own sake too.
Everything he had been made to bear, unwinding it all, one piece at a time.
"Of course we wouldn't abandon you just because you can't fight. We'd welcome you as our greatest contributor, and swear to protect you with everything we have from here on. We absolutely won't let you be hurt again."
And so—
Everything had been stripped away from him, leaving him completely new.
Without a single lingering attachment, just as when he had returned to the Royal Capital... but now, with all his experiences and memories carefully accumulated.
"You really don't need to push yourself any harder. You've worked so, so hard all this time. You've more than earned the right to rest now."
Into such a heart—empty, having set everything down.
Katya asked.
"...So. You're going to quit?"
"------No."
"
Then
,
that's your reason.
"
"...What?"
Ermes let out a stunned voice.
Not because she didn't understand what Katya had said.
...Because it resonated so terribly, so terribly well.
As if to prove it, Katya continued.
"Hey, Er. You must have lost whatever you'd been clinging to until now, and not known how to stand back up. That's why you were searching for a 'reason' to stand up again—something to replace it, something worthy of doing so."
There, she paused for a moment.
Cleanly, with a single breath.
"Something like that doesn't exist. Not in some fairy tale where everything falls conveniently into place."
"…Ah."
As Ermes seemed on the verge of noticing something, Katya continued in a quiet voice.
"Er. Back when I was lost about the path I should take as a noble... and when you guided me from there... the truth is, I couldn't agree with everything you said."
Once, when Katya had faced the problem of unintentionally hurting someone dear in her search for how she should exist as a noble...
In the end, she recovered thanks to Ermes's words... but even so, her own problem hadn't been perfectly resolved, not like some kind of magic.
Still, she moved forward.
Because.
"No matter how many times I agonized over it after that, no matter how deep the conflict...
There was only one thing I could never do—I could never nod my head to the question, 'So, are you going to quit?' That is why I am standing here now."
After explaining that reason, she paused once more.
"…You're probably the same, aren't you?"
"…"
For so long, she had been searching for a reason.
Perhaps a confession of love. Or a cry from the heart. A desperate wish.
Something dramatic and romantic, something anyone would think "If that happened, it's no wonder their heart changed"—a reason as wonderful as something out of a fairy tale.
…But.
There was no such thing — no.
Not for them, at least. That sort of thing... if you must say it,
the kind of reason
that could be
given to you
by someone
shouldn't have been enough to help them recover.
And so Nina, Sarah, and Albert. And Katia, too.
First, they thoroughly dismantled the "reason for another person" that had taken root in Ermes — the nail that had, until now, kept him anchored in place.
Striving for someone's wish, and striving to save someone.
Striving to repay a debt, and striving to fulfill an obligation.
They stripped it all away, tearing off every layer of reason that had formed the shell around him.
His reason to try. His reason to continue.
His very driving principle — every reason he had to keep pursuing magic — they removed it all.
They brought him to a place where stopping would have been perfectly acceptable, where he could let go, turn his back on it all, and no one would fault him for it — and they made sure he recognized that clearly.
Even though he should have been able to stop. Even though there wasn't a single reason left to continue.
And yet, for some reason—
Even though he didn't know why, he still... couldn't give up.
"It's not because I found a reason to keep going."
——
Stopping in One's Tracks
Because
he couldn't find
a reason
to stop, / he still walks.
"Because you've always been that kind of person. That's precisely why you've made it this far. If you can recognize that, I believe you'll be able to move forward again — more strongly than anyone else."
"That's... a terribly cruel thing to say."
Indeed, if he could do that, it would make him the strongest.
But at the same time, it came with incomprehensible difficulty.
After all, nothing he carried had been resolved.
The magic he had believed in — the magic he should believe in from now on — remained opaque.
Without knowing where he should go from here, he still had to plunge once more into the vast world of magic.
But... that was probably what he should do.
Because everyone was the same. Where to go, what path to follow — no one truly knew, and yet they all kept struggling forward with everything they had.
"...It'll be okay."
As if reading the anxiety in Ermes' heart.
Katia leaned forward and took Ermes' hand. With an expression of desperate resolve — as though she would finally say what she had always wanted to say — she turned to him.
"I promise you.
This time, I will never abandon you. If you're wavering like before, I'll do everything I can to help you. If it gets painful, I'll be there to support you. So..."
Those were her words of reckoning — her answer to the regrets of the past.
It was a declaration of vow — that she would never make the wrong choice again.
"......"
Ermes thought.
His doubts had not yet cleared, and the road ahead remained unclear.
What should he aim for? Where should he go? How was he supposed to face those who proclaimed their twisted virtue with pride?
He had not found a clear answer — not yet.
But... even so.
If he could bundle all of that together — bear the suffering, carry the weight — and still clench his teeth and push forward...
(...No, I don't want to.)
The words that rose from the very depths of his soul, stripped of every excuse and rationale.
If he could live by those words... he was sure it would be something truly wonderful.
On top of that, this straight, wonderful girl he had known since childhood —
If she would stay by his side from now on... then he felt he would be all right.
If all of these conditions were met...
Then there was simply no reason left to stop his feet.
"...I'm sorry for the trouble I caused you."
As words to mark a turning point, they were enough.
For this girl he had known since childhood, that alone was more than sufficient to convey that he had regained his footing.
Taking her hand, he climbed down from the bed and stood, surveying the current situation.
The adults he had relied on until now had all turned against him. What remained was a crowd of dissatisfied citizens and nobles, his own magic that he had built up until now, and the mages he had encountered along the way.
That's enough.
Starting over from here. Pushing forward, confronting them once more, and finding the answer.
Or, in more common parlance... "I'll do it until I've had my fill." His resolve was ready.
"Shall we go?" she said. "Yes," he replied, taking her hand.
As if returning to childhood, she led him — who had shut himself away — back out into the world.
The fight to reclaim everything he had lost was about to begin once more.
Ermes has made his comeback.
And with that, the first half of Chapter Three is officially complete! Even the author is shocked that it's still only the first half.
I don't think the second half will be nearly as long as the first, so...!
Sorry for the increasingly erratic update schedule recently! I'll do my best to keep it stable going forward... .
Starting next time, we move into the third episode of Chapter Three — the Rebuilding Arc.
How will the remnants of the Third Princess's faction rally and unite the various powers that have effectively collapsed? And what will the organization attempt to do amid the chaos?
The royal figure who suffered so terribly this time might have their moment to shine next, or perhaps the royal figure who has yet to receive the spotlight may make a reappearance?
The third episode is set to accelerate full-throttle toward the Kingdom's "endgame" — I'd be thrilled if you continue to look forward to what lies ahead... !
Thank you for your continued support of "The Reincarnator of Creation Magic"!