Academy’s Weapon Replicator

Odyssea (34)

Following Quinée’s words, Frondier opened the book.

The book was very thin, and the content was nothing special. It was almost exactly as Frondier had expected.

‘The Viet family, all except Quinée de Viet, were slaughtered. At that time, Quinée was 6 years old.’

Both Frondier and Quinée already knew this story.

It was Frondier who stiffened at the sight of this sentence. He unconsciously worried about Quinée and turned his gaze toward her, but her expression was calm.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Do you really think that seeing something like this now would make me feel gloomy?”

“……It could be.”

“Right. Actually, I am a bit gloomy.”

Quinée said that and chuckled.

Frondier felt relieved by her honest response.

Quinie said.

“But it’s okay. It’s all in the past now. It’s been so long. We’re not confirming sadness, are we?”

“That’s right.”

Prondier nodded and looked back at the book.

‘The culprit of the incident is the wolf.’

However, the sentence ended strangely.

“Wolf?”

As Prondier muttered that, the sentence changed.

‘The culprit is Kora.’

“Huh?”

And then it changed again.

‘The culprit was a wolf. A number of wolves residing in the back mountain of the mansion—’

The sentence that was progressing well changed once more.

‘Considering the circumstances at the time of the incident, it is highly likely that the crime was committed by a single individual. The most probable suspect is the beastman Kora.’

“……”

Now Prondier remained silent, not saying anything.

Then it changed again,

‘The culprit is unknown.’

In the end, it changed to a sentence with no information and was no longer revised.

“What is this?”

Prondier asked, looking at Quinie.

Quinie scratched her cheek, seemingly troubled.

“Um… It seems to be evidence of my confused memory…”

Evidence of confused memory.

Prondier pondered the meaning for a moment, then widened his eyes slightly and looked at Quinie.

“Do you remember that the culprit of the incident at that time was Kora?”

“Ah, no. I remembered, but I don’t remember everything.”

Quinie shook her head.

“That, you remember, right? You once stopped Kora while looking like Mr. Amper?”

“……Ah, yes.”

This is an incident involving Armel.

Armel, who intentionally provoked Kora within the Constellation. And Frondir stood before Kora in the guise of Amper, using a mask to subdue her.

It was the appearance of Amper when he was young.

“At that time, the way you confronted Kora overlapped with the past, so that memory came back to life.”

“……Indeed, I was pretending to be Amper back then.”

It was not merely about appearances.

To replicate the magnitude of Amper’s power, Frondir had used Excalibur to channel all his mana, frightening Kora.

He certainly resembled Amper, and it was not surprising that memories of Quinier surfaced.

“But that’s all I remember. I recall the part where Kora and Mr. Amper confronted each other and Kora was subdued. However, I can’t seem to connect it to what happened before.”

“……In other words, you still think the culprit who killed someone that day is the wolf.”

“Yeah. The part where Mr. Amper appeared is disconnected.”

Frondir nodded at those words, lost in thought.

‘I’ve heard that the brain stores memories as simply as possible. If the context doesn’t match, it adjusts the sequence in its own way. So what’s going on here?’

If Kora and Amper confronting each other came to mind, then naturally, the earlier part should also be recognized as Kora’s behavior, and proper memories should surface.

However, Quinier was not doing that.

‘……Something is missing. But for now, more than that.’

Frondir sighed as he thought that far.

“You should have told me that your memory came back sooner. You could have told me.”

“……I did.”

“You said that? To me?”

“Yeah. I was asleep, though.”

Frondir’s eyes narrowed.

“Then that doesn’t count as saying it.”

“It does count. Not hearing it is your fault.”

What the.

Quinier turned away, leaving Frondir in disbelief.

She muttered something, but Frondir couldn’t hear it.

Quinier looked back at Frondir and said,

“Anyway, is that all there is to the book?”

“No, that’s not all, but…….”

Prondier looked back at the book and furrowed his brows in confusion.

“…From the back, the content is all jumbled. Words and sentences keep changing, entire paragraphs disappear and reappear, and there are quite a few parts that I can’t make out at all.”

“It’s exactly like my mind right now.”

Quinie tilted her head.

“If it’s like this, isn’t it impossible to find memories in my dream from the start? If the content of the book only records my consciousness. We have to extract it from the unconscious.”

That’s true.

Right now, all we’ve done is review the information we already know and confirm that we still don’t know what we don’t know.

We didn’t come into the dream to see this.

“Senior, is there no other book that contains Cora’s records?”

“Probably not. If my sorting criteria are correct, this is the only book.”

Prondier looked at the book again.

“Sure, the content from this page onward is a mess, but it’s not completely unreadable. Even though the words and sentences keep changing, it’s not written in an alien language.”

If this chaos is showing Quinie’s past, then the constantly changing words and sentences must have some meaning.

Prondier placed his hand over the book.

“Senior, let me ask you one last thing.”

“What?”

“Do you really want to regain your memories?”

“Yes. Why do you keep asking something so obvious?”

Quinie answered immediately. Prondier looked at her for a moment.

As many thoughts passed through Prondier’s eyes, Quinie tilted her head.

Prondier chuckled and said,

“Then, since we’re already in the dream, shall we play a little prank?”

“A prank?”

“Have you ever had a lucid dream, Senior?”

At those words, Quinie tilted her head.

“No, I haven’t. I know what it is, though.”

A lucid dream.

It’s when you become aware that you’re dreaming while still in the dream. Once in this state, you can control the dream to some extent. This isn’t particularly special; even without a lucid dream, people can somewhat control their dreams to their liking.

“Right now, our situation is a complete lucid dream, isn’t it?”

“Well, yes.”

“Then you will handle this, senior.”

“Handle it? How?”

“Reenacting the incident from that time.”

At Frondier’s words, Quinée’s eyes widened.

“…You mean reenacting that incident?”

“Yes. There must be something we missed. Or perhaps there’s something we’re mistaken about.”

Quinée found it hard to respond to Frondier’s words.

She had thought about regaining her memories, but recalling that scene directly and facing it again with her own eyes was another matter.

“Will you do it?”

Knowing that, Frondier asked again.

Quinée hesitated for a moment but then nodded.

“…I’ll try.”

“It’s quite a story from the past. It will be difficult to recreate it perfectly. Let’s take it slow.”

Quinée nodded and closed her eyes.

When Lethe possessed Quinée, she treated this space as her own.

So, it was only natural that Quinée, the true owner of the dream, could do the same.

Whoosh—

Before long, a change occurred in the space.

The bookshelves sank down. In an instant, the ground became a flat expanse with nothing on it, and the ceiling began to crack. The library that should have been above vanished, and a white void filled the space above.

Soon, only Frondier and Quinée remained in this space. Aside from the two of them, there was only the pure white space and the ground they stood on.

“This is harder than I thought.”

“You’re doing well.”

Frondier spoke calmly, but in reality, he was quite surprised.

Even if one could control their own dreams, handling it this perfectly was difficult. It’s harder than one might think to control one’s own thoughts. It’s natural to think about what you’re told not to think about and to be unable to think of what you’re supposed to think.

In that sense, Quinée had already succeeded in eliminating the unnecessary within the dream, and one could say she had already achieved half of her goal.

So, it was the remaining half.

“…!”

In the next moment.

Darkness enveloped the surroundings, and what appeared was a wolf.

Then, the background of the mansion filled in, with figures made only of silhouettes.

‘……The first to appear was the wolf.’

For Quinie, the image of the wolf was so strongly imprinted from that incident.

Humans were depicted as silhouettes. Whether the memories were hazy or being avoided, she couldn’t tell.

But now, the problem was different.

“……Senpai.”

“Yeah?”

“It feels like the wolves are watching us.”

As Frondier said, the background and silhouettes here were like a still frame. It felt like only the fragment Quinie remembered was cut out and laid bare.

However, the wolves, with their fiery, predatory gazes, were slowly moving. Moreover, they were clearly exuding hostility directed at Frondier and Quinie, not just other human silhouettes.

“We’re just trying to find the gaps in the past, so there’s no need for the wolves to be like that,”

When Frondier said this and turned to Quinie,

“……Oh no.”

Quinie had become six years old. She had been so heavily influenced by the dream that she had regressed even her own age.

And if one were to think about that statement in reverse, it meant,

‘I have also become four years old,’

Grrr─!

Immediately after realizing that, the wolves lunged at them. Frondier leaped to evade the attack and, while floating in the air, looked at her soft hands.

‘This is even younger than when it was Elodie!’

Frondier landed and shouted at Quinie.

“Senpai! Let’s go back to the beginning! This is dangerous!”

“Y-Yeah! That’s……!”

The six-year-old Quinie squeezed her eyes shut, trying to control the dream.

As soon as Frondier saw that, she instinctively realized.

Ah, this is bad.

Whoosh!

Frondier unleashed her black thread to subdue the wolves. The wolves struggled to escape, entangled in the black thread.

‘My black thread is struggling to hold the wolves!’

It was a weakening of power that had also occurred during the Elodie incident.

Still, she was managing to keep them bound. Just as she was about to devise a plan in this state,

“Uh, what’s happening?”

As Quinie opened her eyes,

Kraang!

A wolf broke through the darkness and lunged at Quinie.

─Black spear.

Thud!

The wolf was pierced in mid-air and fell.

“Close your eyes, senpai! Your strength is weakening!”

“Ah! Okay!”

As soon as Quinie saw it, the darkness was severed.

This isn’t so much that Quinie doesn’t trust Frondir’s power, but rather that Quinie’s basic common sense kicked in.

‘A 4-year-old child is holding several wolves at bay… That fact alone doesn’t make sense to Quinie.’

It’s true that Quinie holds Frondir in high regard, and according to that assessment, Frondir’s power shouldn’t be that weak.

But right now, Frondir is 4 years old.

And Quinie knows what a 4-year-old Frondir looks like.

‘…Oh. This is quite something.’

Frondir was enveloped in a strange emotion and smiled.

A feeling almost akin to curiosity tickled her insides.

‘I can still be in danger too.’

Having all sorts of powers and standing in a position of a god.

At an unexpected moment and place, cold sweat trickled down.

In this familiar situation, faced many times before, it now sparked calmness and excitement.

Ha, that’s why Frondir laughed.

“Trash game.”