36: Into the Mirror

“I—I can’t stop! It’s dragging me into the mirror!!”

An unfamiliar weightlessness, different from the buoyancy of water,
took hold of Rena’s body as the mirror’s tremendous pull seized her.

Her entire body felt like it was being torn apart,
yet the golden axe tightly gripped in her right hand refused to budge, as if resisting the force itself.

“My arm… it’s going to rip off!
But I can’t let go of this axe!!”

Rena’s form began to appear on the other side—
on the shore of the pond, where Mr. Fishing Rod and the imposing man stood.

The man’s right palm was wide open, and just as before, a large mirror appeared.
From its shimmering surface, Rena’s left hand slowly emerged, flinging droplets into the air.

The man frowned slightly at the incomplete emergence and muttered to the mirror.

“She’s resisting…
It’s as if she’s hiding or protecting something.
Hmm… so she’s holding a secret, is she?”

Rena realized that the mirror linked the pond and the land—that it was a boundary between spaces.
And her right hand, holding the golden axe, was still refusing to pass through to the other side.

“You’ve finally come out.
Now then, girl…
Answer me this.
What is that object in your right hand that still refuses to leave the mirror?”

Dragged halfway out, Rena clenched her eyes shut in pain.
Fragments of the earlier conversation beneath the water came back to her.
She instinctively knew she must not reveal the truth about the golden axe.
Peeking at the man’s fearsome face through half-lidded eyes, she replied.

“I… I don’t know anything!!”

The moment their eyes met, she was hit with a massive force—
like being in a car that suddenly slammed on the brakes—
and she tumbled forward, flung completely out of the mirror.

When she opened her eyes, the golden axe was gone.
Still dripping wet, she sat up and frantically looked around.

“So… what you were holding wasn’t some hidden secret after all—just an ordinary axe.
Hmph. Not a bad punchline.”

At his feet lay not the gleaming golden weapon, but a worn and ordinary axe.

Mr. Fishing Rod rushed over to her, visibly relieved as he saw her move.
Rena looked up, stunned for a moment—
but the moment their eyes met, her emotions surged.

“You… You really are Mr. Fishing Rod!”

But the man immediately averted his gaze and turned to face the dominant figure again, shielding Rena behind him.

“Lord Dan! That axe she held—
That’s the one I’ve been looking for… my grandfather’s axe!
She must have found it for me!”

Rena flinched as she looked up at the man called Dan.

His sleeked-back hair gleamed with unnatural polish,
his cold and unreadable expression froze her in place,
and his muscular build, draped in an elegant black suit, radiated both power and menace.

Dan picked up the worn axe with a look of disinterest, then commanded—

“Drenched clothes will interfere with the performance.
Girl. Stand up and try this.”

The old axe landed in front of Rena with a heavy thud.

And in the blink of an eye, as if by magic, her soaked hair and cold, heavy uniform were now completely dry.