Chapter 39

We conquered more worlds. With practice and as the weight of many Isekai gradually lightened, I became proficient at controlling my own mind, thanks to Truck-kun’s lessons. I’ve crushed a dragon between two mountains. What other level 80 mage can say the same?

We had nearly completed the Isekai in which I had two years of memories in a happy, warm house. I had conquered a forgotten floating island in the sky in defiance of gods, man, and demons.

“The next world is the one where you two trapped me in a child’s body. The one with the little cottage café. Making that world was your work, right kiti kyatto?”

Nyarin grew tense when Truck-kun talked to her, like how a wandering cat might get ready to jump away if you walk down the same street.

I had once asked Nyarin why he called her “kiti kyatto” in English. She had just shaken her head and refused to talk about it more.

“So how do we complete this next world’s tasks?” Truck-kun asked.

Some part of me wondered if I could have enjoyed living forever in one of these Isekai. I liked being a level 80 wizard in real practice.

“That’s not as simple as crushing dragons and conquering an old kingdom,” Nyarin said, looking out over the edge of the island kingdom. From here you could see a mountain range that included a dragon squished between two collapsed mountains. Boy, that had been fun.

Nyarin put her hand up in frustration. “You’ve said we need to complete these Isekai. It’s not enough to have Seo grow bored. We have to conquer and complete them to make them go away, then we escape. That works for worlds like this, but how does one conquer a happy little life running a café?”

“Crush it between two mountains?” Truck-kun asked.

Nyarin turned one ear toward Truck-kun while ignoring his sarcastic comment. “It’s going to take time, Seo,” she said to me. “I’ve worked with these kinds of Isekai. If a customer does grow satisfied and fulfills the purpose of the Isekai story, it often takes years.”

I looked at Truck-kun. He wanted to get out of here as fast as possible.

He sighed. “It’ll take the time it takes. Perhaps if I work my magic I can speed up time, make a few years in the Isekai just an hour or so in the real world.”

Nyarin winced at that and I couldn’t help but notice.

I looked between Nyarin and Truck-kun. “Is that somehow bad? Will pushing the spell to make time travel quickly on the inside dangerous?”

“Not dangerous, just uncomfortable,” Nyarin said, tail switching left and right nervously.

“I can manage. Truck-kun let’s go. You said this world should be fulfilled and disappear if I sit on the throne?”

Truck-kun nodded and I left the two of them to the fantastic view while I climbed the tower to the throne. A number of steps later I found Nyarin walking beside me, but in the way that cats do that doesn’t imply they are trying to be near you.

“Are you okay, Nyarin?”

She didn’t answer.

As I climbed the tower I pulled out the perfectly white, perfectly circular stone. Where I touched it there was a fine yellow fire.

She pulled away from it, ears cowering back. It had been weeks of adventuring, yet neither of us had found a chance to talk about what had happened in the garden. I looked at her and the fire blossomed in purple.

She clasped her hands behind her back. She looked small and vulnerable. “This is just a shell, this body. If this looks beautiful to you then…”

I lit the red fire of True Vision, and I could see the Bakeneko spirit inside her. I could see the true Nyarin. If the catgirl form she took looked a little anxious, the Bakeneko inside was absolutely terrified. But as I saw the real her, the purple flame jumped up ten fold.

“I know you, Nyarin.”

Again she didn’t answer. She tried that trick again where a cat stays near a person but tries to make it seem like it’s only a coincidence they’re always near you. Her ears swiveled away. She looked at the ground.

We climbed in silence until I stood before the throne, a fated king about to retake a kingdom after a war that had reshaped the lowly world that floated below. And after all of that, I wanted the little café in the mountains more than all of the kingdoms in any world.

I’m not a smart man, and even worse than me being dumb, I’m also a man. And like men, it sometimes takes me a while to figure things out.

“You’re worried,” I said to Nyarin. The only other sound in the throne room was of distant howling winds this high up, so my whisper sounded out loud. “You’re worried that I’ll fall in love with you if we spend years building a happy life.”

She might have moved her chin up and down as an answer, or she might have just been looking along the walls. She looked so delicate in that moment, as if the wrong words might break her.

“You’re even more worried that you’ll fall in love too.”

“Seo, we can’t. I’m not, you don’t know…” she said, finally looking at me. But she didn’t know what to say after that. Her eyes landed on the burning white stone and she lost all of her words. Her eyes grew wide as she let herself look at the stone. They were elated, terrified eyes.

“Don’t worry, Nyarin, I can’t fall in love with you in the next world.”

Her mouth fell open.

“I’m already in love with you now.”

She took a step back as I sat down on the throne and the world dissolved away.