“Elle…I…I…” Aela’s voice shakes. Fear-filled eyes stare at me.
Sweet and kind Aela doesn’t know what to do. She’s torn over whether she should rip out my heart and offer it up to save countless lives in return.
“What is there to hesitate over, Aela? You know what the correct answer is. You will choose a hundred lives over one, and a thousand lives over a hundred. For you are the saint. The holy heroine. Lylish raised you to make the right choice.”
Crystalline teardrops spill from Aela’s wavering eyes, and she hangs her head. But only for a moment, before she looks up at me. Determination blazes from her.
“E-Elle! I-I…I’m sorry! I…I…! I want to save everyone…!” she cries between sobs.
I know. I understand, Aela.
Aela wants to exchange my heart for everyone to come back to life. But I am not a part of that “everyone.” I am the offering for the revival spell she is about to use.
Spells don’t work on the “offering.” After all, magic activates in exchange for said offering.
I smile at Aela, who is suffering over having to make this decision.
“It’s okay. I want the same thing. Just giving up my heart will bring them all—” I say, bringing my right hand up to pierce it into the left side of my chest. But then someone grabs my wrist…or at least it felt that way.
But no one is holding my wrist. It’s just my imagination. I chalk it up to simply that.
Though I tell myself that, for some reason, I’ve lost the impulse to rip out my own heart.
Am I unwilling to let go of life? Am I afraid to sacrifice my heart for others?
No. That’s not it.
I can feel my heartbeat.
…Julius tried to tell me something in his final moments.
“Please don’t miss the true nature of your power.”
Those were his final words. I rely on what he said to recall what happened back in Laurent’s old village. I pull on the memory of the moment Julius noticed my special ability.
I used an amplification spell that increased the amount of mist and healing magic to extend the effects of the healing elixir I had received from the DemiOracle to the entire village.
When he saw me increase the DemiOracle’s healing magic contained within the elixir, Julius said I could become a perpetual magic generator.
Because I can increase magical power with magical power.
If my infinite supply of magic is due to the nature of my magical power, then…Julius’s theory is fundamentally different from Clark and the Demon Lord’s.
Magic is produced with our blood. The heart processes that blood. Therefore, the heart is the source of magic.
Therefore, the Demon Lord thinks that my heart is capable of producing an endless supply of magic.
The Demon Lord assumes that if my heart is sacrificed, Aela will obtain infinite magical power and become capable of bringing back the dead.
That Demon Lord, who drew a room of extraordinary magic circles, interpreted my power in such a way.
But what if his interpretation was wrong?
My heart isn’t producing an infinite supply of magic. My power is the ability to increase and amplify the magic around me. I mean, Julius said that from the start.
The person I believe in, who I think is the greatest in the whole wide world and is the strongest man to live, isn’t some stupid dead demon lord.
I, the grand sorceress mayor of Elle Village, view only one person as the greatest and strongest in the world, and it is him I’d be happy to appoint as assistant mayor—and that’s Julius.
And the Julius I believe in said my power is the ability to amplify magic.
In that case, if that really is the case…then…I…!
I slowly rise.
Clark, who has been suspiciously watching us, scrutinizes me.
“Clark, I will show you just what you want to see: the powers of Elle Village’s most glorious mayor, Elle!” I proclaim in a loud and clear voice.
“Elle?” Aela calls, staring at me in a daze.
“Aela, use your magic.”
“But…my power alone…isn’t enough to bring back the deceased…!”
“It’s okay. Believe in me! After all, I am the youngest and prettiest girl to become one of Analia’s Four Grand Magi, and the founder of the great and awesome Elle Village! I am the absolute ruler of Elle Village, served by the Four Grand Magi: Jasper the Trembler, Iron Wall Laurent, Legendary Chef Meide, and Too Cute Canna. I am also the strategist in the midst of the genius plot to install Old Gray Regulus and Big Boobs Sereniel as two key members of the Eight Divine Generals! And…and…” I stop to take a breath and Julius fills my thoughts.
“And I am Grand Sorceress Elle, who will absolutely, positively, assuredly, definitely bring back Julius…bring back the person I love and everyone we lost!” I declare, looking Aela straight in the eyes.
She has stopped crying and is staring at me wide-eyed. She looks kinda shell-shocked. But it doesn’t take long before she speaks.
“That’s right. You want to save them just as bad as I do. I will put my trust in you, Elle! Because we are the same. We are just two normal girls who want to save the people they love no matter what!” Aela says with a smile and a big nod.
She closes her eyes and puts her hands together in prayer.
Then a greenish magic aura appears around her.
This is it. This is the magic.
I recognize the cue and draw a magic circle in the sand at my feet. It’s a spell to summon a gentle breeze.
May this breeze carry Aela’s spell far, far away until it gently encompasses every lost soul caught up in the magic circle’s blast.
And then I release the magic inside.