The old man’s body looked completely shriveled, like a sun?dried raisin, pale and lifeless on the bed. I couldn’t stay a second longer there. I stumbled out, dropped to my knees by the door, and stared blankly at the wall, my mind consumed with anger and self-hatred. This was exactly what I had feared, and it had come true. I had finally killed the old man.

  The servant followed after me, talking fast, but all I heard was a loud ringing in my head. Her words never reached me. The world felt distant and muffled. Then something poked my shoulder, and I snapped back, nearly jumping out of my skin.

  “Lord—”

  “Huh, what?!”

  “Sorry… I wanted to ask if you were okay.”

  “I-I don’t know,” I said, my voice shaky and rough. “The old man… is he alive?” I already knew he wasn't. But some stupid part of my brain clung to maybe and asked anyway.

  “Yes, he is.” She said, taking a shaky breath. “But he is unconscious, and his life is still in danger.”

  That eased my chest, if only a little. It was far from good news, but as long as he was alive, there was still hope. I gathered what little courage and dignity I had left, stood up, and went back inside.

  The general must have woken up from the noise. He opened his eyes and, the moment he saw me, tried to sit up. But pain hit him instantly, and he fell back onto the bed. Even like that, he was still trying to show respect. I didn't deserve even a bit of it. I couldn't even meet his eyes. I just stared at the floor, head down, shoulders heavy with shame.

  “My lord… cough… you have returned.”

  “Ah, y-yeah, but please, don’t push yourself. You should rest.”

  “It’s… fine...”

  “Y-yeah.”

  “Your power is beyond… expectations… cough.”

  “Please,” I said, waving my hands, “just sleep and rest. We can talk tomorrow. I… I should go rest too,” I muttered, already walking toward the door.

  I couldn’t stand that scene anymore. My eyes were already wet, a heavy sadness crushing my chest and turning each breath into a struggle. I walked down the corridor, barely aware of my steps. I didn’t even notice when I arrived or when I stepped inside.

  My mind was empty and my body felt heavy as I lay on the edge of the bed. My leg ached, but my heart hurt more. I tried to sleep, but I just stared at the ceiling. Every time my eyes slipped shut, I saw the dog I had killed, then the old man. I jolted awake each time. Sleep never came.

  Hours dragged by without me noticing. Just as I was about to drift off, my eyelids growing heavy and sleep finally winning, a hard hit came out of nowhere and smashed right into my face. I rolled off the bed I was barely hanging onto and hit the floor.

  

  When I turned to see what hit me, I realized Midori was sleeping in the same bed. I hadn’t even noticed she’d been there all night. She must have tried to change position and slapped me by accident. Her hand was still hanging off the edge of the bed.

  I saw the sun was already up, and sleep had completely gone. I got up and left the room. Everyone else in the mansion was still asleep. I wandered aimlessly, lost in my thoughts, and somehow ended up in front of the library on the lower floor. Honestly, it was way too generous to call it a library. It barely had five or ten books here and there, one table, and a few chairs around it.

  Trying to distract myself, I grabbed every book I could find from the nearly empty shelves and piled them on the table. I had no idea what I was doing or if it would help at all. I acted on instinct, flipping through one book, then another, only to go back when I realized I understood nothing.

  Then the door opened, and Midori came in with a tray of food. She set it on the table in front of me, pulled out a chair, and sat down. That’s when I realized it was almost noon. Time had just flown. I was barely halfway through the third book, rereading the same line over and over, and still understanding nothing.

  “They said you skipped breakfast,” Midori said, sliding the tray closer and shoving my books aside. “And judging by that stupid face of yours, you skipped sleep too.”

  “I’m not hungry,” I muttered. I didn’t even have the courage to lift my head.

  “What’s that? Planning to dry up and shrivel like the old—”

  I spun around and grabbed her arm. I held it so tight she almost tipped out of her chair, barely keeping her balance. She stared at me, shocked.

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  “That’s not funny!” I roared.

  “Okay, okay,” she said, grabbing my hand. “Let go, you’re hurting me.”

  I let go of her arm and turned back to the table, guilt written all over my face, head hanging low. I couldn’t take out my own stupidity on her, so I tried to calm myself and push the anger down.

  “Look,” Midori said softly. “I know you feel bad about the old man, maybe even guilty. And, I won’t lie. When I saw him this morning, he was like taking his last few breaths…”

  I jerked my head up, eyes wide with panic. I was terrified that she was about to say the one thing I never wanted to hear, not for the next hundred years.

  “But it’s not completely hopeless,” Midori said. After a long pause, she added, “It’s bad, yes. But there’s still a chance to bring him back, maybe even better than before. Even if that chance is almost impossible.”

  Almost impossible or completely impossible meant nothing to me. If there was a way, I would find it and bring the old man back. And if he died like this because of my mistake, I would never forgive myself.

  “So,” I looked at Midori. The darkness in my eyes faded, replaced by a faint hope. “How? What way?”

  “Calm down, I’ll tell you,” she said, sliding the food tray closer to me. “But first, you eat. If you don’t, I’m not saying a word.”

  “O-okay,” I said and started eating fast. My mouth was full, I was almost choking, and I mumbled, “Now… tell me.”

  “Idiot,” Midori smiled. “Normally, even the highest healers would tell you to start planning the funeral for someone like him. The old man's source is so empty he can’t even pull in the tiniest bit of mana around him.”

  “That’s… not the same you were earlier?”

  “Worse, much worse. Not even close.”

  The bite in my throat hit like a brick. I choked, gasping for air, barely managing to swallow. It wouldn’t go down. It wouldn’t come back up. My breath stopped.

  “Relax. I said there is a way.” Midori kept smacking my back hard.

  I coughed, wheezed, hacked, and somehow survived the meal.

  “But first,” she said once she made sure I finally survived the life threatening moment, “you need to know what went wrong, so it never happens again.”

  She paused, hesitated briefly, then continued. “After we left yesterday morning, the fire didn’t die down, it just kept spreading. The general threw himself over the old man like a shield, his entire body burned. But it was already too late. I was late too. By the time we teleported, the old man had already dried up where he lay…”

  So that was it. The nightmare I was too scared to ask the servant or the general about last night, the one I half expected, had come true, and in the worst way possible. I hadn’t just lost control of my mana. Even after I was gone, it kept causing problems. I buried my face in my hands.

  “You know, it was an accident—”

  “No, not this time. This was all my stupidity!” I barked. “I got so caught up in the duel, so desperate not to lose to you, that I drained more mana than I could control. I even forgot, just for a moment, that the old man and the general were living beings.” I smacked my forehead, exasperated.

  “Alright,” she said. “Half accident, half your stupidity. And fine, a bit of mine too. But that changes nothing at the moment. I didn’t tell you this so you could beat yourself up. I told you so it never happens again.”

  “Of course it won't,” I said at once. “Never again. I will never use this on other people. This, this isn’t power. This is a curse. A bad one…”

  “I don’t think that's a solution,” Midori said. “But if it's what you want, then do it. You already learned how to use the loose mana drifting around you. So focus on that for now. At least until you get better with the other one.”

  She let out a deep sigh, looking at how wrecked I was. After a short silence, “Fine. Listen now,” she said, putting a hand on my shoulder. “First, we fix the old man. I want this half-dead man in front of me to turn back into the same stupid, lively geezer again.”

  “...But how?” I muttered, rubbing my temples.

  “There’s a plant,” Midori said. “An SSS-tier one, the very top of the list… a healing plant, or rather, a miracle.”

  “What kind?” I asked, frowning. “And this SSS thing… the goddess mentioned it too. I think I get the idea, but what does it actually mean in this world?”

  “Super Super Special,” she explained. “It’s a term for things that are insanely rare. This plant only grows at the very tops of the highest mountains, and it takes decades to bloom… So yes, it's kind of impossible to find one.”

  “Can’t we just, I don’t know, grab one from some herbal shop or something? I know you said it’s so rare, and it’s probably a lot expensive…”

  “Expensive, you say? It's worth a fortune! Sell just one, and you could probably start your own little kingdom. And don’t even think about finding it in a shop, anyone who actually has one wouldn’t dream of selling it. They’d keep it for themselves.”

  “...Why?”

  “Because it’s not just a healing plant. It’s basically a youth elixir. Whoever eats it gets ten or twenty years younger. It’s like swallowing a whole condensed mana source in one bite.”

  Now I understood why it was so rare and so absurdly valuable. Whatever this thing was, it was nothing less than a fountain of youth. Of course finding it was almost impossible. But if this was the only path left to me, I would cling to it with everything I had.

  “I get it,” I said. “Well, does this thing have a name, a shape? And where can we find it, even roughly?”

  “Edelweiss. Also called the ‘Flower of Eternity.’ Its exact location is a mystery, but it’s been spotted on the peaks of mana-rich mountains. It needs an enormous amount of mana to bloom, they say, making it a concentrated mana reservoir in itself.”

  “And can I ask… why do you know so much about this, in such a weirdly specific way?”

  “Oh… because,” Midori said, glancing away, a little embarrassed, “I once ate one by mistake. I got fifteen, maybe twenty years younger, and then felt compelled to find out why.”

  “…Huh?” I couldn’t hide my shock. “You did what?!”

  “I was hungry, it was tasty…”

  “Well, anyway,” I said, trying to refocus. “That mana-heavy mountain you mentioned… could it be the one that drove out the demons and hosts that boss level monster? The general said it’s full of mana, right?”

  “Yes,” she said calmly, far too calmly. “I knew you’d ask. Even if the one I found wasn’t on that mountain, the chances of it being there are still high. That’s why I already told them to prepare two boars and a week’s worth of supplies. The old man doesn’t have more than a week, anyway.”

  “A week? Can we even get there in that time?”

  “We ride the boars,” she said. “When I gather enough mana, we teleport to the foot of the mountain. I have already been there before.”

  “So we’re really going there…” I whispered, heart hammering, a mix of excitement and dread twisting in my chest. Finally, the time had come.