The Sorcerer's Handbook

White Queen gradually faded until only Black Witch remained on the bed. She spread her arms and lay back, closing her swollen eyes. She forced the sob rising in her throat back down, replacing it with a different kind of trembling. ”Heh... Hehehe... Hahaha... Hahahahaha!

”She agreed. She agreed! But what does it matter? She can’t protect anything. None of us can! Nothing will change. The princess atop the tower is destined to fall. Tonight... tonight everything changes.”

By the end, Black Witch could no longer suppress the laughter writhing from the depths of her soul. Her whole body shook with uncontrollable mirth. She even slammed her hand against the mattress. Tears streamed from her tightly shut eyes, mixing with mocking drool at the corners of her lips. Several times she laughed until she could barely breathe, yet she pushed on until her strength gave out and she collapsed into a limp heap. She looked like a madwoman.

The palace quietly dissolved. When she opened her eyes again, she was back in the initial zone.

The Witch stood over her, looking down with genuine interest. ”It’s not often I see you this happy. Care to share what’s so amusing?”

”Nothing amusing.”

”I see. Then hurry back,” the Witch said. ”This brief and pleasant game is coming to an end.”

Snap!

A hand clamped around the Witch’s ankle.

The Witch turned around, only to see the girl in the black dress still lying on the ground. Yet, her hand had reached out to seize the Witch’s foot. When the girl lifted her head, the Witch saw a gaze that felt both familiar and entirely foreign.

Her eyes were pitch-black, clear, and bright. There was no ”blood-ink” spreading, no madness, and no murkiness.

A trace of disbelief entered the Witch’s voice. ”Black? You’re... awake?”

Black said nothing. She simply met the Witch’s gaze. This was what the sisters hated most. The fact that even without words, a single look could convey everything. She expressed her stance only in the humble, unyielding way she gripped the Witch’s ankle.

However, the Witch did not look at her. Instead, she shifted her gaze elsewhere.

It was the evening rush hour. White Witch had also finished her work. Dressed in a pure white ceremonial gown she had not worn in ages, she lay weakly on the ground, looking as frail and light as a fallen snowflake.

”Do all of you bleed yourselves dry like this?” the Witch asked. ”If so, it seems I’m the only restrained one here.”

Hearing her voice, the girl in white opened her eyes as well. She struggled to crawl to the Witch’s side and grabbed her other ankle. She, too, said nothing. She only gazed at the Witch, her pure eyes welling with tears of silent pleading.

”Black is awake, and White is back too?”

The Witch crouched down, her face full of confusion as she looked at them, like a child discovering that missing toys had suddenly reappeared on her desk. Soon, realization dawned. She clapped her hands. ”I see! No wonder the Watcher was so generous this time. He even allowed us to interfere so deeply with reality.

”He couldn’t have failed to predict how chaotic we would be. Given his cautious style, we shouldn’t have been qualified for this task at all. I thought he simply wanted to use our numbers, that with Ashe gaining the Incarnation of Secrets, he intended to strike from both ends and turn him into an utterly irredeemable scumbag. But now it seems his target was never the Gospel. It was us. Or rather, you two.

”He predicted how the dream would affect you, so he deliberately let us out. You two are his results. Two out of eighteen odds... and he actually won that bet.”

The Witch marveled at the Watcher’s calculations, then looked down at the sisters on the ground. ”However... he also lost.”

”Even if you’re willing to sacrifice yourselves,” the Witch said, enunciating each word, ”that doesn’t mean I’ll allow it.

”I’m not like the Swordswoman. She can watch Sonya live a better life without interfering. But when I see Lysdia gain the happiness I never had, it makes me sick, so sick I could vomit. I tried to like her, I really did. After all, she is who I used to be. But when I see Ashe treat her so well, when I see her glide through every hardship with ease, when I see her smiling... all I feel is rage and jealousy. It’s as if countless voices are interrogating me.

”Why her? Why not me? Why does she get to avoid suffering while I have to endure everything? What did she do to deserve it all? How terrible must I be to deserve nothing?”

The Witch tilted her head, staring down at the two of them. ”Come to think of it, those voices... are they my thoughts, or your whispers?

”I wish she would experience my fate twice over. I want her destroyed, tortured, and twisted into something uglier and more wretched than I ever was.”

A cruel malice filled the Witch’s beautiful face. ”Only then might I feel even a trace of comfort. I can’t even bring myself to harm her fast enough. Why would I ever help her?”

Boiling malice seeped through their skin, scalding Black and White. Yet they knew what they touched was only the froth rising to the surface. Beneath it lay a bottomless abyss, a pitch-black sea filled with a vast, murky despair that could never evaporate. And this... was only what remained after seventeen sisters had shared the burden. Because the Witch bore the greatest portion of that despair, she held the greatest authority, even if she had never wanted it.

”Then... I’m sorry.”

The Witch and Black both froze. They turned to White, searching for any sign that she was joking.

White tried to suppress the sob in her voice but failed completely. ”Even if it’s late... far too late... I’m sorry.”

Her words broke again and again under choking breaths. ”So... I hope I can at least—”

”You think after all this time, I would still care about a belated apology?” The Witch stood up. ”Actually, you’re right. I do care.”

Smack!

She lashed out with a kick, striking White in the abdomen and sending her flying more than ten meters. The surrounding white mist scattered at once, clearing a long path for her tumbling body.

Then the Witch bent down and yanked Black up by her collar. ”And you? Do you have anything to say to me?”

Black replied calmly. ”No. I have never wronged you.”

The Witch let out a cold laugh. ”You’ve got some nerve. But why? Forget White. Black, you’re not the self-sacrificing type. I thought you were like me, someone who couldn’t stand to see others thrive.”

She glanced at White, who was struggling to rise in the distance. ”No matter how much you give, the one you protect isn’t your Queen. Your past won’t change in the slightest. Your suffering won’t lessen at all. In the end, making up for regrets is nothing more than self-consolation. It’s self-deception. As if fixing the past could erase the suffering that came before... as if it never existed.”

The Witch gazed into Black’s eyes, speaking in a voice that was soft, enchanting, and irresistibly alluring, ”Black, be good. Go back to sleep. You’ve already escaped from reality. Don’t come back.”

Black shook her head. ”But I’m already dreaming.”

A sincere smile curved her lips. ”So this time, don’t wake me up. Let me drown in this dream... alright?”

The Witch paused, then released her grip, letting Black slide back to the ground. The girl in black wrapped her arms around the Witch’s waist, clinging like a child to its mother, or a younger sister seeking comfort from her elder.

”Well played... Watcher.”