Touch My Brother and You Die - Chapter 182

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

That’s right. Back then, I connected the accident and drained all my luck, turning myself into an unfortunate wretch who might die young. It’s my fault. But how am I supposed to grant the wishes of a dead person?
“It’s quite a frivolous condition. Are you really fine with that? As you said, I do harbor affection for Rosalite, so I want to respect your wishes as much as possible… but…”
“You’ll understand once I demonstrate the magic. I haven’t fully comprehended it myself yet.”
Is this another one of those cases where you know the answer first and the solution follows? When I asked that, Rosalite nodded without much enthusiasm and urged me to hurry up and cast the magic already.
Pressured by Rosalite’s insistence, I became completely flustered and quickly attempted to make contact with Tick-Tock. In response to my call, that older brother’s presence materialized beside me in the form of a melting clock.
The form changes every time I summon him, but this time it’s quite… metaphysical, I suppose… It’s rather unsettling.
“Ah, this is Tick-Tock, the one I mentioned earlier.”
“What are you talking about?”
What? Why is Rosalite looking at me like I’m insane?
I earnestly tried to explain Tick-Tock standing beside me, but it seemed Rosalite couldn’t see him. In my long life, this is the first time I’ve tried to show Tick-Tock to another person… Could it be that he’s an existence invisible to everyone else?
I was genuinely shocked.
“Anyway, I’ve received consent and the contract is ready, so the magic…”
Since it was a large-scale spell, it required the same level of concentration and mana as when I destroyed the Homeland Island in the distant past. I focused my mind and tried to establish the temporal reference point through dialogue with Tick-Tock, but…
I was refused.
“Wait. If I grant your condition, a contradiction will arise. Your existence is essential to fulfill Asterion’s wish. The magic requires everything from Rosalite. If you disappear, Asterion’s wish cannot be granted. You would cease to exist across all timelines.”
“Then couldn’t I simply summon a soul infinitely close to Rosalite and fill the gap? Leon is foolish enough not to notice.”
Ah. So that method exists. It’s true—whether it’s superhuman intelligence or something else, the child is clever.
When I asked about the possibility of bringing something nearly identical to Rosalite, even if not perfectly so, Tick-Tock answered that within observable ranges, he could search and retrieve it.
However, he said a criterion would be needed as a condition for the search.
“Here.”
“Ack!”
Just as I was about to relay Tick-Tock’s answer, Rosalite had already understood and grasped everything in the meantime, throwing the book she’d been holding at me. Truly, my Rosalite has grown into a remarkably kind adult.
“So that’s why you wanted to bring the book.”
“What is this? Asterion of the Blue Starry Night?”
“This year’s bestseller. It’s the third work by the author who wrote ‘The Pirate of the Blue Ribbon’ and ‘Preparacerion and Lauramerizia Between the Blue Galaxy.’ I pretended not to know about the first work modeled after Edward Rocksburg and the romantic drama modeled after Rosalite and Theodore, but in the third work, the author didn’t even bother with pretense and used my younger brother’s name directly, then was executed. Since I held the position of nanny to Theodore’s household, there was significant backlash from the Royal Family.”
I’m not entirely sure, but that author seemed to be quite the devoted fan of Rocksburg. Somehow… that person called Eddie seemed to have an incredibly dedicated fanbase.
“There aren’t many people in this world who would cry and beg to adopt someone after seeing the Luke Chatel section. It will make excellent search material.”
I see. So Rosalite cried upon reading this book. I’m oddly curious to see it.
“Why are you standing there dazed! Hurry with the magic!”
“Yes! Yes, right away! My apologies!”
As Rosalite tapped the table repeatedly, I hastily summoned Tick-Tock again. Let’s see. If I spread the book’s contents through the memories of people in observable ranges, using this as bait, I could lure up a Rosalite-like soul…
Then this is the only method. Fine, let’s go with this. I also don’t want Rosalite to completely disappear from the world. She’s a child I’ve raised for ten years, after all. If she vanishes entirely, even I will shed tears. It wouldn’t be good for Maria’s emotional state either.
“Then I’ll begin now, so please don’t disturb my concentration…”
Huh? What is this?
“!”
Before I could even fully deploy the magic, mana drained out in massive quantities. Half my mana was stripped away during the search phase for Rosalite’s substitute—it was an incomprehensible phenomenon.
“Cough, what… what is this…!”
Blood surged from my mouth. At this rate, I would have to release the magic that had been sustaining my body at its peak condition. I couldn’t allow that. If I did, I would die instantly. That was something I absolutely could not do.
“I see… I understand.”
What are you so calmly understanding now?!
There was no other choice. I had to drain my life force to its limit and quickly rewind time.
“Your mana loss is surely being squandered because you’re searching for and drawing in something that isn’t this planet’s soul. Didn’t you say it yourself? The being you contracted with is from another world or an alien realm. If that’s the case, observation should be possible up to that other world. It doesn’t have to be this planet specifically.”
Rosalite was slowly disappearing as the price of the contract. The Unknown Woman was transforming into chains to serve as fuel for restoring the planet’s memories. Yet Rosalite neither raged nor despaired.
Instead, she laughed. She was amused, mocking me as though savoring my predicament.
“When my successor comes to understand everything, you will be finished. Until then, I will obstruct you again and again.”
What are you saying, you monster! Die quickly! Disappear!
Let me see… the trigger for restoring memories should be around the time Asterion dies, which coincides nicely with when Maria grows tired of playing tag with me. I’ll set it for then! The starting point! When should I begin? Ah, forget it—let’s just say five years ago! Rosalite wasn’t around then, and things were fun with Maria!
I barely managed to insert the contract, which had taken the form of The Sword, into the chains and rewound the planet’s memories. The hastily established contract might have had flaws, but I could repair those when The Sword appeared again next time.
Because Rosalite had left such an ominous statement, I visited the Rocksburg Mansion in secret dread, but nothing unusual occurred, and I was able to maintain The Sword properly.
As a precaution, I backed up and made Asterion’s memories recoverable, and I carefully prevented Rosalite from making contact with The Sword. If Asterion died before The Sword appeared and the planet’s memories were restored, Rosalite’s successor would have no way to meet The Sword. That contract was unnecessarily kind, so it might even reveal clues to solving the problem.
The reason I went to such lengths was simply because what Rosalite said before disappearing terrified me. But without knowing the full context and without even contacting The Sword, how could Rosalite possibly finish me off?
And most reassuring of all was this—Rosalite surely couldn’t have foreseen this. The successor who was summoned seemed to be rather lacking in intelligence.
Kind-hearted Tick-Tock had tried to link languages so the successor wouldn’t find life here inconvenient… but apparently the successor hadn’t learned a single foreign language to the level of the original Rosalite, and said there was no knowledge to link Largol and Cerepia languages.
Phew, how fortunate that the successor is incompetent. I nearly died, but things should go smoothly from now on. Once the original battery runs out, I’ll just manipulate the successor into becoming the battery too.
Regardless of what lay beneath, the appearance was still Rosalite, so I continued to feel affection, and she was adequately qualified as a sacrifice.
Thus I would spend eternity with Maria. I was a happy person.

◇ ◆ ◇

That’s what I thought back then. It was already decades ago. So much time has passed that I don’t remember exactly. I don’t even know my own age precisely, so what’s the point in counting the years? Only the present matters.
I headed toward Rocksburg with unease. I’d sensed the fuel was running low, but I never expected The Sword to call out so soon. I’d set up a signal to alert me when the battery reached its limit, and Tick-Tock had been acting increasingly unhinged lately.
This would probably be the last time. I’d thought that once Asterion was provoked, the planet’s memories would naturally restore themselves, but it seemed something had gone wrong.
Until now, whenever people recalled the past, they would kill themselves or die. But why is this time different?
Even after decades, Rosalite’s final words still haunted my mind. Terrifying. That superhuman prescience, that ability bordering on infinite foresight—it was too frightening.
Hadn’t one of Rosalite’s predictions already come true? She said I would personally confess about rewinding time or the original Rosalite’s death. And in a moment of heated emotion, I ended up telling Maria everything.
The premonition was ominous, but given the situation, I had no choice but to go to the Rocksburg Mansion and kill Asterion with my own hands, then drain the battery completely to restore the planet’s memories. It would be far easier to manipulate the successor in a completely blank state without any knowledge. Right now, they were difficult to handle.
That’s because… residual traces from when I’d linked my thoughts with Asterion remained, allowing me to occasionally eavesdrop on what was happening in the mansion. The successor was far more cunning than expected. No matter how unintelligent they were, they possessed a soul most similar to that original Rosalite.
I hurried as fast as I could, but it still took time. After all, aside from using memory manipulation black magic, I was just an ordinary human. I didn’t possess the crude power to erase people like Maria and Serena did.
Of course, I could use manipulation magic to make people fight each other or create subordinates to exercise physical force… but I myself was just human, so the best I could manage was the speed of a vehicle.
In any case, upon arriving at the mansion, I headed straight for where the contract was embedded. First, I wanted to check the exact remaining battery level…
“…”
“…”
“…?”
For some reason, a giant Rabbit and a person carrying a load of food were staring directly at me. That’s strange. I’d kept my presence faint just like when I used to sneak into the mansion before. With the magic that made people ignore my existence, most people shouldn’t even notice I was here.
The ability to see through this magic would require either someone born with an exceptional mana-sensing talent that appears once in a millennium, or a Demon born and raised near the Masujung Mine where mana density is high enough to suffocate.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————