It took Subaru a few minutes to recover and then he crept over to the twins as if they were a pair of sleeping dragons.
Subaru noticed that Rem was wearing some kind of backpack so he quickly rummaged through it. The horn on her forehead had vanished as mysteriously as it had appeared.
Inside, Subaru found a set of three manacles. Two with short chains connecting them and one that was just two shackles tightly bolted together.
Looks like the twins were at least considering bringing me back alive. Chained hand to foot by the looks of it. Swell.
Actually, these look a lot more comfortable than the ones the guards put on me back in the capitol. How about that?
Although, now that I think about it, these might actually be useful right now.
Ram moaned. Her only real thought as she fought her way back to consciousness was that she had a splitting headache. It felt as though someone had taken a chisel to her forehead and then beaten it deep into her skull with a sledgehammer.
Ram started to sit up but she felt that her hands were secured together by a short length of chain.
This shock quickly brought Ram to full consciousness. She opened her eyes and discovered that her hands were manacled in front of her.
She quickly looked around and saw Subaru sitting a short distance away, rummaging through Rem 's backpack. Rem was lying unconscious a foot away from him, a fact which brought a savage snarl from Ram.
Subaru heard Ram and glanced at her.
"Good morning, Ram," He said calmly. "How are you feeling?"
Subaru glanced up at the sun. "Actually, I guess it would be 'good afternoon.' You two chose a weird time to take a nap."
Ram fought her way to her feet. "What have you done to Sister?!" Ram demanded.
Subaru squinted at her. "I haven't done anything to her!"
Ram scurried over to inspect Rem. At a glance, her sister still looked fine although she was restrained. In Rem 's case, Subaru had locked her hands tightly behind her back as well as manacled her legs.
Ram glowered at him. "How did you capture us?" She hissed.
Subaru snorted. "Me? You two did most of the work! I just led you over the Sanctuary barrier and trusted in the 'feedback effect' to knock you both out."
"You could have seriously hurt Sister, you filthy pig!" Ram seethed. "The effect of crossing the barrier hits much harder depending on how much mana a person has and even more so when someone is using magic at the time. Sister was channeling the power of her horn when she crossed the barrier! Can you even imagine how much pain you put her through?!"
Subaru raised an eyebrow. "Ram, I am quite literally speechless that despite the two of you chasing me over the barrier and trying to kill me, you've still found a way to blame me for the situation that you find yourselves in."
Subaru reached down and slung Rem 's comatose body over his shoulder.
"What are you doing to Sister?!" Ram demanded, seemingly prepared to attack him with her bare teeth.
Subaru stared at her. "I'm carrying her. Unless you'd like to do it yourself with no mana left and those little, twiggy arms of yours," He said pointedly.
Ram snarled at him but didn 't answer. "And now what?" She asked.
"Now, we're going to go talk to Ryuzu," Subaru muttered, walking off without a backward glance, confident that Ram would follow him since she would never abandon her sister.
"And you plan to use us as hostages?" Ram spat.
"No," Subaru admitted. "I just plan to make you two her problem. I need to talk to Ryuzu about something that has nothing to do with you. Then I'm leaving the Sanctuary."
Subaru glanced back at the seething Ram, "Why the hell did you two come after me anyway? I wasn't bugging you."
Ram snorted. "You used Sycorax to distract us while you raided Miss Beatrice's library and destroyed countless priceless tomes," She spat. "Your pet witch led us away from the manor with jokes and tricks! Then, when we had finally penned her down, she summoned the demon to devour Lord Roswaal and Miss Beatrice! "
Subaru flinched. Beatrice …
Subaru took a deep breath. "Emilia didn't summon that thing, Ram!" Subaru snapped. "It's been chasing me ever since I got here!"
"Then please may it catch you quickly before you wreak any more havoc!"
Subaru made a face. "Say, Ram, what was up with that weird horn of Rem's? It glowed and then just disappeared."
Subaru wasn 't sure if Ram would answer but she muttered. "The Oni absorb the bulk of their mana through their horns."
"Oni?!" Subaru exclaimed. I knew the twins weren't human but I never guessed… They have Oni in this world?! Those massive guys from the stories who are always super-jacked and smashing stuff?
Ram gave him a withering look. "What did you think sister and I were?"
"Um. I guess I never thought much about it. I didn't know that Oni really existed."
Ram was silent as they walked.
Subaru assumed that she was finished speaking to him but then she whispered, "Our village was destroyed by the Witch Cult. They murdered every Oni in the village. As far as we know, my sister and I are the last Oni in the entire world."
Subaru swallowed hard. "That sounds… horrible," He said truthfully.
Ram didn 't respond.
"No wonder your sister hates the Witch Cult," Subaru said.
And witches …
"Hm," Ram sniffed. "Does anyone not hate the Witch Cult?"
Subaru mulled that over and nodded. "You've got a point there," He admitted. "Why did the Witch Cult attack your village? Is it because the Oni were a threat to them since they can smell the presence of witches and their pawns?"
Ram grunted. "We don't know," She continued, most reluctantly. "We have no idea why the Witch Cult attacked us. And while Sister can detect the foul scent of a witch that is a very rare gift. No one else in our village possessed it."
Subaru digested that.
"Was that trait important in Oni culture? Were you like… the world's witch hunters or something back in the day?" Subaru asked.
She didn 't answer at first. "The village elder once told us that this skill was the Oni's whole reason for existing but he never explained what that meant. Our elder never knew that Sister possessed this ability. Our parents were adamant that Sister could never tell anyone," Ram sighed.
"How come?"
"I don't know," Ram whispered. "Our parents were unusual for Oni. They… wanted us to live our own lives. Not simply be thralls to the community and its needs. They tried their hardest but…" She trailed off.
Ram took a deep breath. "I can only assume that if the elder knew of Sister's ability they would have demanded that she do something difficult and dangerous. Or demand that something be done to her …" Ram sighed, "To answer your question, the most important trait in Oni society was raw power," She said, returning to the original subject. "Obedience and filial piety were in second place and aggression was third. The Oni were a warrior race. Most other races feared our wrath. In the elder days, we often hired out entire clans to local nobles or warlords as mercenaries to fight in their battles as a means of achieving glory and honor but Witches and Cultists were not common targets."
Ram seemed virtually unaware that she was even speaking. "We lived this way for centuries," Ram continued, her voice somber. "But over time, our numbers shrank. Because of our people's eagerness to seek battle, oftentimes years went by when more of us died than were born. We believe that our village was the last Oni in the world. Although, I've heard rumors of other villages, hidden in the mountains of Gusteko or the jungles of Vollachia."
"Hm," Subaru said. "It's odd how you guys can detect Auth… witches, though. Are your people connected to them?"
Ram gave Subaru a chilling glare. "Every race in this world is connected to the witches in one way or another, " Ram snapped.
Subaru raised an eyebrow but didn 't press further.
Ram took a deep breath. "The elder told us a legend about a witch who basically doomed our whole people," Ram recalled.
Ram has never been willing to talk to me this much. Is she trying to distract me or does she just feel a need to get this sad story off of her chest?
"You mean the Witch of Envy?" He asked.
"No," Ram shook her head, her eyes staring off into the distance as she was caught up in a reverie. "The elder told us that many centuries ago, a witch emerged among our people and the tribes gathered from all around the world to celebrate."
"Celebrate?" Subaru echoed in disbelief.
Ram sighed. "They believed that she would conquer the world in the name of the Oni and lead our people to greatness. They called her the ' Kijin . '"
'The Oni god?' Subaru frowned. More words and concepts from Japan?
"The tribes all gathered under her banner and began to wage war against the other races but it was a complete disaster," She said ominously.
"A disaster?"
"Every time our people attacked a foe, the witch was too lazy to help them finish that foe off," Ram grumbled. "As a result, every war ended with our people being beaten back with great losses. No matter how many chances they gave her, the Kijin refused to help them fight. As a result, there is an old saying among our people: 'Beware of witches bearing gifts. There is always a price unguessed at.'"
Subaru digested that. "Are you… sure that 's the moral of the story?" He asked.
"What do you mean?" Ram grumbled.
Subaru hesitated. "I mean… I don't know anything about this legend you told me but… if I take the story you just told me at face value," Subaru said awkwardly. "It doesn't sound much like the witch tricked your people into fighting and then betrayed them. It sounds more like the witch just didn 't want to fight for the Oni at all. The story makes it seem like the Witch refused to fight in these wars but the Oni refused to accept that and they just kept trying to force her to fight for them."
Ram looked at Subaru with a somber, tired expression. For the first time, there was no condescension or annoyance in it, her gaze suggested she thought that maybe he just might have a point.
"Things are different among the Oni," Ram said in a somber voice. "You are expected to do whatever the community needs you to do. To… be whatever the community needs you to be. If you are greatly talented then the community will pile many burdens and expectations on top of you," She said, her voice growing heavy and dolorous. "Among the Oni, the stated moral of this story wouldn't be challenged or even questioned by the audience. They would simply accept what the elder told them. In the time of the Kijin, our people needed a war goddess and therefore it was expected that the Kijin would become a war goddess for them. Any… personal needs or desires that she had, would not have been considered by our people. Then or now."
"Hm," Subaru mused. "Seems kind of unfair."
"Yes," Ram whispered in answer. "It does."
Subaru cast a sympathetic glance at Ram but Ram 's gaze was far aware, her somber gaze reliving sad times of long ago.
Subaru 's first clue that Rem was awake is when he discovered that someone was biting him.
Fortunately for him, from Rem 's position, she was unable to gain any leverage and had to content herself with sinking her teeth into the back of his shirt rather than into his flesh.
"Rem," Subaru sighed. "Knock it off or I'll make you walk the rest of the way."
Rem snarled something through a mouthful of shirt.
Subaru glanced back at Ram. "I don't know her as well as you do, Ram, but can I safely assume that she just told me to go screw?"
Ram rolled her eyes.
Rem spit out his shirt. "What are you going to do to us?!" She demanded.
"We're going to talk to Ryuzu. After which, she can figure out what to do with you two," Subaru said in a bored voice.
"Get your filthy hands off my posterior, you disgusting savage!" Rem shouted.
Subaru shrugged. "Fine by me," He said, casually dumping Rem on the ground. She landed on her butt and the breath whooshed out of her.
Ram was by her side in an instant, helping her up.
"When I recover my mana, Subaru Natsuki," Rem whispered, her eyes blazing, "I will snap these chains like grass garlands and then I will happily tear you limb from limb."
"Yeah, very interesting," Subaru yawned. "My only question is: Are you coming to see Ryuzu? Believe me, I don't care. I'll be just as happy leaving you out here. So are you coming or not?"
Rem fumed.
Subaru started walking again. He heard the twins following behind, seemingly content to wait until their mana returned and then attack him again.
"Say, Rem, I have a question for you," Subaru muttered.
Rem snorted.
"Why are you so angry with me?"
"Excuse me?!"
"Come on! Puck remembered who Emilia really was and so did Felt! That means that I know you did too! You know that I wasn't lying to you about Emilia. But when you were chasing me earlier, that wasn't just business, it was personal. You were going to smash me into dust and you were going to love every single second of it. So why are you still so angry with me?"
"How can you possibly ask me that?!"
"Because I'm honestly confused!" Subaru shouted back, spinning around to face Rem. "I did nothing to you! I never did anything to earn all this rage and hate from you and frankly, I think that I deserve an explanation!"
"You betrayed us!" Rem cried.
"How?!" Subaru demanded. "How did I betray you? By saying that I wasn't a witch?! I told you the truth as far as I knew it! Roswaal was the one who explained the entire mess to me. You found out less than five minutes after I did! I never lied to you and I never betrayed you."
"Have you already forgotten what your elven slut did to Miss Felt?" Rem hissed.
Subaru sighed. "Rem. That was an accident."
Rem seethed. "There. Right there. That 's what I resent. "
"You resent what? That Emilia isn't perfect and she makes mistakes? Even really serious ones?" Subaru demanded.
"I resent how you don't care about anyone except Emilia!" Rem thundered back. "If Felt had been the one who unlocked powerful magic within herself and nearly killed Emilia, you'd be the first person to demand that she pay for her crimes! You would have kicked her out of the trailer on the spot and made her fend for herself! And that is assuming that you didn't kill her yourself before you even thought it through."
Subaru blinked in surprise. "That is not true! " Subaru protested.
Rem snorted. "Please. Even you don 't sound like you believe what you're saying! Emilia is the only thing in this world that you care about and you'd destroy the entire world just to keep her safe."
"Ah," Subaru growled. "I get it now. I love Emilia and I'd do anything for her. So, you're now imagining some hypothetical situation that might never happen where my love for Emilia makes me evil and you've decided to hold me accountable for all that unspeakable carnage that I caused in your imaginary future. Is that about it?"
"Might cause?! You did cause it!" Rem hissed. "Do you think that we've forgotten about how you were the one who empowered the demon and set it free?!"
Subaru hesitated. "That's not fair, Rem! I could never have guessed that-"
Rem snorted. "Any fool could have told you that chasing after the relics of a witch would lead only to ruin but you didn 't care! You were completely indifferent to how many people would end up suffering for your foolishness as long as Emilia's name was restored!
"Nothing else mattered to you! Felt and poor Garfiel crossed an entire continent to help you and even got themselves enslaved in the process. Foolish me, I actually imagined that even you would have dropped everything to free those people who had already sacrificed so much to help you. But, of course, you couldn't be bothered! You just told them to suck it up while you focused on reaching the island to help your precious Emilia!"
Subaru felt his face flush. "You're twisting everything around! I made sure that they 'd be safe until I got back!" Subaru argued. "I made sure they were both assigned to me so they wouldn't be forced to work or be abused while we were gone and I got them a comfortable room at the inn and I left them plenty of money to take care of themselves until I got back!"
"Oh! So you mean that it never even crossed your mind that Tolian Sonas might be untrustworthy and seize them as hostages?" Rem sneered.
Subaru hesitated for a split second. "What was I supposed to do?! There was no more room in the balloon! They couldn't just hide out in the waste because of the Iotuns and other mabeasts! And even if we could have sneaked them out of the city, they would never have agreed to leave with Otto- "
"Did you even try to persuade them to go with Otto and Ryuzu?" Rem asked witheringly. "Or were you so fixated on getting your hands on that accursed Book that nothing else was allowed to matter?"
Subaru flushed. "I didn't try to persuade them to leave because I knew that they wouldn't go," Subaru said uncomfortably. "And I did try to buy their freedom before I left but Sonas refused to negotiate. "
"Why not leave them some protection after you left?" Rem asked insinuatingly. "Why not leave the elf behind? She could have easily defended them if Sonas got any ideas."
Subaru froze for a split second.
"Oh, I forgot. You would never permit her to be in any danger," Rem snickered. "Felt and Garf would have to take their chances in the city while you were gone but you'd never allow Emilia to experience any risk for their benefit!"
"Emilia would have never agreed to stay behind," Subaru snapped. "Believe me, I was constantly trying to talk her into hanging back on this trip but she insisted on jumping into every dangerous situation we encountered!"
"You're a fool, Subaru Natsuki! And you don't even understand your wife at all!"
"Watch it, Rem!" Subaru grated, getting right up in the girl's face.
Rem looked unimpressed. "Emilia told us all about she agreed to stay behind when you entered the Doorway, " Rem taunted. "Why in the world would she do such a thing? Because she understood that doing so was the smartest move and kept everyone out of danger! You could have simply explained to her that Garfiel and Felt would be in great danger without anyone there to protect them and she would have listened.
"She argues with you because the only reason that you ever ask her to stay behind is so that she doesn't experience any risk. That's the entire reason that she fights with you about it. She knows that you think of her as a little girl who still needs to be protected and she resents it! You could have left her behind in the city easily! All you needed to do was explain that she would be more useful protecting Felt and Garfiel and she would have stayed behind. She would have even agreed with you! The problem is that this solution never even occurred to you because you'd never be able to stand her being out of your sight for that long! After all, if she got away from you, who knows? She might actually start learning and growing and we both know that back then, she was so hopelessly obsessed with you that any direction that she could possibly grow in is a direction away from you!"
"Rem!" Subaru shouted. "Emilia is not obsessed with me!"
"Not anymore! Emilia told Miss Felt all about how angry and frustrated you got every time she argued with you!" Rem kept shouting, her eyes flaming. "You hate being questioned or challenged. Especially by her! How dare she have her own thoughts and opinions? Doesn't she realize that her entire identity needs to be wrapped up around Subaru Natsuki?!"
"Rem! Shut up!" Subaru snapped, close enough to Rem to kiss her.
"You're a monster, Subaru Natsuki," Rem hissed, showing not the slightest fear. "The only thing that matters to you is that elf! And don't even try to tell me that you 'love' her! You just want to control her! She's a mirror that you can hold up to your face and see how wonderful you are. God help that poor girl if she ever tries to take a single solitary step away from you!"
"Can we possibly stop this?" Ram asked in a bored voice.
Subaru froze. Ram 's voice cut through the haze of his rage. He realized in shock that his hands were halfway to reaching for Rem's throat.
Subaru turned toward Ram. Despite her calm voice, her eyes bored into Subaru reproachfully and her face was twisted into a snarl. "If you need to talk to Ryuzu then let's hurry up and speak to her. Then at least we can be finally be shut of you," Ram muttered in the same apathetic voice.
Subaru realized that Ram had carefully calculated how to snap him out of his rage.
Subaru looked back at Rem. Her eyes were filled with tears, of rage or sorrow, Subaru couldn 't tell. Her face was a mask of deep bitterness and hurt.
Subaru took a deep breath.
"Let's hurry up and find Ryuzu," Subaru sighed. "Then, you two are her problem."
The twins followed Subaru as he eschewed the village and made for the far side of the valley.
When I first came to the Sanctuary, Ryuzu warned me to stay away from this area because it was dangerous. I didn 't think much about it at the time but now that I know Echidna had a hidden sanctum in the Sanctuary, it makes sense that this would be where it is.
Subaru was completely unsurprised that Ryuzu met him before he even reached the area where he 'd reasoned out that the sanctum must be.
They must keep a close eye on this area.
"Subaru Natuski," The tiny elf whispered. Ryuzu looked just like Subaru remembered, wearing a long black robe whose high collar came up over her mouth. In her hand was a blue crystal staff much taller than she was.
Subaru squinted at her. "Alpha?"
She didn 't respond at once. "My name is Ryuzu Meyer," She said firmly.
Subaru glanced at the twins and then shrugged. "Fine. Whatever."
"What are you doing here?" She asked apathetically.
Subaru sighed. "So long story short, I entered the doorway on your Lady's island and I got sent ten years into the future. To now."
Ryuzu raised an eyebrow.
"The doorway was supposed to send me to someplace I could still find or reassemble the Book. I know that four of you found pages of the Book in the island's rubble. And according to Beatrice, the Book is only four pages long."
"That seems doubtful," Ryuzu said.
Subaru shrugged. "Well, that's what Beatrice told me. If I can get all the pages together, I'm hoping that I can go back in time and stop this nightmare from ever happening."
Ram sniffed. "Even for you, Subaru Natsuki, this theory is insane," She muttered.
Subaru ignored her. "Please, Ryuzu, I know that you probably hate me but if there's any chance that we can stop all this suffering from happening, I think we need to try. "
Ryuzu stared back at him. "You wish to have the page then?"
Subaru nodded.
Ryuzu mulled it over and then seemed to shrug. "Then you may have it," She said finally. "It is not doing us any good. But what do you plan to do with them?" She asked, pointing at the twins.
Subaru sighed. "Well, I tied them up because they attacked me. I was sort of hoping that I could persuade you to take them in. I don't think that they really have anywhere else to go."
He stepped closer to Ryuzu and lowered his voice, "I heard that Roswaal encountered Sycorax yesterday."
Ryuzu stared at Subaru for a long time and then nodded.
"I will find a place for them," Ryuzu turned and walked away. "You may follow me. There is no real point in concealing our Lady's secrets any longer."
"Thanks, Alpha," Subaru said.
Ryuzu paused her stride and looked back at Subaru, her gaze icy. "My name is 'Delta,'" She said in a cold voice. "Not that it matters. Now, I am the only one of my thinking sisters left alive…"
Subaru started. "Where's Otto?" He asked. "And what happened to the others?"
She didn 't answer at once. "As time passed, more and more of my sisters burned out from the power surging through the Great Machine. We never found Gamma again. Finally, Alpha and Beta both went offline.
"In desperation, my Otto attempted to reprogram the great machine," She said without turning around. "However, due to your failure to recover the information that we needed, we lacked the skills and experience to do so safely. Otto tried and tried again. Each time he failed, the machine burned him horribly but he refused to give up. By pure trial and error, he finally stabilized the machine."
"And… Otto?" Subaru asked with a catch in his voice.
"He sacrificed himself so that I might live," She said in a dead voice as they approached the cliffs that enclosed the valley.
Delta raised her staff and touched the stone wall in a certain place.
A large section of the cliff opened up, revealing a brightly lit passage inside.
It wasn 't a rough-cut tunnel, the passage was clean and polished and brightly lit.
Delta led them inside and, after a short walk, they entered a vast underground chasm full of enormous machines and devices of strange design.
These machines were very different than anything that Subaru had seen before. Rather than relying on gears and cogs, the machines seemed to be based on power flowing from one type of pyroxene crystal to another, linked by strange tiles carved with mystical symbols that Subaru assumed drew and directed the power from the crystals.
It 's like… some kind of magical circuit board, Subaru thought in wonder.
Some of the non-thinking Ryuzus stood on a catwalk overhead, tinkering with the machines.
Delta snapped her fingers and the Ryuzus all looked at her, expressionless and unblinking.
"Go fetch a wagon and harness a dragon to it," She ordered. "Subaru will be leaving very shortly and I do not want Sycorax to find him while he's still here."
Two of the Ryuzus scurried off to do as they were told.
Delta led them out of the enormous room and into a vast library with hundreds of bookshelves that reached the ceiling.
"This is Echidna's last library?" Subaru asked.
"It is now that you've destroyed Miss Beatrice's library," Rem snapped. "The poor spirit was left in tears by the curse that you inflicted on her books!"
Delta turned and looked at them sharply. "Curse?" Delta asked in a worried voice.
"Miss Beatrice told us that any book Subaru touches gets turned into illegible gibberish," Rem replied. "He destroyed several of Echidna's priceless tomes!"
Delta glowered at Subaru.
He swallowed hard.
"If the entire world were not already on the verge of being destroyed, I would murder you myself," Delta snarled. "But I suppose that it no longer matters."
"Why not do it just for fun then?" Ram grumbled.
Delta reached for a small box on a table in the middle of the library. She opened the box and handed Subaru a page. This page 's white space formed a pair of fat lines like an equal sign.
Subaru nodded. "Thank you, Ryuzu," He said.
"Will you be leaving now?" Delta asked pointedly.
"Soon," Subaru sighed. "Delta, do you have any idea how I could get back to my own time if I find the last page? Beako started reading a book on 'temporal mechanics,'" Subaru said, saying the unfamiliar words slowly, "But the book got corrupted by my touch. Somehow."
Delta stared at Subaru for a long moment and then sighed. "I believe that we have a book on the matter. I will read it. You will not touch anything! " She snapped at Subaru.
Subaru put up his hands in surrender.
Delta wandered off and began to search the shelves.
"Are you ever going to let us out of these chains?" Rem demanded petulantly.
"I might have. If you hadn't already assured me that your first move when you got out would be to kill me," Subaru said.
"My strength will return in a day or two at most," Rem whispered. "And then it will be my hands around your neck. I doubt that anyone still living would care to defend you."
Subaru sighed and didn 't answer. He scanned the library and noticed a mirror hanging on the library wall.
Subaru looked at himself.
I look rough. Three days in a jail cell didn 't do anything good for me.
Delta returned with a large book with a midnight blue binding. She sat down facing Subaru and opened the book. "I will read to you the appropriate passages," She said. " You stay still and don 't touch anything. I don't want to risk your curse spreading through the library."
Delta cleared her throat and began reading. "It is taken as given that the Heart of the Storm is the fundamental nature of all reality. The Storm being omnipresent and a fundamental underpinning of three-dimensional space, it is trivial to prove that by utilizing the power of Chaos, there are infinite paths connecting any two points in normal space. It is also trivial to prove that the shortest distance between two points is always zero since these two points are actually contiguous in some parallel realm, accessible through the Storm."
Rem and Ram looked confused by this dense recitation and the pair moved to read over Delta 's shoulder.
Subaru was also struggling to follow what Ryuzu was saying. He happened to glance at the mirror and realized he could see the reflection of the book in Delta 's hands.
The words were all mixed up gibberish just like in Beatrice 's library.
Subaru 's eyes widened.
Huh?! This weird ass curse doesn 't just affect the books that I touch, I only have to look at them?!
Subaru winced and waited for Delta to start screaming at him.
"The natural curvature of space-time establishes that by utilizing 'frame-dragging,' any journey through space is in fact a journey through time," Ryuzu continued. "Thus, it is entirely possible, under optimal conditions, to take a long journey through normal space and return to your starting point before you left," Delta continued reading.
Subaru blinked and stared again at the book 's reflection in the mirror.
The book is gibberish! What the hell is she reading?!
"Chaos magic trivializes many of these factors since stepping through the Heart of the Storm equates to an infinite distance traveled when performed under an arbitrary degree of frame-dragging. This-"
Subaru frowned, no longer listening. Her eyes aren 't even moving. What is going on here?"
Subaru 's eyes widened. "No way…" He whispered.
The trio looked at him. "Are you following this so far, Subaru?" Delta asked impatiently.
Subaru took a deep breath. It 's absolutely impossible. It's crazy. But then again…
Subaru turned around so that he was looking away from Delta and the book. "Delta, do me a favor," Subaru said slowly. "Read me the first line on that page again."
Delta blinked. "What?"
"Read me the first line on that page," Subaru repeated.
Subaru heard Delta grumble something and then continue reading, "The natural curvature of space-time establishes that-"
"No," Subaru interrupted. "Read me the letters. One by one."
"Why?!" Delta demanded.
"Just do it!" Subaru barked.
There was a long pause and then cries of dismay rang out from that side of the room.
"Problem?" Subaru asked with growing excitement.
"Subaru!" Delta cried out. "You cursed this book! It's nothing but gibberish now!"
"I did not!" Subaru declared. "Look at me! I didn't touch it. I'm not even looking at it. And you all could read it easily until I actually made you focus on the mechanics of reading it!"
Subaru turned around. "Grab another book. Any book."
Delta looked warningly at Subaru as she reached over and pulled a random book off the shelf. She opened it and her eyes filled with relief. "This book is normal."
"What does it say?" Subaru asked.
Delta gave Subaru a suspicious look but then she read, "The Imperium's descent into the structure now referred to colloquially as 'the Old Kingdom' was a gradual process that began more than five thousand years ago-"
"Now," Subaru interrupted. "Read me the letters."
The trio said nothing, their faces twisted in disbelief.
Subaru 's face was grim. " I 'm not what 's doing this."
"What are you saying?" Delta asked sounding frantic. "Am… I cursed?!"
"There is no curse!" Subaru snorted.
He started pacing around the room. "This is ridiculous. It's crazy. But it's the only possible solution. I can't believe that I didn't think of it sooner."
"What are you talking about?" Ram demanded, her normally scathing voice sounding unsettled.
Subaru glanced at her. "Think about it! Nothing in this world makes any sense! How do you all even know who Emilia is again? The curse got broken when Sycorax broke free and destroyed the Book?! That makes no sense! All of the books in this world are filled with gibberish but nobody notices until you do something to point it out! The wide open spaces between different places in this world have disappeared. All of the 'boring areas' in between two different locations have just up and vanished. Hell, how can I even understand any of you?! I 've lost the Authority! I shouldn't be able to understand a word that you say! I've been here for almost five days and all I 've had to eat is two bowls of thin gruel. I should be starving by now but I 'm not hungry at all!"
"What are you saying?" Delta asked.
Subaru took a deep breath. " None of this is real. This is all a dream. "