High above the deep blue sea, ten thousand meters in the air, a black figure cut across the sky, sending waves through the clouds.
"Eta really is amazing."
Protecting the item in his hand with magic power, Cid could not help sighing in admiration as he recalled what he had just seen at Eta's place.
Eta was the smartest person Cid had met in this life. That was evident not only in how she could casually pick up all sorts of things from the nonsense he spouted, but also in how she understood the world itself.
Are magic and technology the same thing?
If asked that question, ninety nine percent of the people in the world would probably say no. Magic was magic, and technology was technology. That was not wrong, because they really were two different things.
But Eta was different.
She would say they were the same.
Whether it was magic or technology, both were simply manifestations and applications of knowledge. And when the two were combined, that became magitech.
That was right. Eta viewed the magitech devices currently on the market as a fusion of magic and technology, not just simple magical creations.
She believed that as long as development moved in the right direction, different paths would ultimately lead to the same destination. There might be many differences while they were developing, but there would definitely also be many similarities.
And reality had already proven Eta right.
After the worlds merged, she directly used that theory to legally plagiarize quite a lot of technology from other worlds...
It was honestly ridiculous.
According to Eta, she would first memorize the technology from another world, then analyze the principles behind it, then recreate those same principles using magical techniques, and finally simplify them and write magical circuits into the device. Just like that, a magical machine with the same effect but a lower price would be born.
The same principle worked in reverse too. Technology could be converted into magic, and magic could be converted into technology. If both sides already had corresponding techniques, then she would simply take half from each. The first half would use electronic circuits, and the second half would use magical circuits.
With that whole process, it could take as little as a day or two, or at most three or four days, to complete the conversion of a piece of technology.
It was shameless.
And very profitable.
Because this was not just overtaking someone on a curve. This was dragging the other side into her field of expertise, then crushing them with her greater experience.
Thanks to Eta's methods, the countries of World No.3, which was theoretically the weakest world in both technology and magic, meaning the world where he and the Seven Shadows were born, had seen their magitech improve at an astonishing rate.
Of course, the price for that was that the Mitsugoshi Company got absurdly rich in one shot and became a giant on equal footing with entire nations.
God knew what kind of expression he had when he first read Eta's report about all that.
After thinking it over again and again, he had ultimately only replied to her with a single sentence.
"Not bad."
The reason he had only said "not bad" was because the method was just too underhanded. Openly plagiarizing like that, was she really not afraid of getting beaten up?
Still, shameless as it was, it also proved Eta's talent.
As Eta's childhood friend, Cid was genuinely happy for her.
And that also proved just how valuable the medicine Eta had given him really was.
"Woohoo!"
The moment that thought crossed his mind, Cid could not help shouting in excitement. The medicine bottle in his hand was tossed into the air along with his mood.
When he told Eta earlier that if the medicine did not work, he would solve it personally, he had not been lying.
It was just that by "personally solve it," he did not mean researching medicine to deal with his current state himself. What he meant was killing himself directly, then using the seven day resurrection method recorded in the Library to revive and reset his body's condition.
After all, if someone as smart as Eta could not discover what was wrong with his body, then with his own knowledge, he probably would not be able to figure it out either. Killing himself and reviving would simply be faster.
"I'm in an unbelievably good mood right now!"
He shouted that aloud while mentally calculating how fast the bottle he had just thrown upward should be falling.
By his estimate, it ought to have reached the spot right in front of him by now.
So he stretched out his right hand and made a grasping motion.
"This is really so easy... huh?"
When he felt that his hand had caught absolutely nothing, Cid froze.
For a moment, he even suspected he was hallucinating, and subconsciously made the grasping motion twice more.
"Where did it go?"
The black figure racing across the sky came to an abrupt halt. He turned and looked around, and a faint red light appeared in his eyes.
He found it.
Behind Cid, a tiny black dot that a normal person would not even be able to see clearly was dropping at high speed.
His eyes, strengthened by magic power, allowed him to see the dot's true form.
It was the medicine bottle he had just thrown into the air.
"So I really just did that thing where you mark a boat and then look for the lost sword there later? That's so stupid. Good thing nobody saw it."
The corner of his mouth twitched as he mocked himself, but then he immediately felt relieved.
Relieved that he was over the vast open sea.
Forget people, there was not even a bird around.
With a movement of his ankle, Cid turned and flew toward the medicine bottle. He was not moving especially fast, but it was still enough to catch it before it fell into the sea.
Smack!
As soon as Cid caught the bottle, a sharp sound rang out from where it struck his palm.
When he lifted it up to look, he saw that the bottom of the bottle had already shattered on impact.
With a casual use of magic power, Cid patched the hole, then continued flying toward Itogami Island.
"Hiss… hiss… Why does what just happened feel so familiar?"
As he continued flying, Cid started to feel something strange about the scene from earlier. It felt as though this was not the first time something like that had happened.
"Did I… drop something into the ocean before?"
With his arms crossed over his chest, Cid began to think back.
"It feels like… I did. But maybe not."
He vaguely remembered something similar happening before, yet the more he thought about it, the more it felt like a false memory.
"Whatever. If I forgot it, that just means it wasn't important. I should start descending."
After thinking about it for a while, Itogami Island had already appeared in front of him, yet he still could not recall anything clearly. In the end, he gave up trying.
He layered a Presence Erasure spell over the optical invisibility barrier covering his body, then withdrew the magic power from his feet that had been sustaining his flight.
Without magic supporting him, gravity immediately took over. His body began falling from ten thousand meters in the sky, accelerating faster and faster.
The roaring wind rushed past his ears. The scenery around him streaked through his vision, shifting from the vast blue sky to rows of towering skyscrapers.
As he approached the rooftop of one of the buildings, he could even make out a crack in the concrete floor.
"Whoosh!"
At the exact moment Cid was about to slam into the ground, an extremely small amount of magic flowed out from his body, stopping him midair at a point infinitely close to the surface.
After straightening his body in the air, he withdrew the magic power completely.
Only then did Cid truly set foot on Itogami Island.
"Sigh. Zero points."
He pulled out one of his hairs and looked at the tiny speck of dust stuck to the tip. Then he silently gave this extreme stunt a score of zero.
Reaching maximum speed instantly and stopping instantly as well, completely ignoring inertia and turning motion into stillness in a single moment, that would be a perfect ten.
Anything less was zero.
Thinking that, Cid opened the rooftop door and greeted the brown haired woman standing nearby.
"Hey, Nu. Is everything ready?"
"It has already been prepared, Shadow-sama."
As she spoke, Nu handed over a medical record.
"Thanks, Nu."
"It is my honor."
Cid's mouth twitched again. He suppressed the urge to complain and simply walked down the stairs.
This place was
Mitsugoshi Hospital.