The Pagemasters Vol 2 Chapter 26
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Author: Literataku
Chapter 26:
If You Left Behind Love
Shake shake shake! I murred quietly in my sleep, ignoring the fact someone was trying to disturb me. I wasn’t sure how long I had been sleeping, but I wasn’t feeling ready to wake up despite the movements across my back giving me gentle shakes. I ignored them and curled up tightly with a huff. I was not interested in moving or actually waking up just yet.
“Fine then, Blue-san. If one of the girls gets you like this it’s not my responsibility.”
I gave a huff and ignored him, continuing to half-doze even as the window was opened to the sounds of birds chirping outside, the light was already quite bright even with my eyes closed it was starting to give me a headache with how bright it seemed. I heard the sounds of Red walking past me and heading out the door.
“Suit yourself.”
What does he think he is anyway? I growl at the noises outside, trying to curl up as tightly as possible using my paws to over my head and block the light. Killing the sun, and the birds, killing everything that is annoying me right now sounds like a really good plan. My head started throbbing with pain, I didn’t even notice the room door opening up again.
“Blue! You need to change back! Now.”
Go away!
“Blue, listen to me, it’s getting dangerous!”
NO! You listen to me and leave me alone dammit!
“You’re suffering from Mana drunkenness! If you don’t change back now the backlash could seriously harm you!”
I grumble and stretch out glaring daggers at the girl interrupting my sleep. I cancel the spell ready to give her a piece of my mind and then- Woah! My legs give out from me and I tumble forward off the chair. She wasn’t ready to catch me and quickly stumbles back as my full weight crashes into her, sending us both into the bed.
“I just want to sleep…,” I grumble against something very soft and squishy. I couldn’t see anything but I didn’t care as the warmth and comforting feel was making me feel even more drowsy, though the headache was starting to fade.
“Blue you need to get up, please.”
“No.”
“Blue… You’re crushing me! Get off it’s starting to hurt.”
“Don’t wanna.” I’m getting annoyed again, I could feel a pair of hands trying to push me up and off, but I refused and gripped onto the bed holding down and staying put, I was not going to move for any reason dammit!
“Blue, I am not doing this with you right now.” Her voice was getting agitated, well that’s fine maybe she’d leave then.
“Just want to sleep,” I mumbled and snuggled in against the warmth more tightly. I could hear her gasping as her fists pounded on my shoulder.
“I’m not your pillow, Blue! Get off me! You need to wake up before the backlash hits!”
Backlash? What is she talking about? My mind feels incredibly groggy, I don’t recall even getting drunk so it feels completely undeserved. I try lifting up my head, feeling a pair of hands on my shoulder and trying to push me up.
The door opens up and the sound of heavy footsteps, someone coming inside the room as Violet gives a gasp and whimper of embarrassment.
“If you guys were planning on doing this, you don’t have to go hiding. We’re all adults here, right?”
Red’s voice sounded almost amused by the situation he was observing. Violet renewed her attempts to hit me and push me off of the bed.
“Red-san, it’s not like that! I told you Blue is mana crashing!”
Red chuckled and I could hear him moving forward, a pair of strong hands gripping onto my shoulders and standing me upright. I could start to see a little more, though extremely blurry, Violet was laying on the bed, her breathing heavy and looking extremely flushed,. Her clothing mussed and in mild disarray. When did that happen?
“You two are really easy to tease you know? Blue-san you need to drink this.”
A cup was placed in my hand. And my arm guided up so the cup came toward my lips. I took a sip cautiously as the bitter smell hit my nose. It was almost like coffee, or maybe this was black coffee without sugar and cream. I drank some more as the hand on my arm kept my hand up near my mouth.
Swallowing the last of it I could feel my body starting to wake up, looking around the room, Violet had managed to get off the bed and straightened her clothing. Looking at me with flushed cheeks while still having a worried expression on her face. I shook my head trying to clear away the fog still clouding my mind.
“What’s mana crashing?”
“It’s a dangerous event magic users go through when they expend a lot of mana for magic. Most of the time it comes from overusing potions to forcibly restore themselves over and over without letting their mana naturally return to normal.
“Our bodies own mana supply is I guess you can say it’s kind of purified of energy that our bodies can’t handle. Like a filter that occurs naturally. But when you force its recovery the body doesn’t have time to weed out those impurities and it starts to gather up like alcohol poisoning. Too much and you start to develop mana drunkenness, where your body starts kicking into overdrive trying to clean up itself.
“If too much impurity is within the mana your body has forcibly taken inside it. You start crashing, like a coming down from a high on a drug overdose. Your body starts leaking mana and trying to expel it as fast as possible to clean out your body. If you are using magic when your body starts cleansing it can cause physical damage, like a burnout.”
I shook my head as she explained, I could feel how drained the rest of my body felt and started to feel unsteady on my feet again. Red caught me and kept me upright, not letting me sit down or aim for the bed.
“But I haven’t been using potions…”
“Your absorption ability is quite similar to potion drinking. Though normally it won’t have that kind of problem because wind and water mana for you personally are higher compatibility and requires less filtering. But the problem comes that you were constantly using the mana almost as fast as you were absorbing it so your ‘filter’ couldn’t keep up with the supply and demand.”
“But I’ve had moments I haven’t used magic. Like the night before last.”
Red shook his head slightly.
“That’s after two-almost three days of being in cat form constantly as well as all the other magic you have been using.”
Violet nods her head and motions for Red to escort me toward the door. I stumble along as they start moving me out of the room and toward the stairs.
“Yes, that much constant use needs a day or two without magic use to give your body time to clean itself out and recharge its mana naturally.”
I’m not sure how we got down the stairs, and I’m just going to claim I don’t remember from the foggy mind. All I really know is Allouise discovered the beginnings of a new fetish that I do not want to foster or help propagate for her. I tried hard not to look at Red the rest of the morning either.
After some food and dodging questions from Allouise about what happened last night. I wasn’t in the mood to explain anything and even if I did she’d probably take it in ways I wasn’t willing to discuss. I was a bit grateful that I could take the excuse of mana poisoning to make it back up to the bedroom.
I closed my eyes and lay back, this was the third real bed I slept in since I had become a Pagemaster. Taking a deep sigh I let my mind drift around, thinking about various things, Violet, my seeming amnesia, the condition of my soul. I didn’t even realize it until it started and I was jerked forward into a vision.
I was leaning over the dresser in front of me, the light of the moon shining in from the window giving a silvery glow to everything. The air stirred softly from the gentle breeze blowing through. I felt a slight shiver of the cool air after I had been so close to great warmth until I had climbed out of the bed.
Looking in the mirror, I saw the silver light making Violet’s naked form glow with an almost unearthly beauty. She was sleeping soundly, her skin glistening from our lovemaking a short while ago. It always took my breath away seeing her laying in our bed like this.
I smiled and looked into my own eyes with a quiet smirk. “That’s why we do everything we have, and we are going to do. I don’t know how many tries we have left. But I’m going to make sure she survives. I- We can’t let her go. I don’t know what’ll happen but trust that things that happen to us are all for this. I hope I don’t have to use these memories like this. But hey, It’s best to have your walking stick before you tumble, right?”[1. AN: Japanese Idiom for better safe than sorry]
I laughed at the mirror quietly, trying to ignore the tugging pain in my heart. Wiping something from my eye before focusing on myself again.
“But, as advice to me. Don’t go trying to force these unless you really have to. If something happened and we don’t remember any of this, there might be reasons why that I can’t explain because we can’t know about certain… things. Keep her safe and keep fighting, Shikihiro. She’s worth everything we’ve given up and more. Geta o azukeru.” [2. AN: Japanese saying meaning to fully trust someone to do something]
I gave a slight bow toward the mirror and turn around, moving back toward the bed, giving a slight chuckle to myself. “Sorry, you are just going to have to get this outside of memories. This is my moment alone”
Just as I began to slide in next to Violet and feel her skin on mine, the memory cut to black.
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