"What do you mean by this make sense? What makes sense about it? Is experiencing things like that actually common?

"

Zoemi asked in disbelief.

He also ended up grabbing Aspakeony's waist to stop her from fidgetting so much because her constant movement atop his lap was making it excessively hard to focus on her words.

"Hmm? Oh – no, don't mind me – just thinking out loud about something else. I am connected with all of my corpse puppets even when I am not controlling them directly and sometimes their thoughts slip into my mind and I blurt something weird like that.

"

The necromancer casually shrugged her shoulders and explain – although it kind of felt like she had that line prepared beforehand, causing a bit of suspicion in the attentive black-haired attendant.

|…|

Zoemi furrowed his brows and ended up closing his eyes for a moment, diving into the world of dancing shadows and reaching towards Aspakeony's shadow…

"…!

"

He already had a vague understanding of the spell she was constantly using, but now the aspect he wanted to know more about has cleared out.

The corpse puppets had all the memories of their original lives and although they were indeed always connected, they were capable of obediently following the instruction left to them by the necromancer.

The soul wasn't there, but the mana left inside was capable of moving them – it was quite interesting!

…although that wasn't the time for looking into the spell that could be used only on corpses…

"But then what was that doubled point of view…?

"

Zoemi murmured in confusion.

"It might be a coincidence or something important, but I have no idea. But back to our conversation, you were saying…?

"

The gray-haired girl furrowed her brows and tilted her head before asking.

"I… whoa…! I also vaguely remember coming into contact with a rather strange being that I can only associate with the bright golden light and immense presence…

"

The black-haired boy opened his eyes and twitched once he realized how close Aspakeony's face was to his own.

From such a short distance, he had a prime view at her captivating gray eyes that were focused solely on him, transfixed on his face…

…The gray-haired girl's full lips were slightly open as she gazed upon him, very clearly expecting him to continue talking.

"…but… it didn't tell me anything in particular…? I mean… I don't remember anything like that at least…

"

Zoemi blushed and buried the idea about revealing to Aspekeony that he was a reincarnated person.

"Yeah… I bet she was feeling rather shy after all these years…

Aspakeony's face brightened with a soft smile and she giggled.

"She…?

"

The black-haired boy asked, blinking in confusion – after all the gray-haired girl kept calling Presence 'it' before.

"Sorry, sorry – I actually have one of my puppets search for something and I'm trying to focus too much on two things at once and it blends together.

"

The necromancer shrugged her shoulders and gave a vague-sounding excuse before turning serious.

"…I knew you were special… But then, what happened that made it use its magic…? Did it have something to do with you?

"

Aspakeony pondered over those questions and her thighs pressed Zoemi's sides.

"Do you remember anything?

"

She took a careful look at Zoemi's face.

She asked leaning even closer towards the black-haired boy.

"No to me…! But something happened to Burushi!

"

Zoemi flinched and gasped, leaning so close to the gray-haired girl that their noses were basically touching.

"Burushi was murdered by a darkness magician that looked like me!

"

"WH-WHAT?!

"

Zoemi exclaimed, making Aspakeony shout as her eyes widened.

"What do you mean she was killed?! One of MY precious students was killed in MY Academy?!

"

She gasped, sticking extremely close to the boy – who didn't get flustered only because he was focused solely on the groundbreaking discovery.

"Yes! She told me herself! She actually didn't want to talk to me because she was convinced that I killed her, even though that definitely couldn't be me since at the time of that happening I was together with my master and teacher Rokiana! Or at least I was with them when the time was reversed.

"

Zoemi explained and added after a bit of thought.

"By a darkness magician who looked like you…? But if it wasn't someone who just happens to be like you, that would only leave one of the Ghosts… But… No! That is impossible! I would have known if a member of Ghosts of Bellcephora would physically appear in here! I would! I would because they tried to do that once and I managed to evacuate everyone eighty years ago!

"

Aspakeony was extremely disturbed by the information and she instantly tried to explain her reasoning for that while clinging to Zoemi.

She looked both very panicked and extremely angry.

"Maybe it wasn't one of them and just another darkness ma…

"

"NO! I know when an intruder enters my Academy! The only other artifact that I own except for the one creating the seal is a device that detects magic signatures and I have a puppet monitor it at any and all times!

"

Zoemi proposed another explanation, but Aspakeony shook her head and struck that option down.

"The only time that it didn't work was when little Zorus came to the academy – but that was only because of the bracelets distorting the mana reading! And there was nothing like that happening again!

"

She declared, squeezing Zoemi's sides with her legs.

"Then I don't know what could have happened.

"

The black-haired boy furrowed his brows and sighed with a bitter expression.

"Is there another darkness magician or…!

"

"…!

"

He pondered, but then he suddenly flinched and looked straight into Aspakeony's eyes.

"Arisu can use the magic from other atribu…!

"Little Lazaram used every type of magic that he knew during the third-year's magic examination and according to Kross, he was capable of barely using shadow connect sine he focused on training other attributes for understandable reasons.

"

Zoemi gasped but his idea was once again instantly shot down by the dark-skinned girl.

"…oh… then I have no idea who was it – but it definitely wasn't me…

"

The black-haired boy slumped and murmured in a slightly embarrassed voice.

Actually, he remembered that in-game Arisu's character also wasn't proficient with the darkness magic because it was considered as the magic for perverts and assassins by everyone else – but Zoemi thought that the white-haired capture target could be the culprit since he simply had a bad feeling about him, but apparently he was just overthinking everything.

"…that's something I will definitely have to investigate… Do me a favor, kid, next time you see little Burushiitto, tell her to come to my office – I would like to learn the details straight from her if you don't mind.

"

Aspakeony breathed out and shrugged her shoulders again before straightening her back and asking…

…while shifting her position once again…

"That's not a problem at all… but… tell me – Burushi has a lot of mana, but nothing over the norm – is she like me and remembers what happened because of some odd coincidence?

|…or is it because that this world is really a game like she says…?|

The boy asked out loud, finishing his question in his mind.

"Oh? No, no. In her case, I fully know why she still remembers everything.

"

"…!

"