Shades of the New World

Chapter 230: Jealousy

Sasha sat inside her room, confusedly eyeing the young boy sitting in front of her. It was definitely more correct to call the "boy" as an old man, since she'd just learned that not only her younger brother was a Child of the Empress, he had lived up to the age of 300 in his previous life, in a completely different World from this one, and as a ghost at that, which was another cherry on top of the cake. 

"So uh, how do you get to this, Earth of yours?" Sasha asked curiously.

"I'm not quite sure But I'm pretty sure the two Authorities under the Empress' command Twelve Jokes and Two Tales are able to visit them," Evin replied with a shrug.

"And it's filled with ghosts and only humans and all sorts of wonderfully bizarre machinations?"

"There weren't many ghosts as far as I could find. Most of them would also die after appearing, so that was that. As for the other two points, yes; there are only humans on Earth as the dominant species. Aside from them, there were countless other animal species who littered the planet: avians, mammals, reptiles, underwater creatures, and a shit-ton of insects," Evin said with a sigh.

"And those machinations?"

"Ehm, yes. It's probably easier if I just tell you that they worked very similarly to how magical devices worked. See that White sorbothium that acts as a light source? We both know that it mostly works thanks to mana and Luminous energy. But on Earth, there was no luminous energy or mana. So, we had to use something different, something called electricity though I'm not very knowledgeable about how it works in detail," Evin said with a wry smile.

Sasha had brought her brother into her room to apologize, but who knew she would end up learning such wacky facts in the process. To think that the despicable lowlife swindler that she was imagining was actually someone so special and well, unique.

After Evin had left for the North, she had randomly learned about the truth of the Children of the Empress from one of her friends. Before that, she had only thought the Children to be no more than a comparatively smarter mage child compared to others. And the concept of a talking 2-year-old wasn't anything too difficult to imagine for her, as she'd seen the excellency of young mages many times when she was studying in the North. For her, it was natural for a mage to be smarter, stronger, and overall better than her. 

A Child of the Empress wasn't much different than that.

A Hornbearer wasn't really worth much compared to a mage, anyway. Especially the ones with a single silver horn, who could only play around with some illusions. But she'd guessed that she could perhaps become an illusionist of some sorts who gave theaters and plays some life and realism. 

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Although most Silver Hornbearers become street-performers of some kind, Sasha wanted a more stable lifestyle, one that didn't require her to move all around the country, searching for a suitable to crowd to play for. And considering how unsafe it was for a young girl like her to travel around the country, it was much better to stay with a group of like-minded people who had a love for plays and theatrics. 

Even if it turned out to be a traveling theatre, Sasha was sure she wouldn't mind it as much, thinking of the troupe like a second family of some sorts. She would send her family the few coins she made through her plays, with letters describing the towns and scenery she saw on her travels.

Well, who knew that all of that was completely unnecessary?

Her younger brother had made their family a 2nd grade one and also turned them into one of the richest people in town. The empty, cold house she used to stay in had become one of the most lavishly decorated places she'd ever visited. Her father who used to doggedly work for another man had started to work on a bakery with her mother. Elina also seemed to look like a completely different person, one that was much happier and more confident than how she acted before.

All thanks to the mystery child that was born as an unparalleled genius mage. At that point, Sasha could only admire her younger brother's genius and sit silently on the sidelines like the non-mage child she was supposed to be, Hornbearer or not. Sasha had accepted everything without issues, like the perfectly logical silver Hornbearer she was. After all, logic said that having a mage in her family meant that she was going to have a relatively easy life compared to everyone else.

What was there to complain about?

But after she first learned of the fact that the Children were actually reincarnated individuals who managed to retain their memories, she started to feel... conflicted. All the Children started to look like a group of sickening fakes and over-glorified cheats. Evin was obviously the same as the rest.

And in Sasha's eyes, Evin looked even more disgusting compared to the others, with him allowing his parents to fawn all over him like that. Even though Evin looked like he was weirded out by the constant physical contact, in Sasha's memories, the boy would always look like he was smiling sinisterly behind his parents' backs. 

The kisses, the hugs, the love all of it looked violently wrong in Sasha's eyes. 

'Ugh, stop trying to make excuses for yourself. Just accept that you were jealous of him and get over it,' Sasha reminded herself once more, noticing that she was falling into a spiral of hate again.

'When you learned that Evin was a reincarnated individual, you just found a good enough excuse for your hate, and now that you found out what actually happened, you're just lost because your excuse disappeared.'

These past 9 or so days, after Evin had talked to her, Sasha was allowed the chance to see past the misunderstanding she was stuck on for the past two months and clear away the lump of feelings that was festering inside her. She was finally set free from the suffocating whirlpool of emotions that grasped her heart jealousy, disgust, worry, hate, apathy, envy, anger, and even a bit of delusional murderousness.

Obviously, all completely hopeless and futureless thoughts. An ant did not look at a human and felt jealous of them. They only hoped that the humans didn't trample on them too hard. There was no point in hating or envying them, let alone trying to murder them, since the gap between them was much too wide for anyone to cross.

'But if I can somehow murder a mage with the cheap illusions and trickery I possess, the I suppose I can feel a bit proud of myself,' Sasha thought randomly.

Shaking her head, she focused on the talk at hand. 

"By the way, what did you want to talk about?" she asked.

Evin had told her about wanting to talk with her about something, but never really got to it, as he was sidetracked by his talk of his home World. 

"Oh, yes Umm, what do you plan to do after you grow old and leave your house?" Evin asked suddenly.

Sasha wondered why Evin was asking this, but she still thought about the topic quite seriously. Obviously, the first word that appeared in her mind was the theatre, but something inside her was violently opposed to revealing that to others.

"I don't really know. Maybe I'll marry someone and just live life normally," Sasha answered.

Evin smiled knowingly at the remark, no doubt wondering what secret profession she harbored inside her heart. 

"Well, I'm sure you'll think long and deep about that. But I have a little gift here for you," Evin said and brought out a little scroll out of a Storage Space.

Sasha looked curiously at the thing, but couldn't really find anything special about it. 

"What is that?" Sasha asked as she reached out for it with her hands.

"This is a very special gift I had brought for you. Though its effects might be a bit strong, so maybe you should lie down on your bed before taking hold of it," Evin smiled.

"Is it something painful or dangerous?"

"I'm not a hundred percent sure But I don't think you should worry too much," Evin said and urged Sasha to lie down on her bed.