Inside the room, the golden-haired man who had been sitting there all this time slowly opened his eyes.
He looked around at everything in the room, then raised a hand. A golden sphere appeared in his palm.
This was the Divine Key, Void Archives. It could replicate and use weapons and tools whose structure and principles the user understood, possessed an internal knowledge space that stretched almost infinitely, and also had a will of its own.
The golden-haired man closed his hand around the sphere. A lonely voice echoed through the room.
Like a traveler stranded in a foreign land.
"So... this is five hundred years in the future."
The one controlling this body was not the self-assured Void Archives, but Otto himself — the thirteen-year-old Otto who had crossed through time.
Void Archives had always been waiting for a chance to escape Otto's control after five hundred years of suppression. So when young Otto's soul overlaid itself onto this body, there was no way he would let such an opportunity slip by.
I may not be able to outplay an Otto who's more than five hundred years old, but don't tell me I can't handle a thirteen-year-old Otto.
Void Archives had felt very confident.
Void Archives charged straight in.
Void Archives instantly got hit with a fat GG.
Blinded by the excitement of impending victory, Void Archives had forgotten something important: when Otto first turned the tables and suppressed him, Otto had still been just a child.
Damn it, Otto — you bastard, you were already a monster even as a kid!
Void Archives felt the shadow Otto cast over him deepen even further.
But even after suppressing Void Archives with nothing but the soul of his thirteen-year-old self, Otto did not feel happy.
This was the world five hundred years in the future.
He had never heard of anyone living for more than five hundred years, yet Void Archives had told him that this body was his own body from five centuries later.
Had he become some kind of ageless, undying monster?
Otto stood up. Void Archives melted away in his hand and was once again sealed inside his consciousness.
He did not fully believe what Void Archives had said. The fact that it had tried to seize his body was proof enough of its ill intentions.
That strange thing was after his body.
Having always been alone, never having met Kallen, Otto regarded everything around him with the same wariness and distrust.
The withdrawn, gloomy, repressed personality he had developed from growing up in isolation also made him seem oddly mature for his age. Compared to speaking with his father, brother, or other family members, he much preferred to tinker with his inventions.
Otto walked through the room. For a moment, the sudden increase in height made him a little unaccustomed to his own field of vision, though it also made him a little happy.
So the child who had always been so small really could grow up into someone this tall and handsome.
Moving between instruments he could not understand, Otto came to a mirror and looked at the face reflected in it.
"I'm really good-looking."
He could not help saying it aloud.
Reflected in the mirror was a handsome blond man of striking appearance. This was what he looked like after growing up.
No… that wasn't right.
He shook his head.
This was what he looked like now.
He did not choose to search for the reason he had arrived more than five hundred years in the future, because to him, that was not important.
Even if he found the answer, so what? Would he return to the past?
The moment he remembered the cold way his father and brother had looked at him — that family without a shred of warmth — Otto's body shrank in on itself slightly, his right hand gripping his left arm.
He did not want to go back.
This was fine. He had grown up now. Even if his father or brother were still alive, he would at least have the ability to live on his own.
He could find some quiet, secluded place to stay, and peacefully devote himself to his inventions.
Wouldn't that be good too?
A child's wishes really could be that simple. Even if Otto was precocious, he was still only thirteen, and there was still something boyish about him.
But he had no memories of the next five hundred years. If someone found out, would there be others like Void Archives — bad things that wanted to harm him?
The boy began to worry again.
But just then, the door to the room opened.
The sound of it startled Otto so badly that he shuddered. In a completely unfamiliar environment, even the slightest disturbance was enough to frighten him.
Right now, Otto was jumpy at every little sign.
"Lord Overseer."
It was a girl's voice.
Soft and alluring to the bone. Even Otto felt a ripple stir in his heart.
But what caught his attention even more was that title.
"Lord Overseer."
Had his father come?
Otto's father was Nicholas, the Overseer of Schicksal. But this was five hundred years in the future, so perhaps the title referred to his elder brother instead?
But whoever had become Overseer, the thought made Otto's heart tighten. He was not even sure whether he could bring himself to tell them that he wanted to live alone.
And besides, he no longer had the memories of the last five hundred years. If they found out, how would they treat him?
He turned around with difficulty, forcing down the turmoil inside him. Ever since childhood, he had been very good at hiding his emotions.
His face remained expressionless as he looked toward the doorway.
But the figures he disliked from his memories were nowhere to be seen.
A beautiful young woman stood there alone.
Her short ash-blond hair covered her left eye. She had bright wine-red eyes, and the beauty mark at the corner of her visible eye only added to her charm.
Her slender, graceful figure was wrapped in a dark maid outfit designed to accentuate her allure. Rose ornaments adorned it. A decorative garter circled her right thigh. On her head rested a rose headdress shaped like curled ram's horns. The backless design of the maid dress left large swaths of pale skin exposed to the air, while her taut, shapely thighs were wrapped in black stockings.
It was not a seductive pose she had deliberately assumed, but the sort of sensuality that seemed innate to her very being.
Like a dark rose in full bloom.
"Lord Overseer."
The maid named Rita gave Otto a slight bow.
"It is time."
She means me?
There was no one else in the room, and no one stood beside the girl either. Otto realized that this beautiful maid was addressing him.
Which meant…
He was now the Overseer?
I'm actually the Overseer?
Could it be that over the course of these five hundred years, he had outlived his father, his brother, and all their descendants, and that was how he ended up becoming Overseer?
"…Mm."
Even though he had no idea what was going on, Otto still responded with a blank expression, afraid the girl might notice that something was wrong.
Rita did not detect anything amiss.
She only felt that Lord Overseer Otto seemed a little different today.
The sharp, imposing presence he usually carried about him seemed far more restrained now.
So beautiful.
Seeing Rita's face, Otto could not help sighing inwardly. It was only natural for a boy his age to be drawn to beauty.
Even so, he did not let the slightest trace of impropriety show in his gaze, as though the girl before him were an older sister.
Still, a strange thought came to him.
Could this beautiful maid be someone intimately close to him five hundred years in the future?
Although Otto had never been favored within his family, he had still been born into nobility. He had seen plenty of cases where a maid became her master's bedmate.
Without drawing attention, his gaze swept lightly across the room.
A lone man and a lone woman. What did this maid want with him?
Otto's heart tightened slightly again. If she really intended to do the sort of things his brother often did with maids, then should he refuse… or agree?
And if she noticed something wrong with him halfway through, what then?
Rita stepped forward slightly and spoke in a respectful tone.
"Lord Overseer, please try not to be late this time. You were late last time, and that young lady was very angry."