Reincarnated With A Glitched System: Why Is My MP Not Running Out?

Chapter 1945: The Curse

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“Dad… I wanted to tell you that… well, I’ve started my own life this last year and…” Ruby muttered. “I’ve become Master Felicia’s apprentice, the famous Witch of the Blue Mountain. I also… well, I awakened as a Hero. I was blessed by the gods… Did you ever know that?”

“…I did,” he muttered, clearly unamused. “Well, good for you! Cough…! You got your own damn dream life! So go and do whatever the fuck you want. I don’t care anymore… cough, cough… is that all you wanted to… COUGH, COUGH…! Aagh…!”

“F-Father?” Ruby gasped.

Her father suddenly collapsed, vomiting thick black bile onto the floor. He clutched his chest, gasping desperately as his lungs filled with congestion and breathing became nearly impossible.

“Are you okay?!” Ruby hurried toward him, reaching out.

“D-Don’t touch me…!” he groaned, weakly slapping her hand away. “Aahhh…! COUGH…! Leave… leave me… alone…”

“Dad, you’re sick!” Ruby cried. “Um, girls, do you know how to heal?”

“Yeah, yeah, leave it to me,” I said, stepping forward and enveloping him with my Yggdragon Aura, channeling every healing power I had.

“Uugh…! AAAAGH!” But her father screamed in agony the harder I tried to heal him. Whatever disease gripped him reacted violently—as if it latched like a parasite and fed on the magic. The more I tried to purify it, the more it tortured its host.

“W-Wait! Stop! Stop!” Ruby shouted. I pulled back immediately.

“I don’t know what’s happening. That’s not a simple cold or fever,” I said. “And that black vomit—what is that?”

“I was wondering the same. This is weird,” Celeste said. “Also, he reeks of… miasma?!”

“Yes, that’s miasma!” Alice’s voice rang out. She appeared alongside Yggdra and Naturia, followed by Ignatius, Furoh, and Beelzebub.

“That’s strange. Is he cursed?” Ignatius wondered. “I’ve never seen anyone vomit miasma like that. What the hell?”

“It’s no good. Magic will only worsen his symptoms,” Yggdra said. “It’s as if the disease absorbs magic and grows stronger… how odd.”

“Weird…” Naturia muttered.

“Let me check him. I’m an expert in these things,” Beelzebub said. He flew to Ruby’s father—who had fallen unconscious—and settled on his forehead. “Hmmm…”

His large, bright eyes darted around, then froze. They widened as realization struck.

“No way… Sylphy, you should probably see this for yourself…”

“What? What do you mean?”

“Touch my head and you’ll know. It’s faster than explaining.”

“…?”

I placed my hand on his head. Instantly my consciousness was dragged into an endless void of darkness, thick miasma everywhere, woven into countless spiderwebs.

“W-What is this?! Is this his Mindscape?!” I asked.

“Something like that—and his Soulscape too!” Beelzebub said. “He’s not just sick. He’s been cursed and parasitized by something awful! Something…! Aaah, over there!”

Beelzebub hid behind me as I looked where he pointed. Countless insects of every shape and size crawled toward us, their gleaming red eyes and clicking mandibles echoing through the void.

“W-What is this?! S-Stay away!”

I unleashed flames, burning them one after another, but more kept emerging from the miasma. They seemed endless.

As I fought, many began merging into a giant hive, a writhing mass of insects.

A gigantic silhouette loomed; eight gleaming red eyes fixed on me.

And it spoke.

“So it’s YOU.”

That thing knew me.

The silhouette drew closer, paralyzing my consciousness with an unseen power that rivaled my own.

“To think fate would drag us together once more… I have not forgiven what you did to me!”

A massive claw reached out, moving slowly but inexorably to crush me like an insect.

I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak. I was completely paralyzed.

“I will make sure to finish you this time!”

CRASH!

When it crushed me, I snapped back to reality, sharp pain stabbing my chest as if something had latched there.

It was a mass of black.

“Ugh?!” I dropped to my knees.

“Damn it! She got it too?!” Beelzebub panicked.

“N-No, I’m fine…”

Unlike Ruby’s father, who had no resistance, I quickly manipulated my own soul. I isolated the fragment where the thing had latched, severing it from my main soul.

“I can handle it.”

Whoever that was had tried to curse me the same way it cursed Ruby’s father—and likely wanted something from it.

Perhaps to feed.

That thing had spoken of revenge too! Where had it come from? Did I know it?

While observing the isolated soul fragment, I noticed the black curse took the shape of a spider with eight red eyes.

It was utterly bizarre, yet somehow familiar.

A spider…

“Wait, could it be? There’s no way…” I muttered, unable to believe it.

“What happened?” Celeste asked. “What did you see?”

“Sylphy?” Ruby asked anxiously.

“W-We should bring your father to his bed first,” I said. “This is… a bigger problem than I imagined. We should probably call my mother. She’ll likely find a way to keep him stable.”

“Okay!” Ruby nodded. “Come on, Dad…” She quickly helped him to bed.

I explained everything to Aquarina and the others—what Ruby’s father was enduring and what Beelzebub had shown me. Aquarina immediately wanted to kill Beelzebub, convinced he had tried to trap me, so I had to shield him from her fury.

“Ugh, what’s going on?” Aquarina sighed. “I just wanted to go out with my friends and have fun…”

“I’m sorry it turned out this way,” I sighed.

“No, it’s not your fault,” Aquarina said, shaking her head.

“Hm, so what do we do?” Mist asked. “Maybe there are multiple cases of this…”

“Yeah, we should consult someone. The Adventurer Guild, perhaps?” Lara suggested.

“I guess so,” I nodded.

I contacted my mother through the communication necklace and told her everything. She decided to come immediately, teleporting to my side in an instant.

“Let me see what I can do,” she said, entering Ruby’s room and approaching her father. “For the time being, I’ll be busy, so please don’t disturb me.”

“O-Ok!” I nodded. She had turned completely serious. “For now, let’s go to the Adventurer Guild and find out what’s happening…”

To our surprise, when we reached the Adventurer’s Guild, a warehouse had been converted into a makeshift ward filled with patients suffering from the same strange disease. Most were Adventurers who had entered dungeons in the past few days.

“Ah! You girls are here! This is… not a really good time,” the Guild Master muttered, greeting us.

“Just what’s going on, Guild Master?” I asked.

“Some kind of pest has been spreading from the Dungeon. Things are not looking good…” He sighed, readjusting his glasses. “A couple of people have already died… It… it all started about a week ago. Some of the survivors said a great, dark presence has settled within the Dragon Tomb Dungeon… I would recommend you not go there for the time being.”

“A great dark presence…?!”

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