The sky split open.

Beyond it, a massive red eye, the size of a small village, writhed and scanned the surroundings, searching for something.

One, two, three…

Dozens of such eyes appeared, slowly piercing through the sky and beginning to observe.

"...First time I’ve seen it.”

Nightchaser swallowed dryly as she stared upward.

"So—that's what he looks like.”

Between the red eyes, enormous tentacles began to extend, slowly descending from above, reaching down into this place.

At the same time, a spreading Tide Sense field brushed across my body.

[!!!!!]

The dozens of eyes, which had been darting around in every direction, snapped toward me at once.

Then every single tentacle moved with a certain purpose.

To bind me…

...or kill me and take my corpse.

"Don’t you dare.”

Before I could act, Nightchaser frowned and thrust out her hand.

The writhing tentacles were instantly sucked away somewhere, leaving only cleanly severed cross-sections behind.

From the red surfaces, blood spurted out, and even that blood was erased by this deep sea. Curious, I asked,

"What did you do?”

"Isolation.”

Nightchaser answered shortly, still trying to seal the world while eliminating incoming tentacles one by one. Then she shouted toward the sky.

"Back off! I don’t care what kind of grudge you have with him, but I won’t tolerate you dragging us into it! You dare track me down and try to destroy the world I barely managed to build? Are you insane?”

[...]

"I don’t want this to end here either. If you retreat now, I won’t pursue this any further—Kyaak!"

Mimicry answered with pressure.

In an instant, Nightchaser dropped to her knees, being crushed down. I pulled her toward me, easing the pressure. She gasped, eyes wide, and then—

"Y-you %#$&!"

Her form twisted into something monstrous, and even I, who was now able to understand the language of Outer Gods, couldn’t make sense of the string of curses she spat.

I adjusted the pressure to calm her and spoke evenly.

"Talking won’t work. If we don’t fight, both of us are finished.”

"Y-you, what are you? Why is he reacting like that?!”

"No idea. We’ll have to subdue it first and ask questions later.”

"That’s impossible.”

Even in her rage, her response was rational. Fitting for something called a god.

"I told you. Mimicry is…”

"I know. Under normal circumstances, even the two of us together wouldn’t stand a chance. But this isn’t a normal situation.”

The act of tearing down the walls between worlds.

No matter how roughly these worlds had been made, breaking into one was no easy task. Doing it while the owner was actively resisting was like forcing your hand into a hole lined with blades.

On top of that, the place he had forced his way into was my world. My domain.

"And you saw it just now, right? There’s no other option. Either you spend another hundred years rebuilding worlds under crushing pressure, or we subdue Mimicry. Choose.”

"..."

Nightchaser hesitated, glancing between me and Mimicry.

Of course, there was only one real choice.

"...Explain everything when this is over.”

"Sure."

Nightchaser clenched her small hand again and glared up at the sky.

"I gave you a chance. This is what you chose!”

The surface of the deep sea rippled.

-Grrrrrrrrrrrrk!!

"Oh."

A sound of genuine admiration slipped out of me.

Up until now, only the tentacles approaching us had been cut down, but the moment Nightchaser got serious, every tentacle touching the surface, regardless of size, was sliced clean in half.

The once-calm surface now had the cutting power of a massive blender. As I watched it gradually stain red, I briefly wondered if she could handle this alone, but—

"Stay sharp. We don’t know what it’ll bring out.”

She spoke while staring up at the surface, her expression still tense.

"That bastard has devoured countless Outer Gods. If he gets serious, it’ll start using them.”

Before she even finished her words…

One tentacle that hadn’t touched the surface suddenly began to writhe in pain.

Like something inside it had cramped up.

-Riiiip!

"...What the hell is that?!”

From the torn flesh, lips, tongue, and teeth, in other words, a mouth formed.

A massive mouth the size of a small lake opened, and in a voice like a throat being cut, it sang.

[This world is—a cold and frozen, lifeless hell—]

In front of it, the air itself froze, forming a gigantic spear of ice.

Its purpose was obvious. But Nightchaser tilted her head, confused.

"An ice spear? Why would it use something like—”

"...Absolute Frost."

"Ah."

At my muttered words, realization hit her.

"Ugh, no!”

But it was already too late. The ice spear fired into the sea.

-Splash!

With a massive burst of water, the submerged spear began to freeze everything around it, spreading outward.

Nightchaser tried to grind the fragments away, but it wasn’t enough. The shattered pieces spread further, accelerating the freezing.

As she watched the surface freeze over and disappear, she clenched her teeth.

"No…! He said he never devoured Absolute Frost. So it was a lie! It was planning to devour me eventually too! that #%!% bastard…!”

"Seems like it.”

"Why are you telling me this now? No, more importantly, how do you even know about Absolute Frost…?”

I answered her with action.

I extended my hand, ripping near my chest, and drew something up from deep within.

In truth, I didn’t even need to draw it out. The hostility had been overflowing for quite some time already.

-Crrrack...

"...Huh?"

The ice slowly froze over, then melted away and vanished as it was.

Nightchaser stared blankly at it, then looked at me in disbelief.

"A-Absolute Frost? Are you Absolute Frost? No, that can’t be. Then are you…M-Mimicry?”

"Snap out of it. Mimicry’s right there."

I steadied the dazed Nightchaser, but the blocked attack didn’t seem to matter at all. The tentacles continued opening their mouths.

[This world—is a blazing inferno where life burns—]

[This world—is a grave where disease spreads without escape—]

[This world—is a bottomless pit where every step collapses—]

"...It never ends.”

Just how many worlds had it devoured?

I happened to have Absolute Frost myself, so I could block it, but I hadn't consumed the rest. If it truly decided to cover this deep sea with its powers, there would be nothing I could do.

"Does cutting its limbs even matter?”

"Probably not. At best, it’s just consuming physical mass. It can probably produce them endlessly."

The deep sea continued to be polluted and corrupted.

If this had been the real Abyssal Sea, maybe it would be different, but this was an artificial space built within the depths. It simply didn’t have the scale to endure this.

Watching the endless wave of incoming tentacles, I spoke quietly.

"Nightchaser.”

"Ugh, what? I’m busy just blocking it.”

"You said earlier that you can isolate things, right?”

"...Yeah. Why?”

"Isolate this guy in a different world. Just a single moment is enough, as long as it’s not here. Is that possible?

"What would that even accomplish?”

Nightchaser frowned, clearly not understanding.

"You’ve seen it. He’s specialized in breaking worlds. Even if I isolate him, he’ll just waste a bit of energy and come right back.”

"Nightchaser.”

During my long, miserable history with Mimicry, there was very little I’d been able to learn about it.

But even from those scrapes, one thing was absolutely clear—

—It was ignoring the Abyssal Sea.

The Outer Gods didn’t understand the Abyssal Sea.

"I have a plan."

I looked down at Nightchaser, almost as if looking down at Linmel.

She hesitated, still unconvinced.

It was only a brief hesitation, though.

[This world is nothing but a trembling illusion. Behold the reflected falsehood—]

The next moment—

As if everything had been a lie, all traces of Mimicry vanished.

The tentacles, the red eyes, everything.

The only thing proving it had been there was the cracked sky itself. The blood-red sea returned to blue, and the deep-sea creatures swam peacefully again.

In the now-silent fake Abyssal Sea, a weak voice echoed.

"What now?”

Nightchaser, still in Linmel’s form, collapsed to the ground, her face pale with exhaustion.

"I can’t hold him for long. What are you going to do?”

"It's simple. Send me there too.”

"...What?"

"Let me settle things with him.”

Nightchaser blinked for a moment, then immediately burst out in anger.

"Are you crazy? What kind of plan is that?! You’re just going there to die!”

"It’s not a loss for you, is it? That guy is clearly targeting me. So I’ll let him have his way.”

"You’re saying you’ll sacrifice yourself?”

"Do I look like some noble god to you?”

I chuckled and replied.

"I know better than you what kind of monster that bastard is. I also know I can’t beat him.”

"Then why…?”

"There’s only one option, right? I’m going to make it destroy itself.”

I gave Nightchaser one last message as she continued to hesitate.

"When this is over, I’ve got something to say about your plan. See you then.”

"...So you do have a plan.”

She looked at me like I was crazy, speaking as if the outcome were already decided, then let out a sigh and raised her hand.

"I will pray for your soul, for the stupidest Outer God in existence.”

The world flickered.

I could have resisted—but I accepted it.

When I opened my eyes again, there was no light.

Darkness and silence. The occasional sound of bubbles.

For a moment, I wondered if she had just exiled me into the Abyssal Sea, when—

[... It has been long…]

A familiar voice echoed.

[...So very long. Long enough to drive one mad with ecstasy—for you to arrive here…]

A heavy voice, cracked and splitting yet unable to hide its trembling excitement.

Something appeared within the range of my Tide Sense.

At times, it was a writhing worm, other times, an overwhelming fragrance, then a winged lion, followed by a human.

My Tide Sense wasn’t malfunctioning.

If anything, it had become so precise, reaching the level of an Outer God’s domain, that it was accurately reading the target.

My target was simply every single one of those things.

[Aah...]

Something that could be called a tentacle extended toward me.

But it warped as it touched something. That wasn’t my doing.

Nightchaser had placed an invisible barrier between me and Mimicry, preventing him from reaching me.

I told her to just throw me in. What was with this consideration?

[Just a little longer… I must wait just a little longer…]

Even as his own body twisted against the barrier, Mimicry continued to scrape against it, almost lovingly, as if savoring the pain.

That sweet, obsessive gaze, like someone gazing at a beloved, sent chills down my spine. I couldn’t endure it any longer, so I spoke first.

"There’s no need to wait."

[...?]

Sensing Mimicry’s confusion, I formed a pressure spear.

A clear declaration of battle.

Mimicry interpreted it differently.

[Haha…hah….]

It let out a satisfied laugh.

He wasn’t mocking me. A world champion doesn’t laugh at an elementary school kid putting on gloves, they just find it cute.

It was that kind of laugh.

[Come… My liberation… Show me everything that you are…]

"I’m not here to do that.”

[...]

-Slash!

The spear lightly cut through skin.

My skin. A red bead of blood welled up and spread into the Abyssal Sea.

I calmly gathered it in my hand.

"Seems like you really wanted this, huh? The deep-sea creatures were going crazy over it.”

[.........]

Mimicry’s laughter stopped.

A silence, like he was weighing something.

That wasn’t a reason for me to stop talking, though.

"You figured fragments carried by those creatures weren’t enough to escape, didn’t you? You needed to devour me to be satisfied. So, what do you think? Me, who is now half a god. Looks quite appetizing, right?”

[...I see…]

"Well then, I’ll reward your effort.”

I held out the lump of blood toward Mimicry.

Through the barrier.

Mimicry, who should have devoured it greedily, instead stared at the blood and stayed silent.

Only for a brief moment.

[What are you thinking…?]

"What? Afraid I poisoned it? You think poison works on an Outer God?”

[...]

"If you don’t want to eat it, I can just—”

As I tried to pull the blood back—

It vanished instantly, as if it had never existed.

[O-oooh…]

That was the beginning.

Scent. Animal. Human. Temperature. Time.

All the forms that made up Mimicry began to disappear one by one.

The scent vanished.

Temperature vanished.

Time vanished.

Animals vanished.

—The only thing that remained was human.

[Ah, hah “Haha…”

The voice of a god fell into a human voice.

It felt like looking into a mirror. Well of course it did. Because what lay beyond the barrier was me.

"So this is the Outer God of the Abyssal Sea. The power even that accursed sky could not control…”

Jern.

Which meant I was there.

As if it were natural, manipulating pressure and creating deep-sea creatures.

The maddened Mimicry clenched his fist and looked up at the sky.

"I can feel it. There’s a way out of this place…!”

"Ah, yeah. Congrats. So are you going to spare me?”

"...You sought survival.”

Only then did Mimicry seem to realize something, turning to me with a greasy smile.

"In the end, you’re in a human body. Not immortal, so you feared death…”

"Right? If I didn’t fear death, that’d be a lie.”

"Rest easy. You shall receive your reward and live forever—inside me.”

Mimicry extended his hand.

The greatest pressure I could produce mixed with his original power created a vortex.

Well, of course.

If a few drops of blood did that, of course he’d want to devour the whole thing.

I raised both hands as if begging for mercy and continued.

"I heard from Nightchaser. About how she’s trying to escape the Abyssal Sea.”

"...?"

"When I heard it, something about it felt off. Then I heard you’re Mimicry and that you plan to escape by eating me. And that was what seems especially odd to me. How?”

At first, I thought he was trying to escape by creating something like air from the surface.

But no. What he wanted wasn’t to enter the real world. He just wanted to break out of the Abyssal Sea.

If he actually cared about the real world, he wouldn’t be trying to kill me but trying to obtain objects from there.

To begin with, these things didn’t even know the real world existed.

Nightchaser was only guessing that Great Void had died because no more Outer Gods were falling.

Right, guessing.

These beings didn’t know—and what they did know was wrong.

"The more I thought about it, the clearer it became. It was so absurd to me that I wondered who beings that call themselves gods couldn’t realize this.”

"...What are you saying?”

"You said it yourself just now. The Outer God of the Abyssal Sea.”

I slowly shook my head.

"There’s no such thing as an Outer God of the Abyssal Sea. What those deep-sea creatures consumed weren’t the Abyssal Sea’s Outer Gods, but just pitiful mages who sank down here.”

"...?"

“Well, saying it like this probably won't help. You don't even know what the First Mage is. At best, you think humans fall down here and become something like an Outer God of the Abyssal Sea, right?”

Mimicry’s expression twisted.

Whether it didn’t understand or simply didn’t want to hear anymore…

The pressure slammed into my body.

“Kgh."

My ribs felt like they shattered as I coughed up blood.

It was an overwhelming force. Kneeling on one knee, I still smiled and spoke.

"J-just remember this.”

"..."

"I’m not the ruler of the Abyssal Sea. I’m not a god of it either. I’m just—like you, a prisoner. Even if you devour me, your ‘burdens’ won’t disappear. And unlike you. I’m a life-sentenced inmate. The kind this Abyssal Sea hates the most.”

The Wizard of the Abyss.

That was the name of the existence most despised by the Abyssal Sea itself.

"You picked the wrong thing to imitate.”

"Shut up…”

Mimicry, trying to draw out even more pressure to kill me, glared at me with bloodshot eyes.

"A-Aaaaagh…!!”

Soon, dark red blood spilled from his mouth.

He trembled, not understanding what was happening, his body cracking under the strain. Watching him writhe, I offered some senior advice.

"Rule number one of being a mage of the Abyssal Sea. Never use pressure your body can't handle. You’ll suffer the same effects.”

"..."

Mimicry looked down at its own body, its hands beginning to shake.

"Sorry if you got tricked, but what can you do?”

I shrugged and looked up at the sky.

"Now go on. Try leaving. Who knows? Maybe I lied. Maybe the moment you leave, you won’t feel any pressure at all, and the entire Abyssal Sea will become yours.”

It sure would have been nice if he bought that.

"A-ah…”

Unfortunately, he wasn’t stupid enough to miss that his entire existence had just been scammed.