My Friend and I Reincarnated Into a Tragedy Dating Game

The old man continued to stare at the symbol for a long time, presumably in order to memorize it so that it could be part of his "language". I couldn't help but wonder if storing memories as letters were actually physically possible, but I decided that was something beyond me, so there wasn't much point to it.

After a little while, I stared down at the tome that I had in my hands. Now that I think about it, this was originally his, right? He wouldn't like, kill me for having it or anything... right?

...

Well, I would usually be confident of that, but that old man was basically impossible to read, so I had no idea if I would actually be able to without attracting his ire. Which was almost the last thing I wanted to do given how powerful he was.

With a hesitant finger, I pointed at the book in my hand.

"Um, is it alright if I take this? If I go by where I got it, looks like it's yours or something."

The old man raised an eyebrow before waving dismissively, like the book in my hands was a piece of trash.

"Oh, that? It's not even anything that special, you can have it. I would've prepared a better reward for completing that, but I was too lazy to. The only thing that book has is a spell I made by using the principles of desire manifestation, but one that uses mana as a source."

I looked down at the tome once more with one raised eyebrow.

"Wow, I didn't even know that was a thing. You sound like a scientist or something."

The old man looked up to the sky. A small smile had formed on his face.

"I suppose. Might I ask what you intend to use that for, being a person that has seen the future?"

The corner of my lip turned up.

"To help find a way to change myself."

The old man paused for a moment before laughing softly.

"Hm... My old bones should probably follow in your footsteps. I've been down here long enough."

With that, he lifted up a finger. A blinding golden light emitted from his body prompting me to cover my eyes with the tome. Suddenly, the gravity increased several times over, making my legs crumple down onto the floor.

I forced myself to stand back up, though it felt like my knees were about to break.

Yet, a moment later, I felt all the weight disappear. I got a strange feeling that came from going up in a rollercoaster before going down. Almost instantly, I braced myself, still wondering what the hell was going on.

However, a strong force kept me down on the ground. When I opened my eyes again, I saw the...

Not so old man?

Some dude that was wearing the same clothes as the old man was in front of me. He had a smirk on his face and short black hair, just like me. Though, his eyes were golden yellow. On top of his shoulders was the zombie girl, except she wasn't actually a zombie anymore. She had one hand on the guy's head and smiled brightly.

I guess he wasn't lying about

After regaining my bearings, I realized that I was now at surface level, not actually down deep in the caverns like I originally thought. After looking around, I noticed Nathan looking at me with a bewildered expression.

It looks like I had some explaining to do later.

The guy that looked like me gave a small wave.

"I'd like to meet you once more, Bryson. Ah, and one thing that I didn't forget."

He smiled and pointed at me.

"Don't be afraid of who you are. That's dumb, alright?"

The fuck? Why are you speaking like that now?

"Um, alright... old man."

The guy let out a laugh before spinning around on the heel of his foot and walking off. Though, as he was leaving, he still spoke.

"By the way, I gave you a blessing, so don't waste it, alright?"

My eyelid twitched.

"I never asked for your blessing, old man."

The guy chuckled.

"Well too bad, I gave it to you."

The girl on his shoulders turned back to me and gave a wave.

"Goodbye!"

Out of what felt like obligation, I weakly waved back. A bitter smile formed on my face. Once they were out of sight, Nathan walked up next to me.

"What the hell was that?"

"Well..."

I explained the gist of what happened to Nathan. Despite it just being a retelling, he seemed as surprised as I was seeing it in person.

He clicked his tongue while rubbing his chin.

"So supposed gods can just pop out of nowhere? This must've been some plot point that got removed because it was far too shitty. Unfortunately, it looks like it's kept in this version."

I shrugged my shoulders while holding the tome up.

"At least we got what we came here for."

Nathan nodded and pointed at it.

"Can we just instantly learn it like how it works in-game?"

I held the book with both hands, feeling its thickness. After sucking in a cold breath, I responded.

"Unless ninety-nine percent of this book is actually useless, I don't think it is with how damn large the thing is."

I opened up the first page. It was filled with various symbols that I had no way of understanding. After realizing that Nathan wouldn't be able to see, I sat down with it in my lap, while he looked over my shoulder.

"You understand any of this crap?"

Nathan shook his head.

"Not even a little bit."

I flipped to the next page, however, there were still only symbols. After looking at it for a few moments, I flipped it again. Only to see that there were still symbols. My heart began to sink ever so slightly.

At this point, I began flipping through the pages rapidly, skipping over the moment I saw that it was just more symbols. This guy couldn't have possibly just written the entire book using the weird language system he used, right?

Right?

...Right?

By the time I had flipped through over half of the book, I had lost almost all hope, however, there turned out to be words near the end, thankfully. Nathan put his finger on the page and began reading.

"Basic theory of desire something something... magic can be compared like water or something and desires are like oil..."

After roughly skimming like that through the whole page, he turned it, only to read more theory. To be honest, I wasn't following at all. Sure, I could read it as fast as he was, but that didn't mean I would actually be able to understand the content. After all, I needed at least a second to process it.

Regardless, I didn't focus too much on it. If Nathan was able to understand it, I would just ask him to teach me it later. He actually tutored me back in high school. Not to a very high capacity, because he didn't really care about getting grades, but it was enough so that I could be on par with him without too much difficulty.

He was a pretty fucking awful teacher at first, but it did not take too long for him to adapt and become better than all of the teachers I've ever had.

Like this, Nathan made his way through fifty pages, probably in less than ten minutes or so.

All of a sudden, he stopped.

I wasn't really paying attention, so I had no idea why he stopped. After glancing at the paper, I saw what it had said.

'Apply the most basic application of Desire Manifestation but while using mana instead.'

After reading that, I turned to Nathan and saw that he pushed his mask up a bit to fit his hand under. Along with that, there was a trail of blood going down the side of his arm. He probably bit his thumb.

It was one of his habits to control himself when he gets pissed off.

If you didn't understand by this point, that meant he was angry.

Nathan slowly lowered his mangled thumb.

"This motherfucker put nearly one hundred of pages of unnecessary bullshit before saying the actual spell?"

I blinked a few times.

"...The spell was hidden on the last page?"

Nathan slowly took in a deep breath.

"Motherfucker thought I the reader was retarded and drew out the stupid explanation of desire manifestation for fifty more pages than necessary."

I wanted to disagree with him, but with how this book was structured, it was way too hard to. Like, why the fuck was the first half just symbols? And even if we pass by that, he could've just put the final page, which was basically the entire spell, onto the first page instead.

...Maybe it was supposed to be read backward, like a Japanese manga?

No, that didn't make sense. The words were made to be read from left to right.

Huh.

While I was thinking about that, Nathan was thinking before suddenly, his eyes widened.

"Hey, what are you-"

Before I could hear him finish that sentence, everything went black.

Not in the way that meant I went unconscious or anything. As in literally everything in my vision suddenly turned black. On top of that, I lost all feeling in my body. Or to be more accurate, I wasn't even sure if I currently had a body right now.

It felt as though my consciousness was just floating about in an endless void. This was kind of how I imagined how it would be like to just be a brain in a jar, but far more intense. Most people would probably go insane after being in this state for too long.

I'm not saying that I would be an exception, but at least for now, it felt strangely peaceful.

I tried to close my eyes, but quickly realized I couldn't even feel them in the first place. Besides, everything was already black, so even if I did have eyes, there wasn't much of a point.

Yet, before I could get too accustomed to it, I suddenly regained all feeling at once. My legs hurt quite a bit, in a strange position, while the light felt bright, despite the fact my eyes were already closed.

After I regained my bearings, I shakily stood up.

"What the fuck was that?"

I saw Nathan looking at me from the side. The corner of his lip twitched.

"Um, Natan was able to just cast the spell by himself. I'm not exactly sure how he was able to do it so easily, but... that's what he did."

After shaking my head a few times and rubbing my eyelids, I frowned.

"Shit... that's the effects of the Blackout spell? I thought it was just something like a flashbang."

Nathan raised an eyebrow.

"Oh really? What is it like?"

I narrowed my eyes ever so slightly.

"You can't feel anything. Other than your consciousness, there is no proof of your existence."

A smile slowly formed on Nathan's face.

"That means we can do quite a bit with this spell, huh?"