Chapter 2 – I tried thinking back to the future

The first seat of the twelve sages, Chrom Chronogate.

A hundred years in the future, he was feared as history’s strongest mage, and the only time mage in the world.

That was me.

But that doesn’t mean my life was bright and full of praise.

I was once weak, and lost people that were very dear to me because of it.

I spent my life trying my hardest to become strong enough to never lose what I wanted to protect ever again.

I developed theories about time magic, which is something that was always seen as nothing more than a fantasy or a joke, ran around battlefields gaining real combat experience, and killed the ‘demon kings’ that were being born, one after the other, before taking their power into my own body.

If someone as talentless as me was ever going to become strong, I was going to have to work harder than anyone else.

Those days were horrible, they felt like I was drowning in my own bloody vomit…

I wasn’t after status, fame, or wealth. All I wanted was for everything to go back to being like those fun days in my youth.

I didn’t want to lose anything anymore.

So I kept working as hard as I possibly could, and in the end, I finally became strong enough to protect everything.

…But it was too late.

I didn’t have enough time.

By the time I became strong, I had lost everything I wanted to protect.

The girls that were my childhood friends, the people who taught me kindness, the peaceful town where I grew up, the master who taught me magic, my home country of Historia… I couldn’t protect a single thing.

I spent my entire life becoming strong.

But then, I decided I would redo my life, and I used an unprecedented time leap technique to do it.

(…This isn’t a dream.)

Looking at El standing in front of me really makes me feel like I’m back in the past.

“…El, what year and day of the goddess calendar is it?”

“W-what’s that all of a sudden Chrom? Your face looks scary…”

“Just tell me.”

“H-hn? It’s the tenth day of the fourth month of the year one thousand two hundred… It’s your sixteenth birthday. Did you forget?”

“…I see.”

I just wanted to confirm it, and it really is different.

No doubt about it, this is…

A hundred years before when I just was.

My hometown is still peaceful, and I’m still ‘Chrom the failure’ who can’t use magic…

And El is still alive.

“Ha… Hahahaha! It worked! It really worked!”

“…? …!?”

I hug El without thinking.

All the effort I put in during the last hundred years finally paid off. Of course I’m excited.

“C-Chrom!? W-w-w-w-what are you…!?”

“Wow! It’s really you! El, you’re alive!”

“Of course I am!?”

“Uoooh! I can touch you! I can touch you as much as I want!”

“You really can’t!”

“Hahaha! Hey, up up!”

“Why are you tossing me up like a baby!?”

After having my fill of El, I suddenly look at the situation with a cooler head.

“…Ah… Au…”

El’s face is bright red… And there’s steam rising from her head.

(Ah… That’s right. We weren’t really close enough to touch each other like this.)

El was always a sheltered young lady.

I remember her being popular with noble guys who called her things like saint and angel, but I don’t think she’s even used to touching boys.

Of course, that includes me, even if I am her childhood friend.

I’ve never hugged and thrown her into the air either.

(…I came to the past and ended up acting like a perv…)

I quickly step away from El.

“S-sorry. I was just so happy to see you, that…”

“S-see me? We’re always together, aren’t we?”

“…Ah, you’re right.”

We were always together. And I thought we always would be.

But now, I already know.

(…If it’s like the first time, El will die in today’s calamity.)

Today is the turning point.

That black era starts this day.

Demon kings born one after the other, the secret doings of the sorcerer association, the outbreak of the world war…

I lost everything I wanted to protect.

In this era I was too weak to do anything about it, but…

(…Now I have the knowledge and skills I cultivated in the future.)

I peek over at the clock. It’s six in the morning, which means…

(I have twelve hours until El dies.)

I don’t have a lot of time, but I won’t let that happen again.

I will take back everything I lost in the future, and I will do it right here.

(This time, I’ll make sure everything goes well.)

I secretly steel my resolve.