Chapter 32

Chapter : 32

Because my life would change depending on where I stepped, I wanted to control every situation.

Only that way could I keep the anxiety at bay.

Was that why?

Whenever an unforeseen variable appeared, whether it was good or bad, my heart always dropped.

Why is the Crown Prince showing up here?

The glittering shine of his hair only made my unease worse. Why does that thing gleam so much?

The Crown Prince, Kartea Savi Iniespi.

He was like wild mountain ginseng.

You knew he was somewhere in the mountains, but no matter how thoroughly you searched every inch of the place, it was almost impossible to catch even a glimpse of him.

And now he had come looking for me first. My head started spinning.

Worse, he had spoken to me.

Depending on the situation, he was someone who could take my life.

I always had to be careful with my words. I slowly replayed what he had said and pushed myself up from my seat.

First came the proper greeting to imperial blood.

Navier and I bowed our heads and said we were pleased to see him.

Then Navier received Kartea’s question. Looking at me, she asked,

“A flower?”

Right.

There had been a time when I bought a flower at the auction house.

The flower was called Arbania.

It had been an ingredient for the Sleeping Draught I intended to make for Ian.

At the time, Kartea had also tried to buy the Arbania, saying he meant to give it to his younger sister, but he had yielded it to me.

So that was why he had spoken to me now.

I copied Navier’s expression. I opened my eyes at ease and gently lifted the corners of my mouth. Is this how it’s done?

I had no mirror to confirm it, but surely it couldn’t have looked too unpleasant.

“You mean the Arbania. I’m in the Swordsmanship Department, but I’m also interested in Alchemy and take part in club activities. I used the Arbania as an ingredient for alchemical work.”

The fact that I was active in the Alchemy Club was something I had never mentioned to Navier.

Outwardly, we acted as though we were close, but our relationship was more like business partners than friends.

Perhaps because it was new information to her, Navier’s eyes widened into circles.

She looked as though she had something to say, but she couldn’t very well insert herself between me and the Crown Prince.

“So that was it? You seemed so desperate at the time that I thought perhaps you were buying it as a gift for a lover.”

“Haha. I used it while studying Alchemy.”

“Really? So you don’t have a lover?”

“I do not.”

Even while speaking to me, Kartea kept glancing toward Navier.

It looked as though he wanted to say something, and as though my presence was making it inconvenient for him. I ought to take the hint and disappear.

“Then I’ll be going now. See you next time.”

I abruptly said my farewells to Navier.

It would have been natural for her to look confused, given that I was wrapping things up as though our conversation had already ended before Kartea arrived, but Navier understood perfectly.

In an instant, she read my expression and my mood, then smiled.

“Yes. I’ll see you next time.”

Her sense for these things really was excellent.

After giving my greetings to Kartea and leaving the café holding my now-empty drink, I checked the time.

2:20 in the afternoon.

There were about three hours left until the time I had arranged to meet Bishot over Alchemy.

I went into the practice room of the Magic Department and practiced magic.

Was it because even Franz, the Headmaster of the Academy, was a mage?

The building of the Magic Department had been given noticeably more investment than the others.

A small tower rose within the Academy grounds.

Compared to the officially recognized Magic Towers outside, it was shabby, but even so, the students of the Academy called it the Magic Tower.

The Magic Tower had nine floors in all, and beneath it, underground, there was a practice room where one could directly use magic.

This was the very place where I had once hurled Mana Bullets at training dummies with Ian.

I went down into the practice room and opened the book Ian had left behind.

“By the time you open this book, I likely won’t be here.”

That was how the book began, with a line that was not funny in the least.

“Pfft.”

And yet, I still laughed.

There was something strangely ironic about Ian attempting humor that suited him so little.

“It seems you’ve been improving your Perception and Control in your own way, so I’ll explain the sort of magic that can make use of that.”

I had read it several times already, to the point that I could have written the rest of the sentence just from the opening line.

Ratatatatat!

I fired twelve Mana Bullets in different directions and brought down the training dummies.

Even I found myself admiring how much my skill was improving from one day to the next. I had taught myself from the book Ian left behind, but if I sold this thing, it felt as though it would become an incredible source of money.

Mages were generally wealthy, and if something could improve their magical skill, they would gladly open their purses.

The book Ian left behind lacked even the slightest consideration for the learner, but the content itself was excellent.

Excellent enough that even a beginner like me could improve quickly.

I read aloud again, checking the page for the magic I intended to test this time.

“Refine an element onto the Mana Bullet. Do not try to transform the Mana Bullet itself from the start. Practice with the feeling that you are dressing the Mana Bullet in clothing. Once you grasp the trick, move on to practicing firing the Mana Bullet itself as an elemental bullet.”

The Academy allowed its students as much freedom as possible, but there were a few things it absolutely forbade.

One of them was the use of magic inside the dormitories.

Maybe people secretly used simple spells here and there, but even I didn’t dare try something like this.

Whoosh.

A crimson flame rose above my palm.

Looking at the fire dancing without fixed shape, flickering in every direction, I felt oddly moved. This was the first time I had ever used magic that truly felt like magic.

“Wow. This really works.”

I extinguished the flame in my hand, then formed Mana Bullets.

By now my skill had improved enough that their shape and size were even.

There were five of them.

I reduced the number compared to usual.

Today I was going one step further.

Crackle.

First, I set one Mana Bullet on fire.

A red flame crept slowly across the surface of the blue Mana Bullet.

The flame gradually consumed the Mana Bullet until, in the end, it became a Flame Bullet. I tried to turn the remaining four into Flame Bullets as well, but failed because of the strain on my concentration.

Whenever I was in the middle of creating a new Flame Bullet, the flames on the ones I had already made would start to die down.

“Haa.”

After struggling for quite some time, I finally managed to create two Flame Bullets at once, and fired them at the training dummies.

Bang! Bang!

The power of the Flame Bullets was mediocre.

It was roughly on par with what happened when I knocked down the dummies using ordinary Mana Bullets. The only difference was that the dummies were slightly scorched by fire. That was because I hadn’t created true Flame Bullets through the proper method, only an imitation.

I checked the time.

4:30 in the afternoon.

There was still time before my appointment. I repeated the process of creating Flame Bullets and firing them.

---

The place where I usually met Bishot was the club room.

That was because she avoided places like cafés, where too many other people’s eyes would gather.

By the time I entered the club room, it was late enough that most people had already left, and the place was quiet. Bishot rose from her seat to greet me.

Her hair was more disheveled than usual, and her eyes were hollowed out, as though she were drenched in fatigue, yet her gaze itself was bright.

She seemed unwilling to give me even a moment to wander off into side chatter. She only lowered her head in greeting, then went straight to the main point.

“I wanted to inform you of the progress made so far on creating the cure for Elzenic Disease. First, I’ve more or less established the direction of the medicine itself. I’ve finished listing the materials required, and now it seems I only need to determine the proportions and method of preparation.”

“Wow, that’s impressive. That was incredibly fast.”

“And among the materials I mentioned last time, there was one that resisted bonding, so to replace it…”

I did my best to give proper responses to Bishot as she spoke in her usual flat tone.

Ah. Right. I see.

I mixed up those kinds of replies and fed them back to her.

Even with such plain encouragement, Bishot eagerly showed off her progress. Then, as though there was something troubling her, she tugged at her chin and frowned.

It was only natural that creating something involved trial and error.

If the problem was that something had gone wrong, or that she had run into a wall, then that was fine.

“Why? Is there something bothering you?”

There was no possibility that I could actually advise her if something really had gone wrong, but I asked anyway, the way people normally did. Bishot answered,

“No. The preparation of the medicine itself is proceeding smoothly. But the problem is that I can’t predict what kind of adverse reactions the test version might produce. The materials being used are powerful, so if side effects do occur, the repercussions will likely be serious. I’m uncertain how best to deal with that.”

“Ah.”

Just because one had made a medicine didn’t mean one could immediately patent it and sell it on the market.

Several rounds of tests were required to examine the drug’s safety. Usually, one first administered it to animals and observed the reactions, and only then moved on to human trials.

The reason Bishot was troubled was simple.

Elzenic Disease only occurred in humans.

Even if she tested it on animals, she wouldn’t obtain any meaningful data. In the end, she would have to administer it directly to people already suffering from Elzenic Disease.

In cases like this, people usually forced the experiment on slaves, or offered compensation to the poor in exchange for volunteering.

It seemed Bishot found that distasteful.

“If that’s what worries you, then wouldn’t it be enough to seek volunteers among people already suffering from the disease? Elzenic Disease is incurable, and since there’s currently no treatment at all, someone would volunteer.”

“But those volunteers may suffer severe side effects. In the worst case, they may die. I believe there is a high probability of serious abnormal reactions. Even so, I’m unsure whether it’s right to accept volunteers.”

That wasn’t something that had happened in the Original Work.

Back there, Bishot did mention side effects, but she didn’t treat them with this level of seriousness.

Probably because, at that point in the Original Work, she was just about to explode with confidence after producing one major success after another in Alchemy without a single failure.

Compared to that Bishot, who kept climbing toward success step by step in the Original Work, the Bishot before me now had nothing.

She had reached a clue about the new use for Earthroot Fleabane, but lost it because of me.

She had never experienced real success.

So it was only natural that she feared the result she might produce like this.

All the more so because it had to do with people’s health and lives.

So then, should I simply encourage her and help restore her confidence?

Hmm.

That didn’t feel right.

To dismiss the problem she was struggling with as nothing more than a lack of confidence was far too hasty.

It would have been easy to tell her that everything would go well, that she could do it, but I couldn’t guarantee the result of what she made.

And what if Bishot failed badly and then blamed me for it?

It wasn’t impossible.

“I don’t think this is the sort of thing that has a clear answer. The only two methods I can think of are to buy slaves and experiment on them, or to accept volunteers.”

“I see.”

Bishot lowered her eyes. She took a slow, deep breath, then nodded.

“I understand. This does not seem to be the kind of problem with a clear answer. Even so, in that case, I’ll accept volunteers.”

“And the compensation for those volunteers? What about that?”

“I don’t believe I can answer that immediately. I’ll prepare an answer for you next time.”