CHAPTER 3

How to Live as a Hero in a Magical World (3)

Kaian stared at the woman’s face, then rubbed his eyes in disbelief.

For a moment, he even wondered if he was dreaming.

I’ve never heard of elves having horns…

While he was still struggling to make sense of what he was seeing, the woman closed her book and raised her head.

Her jewel-like blue eyes were cold and piercing, as though they could see straight through him.

“Hmm… That is a rather crude weapon to point at the person who saved your life.”

Kaian flinched and took a step backward.

It was because of her voice.

Her voice was clear and mysterious, an exquisite sound unlike anything he had ever heard before.

Yet there wasn’t the slightest trace of emotion in it.

The sheer lack of feeling in that strange voice immediately put Kaian on guard again. But he had no idea what he should say first.

“I…”

His first instinct was to ask about his family.

But he had the feeling that if he actually voiced that question, he would regret it immediately.

Almost without consciously realizing it, Kaian changed his question.

“…Who are you?! Identify yourself! Where have you brought me?!”

He tried his best to imitate the way his father and older brothers spoke, but even to his own ears, his attempt sounded awkward.

The woman gave a smile that could hardly be called a smile.

“Who am I? That is quite a difficult question. Why don’t you introduce yourself first? Who are you?”

The hand gripping the brass candlestick trembled slightly.

She called me a guest. Does that mean she isn’t one of them?

Gathering his courage, Kaian glanced around the room.

The interior was furnished with wooden furniture and looked much like an ordinary home.

Suppressing his confusion, Kaian desperately tried to think.

Those bastards definitely tried to kill me.

And yet he was here, alive and unharmed.

Based on his observations and deductions, Kaian asked a more specific question.

“The men who were chasing me… Where are the attackers?”

The woman took a sip of tea from the cup on the desk.

In the silence stretched taut throughout the room, even the sound of the teacup being set down seemed deafening.

“They say humans are creatures of forgetfulness. Have you already forgotten?”

Kaian thrust the brass candlestick threateningly into the air.

“I don’t care about riddles like that! Speak plainly!”

“Humans seem to have no manners from the moment they are children. Well, it doesn’t matter. At least your vocabulary seems adequate, so that is fortunate.”

“What does that even—! Answer me! Where are they?!”

“You burned them all to death.”

The woman said it casually as she took another sip of tea.

“What…?”

“Did you not hear me? I said you burned them all to death.”

Fragments of memory flashed through Kaian’s mind once again.

The turquoise mana that had shimmered around his left arm.

The way he had swung that arm backward with all his strength.

The screams of the attackers.

And the orange heat that had driven him deeper into the forest…

“No…”

Kaian whispered.

His eyes were trembling even more violently than before.

“No. There’s no way they would have given up that easily! They must have sent a second wave…!”

The woman frowned slightly.

“You are noisy.”

“Ghk…!”

Kaian’s breath caught in his throat.

From that brief warning alone, he could feel a vast amount of mana—something he could never have comprehended even if he devoted his entire life to the task.

His body shrank instinctively, like a rabbit beneath the foot of a giant.

And only then did he finally realize it clearly.

I awakened my mana…!

Those who had yet to awaken their mana could not sense how powerful another person’s mana was, no matter how overwhelming it might be.

But Kaian’s body was trembling like prey before a predator.

“You asked where you are.”

The woman spoke in that same clear, ethereal voice.

“This is Eldergrove. My subspace. Even mages clad in the crude toys used by those who pursued you would be incapable of finding it. So you may rest easy.”

Kaian barely managed to keep breathing.

Then he forcibly made his mind move again, despite the fear threatening to shut it down.

Rest easy… That’s a strange thing to say. How am I supposed to rest easy in a situation like this?

And yet, despite himself, a tiny spark of hope began to bloom in one corner of his heart.

Did telling him to rest easy mean that all the danger was over?

If so, perhaps he could finally ask about his family.

And so, even though he already knew he would regret it, Kaian finally opened his mouth.

“Then… what about my family?”

“They are dead.”

It was a short and unequivocal verdict.

Kaian’s lips parted as he tried to deny it.

But before he could say anything, the woman’s emotionless voice pierced straight into his heart like a dagger.

“Ask me something you do not already know.”

It was a rebuke.

Had he not already known that his family was dead?

It was also a condemnation of his foolish hope and his attempt to escape reality.

Kaian’s body trembled with humiliation and fury.

At the same time, the memories he had desperately tried to bury until now came rushing back into his mind.

The woman asked bluntly,

“Or would you rather go join your family?”

Kaian was so furious it felt as though his heart were being torn from his chest.

Unable to contain his rage, a howl erupted from deep within his stomach.

“AAAAAAAH!”

That was when it happened.

Turquoise mana began surging violently from Kaian’s left wrist.

The thick brass candlestick clenched in his hand began to melt.

—Hissss!

A strange light appeared in the eyes of the woman, Eldarin.

Oh? Turquoise?

The mana used by mages was broadly divided into three types.

Green for intellect.

Blue for creativity.

Red for willpower.

A staggering ninety-five percent of all mages used only one of these three types of mana.

Those who could use two or more types, known as multi-mana users, accounted for only five percent.

And the turquoise mana displayed by the child before her was a combination of intellect and creativity.

In other words, it was a combination possessed by three percent of those five percent of multi-mana users.

But Eldarin could see something else.

A red mana was writhing near Kaian’s heart, still completely beyond his control.

Could he have an aptitude for willpower as well?

The proportion of mages capable of using all three types of mana was a mere 0.5 percent.

At last, a genuine smile appeared on Eldarin’s face.

It has been seven hundred years since I last saw talent like this.

From the moment the human child had broken through Eldergrove’s barrier and entered the forest, she had suspected that he was far from ordinary.

But the talent Kaian possessed surpassed even Eldarin’s expectations by a considerable margin.

—Vrrrrr!

The space around them began to tremble.

A wave of intense heat erupted from Kaian, instantly scorching the air in the room.

—Crash!

The teacup on the bedside table shattered, and the thick oak floor began to blacken beneath the heat.

Eldarin, however, remained seated, watching Kaian with an expression of interest.

More precisely, she was watching the flames surging within his mental world.

That child forcibly manifested the rage filling his mental world in reality.

Magic was the manifestation of a mage’s mental world into reality.

To accomplish that, one needed a deep understanding of both one’s mental world and the physical world.

Yet the child before her did not even seem to be aware of his own mental world.

He accomplished it unconsciously? Impressive.

—Whoooosh!

Kaian’s eyes gradually became bloodshot before losing focus entirely.

Once the fragile hold he had maintained over his reason snapped, all that remained were the destructive and survival instincts from the moment he had burned down the forest.

Melted brass flowed down over Kaian’s hand.

“I’ll kill them… I’ll burn every last one of them…”

—Crack-crack-crack!

Eldarin casually waved a hand and knocked away the fragments flying toward her.

Dangerous.

But…

A faint, knowing smile appeared at the corner of her lips.

Overwhelming talent.

The child before her was not even aware of his own mental world, yet he had instantly converted the sorrow and rage within him into destructive energy.

With this child, I can awaken a true hero.

Eldarin finally made up her mind.

She raised her index finger and lightly pressed it against the air.

“[Calm down.]”

An immense pressure descended upon Kaian, as though an invisible giant had pressed its hand down upon the entire room.

—BOOM!

The flames that had been surging upward died down in an instant.

The trembling space became eerily still, as though nothing had happened.

The overwhelming difference in power caused Kaian’s knees to buckle.

“Khk!”

The hand he planted against the floor trembled violently.

As his reason returned, the pain came rushing back with it.

Eldarin rose silently from her chair and approached Kaian.

“Anger is undoubtedly a powerful force. But if you cannot control it, all it will do is hurt you.”

With a hand so white it seemed as though it might glow, she firmly grasped Kaian’s burned hand.

“Ugh!”

A chill flowed through their joined skin like a wave, cooling the heat that had accumulated within him.

Even his overheated head seemed to cool along with it.

Kaian lowered his head and breathed heavily.

A liquid that might have been tears—or sweat—fell onto the scorched floor.

—Drip. Drip…

Eldarin asked Kaian,

“Do you desire power?”

Kaian raised his head with a puzzled expression.

Eldarin’s inscrutable blue eyes stared directly into his.

What did she just ask? Does he mean… Do I want power? Is she not going to kill me?

Kaian lowered his head again.

Then he closed his eyes and focused on piecing together everything that had happened.

Cool your head. Think calmly.

Eldarin reduced the intensity of her mana so that he could think without being overwhelmed.

Kaian was so lost in thought that he failed to notice even this consideration on her part.

…The people who attacked us weren’t targeting some ordinary noble family. They attacked the Valentins.

The Valentin family was, without question, the emperor’s right hand.

Attacking a family like that was virtually the same as committing treason.

Whoever they are, they clearly aren’t afraid of the imperial family.

And that overwhelming barrage of resources…

It was far more than could have been prepared with ordinary wealth.

In other words, the people behind the attack possessed enormous financial resources while also standing at the true pinnacle of power within the empire—people who were not afraid of the emperor.

And those people had tried to eliminate the Valentin family, a household renowned for its allegiance to the emperor.

Why? Did we become an obstacle to them? Would they really go this far for something as simple as that?

But the most important thing was that they had failed to erase the Valentins from the world completely.

I survived. Do they know that?

Kaian had no intention of obediently disappearing into the shadows of history simply because that was what his enemies wanted.

The Valentins were the empire’s border and its shield.

A great symbol of magic that could never be allowed to fall.

He engraved deep within his heart who the ones that truly needed to disappear from the world were.

I will survive. No matter what.

And I’ll expose their true faces to the entire world.

But to bring down those who stood at the pinnacle of the empire, he would need power beyond anything ordinary.

I don’t know what that horned elf actually is… but one thing is certain. She’s powerful.

Now that his mana had awakened, he could sense it.

The mana emanating from her was far more profound and formidable than that of either his father or mother, both of whom had been hailed as the greatest mages in the empire.

And this place… Eldergrove, was it? It really does seem safe from the attackers.

More importantly, Kaian could sense no intent to kill him coming from the horned elf.

For now, that was enough.

Whether he could truly trust her or not was a question for later.

First, he needed to hide himself.

Then he needed to grow stronger.

Having made his decision, Kaian raised his head.

The woman was still staring at him with those strange, luminous blue eyes.

But there was no longer any hesitation in Kaian’s gaze as he stared back at her.

“I want power. I want to become strong. Strong enough to change this entire world…!”

As though that were exactly the answer she had been waiting for, Eldarin smiled.