Chapter 10

That Guy’s Voice (2)

After finishing the headache-inducing writing work, I left the lord’s castle on horseback with Lucis.

Since it was my first time riding a horse, I was rather tense, but it turned out to be simpler than I expected.

Seymour’s body must already be accustomed to horseback riding.

Just like with this world’s language, anything Seymour’s body had already learned seemed to come naturally to me as well.

Well, it is the same body, after all.

The horse must have been a fine steed too, since even without much effort on my part, it moved naturally in the direction I wanted.

Or maybe it’s mostly thanks to Lucis?

Lucis seemed delighted at experiencing horseback riding for the first time. With one hand, he clung tightly to the horse’s mane, and with the other, he kept gently stroking the horse.

“Clop, clop.”

– Neigh!

“Clop?”

– Snort!

It almost sounded like the two were having a conversation.

Every time Lucis’s hand touched it, the horse grew so pleased that it carefully adjusted its pace so as not to put any strain on him.

Apparently, animals really liked dragons—more than they liked humans, even.

Well, they’re both creatures. Maybe animals feel closer to dragons than to humans.

If it were me, and a massive giant came over acting gentle, I’d probably approach with curiosity too.

“Dragons are basically just giant lizards that evolved to be magically attuned…”

Unconsciously, I muttered the thought out loud.

“?!”

Lucis’s eyes went wide as he whipped his head around to stare up at me.

In those big, round eyes was the sharp pain of betrayal—like he was asking, Is that really how you see me?

Realizing I’d just made a terrible slip of the tongue, I quickly tried to recover.

“I mean, not just lizards—they’re tremendously great, godlike lizards…”

“?!”

Apparently, lizard was a banned word.

“No, no, what I mean is—like ‘li’terally ‘ma’gically perfect ‘serpents’ of legend—shortened to ‘lizard,’ you see…”

“?!”

“No, wait! It’s actually the snakes that resemble dragons, not the other way around. Dragons are the great beings that have existed since the dawn of time.”

“……”

The mighty dragon child silently stared at me, as if urging me to keep going.

“And… uh… you also have wings! And… a beautiful tail! And… um… well, honestly, you’re such an incredible existence that words just can’t do you justice.”

“Hmm.”

At last, Lucis gave a satisfied little nod and looked away.

Watching that small back of his head, I quietly sighed.

To think one careless word could spark such a huge reaction…

It was a lesson: around kids, I had to be very, very careful with my words.

I led the horse up a little hill near the lord’s castle.

It was a gentle rise with a few trees planted, the kind of place the young noble ladies of the domain sometimes visited to admire flowers.

Luckily, no one’s here today.

I dismounted with Lucis.

“Ooh…”

Lucis made a round “O” with his mouth as he eagerly looked around.

Come to think of it, this was probably the first time he’d been somewhere this close to nature.

“Flower.”

He noticed some blossoms at the base of a tree.

He toddled over and plopped down right on the ground.

Sia would scream if she saw this.

Sia, who acted as Lucis’s caretaker, had recently taken great delight in dressing him up in ever more elaborate dresses.

Elaborate, of course, meant ruffles and frills—meaning that sitting on dirt would ruin them instantly.

Not really my problem, though.

And that wouldn’t even be the end of her screaming.

“Mm…!”

In the middle of admiring flowers, Lucis suddenly shut his eyes tight and began to strain.

“Hhng…!”

Like he was trying to push something out.

Then his back and lower body swelled and—

Riiip—!

His dress tore open at the back as white wings burst forth.

A hole opened at his waist, and a tail slipped out.

After flexing his wings and tail a few times, Lucis wore a satisfied expression.

“Hmph.”

And then he sprawled right out on the grass.

Looked like he was planning to sun his wings and tail for the first time in a while.

“…Hm?”

After lying down with his chin on the ground for a moment, Lucis shifted restlessly, then suddenly brightened as he looked at me.

“Mm, mm.”

He patted the ground in front of him.

I sat down where he indicated. Luckily, a tree trunk nearby gave me something to lean on comfortably.

Lucis promptly half-climbed onto my lap, flopping down like laundry draped over a line—or like a cat sprawled out.

With his head and torso propped up, he exhaled deeply in contentment.

“Phew.”

I gently brushed aside the hair falling across his forehead.

His golden eyes met mine.

After gazing at him for a moment, I lifted my head and took in the view below the hill.

Sunlight filtering through the trees. A pleasant breeze. The fief stretching out in the distance. The small warmth and weight resting on my lap.

It was a perfect moment.

So this… is what happiness feels like.

It really had been a long time since I felt so at ease.

Right after falling into this world, I’d been too busy adjusting and struggling with the collateral family to rest.

Resting feels good.

Maybe this was the sort of overseas trip I’d always longed for, back before I worked myself to death.

Patting Lucis’s back, I savored the scenery for quite some time.

After resting, I turned to the real reason I’d come here.

I had left the castle and climbed this hill to practice magic.

Not that I strictly needed to do it somewhere so secluded.

But still…

I just didn’t like people trying to measure my level based on my mana. I wasn’t strong enough yet to show it off anyway.

First, let’s check the skill window.

As soon as I thought it, a glowing magical screen appeared before my eyes.

[Basic Gravity Magic] had increased by 1%.

I chuckled—probably thanks to that banquet incident.

All the more reason to train magic seriously.

I didn’t want to keep turning into a different person every time I used it. I didn’t want magic bursting out just because my emotions flared.

I needed to master it until it became fully mine.

And Seymour had a knack for rapid growth thanks to the contract.

He had reached 3 Stars in just a year.

In this game world, Stars represented a character’s level of power.

The system was borrowed from mobile games, where leveling characters was called star-raising. It basically tracked how many skills one had mastered.

Each skill mastered drastically raised your physical stats too.

Like how in mobile games, breaking character limits or transcending them increased both stars and overall stats.

Each new star was also considered a higher stage of mastery.

Seymour had mastered [Gravity Magic], [Human Experimentation], and [Artifact Efficiency], if I recall.

Even so-called geniuses usually needed about a year to master just one skill. Ordinary people could take ten.

Seymour’s meteoric growth had its reasons.

First was his contract with Mausoleum.

In the lore it was vaguely referred to as just “the contract,” but having become Seymour, I now knew its exact details.

The biggest growth advantage was the skill window itself.

Being able to literally see percentage growth meant he could always pick the most efficient methods.

That visualized progress gave him an enormous edge.

Second was Seymour’s personality trait: narcissism.

Narcissism. Self-obsession.

In short, he was full of himself.

At first glance it seemed like a mere character quirk to emphasize his decadence and arrogance, but in truth it hugely benefited magical growth.

The two most important stats for magic are mana and willpower.

By comparison, divine arts relied on faith and willpower—since both powers were rooted in prayer.

Divine arts prayed for gods to perform miracles, while magic prayed for oneself to wield the supernatural.

The willpower needed for magic often boiled down to belief in oneself. The stronger one’s pride, the firmer the will.

Take dragons, for instance. Even young hatchlings, with underdeveloped intelligence, can wield powerful magic—not only because of innate mana, but because their pride is astronomical.

That’s also why most mages tended to be eccentric or arrogant. As for Seymour—the embodiment of narcissism—enough said.

Third was his unusual training method.

This world did have the concept of gravity, understood simply as “the force pulling downward.”

But Seymour focused on the word “pulling.” He trained not only downward, but also upward, left, right, forward, and back, pushing and pulling in all directions.

This was even represented in the game as one of his attack patterns, blasting the protagonist in every direction.

He’d instinctively discovered the optimal way to train his “willpower muscle.”

In that sense, Seymour truly was a genius.

In the original, he had even used gravity like telekinesis, freezing arrows and spells midair.

Shall I give it a try?

With one hand still stroking Lucis, I reached the other toward a piece of fruit hanging from a tree.

Fly.

Since I’d already tried dragging a pigeon down to the ground, this time I attempted the reverse—pulling the fruit upward into the sky.

“……”

Rustle—.

The leaf above the fruit fluttered, but it was hard to tell if it was my magic or just the breeze.

I focused again, willing it.

Fly.

Still no reaction.

I clicked my tongue.

Well, just because I’m in Seymour’s body doesn’t mean I am Seymour…

I might have inherited what his body had trained, but not his mindset or philosophy.

Genius couldn’t be obtained through effort.

Could I at least train myself into narcissism?

After a moment’s thought, I shook my head.

No matter how handsome Seymour is, I can’t just fall in love with my own face.

Though, to be fair, no one could deny Seymour was the most handsome man in the Empire.

If I were a woman—and not possessing Seymour but some other woman’s body—I’d definitely have fallen for him.

Of course—since I’d personally spent weeks carefully designing him, it was only natural.

In this world, Seymour is the most handsome, and Lucis is the cutest. Even gods descending from heaven couldn’t argue that.

I nodded to myself several times.

In fact, their beauty might be so overwhelming it would send the gods fleeing back up to heaven…

And then—

Pop!

Whoosh—!

The fruit suddenly snapped off the branch and shot skyward with a burst.

“……”

I stared blankly at the fruit as it soared high into the sky before dropping nearby with a thud.

Slowly, I looked down at my own hand.

…Could it be?

No way… really?

“Am I… a genius?”

“?!”

Lucis, who had been sprawled across my lap sunbathing, jolted up in surprise and looked up at me.