TBULF 16

7. Baby Messenger, Jacob

“Hmph, how stupid. All of you, get lost! I don’t need any of you!”

At the same time, in a room at the far end of the third floor of Kairocen Castle.

Currently 10 years old.

The boy, Jacob Kairocen.

With white hair and gray eyes, he sneered sharply at his private tutor.

“Try applying the supernatural principle of mana flow to this structure, teacher. What kind of magical action and reaction is keeping our castle floating? You can’t even understand that?”

“Well, um… then perhaps we can discuss mana conductors—”

“I’ve already studied mana conductors in advance.”

“S-sorry…”

Unable to withstand Jacob’s pressure, the tutor left in tears.

Jacob clicked his tongue in disdain.

“They’re all idiots. Every single one of them. I don’t want to stay in a castle filled with idiots like that!”

He glared out the window at the garden where new sprouts had just begun to grow.

It was the very garden where his parents’ funeral had been held.

But the funeral was already over, and now the garden awaited only a clean restoration.

‘Uncle is erasing all traces of my father.’

Jacob turned his gaze away and muttered,

“I’ll disappear soon too. I don’t want to live surrounded by idiots who don’t understand formulas or magitech.”

He angrily scribbled equations over his precious math textbook.

Before he even finished speaking, the door creaked open.

It was a servant.

Unlike with tutors, Jacob wasn’t harsh with servants.

“What is it?”

“Ah, um… regarding what you mentioned to Lord Raphael—”

“Hah, another blueprint for that new annex?”

Jacob lazily took the blueprint.

‘How annoying. It’ll be nothing special anyway.’

But after a few minutes—

After examining the entire design, his eyes widened.

“W-what… what kind of insane design is this?!”

“The pillars are designed so that the lower they go, th-the less they can properly bear the load…! And it’s disguised so that no one but an expert like me would notice!”

For the pillars to support the roof’s weight, mana circuits had to be wrapped around the stone columns.

But if ten mana circuits were needed, the design cleverly distorted the truth to make it seem like only 9.9 were required…!

For ordinary people, this was like—

The pain of a mouth ulcer that won’t go away for ten days!
A mosquito buzzing in your ear every night for a week without dying!
A tiny pebble inside your shoe shifting around the entire time you’re hiking!

…a truly destructive act.

Jacob’s hobby was to harshly criticize any house blueprint he received and throw it straight into the trash.

But…

“I can’t let the one who made this malicious design go unpunished.”

Jacob gritted his teeth and clenched his fists.

He would never let them get away with this!

“How dare someone design something like this! Completely insane!”

When he first met the woman with tangled silver hair and gleaming violet eyes, Jacob had simply scoffed at her.

But the woman approached him and boldly introduced herself:

“Hi! I’m Serentia Rosemary. I’ll soon be your aunt.”

‘Hmph, I don’t care if you’re my aunt or whatever,’ he had replied—
to which she shot back, “Then call me big sister!”

It was absurd, but Jacob wasn’t the type to fall for such tricks.

He planned to ignore her and thoroughly tear apart her design.

But…!

“Right, it’s a completely insane design.”

“…?”

“Don’t let me off the hook, seriously!”

“W-what?!”

“This design—yes! It’s insane! But why are y-you admitting it first?!”

She had taken the initiative first!

“Well, that’s because I’m an idiot.”

“….”

Do adults usually say things like that?

Faced with this unknown being who openly called herself an idiot, Jacob’s eyes wavered like a candle in the wind.

Then Serentia spoke again, her tone strangely dark.

“So, genius math prodigy Jacob—will you teach me?”

“T-teach you…?”

Then this was a chance to show off his knowledge and give guidance…?

After calming his excitement, Jacob pushed up his silver-rimmed glasses and looked at her.

“I’ve long desired someone like me. Jacob, you should become my secret agent.”

“S-secret agent? What’s that?”

No matter how mature he tried to act, a ten-year-old couldn’t resist words like secret agent.

“It means working with me to design buildings. Jacob, if you evaluate whether the structure is sound from a magitech perspective, it would be really fun. What do you think?”

“You dare call me your secret agent and then ask me to help design buildings for free? I’ve never seen someone crazier than me!”

“Thanks for the compliment.”

Jacob’s eyes flashed.

“That is a compliment! People never understand when I say it!”

“I understand that it’s a compliment. Pretty cool, right?”

At those words, Jacob trembled slightly—

Then hesitated.

“…Still no. Get lost.”

Bang!

The door slammed shut loudly.

But Serentia had no intention of giving up.

If her future husband was a sly cat, and Lady Isidel was an elegant black panther, then Jacob was…

“A really cute snow leopard.”

A baby snow leopard with round glasses.

‘But he’s definitely prickly.’

Even more than the black panther.

Serentia chuckled, imagining herself petting the prickly baby snow leopard—

‘This isn’t the time to laugh.’

Just as she was about to smile, her vision blurred and her head spun.

A full day had already passed.

Which meant her life was once again in danger.

At the same time, in the northernmost region of the Kairocen territory.

A canyon once inhabited by giants of the snowfield, where blade-like snowstorms raged.

Raphael stood before it and slowly raised his hand.

From his fingertips, a blue flame flowed.

That sharp, sword-like aura sliced through the air—

Tap, crumble.

Even the smallest traces of monsters that had been writhing with life turned to ashes and vanished.

Anything touched by that blue light would inevitably die.

And then—

At some point, as the blue light flowed—

A voice echoed in his mind.

“Unrequited love…”