TRS 3

Chapter 3

Noah Hayworth was in a bad mood.

To be fair, it was rarer when he wasn’t, but let’s just gloss over that for now. Anyway, perhaps because of that, his concentration was off and things kept tangling up today.

It had been like this since he headed to the lab early in the morning.  was an unpopular major, so he was the only researcher, and visitors were rare, making it usually cozy and peaceful. But today of all days, there were people loitering in front of the door. Two of them, no less. His golden eyes narrowed.

“Um, excuse me, Hayworth. We’re from the Magic History lab. We heard you recently acquired a puppet magic tool estimated to be from the 600s, and we were wondering if we could take a look…”

“Ah, I’m Jamie Linden, and this is Anna Berman.” The two laughed awkwardly, gauging his reaction. However, they couldn’t hide their anxiously trembling eyes.

He scanned them up and down with his hands shoved in his pockets. Judging by their unfamiliar faces, they must be the new Apprentice Researchers sent over this year.

He was sick and tired of the History lab. Noah curled one corner of his mouth into a grim smile. At that, their expressions stiffened noticeably. Since his major was ‘Archeological’ Magic Tools, his job involved investigating the components and uses of old magic tools that flowed into the lab.

That meant the magic tools he painstakingly dismantled, analyzed, and reassembled were, from the perspective of those bastards, mouth-watering historical artifacts. Fine, that much was okay. It was common for research fields to overlap and for departments to cooperate, regardless of the discipline.

In the past, history researchers used to whine about taking magic tools out of the lab. Something about personal research or writing papers. Even back then, he had ‘kindly’ explained—from his perspective—that it was against the rules.

When they couldn’t take them out, they said they’d come often to look, so he let them be. Honestly, he was vehemently against it, but since the lab’s owner, Professor Theodore Sidfell, allowed it, he had no choice.

Instead, he warned them to look only with their eyes and not touch, but how many magic tools had those annoying gnat-like pests broken by touching them anyway? They seemed to think they could just take things apart as they pleased and use restoration magic, but magic was generally prohibited here.

Since most items were old and worn by time, they often couldn’t withstand the shock of careless magic and would just crumble away. Why did they think he did everything by hand? There was a reason for it.

His stomach churned as memories of discovering magic tools left in a disastrous state surfaced. Noah swept his messy hair back with a neurotic touch.

“Get lost.”

“Hu, huh?”

The two shrank back. With such a fierce-looking man who was also tall looking down at them, they felt intimidated without realizing it.

“I said get lost. Is the Magic Tools lab your personal museum or something?”

Actually, the inside of the lab was decorated quite like an exhibition hall, according to Professor Sidfell’s taste. Well, not that it was a real museum.

Perhaps the reaction was harsher than expected, as they stammered, unable to speak for a moment. Then, Anna, having recovered somewhat from the shock, looked up at him with defiant eyes.

“Professor Sidfell said it was okay to come and look personally whenever we wanted…”

She started bravely, but her voice grew smaller as if she couldn’t withstand his stinging gaze, eventually trailing off.

“Oh dear. The Professor is currently absent.”

“S-So?”

“What do you mean ‘so’? It means get the hell out right now.”

Noah walked past them, opened the door, and slammed it in their faces. He didn’t forget to lock it to keep them out. He thought he heard some grumbling, but the footsteps soon faded away.

Although the intruders who ruined the start of his day were annoying, there was actually someone else getting on his nerves. Professor Sidfell, who showed no signs of returning after more than a month.

He definitely said he was going to Orchen for a ‘short’ trip as a consultant for a magic tool auction, so what is he doing to be this late?

 He muttered under his breath, glaring at the empty air.

Thanks to that, he was incredibly busy with not just one or two things dumped on him. Turning the history researchers away at the door was also because he didn’t have time to supervise them while they looked at the magic tools. Of course, the fact that they were annoying and bothersome was a bigger reason.

Was that all? The new semester had started in the meantime, so he ended up temporarily teaching a two-hour lecture every Wednesday called ‘The Artistic History of Magic Tools’. Add his daily research and thesis writing to that, and a week would fly by in the blink of an eye.

After all that, Professor Sidfell would likely appear one day with an armful of all sorts of junk, acting as if nothing happened. Organizing and analyzing those would, of course, fall to him.

It had already been two years. Two years of being worked like a dog with the ‘Apprentice’ tag attached. Noah’s eyes turned fierce. It wasn’t that he was attached to the rank. The workload was manageable, so that was fine.

The problem was that if he didn’t get promoted by the end of this year, his researcher qualification would be automatically revoked. That was the Genios lab policy.

There were two review periods last summer and winter, but Professor Sidfell didn’t even pretend to watch him seriously. He just dropped by the lab casually whenever he pleased, giggling, then disappeared somewhere again.

Since he had shown more than sufficient results, it surely wasn’t because he didn’t meet the criteria. After all, he had written five papers just last year.

Every one he published was featured in renowned academic journals, and the one co-authored with Professor Sidfell was even selected as 4th place for ‘Paper of the Year’.

Thanks to that, they received more budget from the excited school, and a wealthy aristocratic sponsor whose hobby was collecting antique magic tools even attached themselves to them. Professor Sidfell, grinning from ear to ear because of it, kept trying to hug him, so he had a hard time avoiding him for a while. Besides.

Noah glanced around the lab, which was organized neatly enough to be satisfying. Just the spring before last, when he first arrived, this place was chaos itself.

Sure, installing glass display cases along the walls was fine. But why on earth did he shove magic tools with no commonalities or relevance into them disorderly? For the first half-year, he tried to ignore it, thinking he shouldn’t touch things carelessly, but it displeased him every time he saw it until it became unbearable.

“Ah, the display cases? I just put things in wherever there was space. You can do whatever you want with them.”

I asked cautiously, afraid of hurting his pride, but Professor Sidfell replied nonchalantly while wiping cookie crumbs from his mouth.

Seeing his blinking brown eyes that seemed to have no particular thought behind them, it didn’t seem like empty words. Since he got permission, Noah completely turned the lab upside down from that day on.

He took out all the magic tools displayed in the cases, classified them by type, dusted them off, and reorganized them by estimated production date. He didn’t forget to name each one and create a catalog.

His interest soon moved to the storage room where only rare and expensive magic tools were kept separately. Seeing the shelves packed tight and items about to touch each other with no spare space, his breath hitched.

Normally he would have decided more carefully, but gaining confidence after cleaning the other areas perfectly was the root of the problem. He succeeded in expanding the room by cautiously casting space expansion magic without breaking anything. Yes, up to that point, it was good.

The mistake happened when he had cleaned more than half of the storage room. To be precise, it was because of some unknown sticky liquid pooled on the floor.

Whatever the hell it was, just before he slipped on it, he instinctively grabbed the shelf. A cold chill ran down his spine. Because a loud crashing sound came from behind him.

Noah swallowed dry saliva and turned around. The ‘Weeping Lapis Lazuli Mermaid Statue’ that he had wiped and placed there just ten minutes ago was scattered in pieces.

“Shit.”

That was a work by ‘Rhinos Mickel’, who was renowned as a magic tool maker in the 700s. His head heated up in an instant, and his mouth went completely dry.

He gathered the debris and tried to restore it all night. However, the delicate magic on the magic tool was close to art containing Mickel’s unique craftsmanship, so it was impossible to reproduce. Thus, the elegantly weeping mermaid ended up spurting water from its eyes, which was enough to drive him crazy.

The next morning, as soon as Professor Sidfell arrived, Noah confessed his fault with a much paler face. He was prepared to humbly accept being kicked out of the lab, and planned to pay back the cost of the mermaid statue somehow even after that. However, contrary to his resolve, an unexpected reaction returned.

“Hey, it’s okay. That can happen. You’ve done more for me in the meantime. You don’t have to work today, so go get some sleep. You look like a mess.”

Noah blankly watched Professor Sidfell, who was making a fuss admiring the clean storage room. That was the first time he thought it wouldn’t be too bad to stay in this lab for a long time.

So he worked even harder, but not only was there no mention of promotion, even after becoming a second-year, the professor didn’t even ask about his future career path. Once it started bothering him, it kept lingering in his mind, making him annoyed. So he swallowed his pride and asked directly as soon as the new year dawned.

“Do I need to look for another lab next year? If so, please tell me in advance so I can prepare the application documents in time for the recruitment period.”

“Uh, about that.”

Professor Sidfell scratched his dark brown mop of hair and turned to look at him. That blank face, with his messy clothes, made it impossible to read his inner thoughts.

“You’ve been perfect beyond my expectations since day one, you know? Except for just one thing.”

“What is that?”

Since he had never heard that he was lacking anywhere, his tone became sharp for no reason. Professor Sidfell giggled for a long time as if something was so funny, then opened his mouth.

“Your misanthropy.”

 Noah snorted lightly. What the hell did hating people have to do with getting promoted? Even so, he had treated him, his advisor, with reasonable respect and politeness.

“A guy who’s only twenty-one shouldn’t live turning his back on the world already. You’re too wasted for that, aren’t you?”

Rebellious adolescent lines like “It’s my choice how I live” rose to his throat, but he chose not to spit them out. It felt slightly childish.

Furthermore, it wasn’t just once or twice that he got swept up in Professor Sidfell’s illogical sophistry while discussing topics other than academics. So he didn’t want to waste energy on something pointless.

“So, I came up with a brilliant idea. If you promise to do this, I promise to promote you at the end of this year. How about it?”

“I won’t tell you what it is beforehand,” he added teasingly, leaning back in his chair. Noah put down his tweezers and frowned. Seeing him this excited made it feel ominous. But he couldn’t refuse outright. The condition at stake was too attractive for that.

He looked down at the half-dismantled clock magic tool and fell into brief contemplation. The conclusion came quickly. Whatever it was, the desire to remain in the lab of his alma mater, which had become familiar and comfortable, was greater. And… Noah’s gaze turned to Professor Sidfell, who was grinning slyly. At this point, his relationship with his advisor was on the smooth side.

“If it’s something I can do, I’ll do it.”

“Ah, of course you can do it. I heard a spot just opened up because someone took a sudden leave of absence.”

Professor Sidfell grinned, showing his teeth.