The Berner Marquis family is one of the oldest and strongest magic families of the Hela empire.
If the Tardema family possessed the battle mage organization ‘Northanc’, the Berner family was in charge of publishing the Magical Journal, the single most-authoritative magic academic journals in the continent. Traditionally, the family was that of researchers.
The capital of Berner territory, ‘Beheran’, was not that far from Helarion. As such, Sibelius visited his father, Marquis Berner every weekend.
Marquis Berner laughed heartily after looking at his son’s grades report. He looked very proud as well.
“Hahaha, you were third, my son!”
“I’m sorry, father. I’ll definitely take first place next time…….”
“No. I’m very satisfied with you coming in at 3rd place. 2nd was the son from Junerheart family… and who is this first fellow?”
“He’s called Abel, and he’s ridiculous. He finished a spell in 5 seconds! I can never win against him in practice…….”
“Ha, is that so? That’s amazing… No +matter how fast his calculations are… Hm…….”
Berner was surprised by his son’s words. They were quite unbelievable
To him, his only son Sibelius was a precious child that he dearly cherished. He was born when he was in his 40s. Sibelius was also the only heir to the family.
Because of that, he was always worried when he thought about his son. His son listened to his words well, but his downside was that he trusted too much in people who flattered him. He was a pushover.
He was smart enough to be called a magic genius since young, but he had no eyes for people…….
But Berner believed that there will be a day his son would realize that.
“I want to see him once. Why don’t we invite him over?”
He was curious since it was his son’s friend, and also because he was curious about how he could cast spells that fast.
“Th, the thing is, I’m not close to him…….”
Berner’s suggestion drove Sibelius into a panic and he stuttered.
“Don’t you just need to get closer to him starting now”
“Yes…….”
To Sibel, his father’s words were absolute.
Humans are cunning creatures. They always have been. They treat others like nothing if they look nothing special, but once they rise, then people would flock. Like hyenas lurking round to see if there was anything to eat.
Abel was feeling exactly like that right now.
Now that he took 1st place, all sorts of people wanted to meet him.
“What’s this? You want me to join your club as well?”
Abel grumbled seeing Sibel in front of him.
(T/N: Anyone notice that Abel rhymes with Sibel…?)
Abel’s first impression of Sibel wasn’t that good. The two clashed at the school uniform store ‘Erite’. To be exact, it was Abel’s clash with Sibel’s right hand, Goel, but birds of a feather flock together.
‘You too?’
“Looks like Cain asked you first… If you didn’t join MARIO, then come to us MEAT.
We have meetings every day except weekends, and on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, we have discussions, while on Tuesdays and Fridays, we do actual practice. Also we can read the latest versions of the Magical Journal a week early when I ask my father. How is it?”
Sibel spoke about his club MEAT.
That was unexpected. Abel thought that he was going to offer an employment after graduation with the halo of the marquis family, but this was actually a pretty good deal.
“MEAT?”
“It’s an acronym for Magical Exploration & a.n.a.lysis Team. Cain, that p.r.i.c.k bought all of my members with money, and that reduced the members…. But we’re all eager, so try it out some time.”
MEAT, huh…… Yum.
(T/N: There is some missing translation here because the original club name is ‘majang-dong’ which stands for something else. Majang-dong is a place in Korea that is usually a.s.sociated with butchery. And there’s some episode about extortion and blackmail…)
‘Now I’m hungry again…….’
In any case, Sibel’s offer wasn’t that bad. Sibel looked unexpectedly(?) normal. He also liked the fact that he could try it out.
Now, he felt slightly different about him than when he clashed with Goel. You need to make good friends. The older generation always said that, and it was true.
“Okay, I’ll seek you out once. I can take another person, right?”
“Yeah, and do you mind coming over to my house and eating together once? My father wishes to meet you…….”
“Me? Why would he?”
Sibel’s father? Wasn’t he the Marquis? But why? Was it perhaps to erase his son’s compet.i.tor? He’s a marquis for G.o.d’s sake. He won’t do that, right……?
“Because your casting speed is so fast. He seemed to be interested in that…. He also wants to do an interview…….”
“An interview?”
“Oh, we publish the Magical Journal, and he wanted it to go there.”
“Do I get money if I do that?”
He was getting money from Reina, but it was slightly lacking if he wanted to eat meat 3 times a day.
“Hmm… probably?”
“Okay then! Where is it?”
“Come to the front gates of the Academy around sunset tomorrow,”
By this point, Abel was addicted to meat.
“Why do you want to follow? I’m really just going there to eat.”
Abel grumbled seeing that Reina didn’t want to leave him.
“Father told me that you couldn’t be left alone Because it’s dangerous.”
“That old guy… I said that I won’t cause trouble, and he can’t trust me a single bit.”
Actually, this had more to do with protecting the safety of the successor to the Duke rather than Abel causing accidents. Though, Abel seemed to be completely misunderstanding….
“Haa…. Okay, then. Act like you aren’t here, okay?”
It was a bit awkward since he was the only one invited, but it should be fine to bring another one along, right?
The two arrived at the front gate of the academy. Sibel was waiting in front of a large yellow carriage for 6 people.
“You’re here. But who’s that next to you? Your girlfriend?”
Sibel asked while looking at Reina.
Every, single, person, misunderstood Reina as Abel’s girlfriend.
“Just a friend…. Can I take her along?”
“Well, it doesn’t matter. Hop on! It won’t take long.”
In fact, the Marquis would probably like it if he took more people. He always like it when he brought friend home.
That was one of the reasons why Sibel took many people around
The golden carriage with 4-horsepower was very fast and comfortable, and it seemed that Sibel was right when he said that it wasn’t far, and they arrived quickly when they chatted.
The inner castle of Beheran wasn’t that much different from Sellion’s. Abel deemed that this was because they were both magic families.
When they entered a separate mansion, they could meet Marquis Berner, who was waiting for them after setting the table.
“Haha, nice to meet you. I’m Sibelius’s father.”
Marquis Berner extended his hand to Abel.
“Nice to meet you too, sir. My name is Abel.”
Said Abel as he grabbed that hand.
“You should be hungry after your journey here. Make yourselves comfortable.”
While dining, their main topic of conversation was about Abel’s life in the academy, and unlike Abel’s expectations, he felt that the Marquis was quite the gentle person.
After dinner, Abel had a private tea time with Berner as Berner had requested.
When Abel drank a sip, Berner spoke up first.
“Haha, I heard a lot from Sibelius. I heard your casting is very fast… what is your secret?”
“If I told you that I can calculate quickly… you won’t believe me, would you?”
Obviously. Although Berner looked ordinary, he was a high-cla.s.s 7-circle mage.
“I am also confident when it comes to casting speed, but from what I heard from Sibel, that kind of speed… is impossible.”
“Actually… I used a bit of mathematics.”
“Mathematics? Do you mean the study of numbers?”
This subject really doesn’t seem that familiar to the people of this world.
“Yes. First….”
“Whoa! I cannot understand all of what you’re saying, but that is a very interesting story! Why don’t you try publishing it through out Magical Journal? I will pay decently for your ma.n.u.scripts.”
“The ma.n.u.scripts?”
Gulp.
Thinking that he could eat late-night meals every day, Abel gulped subconsciously.
“Instead, you will exclusively publish them through our journal.”
“Well, okay. Then can I ask for something as well?”
Actually, the ma.n.u.script fees were one thing, but he wanted something else after looking at the castle.
“What is it? Just tell me.”
“You had a lot of research materials, as well as magical records. Can you lend me the books about s.p.a.ce and time?”
He had already read through the books that Kyle had sent over. The only useful thing there was Kyle’s research about the dimensional gate that summoned Abel.
The part about mana was quite complicated, and it seemed as though he would never understand unless he had enough insights of an 8-circle mage.
As said before, the Berner family is a magical research family. The quality of their books should be better than the ones at Tardema.
“Books about s.p.a.ce-time, huh… Haha. Sure. I’ll sc.r.a.pe even the published papers and send them over to you.”
It wasn’t that hard for Berner to do that.
Actually, Berner didn’t know what kind of effects this contract would bring to the Magical Journal and the field of magic as a whole…….
-Oh my word! I cannot believe this, but I cannot deny it either!
-What in the world… this is the best discovery since the apocalypse.
-History will split in two starting today. Before this discovery, and after this discovery…….
-How unfortunate… How unfortunate that I was born before this journal.
-It will take a lot of time for this to sublime into the world, but this is a revolution that will drag technology by ten thousand years.
Not to mention the field of magic, the entire world was flipped over. This was thanks to one paper on the Magical Journal. The discovery of 0 and its uses.
Hela empire said that it was written by a student at the academy,
but this might as well be used as a textbook instead.
However, this was just the beginning…….