Irium

"Perhaps I do." I answered, looking directly in his eyes. Since he usually didn"t react much, I had figured that I needed to keep a close eye on his features to pick up small hints of things. Maybe I didn"t need to do that though.

"In that case, do you know how to use mage-craft?" He asked then.

"I don"t, for now." I answered.

"Why is that?"

"Just before coming here, I had found out about the existence of mage-craft through a letter addressed to my dad that I got a look at."

"…" He stayed silent for a bit to that. And as that gave me a moment to think, I realized something.

"W-why!" I questioned myself – why was I so casually answering his questions. Yes, I was very intrigued by the fact that he was also someone who knew about the existence of mage-craft. But that doesn"t mean I could just answer his questions without any holding back. In fact, that should have put me more on guard.

"Oh that? I was using mage-craft to make you talk so I didn"t have to deal with any ha.s.sle." He said and returned to thinking about things.

"…" I was speechless. At that moment, I didn"t know how I should look at that boy. And he continued without caring about that confusion of mine.

"I suppose that means your father is a mage but he keeps it a secret from you. There can be quite a number of reasons he would do that but since it"s you, it"s probably a pretty generic reason."

"…" And while I thought I would be able to respond to whatever he said next, that didn"t happen either.

"You have any idea why he keeps it a secret from you?" He gave me a look as he asked me so.

"I think it"s because he mage-craft might be dangerous in some ways and he doesn"t want me to mess with it." I gave him the reason that seemed to make the most sense to me.

"It"s mage-craft, not LPG.��� He said sarcastically. "Though I guess the world of mages IS a pretty dangerous one. He might be trying to keep you away from it."

He surmised, putting a hand on his chin, "As I suspected, that"s a pretty predictable and boring reason."

By that point, I had forgotten why I even wanted to talk to him in the first place. It had started to feel like only he had things to ask and I was there merely to answer.

"By the way, your surname is Glice, isn"t it?" He asked. "What"s your father"s name?"

"Kaylith Glice."

He narrowed his eyes as he looked at me. "Hmm, I think I have heard that name before."

"S-so," I finally tried to ask something from my side, "you are a mage too?"

"Well, duh!"

It didn"t take him much effort though to destroy my line of conversation and get back to his.

"How much do you know about mage-craft?" He asked.

"Well, I know that it exists, and that it"s really cool. Aaannndd~ that"s pretty much it!"

"…" He looked at me with deadpan eyes.

Feeling uncomfortable because of that gaze, I said, "So I don"t know much about it, that doesn"t matter. I will soon learn the things I don"t know."

"How?"

"I-I could use the books my father has on mage-craft."

"I don"t think he would give you permission to read them, would he?"

He was right. Of course my father, who had did his best to not let me find out about mage-craft in the first place, would not have given me permission to pursue more knowledge about it.

"You plan on reading them sneakily?"

"Perhaps I do." I said.

He looked at me and sighed, then said, "You won"t be able to make heads from tails and will only end up doing something stupid."

I was about to retort but he took out a book and handed it to me.

"Read it. It"s the basics." He said.

"W-why are you helping me?" I asked.

"I am not really helping you." He said. "I am just trying to have contact with as many powerful people as possible. Since you can potentially become someone powerful as well, I am just doing what I need to."

That made sense. That made complete sense. And I was completely fine with it too. If helping he become a powerful mage would be beneficial to him, then so be it. Or so I had thought.

*****

After I gave her that book, we parted ways. We deliberately tried to avoid each other for the rest of the camp. We did so to make sure the rumors that had a chance of spreading about the two of us dating or whatnot don"t spread. Sadly, that didn"t work out and they still spread anyway. Because we didn"t keep in contact though, they died down pretty quick. Though, I have to say, for the brief period of time that they were around, they were the most annoying thing in the world to deal with.

But in any case, after the half-yearly exams were over, I finally decided to meet with her again. Since I was trying to bring about her potential as a mage, I couldn"t just let the knowledge of basics be all that she knows. I needed to give her more to study.

Trying to meet with her in a way that didn"t stir up a lot of trouble though was hard. She was someone who was near the top of the social hierarchy after all. She was always surrounded by friends and admirers. Since I was at the bottom of hierarchy, it was hard for me to meet her secretly. Therefore, I decided to use the one aspect of her life I had a little knowledge about.

"Um, h.e.l.lo!" I greeted the woman who opened the door when I knocked. It was the door to the house of Glice family.

"h.e.l.lo, and who might you be?" With so much politeness that I thought I was looking at a fictional character, the lady who I a.s.sumed to be Grimma"s mother, and in fact was Grimma"s mother, asked.

"I, well, am the big brother of a friend of Irium"s."

From our meeting in the princ.i.p.al"s office, I remembered the thing about her loving spoiling this brother of her.

"I had to return a book he borrowed from Irium."

As I said that, the woman called Irium, and soon enough, a 6-7 year old little twerp came to the door. He was confused as there obviously was no brother of mine who had taken any books from him.

But I used the opportunity I got to hand him the book and whisper in his ears, "Don"t tell your mother that I am lying about this book borrowing story, okay? Grimma, your big sister, wanted you to give this book to you but didn"t have the money to so I am doing her a favor."

He t.i.tled his head to the side and asked, "Are you a friend of sis?"

"Yes, indeed I am. And if you would, please tell her to meet me sometime soon, okay?"

To that, he happily nodded.

If only he would be half as cute now as he was back then, I might even consider letting him in all my plans. Hah! Well, with how the things stand now, that"s not going to happen.

*****