RAC

Chapter 17 – A Fire-Magic Tool

Quiet, ordinary days went by for a good while after that. I practiced magic and trained on every one of them, and I think I have got considerably stronger. My mana capacity has climbed a long way too. I don’t intend to get comfortable about it, though; I mean to keep pushing. I have never fought a monster or a knight, so I have no idea how strong I actually need to be. Well. It’s hard to see how being stronger could hurt.

I was living days like that, and the first real signs of winter were coming in, when Marie caught a cold. There are no thermometers in this world so I can’t be sure, but from the feel of her forehead the fever was high. Her breathing was rough and it clearly hurt.

The fever came on last night, and by this morning it hadn’t gone down at all. If anything it felt higher. I was badly rattled. Medicine in this world is a long way behind, and even an ordinary cold might turn into something that kills her. And if it wasn’t an ordinary cold but something worse, it might not be curable at all. We had been giving her medicine bought from the apothecary and it wasn’t doing anything I could see.

“Marie, are you all right?”

“…Big Brother. I’m all right.”

She answered with no strength in her voice and her face pulled tight. She ate nothing last night and nothing this morning either. What do I do. Is there anything I can do. And I know nothing about medicine… Ah, everything I learned in Japan is useless here! Somebody should have told the version of me back there to stop messing about and study something. Shouting it at him now doesn’t put it in my head.

What I can do… Wait. Healing magic! I have only ever used it on injuries, but I have wondered whether it might work on illness. I decided to test it on myself first and went through to the living room.

Right. When you cast Heal you picture the healing clearly and pour mana into the injured place. Except that with an illness I don’t know where to pour it.

Which means what, pour it through the whole body? I covered myself in healing-attribute mana to see. And suddenly I could feel the state of my own body as clearly as if I were holding it in my hands. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with me, but if I do this to Marie, wouldn’t I be able to find what is wrong? And then heal that with healing magic. That might actually work!

Now that I had a way to help Marie I hurried up to the bedroom. She seemed to be asleep, though not comfortably. I stood beside her and covered her in healing-attribute mana, and I could feel it: in her nose, in her throat, somewhere down the windpipe, things that were doing her harm. Viruses, presumably. So I poured mana into those harmful things the way I would cast Heal, and they thinned away and thinned away until there was nothing left of them at all.

I stopped the flow of mana and looked at her. The strain had gone out of her face and the fever seemed to have broken. Healing magic is extraordinary. The mana cost is brutal, but it can cure sickness! My capacity has grown a long way, and that took very nearly all of it, which means this is probably beyond anyone else alive.

I looked down at Marie’s quiet sleeping face and thought, with everything in me, that I was glad to have this strange ability.

She slept about three hours after that, and the Marie who woke up was the usual one, full of energy from end to end.

“Morning! I’m better!”

She came down the stairs announcing it, at speed.

“Marie, are you feeling all right now?”

“Nothing hurts any more?”

“Uh-huh!”

“Come here a moment.”

Mom said it and put a hand on Marie’s forehead.

“No fever now. Oh, thank goodness. Are you hungry?”

“I’m starviiing!”

“There now. Lunch is just coming.”

“Really?! Yaaay!”

Watching all that, I felt the relief come up so hard my eyes went hot. Marie must have spotted it, because she came straight over.

“Big Brother, what’s wrong? Are you sad?”

“No. I got something in my eye. Thank you for worrying about me.”

“Does it still hurt?”

“It’s fine now. Shall we go and eat?”

“Uh-huh!”

Walking through to the living room with her, I was already thinking about how to keep Marie from catching cold again. She caught this one because the season turned and it got cold… Winter here doesn’t go as deep as a Japanese midwinter, but cold is cold. The nights and the early mornings especially. And apparently it snows occasionally.

Wealthy houses may have fireplaces. Commoner houses have nothing of the kind: you put on every layer you own and take your warmth from the kitchen. At night you pile on cloth and everyone sleeps in a heap to get through it. It would be strange if a person didn’t catch cold.

I was told a fire-magic tool is impossible because it melts the magic iron. But is there really no way to make one? I want a stove badly enough that it hurts. Magic practice and training have eaten my time and I haven’t been to Marcel’s in a while. Perhaps it’s time I went.

So a few days later, today, I am on my way to Marcel’s house. I may not be able to buy a magic tool myself, but nothing starts until the thing exists.

I can do a passable stove with fire magic and wind magic on my own, but it eats mana, and keeping it going takes concentration and wears me out.

“Marcel, it’s been a long time!”

I opened his door and called into the house. A voice came back from the depths of it telling me to come in, so I went straight through to the workshop.

“Good afternoon, Marcel.”

“Been a while, Leon.”

“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to come.”

“No matter. So what brings you today?”

“I came because I want to work out a fire-magic tool. Winter’s coming, and it’s cold enough that I want one badly.”

At which Marcel turned to me with a slightly rueful look on his face.

“Everyone says exactly that when winter comes on, and starts researching fire-magic tools. But a fire-magic tool won’t work, Leon. The magic iron can’t take the heat.”

“So I’ve heard. Which is why I’d like to put some proper thought into it. I might come up with something.”

I sat down, set a magic stone and a piece of magic iron in front of me, and started thinking about what would make a fire-magic tool work. A magic tool works by fitting the magic stone into the magic iron, which makes the magic built into the stone manifest. And it manifests from the stone. Water comes out of the stone in a tap. The stone glows in a light orb. Wind comes off the stone in a blower. With fire magic, fire comes out of the stone, and the magic iron can’t survive it. That’s the failure.

How do I get around that… Wrap the magic iron near the stone in some kind of insulation? Except what would insulation even be in this world? Hmm. Earth or stone are all I can think of. And if I packed earth around the magic stone, how would I hold it there? Earth is also, frankly, dirty. Magic tools are things nobles use, so it would never be accepted. Which leaves stone, and working stone is far too much trouble, and stone is heavy.

So insulation is out… Or rather, more than that: the magic stone has to be in contact with the magic iron, so however much insulation you pack around it, the heat comes straight through at the point where they touch. No. Insulation is dead.

Some other approach, then. What is there? It would be simple if the fire manifested somewhere away from the magic iron.

Hmm…? Hold on. The ice maker I built. Didn’t that make wind magic manifest away from the stone? It did! So couldn’t fire do exactly the same thing?!

How did I never notice? I had it fixed in my head that magic from a magic stone comes directly off the stone. When I built the ice maker my whole attention was on getting ice out of it and I never saw what I was doing. I want to try it right now!

“Marcel! Magic from a magic stone manifests directly from the stone, doesn’t it?”

“Obviously it does. It’s a magic stone.”

“But when I built the ice maker, I had wind magic manifest away from the stone.”

“You did use wind magic. Wasn’t it blowing out of the stone?”

“No! It came from the middle of the box and from the outside of it. Away from the stone.”

“Surely not… Can that be done? And yet, now that you say it. How has nobody noticed…”

“It’s a fixed idea. The things you’ve assumed are the things you can’t see. So, may I try it with fire?”

“Aye. Go on.”

I started by reshaping the magic iron. I wanted a stove, and if I made the body of the stove out of magic iron the body might melt, so I made the magic iron a single thin plate with a socket for a stone in the middle. Then I set into the stone a small Fireball, to manifest about thirty centimeters above the plate.

I fitted the stone into the iron, and a Fireball appeared, properly, thirty centimeters up in the air. Success! I had been thinking that if the magic iron melted anyway I could put stone or something in between, but heat goes upward, so it seems to be fine as it is.

“Marcel, it works! Now if we put an ordinary iron grille or something round the outside, it’s finished!”

“What?! It genuinely works… Leon. To have the thing we all gave up on made in front of me, and made this easily… Well. It’s you. I shall have to accept that…”

What is that supposed to mean?! I’m not that far outside the normal! Marcel had started off astonished and was working his way steadily toward exasperated.

“I’m not that far outside the normal! But this is going to make life much easier.”

“That it is… though it may be better not to file this one with the royal palace.”

“Why not?”

“The ice maker drew a good deal of attention as it was. Add a fire-magic tool on top of it and it will draw far more still, and somebody will certainly go digging. Likely enough somebody will get as far as you. You would rather not stand out, would you?”

“That’s true… but would it really attract that much attention?”

“Of course it would! In the several decades since anyone started making magic tools, only four have ever reached the market. Four. Register several inside a single year and of course you will stand out!”

Ah… Put that way, perhaps not registering is wiser. Except, hold on. In the ice maker I already made wind manifest away from the stone, didn’t I?

“Marcel, in the ice maker I already made wind manifest away from the stone. Isn’t it only a matter of time before somebody notices that?”

“Ngh… Aye, that’s so. The ice maker I built for the registration has already been handed over, so somebody noticing is only a matter of time.”

“Then wouldn’t it be better to register the fire-magic tool as well, before somebody else gets there first?”

Marcel sat with that for a while and then gave me a reluctant nod. He had worked it out, I think: once anyone realizes magic can manifest away from the stone, it comes to the same thing anyway.

“Very well. We register this time. But this is the last! From here on, once you have a position of your own, you file them yourself.”

“Yes, I will! And, um, could I keep one of these for myself? It occurred to me that I can’t buy magic tools because I’m not a noble, but you can, can’t you?”

I had taken Marcel at his word when he said he couldn’t sell me anything, because every magic tool goes to the royal magic tool workshop. But there are magic tools in Marcel’s own workshop.

Which made me think that even if I couldn’t buy from Marcel’s workshop, one could presumably be bought at the royal workshop or at a magic tool shop. A commoner couldn’t buy it. A noble could.

“Well. Aye, that’s so. I can’t sell you anything out of my workshop, true enough. But there’s nothing to stop me selling you something I bought at a magic tool shop. That way there’s no difficulty.”

“I knew it! Then could you buy me just the stove?”

“Aye, that’ll do.”

Yes! I’m getting a stove! Marie won’t catch cold, and none of us will be shivering under a pile of heavy cloth!

After that I made the magic-tool parts of a cooking range and a water heater as well, and drew rough plans for the parts that would be ordinary iron. If we were going to register anyway, I thought, I might as well build every fire-magic tool I could think of. Marcel will take the tools and the plans to a workshop he favors, and they will finish them there. Then he will take the finished articles to the royal palace to register. He promised to secure my stove for me too.

“Once all of this is registered I’ll put the money into your account while I’m about it. I’ll take the cost of the magic tool out of it.”

“Yes! Thank you very much! Ah, that reminds me. When I looked at my account the other day there was more in it than the figure you gave me. Why was that?”

“That was a payment for having found a new use for water magic. That’s the difference.”

“They pay for that too? Thank you for passing it all on!”

“I wasn’t the one who discovered it. It’s yours by right.”

He could perfectly well have kept quiet and taken it, and instead he handed it over. Marcel really is a good man. I must have been grinning at him like an idiot, because he apparently found it embarrassing and abruptly started throwing me out.

“Leon, isn’t it about time? You had best be getting home.”

He was flapping a hand at me, go on, off with you.

“Yes, yes. I’ll head home, then.”

I said it with a wry smile of my own, left Marcel’s house, and started walking slowly back toward ours.

A few days after that I went to Marcel’s house and found the stove, the cooking range and the water heater all finished.

“They’re done already!”

“Aye, and registered. There was a nasty moment when they doubted I was really the one developing them, and then an instruction came down from above and it went through at once. Leon. Do you have connections in the upper reaches of the royal palace?”

Marcel fixed me with a long, suspicious stare. I don’t have an acquaintance in the royal palace, and in any case the only nobles I know are the Townsends.

Ah. Although, wasn’t Lord Richard working at the royal palace? Well, I don’t really understand it, and if it got registered, what’s the harm.

“I’m not really sure, but perhaps House Townsend? Anyway, it got registered, so surely that’s all right.”

“Wait! You have connections not only with Lord Frederick but with the whole of House Townsend?!”

“Hm? Didn’t I tell you? I was invited to the mansion the other day.”

“Invited to the mansion?! That is…”

Marcel muttered away under his breath after that. Something about how, as abnormal as I am, of course they would take an interest. Something about whether I was useful material to the Townsend camp. Eventually he seemed to make his peace with it.

“Never mind. Where you’re concerned, the less deeply I think, the better. In any case it’s registered, so I’ve put fourteen platinum coins and five gold into your account, with the price of the stove taken out.”

Something about that does not sit right with me, but arguing that I am not abnormal would carry no weight coming from me, so I let it go.

“Thank you. I’ll check it later.”

“Do that. And how do you mean to get the stove home? Shall I lend you my handcart?”

“I’d be very grateful if you would! I’ll bring it back tomorrow.”

So I borrowed Marcel’s handcart, loaded the stove onto it, threw a cloth over the top and went home.

“I’m home! Dad, could you give me a hand?”

“Welcome back. What’s the matter, Leon?”

“This is heavy. Could you help me carry it inside?”

“Of course, but what is it?”

“It’s a magic tool. This one we can actually use at home.”

The words magic tool stopped him where he stood. As far as he knows, magic tools are things nobles have. I would like a great many more of them in this house, but the cooking range can’t be installed without rebuilding the kitchen, so that’s out. Nobody will do the installation work for a commoner’s house.

Flush toilets and running water are out too, because in the central district they work off a sewer system and we have none. The bath is the same, and on top of that there’s nowhere to put a tub.

Marcel’s workshop has magic tools installed, but the state apparently ran a sewer line to it by special exception. I am extremely envious.

I did once think I could make a purification tool by setting Purification into a magic stone, and when I asked Marcel it turned out not to be feasible. Purification eats a great deal of mana, and putting it into a magic tool doesn’t make it cheaper. Cleaning a toilet once would drain a fully charged magic stone and want it charged twice more on top. That’s no use to anyone.

So magic tools in my house are more or less impossible across the board. A stove, though, works anywhere you put it and needs no building work, which means it works in my house! And Mom and Dad can charge it. I would love to fill the place with magic tools and make it convenient, but that is asking for too much. Being able to use a stove at all is plenty to be grateful for. Though I would still rather like to be a noble. It looks more convenient.

I had got that far in my head when Dad finally came out of his astonishment.

“A-a magic tool, that’s the thing nobles use, isn’t it? Why do you have one, Leon?”

He asked it quietly. So it is better if people don’t know we have a magic tool. It could be stolen, too. We’ll use it in the living room and the bedroom.

“I’m friendly with Marcel, so I was able to get hold of one. Marcel makes magic tools, remember?”

That seemed to satisfy him. Between the nobles I know and everything else, he is gradually getting used to it. Mom and Dad both have a way of deciding not to think too hard about me.

“Well then, let’s get it inside quickly.”

“Yeah!”

Dad and I decided to put it in the bedroom for now. Mom was astonished by the magic tool as well, and seemed to settle once Dad told her Leon had brought it home. I am not sure whether to be pleased that this now settles matters. Well, never mind. Marie didn’t seem to have much idea what a magic tool was, but she was delighted about it being warm.

That night, in the bedroom, I taught Mom and Dad how to use it, and the image to hold while charging it.

“The image when you put the mana in is a small Fireball, made about thirty centimeters above the magic stone.”

They’re both fire attribute, so I expected them to manage it right away. But their mana capacity is low, and nothing came.

“Leon, Mom and Dad haven’t much mana, you know? Neither of them can make a Fireball at all.”

Ah… That does make it harder. But if I taught them the idea of oxygen and drilled the imagery, mightn’t they get there? That image cut my own mana cost enormously.

So I explained oxygen to Mom and Dad and had them practice sharpening the image as far as they could. I was nervous at first, expecting to be asked how on earth I knew such a thing, and when I said I had read it in a book at the noble’s mansion they accepted it instantly. That excuse is convenient. I expect I’ll be using it again.

“Does that make some sort of sense?”

“A little of it, I think. Though what does Mom do with it, sweetheart?”

“I can’t believe any of that is going to let Dad make a Fireball.”

“Let’s just try it! It’s dangerous in here, so let’s go out to the courtyard.”

So the three of us went out to the courtyard. Marie had worn herself out and fallen asleep while we were talking.

“Right, make a Fireball with that image. A little way off your palm, and picture it small.”

They both tried it, gingerly, and they both produced a small Fireball. Amazing! The image really is what matters. If this method spread, the strength of magic in this world would rise a long way. It might make our enemies stronger too, though, so I need to be careful with it.

“Leon, you’re amazing! Mom really can do it!”

“Thank you, Leon. It’ll be useful about the house, and it’s a way of defending ourselves.”

“I’m so glad it worked! I think you can charge the magic tool now, so come back and try!”

We went back to the bedroom and both of them put mana into it, and both managed without any trouble.

“Now we can sleep warm whenever we like.”

“Oh, that is a joy. Mom used to wake in the night all winter, it got so cold.”

“And it should stop us catching colds.”

I was glad they were both so pleased.

“But this is better kept from the people around us. The magic tool, and that way of using magic as well.”

Mom said it with her face gone rather serious.

“The magic especially. That could change a great deal. Leon, you mustn’t teach that to people lightly.”

They’re right, of course. If I spread it, it will be when I can admit to every attribute.

“I know. Will you two keep it secret as well?”

“As if Mom and Dad would ever say a word that put you in danger.”

“That’s right.”

“Mom, Dad. Thank you.”

I think the two of them have noticed by now that I am not the Leon I was. And they say nothing, and go on loving me exactly the same. It makes me happier than I can say. I’ll be careful not to put my family in danger. And I’ll build the strength to protect them. That was what I decided.

We ended the conversation there, turned the stove on and went to bed. The room was warm and the bedding was warm and I dropped straight into a deep sleep. Stoves really are the best…

Chapter 16 – The Monster Forest and Attack Magic

Things had been hectic for a while on account of Lady Martine’s visit, and at last ordinary life came back to us. So I decided to read the history materials Lord Frederick had lent me, and took them through to the living room.

The book was an account of the last several decades. They weight recent history heavily, then. I read on, and what I found was a rough stretch of it.

Up until a few decades ago this world was fighting a war on a very large scale. Then, around twenty years ago, the king of this Kingdom of Lathlasia annexed every nation that had designs on expanding its territory, concluded ceasefires with the rest, and brought the world to peace. For a time the mood was one of celebration. And then, almost immediately, the monster forest appeared. Now the knights stand against that instead, and hold back its advance. There is a great deal of detail in the book, but broadly, that is what it says.

What is the monster forest… For a start, there are monsters in this world? And if they are holding back its advance, that means it is spreading, doesn’t it? At what rate? And where is it, come to that?

There isn’t nearly enough here for me to work any of it out… I want to ask somebody who knows. The best-informed person I have access to would be Lord Frederick. He’s a knight, so he should have the current picture. I’ll ask him the next time I can get hold of him.

That was as far as I could take it, and there was nothing to be done about any of it now, so I shut the book on the vague uneasiness it had put in me and went to help set up for the dinner service.

Quiet days followed for a while after that. I thought up magic tools at Marcel’s, helped at home, went to the forest with Marie and Nikola and Luke, made the rounds of the food stalls, and studied the history book.

And the weather, which had been on the chilly side when I was first reincarnated here, turned hot enough that a long stretch outdoors became genuinely unpleasant.

All through those ordinary days, the monster forest stayed lodged in my head. I asked Marcel about it, and he knew nothing beyond what was in the book and had nothing current on it either. When Marcel was a student it does not seem to have been much of a problem yet.

I wanted to ask Lord Frederick, but I didn’t have the nerve to present myself at the ducal house uninvited, so all I could do was wait for him to come to us.

I spent a good many restless days like that, and at last Lord Frederick came into the restaurant.

“Welco… Lord Frederick! You’ve come at last!”

“What? Leon, what’s got into you? Did you need me for something?”

“There’s something in the history book I very much wanted to ask about, and you weren’t here, so I had no way of asking…”

“That was my fault, then. I’m sorry.”

Lord Frederick gave a wry sort of smile. Oh no… I’ve been wanting to ask about the monster forest for so long that I came out sounding as though I were blaming him. He’s under no obligation whatsoever to come and see me…

“I-I’m sorry! That came out with more force than I meant…”

“It’s quite all right. I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner. You’re right that you ought to have some way of reaching me.”

And he handed me a coin, a rather large one, with something like a crest cut into it.

“What is this?”

“Proof that you are connected to the ducal house. Show it to the gatekeeper and give your name and the name of whoever gave it to you, and they will let you in. Then you can leave a message with Alban, or anyone.”

Isn’t this a pretty big deal?! Am I allowed to have it? I’m a little scared just holding it…

“May I really accept something this important?”

“You may. Only take care not to lose it. I’ll have your name and description passed to the gatekeepers, so even if somebody else picked it up, they’d be very unlikely to get any use out of it.”

“I’ll be absolutely careful not to lose it!”

If there is one thing in the world I must not lose, this is it. It goes in the back of my purse and stays on me.

“Now then. What was it you wanted to ask?”

Which was the moment I realized I hadn’t shown Lord Frederick to a table yet!

“I-I’m so sorry! Please, take a seat first! Will you be having lunch?”

“Ah, thank you. Then I’ll take lunch first.”

By the time Lord Frederick had finished eating, the other customers had gone and the lunch service was over. Mom and Dad said we could use the restaurant, so the two of us stayed there to talk.

“So. Was there something you couldn’t follow?”

“Yes. I was reading the book and the monster forest caught my attention. What is the monster forest?”

“The monster forest…”

The moment I said the words, Lord Frederick’s face went hard. Then he looked down, as though assembling his thoughts, and after a while he spoke.

“The monster forest is not an ordinary forest. It is a forest that monsters live in, and the plant life in it is nothing like an ordinary forest’s.”

“Monsters? What are monsters?”

“Yes. A monster is an animal that can use magic. A weak one even an ordinary commoner can put down; a strong one takes several knights together. They’re a considerable nuisance.”

“Where is the monster forest?”

“At the eastern edge of this country. Two weeks by carriage from here, at least. Monsters will never reach the royal capital, so there’s no cause to worry.”

Animals that can use magic. That sounds terrifying… Lord Frederick says it’s far away and we’re fine, but are we really?

“The book said the knights are holding back the monster forest. Doesn’t that mean it’s spreading?”

“Well… it does spread, yes, but the knights cut the trees back and cull the monsters along its edge at regular intervals, so it’s all right. The force spreading it and the force holding it are about even.”

He said that, and put on a smile that had a faint smell of a lie about it. It would have fooled an ordinary child. It isn’t going to fool me. It might be that the force spreading it is the stronger of the two… and if it is, then the places where people live are being swallowed a piece at a time.

I want more information. But Lord Frederick doesn’t look likely to tell me any more, and there may be restrictions on it. A general panic would be its own disaster.

Except that if villages or towns are being swallowed, how are they concealing it? Move people out first with some plausible reason, then close the area off? Well. Nothing I can settle by thinking about it now… What it does mean is that this, too, is something I have to gather information on.

I don’t know whether there’s anything I can do. But I’ve got every attribute, so raw ability is the one thing I do have. For now, then: train hard, and make that ability count for something.

“Lord Frederick, thank you for explaining. If the knights are holding it back for us, then that’s a relief.”

I said it with a nice childish smile, the reassuring kind. Better to look as though I have noticed nothing. If this got taken as Lord Frederick letting something slip, it would land on him.

Even after he had gone, I went on turning the conversation over. So there are monsters here. I had thought there was very little in this world that could threaten anyone, so I have never once practiced attack magic. From now on I ought to.

I can use every attribute, so combining them might give me some genuinely strong attack magic. I should have picked up a way of defending myself long before this. Whenever I have the time, I’ll go into the forest alone and practice.

And my mana capacity grows the more I use it. Marcel said the capacity you are born with never changes, so that appears to be mine alone. Another strange ability I have no explanation for, but since I have it I had better make it work for me. All the more so now that I know what is out there. Magic practice in the forest, then. Let’s get to it!

I had got that far in my thinking when Marie’s voice arrived in my ear.

“Big Brother!”

I was so deep in it that being called made me jump clean out of my skin.

“Big Brother, what made you jump?”

“Nothing. Your voice just surprised me, that’s all.”

“Did it?”

Marie peered up into my face, puzzled.

“Yes, I’m fine. So what did you need?”

“Big Brother, did you forget?! Dad’s got things to do today, so we’re going shopping with Mom. We said this morning!”

“S-sorry! You did, didn’t you.”

I looked around, and Mom was standing there too, with the shopping basket in her hand.

“Leon, what are you doing lost in thought with a face like that? We’re going shopping.”

“R-right! Where’s the basket I’m carrying?”

“On the table.”

I grabbed it in a hurry and followed Mom and Marie out. I pushed everything I’d been thinking about into a back corner of my head, decided to concentrate on the shopping, and fell into step beside Mom.

A few days later, in the afternoon, I went out to the forest to practice magic. Not the fringe of it where I usually go with Marie and the others, but a little deeper in, an open patch near the river. Almost nobody comes out this far.

Now, where to start… I may as well get down what I actually know about magic. I crouched, found a fallen branch, and started scratching it out in the dirt.

Attributes first. Magic divides into six of them: fire, water, wind, earth, body strengthening and healing. Officially I am healing. In fact I can use all six.

Magic makes the phenomenon you picture happen, which means it cannot really be sorted into types. It changes with the strength of the image. But the range of magic available to you is fixed by your attribute, in that a water-attribute person cannot use fire magic. And as far as I know almost everyone says the name of a spell aloud when they cast, which supplements the image. You can cast perfectly well without saying anything, though.

The power of a spell rises with the amount of mana you put into it, which is why a person with little mana can only manage weak magic. But picturing the thing in fine detail cuts the mana cost enormously, so training the imagination should let even a low-capacity person manage something reasonably strong. Since I am working from knowledge I picked up in Japan, though, I don’t think anybody but me is doing that yet.

And mana capacity is fixed at birth, with me as the sole exception: the more I use, the more I have. More is better, so I may as well keep pushing it up while I’m at it.

That is about the whole of what I know. The image is what matters. So which spell should I practice first? If I am imagining a fight with a monster, then something with real offensive power. Fire, then. An arrow of fire. A Fire Arrow. That sounds cool! It ought to have more penetration than a Fireball, and hit harder. Let’s try it once.

I faced a large rock at the water’s edge, pictured an arrow of fire flying fast, and cast. One flew dead straight at the rock. Amazing! It worked!

Except that the arrow struck the rock and vanished. I looked at the rock: not a mark on it. Not enough power? I tried again, this time picturing it moving considerably faster. And again, not a mark.

Why not? It can’t be the speed. Was the rock simply too hard…? Ah! Of course. I have been thinking of fire as something without substance, so giving it any penetration may simply be impossible.

Hmm. What do I do about that. A Fireball has burning power but it would end the same way. Come to think of it, if I can use every attribute, shouldn’t I be able to combine them? Make an arrow of stone with earth magic, wrap it in flame, and send it off. That sounds ferociously strong.

Right. Earth magic for the arrow, fire magic wrapped around it. That was the plan, and making the arrow with earth magic turned out to be quite hard. Shaping it was fine; lifting it and driving it fast ate a great deal of mana. After a good deal of trial and error, picturing it as weightless was what worked best and cost least. And drawing the arrow out of actual earth, rather than conjuring the stone out of mana, cut the cost a great deal further.

Then I wrapped the arrow I had made in fire and sent it at the rock. As fast as I could manage it. Picture a bullet out of a gun.

Whump. Ohh, that made a good loud noise. Obviously more powerful than anything I’d managed so far. I looked at the rock and the point of the arrow was buried in it. Success! Success, but do I actually need to make anything but the point? It’s mana that drives it, so it doesn’t need to be arrow-shaped at all. And does it need the fire? Hmm. Then again, if it’s wrapped in fire the enemy might catch alight, which is damage the impact alone wouldn’t do. Keep the fire for now. The arrow shape can go.

I pictured something more like a slightly pointed bullet instead, made it out of earth, wrapped it in fire and sent it off. It sank into the rock about as deep as the last one and cost a great deal less mana.

Complete success! The tip really is all you need. This is going to be an extremely serviceable spell. What do I call it? Fire Arrow won’t do, since it isn’t an arrow any more… It’s a bullet, near enough. Fire Bullet, then! Yes. That sounds cool. Not that the name matters in the least. It’s a question of how it feels.

Next. Fire Bullet is single-target, so I should work out something with area. For area, wind? A Tornado! Let’s picture a smallish one and see.

That ate a great deal of mana for very little offensive power. It is genuinely hard to picture wind cutting something. I have never seen a whirlwind slice anything in my life. So what if I put the bullets from before inside the whirlwind?

What I got was an attack that shreds everything caught in it, indiscriminately, which is horrifying. I fed a reasonably thick branch into it and what came out the other side was splinters… W-well. Power is good, I suppose.

At any rate I have something strong now. It does eat a lot of mana. I’ll think of it as my finisher, for when things get really bad. The name… Rock Tornado.

After that I went on developing and drilling attack magic. Water Jet, from water magic: only enough force to scrape a little off the rock, but the low mana cost is the appeal. Fireball, from fire: I tried raising the temperature of the flame, so that the heat itself does the damage. Wall, from earth: heap the soil up into a barrier. The sturdier you make it the more it costs, so I can’t push the strength very far, but it should be useful for defense.

I turned out a great many spells that way. That is more than enough attack magic. If anything I may have overdone it, and looking around me rather confirmed it. The rock is cracked through from being hit so many times, and the trees look like the aftermath of a storm. Is this bad? Well, I did come a fair way into the forest, and nobody comes out this far. Probably.

More to the point, I want to try the attack magic on something real. I can hardly go to the monster forest, and I have been told this forest has ordinary animals in it, bears and boars and the like, so perhaps I should bring one down. I don’t like killing, even an animal. But if I have never done it, and I hesitate in front of a monster, and I am killed for hesitating… that is the worst of all the outcomes. I ought to have the experience.

I put the animal-warding bell away in my pocket, kept the river in sight so I would know my way back, and pushed deeper into the forest. About thirty minutes of walking, and I heard something moving in the undergrowth. I looked all around me and listened hard, ready for an animal to come from any direction.

A rustle.

Behind me! I spun around, and there was a pitch-black bear already charging. Oh crap. I put Build Up into my legs and threw myself sideways as hard as I could. Branches raked my arms and my legs, and there was no time to care about that. I got up and turned to face it.

Are bears this aggressive?! And it is enormous. If I had been a moment slower noticing it, that would have been very bad. Magic alone isn’t enough; I have to train my body as well. I was thinking that when the bear came at me again.

So I aimed a Fire Bullet at its head. The Fire Bullet passed just above the head, struck a tree behind it, and blew the trunk apart.

No good, I missed! Hitting a moving target is far harder than I expected. I threw myself sideways again to get clear. Then, to be certain of hitting it this time, I put a Fire Bullet into the body. It hit. The bullet buried itself somewhere around the right shoulder, and the wound didn’t look mortal. The fire had caught and the fur was starting to burn, and that wouldn’t kill it quickly either. This is bad. I may simply have made it angry.

The bear came at me again, furious now, and I threw a Rock Tornado at it in a hurry. When the tornado died away, what lay on the ground had presumably once been a bear.

Ugh… I think I’m going to be sick…

Rock Tornado really is too much. I am not using that again except in genuine danger.

Haaah. That was far too close. Now that the danger was actually past, the relief took my legs out from under me and I sat down where I was. I think I had been overrating myself, just because I can use magic. I need to practice putting the shots where I aim them, and I need to train my own body. From now on it’s magic practice and conditioning.

I had got that far when it hit me. What time is it? For that matter, is my watch broken?! I checked it in a panic, and the watch had survived. Thank goodness… but it’s already past five!

That’s bad! I have to be home inside the hour! I closed the scratches with Heal, cleaned my clothes up with Purification, and ran the whole way home. There wasn’t much left before the dinner service by the time I got there, but I made it.

Chapter 15 – Her Highness and the Pancakes

For the days leading up to Lady Martine’s visit we threw ourselves into the preparations. The restaurant closed for a few days and Mom and Dad turned the house out from top to bottom. I told Uncle and Auntie that a noble was coming, and went out to the forest to find where the raspberries were growing. I picked some while I was there and put them by at home as a reserve, in case it rained on the day and we couldn’t get to the forest at all.

So we prepared everything we could prepare, and at last the morning came. It was around nine, and the whole family was gathered in the restaurant. I was about to tell them the truth.

“Everyone, there’s something I need you to hear.”

“Is it the sort of thing that needs a face like that?”

“Huh? Am I making a face?”

Dad said it, but am I really? Well. I am certainly nervous.

“Big Brother, your face is scary.”

If even Marie is saying it. I made a deliberate effort to loosen everything above the neck, and looked around at my family.

“Don’t any of you be shocked. I said the girl coming today was a distant relative of Lord Frederick’s, and that isn’t true. The truth is that Lady Martine is… she’s the princess.”

“What? Leon, what did you say? The princess? Is that what you said?!”

“Leon, is that true? Truly, truly the princess?”

Dad and Mom fell straight into uproar. Well, that’s what happens when somebody says princess. Why on earth would she come to a restaurant on the outskirts of the royal capital? I still ask myself the same thing.

“Mom, Dad, she really is the princess. If word had got out beforehand that a princess was coming it would have been dangerous, so I couldn’t tell you until today. But don’t worry. You can go on exactly the way you were going to. A noble and a princess aren’t all that different, are they?”

That got a little of their composure back.

“W-well. Yes, I suppose that’s so. Noble or princess, from where we stand there isn’t much in it.”

“Th-that’s right. We’ve done the preparing, so it’ll be all right.”

Mom and Dad were talking themselves level, more or less. Marie, on the other hand, had clearly not followed a word of it. She was tipping her head to one side, puzzled.

“Is a princess someone amazing?”

“She is. She’s a very important person. She’s the child of the most important person in the whole country.”

“Wow! That’s amazing, isn’t it?”

Marie said amazing without looking as though she knew what was amazing about it. I don’t think she has a firm grip on rank yet. At five, fair enough.

“Mom, Dad, Lady Martine is the princess, but if anyone finds out she’s the princess there could be a real fuss, so when you speak to her, call her Lady Martine. That’s the only thing you have to be careful about. Marie, you call her by her name too.”

“I just call her by her name?”

“That’s right. You like it better when people call you your name, don’t you?”

“Uh-huh! Then I’ll call her by her name!”

And Marie went off practicing it, saying Lady Martine over and over. Marie really is a lovely, good-hearted kid. That’s my sister for you.

After that we all waited in the restaurant, fidgeting and quiet, until at last somebody knocked at the door.

Knock, knock.

“Lady Martine has arrived.”

A woman’s voice I didn’t know. Her maid, presumably.

“Of course.”

I answered and opened the door, and there they were: a young maid, somewhere in her twenties; Lady Martine, beaming from ear to ear; and Lord Frederick, watching Lady Martine with a wry sort of smile. She was dressed more simply than she had been before, perhaps so as not to stand out, and the maid and Lord Frederick were dressed to be overlooked as well.

“Thank you for coming. Please, come inside.”

All three came straight in at that, so I shut the door and followed them. Lady Martine turned to me at once.

“Leon, it has been too long. I have been looking forward to today so much!”

“I’m very glad to hear it. May I introduce my family?”

“Yes. Please do.”

“My father and mother, and my sister, Marie.”

Dad and Mom scrambled to bow their heads, and Marie beamed at her.

“Leon’s father and mother, I am sorry to have forced myself upon you today.”

“N-no, not at all, it is most honorable, and, ah, we do hope your enjoyment today is very good.”

“If it pleases you… we would be glad. Greatly.”

Dad and Mom were doing their level best with polite speech neither of them has used once in their lives, and it was coming out sideways and at odd angles.

“And you must be Marie. Let us be friends.”

“Uh-huh! Lady Martine, you’re so pretty!”

“Am I really? That does make me happy. You are very pretty yourself, Marie.”

“Really?! Thank you!”

Listening to that exchange, Dad and Mom went steadily paler. But Lord Frederick and the maid were watching it with obvious fondness, so it should be fine.

Once the greetings were done, Lady Martine looked around at everybody.

“One does not usually introduce one’s attendants or one’s guard, but I shall introduce them today, purely as a formality. This lady is my maid, and this gentleman is my guard. Please pay them no particular attention.”

The two of them answered that with the smallest of bows and nothing more. So attendants and guards aren’t introduced and aren’t spoken to, as a rule.

“Now that the greetings are behind us, what shall we do today?”

Lady Martine turned a pair of shining eyes on me as she asked it. Ugh… that expression on a beautiful girl has far too much destructive power.

“Today I thought you might look over my house, and then we would go to the forest. We would gather raspberries there, and then make a dessert called pancakes together at home, using the raspberries. How does that sound?”

“Wonderful! I have never heard of a dessert called pancakes. Is it something in fashion among commoners?”

“No. The recipe is one I thought up myself.”

“You thought of it, Leon?! How splendid! Now I am looking forward to the pancakes even more. But first, an expedition through the house!”

“Lady Martine! I’ll show you!”

“Thank you, Marie.”

And Marie took her by the hand and towed her off toward the living room. Lord Frederick and the maid followed her out of the restaurant, and I was about to follow them when Mom stopped me.

“L-Leon. The way Marie is speaking to her. Won’t she be punished for disrespect?”

“No. Lord Frederick told me not to worry about how anyone behaves, so it’s fine. Which means you and Dad could relax a bit too, you know. Your words were coming out very strange just now.”

“Were they. Well, that’s a relief. Speaking of which, Leon, how is it you can use formal speech like that? I’m fairly sure we never taught you any…”

“Dad’s been wondering about that as well. Using it as naturally as all that. Who taught you?”

Ah… I don’t think I have ever used proper formal speech in front of Mom and Dad before. I barely spoke when Lord Frederick came, and in any case the two of them were in such a state that they weren’t listening.

What do I say. I’ve told them about the attributes, but I do not have the nerve to tell them about being reincarnated…

“Um, well… Marcel taught me.”

Will that do? It has to do, really.

“Did he? But you haven’t known Marcel very long, have you? Could anyone learn it that quickly?”

“Um, well… that’s it! Marcel said I was clever!”

Ugh, I’m running out of road here. What do I do…

“I see. That’s our boy.”

I had a cold sweat going down my back by then, and Dad said that and stroked my hair. Thank you, Dad! And I am so sorry for lying to you… I was sinking under the guilt of it when Lady Martine’s voice came from the back of the house.

“Leon, whatever is the matter? Are you not going to show me anything?”

“Coming right now! Mom, Dad, I’m going.”

“Yes, off you go. And you can teach Mom some formal speech one of these days.”

“There may be more call for it from now on. Will you teach Dad as well?”

They don’t doubt me, they believe me, and on top of that they want to learn the same thing… I really am glad I ended up in this family.

“Sure! Of course I will!”

Still carrying a little of the guilt, but a good deal brighter than I had felt a minute before, I went after Lady Martine.

She turned out to be in the living room, and came straight over the moment I got there.

“Leon! I saw the well just now. It really is true that the water comes up out of the ground. I had studied wells, but seeing that one genuinely exists is quite moving!”

“I’m glad. For us commoners, water is a thing you draw out of a well.”

“Marie drew some for me a moment ago. Seeing a thing for oneself really does teach one so much! May I see the bedroom next?”

“Yes. You may look at anything you like.”

“Then I shall.”

“Of course. This way.”

“Big Brother, are we going to the beds?”

“That’s right. Will you show Lady Martine the way?”

“Uh-huh!”

So we all went up to the second floor and I let her see where we sleep. It must look dim and cramped and dirty to her, and not one flicker of that reached her face; she listened to Marie in complete earnest. She really is a kind, good-hearted girl.

“I always sleep here! Mom and Big Brother are next to me, and Dad’s on the other side of Mom.”

“How lovely, all of you able to sleep together.”

“Uh-huh! It’s warm when everyone sleeps together! Maybe a bit hot in summer though.”

We finished with the bedroom on that note, then went through the storeroom and the restaurant and everything else, and came back to the living room. Looking at the time, we needed to be leaving for the forest or there would be no time left for the pancakes.

“Shall we set out for the forest, then?”

I put the question to Lady Martine and got a puzzled tilt of the head in reply. What was that? Had I missed something? I was running my brain at full speed trying to work it out when she asked me.

“What are we doing about lunch? Are we taking it to the forest?”

Lunch. I had completely forgotten about lunch! Oh, I have made a mess of this. The pancakes had crowded everything else out of my head, but of course, at this hour pancakes are an afternoon snack. I was flailing for an answer when Dad spoke up, tentatively.

“Ah. We could make you something from the restaurant menu. We got it ready in case you wanted it.”

“Oh, I should like that very much! I have been wanting to eat food from the restaurant.”

Dad, thank you! Mom, thank you! I hadn’t thought that far ahead and they had it prepared anyway. That’s my parents. I thanked them both with my eyes and carried on with Lady Martine.

“Then shall we eat lunch here and go to the forest afterward?”

“Yes, that will do very well.”

“The menu here is steak, or stir-fried vegetables with pork. Which would you care for?”

“Let me see. I should like the stir-fried vegetables with pork.”

“Certainly.”

Then I took everyone else’s orders, and we all had a very cheerful meal. Lord Frederick and the maid didn’t eat, though. They were on duty, and confined themselves to tasting Lady Martine’s food for poison.

With the meal behind us, it was finally time for the forest. Mom and Dad were staying at the house, so the party was me, Marie, Lady Martine, Lord Frederick and the maid: five of us.

I had assumed Lady Martine would go by carriage, and it turned out she meant to walk with the rest of us. She does basic conditioning and swordwork as a matter of routine, apparently, so walking presents her with no difficulty at all. It surprised me a little to learn that girls train too. Well, a body is healthier for being worked.

“Lady Martine, have you ever been to the forest?”

“I have never been, no.”

“Then I’ll show you! I’m really good at picking raspberries!”

“Thank you.”

Marie said it beaming, and Lady Martine thanked her with the gentlest look on her face. I have no idea whether any of this is being done correctly, but Lady Martine is enjoying herself, so it must be all right.

We walked and talked and made a good deal of noise about it, and eventually the forest came up in front of us. It took longer than it usually does, and I don’t think that was Lady Martine slowing us down so much as the fact that I normally walk it in near silence and today nobody stopped talking.

“So this is the forest. There really are a great many trees.”

“All sorts of trees, all growing wild. What I would like to do today is find the raspberries among them and pick them. Is that all right?”

“Yes. I shall pick a great many myself!”

Her eyes were shining and she was thoroughly braced for battle. Her speech is every inch a princess and her manners are exquisite, and then her face goes curious and childish, and it is extremely endearing. I caught myself watching her and smiling.

“Leon, what are you smiling at?”

At which she narrowed her eyes a little, puffed out her cheeks, and gave me a look that was supposed to be angry. It was not frightening in the slightest. If anything it was cute.

“I beg your pardon. I only thought how cute you looked just then.”

I said it honestly, and Lady Martine went scarlet from the neck up. What? That embarrasses her? I’d have thought she heard that sort of thing constantly, and a reaction like that is starting to embarrass me too.

To get us out from under the atmosphere that had settled on us, I made a show of rolling my shoulders as though I were limbering up for something.

“R-right. Let’s pick as many as we can!”

“Y-yes. I shall pick more than you, Leon!”

“I don’t intend to lose either!”

Having got that awkwardness out of the way, Lady Martine and I hurried over to where Marie was.

“Marie, did you find the raspberries?”

“Uh-huh. They’re here!”

Oh, good. I’d found the place beforehand, but if somebody else had come through and stripped it there would be nothing left. It seems nobody had.

“There are lots of them. Lady Martine, please use this bag.”

“Thank you.”

Lady Martine watched how Marie was doing it and then set to work in dead earnest. That should be fine, then. I may as well get picking myself.

“Leon, can these be eaten as they are?”

“Yes. There is nothing wrong with eating them as they are, but I think you will find them very sour.”

“Will I? I do not dislike a fruit with some sharpness to it.”

“Lady Martine, these are sweet, they’re really good! I love them!”

“Are they. Then perhaps I shall try one.”

And she put a raspberry in her mouth without hesitating for a second. Two or three chews in, her face contorted and she froze solid. Yes. They are sour. I ate one once and resolved never to eat another one raw as long as I lived.

“Lady Martine? Are you all right?”

Her eyes had gone watery, and she seemed to get it down somehow.

“I… I am quite all right…”

She was extremely not all right, and that sourness stays in your mouth for a good while. I was about to call her maid over, on the theory that a drink of water would help, when Marie got to her first.

“Lady Martine, was it good?”

“Y-yes. It was very good indeed.”

Lady Martine put a perfect smile together and gave it to Marie. She is far too kind. And this is royalty. If the royalty of this country are made like this, then I think the country will be all right.

“Then I’ll give you one of mine!”

Marie said it with an innocent smile. I know she means nothing but well by it, but that has to be more than even Lady Martine can take. I moved to stop it, and before I could, Lady Martine had thanked her and accepted the raspberry.

“Thank you, Marie.”

And put it in her mouth without hesitating, again.

“It really is good.”

“Isn’t it! They’re even better in pancakes!”

“Then I have that to look forward to!”

Not letting a flicker of that sourness show was impressive enough on its own, and then she had taken a second without a moment’s pause. Belatedly, I got in between the two of them so she would not have to eat another.

“Marie, if we eat too many there won’t be enough left for the pancakes, so let’s hold off for now.”

“Oh. Okay, I’ll hold off!”

“Good girl. Shall we get back to picking, then?”

“Okaaay!”

Marie threw herself back into it, so I turned to Lady Martine and spoke quietly.

“Lady Martine, I’m very sorry. Raspberries are extremely sour eaten raw, but Marie and the others seem to like them that way…”

“They were extremely sour.”

“Thank you for taking such care of Marie’s feelings. Truly. A drink should make it a little easier, so please do take a rest.”

“That was nothing to thank me for. It is you who should be thanked, Leon, for all the care you have taken over a visitor who more or less forced her way in.”

“Not at all. I am enjoying the time I am spending with you.”

Which is the honest truth. I’d expected to spend the whole day too nervous to do anything but come out of it wrung dry, and instead Lady Martine is genuinely kind and good and clever, and being around her is a pleasure.

“I am glad to hear you say it. Thank you, Leon. I shall go and rest.”

She said it, and smiled at me, and it was a beautiful smile, and then she walked off toward her maid. That last smile caught me completely, and I stood there staring after her for a while like an idiot.

She came back before long and we all picked in silence for a time, and once we had more or less cleared the patch we decided to head home. We had less in us on the way back than we’d had coming out, tired, I suppose, and we kept our legs going with only a little conversation here and there.

The walk back took us a little less time than the walk out had. I opened the door and had Lady Martine and the others go into the restaurant first, then followed them in.

“We’re hooome!”

Marie announced it and scrambled up onto a stool at the counter, and Mom and Dad put their heads out from the kitchen.

“Welcome home.”

“We got loads of raspberries!”

“Well done. You’re making the pancakes next, aren’t you? Go and wash your hands and get changed.”

“Okaaay!”

Marie had that exchange with Mom and then went straight off to the well to wash her hands. Marie does exactly as she pleases.

“Lady Martine, would you like to change as well?”

I asked, and it was her maid who answered.

“We have brought a change of clothes for her, yes.”

“Then I shall change. Leon, might I borrow somewhere to do it?”

“Of course. Once everyone has finished washing, please use the living room.”

“Thank you.”

Then we washed at the well, put away the things we’d taken to the forest, and went through to the kitchen.

Mom and Dad had already laid out every tool and ingredient we needed, so there was nothing left to do but make them.

“Mom, Dad, thank you.”

“This is about all we can do, so it’s no trouble at all. I’m glad to be useful to you.”

“That’s not true! You two help me all the time.”

“Is that so. It’s a fine thing to hear you say it.”

Dad’s face went soft and he ruffled my hair. Harder than usual…

“Dad! You’re wrecking it!”

“Ha! Sorry, sorry.”

We were in the middle of that when Lady Martine came through, changed and ready, so it was time to start on the pancakes.

We made them in two teams: me and Marie on one, Lady Martine on the other. I would rather have had everyone make their own, but we only had two bowls the right size.

“We shall begin. First, break the eggs into the bowl, add the sugar and the water, and mix. Please mix it thoroughly.”

Marie started the moment I said it. She has made these enough times to know her way around them. I had thought I would have to guide Lady Martine as we went, but her maid was assisting her, so I could stop worrying about that.

“Once it is well mixed, add the flour and keep mixing. Please mix until there are no lumps of flour left.”

At that, everybody tipped their flour in at once and set to. There is something lovely about watching children working that hard at something. I thought so, having briefly forgotten that I am also a child.

“Leon, is this about right?”

“Yes. That’s perfect. Now, last of all, put in about ten raspberries.”

Last time we made these I crushed the raspberries and stirred them through, to spread what sweetness there was. With sugar in the house there’s no need for that. Better to keep a few whole for the texture and turn the rest into jam to pour over the top.

“Once you have done that, all that is left is the cooking. We shall start with yours, Lady Martine.”

Mom had lit the fire and brought the pan up to heat, so I put butter in and poured the batter. One bowl makes exactly one pancake. A very large one, admittedly.

“Now we wait a while for it to cook. After a little, lift it and look at the underside, and if it has browned properly, turn it over and cook it again. And it is finished.”

“I can hardly wait! I find I have become quite hungry.”

“A little longer, please. While the pancakes cook, let us make the jam.”

“Is the jam made from those raspberries?”

“Exactly so. Raspberries with sugar cooked into a jam become extremely good. And they go better with pancakes than anything.”

“It’s soooo good! I used to like raspberries best just as they are, but now I like pancakes and jam better!”

Marie has been thoroughly captured by sugar over the last few days. She still says plain raspberries are good, but once she’s used to sweetness, raw ones will start to taste sour to her. I don’t know whether that’s a good thing or a bad one. Either way I’ve decided to buy sugar in bulk so we always have it in the house, and to keep topping it up.

“Now the jam. Lady Martine, would you put the raspberries into this pot? Everything in that bowl, if you would.”

“Of course.”

“Thank you. Now we put it straight over the heat, and stir, crushing the raspberries with a wooden spatula as we go. Would you like to do it?”

“I should like to try!”

“Then please do.”

I handed her the spatula and she started stirring the pot with a very serious expression, which left me free to get the sugar and the lemon ready. Sugar doesn’t circulate among commoners, but making raspberry jam is apparently something plenty of people do, and it was Mom who told me a little lemon juice improves it. You want about half as much sugar as fruit. Mom and Dad seem to prefer rather less, but Lady Martine likes sweet things, so I went heavier today.

“Lady Martine, we add the sugar now, and a little lemon juice.”

“Yes, I see.”

“Now we let that reduce for about thirty minutes, and it is done.”

You’re supposed to strain the raspberries through a sieve for a smooth jam, but I’ve grown fond of the seeds and the texture, so I leave mine as it is. Straining is a nuisance, and plenty of people seem to eat it unstrained.

While we were busy with all that, the pancake started to come along. The smell was extraordinary.

“Lady Martine, I think your pancake is nearly there.”

“Really?!”

“Yes. Please come over here.”

I took the spatula back from her and steered her to the counter in front of the pancake, leaving the jam with Dad.

“Lift the pancake a little with this spatula and have a look at the underside.”

“I understand. …How does it look?”

I had a look under it myself. Perfectly done.

“Perfect. Now we turn it over and cook it a little longer, and it’s finished. Turning it is difficult, so may I leave that to my mother?”

“Yes, please do.”

“Mom, if you would.”

“Leave it to Mom.”

Mom picked up the spatula and the pan, looking slightly nervous, and flipped the pancake over cleanly in one go. That’s my mom!

“How wonderful! You made that look effortless!”

“Th-thank you.”

“Ohhh, the smell is glorious. Will it be ready soon?”

“Yes. Just a little longer.”

We waited a while after that, and the first pancake was done.

“And that is it finished.”

“Oh, this is the one I made, is it not. I am so pleased!”

“Would you like to eat it right away?”

“I should like to, but nobody else’s pancakes have finished cooking yet.”

“You are very welcome to start…”

“No, we have come this far. I want to eat with everyone!”

“I see… Then it is a little ill-mannered, but might I offer you one piece here, as a taste? We shall of course have some as well.”

“What a splendid proposal!”

Lady Martine agreed, so I cut the finished pancake into bite-sized pieces and handed them around. Lord Frederick and the maid could surely manage a single mouthful. That was my thinking, and even that they turned down.

“We are on duty. I am afraid not.”

“Leon, it’s a kind offer, but…”

“Both of you will have some. You are on duty, but you have not been relieved today either, so a little can hardly hurt, can it?”

At Lady Martine’s word Lord Frederick evidently decided to eat at once. He was on duty last time as well and ate perfectly happily, so presumably it is the maid’s presence that has him behaving today. The maid is a great deal too serious and looks constitutionally incapable of letting her shoulders down. The exact opposite of Lord Frederick’s slightly slack air.

Not that she looks down her nose at us. There were moments when Marie and the others used no formal speech at all and she said nothing and watched them fondly, so she isn’t a bad person. Just rather too serious.

I handed a bite-sized piece to everyone else after that, and told Lady Martine that they all had one.

“Lady Martine, everyone has their pancake.”

“Then let us eat!”

She popped hers into her mouth, looked startled for a moment, and then began to chew in earnest. When she had finished it she spoke.

“This is extremely good! The texture is fascinating, and the sweetness of the sugar against the sweet-sharpness of the raspberries is exquisite.”

She seems to have liked it. Good.

“She’s right. That’s a texture I’ve never had before, and it’s delicious…”

“It really is…”

Lord Frederick and the maid liked it as well. Relieved, I put my own in my mouth. Yes. Reliably good. Chewy, sweet, sharp with raspberry. A great deal better than the first sugarless pancakes we made. Sugar really is essential.

Milk and baking powder would make it better still. You can get a little milk in winter, but it barely circulates at all. It comes back to there being no refrigeration, doesn’t it. Butter, at least, we can get. Well, I’m satisfied with this as it is. Complaining about this would be asking for a thunderbolt.

We cooked the rest of the pancakes then, and finished the jam, and all the cooking was done. We were sitting around a table in the restaurant now, with pancakes and jam in front of every one of us.

“Then let us eat.”

Everyone said Itadakimasu after her and started. I put a generous amount of jam on my pancake and took a bite. Mmm, that’s good! I really do love this jam. The seeds and the texture make it.

“This… this jam is absolutely delicious!”

“I’m very glad to hear it. Straining it through a sieve makes a smooth jam, but I like the texture of the seeds, so I left it as it is. What do you think?”

“I like the seeds as well! I had wondered what the difference was from the jam I usually eat, and it is that you have kept the texture. I shall have the head cook make this jam.”

The head cook has surely been straining it so carefully precisely for Lady Martine’s sake, and being told the unstrained version is the better one is going to be a blow… I’m sorry, head cook.

We ate our pancakes and talked for a good while after that, and everybody cleared their plate.

“Leon, the pancakes were truly delicious. And thank you, all of you, for indulging me in all of this today. Today has been enjoyable enough that I may call it the finest day of my life! If ever the chance comes again, might I visit here once more?”

She looked thoroughly content saying it. Underneath that, she looked a little sad.

“Lady Martine, it may be difficult to arrange often, but please come whenever you wish.”

“I want to play with Lady Martine again!”

“Leon. Marie. I shall absolutely come again. Thank you.”

And she smiled, and the whole of her lit with it. It really is a beautiful smile.

She left very soon after that. She had apparently been due to leave rather earlier, and there was no stretching the visit any further.

A tiring day. And a good one. I meant that with my whole heart.

Chapter 14 – The Goddess’s Mistake

“Oh nooo…! That was a soul I brought all the way from Earth and I went and botched the reincarnation!”

Why do I have such awful luck?! I finally get a soul out of Japan, out of Earth, out of Sherifie herself, and this is what happens! I built a whole world modeled on Japan because I love it so much, and this is what happens!

All right, that child I sent down as my Apostle last time turned it into something closer to medieval Europe than to Japan, so I picked the wrong one that time. Even so, I was looking forward to seeing where it all went next. And instead. And instead… why did I have to go and fail, stupid, stupid me!

If things stay as they are, this world gets torn apart by monsters and the humans die out all over again. Absolutely not! And who knows how long it would take to build up enough divine power for another world after that. First things first. I have to go and see Sherifie!

“Sheriiifie! Heeelp! That soul you gave me the other day, I botched the reincarnation! What do I do?”

“Micheline, what do you mean, you botched it?! That soul came out of my world. I told you to be careful with it!”

Sherifie was furious, that beautiful black hair of hers flying everywhere. I made myself as small as I could and apologized.

“I’m sorry…”

Being meek about it did nothing at all for Sherifie’s temper. She came over and started grinding her knuckles into the top of my head.

“Ow! Sherifie, ow, that huuurts!”

“It’s your own fault, isn’t it. Hold still and take it.”

“It hurts, it really hurts! I’m sorryyy!”

I apologized for all I was worth, and at last she stopped.

“So how did you manage to fail?”

“The thing is, there was a body in my world that fit that soul exactly. Then, of all the luck in creation, that very human died at the exact instant I was moving the soul across, so his own soul had just come loose. The empty body pulled, and the soul I’d brought from Japan went straight into it…”

“A body and a soul from two different people, fitting each other exactly? Can that even happen? And if it did, what about the body? It should have been rotting by now.”

“It’s true! I don’t tell lies! The body repaired itself the instant the soul got inside it.”

“So that sort of thing does happen… What extraordinary odds.”

“Sherifie, this is not the time to be impressed! Think about what I do next!”

I was going to put that soul from Japan into a child of the royal family, as my Apostle. It ended up in the body of a poor commoner!

“All right, all right. Your world was the one being eaten into by the monster forest, wasn’t it, and you wanted to save the humans, and that was what the reincarnation was for.”

“That’s the one! I was going to explain everything to him in the divine realm and then grant him his abilities and put him into the highest rank there is…”

“You couldn’t grant the abilities either?”

“Magic in every attribute and comprehension of every language, those I managed. It was lucky that reshaping the body was easy while it was repairing itself. But I couldn’t hand him the divine object he needed to talk to me, so I can’t reach him. He’s a poor commoner and he doesn’t even know what he was sent for.”

I was supposed to keep in touch with him after the reincarnation, regularly, and steer him through saving the world. I was going to have him pull that medieval-Europe mess of a world of mine back toward Japan, too…

“How long have you got before your world is overrun? And when can you next send someone down?”

“A bit over ten years, that’s all… And I can’t reincarnate anyone again for several hundred. I’ve used so much divine power I’m all but empty.”

“What did you spend that much divine power on?!”

“Well, the humans in my first world died out, and I really did want a world with humans in it, so I made this one as well, didn’t I. Building a brand-new world took an enormous amount of divine power to start with. On top of that I wanted humans to appear in this one quickly, and I wanted the climate close to Japan’s, so I kept meddling with every corner of it and running time forward. That took almost all of the rest.”

In the first world I made, I gave mana to every living thing, and the monsters wiped the humans out. So for the second world I worked out that I only had to give mana to humans! Clever of me, don’t you think? I built it in the image of Japan, that country in Sherifie’s world that I love so much. I worked terribly hard on it. I even gave it the same sort of plant life!

There are one or two differences, because of the mana. And there’s no rice. I left the rice out, because rice was what made the monsters multiply in the first world. Well. Small details. Nothing worth worrying about!

Then, for the finishing touch, I brought one person down out of Japan as my Apostle, and that child turned around and said medieval Europe was nicer than anything Japanese, and my world stopped looking remotely Japanese. Even so, I liked it. If only I hadn’t made that mistake…

Because I made one serious mistake when I built this world, and it was only a bit over three hundred years ago that I finally noticed. Of all things, I had punched a tiny hole between my first, failed world and this one!! Whatever was I thinking?!

The hole kept getting bigger. Plants and animals came through into this world, and out of them the monster forest grew. There were never supposed to be monsters in this world at all. If it goes on like this, the humans will be destroyed by the monsters exactly the way they were in the first world.

Which is why I dropped a divine tool and a book into the world so the hole could be sealed! I do try! Except that nobody found the tool or the book. By the time somebody finally did, the humans who could read that language had been all but wiped out in a war, so nobody could make sense of it. Or so I gather.

So the monster forest spreads and spreads. This time I was going to send one more person down to seal the hole for me, and I never dreamed I would fail at it…

“If there’s really nothing left you can do, then all you can do is pray that human moves on his own and saves the world for you. Anyway, monsters are cute. I wouldn’t mind a world of monsters.”

“I like humans! I want a world with humans in it! Your world is a human world too, Sherifie!”

“I didn’t set out to make it a human world. It just seems that in a world with no mana, the clever humans are the ones left standing. Shouldn’t you have made a world without mana as well, Micheline?”

“But you were the one who told me! You said a world with no mana falls apart eventually.”

“Well, that’s true enough. When humans use an energy that isn’t mana, the world seems to break down bit by bit.”

“So I made a world with mana in it to stop that from happening!”

Up to that point it should all have been fine. Where did I go wrong? No, wait! I didn’t go wrong at all. I was just unlucky.

Enough looking backward. I need to think about what comes next. He goes by Leon now, I think? Then Leon is the one who has to seal it for me. If only I had some way of getting a message to him…

“Isn’t there any way at all to reach him?!”

“An oracle would hardly cost you any divine power.”

“Sherifie! That’s it!”

Of course! With an oracle I might get word to him without ever speaking to him directly. Oh, but hold on. Nobody in this world has the slightest faith in me… what do I do? Would anyone believe an oracle if I sent one?

“Sherifie! I’ve just remembered, nobody down there believes in me. What am I going to do…”

“What are you going to do? You brought that on yourself. In any case, nobody has any faith in me either.”

“That’s gods for you, isn’t it. …Is it really hopeless? If I sent an oracle, do you think they’d believe it?”

“Not without a good deal of time, I expect. For now all you can do is watch. If it doesn’t work out, you can always come and visit Earth again.”

“That’s very kind of you, but I’d rather have my own world…”

“Well then. Do your best.”

“You don’t mean a word of that!”

“Yes, yes. I’ll have the next volumes of your manga waiting for you next time you come, so cheer up.”

“Really?! Sherifie, I love you!!”

“Honestly, you’re so easily bought. Anyway, watching is all you can do for now. It’s about time you went back to your own world.”

Sherifie said it with a wry smile, waving me off.

“Yes, all riiight. But there has to be something I can do. I’m absolutely going to save those humans, just you watch!”

And with that settled, I went home to Miyusolute, my own world.

Chapter 13 – The Commoner with Every Attribute

There was a tightness under my ribs as I went into His Majesty’s study in the royal castle. I am this kingdom’s Chancellor; the room has never troubled me. What troubles me is that I must tell His Majesty about the boy named Leon who came to the house yesterday.

Leon. No, Master Leon, I ought to say. His Majesty and I have spoken of Master Leon once already. At that point he was simply a person to be watched, a commoner who had come into contact with Her Highness the Princess. That he should turn out to hold every attribute…

Now. How will His Majesty take it? He is a man who steadily raises up the able whatever their birth, so he will make no objection to the ducal house looking after Master Leon. If anything, once he hears about the attributes he is perfectly capable of declaring that the royal house will take the boy instead.

Master Leon states that he is not the Apostle. But the intelligence, the polished bearing, the speech: none of it belongs to a commoner, and every part of it says he is one. And what settles the matter is every attribute.

So long as Master Leon has not declared himself the Apostle, we cannot treat him as one. That leaves looking after him through the ducal house as the most that can be done. Neither can we make him a noble by special dispensation, and if another country or a hostile camp learns what he can do as things stand, he will be in very real danger. He must be handled carefully.

It may be that he has some reason for not revealing himself. If so, then we must pretend not to have noticed and guard him with everything we have. For that I need His Majesty’s cooperation.

“Good morning, Your Majesty.”

“Ah. Good morning, Richard.”

“Might I have a little of your time before the day’s business? And I would ask that the room be cleared, if you will permit it.”

“That’s no trouble. But is it the sort of talk that wants the room cleared?”

“I believe it would be better so.”

“Understood. Have the room cleared, then.”

His Majesty is Alexis Lathlasia, and he is a remarkable man: very able, and possessed of kindness and severity in equal measure. Once the study held nobody but the two of us, we moved to the sofas and sat facing one another.

“So. What’s this about?”

“Yes. It concerns Master Leon.”

“Master… Leon? The commoner we spoke of the other day? You had him to dinner yesterday, didn’t you.”

“Yes. We invited him to dinner at the ducal house yesterday, and the truth of it is that Master Leon is… the Apostle.”

“The Apostle… Did you say the Apostle?!”

It shook His Majesty enough that he came to his feet without meaning to. I am shaken enough myself, even now, to wonder whether I dreamed the whole thing. But it is fact.

“I said the Apostle, Your Majesty.”

“And did Master Leon tell you so himself?”

“No. He denied it outright. But a great deal else points to his being the Apostle all the same.”

“How so?”

His Majesty had steadied a little. He sat back down on the sofa, and asked it.

“To begin with, his speech and his bearing are the equal of a properly brought-up noble child’s. They do not belong to a commoner, still less to the son of a restaurant family out at the edge of the royal capital. He follows difficult conversation without the least trouble, so the mind is quick as well. All of that alone had me disbelieving what was in front of me. And beyond it, he can use magic of every attribute.”

“Every attribute?! Richard… that’s the Apostle. There’s no doubt about it.”

“I thought so at once and asked him outright. Master Leon says he is not. My own view is that he has some reason for it and is concealing what he is. How does it strike Your Majesty?”

“I’m of the same mind. If he means to stay hidden, we look the other way and keep him safe. It would be a catastrophe if commoner-hating nobles got their hands on him.”

So His Majesty has arrived where I did.

“That is precisely what I fear.”

“And what’s Master Leon to do now?”

“Master Leon himself says he wishes to attend the Royal Academy. Frederick handed him the study materials, and it seems he said he had no need of reading, writing or arithmetic. He will study only history.”

“That… Richard, there’s another piece of evidence for you. There’s a life of the Apostle that only a man who has become king may read, and it says that the Apostle was perfect at reading, writing and arithmetic, but learned history from the beginning.”

Such a life exists, and I had no idea of it. There is a door in this kingdom closed even to me.

“Then we may take it that Master Leon is the Apostle. But he must never learn that we have concluded it.”

“Agreed. For now this goes no further than this room.”

“Quite so, Your Majesty. And what is to be done about Master Leon using every attribute? I advised him myself to keep it hidden until he has graduated from the Royal Academy.”

“That’ll serve for now. Master Leon can hardly want it coming out, with all the noise and the danger that would follow. Once he has graduated from the Royal Academy and been made a noble, the commoner-hating nobles will not be able to touch him, and other countries will find it hard to. And should Master Leon say that he wishes to be king, I would hand him the throne. Until then, will the ducal house keep him safe? The royal house will of course give every assistance it can.”

“Of course we shall. He is to attend the Royal Academy from our house. My son’s eldest, Lucien, is exactly Master Leon’s age, and I would hope the two of them become good friends.”

Lucien is a clever boy, and I am told there is no prejudice in him, so it should do well enough.

“That’s good to hear. My own children are of an age with him, come to that. Ought they to be told that he has every attribute?”

“No. Clever as they are, they are still children. There is no need to go out of our way to tell them. Surely it is enough to say that he is a remarkably able commoner and that they should be friendly with him.”

“There is that. I’d like to meet him myself, once. Would that be difficult?”

To meet His Majesty, Master Leon would have to be brought to the royal castle. That would draw far too many eyes.

“I am afraid that would be difficult. It is better that he not be conspicuous yet. Master Leon himself we can protect. His family we cannot, and that is what worries me.”

“There is that as well… And yet once he’s at the Royal Academy he’ll stand out whether he wishes it or not. With the backing of House Townsend, at the head of the camp, no less.”

That is a problem I have been turning over myself. Seizing the family to draw Master Leon out is entirely conceivable. And if something were to happen to Master Leon’s family and he were angered by it, the result would be a disaster, because the Apostle must never be angered.

The best answer of all would be to declare Master Leon the Apostle and have him use every attribute openly, but he is concealing what he is, so that is out of reach. It may be that the family ought to be sheltered at the ducal house as well.

“I intend to put shadows on Master Leon’s family as guards. Or, should they wish it, to consider taking them into the ducal house’s service.”

“Yes, do that. I’ll lend you the royal house’s shadows as well.”

“You have my thanks.”

With the matter settled for the moment, His Majesty and I drank the tea his valet had left for us, which had gone a little cold.

“We’re going to be busy. I wonder whether the Apostle appearing at this particular juncture has anything to do with the spreading of the monster forest.”

“I wondered the same thing. For the Apostle to appear at a time like this can only be the will of God.”

“Unless we somehow hold the monster forest back, this world will be under monsters in a bit over ten years. I would like the Apostle to be the one thing standing between us and that…”

“Which is why the Apostle must be guarded with everything we have.”

“Yes. Draw me up a list of the more dangerous noble houses, would you. We’ll tighten the watch.”

“Certainly. By tomorrow, without fail.”

And that was the end of my secret meeting with His Majesty. Privately, I have hoped for a long time that the Apostle would prove to be this world’s savior.

Before anything else, Master Leon must be protected, while we go on pretending we have not seen what he is. I do not believe there is anyone in my household who would let the secret out, but I shall put the word around once more that he is not to be spoken of. Another busy day tomorrow, then, and a good many after it. I set about the day’s business.

Chapter 12 – A Talk with the Family

“I’m home!”

I pushed our door open and called it through, and Mom and Dad came flying out of the kitchen.

“Leon! Oh, thank goodness. You’re all right.”

“Leon! They didn’t do anything to you, did they? I’m so glad you’re back.”

Both of them had tears standing in their eyes, they were so glad to see me. Knowing they cared that much makes me happier than I know how to say. It also makes what I have to tell them terrifying, because there is a real chance it changes the way they look at me. First, though. Get them calm.

“I’m fine, both of you, honestly. They invited me to dinner, and we ate and talked a bit, and that was all of it. They even sent me home with clothes.”

“Now that you mention it, that’s a very fine outfit. That can’t have been cheap.”

“Leon, are you sure it’s all right to take something like that? If a bill comes for it later we can’t pay it.”

And now they were both in a flurry. The stiffness went out of my shoulders all at once and I laughed.

“It’s a present. It’s fine.”

“Is it? But why would a noble give Leon clothes? And why were you invited to dinner in the first place?”

“Leon, explain it properly to Mom and Dad.”

Mom and Dad were looking into my face, serious now. All right. Steel yourself. All of it: every attribute, the Royal Academy, and living at the ducal house.

Just as I’d settled myself to say it, the front door opened.

“I’m home! Oh, Big Brother, you’re back? I’m so glaaad.”

Marie, by the sound of it. She needs to hear this too. She’s old enough to follow it, and I don’t want her shut out of it. I’ll press the secrecy on her harder than on the other two. There are things you’re happier not knowing. But I want Marie to know. That may be nothing but selfishness on my part… except that Marie is family too.

“Welcome home. Marie, I’ve got something to tell everyone. Will you listen?”

“Uh-huh! Course I’ll listen!”

“Thank you. Mom, Dad, will you hear me out as well?”

“Of course we will. Let’s go through to the living room. We were closing the dinner service tonight in any case, so it doesn’t matter how long it takes.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

So we moved through to the living room and everyone took a seat. Start with every attribute? No. Start with how I met Lord Frederick.

“All right, Leon. Whenever you’re ready.”

“Okay. The man who came to invite me to dinner yesterday is called Lord Frederick, and the first time we met it really was pure chance. Then he found out I want to get into the Royal Academy, and he offered to lend me study materials, and yesterday I went to collect them.”

That shook them both badly, and it showed.

“You want to go to the Royal Academy, Leon? But why?”

“And where did you hear about the Royal Academy at all? I don’t think a soul from around here has ever taken it…”

I’d been told plenty of commoners take the exam, but apparently not the commoners around here. Then again, it’s true that I have never once heard the Royal Academy mentioned on this street.

“The man who took me to the central district told me about it. Marcel, his name is. He makes magic tools, and he showed me some. I got interested, and he told me the Royal Academy has magic tools, and that if you become an official you can live with magic tools all around you. That’s when I decided I wanted to go.”

“Magic tools. Those are the convenient things the nobles have, aren’t they?”

“That’s them! They’re incredibly useful, and they change how everything works! And I think they’re only going to keep getting better!”

Mom and Dad laughed at that, softly, almost together.

“You really do love magic tools, don’t you. Your eyes are shining.”

Huh?! Is it that obvious on my face? That’s embarrassing… Although in a world this inconvenient, when something convenient turns up, of course I’m going to throw myself at it.

“I understand that you want to go to the Royal Academy, Leon. Dad and Mom are behind you. Live the way you want to live. That’s all we ask.”

“Me too! I’m cheering for Big Brother!”

“Really? Everyone… thank you.”

A commoner boy announces he wants to go to the Royal Academy, and instead of being told to give up on something so far above him, he gets told they’re behind him. I could not have asked for better parents. If only the conversation could have ended right there. But I don’t want every attribute sitting between us for the rest of my life, and I’ve decided to tell them.

“But can you actually pass it? We can’t teach you your lessons at home, you know.”

“That part’s all right. Lord Frederick lent me the materials and taught me a little, and Marcel can teach me too.”

“That’s very good of them. But why would anyone go that far for us? We’re ordinary commoners and we’ve no money…”

This is the moment, isn’t it. Right. Come on, Leon.

“There’s a reason for that… So, um. You know how my mana attribute came out as healing? Well, the thing is… I can use the others as well. All of them… And people with every attribute are really rare, so they asked me to lend them my strength. And in exchange, they’ll help me.”

When I’d got that much out, Mom and Dad went still, mouths open, and stayed that way. Then, after a while, their lips began working without anything coming out. Wanting to say something and being too shocked to find it, I think. It was Marie who spoke first.

“Big Brother can use all the magic? That’s amazing, that’s so cool! I want to use all of it too!”

Not creepy. Cool. She said cool… Marie is still little and she may not really grasp what she’s just heard, and I don’t care in the slightest. That landed somewhere in me I hadn’t known was open.

“Thank you, Marie. But this is something you mustn’t tell anybody. Can you keep it a secret? If people find out about it, everyone could be in danger.”

“In danger?”

“That’s right. So it’s a family secret.”

“A family secret. Got it. I’ll never ever tell!”

Marie said it with both hands clapped over her own mouth. She’s a sharp kid; she won’t tell. And in the unlikely event that she did, whoever heard it would write it off as a small girl’s daydream.

Marie had given me enough to go on with, so I looked up and met my parents’ eyes.

“Mom, Dad. Do you think I’m frightening? Do you think I’m creepy?”

I meant to ask it looking straight at them, and halfway through my nerve went and my head went down with it. What do I do if the answer is yes… I sat there with my eyes on the floor and my throat going tight, and Mom answered me before I could finish being afraid of it.

“Leon. As if Mom and Dad would ever think a thing like that.”

“That’s right. There’s nothing in any of it to make us find you creepy. If anything we were just sitting here stunned. Being able to use every attribute there is. That’s an astonishing thing.”

“Mom got a terrible shock too, I’ll admit that much. But that’s our boy, isn’t it. You’re a son to be proud of.”

That is what they gave me. The relief and the gladness came up together, and the tears came with them before I could do anything about it.

“Really? Do you really mean it?”

“Of course we do.”

“…Mom. Dad. Thank you.”

I said it with the broadest smile I had in me.

“We won’t breathe a word of it, and we’re behind you. If a noble family needs your strength, and they mean to look after you in return, then there’s nothing to worry about. You give it everything you have.”

“Dad’s going to be lonely, with you leaving home in a year and a bit. But I’m behind you all the same.”

“I’m behind Big Brother too!”

“Everyone… thank you. Really. I’m going to work so hard!”

All of them behind me. Of all the families I could have been reborn into, I got this one.

Nobody had turned away from me. The relief cut the tension so cleanly that the whole day’s tiredness landed on me at once. There was still Lord Frederick to fetch, though.

“Everyone, Lord Frederick has actually come along to explain things. Can I bring him in?”

“What? Lord Frederick, he’s here? Now?!”

“He is. He’s going to explain about the Royal Academy and the rest of it. I’ll go and get him.”

“L-Leon! Wait! We’ve nothing to offer him. And look at the state of us, what are we supposed to do?!”

Mom went straight into a full panic. Dad wasn’t doing much better beside her.

“It’s all right. Nothing needs preparing.”

I told them so and went back out to the carriage, feeling a great deal lighter than I had walking in. Then I brought Lord Frederick back with me, and when we came through the door Mom and Dad were kneeling, waiting for him. Marie was sitting on a chair.

“Please, do not stand on ceremony. I am sorry to have called on you so suddenly.”

“Mom, Dad, you really don’t have to do that. Come on, sit down. We can’t talk like this.”

I got the two of them into chairs and offered one to Lord Frederick as well.

“Allow me to begin again. I am sorry for taking Leon away from you with no warning. I have come today to explain what is to become of him.”

“Th-thank you.”

“You will have heard it from Leon already, but your son has every attribute. We would like that strength put to work for the ducal house, and so it has been settled that he will attend the Royal Academy. I am sorry to be asking your consent after the fact. Will you permit it?”

“Yes. It’s, um, it’s what Leon wants to do, so we’re behind him.”

Dad got that out with his nerves showing, and Mom nodded along beside him. Thank you, both of you.

“You have my thanks for understanding. And for as long as he attends, Leon will live at the ducal house. Will you permit that as well?”

“At the ducal house. Leon, living…”

“Yes. We concluded that it is better both for Leon and for the house.”

“That is, well… thank you.”

Neither of them has much grasp of formal speech, so their answers come out at odd angles as they try their hardest not to give offense. That’s what happens when you talk to a noble. Sorry for dropping this on you with no warning, you two. Hang in there.

“Then when the time comes for the Royal Academy, we shall take good care of him.”

“Please do.”

That was the end of the explanation, and the tension in the room came down a little. Which was when Lord Frederick started again, in a rather softer voice than before.

“There is one more thing I would ask of you. A child of a distant relative of mine has asked to visit here. It is short notice, one week from now, but might the child call on you? Forgive me for the suddenness of it.”

Lord Frederick bowed his head to them, and the pair of them came apart on the spot. When a noble bows his head at you, you have no idea what to do. Believe me, I understand the feeling.

“O-of course!”

“We can’t offer her anything, but…”

“Thank you. You need do nothing beyond what you always do. I am grateful.”

That settled, Lord Frederick got straight up out of his chair.

“Then I shall take my leave. I am sorry to have come down on you without warning.”

“Oh… are you leaving us so soon?”

I asked it, and Lord Frederick looked over at me and gave me a nod.

“Yes. You’ll have things to talk over as a family, won’t you.”

Then he turned to Marie, and stroked her hair gently with one big hand.

“We arrived out of nowhere. Rather a shock, was it? I’m sorry for that.”

“It’s okay!”

“Is it. Thank you. I’ll be coming again, so we’ll see each other then.”

“Yeah!”

“Then if you will excuse me.”

Lord Frederick made one clean bow and went.

Once I’d seen him off, we all gathered in the living room again.

“I was so nervous I couldn’t really follow what he was saying to us.”

“Me neither. So, Leon is going to live at the ducal house?”

“Yeah. If I get into the Royal Academy, that’s what happens.”

“I see…”

They both had that faraway look. I understand it. That is the correct face. Nothing about any of this makes sense anymore.

“And Lord Frederick’s relative’s child is coming to us?”

“He did say something along those lines. His words were so fancy I couldn’t make heads or tails of them.”

“That’s right. She’s coming exactly a week from now, so could I ask you to get a few things ready? It’s a girl, and she’s a noble, so there’s some preparing to do.”

At the word noble the two of them reacted as one.

“A-a noble?! W-well. Yes, of course she is. Now that I think about it, a noble’s relative is a noble. I hadn’t got that far. A noble, here, what are we going to do?!”

“Wh-what do we do? What’s she coming for? We’ll have to buy something we can put in front of her.”

“Both of you, calm down! It’s fine. I’ve already worked out what we’re doing.”

That brought them down a little.

“Have you. Well, that’s a weight off. Haaah. So much has happened today I’m worn out with it.”

“…Sorry for all the trouble.”

I said it with my head a little down, and Mom came straight over and pulled me into a hug.

“I have never once thought of you as trouble. It isn’t as though ordinary people get to meet nobles, and if this is happening to us, then we’re going to enjoy it!”

“That’s right. Dad’ll do the same.”

“I’m going to be friends with her!”

“Everyone… thank you. Really.”

I am so happy I don’t know what to do with it. I love all of them. There may be hard things coming, but I will always treasure this family. I will keep them safe. I settled that in my own head, then and there.

“So, Leon, will you tell us what we’re doing? Why is she coming to us at all?”

“Sure. We happened to run into each other, and she got interested in how commoners live. She wants to try it for herself. Her name’s Lady Martine, and apparently she likes sweet things. So I thought she could look around the house for a while, then we’d go to the forest and pick raspberries, and bring them back to make pancakes together in our kitchen.”

That took a good deal of the worry out of both of them.

“I see. Yes, we can manage that here.”

“Give the house a good cleaning, and that should do it?”

“Yeah. I don’t think anything special is needed.”

“Then I can rest easy.”

While the two of them were settling, Marie latched on to the word raspberries and turned to me beaming.

“You’re going to pick raspberries with her?”

“That’s right. Will you help, Marie?”

“Uh-huh! I’ll pick lots and lots!”

“Thank you, Marie.”

Marie won’t have the first idea about manners, but Lord Frederick told me that was fine, so I’ll have her in on it with the rest of us.

“Big Brother, are Nikola and Luke coming too?”

“No. This time it’s a secret from those two. The girl who’s coming is a noble, so she can’t be around a lot of people.”

“She can’t?”

“She can’t. So this is a secret as well. Another family secret.”

Marie clapped her hands over her mouth again and nodded at me, hard. Family secrets must never, ever be told: she has that filed away now.

“Keeping it from Nikola and Luke is all very well, but those two turn up here without warning. What do we do about that?”

“Hmm. I’ll tell Uncle and Auntie a noble’s coming and ask them to keep Nikola and Luke indoors that day. If I put it like that they’ll stop them, won’t they?”

“They will. Say a noble’s coming and they’ll hold to it absolutely.”

“Then I’ll go and tell them later.”

“See that you do.”

I mustn’t forget that. She is the princess, after all, so the fewer people around her the better, and Nikola and Luke are better off well clear of anything complicated.

I was still sorting out my list of things to do when Dad spoke up.

“Leon, may I say something about that plan of yours? I think it’s a good one, but isn’t a pancake with nothing but raspberries in it a bit plain for a noble?”

“He has a point. They say nobles eat food made with sugar every day of their lives.”

“That’s what I thought too. So I bought sugar, at least.”

I said it, opened one of the bags that had been sitting on the table all this time, and showed them what was inside.

“Big Brother, what’s this? Is it salt?”

“Marie, this is sugar.”

“Sugar?”

“That’s right. It’s very, very sweet.”

“Really? I love sweet things!”

Marie’s whole face lit up at the word. Mom and Dad, on the other hand, looked thoroughly astonished. What has surprised them so much? Is sugar that rare?

“Leon, did you even have money for sugar?”

Ah… I hadn’t said anything about money. I may well be buying more things from here on, so I ought to tell them I have a way of earning it.

“The truth is that Marcel bought an idea off me, so I have enough for sugar. You don’t need to worry about it.”

“Bought an idea? What does that mean?”

Hmm. How do I explain this. Neither of them really knows anything about magic tools.

“An idea I came up with happened to be useful for developing a magic tool. So they paid me for it.”

“Does that sort of thing happen?”

Both of them still looked puzzled, but they let the explanation stand.

“Well. We understand that you have money, at any rate. Thank you for buying the sugar.”

“Sure! So, shall we practice making pancakes with sugar in them today?”

“We don’t know the quantities, so a practice run is sensible. And there are a few raspberries left.”

“Then today we make pancakes!”

“Pancakes today?! Yaaay!”

Marie was bouncing where she stood, and Mom and Dad were watching her and smiling. Everyone in this room is laughing. I’ll take it.

After that the whole family went through to the restaurant and made pancakes together. We made several batches, shifting the quantities a little each time, and what came out at the end was genuinely good. With no milk and no baking powder they come out chewy, and they don’t taste the way a pancake tastes in Japan, but the sugar has made an enormous difference. Princess Martine should be pleased with these.

Chapter 11 – Shopping in the Central District

“Haaah. I think that might be the best I’ve slept in a very long time…”

Hang on. This isn’t our house. That ceiling is much too far away and there is a canopy involved… Oh. Right. Yesterday I came to House Townsend and they put me up for the night. I haven’t overslept, have I? I climbed down off the bed with that worry in my head and went through to the front of the room, where Anne was already waiting.

“Good morning, Master Leon.”

“Good morning, Anne. I haven’t overslept, have I?”

“In the mornings the family takes breakfast in their own rooms and leaves for their work, so please be easy about it.”

Oh. Well, that’s a relief. I let the breath go out of me and asked her the next thing.

“Will I be given breakfast today?”

“Yes. Lord Frederick left instructions that you were to have your breakfast, and that word was to be sent to him the moment you were ready to go home.”

That is very kind of him. Though it does leave the question of whether I ought to be paying my respects to the rest of the family first.

“Should I not give my greetings to everyone before I go?”

“The mistress is at home, so if you would take your leave of her, that will serve.”

“Understood. Thank you very much.”

“Then we shall begin with your clothes. Please change into these.”

What Anne handed me was a good deal finer than what I’d arrived in. Not noble clothing, exactly, but the sort of thing you would expect on a commoner from the wealthier end of town.

“Um, these aren’t my clothes, are they?”

“No, sir. They are a gift from the master. He had clothes prepared that would not make you conspicuous among commoners.”

Not conspicuous among commoners! Among the rich ones, maybe. On my street these will have people coming out of doorways to look! Still, you don’t hand a gift back, not after somebody has gone to that much trouble…

“Thank you very much. Would you pass my thanks to Lord Richard as well?”

“Certainly, sir.”

So I changed and ate my breakfast, and then it was time to take my leave of the Townsend house. When I came out into the entrance hall, Lord Frederick and Lady Catherine had come down to see me off.

“Lady Catherine, thank you very much for having me.”

“We enjoyed it too. I hope we shall be seeing a great deal of you.”

“Yes. I hope so as well.”

“Then let’s be off.”

“Yes. Lord Frederick, I’ll be in your hands today.”

Then Lord Frederick prompted me along and I climbed into the carriage. It was the same one that had brought me, so the ride was as comfortable as I remembered. Anne came with us.

“Leon, is there anywhere in the central district you want to stop?”

“N-no, I’m quite all right.”

“There’s no need to hold back. Getting yourself out to the central district again would be no small undertaking, would it?”

There are places I want to stop. Whether I’m allowed to say so is another matter. Dragging a duke’s son around on my errands sounds a lot like disrespect from where I’m standing. Then again, getting out here and back takes half a day, and he did offer. Maybe I’m allowed to lean on this one.

“Are you certain?”

“Of course I am.”

In that case I want the bank, to see what my balance has done, and I want a clock. And sugar, for when Her Highness comes. I’ve already told them about every attribute, so there’s no reason left to hide the account.

“Um. The bank, and a clockmaker, and then I’d like to buy some sugar…”

“The bank? You have an account, Leon?”

“Yes. Marcel opened one for me. He said I would be needing it. And I’m paid for the work I do on magic tools with him.”

“Ah. Yes, every attribute would be uncommonly useful in making magic tools… Then we’ll go to all three. Anne.”

“Certainly, my lord.”

The moment Lord Frederick said her name, Anne was already giving the driver our destinations, as though she had understood the whole errand before I opened my mouth. W-wait, we have to do the bank first, I haven’t got any money on me!

“Excuse me, could we go to the bank before the rest? And, um, may I ask what a clock and sugar cost?”

“We are going to the bank first, sir, so please be easy. The price of sugar depends upon the quality, but a bag may be had for about one copper coin. As for a clock, the very simplest should be about one gold coin.”

So sugar is expensive, but not out of my reach. Clocks are expensive too, but that’s about what I’d guessed, and I was buying one regardless.

“Then I’d be really glad if we could go to all three.”

“Certainly, sir.”

Anne smiled and inclined her head.

The carriage rocked along for a little while, and then we were at the bank. When I got down Anne fell in a step behind me. I told her she was welcome to stay where she was, and she would not be moved: “Until Master Leon has been delivered to his own door, I am Master Leon’s maid.” Lord Frederick, meanwhile, would wait with the carriage. Which means a duke’s son is sitting outside on my account, so I had better be quick about this.

I went in at a good pace, made for the window where I’d opened the account, and spoke to the man behind it. I wanted somebody I’d dealt with before. It’s only my second time in here and the place makes me nervous.

“Welcome. How may I help you today?”

“I’d like to check my balance, and to withdraw some money.”

“Certainly. May I see your bank card?”

“Here it is.”

“Thank you. Now, if you would send a little mana into this crystal ball.”

His eyes went to my clothes, then to the maid standing behind me, and he checked for half a second. He must remember me from last time, when I stood out for entirely the opposite reason. Whatever he thought, he worked through it without a flicker and didn’t press me about any of it, and I was grateful for that.

“Master Leon. Confirmed, thank you. Your balance first. This is where it stands at present.”

He passed me a small slip of paper. They write the balance down for you, apparently. Ten platinum coins.

Isn’t that kind of a lot?! Next time I see Marcel I’m asking about this…

“Thank you. Could you take out one gold coin’s worth for me?”

“Certainly. In gold? Or would you like it broken into silver and copper?”

“Ten silver coins, please.”

“Certainly. One moment.”

Being able to draw it out in small coins is genuinely useful. Gold coins and up are next to useless among commoners, so the smaller the better. I waited a while, and the man came back with ten silver coins.

“Thank you for waiting. Please check them.”

I counted them properly, all ten, and put them away in my purse.

“They’re all here. Thank you very much.”

“Please come to us again whenever you need us. Thank you.”

“Thank you as well.”

Then Anne and I went back out to the carriage at a fair clip. The sheer formality of that place really does get to me.

“Then we go on to the clockmaker.”

“Yes. Thank you.”

We were there almost at once, so the clockmaker must sit very close to the bank.

“I’ll be waiting in the carriage. Take as long over it as you like.”

“Certainly. Thank you very much.”

I’m afraid taking my time is quite out of the question, sir! I kept that where it belonged and got down from the carriage.

“Master Leon, this shop admits only nobles, or those carrying a noble house’s introduction, so I shall go in ahead of you.”

“Understood. Thank you.”

So there are shops like that too. The gap between nobles and commoners is already real enough, and the idea of it opening any wider is frightening. All the more reason to work hard and be of some use to the Townsend camp.

I followed Anne in, and a mild-mannered man in late middle age came out to us. Anne produced something like a crest from inside her uniform and showed it to him, and after that we were let through without the smallest fuss. A noble house’s crest, I suppose.

“Good morning to you both. And what sort of clock are we looking for today?”

He put the question to me, not to Anne. It seems I have been certified as a customer.

“I’d like a clock I can carry with me. Something simple and hard-wearing.”

“Very good. In that case, might this suit you?”

What he showed me was a plain pocket watch, and the cheapest started at five silver coins. Fifty thousand yen for the simplest one in the shop; Anne had warned me a clock runs to a gold coin, so this is half what I had braced for. If you went looking for a pocket watch in modern Japan I suspect it would cost you a great deal more…

I worked my way along the case comparing them. Almost every lid was plain, with no design worked into it, but one of them had an acorn set into the lid. A bit of decoration does look sharper. It’s bound to cost more than the plain ones, though…

“How much is the one with the acorn on the lid?”

“That one is eight silver coins and two copper.”

Call it eighty-two thousand yen. Expensive, but it’s a thing I’ll be carrying for years, so I may as well.

“Then I’ll take that one, please.”

“Very good, sir.”

I have one at last. The bells give you a rough idea of the hour, but I’d been wanting something that would tell me the time exactly. I took the watch and tucked it into my inside pocket. I intend to have it on me from now on, wherever I go, which means every last piece of clothing I own is going to need an inside pocket sewn into it.

With the watch bought we went back to the carriage and on to a shop that sold sugar. I came out with about three bags of it, and after that the carriage took me the whole way home.

“Right, Leon. I’ll be here, so call me in when you’ve finished.”

“Yes. I’ll come for you as quickly as I can.”

“Don’t rush on my account.”

“Thank you.”

And with that I left Lord Frederick in the carriage and got down alone. I was a little tired, and the part that actually mattered hadn’t even started, so I braced myself and went inside.

Chapter 10 – House Townsend

For a few days after that, nothing out of the ordinary happened. I went out to the forest with Marie and Nikola and Luke, and otherwise the days went by the way days do. Right now we’re in the middle of the lunch service, though the customers have thinned out, so we’ll be closing soon. Man, I’m starving. I want my lunch.

I was thinking exactly that when one more customer came through the door.

“Welcome! …Wait, Lord Frederick?”

It was Lord Frederick, but not as I’d ever seen him. He was in plain, simple clothes with an easy smile on his face, and anyone who didn’t know better would have taken him for a commoner who’d done a little better than most.

“Leon. I came to talk to you today.”

“May I ask why you’re dressed like that?”

“In my usual clothes everyone is frightened of me. Nobody will treat me like a person.”

Nobles do not, as a rule, put on commoner clothes over a complaint like that. Which reminds me. It’s a little late to be noticing, but this man doesn’t act much like a noble at all. He smiled at me the day I ran headlong into him in the street, and with any other noble I’d have been cut down where I stood for the insolence and nobody would have thought it strange.

Then again, maybe the class system here isn’t as rigid as I’ve been assuming. Commoners can take the Royal Academy entrance exam. Commoners can open an account at the bank. When you actually stop and think about it, that’s an extraordinary thing.

While I was thinking it over, Lord Frederick bent down and peered into my face, plainly puzzled.

“Something wrong, Leon? Don’t tell me it doesn’t suit me.”

“N-no, nothing like that! I only thought that nobles must dress this way sometimes as well.”

“Leon. The fact that I am a noble is not public knowledge.”

“Y-yes!”

I slapped a hand over my mouth and nodded as hard as I could.

“Anyway, you’re still open, aren’t you? May I have lunch?”

“Please do. We have steak or stir-fried vegetables with pork. Which would you prefer?”

“Steak, I think.”

“Certainly. One moment, please.”

I went to the counter, called the steak set through to Mom and Dad, and was on my way to clear a table a customer had just left when Marie stopped me.

“Big Brother, come here a second.”

She had her voice down to a whisper. What was that about? I went over, puzzled.

“What is it, Marie?”

“Do you know that man?”

“That man? You mean the one I was just talking to?”

“Uh-huh. You were talking all different from normal, so I thought maybe something was wrong.”

Because I was using polite speech with him? Marie, you are a very kind little girl. I had to fight my face back down to something like neutral first. Then I had to work out what I could safely tell her.

His being a noble is supposed to be a secret, after all.

“He’s a friend of mine, Marie, so it’s fine. He’s just somebody important, and I was being careful not to be rude to him. That’s all it was. You don’t have to worry about me.”

“Ohhh. Well, that’s good then.”

“You have to be careful not to be rude to him too, all right? I’ll look after him, so you take the other customers.”

“Got it!”

I don’t think Lord Frederick is a bad person. I just don’t know him well enough yet, so I’d rather do the looking-after myself. If someone in my family said the wrong thing and it got called disrespect, that isn’t a problem I could fix afterward.

While we were talking, the steak came up.

“Leon, the steak, please.”

“Yep! Taking it now.”

I carried the steak set over to Lord Frederick’s table.

“Thank you for waiting. Your steak set. Please take your time.”

“Thank you. I’ll eat, then.”

He worked through the steak with nothing but a wooden fork and looked graceful doing it all the same. Maybe it’s only that I know what he is. But whatever that quality is, it comes from somewhere inside, and a change of clothes doesn’t cover it.

A while later he finished his meal.

“Thank you for the meal. Leon, do you have a moment?”

“Yes. What can I do for you?”

“I told my family about you, and it turns out they would very much like to meet you. Would you let me invite you to dinner tonight? I thought I might hand over the study materials afterward.”

Dinner. At Lord Frederick’s house. Which means House Townsend?! Why me?! Maybe I really am under suspicion… Is it something I’ve said, or something I’ve done? Not that I could start acting like a normal eight-year-old at this stage.

And it’s not as if I could refuse, however long I sat here worrying about it. I’m going. There’s nothing else on the table. So I’m going, then… and my stomach already hurts.

“Yes. Um, may I go and ask my parents whether I’m allowed out?”

“By all means. I’ll come with you.”

“Oh, but isn’t your being a noble supposed to be a secret?”

“It is a secret from people at large. Your family is another matter. I can hardly take custody of a child without disclosing my station.”

“That is… thank you very much.”

So the two of us went to the counter, and I called Mom and Dad over. There was nobody else left in the restaurant by then.

“Dad, Mom, can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Leon? What is it, sweetheart?”

“Is something the matter, Leon?”

“So, um, this is Lord Frederick, and he’s invited me to his house today. Can I go out?”

The two of them looked at him, and their faces went guarded.

“Is this man a friend of yours, Leon? Mom’s never seen him before.”

“Who might you be, sir?”

“Forgive me for not introducing myself sooner. My name is Frederick Townsend. I serve with the Royal Guard at the royal palace. This is my proof of that.”

He drew something like a badge out of his coat. Mom and Dad listened to him, then looked at the badge, and the color drained out of both of their faces while I watched.

“W-we are terribly sorry, sir, truly, we had no idea—”

“Our apologies. Forgive us.”

They got the words out in a rush and dropped to their knees where they stood.

“Please, raise your heads. There is no need to be frightened, and I am not going to call anything here disrespect. The truth is that I became acquainted with Leon a few days ago, and I would like to invite him to dinner tonight. Would you permit it? Since it is dinner, he would stay at the house overnight, and I will see him home to this door myself tomorrow without fail.”

“W-why would you invite Leon to dinner…?”

Mom asked it, and she was frightened.

“I spoke of Leon to my family, and they said they would like to meet him. So I decided to invite him. It is simple curiosity on their part, nothing more, and I would ask you not to worry over it. I am sorry for the trouble I have brought to your door.”

Lord Frederick answered so courteously that there was no arguing with it. Or perhaps they’d decided you don’t refuse a noble. Either way, Mom and Dad gave their permission, and neither of them looked easy about it.

“Then, um. Dad and Mom would be grateful if you’d take good care of him.”

“Certainly. Please be easy about it. Right then, Leon, can we go just as you are?”

“Yes, I’m ready. Mom, Dad, I’m off. Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

“Be careful, sweetheart.”

“I will. I’m going, then.”

And with that Lord Frederick took me out of the restaurant. I said I’d be fine, but honestly I’m pretty worried. Why would the ducal family want to meet me? Simple curiosity, he says. Curious about what, exactly? Lord Frederick seems like a good person, but I still don’t really know him. And a whole ducal house frightens me more than I can say…

“Leon, we’re taking that carriage.”

A single carriage was standing a little way down from our restaurant. Solidly built, from the look of it, but plain. A closed box on wheels and nothing more.

“What sort of carriage is that?”

“The ducal house’s. It’s what we use when we want to go about unnoticed.”

“So you have carriages for that as well.”

As we came up to it the driver opened the door for us.

“Go on, you first.”

“I-is that all right?”

“Of course it is. In you go.”

“Thank you very much.”

I climbed in, half afraid to touch anything, and the inside was nothing like the outside. Thick carpet underfoot. Chairs with real cushioning in them. Light orbs that lit the whole interior bright as day.

“Whoa!”

“Ha! We do count as a ducal house. Though as these things go, this one is on the modest side.”

“S-sorry!”

“Nothing to apologize for. Sit down.”

“Yes. Excuse me.”

A ducal house really is something else. The seats are soft enough to sink into, and the jolting of the road never comes up through them, so riding in it is no work at all. I spent a while enjoying the luxury before I remembered that I had rather more pressing things to think about.

I’m on my way to a ducal house. What are they going to say to me? Am I so obviously strange for a commoner child that they’ve decided to look into it? The more I turned it over, the worse it got.

“There’s no need to look so anxious.”

“But why have I been called for?”

“My parents simply want to meet you.”

“Lord Frederick’s parents… that would be the duke, wouldn’t it?”

“No. My eldest brother has already succeeded to the title, so my father is the previous duke. The custom in this country is that a man hands the title to his son the year the boy turns fifteen, and goes to serve at the royal palace himself.”

Good to know. Although whether he’s the duke or the previous duke makes no difference at all from where I’m standing. Either way he’s a noble, and a very highly placed one.

And a noble like that wants to meet me. Which brings me back to being certain I’ve done something.

“Have I committed some offense? Is that what this is about? And why is it that you take such an interest in me, Lord Frederick?”

“That is…”

What was that gap! Excruciating! So there is something he’d rather not say.

“If I want your trust, I’d do better to be honest. I suspected you at the start. A spy out of another country, I thought. Then we talked, and it stopped fitting. I had you looked into and found nothing out of place. That settled it. Which leaves the other problem. If you are not a spy, then you are far too able for a commoner. You’re clever. You think quickly, you pitch yourself differently for every person you speak to, and your manners are sound. The ducal house would like you on our side. Does that answer you?”

So I was under suspicion. And investigated, and I never once noticed. But now the suspicion has been cleared, or mostly cleared, and what’s left is a duke’s son telling me I’m worth having.

Which means I ought to be building this friendship on purpose. If I’m going to walk into the world of the nobility, the backing of a high-ranking noble isn’t optional. With a ducal house behind me, everything ahead of me gets easier. Maybe I should even be showing off a little more than I have been.

“I’m glad the suspicion is cleared, and I’m very happy that you think so well of my abilities. Thank you.”

After that we talked about nothing in particular and let the ride carry us. Knowing that Lord Frederick had his own calculations in coming to me actually let me relax; it’s when you can’t work out why somebody is being kind to you that you can’t sit still. I rode along hoping, as hard as I could hope, that the rest of his family were as easy to talk to as he is.

And so, at the end of a very elegant stretch of time in a very fine carriage, we arrived at House Townsend. The first thing that astonished me was the size of the grounds: it is far enough from the gate to the house that you cover the distance by carriage. On the way I got a look at garden after garden, every one of them beautiful.

The house astonished me too. I only caught a glimpse of it through the window, but it was enormous, something like three stories high and above all impossibly wide.

“Leon. Stay behind me.”

“Y-yes! Understood.”

The moment he said it my nerves came back, and a strange sweat with them. Whatever happens, I must not blunder.

The carriage stopped, the door opened at once from outside, and Lord Frederick stepped down first. I followed him out.

“Welcome home, Lord Frederick.”

“Alban. I’m back. Leon, this is Alban, our butler.”

“My name is Alban. I hope to serve you well.”

“H-how do you do. My name is Leon, and I hope you’ll be good to me as well.”

When I gave my greeting back, something like surprise crossed Alban’s face, and then he bowed to me. People in this world really do bow, exactly the way we do at home. As a Japanese person I find it comfortable, but why does so much here line up with Japan? Does it have something to do with how I ended up here…?

“Leon, you have been invited as a guest, so if there is anything you need, say so to Alban or to any of the servants without hesitating.”

“Yes. Thank you very much.”

“Then I shall have a maid show him to the guest room.”

“Yes, do that. Leon, I’ll see you at dinner.”

“Yes. At dinner.”

I got the pleasant smile out on cue, but wait, Lord Frederick is leaving?! Being left here alone is nothing but terrifying!

“Master Leon. I am Anne, one of the maids. I will show you to your room.”

“I’m Leon. It’s good to meet you.”

I ducked my head to her. Anne looks to be somewhere in her forties, and she has the warm, unhurried air of the sort of woman you’d want to call Auntie.

“Oh, no, no. Please raise your head. Master Leon is our guest, and a guest has no cause to bow to a servant.”

“But I’m a commoner.”

“That does not make you any less our guest. Now then, your room is this way.”

Anne led me through the house, and the walk to the guest room was one shock after another.

The entrance hall was vast, and an enormous chandelier hung from the middle of the ceiling. Every single arm of the thing held a light orb, which means that switching the lights on in here, and off again at night, must be an ordeal. There’s presumably some mechanism for lowering the chandelier. Even so, that is an awful lot of orbs to get through one at a time.

Past the hall and up the stairs, carpet ran over every inch of the floor, deep enough that walking on it was a pleasure in itself. Vases of flowers stood all down the second-floor corridor, with paintings hung on the wall between them, and the whole of it was ridiculously grand.

So we walked on through a house of a kind I’d only ever seen inside a story, even back in Japan, and came to the guest room.

“Master Leon. Here we are.”

“Thank you very much.”

Anne held the door open and waited, so I stepped inside. The space just past the door had a low table and a sofa, and the left side of the room was hidden behind a screen. Behind the screen were a bed, a small table, and two more doors.

“Master Leon, may I go over your schedule with you?”

“Y-yes!”

I hurried back to where Anne was standing near the entrance.

“Please, sit on the sofa.”

“Thank you. Aren’t you going to sit, Anne?”

“I am a servant. I cannot sit on the sofa in a guest’s room.”

“Of course. I understand.”

Being a noble’s servant really does sound like hard work.

“Now then, your schedule. The dinner is about an hour from now, so between now and then you will take your bath, have your hair arranged, and be changed into fresh clothes.”

Hold on. How does she know it’s an hour from now? Does this world have clocks?!

“Excuse me, may I ask one thing before the schedule? Do you have clocks here?”

“Clocks? Of course we do. There is a clock in every room of this house. The servants also carry small ones about with them.”

Seriously?! I’d assumed this world simply didn’t have them. We don’t have one at home and they do have them here, which means clocks are expensive. Wait. This means I can finally find out how many hours there are in a day!

“Which one is this room’s clock?”

“This is it, sir.”

Anne fetched the little clock that had been sitting on the small table by the bed. It was exactly, precisely a clock from Earth. Numbers from one to twelve, an hour hand, a minute hand, a second hand. Another thing this world has in common with Japan. Which makes me wonder whether a day here runs twenty-four hours as well.

“It’s sixteen-oh-five just now. Am I right?”

“You are, sir. Quite right.”

“And a day is twenty-four hours?”

“It is, but… you can read a clock, Master Leon. And there is nothing the least bit off about your formal speech. That is wonderful. Those two things are what every new servant hired into this house struggles with first.”

“I was very lucky. There is someone near my home who taught me. Forgive me, clocks are a rarity where I come from and I got carried away.”

Phew. A clock. I honestly did not expect a clock. There is so much here that matches Japan, and I may be reading too much into it, but it’s hard not to feel that somebody arranged it that way. Nothing I can do about that today, though.

What matters is that clocks exist. I want one as soon as I can possibly buy one.

“If anything puzzles you, please ask without hesitating.”

“Thank you. I’m all right for the moment.”

“Very good. Then shall we begin with your bath?”

“Yes. Where would I bathe?”

“The door on the left, there, is the bath. The one on the right is the lavatory.”

“A bath?! There’s a bath?!”

“There is indeed, sir.”

“And I’m allowed in it?!”

“I should be in some difficulty if you were not. It is preparation for the dinner.”

Yesss! A bath at last! My first bath in another world!

“Of course it is. I’m sorry. I’ll go in, then.”

“Yes. I shall assist you.”

Assist? Assist how? She doesn’t mean she’s going to wash me?

“N-no, thank you, I can manage on my own!”

“There is the matter of how our bath is used, however. I could hardly leave you to it.”

Ugh. Put like that, I have no idea how a bath works in this world…

“Then, please. Thank you.”

“Yes. I shall assist you.”

Anne opened the door onto what turned out to be a changing room, with a long bench and a table in it, and the door beyond that led to the bath itself. I undressed and went through. Anne put on something like a heavy apron to keep her uniform dry and rolled her sleeves back.

Oooh, a real bath, it’s been forever! The tub was big enough for several people to stretch out in, with something like stone laid all around it, and it stood full to the brim with hot water, the whole room fogged with steam.

“Anne, how do you heat the water?”

“We fill the tub from the tap, and then one of the staff who can use fire magic warms it to the proper temperature.”

“Ah, so that’s how it’s done.”

So they do it with magic. But heating this much water would take a fire capacity of at least three, which makes me wonder whether they keep a servant purely for the bath. I did try making hot water myself, on the theory that if I can make water a hair off freezing I ought to be able to go the other way, and I never got it above room temperature. I think mana of the water attribute simply can’t heat things. Magic. I have given up expecting it to make sense.

“Do you have a servant just for the bath?”

“Not at all. When nobles take on staff, the lower staff above all, they favor those at level three or higher in fire magic. Fire magic cannot be put into a magic tool, you see.”

They hire for it on purpose. Nobles really do love their baths. Not that I can argue, since I would also like a bath every single day!

With water magic and fire magic I could have hot water in seconds. What I don’t have is a tub. And even if I made one, there’s nowhere in our house to put it, so a bath at home is out of the question. My whole family would tell me they didn’t want the enormous thing in the way, too.

While I was thinking all this, Anne brought a chair over.

“Master Leon, please sit here.”

It was about the size of a chair at a dining table, so I sat, and Anne dipped a pail into the tub and poured the water over my head and body a little at a time.

Ohhh, that’s good. There’s no shower, so it has to be done with a pail, and it’s true that this would be hard work without someone to help. You’d be fetching water over and over, and that pail can’t be light.

“Anne, do all nobles bathe with a maid helping them?”

“Everyone is attended, sir, but from around eight years old the men are attended by a valet and the ladies by a maid. Children are all attended by maids.”

“I’m eight…”

“I am aware. But no valet happened to be free, and you are only just eight, so I was given to you instead. Would you have preferred a valet?”

“No. This is fine.”

I’d assumed she was simply one of the older maids. It turns out this is the work that calls for one.

“Now I shall soap your hair and wash it. Please close your eyes.”

“Yes.”

Oh, this is bad. This is far too good. It’s exactly like having your hair washed at a salon…

“Is that comfortable, sir?”

“It’s wonderful.”

“I am glad to hear it. I shall rinse now.”

Haaah. That was so good…

“Will you wash yourself, sir?”

“Yes. I’ll do that part.”

“Then I shall wait outside. Please take as long as you like.”

Once Anne had gone I wet a cloth, worked the soap into it, and scrubbed every inch of myself. I use Purification now and then, but actually washing is a completely different animal. When I’d gone over myself properly I filled the pail, rinsed off clean, and lowered myself into the tub.

“Aaah, this is too gooood…”

That is not a noise an eight-year-old makes. I couldn’t help it. Sinking into that much hot water is just… Being able to bathe every day. Nobles have it made.

I stayed in until I’d had my fill and then went back to the changing room, where Anne had towels and a glass of water waiting. I dried off, drank the water, put on the thing that seemed to be a bathrobe, and came out.

“Did that ease you, sir?”

“Yes. It was wonderful.”

“I am glad. Then may I dress you and set your hair?”

“That’s fine, only… I don’t have any other clothes with me.”

“Lord Frederick has had clothes prepared for you to wear at the dinner, Master Leon. You are to change into those.”

Clothes as well?! They have thought of so much that it has come back around to frightening. I’m not sure I’m a useful enough person to be worth this much trouble… But it isn’t as though I have anything else to wear, so the right move is to be grateful and borrow them.

“Thank you very much.”

“No, sir. Give your thanks to Lord Frederick. Now, before we dress you, may I dry your hair? Please sit in that chair.”

She was right, it was still wet. I did as I was told and sat, and the chair turned out to belong to a dressing table, so my own face came up in the mirror in front of me. I’ve never had a proper look at it before. I’ve seen my reflection in water any number of times, but never this clearly.

That really is beautiful blond hair and amber eyes. The features are all in the right places, too. I can’t believe this is my face. For better and for worse, Japanese me had the kind of face you could pass on any street and never once look at twice, so the gap is honestly staggering. I was still staring at myself when Anne set something down on the table.

“I shall dry your hair with this blower.”

I’d been wondering how one dries hair here, and the answer is a blower. Anne stood a small platform on the dressing table, set the blower on top of it, and fitted a magic stone into place, and a fairly stiff wind came up into my face. It seems you dry the hair in the wind while lifting the water out with a cloth. Very pleasant in summer. Freezing in winter.

Anne worked at my hair for a while and stopped once it was nearly dry. I’d been beautifully warm coming out of the bath and now I was chilled through. I want to go back in. I was thinking exactly that when she handed me the clothes.

“Now then, if you would change into these.”

What she gave me was brilliantly colored, generous with its fabric, superb against the skin, and unmistakably expensive. I am too frightened to ask what it cost. I decided not to think about the price and put it on, and it was as comfortable as it looked and sat on me as though it had been built there. How does it fit when nobody ever asked my measurements? Come to that, I don’t know my own measurements…

“It suits you beautifully. Now, if you would sit in this chair again.”

“Yes.”

“I shall set your hair with a little wax.”

“Please do.”

Anne swept my bangs up and back and parted them, and put the whole thing in order.

“That is everything. It is nearly time, so I shall take you down to the dining room.”

“Thank you.”

I was more than a little nervous about the people I was about to meet, but I gathered up my courage and got to my feet.

Anne walked me through that enormous house to the dining room, and when we went in, the family was already seated. I very nearly panicked at the thought that I’d kept them waiting, got hold of myself, bowed properly, and gave them my best pleasant greeting.

“How do you do. My name is Leon. I am very glad to have been invited to dinner this evening.”

That was the line. First impressions matter, so I’d spent the last stretch tearing through my memory for the right way to say it. For a moment every face at the table showed surprise, and then the smiles came back, and the man seated furthest in, a man in his prime, returned my greeting.

“Leon. Thank you for coming to us. Do not stand there being nervous. Sit down.”

That will be Lord Frederick’s father, then. Anne showed me to my place and drew the chair out for me, and I sat as gracefully as I knew how.

Telling me not to be nervous is all very well, but it can’t be done. There is too much rank in this room, and my spine straightened all on its own. I need to be paying attention to everything so I don’t blunder.

“Then let us make our introductions before we eat. Myself first. I am the previous head of House Townsend, Richard Townsend. Beside me is my wife, Catherine.”

Called it. That is Lord Frederick’s father, and he carries himself like it.

“Catherine Townsend, Richard’s wife. I am very glad you have come to us, Leon.”

“I’m glad to know you as well.”

She looks far too young to be Lord Frederick’s mother. Perhaps the nobility have their own methods for that sort of thing.

“And these are my second son, Julien, and my third son, Frederick. My eldest has taken the dukedom and is at the domain, so he is not with us. My eldest daughter is married and likewise absent. I shall introduce them when the chance comes.”

“Julien Townsend. The second son. I trust we shall become acquainted.”

“Yes. I hope so too.”

“You know me well enough by now, but: Frederick Townsend, the third son. Good to see you again.”

“And you.”

Every one of them gives off enough rank to keep a person at arm’s length, but they are smiling at me kindly, so perhaps they really are good people. Then again, a noble is bound to have an excellent poker face. I’d better not extend too much trust just yet.

“Now that the introductions are done, let us enjoy the meal.”

At Lord Richard’s word, the servants brought the food in. Soup first, and bread in a basket.

“Then let us give thanks and eat.”

“Itadakimasu.”

Everyone said it together after him, and that was the signal to begin. I was half a beat behind, so I got my own Itadakimasu out under my breath and started.

Only bread and soup so far, which suggests that a noble’s dinner in this world runs like a full course. There was cutlery laid out on both sides of my plate, exactly like the French place my dad took me to once, back in Japan.

I watched out of the corner of my eye to confirm that everyone was starting from the outermost piece, picked up the same one, and had a mouthful of the soup. Delicious! Something very close to pumpkin potage. I could drink this all night.

I took my time over the soup, and then the bread. I tore off a bite-sized piece and put it in my mouth. Ohhh, it’s soft, it’s wonderful, this is happiness. Bread has to be soft. That’s all there is to it.

From there we talked about nothing in particular between courses and I worked my way happily through the meal. Every dish was excellent, and it was easy to believe what they say about noble cooking advancing by the year.

“Leon. Did we satisfy you?”

Lord Richard put the question to me.

“Yes! It was delicious.”

“I am glad to hear it. Then may we turn to something rather more serious?”

His face went grave as he said it. Right. I’d been so busy enjoying the food that I still hadn’t heard why I’d been brought here at all. My nerves came back all at once.

“Yes. Please go ahead.”

“Leon, there is a favor I wish to ask of you.”

“A favor, sir?”

What could a noble possibly want from me? He could surely get hold of anything he liked without coming to me for it…

“There are a great many nobles in this country, and at present they are split precisely down the middle. One is the camp we belong to: that noble and commoner should help one another, and that a capable person should be raised up whatever their birth. The other holds that the great houses and their histories must be preserved, and that the line between noble and commoner should be drawn far more strictly than it is.”

So that’s what has been going on over my head. It is very much not in my interest for the second camp to win.

“The order of this country was laid down several hundred years ago by the Apostle, and certain important rules were fixed at that time. One: that in return for their privileges, nobles guarantee commoners a minimum standard of living and their safety. Another: that nobles do not rule commoners, but that the two live by helping one another. The country was built with those rules underneath it. Of late, however, fewer and fewer people revere Micheline, and the voices saying the rules need no longer be kept grow louder every year.”

The Apostle again. Every attribute, apparently, which makes the whole subject hard to leave alone.

More to the point, it’s because of those rules that this whole family is dealing honestly with a commoner boy at their own table. Which means I owe the Apostle a certain amount of gratitude.

“Frederick tells me you are a remarkably able commoner. And I have been watching you since you arrived. Your speech and your table manners are very nearly complete. Where you learned them is a mystery to me, but I do not intend to pursue it. In return for that, I ask you to lend your strength to our camp. What matters is the plain fact that commoners of talent exist. That there has been no commoner of any real distinction for decades is part of what has given the other side its confidence. Leon. I am asking you.”

And Lord Richard bowed his head to me. A noble, bowing his head to me! I scrambled to say something, anything, that would get him to lift it again.

“Um, please, raise your head!”

Right. Sort it out. One side wants the classes drawn hard, the other wants talented commoners pulled up, and the nobility is split between them. Long ago God’s Apostle set it down that nobles were not to rule commoners but to live by helping them, and now that hardly anyone has any faith left, more and more people are saying that rule can go.

That’s the shape of it. Except… wait. Wouldn’t a noble ordinarily want commoners under his thumb and his own power increased? Why is the nobility divided over it at all?

“Um, may I ask one thing? Why are you in the camp that protects commoners, Lord Richard? Wouldn’t a noble ordinarily want the nobility made stronger?”

“Because I believe that holding people down by force is bad for the future of this country. A country is built out of people in the end, and most of those people are commoners. If noble power grows past what it already is and commoners are pressed under it, the country will rot in time. Nearly everyone in our camp thinks as I do.”

That is a genuinely good answer. He isn’t thinking about making himself stronger, he’s thinking about what this country will be later. The nobles here are not all bad after all. For a man like this I’d like to be of use. And from my side of it, having a ducal house lend me its strength is about as reassuring as anything I could ask for.

“Um. I don’t know how much help I can be, but please let me help you.”

“Truly?! Leon, thank you.”

He bowed his head to me a second time. I’d been carrying around this idea that nobles were all black-hearted and looked down their noses at commoners, and apparently that isn’t so. House Townsend surely has its share of that somewhere. But they don’t hold a commoner cheap for the sake of it.

These people, I might actually be able to trust.

Which raises the question of whether I could tell these people about my attributes. They’re putting their faith in me, and lying to them sits badly. And beyond that there’s a calculation in it: I want to be protected by people who know.

“Leon, I would have you enter the Royal Academy first, and take good marks while you are there. You should attend from this house. Everyone around you will understand at once that you stand under the protection of a ducal house. And once you graduate, I would have you serve the country at the royal palace.”

Attend from this house. As in live here?! My nerves would put me on the floor daily. Is there no way at all to get out of this…

“I couldn’t impose on you by living in the house. I’ll rent a room in the central district, so please don’t trouble yourself.”

“There is no call to hold back. Both to make your backing plain to everyone and for your own safety, you had better attend from here.”

Once he’s put it like that, refusing isn’t on the table. I’ll simply have to get used to it…

“Yes… Thank you very much.”

“Think nothing of it. Tell me, Leon, have you had your mana measured yet?”

“Yes, I have. My mana capacity is five, and my attribute is…”

What do I do here. Do I say every attribute? Hiding it in this room would be easy, and if I hide it now I may end up hiding it for the rest of my life. And if it came out later by some accident, I could lose their trust. No. I should say it now…

“Leon? What’s the matter?”

“Um. My attribute is… every attribute.”

“What? What did you say?”

“Every attribute. I can use magic of all of them.”

Every single person at that table let their mouth fall open and simply froze. So nobles can make that face too.

I waited, and one by one they thawed out.

“Every attribute, you say. Is that… is that the truth?”

“Yes. Shall I show you?”

“Do. I cannot believe it on hearing alone.”

“Of course.”

So I ran through a simple spell of every attribute, right there at the table.

“You truly can. Then… might you be the Apostle?”

Here we go again. I’m not the Apostle. I have never met God in my life, and an Apostle who has never met God is a contradiction. Although the business of having every attribute is a genuine thing we have in common, and I do keep circling back to it.

“I’m not the Apostle! From everything I’ve been told I have a great deal in common with the Apostle, but I have never met God.”

At that Lord Richard sank into thought again, and it was some time before he seemed to arrive anywhere.

“Leon. Will you keep it from the people around you that you hold every attribute? It is better that this is not widely known. What attribute did you show at the measuring?”

“Healing.”

“Then let it be healing for the time being. Once you hold a position of your own, I think it may safely be announced. For now, it stays a secret until you graduate the Royal Academy at the very least.”

“Understood. I’ll be careful not to let it slip. Ah, but… I’ve already told Marcel.”

“Master Marcel. Yes, he is an acquaintance of yours. Did he say anything to you?”

“Yes. He said to keep it secret for now, and that if I found someone I could truly trust, I could tell them and no one else.”

“Then there is no difficulty there.”

“I’m glad. …There is one more thing, about my family. Would it be all right if I told them, and only them? I haven’t said anything to them yet, but keeping it from them forever would be hard, and more than that, I don’t want to keep things from them if I can help it…”

Ever since I found out about the attributes I’ve been going back and forth about telling my family. But I don’t want secrets in that house. I can’t tell them everything, obviously. Telling a ducal family and hiding it from my own family, though, is something I can’t stomach.

I keep thinking they might be frightened of me, or find something uncanny in me. And I want to tell them anyway.

“Hm. Well, a family finds these things out by accident in the end. You may tell them. But be certain you have their silence. And I shall send Frederick to explain matters to them. They will want the Royal Academy and your living here explained as well, will they not?”

I can tell them, then. Good. All that’s left is for me to work up the nerve. It’s frightening, but I’ll tell them all when I get home.

Having Lord Frederick there will make the whole conversation go more smoothly, which I’m grateful for. If I walked in on my own and announced I was going to live in a ducal mansion, I don’t think anyone at home would believe a word of it.

“Yes. If he would come, I’d be very grateful.”

“Good. Frederick, I leave it to you.”

“Certainly, Father.”

That brought the business to a close, and the room settled into the feeling of an evening ending.

“Let us leave today’s talk there. Leon, I shall be counting on you.”

“Yes. And I on you.”

With that, Lord Richard, Lady Catherine and Lord Julien withdrew from the dining room. Lord Frederick stayed behind and came over to me.

“Leon. Thank you for lending the house your strength.”

“Not at all. It’s to my own advantage as well.”

“Even so. I truly did not expect every attribute.”

“I’m sorry for keeping it from you… I thought it was better not to tell many people. And please do explain things to my family.”

“No, that was good thinking. Going forward, keep it to your family and nobody else, and stay quiet about it until you graduate. Leave the explaining to me.”

“Yes. Thank you.”

“When should I come to your house?”

Let me see. I’m going home tomorrow and I want to sit everyone down, but the part about every attribute I want to say in my own words. So I’d rather Lord Frederick arrived afterward.

“I’d like to tell them about the attributes myself. Once I have, would you explain the Royal Academy and my living at the house?”

“Understood. You’re going home tomorrow, aren’t you?”

“That’s the plan.”

“Then I’ll go with you. I’ll wait in the carriage while you talk to your family, so call me in when you’re finished.”

“Certainly. Thank you very much.”

Mom and Dad are going to be badly shaken when Lord Frederick turns up on the doorstep a second time. And that’s before they hear what he came to say. I hope shaken is all they end up being, and that nothing about me frightens them…

“Ah, that reminds me. I’d like to hand over the study materials now, if that suits you.”

That’s right, the materials. So much has happened that I’d lost track of the thing I originally came for.

“Yes, please.”

“Then let’s move to the drawing room.”

The materials, at last. Imagining the conversation with my family had put my mood on the floor, and this lifted it a little. Getting hold of information in this world is desperately hard, so being handed something to learn from is genuinely exciting. In Japan I hated studying with a passion.

We walked a good way from the dining room to the drawing room, and four of us went in: me, Lord Frederick, Anne, who has been assigned to me as my maid, and Lord Frederick’s valet.

Once we were seated, Lord Frederick asked Anne to bring tea and sent the valet for the materials. Watching him use people as easily as breathing is a reminder of exactly what he is. It makes me feel vaguely guilty, and I have to fight down the urge to go and fetch the tea myself.

Before long the tea was poured and the materials were laid out.

“Leon, this is the study you’ll need for the Royal Academy entrance exam. Reading and writing, arithmetic, and a little history, in the main.”

“May I look inside?”

“Go ahead. Ask me if anything puzzles you.”

The materials Lord Frederick handed over turned out to be three books. The first was a basic language reader, and more than half of its pages were given to learning to write the characters, with the back half devoted to reading comprehension. I don’t need this one. I read and write this world’s language exactly as I read and write Japanese, and I went all the way through university back home, so being handed a first-grader’s language book isn’t going to do much for me.

The second was simple arithmetic. Addition and subtraction, straightforward multiplication and division, and that was the whole of it. No fractions, no decimals, nothing geometric. Perhaps those come after you’re admitted. Either way, nothing here I need to study.

The third was the history of this kingdom. The distant past is covered in broad strokes and the recent past in a good deal of detail. This one I want! I ought to study it, and I’ve been wanting to know about this country since the day I arrived.

“Well? Can you follow them?”

“Yes. I can already read, write and do the arithmetic, so I don’t need those two. May I borrow the history?”

“You don’t need the reading or the arithmetic?! Truly?”

“Yes. The history on its own is plenty.”

Perhaps I should have taken all three and made a show of studying them. Though it feels far too late for that now. I expect to be dealing with House Townsend for a long time to come, and I’m starting to think I don’t need to hide very much from them.

“Well. If you say you’re all right, then you’re all right. The history is yours to borrow. Bring it back whenever the exam is behind you.”

“Thank you, truly. I’ll work hard, so that I’m of use to all of you!”

“Yes. Work hard.”

“I will!”

I picked up the history and was about to head back to the guest room when Lord Frederick stopped me.

“Actually, there’s one more thing.”

“What would that be?”

“The date for Her Highness’s visit to your restaurant.”

That! I’d forgotten completely! Between being invited here and everything that followed, it had fallen straight out of my head. I sat back down properly, got myself ready to listen, and prompted him to go on.

“Has the date been decided?”

“It has. One week from today, at ten in the morning.”

A week?! I’d assumed it would be much further off than that! That’s far too soon. Is there anything I’m supposed to have ready?

“…That is very soon, isn’t it. Is there anything I need to prepare?”

“Her Highness insisted she wanted to go quickly. My apologies. There shouldn’t be anything in particular to prepare. She wants to see commoner life exactly as it is. She also said she wants to play with you.”

Play with me! What is a person supposed to do with that! The things we normally do are going into the forest and buying food off the stalls. Cook something together, maybe? Go to the forest, pick raspberries, come back and make pancakes?

No. Pancakes that taste the way ours taste are not something you set in front of Princess Martine. If I had sugar they’d be better… That’s it. I can buy sugar in the central district.

“Um. Would it be out of the question to take Her Highness into the forest, pick raspberries, bring them back and cook with them? It’s what we do most days…”

“Hm. Her Highness would enjoy that. Let’s have it as the plan.”

“Certainly. And… would I be allowed sugar, just as a special case on the day?”

“Yes. There is no need to be that strict about keeping everything to a commoner’s life. Her Highness’s first object is playing with you, and she loves sweet things, so she’ll be delighted.”

“That’s a relief. Then that’s what we’ll do.”

Is there anything else I should be settling… That’s right, I need to ask how much I’m allowed to tell my family.

“Um, how much of this may I tell my family?”

“Let me see… There’s no harm in it getting about afterward that Her Highness visited your restaurant. It’s word getting out beforehand that raises the danger. So until the day, could you pass her off as the child of a distant relative of mine? On the morning itself you may tell them the truth.”

True enough. As long as it doesn’t travel ahead of her, it’s fine.

“Understood. That’s what I’ll do. There’s one more thing, though. Apart from me, nobody in my family has the first idea about polite speech or manners. Will that be all right?”

“Yes. They’re commoners, and nobody expects otherwise. You’re the strange one, Leon. We know what we’re walking into, so put it out of your head.”

Oh, good… That had been sitting on me rather heavily.

“Thank you. Will it be only Her Highness and yourself coming to the restaurant?”

“Yes, and one maid. Someone has to look after her. Officially it will be the three of us so as not to draw eyes, but take it as read that there will be a good many guards concealed around you. Every one of them will have been briefed, so nobody is going to start shouting about disrespect. You can be easy on that count.”

Of course there are. Guards are only sensible. And the good news is that we don’t have to think about them, and nobody is going to call anything disrespect, so we’ll plan for three visitors and leave it there.

“Understood. I’ll tell them that three people are coming.”

“Yes. I’m grateful.”

And with that the talk was over, and I went back to the guest room.

Everyone in House Townsend seems to be a good sort, and in exchange for helping their camp it looks as though they’ll stand as my backing, so I think today can be called a good result.

Right at the end, of course, the next impossible problem landed on my head. Well. I’ll go into it planning to enjoy playing with her; Princess Martine will probably have a better time of it that way too. While remembering my manners, obviously.

It must have been the nerves. The moment I got back to the guest room and let my shoulders down I was too sleepy to think, so I did the barest minimum to get ready for bed and went straight under.

Chapter 9 – Someone I Can Trust

Three days have gone by since we got back from the central district. A lot happened there, and for the moment I’m doing my best not to dwell on that particular incident. No amount of thinking changes it, and what happens will happen! That’s what I’ve been telling myself through three perfectly ordinary days.

And today I’ve come to the workshop, because I’ve decided to tell Marcel about my attributes. Carrying it alone makes me anxious, and hiding it only works until it doesn’t, so it seemed better to say it myself from the start. Besides, Marcel isn’t the sort to look at me like I’m something unnatural. It hasn’t been that long since we met, but he really is a good man.

And if telling him here ends up costing me, then I misjudged somebody and I’ll take my lumps. I walked to the workshop with that settled.

So here we are, sitting across from each other, and now that it’s time to actually say it my nerves have scattered my thoughts everywhere.

Maybe I should drop it after all. No. Marcel’s fine, he’ll be fine… Right. Trust him.

“So, what brings you today? Have you thought up a magic tool?”

“I’ve thought up several, but before that, could I talk to you about my attribute?”

“Your attribute? Healing, wasn’t it?”

“It is, but it turns out I can use the others as well…”

“The others? The others!?”

He came out of his chair shouting. My nerves were already stretched thin, and I flinched hard enough to hop where I sat.

“Ah. Sorry about that. I’m not angry with you, I was startled.”

Hearing that let all the air out of me at once. Thank goodness. No revulsion, at any rate.

“So which of the others can you use?”

“Um. All of them.”

“Wh…”

This time nothing came out at all. He simply stopped, struck dumb where he stood. So using every attribute really is that far outside the normal. Around here, one person means one attribute; the possibility of more than one isn’t even entertained at the church. Which leaves the question of why I can.

Being reincarnated probably has something to do with it, though I still have no idea why I was reincarnated in the first place.

“All of them? Truly!?”

“Yes. Shall I show you?”

“Show me!”

There was something fierce in his face, and it carried me along, so I ran through every attribute for him.

“You’re the Apostle…”

He said that much and froze again. The Apostle? Marcel, please, stop seizing up and explain.

“Marcel. Marcel! Marcel!”

“Ah!? Apostle, I beg your pardon. Forgive me.”

“I’m Leon! I’m nothing like an Apostle!”

“But every attribute…”

“Please, just calm down. I’m Leon.”

He stayed rattled for a while after that, but he came back to himself eventually.

“Forgive me for losing my head. I’d always believed only the Apostle could use every attribute, and it shook me.”

“What is an Apostle, exactly?”

“The Apostle was sent to us by God, and could use every attribute, and held all manner of knowledge. There are records left of an Apostle who walked here several hundred years ago, so they say.”

“There are actual records of that?”

“There are. And since that time, not one person has been able to use more than a single attribute, let alone all of them. Which is why I took you for the Apostle. Are you truly not?”

So somebody like that existed… Am I an Apostle? I can use every attribute, and being reincarnated does mean I know things. But I’ve never met any god, and what I know is half-formed odds and ends. An Apostle, when you get down to it, is somebody who has actually met God.

By that standard I’m not one. I’ve never met God in my life.

“God didn’t send me, and I’m not an Apostle.”

“So it is. A pity. I’d thought that if an Apostle had come again, people’s faith might have risen.”

“Their faith?”

“That’s right. This world worships Micheline, but it’s been several hundred years since the Apostle came, and there’s hardly a soul left who holds any faith at all. My own view is that we ought to hold more of it than we do.”

So the god of this world is called Micheline. And the statue at the church was a goddess, so God here is a woman, which fits. And Marcel is a devout believer. Personally, I’d rather religion here stayed weak. Powerful religion sounds like an enormous amount of trouble.

“How much power does the church have these days?”

“The church has next to none. Every church is run by the state, and nearly everyone working in one draws a state wage.”

“I had no idea.”

The churches are state-run! So they’re churches in name and government offices in fact. Excellent. That kills off almost any chance of religion and politics tearing at each other, which is exactly the sort of mess I don’t want to live through.

“Since I’m not an Apostle, I’m afraid I can’t raise anybody’s faith.”

“Aye, so it is. Well, never mind it. Sorry for taking us off the subject.”

“Not at all. I’m glad to have heard about the church.”

He looked a little let down, but questions of religion get complicated fast and I’d rather not go poking at them clumsily.

“So, about my magic.”

“Aye, that’s where we were. If you’re not the Apostle, then how is it you can use every attribute?”

“That’s exactly what I can’t work out, and it’s what I wanted to ask you. In all of recorded history, nobody but the Apostle has used two or more?”

“Nobody. Not in all of it. I’ve no idea why you can use every attribute, but I’ll tell you this much: you’d do well not to tell a soul.”

“I thought you might say that.”

So I really should keep it buried. Power that outstrips everyone else’s is exactly the sort of thing people start fighting over.

“There may come a day when you have the backing of a strong noble you can trust, and then it might be safe to reveal it. But show it around carelessly and other countries, or dangerous nobles, will start moving to get hold of you or to get rid of you. In the worst case your family becomes the target. Keep it hidden until you hold enough power to shelter them.”

Yikes. I’m still a child, and I have no way of protecting my family. Until I have power of my own, or until I meet a noble I can genuinely trust, this stays buried.

“Which settles it, Leon: you must go to the Royal Academy. If your ability comes out while you’re still a commoner, it’s one of two roads. Either you live out your life as somebody’s kept animal, or some noble decides you’re in his way and you’re gone. But become an official, earn trust, and reveal it then, and there’s a real chance you end up an aide to the king, or a noble yourself. And nobody is made noble without graduating the Royal Academy. So for now, you pass that exam.”

Living out my life as somebody’s kept animal is out of the question. On my own I might be able to run, but I already have too many people here I care about to leave any of them behind.

So the plan is the Royal Academy, and hiding it until I’m an official. No, not until I’m an official. Until I have power, and trust.

“Understood. I hide it for now, and once I have power behind me, then I can say it.”

“That’s it. And I mean nobody.”

“Yes. I don’t want my family anywhere near that kind of danger.”

Marcel and I looked each other in the eye and nodded, and that was that. He really is a good man… I’m glad I brought this to him.

With my attributes settled, I straightened up, because I wanted to talk about magic tools while I was here. If I have to keep every attribute hidden, that may put limits on what I can build.

“Marcel, can I ask you about magic tools too? If I can’t let on that I have every attribute, the one I’ve been thinking about might be impossible.”

“Go ahead. You’re right that we’ll have to be careful in the making of them, so nothing gives you away.”

“That’s what I thought. I’ll be careful.”

“So what did you come up with?”

“A refrigerator. A cold box, for keeping food from spoiling.”

“Ah. That one’s beyond us, I’m afraid. We’ve no way to make ice.”

“About that. I can make ice.”

“You can what!?”

Frozen again. I might be surprising him too much today. I’m starting to worry about his heart.

“Marcel, are you all right?”

“Y-yes. Yes, I’m fine. You’ve done nothing but astonish me all day and I’m worn out with it.”

“Sorry…”

“Never mind. Now, how is it you make ice?”

“I use water magic to make water that’s a hair away from freezing, and then I disturb it, and it turns to ice.”

“Would you do it once for me?”

He handed me a bowl and I filled it with water on the edge of freezing, then jostled the bowl to disturb it, and it froze. Marcel watched, and then his brows drew together and he sank into thought. What was that about? Had I done something wrong?

“Do you think anyone with the water attribute could do that?”

The question stopped me, and I had to actually think about it.

It might work for me because I have modern knowledge and can picture what I want. Whether anyone born here could make it at all is another matter. Although. What if I cast it thinking only water that freezes when disturbed, and nothing more specific? If that worked, then somebody from this world could probably do it too.

“Could I use it once more?”

“As often as you like.”

I took a fresh bowl, and this time I cast while holding nothing in my head but water that freezes when disturbed. It ate roughly five times the mana of the first attempt, but the water came. Had it worked? I picked the bowl up, half afraid of what I might get, and gave it a shake, and the water went to ice all at once.

There it is! An ordinary person might manage this. Though it would take someone with a serious amount of mana.

“Marcel, I think anyone with plenty of mana could do it. You cast while thinking water that freezes when disturbed, and it comes. It takes a lot of mana, so I don’t know what capacity you’d actually need.”

“Your mana capacity is five, isn’t it, Leon. I’ll get someone of the water attribute with a capacity of five to try it.”

Marcel rounding up other people to test it for me is a real kindness. This might make the refrigerator possible after all.

“We’ll test the magic later. Have you settled on a shape for the tool?”

“Roughly, yes! A tall box, with shelves inside, and the ice-making function built into the top of it. The box itself I’d make of ordinary iron rather than magic iron, and only the ice-making part would be the magic tool. What do you think?”

“Good. Magic iron is worth sparing wherever you can. Although if that’s the shape of it, wouldn’t ‘ice maker’ suit it better than ‘refrigerator’?”

He’s right, the magic tool part is an ice maker. And come to think of it, selling it as this makes ice is stronger than selling it as a refrigerator. In which case I could skip the box I’d been planning entirely and sell the magic tool on its own, and let people work out their own uses for it. That’s more useful to more people anyway.

“You’re right. I’ll call it an ice maker. No box, no fixed use, just a magic tool that makes ice. That way everyone can do as they like with it.”

“Aye, that’s the better road. Shall we make one, then?”

He laid magic stone and magic iron out on the desk.

“Do you want to make this one yourself? With a capacity of five, you can work magic iron.”

“Can I!? I’d love to!”

“Then take the magic iron in your hands and picture the shape you want it to become. Once the picture is firm, send your mana into it and it will change to match.”

Bigger ice would melt more slowly, so I settled on a square vessel thirty centimeters to a side, with two sockets for magic stones, and let the mana flow. The magic iron shifted under my hands, and in no time at all there it was, exactly as I’d pictured it.

Magic iron is incredible! Is there anything this stuff can’t be!

“Finished!”

“Why that shape? I’d assumed you would make something along the lines of a faucet. And it looks to have two sockets for magic stones. Why is that?”

“Bigger ice melts more slowly, so I wanted the shape for that. The trouble is that at this size the disturbance doesn’t reach the middle and the ice doesn’t set properly, so I use wind magic to send air at the water from the center and the outside at the same time. That’s what disturbs it.”

I’d made a lot of ice since that first bowl, and the more water there was, the less solidly it set. I never worked out why, but I did find that raising wind from the center and the outside at once freezes it cleanly.

Why that should be, I have no idea. Then again, magic itself runs on principles I don’t understand, so I’ve stopped asking. What matters is what comes out the other end. The fact that magic tolerates a certain amount of winging it is honestly its best feature. It suits me.

“Leon. Putting two attributes into one magic tool has never been done before either. Though I get the feeling that lecturing you about what’s normal is a waste of my breath.”

He was giving me a rather exasperated look. Rude. I am a perfectly normal person! I am, aren’t I? Unless I’ve been off-kilter in this world all along…? I’d prefer to believe I haven’t.

Not entirely satisfied, but willing to let it go, I took the two magic stones from him and poured mana into them while holding the magic in my mind. The wind stone went into its socket first. Something I’d noticed while making all that ice: setting a faint breeze going first and then bringing the water into it is better for mana efficiency and better for the ice. I put my hand inside the box, and there was the breeze. That much worked.

Then the water stone. A few seconds later, ice. I think that’s it!

I pulled the stones out and lifted the ice from the box, and it came out a clean, perfect cube. Look at that. Complete success!

“Marcel, it’s done! What do you think?”

“This is remarkable… Food could be kept through the summer without spoiling. There will be no shortage of people who want one. And this ice looks a good deal finer than what you made in the bowl.”

“It does! Water magic alone, just the water and a shake, gives you slush, or a skin of ice on top and nothing underneath. Raise a faint breeze with wind magic first and bring the water into that, and you get hard, clear ice.”

“Which means someone with a water capacity of five still can’t make ice of this quality alone. They’d have to work with someone of the wind attribute. This may well sell.”

What a relief. Maybe this goes a little way toward paying Marcel back.

“Here’s what I’ll do, Leon. I’ll have someone of the water attribute with a capacity of five confirm the ice can be made, and then I’ll carry this to the royal palace and have it registered. Does that suit?”

“Yes! Ah, but the person testing it, is there no chance he walks off with the idea…?”

“I’ll be asking a friend I trust, so there’s no fear of that. And it’s water and wind together; there’s nobody alive who’ll see it once and reproduce it. I’ll go and register it the same day regardless. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Then I’m not worried. Please go ahead.”

“Leave it to me. While I’m at the palace I’ll put money into your account, so have a look at it later.”

“Yes! Thank you so much!”

With everything settled I stretched the ache out of myself and looked to the window. It’s that late!? The dinner service is about to start! I shot out of the chair.

“Marcel, I have to go! I’ll be late for the dinner service!”

“Aye. Mind yourself on the way.”

“I will! I’ll come again!”

And with that I flew out of Marcel’s house and ran the whole way home.

Chapter 8 – A Peculiar Commoner

I’m Frederick Townsend. Third son of House Townsend, serving with the Royal Guard. When I’m dealing with nobles I keep the ducal face on, which is why people say things like ‘the strong and gentle young lord,’ and none of that is really me. With friends I’m easy around, I’m rough at the edges and far too curious, and the truth is I like the way commoners stand in relation to one another, nobody holding anything back out of deference.

That day I was on leave as usual and had gone out to the edge of the royal capital, thinking I’d get a meal at a commoner restaurant. I rode as far as the western outskirts, left the horse, and was on my way to one of the several rooms I keep around the capital to change into commoner clothes when I walked into a child.

I still had my light riding armor on, so I apologized and made to move along rather than frighten him. Instead the boy answered me in language no commoner child has any business using. Difficult, correct, polite speech. There is no possible way the son of a restaurant family out on the edge of the capital talks like that.

More than that. Among commoners, the only ones who can speak that way at all are in the great merchant houses that deal directly with the nobility.

I let him think his excuse had satisfied me, and privately I marked him down as suspicious, possibly an agent of another country. If that was what he was, then failing to catch him early was dangerous, so I had the boy looked into. If he was a spy, I reasoned, then even at that age he would have been given an education.

The war ended a bit over ten years ago and we hold to a ceasefire with our neighbors, but there is never any shortage of people who would like to see us brought down. Better too careful than not careful enough. I used the ducal house’s shadows and had it done thoroughly. The result: the father, the mother, and the little sister were entirely ordinary commoners, and the boy Leon had nothing particularly suspect about him either. Born and raised in that house, by every sign.

Which makes no sense. In that case, where did he pick up that speech? So I had them check whether anyone from a fallen noble family or a great merchant house lived close enough to see Leon often. Nobody of the kind.

Less and less sense. I was on the point of deciding to go to the restaurant and talk to him directly when I ran into Leon in the central district of the royal capital. I was escorting Princess Martine on one of her incognito outings. Running into him at that particular moment sent my guard up sharply. It was possible he had aimed for that collision.

If Leon was an agent of another country, then he meant to harm Her Highness, or to take her, or simply to gather what he could. Whichever it was, I swore on the spot to protect her. I dealt with him on that footing, and I was careful to keep my manner exactly as it had always been, so that he would never see he was suspected.

And while I was handling him with every ounce of care I possessed, Her Highness showed no tension whatsoever. She is ordinarily a far more guarded person. Your Highness, why must you open your heart so far, today of all days!? That child may be an agent of a foreign power!

My inner voice failed to reach her, and for reasons I still cannot follow Her Highness was asking Leon to be her friend. I had no idea what had brought that on, and I tried to head it off, and she pushed straight through me. It was hardly as though I could say I suspected him of espionage with Leon sitting right there. Nor could I very well say that I did not trust Master Marcel.

Why Master Marcel was with Leon in the first place had already surprised me a good deal. If Leon is an agent, he may be a very good one. Either way, tighter watch.

And then, somehow, the four of us were going to a cafe.

At the cafe, Her Highness went right on running off the rails. She heard that Leon’s family kept a restaurant on the outskirts and announced that she wished to see it. That one I fully intended to stop, and Leon’s quick thinking on the spot turned it into an appointment instead. That kind of mind is not something an ordinary commoner acquires. My guard went up again, and alongside it, a doubt.

For an agent, Leon’s face gives away far too much. You can read every thought he has as he has it. His manners at table are lovely as well, nothing like a commoner’s, which is exactly wrong for a man infiltrating as one.

A spy disappears into the part. If you were slipping in as a commoner child you would play one flawlessly, and he isn’t doing it. A spy avoids being noticed, too, and Leon does nothing but draw the eye. He has drawn mine, plainly enough, and there are reasons enough to suspect him. And the strangest piece of it is that he doesn’t appear to realize he stands out at all.

Even supposing every bit of it is calculated, I cannot work out why anyone would choose to look suspicious. An agent capable of calculating all of that could get close to us far more neatly.

Set beside the clean report from the shadows, the odds are that Leon isn’t a spy. But if he isn’t, where did the speech and the bearing come from? He’s level with a properly raised noble child. And he reads and writes on top of it, or so I’m told.

He says an old man in the neighborhood taught him. No such person exists; we looked. How he came by any of it is a complete blank. The boy is nothing but mysteries.

He is certainly able, though. His mind moves so quickly that speaking with him was like speaking with a grown man. He may grow into a man of real use to the ducal house. If I can manage it, I want him where I can see him.

First, then. Deliver the study materials, learn a little more about him, and find out how much he actually knows. And before Her Highness’s visit, check the place over for anything dangerous. I’ll need to think about where to put the guards, too.

That reminds me: it might be best to have him attend the Royal Academy from our house. Leon is plainly able, and some part of him hasn’t noticed it. I dropped a few of the harder subjects into the conversation, economics among them, and he fielded them as though it were nothing, with no sign of knowing that this is abnormal in a commoner. Her Highness kept pace as well, but that is because the royal family is educated rigorously from a very early age. It is not possible in a commoner child. Master Marcel, sitting beside the boy, was by a wide margin the more rattled of the two.

This country has no shortage of dangerous nobles, and our neighbors still bear watching. That sort would snap Leon up in an instant, and a mind like his working for an enemy could become a genuine threat. And there is a second risk on top of that: let it get out that the boy is valuable to the Townsend side, and he may simply be removed. All the more reason to have him where we can watch him.

Better to put this to Father and Mother and to my brothers. I finished my escort duty and went straight on to the family house.

⁂

That evening I sat down to dinner with my family at the Townsend house for the first time in a long while. I live in the knights’ dormitory, so meals at home are rare.

At the table were Father and Mother and my second brother. As a rule, the nobility of this country spend the years from fifteen until their own child turns fifteen out in the domain, as head of the house, running it. So my eldest brother, the current duke, is out in the domain with his wife and children and isn’t here.

And once a man hands the headship to his child he takes up work at the royal palace, which brings him back from the domain to the house in the capital. Which is why Father and Mother are here.

Over the meal we talked about how everyone had been, and when it was finished and we were sitting with a light drink, Father gave me my opening.

“Well then, Frederick. You have something you wish to say, I take it.”

“Yes, Father. It concerns a commoner boy named Leon.”

Even within the family, and with Father above all, a noble is expected to speak properly. I envy commoners their family life, though as noble houses go this one isn’t strict about manners indoors, and we’re fond of one another. It’s a good house, and I count myself lucky to have been born into it.

“A commoner?”

“Yes. He is the eldest son of a family that keeps a restaurant on the western outskirts of the royal capital, and he is eight years old. I collided with him through my own carelessness while I was out that way, and that is how we came to know each other. At that first meeting Leon used flawless polite speech, of a kind no child of a restaurant on the outskirts could possibly have. That speech led me to suspect him of being an agent of another country, and I used the ducal house’s shadows to investigate him thoroughly. There was nothing suspicious about him whatsoever, and equally no sign of anyone teaching him. The reason is still unknown.”

A commoner using flawless polite speech struck all of them as suspicious, exactly as it had struck me, and they were listening far more seriously than when I began.

“And today, while I was escorting Her Highness, the boy I stopped from colliding with her was Leon.”

Father went a little pale at that.

“Then Her Highness is being targeted?”

“That was my own first thought, and I was on my guard accordingly. But Leon’s conduct is poor work for an agent. Everything he thinks appears on his face, and for someone supposedly passing as a commoner, his speech and his bearing are those of a noble. He looked thoroughly out of place. An agent would avoid being suspected in precisely that way. Taken together with what the shadows found, my own judgment is that he is clean.”

“Quite so. One could argue that the whole of it is calculated, but a man able to manage anything that sophisticated would avoid standing out and drawing suspicion.”

“That is my thinking as well. He is poor work as an agent, and as a commoner he is remarkably able. In truth he would stand out as exceptional even among nobles. After we met again today, we took a meal at a cafe, with Her Highness among us—”

“W-wait! That suspicious boy ate together with Her Highness!?”

Cut off right before the important part. Though, granted, anyone would doubt their ears. I did try to stop her. Today of all days Her Highness’s curiosity was running higher than usual and she was not to be stopped.

“Yes. The four of us ate together: Her Highness and myself, Leon and Master Marcel. Master Marcel appears to be acquainted with Leon, and they had come to the central district together. I intended to part from Leon at once and see Her Highness back to the royal castle, but for some reason Her Highness had taken to him and I was unable to refuse. Furthermore, she has promised to visit the restaurant Leon’s family keeps.”

“Wh-why did you not stop her! However low the chance that he is an agent, it is not zero. Visiting the restaurant is far too dangerous.”

“I thought so too, and Her Highness was so very insistent that in the end I could not stop it. The failing there is mine. If permission is refused, I will apologize to Her Highness in all sincerity. If it is granted, I will guard her with the utmost care.”

That settled him somewhat. He drank a little and spoke again.

“There is no use in dwelling on what is done. You will protect Her Highness. Absolutely.”

“As you command. May I return to the subject?”

“Yes. Forgive me for taking us off it.”

“Not at all. When we ate together after meeting again today, his manners at table were the equal of a well-raised noble child’s. I wove a few difficult topics into the small talk, and he understood every one of them and answered precisely, which surprised me. He is also, apparently, already able to read and write.”

“That is… past merely able. That I would call anomalous. If our own shadows have looked into him then there is certainly nothing suspicious to find, and yet how does a boy like that come by such a spread of skills…”

Father was thoroughly baffled, and by the look of them so was everyone else. I don’t blame them. I’m still baffled myself.

“On that point, Father. It seems Leon means to attend the Royal Academy. If his ability becomes apparent at the school and another camp or another country takes an interest in him, the loss to us could be considerable. I have promised to provide his study materials; should he be admitted, might we not have him attend from this house?”

“Hm. If he is a talent of that order, we ought to secure him early. He may well become a man who strengthens our camp. And keeping him near at hand makes it easier to act should anything happen.”

“Yes. And Lucien enters the Royal Academy in the same year as Leon, so we would know how the boy is faring at school. I think Leon would make him a good friend.”

Lucien is the eldest son of my eldest brother, and he sits for the Academy the same year Leon does.

“The same age as Lucien, is he. If this commoner Leon is as able as that, he will be a good friend to Lucien as well. Should Leon attend the Royal Academy, I will permit him to attend from this house. And bring him here sometime. I would like to meet him once.”

“Thank you, Father. I will arrange a time and bring him.”

“Do that. This promises to be entertaining.”

Ah. I’ve gone and stirred up Father’s curiosity. He does love a rare thing, or a new one. Well, I have what I came for, so today I’ll call it a win.

“One more thing, Frederick. Put a watch on Leon, to be safe.”

“As you command. I will assign one of the shadows.”

Since I can’t trust him yet, I had been wanting a watch on him myself, and Father offering first was welcome. When I first put the shadows to work it was investigation only, not a tail. I had meant to leave one man watching him, then the investigation came back all but clean and I let it go. Watching someone around the clock is heavy work, and we have only so many shadows to spend. With a watch on him now, we will learn what his connection to Master Marcel is as well.

I hope Leon turns out to be to this country’s benefit. That was the thought I carried back to the knights’ dormitory.