The Obvious Story He Wanted to Hear (2)
"Whoa—what is this...!?"
Derek had just taken a switch across the calves until they burned, but he had no room to feel a pain like scalding. He was too busy being struck speechless.
And with good reason.
"Why is the composition this clear and active? Even the living blood by itself is packed with nutrients."
"...Watching you like that is actually giving me the creeps."
It was no joke. With nothing but a tiny sample of drawn blood, Derek was running experiments through one instrument after another, no different from a mad scientist. Excitement had flushed his cheeks on top of it. If that wasn't a lunatic, what was?
At the assessment, Derek offered an excuse.
"I-I was just surprised, that's all. I d-don't have any other intentions...."
The more he explained, the more he seemed to look back on what he had done, and his voice shrank away to nothing. Even he could see how grotesque he looked. He coughed several times in a row and turned the talk aside.
"A-anyway, about your blood, Instructor...."
"Well, well. Changing the subject?"
"Th-that's not it. I think this is something you ought to know. Instructor, it seems the monster factors you were supposed to have have all died out."
"...?"
"No—not died out. I think you also have to consider the chance they were never there to begin with."
"What do you mean?"
"I-I mean you were human."
Lee Han tilted his head, understanding none of it. Derek scratched his cheek, paused as if to sort his words, and did his best to explain in full.
"You said a mage gave you troll and gnoll factors when you were a child, didn't you? And that thanks to them you gained a troll's tough physique and regeneration, and a gnoll's keen senses—smell and touch and the like."
"Y-yeah?"
It was an old story, and a truth Lee Han himself had never doubted. The body he had won after surviving as a mage's test subject, and at last overcoming it, was nothing an ordinary human possessed. It was no exaggeration to say that power had kept him alive and laid the ground for him to grow strong.
And yet.
"That story is wrong. Take a look. These are the results from analyzing your blood against troll blood and gnoll blood."
He slid something across.
"It came back negative. That means there isn't a trace of monster factor."
What he held up looked like a diagnostic kit, and he was certain: if monster factors were present, it would have read positive.
Lee Han blinked.
He had only allowed the experiment on a light whim, and now the common sense he had lived by was turning over. He was simply at a loss. The cold brat, however, kept forcing the truth into him whether he was confused or not.
"In that sense, you aren't a human who possesses a monster's power. Genetically, you are human."
"...Does that even make sense?"
More than one meaning sat under the question. How was he supposed to explain the unnatural regeneration he had, or senses as sharp as his?
"Evolution."
"What?"
The answer was absurd beyond belief, and Derek was entirely serious.
"This is only a hypothesis, but while you endured the experiments as a child, your body may have kept evolving so it could endure them. You said your will to survive was strong from the start, didn't you?"
"I... was?"
"You could call it grit theory, if you like, but it seems that in the course of enduring the experiments your body evolved, little by little, until it was strong enough to overcome the monster factors. Others couldn't bear the pain and died, tragically. You survived agony that ought to have killed you on willpower alone, and your flesh evolved along the way."
"Ah, I know. It's pseudoscience. So please don't glare at me like that...."
"...I'm not glaring. I'm thinking. Even if your hypothesis is true, it doesn't explain everything I can do. I'm especially sensitive to potions made from troll blood, and they've helped me more than once. How do you account for that?"
He thought it a fairly sharp question, but Derek laid out his answer without a moment's pause, as if he had been waiting for it.
"That's where the theory of evolution comes in."
"...Huh?"
"Did you know? Evolution in living things isn't only one kind of thing. There's also evolution through genetic mimicry."
"In other words, your cells mimicked the monster factors entering your body so you could survive. So they could fight the monster cells and win."
"...Interesting, I'll give you that."
Even so, Lee Han could not bring himself to believe it. Evolution could not possibly happen over so short a span.
Ah. Were ten years actually on the long side?
Reminded all over again of how long he had been held as a test subject, he even began to wonder whether the theory might be right. And then, as if to land the finishing blow:
"Also, did you know? They say both trolls and gnolls are incredibly cute when they're young. Then, in the process of becoming adults, they undergo a tremendous reversal."
"Does that suggest anything?"
"A little, yeah?"
Lee Han let out a dry laugh, briefly calling up his prime. Through his teens and into his early twenties, he really had been told he was quite cute.
I thought training did this to me.... Was that not it?
Holding the thought, he listened a little more closely to Derek. It was starting to sound plausible.
"If that's the case, it makes sense why so few of your Traits have anything to do with monsters. If you truly had monster factors, you ought to have had something like Berserker or Monsterization among them."
"Hm. So I'm just an ordinary human?"
Not some modified specimen?
"Of course you aren't ordinary. You evolved, for one thing. If we had to put a name to it... a mutant?"
"To put it more simply, a mutation. In a way, isn't that an even stranger case than a mystery-race?"
"Ah, so, Instructor—would it be all right if I drew a little more blood? Your blood might be worth far more than a troll's...."
"Plant your head."
"Pardon?"
"I said plant your head. Want me to kindly spell it out? Wonsan bombardment."
"...This is a gravel yard."
"And?"
"Execute."
"E-execute...."
Derek echoed the order, planted his head where he stood, and blinked back tears. Lee Han only clicked his tongue.
Doing so well, and then he goes and earns the rod.
There were people who could settle a fortune in debt with a single word. Lee Han was now certain this one was the sort who ran up a fortune in debt with a single word.
Money-mad Taechang was, without a doubt, a lucky bastard.
"Late as it is, I have come to offer my thanks. Thank you. Another greeting would still fall short."
"Thank you, Instructor."
"Haha. We meet again before even half a day has passed."
"...Hm."
A guest had arrived—more precisely, the master of the house—and so the extra infusion of a teacher's grace had fizzled out. A shame. The most he could do was order a modest Wonsan bombardment and leave the boy waiting off to one side. He could hardly raise a club with guests standing there.
"Ahem...."
The wolf pup stole a sidelong glance, then wisely chose to cough and draw attention on purpose. He did have a decent feel for the room. The other adults were another matter.
"That will make for fine training."
"Training the neck, is he? The swordsmen of the house often train their necks just like that."
True to a house of the sword, they offered a charitable reading and then lost interest entirely.
"Khk... why isn't there a single normal person...."
The boy muttered something, but Lee Han brushed the grumbling aside and spoke to them.
"You lot ought to be buried in work. What are you doing here?"
He said it bluntly, but the manner was only the manner. He genuinely wondered why they had come at a time like this. Restoring the collapsed mansion, managing the Half-Fiends, taking stock of the damage to the house, reporting the course of the incident to the royal family—their duties ought to have stood like a mountain. People with no mind to spare for entertaining guests, turning up out of nowhere. And to that, she answered.
"If not today, I didn't think I would have another chance to greet you."
Felicia spoke with a rare gravity, and the father and son nodded along. For Lee Han, it was an unwelcome business.
"Pretty sure I've heard it until my ears grew scabs...."
Not a joke. He truly had heard thanks until he was sick of them.
Take Felicia. The moment that fairy-tale writer of hers came back to life, the woman had—
"Thank you. Truly, thank you...!"
She had thanked him through tears and a running nose alike. Up to there, it might even have warmed the heart. What followed had been awkward, and exhausting.
"Thank you, thank you...."
"I will regard you as my benefactor for life!"
"It is humble, but please—even this...."
The retainers of House Offen had come one after another to give their thanks, and some had even gone to their knees. For him, it had been nothing short of mortifying.
Men far older than me, acting like that. How am I supposed to be at ease...?
Perhaps it was the faint scrap of Confucian manners still left in him, but he could not sit still. Even so, telling them not to thank him would have been strange in its own right. He had saved the house from the rebels' hands, yes—but how relieved must they have been not to lose the Sword Duke they revered, and the Sword Saint who was the pride of the house and a great man of letters besides?
So once the incident was settled, Lee Han had been forcibly kept at the mansion for the past five days. House Offen wanted to look after him in one way or another. He would rather have told them to spend the time rebuilding, but—
That had been the fervent cry of a certain old retainer of House Offen, and for five days Lee Han had eaten well and been tended so thoroughly that a sheen had come to glide across his skin.
Three meals a day really were delicious.
They had pressed dessert and late-night snacks on him as well, until he began to worry he might put on weight. He was already sick to death of thank-yous, and now three generations had gathered to offer them again. The burden set in at once.
"Ho ho. What a troubled face."
"I told you from the start—one verse is enough. That's plenty."
"How could I stop? No matter how I express my gratitude, it would still fall short."
"...Whoa."
That last breath of awe had not come from Lee Han. It had come from Taechang, still in the middle of his Wonsan bombardment.
And well it might. This amounted to the right to command an Aura User. A priceless treasure—authority enough to make even the sovereign of a nation sick with envy. Anyone would covet it. And yet.
"...Please put that thanks away. I don't need it."
"...?!"
The man in question tried to hand it straight back, as if it were an antique he had no idea what to do with, and Felicia's eyes brimmed, just a little.