Would You Like to Become a Spirit Mage?
"Hwah… It's been a while since I woke up at home."
The day after returning from the Great Forest, Rosaria rubbed the sleep from her eyes and sat up in a bed that had somehow become familiar.
"I guess humans really are adaptable creatures… Before I knew it, this place started feeling as comfortable as my own home."
Maybe it was because this was the first time she'd slept anywhere else since possessing a body in this world. The manor felt a touch more dear to her now. Then again, even the most miserable military service eventually had you calling the barracks "home" without thinking twice. Same principle.
As always, Bennet arrived to attend her — and by now, being waited on felt perfectly natural. Rosaria let her hair be brushed, then headed for the dining hall for breakfast.
"Hwaaaahm… Huh?"
"*Mmph* *Nom-nom* Ah, good morning~"
When she stepped into the dining hall, her family was nowhere in sight. Instead, an elf girl had her face buried in a plate, shoveling food down with abandon.
Estel had decided she needed to stay in the Evergarden Territory for a while to get a proper read on human society, and had declared that she would bring along an elf who could blend into that world to some degree. That elf was Shalle.
Unlike most ordinary elves — who tended to distrust humans and lean hard into elf-supremacist thinking — Shalle was friendly toward people. She hadn't been anxious about leaving the Great Forest, either; she'd actively campaigned to go. That was why she'd been chosen.
Come to think of it, it was Shalle and Lio's original visit to the Evergarden Territory that had set all of this in motion. In a way, she had already done them a considerable service.
The first time Shalle came to the manor, she had been in disguise. Now she wandered the halls in her true elven form. Rosaria had wondered whether that was wise, but with two distinguished guests in residence — one of them a young girl and the other a woman — inventing a plausible cover story would have been difficult. So they had simply presented themselves as elves from the start.
Besides, the occasional elf did travel the human world, and visiting elves were treated as rare and valued guests, often invited by the lord of the territory. It wasn't so strange. The household staff found them mysterious, certainly, but not suspicious.
"Uh… Miss Shalle?"
"Just call me Shalle, please!"
"Ah, right. Shalle — where is everyone else?"
"The others *nom* already finished eating!"
"Then why are you still here?"
"Because I wanted more! This soup is so good! And the meat!"
"…Yeah. Eat as much as you want."
Shalle beamed and dunked a piece of bread into her soup. Rosaria could understand. The girl was roughly two hundred years old, and after spending that long buried in the Great Forest eating nothing but Frumt, a spread of real food would be enough to make anyone's eyes spin.
—Food!
"Ah, right — you're here too. Want some bread?"
A voice slipped into Rosaria's ear. She turned her head, and the spirit who had followed her all the way from the Great Forest — Sylph — appeared.
"Here. Eat this."
—Heehee! Nom nom!
Sitting across from Shalle, Rosaria plucked a butter roll from the basket in the center of the table, tore it into small pieces, and held them out. Sylph accepted the bread with a bright little smile, plopped down on her bottom near Rosaria's plate, and began chewing with pure delight.
And then—
—Clink.
"Wh-what…? Huh? Wha…? Syl—ph…? Huh?"
Shalle, who had been blissfully eating until that very second, dropped her spoon. Her pupils trembled as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing.
"Th-that's Sylph…? Isn't it?"
"Huh? Oh — yeah. She just showed up out of nowhere while I was in the Great Forest and latched onto me. She's cute, though, so I've been keeping her around like a hamster… ah, like a little pet."
—Heehee!
"What? Then it really is— wait? That's weird? Huh? What is this…? Ah?"
"…What's wrong?"
Shalle's eyes flicked rapidly between Rosaria and Sylph. She clutched her head as if her brain had short-circuited. Rosaria's expression hardened; something about the reaction was clearly not normal.
Then Shalle said:
"How is she eating?"
"…What?"
Shalle pointed a shaking finger at the roll clutched in Sylph's tiny hands.
—Yummy!
Sylph, for her part, simply kept eating with total contentment.
"So… spirits don't normally eat food like this?"
After the chaos of breakfast had settled, Rosaria and Shalle stepped out to a quiet corner of the training grounds to talk.
"That's right. Spirits aren't born in artificially developed spaces like this one. They're born somewhere else entirely — a place called the Spirit Realm."
"The Spirit Realm?"
"Hmm… how should I put it? If you think of the land we're standing on as the Mortal World, then there are higher-dimensional spaces — completely different planes. One of those is the Spirit Realm."
"You've noticed that Sylph isn't at your side all day, right? Miss — wait, Miss? Um… Miss Rosaria? Yes. Anyway, she vanishes and then suddenly reappears. When you can't see her, she's in the Spirit Realm, and she comes back into the Mortal World when she appears. Spirits can travel freely between the two."
"Ohh…"
Rosaria thought back over everything that had happened. Sylph would be nowhere in sight, then suddenly perched on her shoulder or the crown of her head. So that was her crossing between the Spirit Realm and this world.
"And the rules of the Spirit Realm and the Mortal World are different, so every time a spirit comes here, it continuously burns through its mana. Once that mana runs dry, it gets automatically reverse-summoned back to the Spirit Realm."
"That's why spirits either absorb the pure mana that flows through nature, or draw on the mana of a Spirit Mage they've contracted with, to extend how long they can stay."
"But… I've never seen a spirit eat food before!"
"Is that really such a big deal?"
"Not a disaster, exactly… it's just that it's never happened. Not once."
"Spirits have no interest in food. Even if they do take an interest, they treat it like a toy at best. They shouldn't be able to eat it or taste it at all…"
—Play with me! Play with me!
"H-hold on! I'm talking right now. I'll play with you in a bit."
—Heehee! Okay!
Apparently bored, Sylph was rubbing her cheek against Rosaria's face and throwing a tiny tantrum for attention.
"She's a very unusual spirit. How did you two meet?"
"I don't really know. I was outside, and she just appeared."
"Hmm… normally, you can only see a spirit, touch a spirit, or form a contract with one if your affinity with it is high enough."
"But this one seems visible even to ordinary people."
"Is she just that special?"
"As far as I know, I've never seen or heard of a spirit like this. Even the old men… I mean, the Great Elders… I doubt they'd know either."
"Huh… Well, eating isn't a bad thing, so whatever!"
—Kyahaha!!
Shalle folded her arms, lost in thought. Rosaria, for her part, had settled on a simple conclusion — Guess our kid's just special~ — and gently tugged at Sylph's soft little cheeks. Sylph's bright laughter rang out beside them.
"Miss Rosaria."
"Hm?"
Having finished thinking, Shalle uncrossed her arms and stepped right up in front of her, meeting her eyes head-on.
"Would you, by any chance, be interested in becoming a Spirit Mage?"
"A Spirit… Mage?"
A chance encounter — and the opportunity that came with it. From this moment on, Rosaria's life was about to take a dramatic turn.
At that same hour—
"Hmm. No liquor? This tastes fine, but it's far too bland."
"I shall prepare some at once."
Estel set down the teacup she'd been sipping from, wrinkling her nose at the milk tea as if it had personally offended her, and looked at Gordon. He immediately uncorked a prepared bottle of wine and began filling a glass.
"I see your habit of enjoying a cup whenever important business is at hand remains as steadfast as ever."
"Especially since those elf types have no taste for drinking… You could dig one up if you looked hard enough, I suppose, but I'm not so far gone that I'd turn the place upside down for a bottle."
"You seem to have forgotten that on your first night here, you knocked back wine like water at dinner, got thoroughly drunk, and slept in until midday."
"Ugh…! Grandchild. Do you not understand that a man, when he drinks, drinks with gusto?"
Across from Estel, Freya delivered the mild rebuke in a voice low enough that only the two of them could hear.
Estel had always enjoyed a drink, even in the modern world. The moment she'd arrived in the territory yesterday, her eyes had lit up at the sight of alcohol; she'd drained seven bottles of wine and promptly passed out. She had only just woken up.
"Gordon, mulled wine, if you would — the non-alcoholic kind."
"As you wish."
"We have important matters to discuss. It would be rather inconvenient if you were drunk."
"Do I look like some green boy who can't even manage his own liquor?"
"At the moment? Yes, you do."
"Gnnn…!"
Freya cancelled the wine Estel had requested entirely and had Gordon bring mulled wine instead, effectively confiscating her alcohol. Estel glared at her in pure indignation. To Freya, though, it only looked like a sulky little girl puffing out her cheeks — utterly harmless.
"Hmph! No point wasting time. So. What's the real business?"
"There's something I need before we get to that—"
Knock, knock—
"My Lady, it is Fenril."
"Ah, perfect timing. Come in!"
Just as they were about to get down to business, Fenril arrived right on cue. Freya took it as the signal that they were ready to talk.
"Ah… so that's her…?"
Fenril entered the study, her ears pricking as she looked at Estel seated in the chair. To the rest of the household, Estel had been introduced as an ordinary elven guest. But Freya's inner circle already knew she was the Third Princess — and that she would become a person of great importance to this territory.
"Oho… This young lady has wolf ears on her head. How fascinating…"
"Ah, Fenril. She's only recently left the Great Forest, so please forgive any discourtesy."
"It's quite all right. I understand — there's no need to worry."
"Was that rude just now? Then I apologize."
"N-no…! There's no need for an elven princess to bow her head to a lowly knight like me."
"Nonsense. A man worth his salt does not dodge his mistakes — he takes full responsibility for them."
"Ah… yes…"
A man? Looking where, exactly?
It was Fenril's first time seeing a beastkin, and Estel's apology — complete with that particular choice of words — left her thoroughly confused. She returned the bow, but tilted her head just slightly as she did.
"Ahem. First, the report, if you would."
"Yes, ma'am."
Freya, who had been watching the exchange, nearly burst out laughing. She reined it in with superhuman restraint, smoothed the atmosphere, and addressed Fenril.
"A report came in last night from the investigation unit we attached to Viscount Bjorn."
Fenril immediately drew a report from her coat and handed it to Freya.
"At last."
Viscount Bjorn. A month ago, they had dispatched an investigation team to dig into him. This was their first scheduled report.