Chapter 255
Chapter 255
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 255
Chapter Title: How to Survive as the Second Son of a Magical Noble Family
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The Archbishop wore a troubled expression, pondered for a long while, and finally spoke.
“…Alright. Matching our breaths—that does sound rather appealing.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
“Nicolaus can pull off anything. It’s better than me running around everywhere on my own.”
I replied with a smile.
“Good. Then we should start by making plans together.”
“I suppose we should. But first.”
He sat back down on the bed with a faint smile. Then he suddenly grabbed my cheek.
“…….”
I froze in bewilderment for a moment before narrowing my eyes.
People don’t change. What the hell was this out-of-nowhere behavior? When I made a disgusted face, he burst out laughing.
“I saved you, so you can at least give me this much.”
“I could’ve survived without you, but fine. Whatever.”
That was my response, but when he pinched and pulled my cheek with his fingers, I didn’t feel like putting up with it anymore. Was he joking around in this atmosphere?
The Archbishop stared at me without blinking, a smile on his face. The way he tilted his head like that was downright eerie.
“You don’t seem all that grateful, more than I expected….”
He was talking about ‘saving’ me. My reaction must’ve been too lukewarm.
“I already said thanks earlier. Why? Were you hoping for a more dramatic response?”
I answered indifferently. His fingers had now moved up to my eyelids.
Through the gaps in his hand, the Archbishop’s blue eyes flashed in the light. They remained fixed solely on me, without the slightest twitch.
“Yes.”
“…….”
Of course.
I tilted my head while looking at him.
Maybe because I wasn’t stopping him, he laughed in surprise at my reaction and said,
“You do keep your promises, though. I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it just because you said you would.”
“Didn’t you know? And you’re the one who’s bad at keeping promises.”
“Why do you think that?”
Why do I think that? I wanted to know if he was asking sincerely. Based on everything so far, he was the type who prioritized his own interests and desires over promises. He wouldn’t break every single one, but if circumstances changed and a promise became disadvantageous or offered him no gain, he’d switch attitudes with a smile at any moment. That was my conclusion.
He’d already broken a promise with the Pleroma world once.
Who in their right mind would think of taking Nicolaus to the Pleroma world to play around? What could you expect from someone who broke community rules for his own benefit and lived by a ‘it’s fine if I don’t get caught’ mentality?
‘If I’d thought he had any sense, I would’ve called my friends and beaten him down together when I first summoned him with that love potion.’
It was that day on the Wittelsbach mansion rooftop when I’d taken the love potion and shouted. Under the conclusion that he’d bolt the moment I called my friends, I’d handled him alone, leading to this ongoing situation.
I’d thought the same back then—if I’d called my friends, he would’ve fled in an instant, prioritizing profit over pride or anything else. He was someone whose logic we couldn’t comprehend with common sense, so he wouldn’t see running away as a blow to his ego. He’d probably view it positively as a strategic retreat for a greater advance. Judging by his actions so far, he was extremely narcissistic, so I had to speculate accordingly.
But regardless of his tendencies, hadn’t he just failed to keep a promise? At least on the surface.
So now it was my turn to play along with his act.
Conveniently, I no longer needed to voluntarily do something that would please him. He opened the drawer beside the bed and took out a vial. The 10th-level emotion manipulation drug was inside.
‘As expected.’
I’d considered this possibility earlier, and it hadn’t deviated from my expectations.
“Drink it.”
“Isn’t this enough already? Don’t you trust my feelings?”
“I want a bit more. Ah, saying it like that might sound suspicious. I’ll drink some too.”
“No? Absolutely don’t.”
He was already insane with emotions—did he plan to drink more? It was ridiculous that he framed this as consideration for me.
I snatched the vial from his hand and infused it with divine power. No unusual reactions, so I downed it in one go.
I could feel the man in front of me expecting a lot. He just smiled and watched me without doing anything. I considered shoving him aside and going outside to look at the servants, but what had they done wrong? I turned my eyes back to the one before me.
The boiling emotions and thoughts in those blue eyes were something I didn’t have toward him. My stomach churned for a moment.
That discomfort washed away quickly. Now, the person before me was just a young ancient human looking at me with clear eyes and a gentle smile.
“…….”
His pink cheeks no longer felt particularly disconcerting. The emotions in his eyes and all the plans he desired seemed like something I could join in on.
Of course, rationally speaking, it was nonsense, but that was the drug’s effect anyway.
Normally, the effect should be even stronger than this. But for me, this was the best it could do, so nothing to be done.
He took my hand, linked our pinkies, and smiled brightly.
“We can do so many things together.”
“Suddenly?”
“You have to express it when it comes to mind. We might not have much time together.”
“Doing many things—like what, for example?”
“Putting the Empire under our influence, say.”
“…….”
“I’m kidding.”
If it were anyone else, I’d dismiss it as nonsense, but I couldn’t with this man.
When I responded with a cold stare instead of words, he waved his hand.
“I said it’s a joke. You’re already having a huge impact on the Empire anyway. And I’ll listen to whatever you want, no matter what.”
“Hey. I never said I’d keep working with you after this.”
He just nodded and smiled, as if my words didn’t matter.
He patted my shoulder.
“Rest a bit more. Don’t think about moving right away.”
“…….”
“Plans can come later. A day here is two hours outside, right? This is the most distorted coordinate system among the existing Pleroma ones. Other places… take the leadership’s coordinate system, for example. Time flows exactly like in your world there. You know why.”
I did. The moment a coordinate system collapses under external pressure, everything inside turns to smoke. The leadership, as the core of this organization, would be in a position hard to attack, and they’d have to pay special attention to distortions.
Anyway, it meant other places weren’t as severely distorted as this.
“If you sleep for 24 hours here, only two hours pass in your world and most of the Pleroma world. The distortion here is growing, so maybe even 1 hour 30 minutes.”
“Hmm….”
“Even a week here is just 14 hours outside. I’m saying it’s fine to recover for a few days here. We can make plans after you’ve regained your strength.”
“…….”
“Is it because you want to go back? If you don’t want to be the Empire government’s scapegoat, you shouldn’t return too soon.”
That was true.
Before I came here, the public didn’t know about the terror attack, but experts surely did, so by now, questions about that cross terror incident must be flooding in.
If I returned immediately, the government—which had successfully fooled the public until the opening—might try to dodge responsibility without knowing their place.
In that case, starting from the ‘coincidental’ fact that I knew the disassembly solution, to my easy return as if nothing happened, they could paint me as someone in cahoots with Pleroma.
For example, ‘Lucas Ascanien staged the terror for great merits.’ It sounded absurd, but considering the Pleroma stigma conveniently attached to me, the situation changes. It’s not very sensible to assume all politicians are rational professionals prioritizing their citizens. These were people who’d called in a choir to cover up a terror attack—what wouldn’t they do? It wasn’t impossible.
The imperial spokesperson and court would say: Lucas Ascanien was actually a real Pleroma agent, hiding his identity to gain recognition from the imperial family while heightening fear of Pleroma to throw the nation into chaos and diminish the Empire’s prestige as a side effect. The imperial family was just the deceived victim.
But if Anhalt’s second son and imperial family mage disappeared mid-opening and didn’t show up for days, the narrative shifts.
They could still try to frame it as me colluding with Pleroma for the terror, but it’d be harder than the above scenario.
There was a decisive issue.
If it was a staged terror for merits, why wouldn’t Ascanien—who was clearly captured by Pleroma—reappear?
They could claim I was hiding somewhere, but that would give me time to leverage Bayern’s power to make the public recognize me as a victim of this incident.
At least, it was far more advantageous than returning right away.
I nodded for now. There wasn’t much to argue with in the Archbishop’s words.
Politically speaking, the later I returned, the better for me. A week here? That was nothing—I needed to let a week rot outside.
Of course, I had no intention of spending that long with this guy.
More importantly….
“If you wanted me to leave now, why make me drink this?”
I shook the empty vial and asked. He just smiled brightly.
Then he stood up.
“We need to plan how to take out that bishop quickly. I’ll go outside, check the situation, and bring back info useful for the plan. Recover in the meantime.”
Instead of answering, I looked at him with exasperation.
“It’ll take a while. Make yourself comfortable.”
He gave a light hug as a goodbye and left without lingering.
If the drug had worked properly, I would’ve stopped him, but since my stamina was still low, I was grateful he left without fuss.
And yes, my stamina really had been lacking.
The moment he left, I collapsed again and slept until nightfall.
Checking my status window confirmed the Archbishop was right.
While 8 hours passed here, outside—according to the status window’s time—only 40 minutes had gone by.
‘Hmm.’
That meant, based on the leadership’s coordinate system, the Archbishop had only been gone for about 40 minutes.
From my perspective, he wouldn’t be back soon.
I needed his intel to decide my next moves smoothly, but this left my schedule floating.
“…….”
I stood on the balcony to the left of the bed, letting the night breeze blow as I opened and closed my eyes repeatedly.
‘Time with nothing to do.’
No, I could make something to do. Take a walk, study magic formulas.
More precisely, it was time where I didn’t need to do anything.
No one expected anything from me, and I had nothing I had to guard.
Excluding the one who expected something—he was out now.
This being the Archbishop’s mansion and with upcoming events made it not entirely relaxing, but the fact that no burdens weighed on my shoulders right now felt novel.
‘How long has it been?’
Once I wrapped everything up and returned, maybe I could feel this even when relaxing with friends.
Anyway, I’d recovered well.
Thanks to ample sleep, Leo’s magic that had surrounded my core during the match had mostly healed my depleted stamina. No need to dawdle and waste more time. With things still to resolve, more rest would be a luxury.
I needed to talk to the servants, tour the mansion, and gather as much info as possible. No matter what, this wasn’t friendly territory—more intel was always better.
‘Come to think of it, when does the 6th arc special reward show up?’
Still not the right time? I wondered how much more helpful it planned to be.
Ding—!
[Chapter 7. Verily, verily, I say unto you….]
Proposal 1: Talk with ‘Lu Bar’ (0/?) (59 minutes 59 seconds)
* Route 1 — [Proposal 2]
* Route 2 — [Proposal 2]
‘What’s this?’
Thinking about the status window brought this up immediately. But it wasn’t a special reward—it was a proposal.
‘Lu Bar.’
What topic was it for?
A bit disorienting, but skipping it wouldn’t affect the ending much.
Looking at past Route 2 chapter titles, rejecting proposals that led to bad outcomes would shift chapters negatively, but here both routes went to [Proposal 2].
Of course, there must be a reason it was presented as a proposal.
Knock knock—
Someone knocked on the door.
“Come in,” I said simply, and the valet I’d seen earlier opened it.
“You’re awake. I’ll prepare bathwater for you.”
“Yes.”
He said that and vanished somewhere—no sign of him. About 20 minutes later, another servant called me and led me to the bathroom.
I checked the water for magic formulas, bathed quickly, and finished eating.
It hadn’t even taken an hour.
‘Definitely.’
It didn’t feel like a place where people lived.
In the dining room, while casting triple purification magic on the grapes served for dessert, I thought.
From my room to this dining room, every piece of furniture showed no signs of use. Not just furniture—the cutlery I’d just used had no scratches. Like I was the first to ever use it.
I didn’t know about the servants’ stuff, but clearly, the Archbishop didn’t spend much time here as the Freiburg Archbishop. Or he had another residence.
The servants were minimal.
I got tired of casting purification and pushed the dessert aside, ringing the bell. A servant waiting outside approached. Before he could speak, I said quickly,
“Does the master of this mansion actually live here?”
“Well…? He’s busy and often away.”
“How many libraries does this mansion have?”
“I believe there’s one in the basement.”
His vague wording made me ask again.
“You believe?”
“We can’t access the basement, so we don’t know well. It’s a space the master uses alone.”
I’d asked about the library specifically because it seemed a good place to learn about the owner.
Unless they were a scholar, owners didn’t open libraries to strangers, so it might seem rude.
While he answered, I opened my status window to check his name.
Custin Becker. This man wasn’t ‘Lu Bar.’
I nodded and took a step back.
“I see. That’s a shame. I’d like to tour the mansion—could you guide me?”
“Ah, you want to look around.”
I hadn’t even said the basement, but he looked slightly troubled, told me to wait a moment, and left.
Naturally, he didn’t have authority to let an outsider roam freely.
Soon after, it wasn’t a servant but the valet from earlier who approached.
“I heard you wanted to tour the mansion. I’ll guide you.”
I stared at him blankly before standing.
‘Hmm.’
Meeting ‘Lu Bar’ wasn’t hard. This was him.
Meeting the system-designated person right here.
I hadn’t noticed amid the chaos earlier, but now I saw he spoke a mix of Low and High German.
And so, we toured the mansion’s ground floor for about 30 minutes.
‘No locked rooms in particular.’
Nothing special. The owner used only the basement anyway, so it made sense.
I’d met the designated person, so now I needed to proceed definitively.
“Could you show me to the library?”
“…….”
He looked at me silently.
Then he nodded for me to follow and turned around.
“You’re guiding me more readily than expected.”
“You’ll be the husband, so it’s fine.”
“…….”
I pondered what I’d just heard.
But the shocking word left me unable to think further. I stopped in place and asked seriously,
“Who?”
The valet gave me a look like he’d seen every kind of weirdo.
Then he pointed to the ring on my finger.
“His Excellency.”
“…….”
I looked down at the ring and nodded. My head throbbed so badly I nearly collapsed, but thankfully I didn’t.
I was the crazy one for asking who. In this era, not assuming engagement from this would be stranger.
Come to think of it, the first time I came to the Archbishop’s mansion, I vaguely remembered hearing nonsense about it soon becoming my home.
Setting aside that it’d never happen even if I died and revived, anyway….
‘…They’re seeing it that way.’
It wasn’t even new from today, yet it hit me fresh, making my head ache.
But if they saw it that way, it wasn’t bad in some respects.
At least for gathering information.