Mom Got Pissed (3)
“More importantly, tell me again about what happened earlier. You say you broke free from that satyros bitch on your own? With your own power?”
Lilith, who had demolished several slices of cake paired with beer, licked the cream from her lips and asked.
I hadn't even finished my single slice yet... Well, I just don't like sweets that much anyway.
Anyway, I opened my mouth at Lilith's question.
“Oh, that.”
I'd been curious about it myself.
I'd broken free from that satyros bitch on my own, but even I—the one it happened to—didn't really know why. I'd been meaning to ask Lilith about it sometime, so I laid out the details of what had gone down.
It wasn't like I hadn't told her once already, and there was no need to feel embarrassed about it now.
I told her how I'd gotten drunk on the satyros bitch's body scent, nearly got pinned down and fucked senseless by her, but snapped out of it midway and escaped. As I recounted it, I could see Lilith pondering deeply.
“...No matter how I look at it, that sounds like a Gift.”
Gift.
In this world, they called it a Gift when someone was born with a constitution that readily accepted mana, leading to acquired changes in the body, unique abilities, or talents due to adapting to that mana.
A superpower that manifested postnatally, no different from a gift in name.
So I was the lottery winner?
Nah, lotteries come in all shapes and sizes, and this world had every kind of Gift imaginable, so it wasn't exactly something to celebrate.
There was even that infamous case of the guy who got the world's shittiest Gift, dubbed “Breath,” letting him spew fire, water, or all sorts of crap from his mouth.
He could blow fire or water from his mouth, sure, but humans don't have the organs for that. Even with the Gift, he was otherwise a normal guy.
Naturally, he'd burned his own mouth and esophagus with the flames he spat, or nearly drowned himself in the water another time.
The world had its share of retarded Gifts like that.
Hell, that crap even got research funding and support money. Back when I was scraping by, it might've seemed like hitting the jackpot.
But now that I was set financially, landing some bullshit Gift would just be the universe fucking with me.
Besides, I'd already gotten tested for Gifts and been ruled out as null.
And yet, suddenly I had one?
Well, it could happen.
Gifts were, after all, changes in the body triggered by acquired mana adaptation.
They were postnatal talents, by definition.
But Gifts were still in the realm of talent.
Having a constitution that readily accepts mana innately wasn't easy—it was like being naturally fast on your feet or a genius. Hell, maybe even rarer than those innate talents.
True prodigies blessed by the heavens.
And even among them, you needed luck so that a part of your body evolved on its own while absorbing mana to gain a Gift.
Talent plus heavenly fortune—that's what made Gift holders.
Me? I'd gotten my muscular build without trying, shot past 180cm growing up in that shithole orphanage, so I'd figured maybe mana or whatever was influencing me and got tested.
Result: null.
All they could tell was I had a slightly better mana affinity than average.
Just a tiny bit more mana accumulation in my body than most.
Otherwise, a completely ordinary physique.
I'd thought my muscles and height spurt were somewhat mana-related, but nope—just genetics, apparently.
Wonder what kind of people my mom and dad were.
Anyway, I'd already told Lilith about my null Gift result. So she scrutinized my face from every angle, then tilted her head.
“But no matter how I look, there's nothing particularly off about you.”
“You can tell just by looking?”
“Roughly, yeah.”
She stared at me intently and continued.
“It's all changes from mana in the end. You just check where the mana pools unusually. Magic circles for spells, dantians for martial arts... those are basically artificial mana organs created inside the body. Artificial Gifts, you could say.”
“Artificial Gift?”
“Yeah. Gifts arise naturally, unlike those. Think of circles or dantians as systematically cultivated artificial ones—like hothouse strawberries. Regular Gifts are wild ones grown on the mountain.”
Strawberries versus wild strawberries...
I kinda got it, but not really.
Whatever, as I was half-grasping it, Lilith stabbed a strawberry on my cake with her fork and went on.
“They're unstructured, branching wildly because of uncontrolled mana, so shapes, powers—all random. Inconsistent, sure... but the rare ones, stacked coincidences of chance, are insanely powerful. Like how some wild strawberry tastes better than cultivated ones fussed over with breeding and fertilizer. Anyway, circles and dantians are similar beasts at heart. That's why you can spot a lot just by looking.”
That so?
All I could really parse was that you check body mana to see if there's a Gift.
Come to think of it, during my test, I'd gone into some machine that scanned me real quick.
Guess that checked accumulated mana or whatever.
“But you don't seem to have anything like that. Your mana affinity is decent—more accumulated than average—but otherwise, plain as day. And yet you resisted that satyros bitch.”
Hmm. Lilith paused, thinking, then spoke.
“Alright, fine. We can recreate something similar to what happened then and find out.”
“Recreate it?”
“Yeah.”
She tapped the table—tok, tok—and said,
“You resisted her body scent. Satyros are a strong race, even if they're a bunch of crazy bitches. Resisting that points to a pretty damn powerful Gift. Mental resistance type, maybe. Hard to detect even on tests... and rare as hell.”
Her pupils glowed red.
“Now, 'raise your hand.'”
“Uh.”
My right hand rose smoothly. Staring at my rogue hand, I said,
“What the hell? What'd you do?”
“Simple hypnosis. But you went under way too easy? This isn't just low resistance—this was a weak cast; no way it should've hooked you like that. Cases like this...”
Lilith clamped her lips shut mid-sentence.
“Like what?”
She'd cut off right as it got good—the most infuriating type. I asked, and she flushed, glaring at me.
“Shut up. Anyway, doesn't seem mental. So what the fuck is it?”
Why's she suddenly pissed?
Anyway, even Lilith didn't know.
Wait a sec.
Come to think of it...
“Actually, I'd resisted a satyros bitch before that too? First time I met her, same deal.”
“What? Wasn't it Hoaran who saved you?”
“She did, yeah. But before that, her scent had me fucked up already. I snapped out, started cursing her ass off, got smacked, then Hoaran showed up.”
At that, Lilith flinched, shoulders trembling, and growled low.
“...Why the fuck are you telling me this now?”
“Oops.”
Her eyes blazed red.
“She hit you? That fucking bitch? Where? How? I didn't hear shit about that? And you just forgave her skank ass over some crap like that?”
“No, wait...”
She didn't know?
How could she not?
Actually, yeah.
It hadn't been long since Lilith tracked me and Hoaran. I'd been rescued by Hoaran mere moments before Lilith arrived, so she probably hadn't gotten the full story from anyone.
By the time we reunited, Hoaran had patched me up good as new.
She might've just assumed I'd nearly fallen for the satyros's charms and Hoaran saved me.
“...Whatever, moving on.”
“Moving on my ass?”
Grind. Lilith gnashed her teeth.
“If I'd known, I wouldn't have let that cunt walk away unscathed... At least an arm...”
Fucking scary.
Time to change the vibe quick.
“Anyway, both that time and when I escaped her later. Uh, sounds weird to say, but... I was fully erect both times.”
“...What? What the fuck are you blabbering about, you perv?”
Yeah, fair.
Lilith wrinkled her nose at the erection talk. Honestly, even I thought it sounded dumb, but facts were facts.
First time, second time—both when her scent had me fully hard, that's when my head cleared right up.
The only common thread? Me being rock-hard.
“No joke, for real. Once I got erect, suddenly I was fine.”
I insisted, and Lilith seemed to realize I wasn't messing around. Her face turned serious as she spoke.
“If that's true, could be a conditional Gift. Never heard of one that activates on erection, though.”
“Conditional Gift?”
“Yeah. Most Gifts warp part of the body to grant new powers. But sometimes, they only trigger under specific conditions. Famous one you'd know... 'Clairvoyance' ring a bell?”
“Oh, that.”
If “Breath” was infamous for being shit-tier, “Clairvoyance” was notorious for different reasons.
Let you see anywhere from your seat.
The World Government shoveled insane cash at researching it for that busted potential.
Just figure out how to apply it elsewhere, and the uses were endless.
“That chick manifested it when she went blind in one eye. 'Must have only one eye' was the trigger condition.”
“Damn. Could've gone her whole life clueless.”
“Exactly. Conditional ones tend to be stronger than standard Gifts. Not always better, though.”
Anyway, Lilith smirked.
“Lucky break. If yours triggers 'only when erect,' it'll be easy to test.”
“Huh?”
Her words sent a bad chill up my spine, some ominous vibe. I eyed her warily, and she grinned back.
“What're you waiting for? Get it up.”