Push and Pull (3)
The magitech magic staff was the first work Rin had ever created after losing her voice and inventing magitech formulas.
A staff for the weak—one that let even ordinary people use magic.
It possessed mana and could compute on its own, yet it could not chant. A half-measure.
Without realizing it, Rin had projected herself onto that staff.
That was why she had despaired so completely when Offen pointed out its flaws.
Ehehehehe.
Now that the staff had been praised, she felt as if she were soaring through the sky.
If her vocal cords had still been intact, she would have let out the most ridiculous, giddy laugh imaginable.
What is this? I don’t know this feeling. Praise… feels this good?
To Rin, praise had always been something that simply followed whatever she did—an inevitability.
She was an unparalleled genius. The things she accomplished as a matter of course were, to everyone else, feats worthy of cheers and thunderous applause.
A life in which even breathing earned her compliments.
That was the life Rin, the greatest genius in the history of the Magic Tower, had lived.
And so, no praise from others had ever made her happy.
After all, no adult delights in being told, “You can count to ten? Amazing!” the way a child might.
But the praise from this man is different. Every word he speaks fills my heart. I want to keep hearing it.
Offen’s praise was different.
Every word that left his mouth sank into Rin’s chest with effortless ease.
The reason his compliments seeped into her heart so deeply, unlike anyone else’s, was simple.
“The potential contained in this staff is boundless. It can only use lower-tier magic? Depending on how it’s used, that can actually become an advantage.”
To Rin, Offen was the first person she had ever met who surpassed her.
[How can only being able to use lower-tier magic possibly be an advantage?]
Rin barely managed to calm her trembling heart as she asked Offen the question.
If she had spoken it aloud instead of writing it, she would not have been able to hide even a fraction of the excitement in her voice.
That was how much she was looking forward to this.
She wanted Offen to tell her the strengths and possibilities of the magitech magic staff that even she herself had never known.
“Earlier, when I used the lower-tier magic Light through this staff, all I did was think that I wanted light. The staff recognized my intent and computed the appropriate magic for it, correct? Is that right, Lady Rin?”
[Yes. That’s the effect of the magitech formula engraved into it. It reads the user’s intent and computes the matching magic formula.]
“As expected, Lady Rin’s magitech formula is a great invention that will go down in history. The fact that it can only use lower-tier magic without chanting has merely obscured its greatness for a moment.”
[……Thank you.]
Rin forced down the smile that threatened to tug at the corners of her lips and conveyed her gratitude with her mana quill.
At the sight of her, Offen offered a gentle smile, then ran his fingertips along the staff as he continued.
“A magitech formula that reads the user’s intent and handles the computation in their place. A staff with magic formulas engraved into it. The only thing this perfect creation lacks is the output of lower-tier magic—the quality of the magic itself.”
[That’s right.]
Lower-tier magic could never surpass the output of mid-tier magic.
The hierarchy of magic was determined by mana consumption, the complexity of computation, and the absolute value of magical output.
Knowing this, Rin herself had despaired at that limitation when she first created the magitech magic staff.
But Offen spoke of a way to transcend that limit as if it were no problem at all.
“If the quality of the magic you can use is low, then you simply compete with quantity.”
[……What?]
“A staff that can compute magic formulas on its own. If you make a hundred of them and combine them, wouldn’t you be able to use lower-tier magic a hundred times at once? A single lower-tier spell cannot surpass a mid-tier spell, but a hundred lower-tier spells can easily surpass one mid-tier spell. A staff whose efficiency and output rise the more you increase its numbers…… Isn’t that truly magnificent?”
What came from Offen’s mouth was a method so crude and primitive it bordered on absurd.
That kind of method……
Yet the moment Rin heard it, she realized how painfully narrow her own vision had been.
Why…… why didn’t I think of something this simple? Why didn’t I think to make better use of this magitech formula’s strengths?
Rin berated herself after hearing Offen’s words.
She felt like a fool—the creator of magitech formulas who had failed to grasp the technology’s true potential.
But the fact that she had not noticed that potential was not actually her fault.
“You’re making a face that says, ‘Why didn’t I think of something this easy?’”
Offen returned the staff to its original case and looked at Rin as he spoke.
Earlier, she would have thought, Is he mocking me for being stupid? Damn it…… and sunk into self-loathing. But not now.
“But Lady Rin, that is not your fault. You are a pioneer of technology, walking alone and proudly down a path no one else has ever tread.”
She now knew that Offen would never mock her.
[A pioneer……]
“Yes. You are the one who created magitech formulas, and you are the only one who uses them. Who would dare belittle your footsteps simply because you have not yet mapped every fork in a path walked through pitch-black darkness where nothing can be seen?”
The magitech formula Rin had created was, quite literally, groundbreaking—a technology that shook the very foundations of the magical arts.
Magic had originally been something only those chosen by the magical path—mages—could wield.
But Rin’s magitech formula allowed even those not chosen by the magical path to use magic. It was a revolutionary technique.
That was why Rin had researched and developed magitech formulas entirely alone, without support from any other mage.
Of course, she was a genius and had never needed anyone’s help.
Yet she had been alone, walking a road no one had ever walked before, and so her field of vision had inevitably been narrow.
That was the reason she had missed the potential of magitech formulas—until Offen pointed it out.
“I merely added a single comment as a third party. The potential contained in this staff, in the magitech formula itself, is entirely yours, Lady Rin—something you created.”
Watching Offen speak with that gentle smile, Rin felt as if her vision were widening and the world around her growing brighter.
His praise, his affirmation, his recognition—her chest began to fill with warmth.
“You are truly remarkable. Even after losing your voice, you did not despair or collapse and stop. The effort you poured into creating this magitech magic staff, into creating magitech formulas, can undoubtedly make this world a better place to live. I am certain of it.”
Offen praised the staff, the magitech formula, and the effort of Rin herself—effort that had wavered and teetered yet never broken.
At that sincere voice, Rin felt something hot surge up from deep within her.
It was emotion, gratitude, and relief all at once.
Receiving recognition and praise from someone greater than herself, Rin felt for the first time that the heart which had been crumbling ever since she lost her voice was beginning to heal.
If I’m with this person…… I think I’ll be all right. I think I can trust my back to him.
For the first time outside of her companions in the Hero’s Party, Rin wanted to trust someone else.
I…… want to be with this person. It has to be him.
No—more than even the companions with whom she had shared life and death, she wanted to be with Offen.
Her companions in the Hero’s Party were certainly trustworthy allies to whom she could entrust her back, but they had never quenched her thirst.
They were not mages. They possessed neither magical knowledge nor capability of any kind.
And so they could never truly understand Rin the mage.
But Offen was different.
He could freely manipulate subspace.
He had, on his own, grasped the flaws and operating principles of a magitech magic staff he was seeing for the first time—and even the potential of the magitech formula that Rin herself had not known.
The first person Rin had ever met in her life who possessed magical knowledge and capability superior to her own.
Offen Termin.
[……Um, well…… would it be all right if I showed you my other works as well?]
Rin scribbled with her mana quill and asked Offen.
She still had the same goal as at the beginning: I’ll prove to Offen that I’m useful!
But the heart contained within that goal had changed a great deal.
I want more praise. I want this man to acknowledge me.
Rin did not want to let Offen Termin go.
To Rin, for whom every mage in the world had looked like nothing more than ignorant children, Offen was the first reliable adult she had ever met.
She wanted to stay by his side, help him, receive plenty of praise, and earn his recognition.
“Yes, of course. The chance to encounter Lady Rin’s works…… I’m truly looking forward to it.”
At Offen’s reply that he was truly looking forward to it, Rin clenched her fist tightly and made her resolve.
Right here, today—I will definitely prove my usefulness to Offen Termin!
The mage of the Hero’s Party, the greatest genius mage in the history of the Magic Tower—Rin’s all-out usefulness appeal began!