Chapter 5
Chapter 5
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: crow
Chapter Title: Normalization
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Gogo~s..."
The mentor cried out in anguish.
Stamping her feet, she approached the plant zombie that had gone from Gogos to a complete stop.
Her restless hands gathered the grasses that had formed Gogos.
"This child I raised with such care..."
"...Mentor?"
"It's fine, Rishir. Gogos will understand. A child from the soil has simply returned to the soil."
"Ah. Yes. Sorry, Senior Gogos. May you rest in peace in the embrace of the Plant Lord's arms, in plant heaven... Anyway, that's not what I wanted to say—"
I spoke to my mentor as she picked up a seed from Gogos's remains and faced me.
"Wasn't this your doing, Mentor?"
"Of course not. Why would I intentionally harm Gogos?"
"I thought maybe you did it to draw out my qi."
My mentor examined Gogos's seed for a while before speaking.
"Rishir? My disciple."
"Yes, Mentor."
"That thing you just did. Want to try it one more time?"
My mentor summoned another plant zombie.
This time, twice as many vines danced.
The vines were much thicker too, almost resembling trees.
"...Mentor?"
Our Senior Gogos.
In that industry over there, you were considered cute, huh.
A plant giant with multiple arms sprouting all over its body like tree branches appeared before me.
Unlike Gogos, it didn't move.
It just stood there motionless.
The original intent of assisting with swordsmanship sparring had thoroughly faded away.
Mentor. Our class is still on addition and subtraction.
What's calculus? Where'd the numbers go? What are these squiggles? This is English.
"Mentor. For reference, what I just did was a simple sword swing. Too embarrassing to even call swordsmanship."
"Yeah. Looked like it."
Injury.
"But Mentor, will I really have to face things like this with a sword anytime soon?"
"This one's called Mumum."
"Oh. Gap moe."
My mentor no longer cared about the original goal of improving swordsmanship through real combat experience.
Her silver eyes were fixed not on my swordsmanship, but on me.
Screw it, whatever.
Let it be what it will.
I swung my sword with full power once more.
The plant giant didn't budge.
Mumum. If you do that, where does that leave my pride?
I missed Senior Gogos, who had burst apart from my single strike.
"Sorry, Mentor. I couldn't finish off Mumum."
"What kind of nonsense is that?"
My mentor went to Mumum and checked its condition.
Oh my.
Oh my oh my oh my.
She kept making those sounds, covering her mouth with her fingertips in astonishment after confirming.
"Duran?"
"That's not the issue right now."
"Our disciple here seems to have been born with a Unique Color."
A strange expression. Sparkling eyes.
That was my mentor's and the book's expression.
The book had no face, but after spending ages with Mr. Duran, I could tell.
"Uh, Mentor?"
"Yes? My one and only disciple."
The form of address had changed?
"What's a Unique Color?"
"A Unique Color refers to mana that possesses a unique property and influences things accordingly."
"A unique property? Like the moving plants I just fought?"
My mentor shook her head.
"No. That's just one branch of magic. Anyone who learns the same magic can do the same thing. There might be slight differences based on minor factors."
"Then what happens if someone with a Unique Color learns that magic?"
"Shall I give an example?"
The 'Star' title given to great archmages who reach historic prominence.
My mentor mentioned the Star of Talent, the Grand Sage of the Crimson Tower.
"His innate Unique Color is 'Combustion'. If he learned the same magic as me and summoned walking grass, what do you think would happen?"
"Don't tell me it bursts into flames?"
"Exactly. You'd witness the miraculous sight of burning yet living, moving plants."
"Then what if that Star of Talent used water magic?"
My mentor gestured toward the training ground floor.
The dry soil of the training ground gradually moistened, soon forming a small puddle.
"Creating this much moisture from a place without water...!"
My mentor scooped up water from the puddle with her hand and sprinkled it on mine.
"How is it?"
"Ahng."
"Just ordinary water with no special traits?"
"Yes. As you see, completely ordinary water with no special traits. That's the essence of that magic. Since I don't have a Unique Color, it produces the result as is. But what if the Star of Talent used it?"
"Water that combusts everything it touches...? Like boiling oil or lava."
"Yes. Exactly."
"Uh... Is there magic that creates lava too?"
"You're wondering what would happen if the Star of Talent used that? Probably lava that's much hotter and doesn't cool for far longer."
A Unique Color imparts properties and sometimes enhances them.
Thanks to this, mages born with Unique Colors show overwhelming strengths in specific magics and sometimes create entirely new ones that didn't exist before.
"That's why a Unique Color is like a blessing for a mage. Unfortunately, though, very few mages are born with one."
"..."
After the Unique Color lecture ended, I looked down at my hand.
"So, you're saying my bastard rating has been upgraded from B- to S+?"
My mentor chuckled amusedly.
"Oh my. How composed."
"Is that so? Then how should I have reacted?"
"Duran would have rolled on the floor screaming."
"And you, Mentor?"
"Me? Hmm. Well."
My mentor pondered briefly with a face full of delightful imagination.
"If it were the kind of Unique Color I wanted, I probably wouldn't have slept for days from excitement."
"The kind of Unique Color you wanted...?"
Come to think of it, what was my Unique Color?
For me to be this cool-headed bastard.
Not jumping for joy at getting a trait, but worrying first about it possibly being a dud.
As if reading my doubt, my mentor showed me the seed from the Gogos she had just summoned.
"Rishir. How does this seed look to you?"
"Like the core of Gogos? The walking grass one. But it looks surprisingly ordinary?"
"Now come here and look at this one too?"
Through the gaps in the plant giant's vine body, its central seed was visible.
In terms of shape and size alone, it was the same seed as Gogos's.
But its condition.
Roots entwined on the seed's surface, pulsating like blood vessels.
The difference between alive and dead?
"It's not because Mumum is alive."
"Pardon?"
As if reading my thoughts, my mentor said.
"Originally, Gogos's seed should have been like this too. Even if Gogos's body was destroyed, the magic and its traces in the core should remain. But with Gogos, not only was its body destroyed, but the core was too— or should I say destroyed?"
Tap. Tap. Tap.
My mentor closed her eyes and tapped her lips with her fingertip.
When my mentor did it, it seemed like mystical magic knocking to summon deep memories.
A moment later, she exclaimed 'Ah!' and cutely waved her finger.
"Right~ Restoration. Let's say it was restored."
"Restored?"
"Yes. This core wasn't destroyed. It was restored to its normal state before the magic was imbued."
"Normal state... Normalization..."
"Normalization? Oh, that's good. Perfect expression."
She clapped at my offhand remark, affirming it.
Not good. That word. For some reason, it has a bad ring to it.
"No, Mentor. Let's just keep calling it restoration."
"No. Your expression fits better, Rishir. As you said, Gogos's seed was normalized due to your Unique Color's influence. If your power had been sufficient, maybe Mumum would have been the same?"
"Uh... So my Unique Color is restoration?"
"Too early to say definitively. Could be Dissolution, or Conditional Destruction. That's why the general term Normalization fits best."
"Is that why I wasn't affected by your perception impairment magic?"
Clap clap clap clap.
"Yes. Yes. That too. You were under the perception impairment magic, but it normalized right away."
"Mentor, please... restoration..."
"My goodness. Duran, my disciple Rishir really is a Unique Color possessor."
"Does that mean I'm the first to recognize my disciple's true value?"
"Call it the Normalization of the Contract? My disciple's Unique Color."
"..."
The dark elf and the book gleefully repeated that specific word for a while.
Bendel Mansion, main building, family head's office.
At the window overlooking Haeren at a glance, someone other than the Bendel family head stood.
"What a truly beautiful place. Haeren."
She was the head of the Diltan Family, rulers of the Diltan Territory adjacent to Bendel Territory.
Her reception was extremely quiet.
And without any hospitality, she planned to leave immediately after the conversation ended.
Because the Diltans had long-standing conflicts, large and small, with the Bendels due to geographical issues.
But that too seemed likely to end today.
"Are you really sure about this?"
Bendel asked with an uneasy expression.
"You already know, but that boy is—"
"It's my daughter's matter. How could I not know?"
"..."
"Duke Bendel must know about our daughter's situation too, since it's a family matter."
The Diltan family head turned from the window.
She let out a deep sigh.
"I too am reluctant to pair my half-bastard with my daughter."
Bendel did not take those words as an insult.
Nor did Diltan consider it an insult.
To those of their orthodox and noble bloodline, a bastard was simply that kind of existence.
"I just hope this becomes the knot tying our two families together."
"Understood."
At that moment, his engagement was being discussed—unknown to the sole principal party, Rishir.
"..."
Diltan looked at her daughter seated across from Bendel, barely hiding her anguish.
The girl looked fragile and harmless, like a dandelion before its head turns to white fluff.
"This isn't a dream, right? That Rishir will be my husband..."
At the two family heads' mention of the engagement, she smiled like a sunflower.