Paving a Path of Flowers for My Nephew Made Me the Hero — Episode 7
Because the Fire spell had come out far bigger and hotter than Alex had expected, he had to stumble back a couple of steps.
Even so, he could feel the heat radiating off it.
"I think I used too much mana."
"No, that was exactly the right amount."
"For first-circle mages, anyway."
Lee Baek peered at the massive ball of flame and at Alex's body with evident fascination.
"Try it one more time."
"Okay. But how do I get rid of this?"
"Think about scattering the mana. The fire is made of mana, after all."
Alex did as Lee Baek instructed, and the moment the mana dispersed, the roaring flame vanished like smoke.
Alex cast Fire again, exactly as before.
"Fire."
Once more, a huge blaze appeared in front of his hand.
"That's incredible."
"Usually, first-circle mages just learning magic waste their mana, you know?"
"They waste it?"
"Think about it — when you cook something for the first time, you don't know the right amounts, so you end up wasting ingredients, right?"
"But a chef who's used to cooking uses exactly the right amount every time."
Alex understood what Lee Baek meant.
It had been the same for him the first time he cooked. Granted, he'd been too frugal to throw anything out, so he'd eaten it all anyway.
"So magic works a lot like cooking, then?"
"Yeah. Exactly."
"There's a reason proficiency exists, after all."
"The more you cast a spell and the more familiar you get with it, the less mana you waste and the more efficiently you can use it."
Lee Baek continued.
"But this was your very first time casting magic, right?"
"That's why brilliant me calculated even the amount of mana you'd waste and adjusted the teaching accordingly."
"And yet, amazingly, not a single drop of mana was wasted. You burned through everything with zero loss — that's why the Fire came out so enormous."
"Is that because of my talent, too?"
Since moving mana so easily had been thanks to his talent, Alex figured this must be the same thing.
"No."
"No matter how much of a culinary genius someone is, it's impossible to cook a dish you've never seen before, perfectly, without wasting a single ingredient — isn't it?"
Given that every single one of Lee Baek's examples revolved around food, Alex was starting to grasp just how vast and bottomless the lich's appetite truly was.
"This is, hmm, how do I put it."
"It feels like you've been using my magic for over ten years and gotten completely fluent in it."
"I've used your magic?"
Alex was puzzled. He had never cast a single spell — not during his twenty years as a human, nor during his twelve years as a ghost.
"No, I mean it feels that way."
"Which is why it's so strange. This is my magic, after all."
"Magic that doesn't exist in this world."
Even Lee Baek, the otherworldly lich who had reached the very pinnacle of magic, had no idea why he felt this way.
"It's not a bad thing, is it?"
"It's actually a good thing."
"It means you can use my magic efficiently, without wasting a scrap of mana."
"Then I won't worry about it."
Alex decided that if it wasn't a problem, it wasn't worth dwelling on.
After all, having an otherworldly lich living inside his body was already a big enough problem on its own.
"Well, I'm curious."
"But I can look into it slowly, I suppose."
With plenty of time on his hands, Lee Baek shelved the question for later.
"So to make it smaller, I just use less mana?"
"Right."
"Let's shrink them down this time, then make several at once."
At Lee Baek's instruction, Alex reduced his mana output, fixed his gaze on where the spell should appear, and cast.
"Fire."
Three small flames appeared before Alex.
"Nice. And again, not a drop of mana wasted. Unbelievable."
"Next, let's try using as much mana as you possibly can."
Following Lee Baek's words, Alex poured his entire core of mana into the spell.
"Fire."
More than twenty flames bloomed across the backyard.
"Whoa! I'd believe you were second-circle — no, early third-circle at this rate!"
His mana running low made Alex's head spin for a moment, but the moment he used the mana circulation technique Lee Baek had taught him, his heart began to fill with mana again.
"Fast recovery, too."
"You're remarkable, you know that?"
With a light exhale, Alex gazed at the backyard overflowing with Fire spells of his own making.
His respectable talent for the sword, the magic Lee Baek was teaching him, and even his memories of the future.
Feeling his heart steady with confidence, Alex made his decision.
"Let's go."
No more delay — they would leave right away.
For Leo's happiness.
And to burn the demons' schemes and plans to the root, before they could ever take hold and grow.
"Go where, exactly?"
Having the lich riding along in his body would come in handy, too.
Lunchtime.
Alex listened happily to Leo's excited account of playing with his friends, then looked at the boy and spoke.
"Leo."
"Yeah?"
Leo looked up at Alex with a face like his mother's and sky-blue eyes like his father's.
It was the face Alex always saw when he missed Serena and Glick.
But right now, what surfaced first was another face — the face of Hero Leo, killed by the Demon King.
That was why Alex had decided to leave: so that future would never come to pass.
He'd been wondering how to convince Leo, when the perfect reason had presented itself.
"Should we... go find your mom and dad, Leo?"
Serena, Glick — I'm sorry.
But he meant it, too. He genuinely intended to search for them.
Granted, even Hero Leo had never managed to find them, so it would be incredibly difficult.
At Alex's words, Leo's eyes went wide and round.
Mom. Dad.
People he knew only from the stories his uncle and the villagers told —
"Leo!"
"Leo."
The owners of those faint, faint voices, calling his name so tenderly in the far reaches of memory.
And yet he couldn't remember their faces. His own...
"My mom... and dad...?"
At those unfamiliar words of address, so rarely spoken aloud, Leo's small heart began to pound.
"That's right. You've grown so much, Leo, and your uncle's gotten strong."
"Oh! You're going to find his mom and dad!"
"I'll help too!"
Alex, long since accustomed to tuning out Lee Baek's chatter, looked at Leo.
"How would you like to go find your mom and dad?"
"But... you said Mom and Dad died."
Alex's expression darkened.
No villager would have said such a thing in front of the child, so Leo must have overheard it somewhere, sneakily.
Alex didn't blame him — he'd had those same thoughts himself, from time to time.
"Yes. But they might still be alive, so..."
Alex's voice trembled despite himself.
"They might be out there, alive, waiting for you and me."
So much time had passed, but they were still the sister and brother-in-law he longed to see. Even faded, longing was still longing.
Leo, who had been listening quietly, looked up at his uncle. On his uncle's face — the same face worn by the longing and sorrow Leo had seen there so many times — he saw hope for the very first time.
And that hope passed into Leo as well.
Leo wanted to see his mom and dad just as much as his uncle did.
Mom and Dad he couldn't even remember.
"...I want to go!"
Mom and Dad he had never once called out to.
"I want to go find them!"
Before he knew it, Leo was speaking through a face full of tears.
"I want — I want to see Mom and Dad too!"
Remembering the future — where a child who longed for his parents like this lost even his uncle — the emotions surged up in Alex all the more.
Alex pulled Leo into a fierce hug.
"Yes. Let's go find them."
Inside his uncle's warm embrace, Leo wailed — Waaah! — crying as much as he had missed his mom and dad, as much as he had longed to see them.
As Alex gently patted the sobbing boy's back,
"Sniff. I swear I'll find them for him."
— Lee Baek was crying too, and Alex thought, Is this guy really a lich?
"We leave tomorrow."
Alex told Leo, whose eyes were swollen and puffy.
"Okay! But where are we going, Uncle?"
"First we'll go to the lord's castle. And then to other countries, too."
"The lord's castle! Other countries!"
Leo's eyes sparkled.
"So we need to pack. We'll be traveling by wagon, so let's take only what we really need."
"Okay!"
Leo answered with a face brimming with determination.
"What a tough little guy."
"He's growing up so well!"
At the lich's praise, Uncle Alex — Alex himself — smiled with quiet pride.
"And you'll have to say goodbye to your friends."
"Okay!"
"Aren't you sad to leave your friends, Leo?"
"I'm sad, but we can meet again!"
Just as Lee Baek said, Leo was being very brave.
"Everybody! I'm going to find my mom and dad!"
And he had no hesitation at all.
He ran to his friends, shouting it loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear.
"You're going to find your mom and dad?"
At Leo's words, the children blinked.
"Yeah! With my uncle! We're going to the lord's castle, and other countries too!"
Leo's beaming smile seemed to pour out light.
"Whoa! The lord's castle?!"
"Other countries too? That's amazing!"
Not one of them understood how long or how far their friend Leo was really leaving — they simply envied him.
"Mom! Dad! Leo says he's going to find his mom and dad!"
"Leo's going to the lord's castle with Uncle Alex!!"
The news spread through every corner of the village in no time at all.
"You're going to find Serena and Glick?"
Before he knew it, Alex found himself surrounded by villagers who had come running at the news.
They remembered it vividly — eleven years ago, when sixteen-year-old Serena and nine-year-old Alex had first settled in this village.
And the mercenary Glick, whom Serena had brought back a few years later when she announced her marriage.
Even now, remembering Glick's stony face with that unmistakable flicker of joy underneath still made them laugh.
And then there was the day Leo was born.
Alex, Serena, and Glick, all grinning ear to ear — they had looked so very happy.
And so, though worry was plain on their faces, the villagers couldn't bring themselves to talk Alex out of it.
"I knew this day would come."
Mark spoke, looking at Alex, who had shot up into a twenty-year-old man almost before their eyes.
"Every time I saw you standing at the village entrance, staring down the road, waiting for Serena and Glick. Every time I saw you practicing your sword alone. I kept thinking — someday, he'll go looking for them."
Every villager had thought the same, whenever they saw Alex's lonely silhouette carrying little Leo in his arms.
Alex could only smile faintly at that.
I had planned it, didn't I.
Before he died to the wolf.
Alex had meant to leave in search of Serena and Glick once Leo was a little older. That was why he had trained with the sword every single day, as soon as the farm work was done.
Apparently the villagers had known all along.
"And Leo? Is he going with you?"
At the villager's question, Alex nodded.
"Yes. I'm taking him with me."
"That won't be easy."
Traveling with a six-year-old was no small undertaking — but somehow, everyone took one look at Alex's face, so suddenly grown, and offered nothing but advice.
"Watch out for strangers, not just monsters."
"Right! Don't let anyone snatch the boy!"
"I will. Thank you."
No one knew better than Alex just how dangerous the world outside the village could be.
"Wait here just a moment."
"Yes, stay right here!"
The villagers hurried off toward their homes. Apparently they meant to give the departing Alex something to take with him.
Mark was about to head home to fetch something as well when Alex stopped him.
"Sir. There's something I'd like to ask of you."
"Name it! Anything!"
Mark answered, ready to agree before he'd even heard the request. Alex smiled and said,
"I'd like you to look after our house."
Our house.
The house brimming with memories of Leo.
Alex hoped that when he returned one day, after everything was finished, it would still be standing just as it was now.
"And please manage the fields with the other villagers. Everything that grows, minus the taxes, you can all split among yourselves."
Better for the villagers to keep the fields tended than to leave them sitting empty.
"Oh, thorough."
Mark waved his hands quickly.
"No need for all that! I'd do it anyway!"
"This way, my heart's easier."
When Alex was young, and when Leo was a baby — without the villagers' help, neither of them would have grown up so well.
After several rounds of back-and-forth, Alex finally won.
"You should at least let us charge you rent, then..."
"I told you, it's fine."
Meanwhile —
The villagers began emerging from their houses, each carrying something.
"This is emergency medicine. Take it when you're sick."
"This here's dried jerky."
"Thank you. We'll eat it well."
Before long, Alex's arms were overflowing with gifts.
"Can you even carry all this?"
"What are you traveling by? Walking won't cut it."
"I was planning to buy a wagon and a horse."
At that, Mark — who owned a wagon — and another man — who owned a horse — bellowed at once.
"Buy? What's all this buying!"
"Just take ours — they're yours!"
And so Alex came to acquire a wagon of just the right size, and a brown horse to pull it, at an absurdly cheap price.
"This village really is a good village."
At Lee Baek's words, Alex could only smile in agreement.