Landing the Job
"Are you the kid who starts today?"
"Yes, sir, that would be me..."
My name is Noel. I'm an ordinary commoner who just turned twenty this year, and as of today, I'm officially employed at the Magic Tool Workshop inside the prestigious Imperial Academy. Well, "employed" might be putting it generously. In truth, it felt closer to the orphanage pawning me off like unwanted baggage the second they noticed I had a modest flicker of talent for enchanting.
To be entirely candid, I’m not exactly a "pureblood" native of this world. In my previous life, I was just an ordinary twenty-first-century wage slave—a software engineer serving as a replaceable cog in a massive corporation—until exactly one month ago, when I woke up inhabiting the body of this kid named Noel.
Why did I transmigrate here? Obviously, I have no clue. Maybe getting into a petty keyboard battle on an online forum after leaving a snarky comment asking why people even read web novels did me in. If fate was going to fling me into another world, the least it could've done was make me a spoiled young lord. Instead, I got stuck as a talentless, orphanage-raised commoner. Talk about drawing the short straw.
In any case, a guy who never gave fantasy a second thought was now living in one. I didn't even know what book this was—or if it was even a novel at all—so any pipe dream of exploiting future plot knowledge to coast by on easy street was out the window.
"Noel Brighthome, right? The director gave you a glowing recommendation. Said you're an upright kid. Take a seat over there."
"Y-Yes, sir. Excuse me."
For the record, Brighthome was simply the name of the orphanage. With no surname left behind by my biological parents, I took the institution's name as my own, a convention the original owner of this body seemed to have accepted without complaint.
"I'm Walter Briggs. Around the workshop, you call me Workshop Master."
While Walter flipped through my paperwork, I rested my hands on my knees and examined them. The faint nicks and calluses lining my fingertips were likely souvenirs from the original Noel tinkering with magic tools. According to the jumbled fragments of memory I possessed, the boy had possessed a slight knack for cobbling together crude magical contraptions. Recognizing that talent, the orphanage director arranged this job as he aged out of care—making today the very first day of work Noel had looked forward to for so long. Considering how thrilled the kid must have been, stealing his spot left a mildly bitter aftertaste in my mouth.
"I take it you unpacked at the staff quarters? You'll take your meals at the employee dining hall, and the tools in that back drawer are yours to use."
"Understood, sir. Should I go introduce myself to the others?"
"No need. It's just the two of us."
As I stood up and glanced around the workbench, Walter tossed me an apron that had been hanging on the wall.
"...I look forward to working with you, sir."
I know lean hiring is the trend these days, but isn't a two-man department pushing it a bit far?
"Excuse me, but will the two of us be handling all the students' equipment? The academy looked fairly massive when I walked in."
"Why on earth would those highborn lords entrust their gear to us? Every noble house has its own private workshop."
Ah. Good point.
I should have picked up on that from the sheer extravagance of the carriages rolling through the front gates. With every student hailing from an illustrious pedigree with a silver spoon in their mouth, why would they ever drop off precious equipment at a dingy academy workshop tucked away in a corner?
"The most we ever get are quick mana recharges or emergency maintenance," Walter said. "We handle those as they come. When things are quiet, you can occupy yourself with other tasks. For today, start by taking inventory of the storeroom."
Alright, so there was at least some work. Playing the salary thief and coasting had its appeal, but my mild workaholic tendencies meant I felt far more at ease when I had something productive to do. If I started with menial chores and steadily honed my craft, I'd eventually secure a stable living.
"Hey, Walter! Heard the new hire arrived. The dining hall's short on hands to haul supplies. Mind lending him to us for a bit?"
Reminding myself that even a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, I moved to follow Walter—only for a man in an academy uniform to poke his head through the open doorway.
"What the hell? How am I supposed to train him if you drag him off on his very first day? Send him back by the afternoon; I need to teach him the basics."
"Got it, got it. You're the rookie, right? Leave the apron there and follow me."
"E-Excuse me?"
What in the world is this black company move?
They were making unilateral decisions about my labor without even asking for my input! In utter disbelief, I looked back at Walter, only for the man to casually hold out an access pass.
"Off you go. While you're at it, get used to where the dining hall is. You have to eat there anyway."
...Why was he letting me go so easily?!
"...Workshop Master, do you think it's time I formally transferred departments? The staff at the dining hall and the warehouse greet me like family these days."
"Do they pay better? If so, sign me up too."
"There's no need to go that far, sir. I'd settle for them recognizing three separate department affiliations when paychecks roll around. That's how much work I'm already doing, after all."
"Go take it up with human resources. If you pull it off, put in a good word for me too."
Two and a half months had flown by since my first day.
In that time, between hauling crates in the dining hall, organizing materials in the warehouse, and setting up chairs in the auditorium before major school functions, the only thing I had truly mastered was the sprawling layout of the Imperial Academy.
Enchanting? Don't make me laugh.
Walter handled the sporadic maintenance requests all by himself, and whenever folks from other departments came knocking on our workshop door, they invariably called out for me before Walter. I barely even had time to sit at my workbench. The grand sum of my education consisted of peeking over Walter's shoulder on the rare occasions he recharged mana in a tool during downtime.
"Are there any departments calling for me this afternoon?"
"Not today. Word came in that the last material shipment cleared earlier. Take a breather."
"You should've said so sooner! I was sweating bullets thinking someone was about to drag me away again."
Seeing my relief, Walter let out a dry chuckle and handed me a small pair of tweezers. "If you're so bored, lend me a hand. Just a simple maintenance job—make sure you don't mess up."
"Ooh, did a student drop this off?"
"Student, my foot. It's a private side job I took on."
"Figures. What should I do?"
"Grip the outer rim right here with the tweezers. Gentle, now. Squeeze too hard and you'll warp the frame."
Click, clack...
Following his instructions, I clamped the edge of the magic tool, allowing Walter to extract an internal component using a slender pick. Nestled inside was a transparent Mana Stone no larger than a pinky fingernail. With deft, practiced movements, Walter unscrewed the tiny retaining bracket and slotted in a fresh stone of identical size. Instantly, a brilliant, vivid blue radiance shimmered within—far richer than the dull stone he'd just extracted.
I made sure to burn every movement into memory. Watching someone reassemble a device in reverse made it seem deceptively simple, but the moment you picked up the tools yourself, hesitation always set in over where to even begin.
I spent the remainder of the afternoon watching Walter service the tool.
A few days later.
"Workshop Master, do you have any work today? You've been sitting there doing nothing for a while now."
"I need orders to actually do work. Stop pacing around like a caged animal and sit down." Walter leaned back in his chair, stifled a wide yawn, and gestured toward the barren workbenches.
On days when other departments didn't come hunting for extra labor and the workshop had zero commissions, boredom became an absolute torment. In my past life, I would've glued my eyes to a smartphone, but having nothing to do here except watch people stroll past the window was pure torture.
"Noel, I'm heading out for a bit. Watch the workshop while I'm gone," Walter said, rising from his chair and grabbing his coat from the peg. "Got some personal errands to run, might as well get them done while it's quiet."
"Understood."
"If anyone stops by to drop off equipment, just take it in. I'll handle it when I get back. No one's scheduled for a pickup today, so keep that in mind."
"Got it, sir. And if another department comes looking for me, I can tell them I have to guard the shop, right?"
"Of course. Who's going to watch the place if both of us are out? Use me as your excuse and stay put."
"Have a good trip, sir."
After seeing Walter off, I sank back into the chair, only to realize solitude amplified the boredom tenfold. At least earlier, we'd traded a joke or two. Now there wasn't a single soul to speak to.
Unable to bear the stillness, I retrieved a broom propped in the corner and set to sweeping the floor. I swept out accumulated dust from beneath the workbenches, shifting stools as I went, gathering stray screws and scrap metal fragments that had rolled into the corners. The salvageable bits went onto the workbench, while the rest was swept away with the dirt.
Having started, I wiped down the windowsills and neatly squared the stack of parchment on the reception counter. Under normal circumstances, cleaning was the most tedious chore imaginable, but having any sort of task right now felt like a blessing.
Once a workaholic, always a workaholic. It's a curse.
As I rinsed the rag and gave the reception desk one final polish—
Click, clack. Click, clack.
The crisp cadence of dress shoes echoed down the hallway.
I paid it no mind at first, assuming someone was merely passing by, but my senses sharpened when the footsteps drew closer and halted right outside our door.
Knock, knock.
A polite rap sounded against the wood.
Ah. The dining hall staff must be back to drag me into more manual labor.
They’d had me haul fifty bags of flour weighing at least twenty kilos each just yesterday, and now they were back for more? There had to be a limit to their shamelessness. Fortunately, I had the perfect excuse today: standing guard over the workshop. I fully intended to send whoever it was packing without lifting a finger.
Steeling my resolve, I pulled the door open.
"Excuse me, but the Workshop Master stepped out today, so I have to keep watch over the worksh—huh?"
Huh?
It wasn't the burly crew from the dining hall.
Standing in the doorway was a female student I had never seen before.
"Pardon the intrusion. I came to have a magic tool recharged. This is the Magic Tool Workshop, correct?"