The Cursed You
There is a concept known as a doll.
They are magical lifeforms created to assist humans with domestic chores, possessing flawless homemaking skills.
At least, that was my understanding of dolls until now.
"I—I'm a doll?"
"Yeah."
The kid in front of me gave a half-hearted reply.
My insides were practically burning with anxiety, yet he was acting incredibly arrogant.
He looked exactly like the bastard who used to rank second right beneath me.
The kid let out a heavy sigh at my reaction.
"What kind of defective product is this...?"
"What? Did you just call me defective?"
Now that was something I absolutely could not let slide!
I promptly hoisted one of my legs onto the table in front of me, striking a dramatic pose.
"If you must know, I am the world's strongest mage! Lee Eun... wait, what was my name again?"
"Lee Eun-ha. That's what it said in the catalog."
"No, it definitely wasn't a name like that."
My name was undeniably masculine. It wasn't some feminine-sounding name like 'Eun-ha.'
I remembered all my magic. I remembered exactly what kind of life I had lived.
But my name... that was the one thing I couldn't recall.
The new name, 'Lee Eun-ha,' had completely usurped the place where my real name should have been.
A sharp, irritating sensation prickled at the edge of my consciousness.
I quickly channeled my mana to run a diagnostic on my body. For a genius mage like me, a simple self-check didn't even require casting a magic circle.
...And there it was. I found the culprit.
A contract magic, huh?
A powerful contract magic was firmly rooted inside my mind.
So that was it. The raw material for a 'doll' was a human. They took the brains of the deceased and applied magic to them to substitute for artificial intelligence.
But I was the strongest mage, the strongest hunter... or at least, the man who used to be.
Even if I couldn't completely break free from the contract magic's influence, I had bypassed it to some extent. That was why I was able to retain my sense of self like this.
Though I had lost my name and gained memories of domestic chores—something I had never had any association with in my entire life—my memories of magic remained perfectly intact.
In other words, this body was still the strongest!
"Get down."
"Ah. Yes, sir."
...Wait, why did I just obey his command?
Well, putting my foot on the table was bad manners anyway.
I only did it to strike a cool pose for a second. It's not like I actually wanted to keep my foot up there forever!
"You're a doll now," he said.
"They just locked my memories with contract magic, you jerk," I grumbled.
At the very least, I remembered up to my final moments.
"I distinctly remember agreeing to organ donation, though."
"Organ donation?"
The kid's eyes twitched.
It seemed the phrase 'organ donation' had triggered something in his mind.
"Lee Eun-sung?"
"...That sounds familiar."
It was a familiar name, yet it felt distant. It didn't quite feel like my own name anymore, if that made sense.
And yet, there was an undeniable resonance to the name Lee Eun-sung.
"Awakened as a mage at seventeen?"
"Exactly!"
"Became the youngest to reach the 9th Circle at twenty-one, and mastered it by twenty-five?"
"Impressive, right? That's me."
For the record, before I mastered the 9th Circle, the only other 9th Circle Master in existence was a seventy-year-old grandmother.
She might have been my senior in the industry, but my talent was overwhelmingly superior.
The kid muttered in sheer disbelief.
"...Are you really Lee Eun-sung?"
"You seem to know a lot about me."
The achievements matched perfectly.
This strange sense of detachment from my own name was likely a side effect of the contract magic. Strangely enough, the new name 'Lee Eun-ha' felt more natural, as if it suited me better now.
Well, a genius like me can just claim both names.
Lee Eun-sung is me, and Lee Eun-ha is also me.
Simple as that, right?
"So, kid. Who are you?"
"I'm..."
The kid hesitated, clicked his tongue, and finally spoke.
"I'm Han Sung-jun. Not sure if you'll remember me."
"Ah. The Sword Idiot."
"I am not a Sword Idiot!"
If you can match magic with just a single sword, you deserve to be called a Sword Idiot, don't you?
That was the logic behind the nickname I gave him, but he clearly didn't appreciate it.
By the way... why does he look like this?
"Did you die too?"
"I'm not dead. And I didn't donate my organs like you did. You were all over the news after you died, you know."
"Oh, really? How many lives did I save?"
My brain might have ended up here, but my other organs must have saved people, right?
That was the whole reason I agreed to donate them in the first place.
"...Well, last I checked, the lives you saved numbered over fifty."
"Then that's enough."
I wasn't thrilled that they used my donated brain to make a doll, but saving fifty lives made it worth it.
It was far better than rotting away in the dirt if it meant saving even one more person.
"So, why are you in that pathetic state?"
"It's a curse. From the Demon King."
"The Demon King?"
That used to be one of my nicknames.
Short for the King of Magic, the Demon King. It was one of my personal favorites.
"Not your nickname. It's a new guy who showed up after you died. He's currently ranked second."
"Wow, Han Sung-jun, you've really fallen. You even let someone take your second-place spot."
"I was ranked first."
"Oh."
So he actually made it to number one once I was gone?
Well, he was a guy who could achieve with a single sword what took me dozens or hundreds of spells to pull off. It wasn't that surprising.
See? 'Sword Idiot' was the perfect nickname. Who else could perform such miracles with a mere sword?
No one but him could ever pull that off.
"A curse that makes your body younger? Isn't that more like a blessing?"
"It's not that convenient."
Han Sung-jun let out another deep sigh.
"It's Level Drain."
"Ah. That's brutal."
Curses of the Level Drain variety had a very straightforward cure, but any other method of dispelling them was practically useless.
The standard way to break it was to simply re-earn the lost levels through training and combat. Since Level Drain was technically a temporary affliction, and one's combat experience didn't just vanish with the levels, clawing one's way back up was supposedly quite easy.
However, because the standard cure was so absolute, it came with a fatal catch: no other dispelling magic could restore the stolen levels. And even if you did break it the proper way, it wasn't as if your lost levels were instantly handed back to you on a silver platter.
"Is it the type that regresses your physical age?"
"I didn't get younger. I just shrank."
Come to think of it, he was right.
His voice was still a deep, resonant baritone, just like a man in his twenties. Given his current appearance, you'd expect a high-pitched, bird-like voice that could rival a girl's. The contrast created a rather bizarre, mismatched impression, but since I was already used to his voice, I didn't mind. In fact, it would have been weirder if he actually sounded like a kid.
"Well, fine. But didn't you have a doll before?"
"I didn't need one. I took care of everything myself until now."
"Pfft. So you shrank and realized you needed a nanny?"
"...Something like that."
Sung-jun sighed heavily.
Some people just found it more comfortable to handle everything on their own. Personally, I used to employ dolls because I considered chores like cleaning to be a waste of my precious time.
Though my old dolls had probably been scrapped by now.
"I plan to focus entirely on training."
There were two ways for an Awakened to raise their level: training and real combat.
Neither was easy once you reached a certain height. While real combat raised levels much faster than training, it naturally required risking one's life. Sung-jun would likely train to regain a baseline of strength before throwing himself back into the fray.
"I bought a doll just so I could lose myself in training... I never expected it to be Lee Eun-sung."
"Heh. I didn't expect to resurrect like this either. I thought I'd completely perished along with that dragon."
Even though my original body had been divided and scattered all over the place...
At least the most important part, my brain, survived.
And besides, it was my own choice.
"Alright. Let's make a contract."
"A contract?"
"I'll give you your freedom."
Freedom.
That meant he would release the contract magic currently binding my brain.
I had never paid much attention to the contract magic used on dolls, but this was a Geas.
No matter how unprecedented of a genius mage I was, I couldn't simply crush an already established Geas contract. I could bypass it with some cheap tricks, but...
Either way, his offer meant he would officially terminate that contract.
Sung-jun began scribbling characters onto a sheet of paper.
Befitting hands that drew clean, precise sword paths, his handwriting was perfectly neat. It was a stark contrast to my own chicken scratch, which looked like crawling earthworms.
1. Teach Han Sung-jun magic.
2. Assist Han Sung-jun with all your heart (domestic chores).
3. Upon dispelling the curse, the contract with Lee Eun-ha shall be terminated.
"First, you will teach me magic."
"Do you even have talent for magic?"
If he did, he wouldn't have relied solely on his sword, right?
"If I simply can't keep up due to a lack of talent, that's fine," he said.
"Hmm. Okay."
Well, I doubted this guy would ever master magic, but teaching him wasn't a bad idea.
It brought back old memories.
"Second, you will assist me with all your heart. I bought a doll to handle the housework, after all."
"I'm not entirely thrilled about that... but fine."
My personal assets had likely been returned to society after my death, and high-end dolls cost an astronomical amount.
I didn't have the money to pay him back right now. In that case, paying him back with labor was my only option.
"Third, once this curse is dispelled, the contract with Lee Eun-ha will be terminated."
Below the terms, he drew spaces for our names and signatures, then signed his own.
Hmm. That wasn't ordinary paper.
"A Geas Scroll."
"Contracts must be absolute. That was your favorite saying, wasn't it?"
"You're right."
A Geas was a contract bound to the soul, completely immune to outside interference.
As long as neither party intended to break it, there was no better method of agreement than a Geas.
"Sign it."
"Fine."
I signed the scroll as well.
The moment our signatures were complete, the scroll erupted in blue flames, burning down to a pile of ash. It was proof that the Geas had been successfully established.
"Good."
A Geas Scroll couldn't be kept as a physical object. Since the contract was already bound to my soul, I could check its contents whenever I wanted.
"I'll be in your care from now on."
"Hmph. Just make sure you can keep up with my genius."
I was brimming with confidence.
Back when I was active, I had given magic lectures on numerous occasions.
Granted, they were all such blockheads that none of them could truly claim to have 'learned' anything from me, but still.
"In that case, make me some food."
"...What?"
"Food. Kimchi fried rice."
"No, wait. Make it yourself!"
Am I a maid or something?
"It's in the contract."
...I could probably find a loophole to bypass it, but showing my hand this early wouldn't be wise.