#33
As Noah spoke the spell, he tightly shut his eyes. Whether Aeongi would be expelled alone or Noah would be expelled along with him, everything was in God’s hands now.
With his eyes closed, Noah was waiting for the Dean’s words when, after a continued silence, he slightly opened one eye before quickly shutting it again.
Huh?
Aeongi should have been visible. But what Noah just saw was the Dean, not Aeongi. This time, he carefully opened both eyes slowly.
“Hmm.”
The Dean was stroking his long beard and clearly looking at something. The only thing for him to see was Aeongi, but where had Aeongi gone?
“Eh?”
Our Aeongi.
Where did our Aeongi, who grows to the size of a cow when fully grown, go, and why is there something only the size of a pig? Seeing Aeongi, who had been as small as a puppy, now transformed to an intermediate size, Noah’s gaze naturally turned to Raymond standing beside him.
“Children certainly see small things as larger. And even if what I saw was small, it’s easy to think something is big when many people say it is.”
Raymond, who had confidently spoken to the Dean as if asking what the problem was, extended his hand toward Aeongi, who was now displaying a size that didn’t violate the standards set by school rules, while wearing a gentle smile.
“Grrr!”
Aeongi, who had been sitting quietly with his rear end firmly planted on the ground while staring at the distant window, suddenly snarled, making Noah flinch involuntarily. Raymond’s hand, which had been about to pat Aeongi approvingly, remained awkwardly suspended in the air without touching Aeongi’s body.
“The temperament…”
“Our Aeongi is hungry, aren’t you? I’m sorry I didn’t give you a snack after breakfast.”
Cutting off the Dean, who was about to say something negative about Aeongi’s clearly unfriendly temperament, Noah quickly wrapped his arms around Aeongi’s neck and hugged him.
Though Aeongi rarely showed his teeth or appeared threatening, he absolutely hated being touched by others.
Only Noah could ride him when his legs hurt, touch his ears when bored, or randomly ruffle his fur when restless. Even if Noah forcibly opened Aeongi’s tightly closed mouth or stuck his head inside when Aeongi was yawning, Aeongi just accepted it.
Despite living together for years at Schwein Castle, the only people who could actually touch Aeongi were Lucas, Loren, and Elisa. Even then, they couldn’t handle him like Noah did. They could only pick up a shrunk-down Aeongi to move him, or unavoidably touch him when trying to put Noah to bed while he was sleeping pressed against Aeongi.
For Raymond to try touching Aeongi was preposterous. Moreover, Aeongi and Raymond knew exactly who each other was.
In Raymond’s case, he was probably trying to pet Aeongi to represent both Aeongi and Noah, implying Aeongi was gentle and kind, but Aeongi, who clearly disliked this situation, would never willingly surrender himself to Raymond’s hand.
“Aeongi gets like this when he’s hungry. It’s because he’s hungry.”
While saying this nonsensical excuse, Noah quickly rummaged through his pocket with one hand. At some point, Noah had started always carrying a few pieces of cookies with him. At first, he wrapped them in a white handkerchief, but after seeing this, one of the servants made a special cookie pouch for Noah.
From then on, whenever he went out, he always put a few cookies in the pouch, which was always kept in the left pocket of his jacket.
“Aeongi is really well-behaved.”
In his urgency, Noah opened Aeongi’s mouth and inserted a cookie. Seeing that the cookie he had hastily put into Aeongi’s mouth was a chocolate one, Noah quickly shoved the remaining cookies into Aeongi’s mouth as well.
Noah kissed Aeongi’s cheek, who was still looking disgruntled with half-open eyes, apparently unhappy about being forcibly awakened, then smiled brightly at the Dean.
“Since you haven’t violated school rules, and you’re still adjusting to the academy, I’ll let it go this time. But if the animal you bring next time startles or threatens other students, we’ll have to send it back.”
Only after hearing a few more precautions did Noah exit the Dean’s office, looking up at Raymond standing beside him. He couldn’t readily think of how to express his gratitude for defending him and even using magic to adjust Aeongi’s size without the Dean noticing.
“Remona hyung.”
Although he could now correctly call him Raymond, Noah softly used the name he had always called him.
“Yes, baby.”
“Thank you.”
He wanted to give Raymond cookies to show his gratitude, but since all the cookies had already gone into Aeongi’s mouth, he had nothing to offer. Instead, Noah made the first move and took Raymond’s large hand. Unlike Lucas’s hand with its calluses, Raymond’s hand was remarkably soft.
“I’m your guardian at the academy, after all.”
Noah and Raymond looked at each other, smiling brightly and taking turns saying pleasant things to each other.
“Nyaaaaaooow.”
Their footsteps stopped as they walked side by side down the long corridor, swinging their clasped hands. Aeongi, who had maintained the size of a pig until just now, had somehow returned to his original form and wedged himself between the two of them.
Having accidentally let go of Raymond’s hand because Aeongi had forced his way between them, Noah reached out to take his hand again.
“Huh?”
Just as he was about to grasp that warm hand again, Noah uttered only a small sound before disappearing from in front of Raymond.
And a small sigh escaped from Raymond’s lips as he was left alone in the long corridor.
The Great Mage Chris was famous for being eccentric.
As with all human affairs, factions existed everywhere, and even within a single class at the academy, several groups formed. These groups sometimes opposed each other, sometimes united, and sometimes remained indifferent to one another.
In any case, humans, being social animals, lived by forming relationships with others, but Chris was not that kind of person.
To Raymond, Chris was both a mentor and family.
Where there is light, there is darkness. The place where Raymond grew up was the slum outside the city walls, where the empire’s laws barely reached.
He couldn’t even remember his parents, and the deepest memory in Raymond’s mind was hunger. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say he lived by begging every day. At some point, Raymond became a pickpocket, entering the city daily to steal from those who looked like travelers.
But even the money he stole didn’t all become his. If he stole 10 silvers, he would only get to keep 1 silver at most. In a place with no one to rely on, no one to help, and no one he could call a friend, what protected Raymond was magic.
He didn’t know what magic was, nor what mana was.
With nothing to play with, he played with what was inside him. He created fire with his left hand and water with his right. He mixed them and sometimes let the wind carry them away.
Raymond and Chris’s fateful encounter happened because of pickpocketing. That day too, he was wandering inside the city, and two wealthy-looking travelers had money pouches attached to their waists. What a grateful day. Literally, whoever took it first owned it.
Just as he excitedly snatched the money pouch, Raymond was grabbed by the neck and lifted into the air by the traveler.
And that traveler was Chris.
‘What’s this? Interesting.’
Those were the first words Chris said to him. He didn’t turn Raymond over to the patrol, nor did he demand the stolen money pouch back.
‘Hang in there. If you endure, I’ll let you live.’
The man with silver-white hair and gray eyes smiled, and at the same time, Raymond fainted. When he opened his eyes, he was on a bed in a luxurious inn. Raymond fainted every time Chris touched him, and after several repetitions, Chris determined his life with a single question.
‘Do you want to go back to the streets? Or enter the Magic Tower?’
That’s how Raymond entered the academy with Chris’s sponsorship, and only then did he learn that Chris was the Imperial Tower Master. And although he became a sponsor, Chris didn’t take particularly good care of him.
He only paid for his tuition and occasionally summoned him to the Magic Tower to show him magic.
‘Try it.’
He would show magic once and tell him to try it. He didn’t teach him formulas, nor was it what Raymond learned in the magic department. From the day he saw the magic, Raymond spent countless nights studying. He searched through books and tried it himself.
Sometimes it took days, sometimes months. When he proudly stood before Chris after figuring out the secret of the magic on his own, instead of praise, Chris would only show him another magic spell.
And so he lived, immersed in magic like a madman.
Unlike others, his skills improved rapidly, and before he knew it, Raymond became a scholarship student and started receiving a salary as a student affiliated with the Magic Tower.
Having gone from being cursed at on the streets to becoming a member of the Magic Tower—a dream for any magician—Raymond confidently sought out Chris.
Honestly, he thought Chris might praise him at least once by now. He also thought it was a way to repay the man who had taken him in.
But Chris didn’t even show him the slightest smile.
The person Chris showed interest in, despite being so cold to Raymond, was a little boy Raymond had also met.
Grand Duke of the North, Lucas Schwein.
Noah, the only son of Lucas, who was one of the empire’s top swordsmen and the owner of vast territories.
Raymond couldn’t understand why Chris was beside Noah, who was born with everything, who would be served by everyone until his death, who lived a certain life envied by all.
Chris, who had never shown any interest in Raymond, mysteriously doted only on that child, and Raymond began to wonder why.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
