How to Survive as the Second Son of a Mage Family - Chapter 255

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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How to Survive as the Second Son of a Magic Family (255)

 

The Archbishop made a troubled face, then after pondering for a while, opened his mouth.

 

“…Alright. Working in sync, that does sound quite nice.”

 

“That’s a relief.”

 

“That Nicolaus can accomplish anything. It would be better than me running around everywhere alone.”

 

I answered with a smile.

 

“Good. Then we’ll need to make plans together.”

 

“We should. But before that.”

 

He smiled faintly and sat back down on the bed. Then he suddenly grabbed my cheek.

 

“…”

 

I froze momentarily in bewilderment, then narrowed my eyes.

 

People really don’t change. What the hell is he doing all of a sudden? When I made a disgusted expression, he burst into laughter.

 

“I saved you, so you should at least give me this much.”

 

“I could have survived without you, but sure. Whatever.”

 

I answered that way, but the moment he pressed and pulled my cheek with his finger, I didn’t want to indulge him anymore. Is he joking around in this atmosphere?

 

The Archbishop smiled without blinking once as he stared at me intently. The way he tilted his head in that state was eerie.

 

“You’re not as grateful as I expected…”

 

Is he talking about ‘saving me’? My reaction must have been too lukewarm.

 

“I said thank you earlier. Why? Did you want a more intense reaction than this?”

 

I answered indifferently. His finger had now moved up to my eyelid.

 

The Archbishop’s blue eyes visible through the gap between his fingers flashed in the light. His eyes were still looking only at me without a single movement.

 

“Yes.”

 

“…”

 

Of course he would.

 

I tilted my head while looking at him.

 

Perhaps because I didn’t resist at all, he was surprised by my reaction and said with a laugh.

 

“Still, you’re good at keeping promises. I didn’t think you’d actually let me when you said you would.”

 

“Didn’t you know? And you’re not good at keeping promises.”

 

“Why do you think that?”

 

Why do I think that? I wonder if he’s asking sincerely. Based on what I’ve experienced so far, he’s someone who prioritizes his own interests and desires over promises. Even if he doesn’t break every promise, if circumstances change and a promise becomes disadvantageous to him or he thinks there’s nothing to gain from it, there’s a high possibility he’ll change his attitude with a smiling face at any time. That’s the conclusion I’ve reached so far.

 

He has already failed to keep promises with the Pleroma world.

 

Whose head could possibly come up with the idea of taking Nicolaus to the Pleroma world to play together? What can you expect from someone who breaks the rules that exist in a community as he pleases and puts the ‘it’s okay as long as we don’t get caught’ mindset into action?

 

‘If I thought he was a guy with his head screwed on straight, I would have called my friends to beat him up together when he first drugged and summoned me.’

 

That day when he took the love potion and screamed on the rooftop of the Wittelsbach Estate. I faced him alone based on the conclusion that he would flee the moment I called my friends, and haven’t I been continuing this situation ever since?

 

I thought this then too, but if I had called my friends, he would have fled in an instant since pride and everything else doesn’t matter to him, only practical benefits. Since he’s someone who can’t be interpreted by our common sense in the first place, he wouldn’t consider running away as something that hurts his pride. Rather, I think he’d accept it positively, thinking of it as taking one step back for two steps forward. As you can tell from his track record so far, he’s someone with extreme narcissism, so I have to make assumptions accordingly.

 

However, regardless of his tendencies, didn’t he keep his promise now? At least superficially.

 

So now it’s my turn to respond to his performance.

 

Conveniently, I no longer needed to voluntarily do actions that would please him. He opened the drawer beside the bed and took out a medicine bottle. The 10-stage emotion manipulation drug was inside the drawer.

 

‘As expected.’

 

I definitely thought of this possibility earlier, and it doesn’t deviate from my expectations.

 

“Drink it.”

 

“Isn’t this already enough? You don’t trust my emotions, I see.”

 

“I want a bit more. Ah, now that I say it, it might look a bit suspicious. I’ll drink some too.”

 

“No? Absolutely don’t do that.”

 

He’s already crazy with emotions and wants to drink more here? It’s just ridiculous that he’s saying this as if he’s being considerate of me.

 

I snatched the bottle from his hand and blew divine power into it. There was no particular adverse reaction, so I drank it all at once.

 

I could feel that the guy in front of me was expecting a lot. He just smiled and did nothing, only looking at me. I thought about just pushing him aside and going out to look at the servants outside, but thinking what crime those servants had committed, I turned my eyes toward the person in front of me.

 

The emotions and thoughts seething in those blue eyes were of a kind I didn’t have toward him. I felt nauseous for a moment.

 

That discomfort was quickly washed away. Now the person in front of me was just a young Human looking at me with clear eyes and smiling gently.

 

“…”

 

His pink cheeks weren’t particularly bewildering anymore. I felt like I could go along with the emotions in his eyes and the many plans he wanted.

 

Of course, rationally it’s nonsense, but anyway, this was the effect of the drug.

 

Normally the effect should appear much more powerfully than this. But for me, this is about the best it can do, so there’s nothing I can do about it.

 

He clasped my hand, interlocking our fingers, and smiled brightly.

 

“We’ll really be able to do so many things.”

 

“Suddenly?”

 

“You have to express things when you think of them. We might not have much time to be together.”

 

“Many things, for example?”

 

“Like making the Empire our sphere of influence.”

 

“…”

 

“I’m joking.”

 

If it were someone else’s words, I would have dismissed it as nonsense, but I absolutely couldn’t do that with this person.

 

When I gave a cold look instead of an answer, he waved his hand.

 

“I said I’m joking. You’re already having a tremendous influence on the Empire anyway. And I’ll listen to your opinion on whatever happens.”

 

“Look. I never said I’d continue moving with you after this incident.”

 

He just smiled and nodded regardless of what I said.

 

He patted my shoulder.

 

“Rest a bit more. Don’t think about moving right away.”

 

“…”

 

“Plans can come later. You said one day here is two hours outside. This place has the most severe distortion among the existing Pleroma coordinate systems. Other places… to give an example of the coordinate system where the Leadership is, that place flows at exactly the same rate as time in your world. You know why, right?”

 

I know. The moment a coordinate system can’t withstand external pressure and collapses, everything inside it will turn to smoke. Since the Leadership is the core of this organization, it would be in a position where it won’t be easily attacked, and they have no choice but to pay special attention to distortion.

 

Anyway, other places aren’t distorted as severely as this.

 

“Even if you just sleep for 24 hours here, only two hours would have passed not only in your world but also in most of the Pleroma world. Since the distortion here is getting bigger, it might even be 1 hour and 30 minutes.”

 

“Hmm…”

 

“Even if you stay for a week, only 14 hours pass outside. I wanted to say that nothing goes wrong if you recover here for a few days. Plans can be made after you recover your strength.”

 

“…”

 

“Is it because you want to go back? If you don’t want to become a scapegoat for the Imperial Government, you shouldn’t return early.”

 

That’s a valid point.

 

Until I came here, the terrorist incident hadn’t been revealed to the public, but experts must have known its true nature, so by now there must be a flood of questions about that cross terrorism.

 

If I return immediately, the government that succeeded in deceiving people’s eyes until the opening might try to evade responsibility for the terrorism without knowing their place.

 

In this case, starting from how I ‘coincidentally’ knew the dismantling solution to how I easily returned without incident, there’s room to frame me as someone in cahoots with Pleroma.

 

For example, ‘Lucas Ascanien orchestrated terrorism to build grand achievements.’ It sounds absurd, but considering that I have the very useful stigma of Pleroma attached to me, the situation changes. Thinking that all politicians are sensible professionals who prioritize citizens above all else is not a very sensible thought. What can’t those who even brought in a choir to hide terrorism do? This isn’t impossible.

 

Lucas Ascanien was actually a real Pleroma, he tried to hide his identity and gain recognition from the Imperial Court, while simultaneously trying to heighten fear of Pleroma to throw the nation into chaos and achieve the side effect of lowering the Empire’s prestige – that’s how the Imperial Court and government spokesmen would speak about me and the terrorism. The Imperial Court would just be a victim who was deceived.

 

However, if the second son of the Anhalt ruling family and an Imperial Court mage disappears during the opening and doesn’t appear for days, the story changes.

 

In this case too, they could frame Pleroma and me as having orchestrated terrorism together, but it would be more difficult than the above case.

 

Because there’s a crucial problem.

 

If it was terrorism orchestrated for achievements, why doesn’t Ascanien, who was clearly captured by Pleroma, reappear?

 

They could blindly insist he’s hiding somewhere, but in this case, there’s time left to use Bavaria’s power to make citizens recognize that I’m a victim of this incident.

 

At least this way is much more advantageous than returning immediately.

 

I nodded for now. There wasn’t much to argue about in what this Archbishop just said.

 

Due to the political external situation, the later I return, the more advantageous it is for me. What’s a week here? I should let about a week pass in outside time.

 

Of course, I have no intention of staying with this guy for that long.

 

More than that…

 

“If we’re leaving now, why did you tell me to drink this?”

 

I asked while shaking the empty medicine bottle. He just smiled brightly.

 

Then he got up from his seat.

 

“We should quickly make plans to deal with that Bishop. I’ll go outside to check the situation and bring back information useful for planning. Rest and recover in the meantime.”

 

Instead of answering, I looked at him with an incredulous expression.

 

“It’ll take a while. Make yourself comfortable.”

 

He lightly hugged me in farewell and swiftly went outside without lingering.

 

If the drug effect had worked properly, I would have caught him, but perhaps because my physical condition wasn’t particularly good right now, I was only grateful that he left without being troublesome.

 

And indeed, it was right that I lacked stamina.

 

As soon as he left, I collapsed again and slept until night fell before opening my eyes.

 

According to what I verified by checking the status window, the Archbishop’s words were correct.

 

While 8 hours passed in this place, outside—that is, according to the status window’s time—only 40 minutes had barely passed.

 

‘Hmm.’

 

Then based on the coordinate system where the Leadership is located, it’s only been about 40 minutes since that Archbishop bastard left.

 

Really, ‘by my standards,’ there was no way he would return early.

 

I need his information to easily decide my next actions, but this makes my schedule float around.

 

“…”

 

I repeatedly closed and opened my eyes while feeling the night breeze blowing from the balcony on the left side of the bed.

 

‘Time with nothing to do.’

 

No, I could create things to do. Like taking a walk or studying magic formulas.

 

To express it accurately, it’s time when I don’t need to do anything.

 

No one expects anything from me, and there’s nothing I must protect.

 

The bastard who expects something is currently out, so excluding him from consideration, that’s how it is.

 

Though it’s not exactly comfortable due to this being the Archbishop’s mansion and the events scheduled next, the fact that no burden was currently loaded on my shoulders felt unfamiliar.

 

‘How long has it been.’

 

When I finish everything and return, I wonder if I’ll be able to feel this emotion when resting with my friends too.

 

Anyway, I recovered well.

 

Perhaps because I slept sufficiently, Leo’s mana surrounding my core had mostly healed my stamina that was completely drained during the match. Then there’s no need to waste more time dawdling around. Resting more when there are still things to resolve would be a luxury.

 

I need to gather as much information as possible, whether by talking with the servants or touring the manor. No matter what, this place can’t be called allied territory, so the more information the better.

 

‘Come to think of it, when will the Chapter 6 special reward appear.’

 

It’s still not time to use it, so I’m curious how much it’s trying to help me.

 

Ding—!

 

【 Chapter 7. Truly, truly I say to you… 】

 

Suggestion 1: Talk with ‘Lu Bar’ (0/?) (59 minutes 59 seconds)

 

* Route 1 — 【 Suggestion 2 】

 

* Route 2 — 【 Suggestion 2 】

 

‘What’s this.’

 

Just as I thought about the status window, this appeared. However, it’s not a special reward but a suggestion that appeared.

 

‘Lu Bar.’

 

What topic am I supposed to discuss?

 

It’s a bit bewildering, but it’s a suggestion that won’t cause major problems to the ending even if I don’t do it.

 

Let me think about the chapter titles that appeared in Route 2 so far. When not accepting suggestions would lead to bad results, the chapter would shift to the negative side entirely, but this time both routes head to 【 Suggestion 2 】.

 

Of course, there must be a clear reason why it was presented as a suggestion nonetheless.

 

Knock knock—

 

Someone knocked on the door.

 

When I simply answered to come in, the servant I saw earlier opened the door and said.

 

“You’re awake. I’ll prepare bath water for you.”

 

“Yes.”

 

After saying this, he disappeared somewhere without a trace. Only about 20 minutes later did another servant call me and guide me to the bathroom.

 

I checked that no magic formulas were cast on the water, quickly finished bathing, and even completed my meal.

 

All of this took less than an hour.

 

‘Definitely.’

 

It doesn’t seem like a place where people live.

 

In the restaurant, I thought while casting purification magic three times on the grapes that came out for dessert.

 

From the room I was in to this restaurant, all the furniture showed no signs of use. Not just the furniture. The cutlery I just used had no scratches whatsoever. As if I was the first to use it.

 

I don’t know about the servants’ things, but it’s clear that the Archbishop bastard doesn’t often spend time in his status as Archbishop of Freiburg. Or he has other living quarters.

 

He also kept only the minimum number of servants.

 

I got annoyed while casting purification magic, so I pushed the dessert aside and rang the bell. A servant who was waiting outside the room approached me. I spoke quickly before he could open his mouth.

 

“Does the owner of this manor actually live here?”

 

“Well, yes…? Though he’s often away due to busy work.”

 

“How many libraries are there in this manor?”

 

“I believe there’s one underground.”

 

I asked again about his vague expression.

 

“You believe?”

 

“We can’t enter the underground level, so we don’t know well. That place is a space used only by Master.”

 

The reason I specifically asked about the library was that it’s a good space to obtain information about the library’s owner.

 

Unless one is a scholar, it would sound somewhat rude to open not a study but a library to unfamiliar guests.

 

While he was answering, I opened the status window to check the name.

 

Kerstin Becker. This person is not ‘Lu Bar.’

 

I nodded and stepped back for now.

 

“I see. That’s unfortunate. I’d like to tour the manor a bit, could you guide me?”

 

“Ah, you want to tour it.”

 

Even though I hadn’t said I’d enter the underground level, he made a slightly troubled face, then told me to wait a moment and went outside.

 

Naturally, he didn’t seem to have the authority to let outsiders freely roam the manor.

 

After a while, this time not a servant but the attendant I saw earlier approached me.

 

“I heard you said you wanted to look around the manor. I’ll guide you.”

 

I stared at him intently then got up from my seat.

 

‘Hmm.’

 

Meeting ‘Lu Bar’ wasn’t very difficult. This person is ‘Lu Bar.’

 

To meet the human the system designated right here.

 

I didn’t know because I was so flustered, but now I see he’s speaking a mix of Low German and High German.

 

Like that, we toured the surface level of the manor for about 30 minutes.

 

‘There are no particularly locked rooms.’

 

There was nothing special. It was natural since they said the owner of this house only uses the underground level anyway.

 

Since I also met the person the system designated, I definitely need to make my move now.

 

“Could you guide me to the library?”

 

“…”

 

He looked at me silently.

 

Then he gestured with his eyes to follow and turned around.

 

“You’re guiding me more readily than I thought.”

 

“It’s fine since you’re the one who will become Master’s husband.”

 

“…”

 

I briefly pondered what I had just heard.

 

However, due to hearing such a shocking word, I didn’t have confidence to think any further myself. I stopped right there and asked seriously.

 

“Who?”

 

The attendant looked back at me with eyes that said he’d seen all kinds of strange bastards.

 

Then he pointed to the ring on my hand.

 

“His Excellency.”

 

“…”

 

I looked down at the ring and nodded. I suddenly felt dizzy and almost collapsed on the spot, but fortunately didn’t.

 

I’m the crazy one for asking who. In this era, it would be stranger to see this and still consider us an unengaged relationship.

 

Come to think of it, when I first came to the Archbishop’s mansion, I do remember hearing nonsense about how this manor would soon become my home.

 

Setting aside that it would absolutely never happen even if I died and came back to life, anyway…

 

‘…That’s how it’s being perceived.’

 

It’s not something that newly started today, but it’s newly shocking and gives me a headache.

 

But if that’s how it’s being perceived, in some ways it’s not a bad thing.

 

At least in terms of information gathering.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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