How to Survive as the Second Son of a Mage Family - Chapter 43

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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 Noble Family (43)

“Hmm, yes~ It says here too that he’s estimated to be in his late twenties to early thirties. Now I understand why you’re so calm about this, Lucas.”

Narke smiled gently as she flipped through another booklet. Leo, who had been pressing his forehead with dead eyes, only lifted his eyelids to look at me and asked quietly.

“I did hear you say before that there was no need to stop the yellow press… but after seeing today’s article directly, surely you’re not still thinking of using this.”

“That’s exactly what I’m thinking.”

“Haah…”

Leo pressed both hands firmly against his eyes.

It’s amazing how someone who acts like he’ll die if he doesn’t do everything by the book could get along so well with Elias.

Well, in the end, he does have some similarities to Elias.

Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been able to pressure Wittelsbach into getting him fake identity citizenship.

Then Narke, who had been staring at me intently, spoke up.

“Lucas.”

“Mm?”

“You might be a bit tired, but… I think you’ll handle it well. Hang in there.”

Did she use her precognitive ability?

I guess that means the overall flow isn’t too bad.

“Thanks.”

“Hey, it says here that you have social anxiety disorder so you don’t meet with people. If they’re going to report about the same person, shouldn’t they at least get their story straight? What are they even doing?”

Elias giggled again.

I looked at him and smiled along.

“When they come at me like this, it’s actually good for me.”

“How relaxed. Are you enjoying the feeling that everyone except us has become idiots?”

“Well, I can’t say that’s not part of it. They’re screwed both in terms of grasping the truth and in terms of the credibility the public will feel.”

Even if you try to deduce something, the story has to make sense for you to be confident about it.

This is a fight they’re bound to lose because Nicolaus isn’t a real person but a character who was only born in the second half of this year.

“Credibility~ That’s good. It’s already over.”

“Right. People who became interested will look for other gossip magazines that mention my story.”

“If it were me, I’d scrape up everything from the newsstand floor. Honestly, after dealing with the barrier compatibility issue, I was planning to look into where this Nicolaus guy came from.”

“…”

Suddenly my skin feels cold.

I nodded as calmly as possible.

“…Right. I see. But when you see that everything they publish has completely different stories, what would you think?”

“It’d be annoying. So what’s the real story then? Forget it. It’s my fault for trying to look it up here… That’s what I’d think, right?”

Elias shrugged his shoulders.

Right.

Even without the attitude of ‘I must find out the information no matter what,’ it’s the same.

If everything they publish has completely different stories, it becomes an opportunity to recognize that what you’re reading isn’t reliable information but just gossip for entertainment.

Of course, it’s also beneficial if they get their stories straight.

What damage could there be from matching stories when only false information is circulating anyway?

Either way, it’s just gratifying and amusing.

Then Leo frowned at the proliferating false information.

“Wait. Now that I think about it… how did the social anxiety disorder story come up?”

“They got an interview with someone who claimed to be Nicolaus’s childhood friend. Luca, did you read it?”

“Yeah.”

It was an interview with someone from the Papal States.

He claimed he had a friend named Nicolaus when he was young.

He said ‘Nicolaus’ had often performed incomprehensible magic-like feats since childhood, but one day suddenly disappeared and hasn’t shown his face since.

There are cases where magic isn’t inherited but a mage is suddenly born between completely non-magical parents.

He seemed to regard that Nicolaus as such a case.

Of course, that wasn’t me, but it’s a surprisingly elaborate and grateful scenario.

Leo asked with a bewildered expression, pulling down the corners of his mouth.

“What, someone who was friends with Nicolaus?”

“Yeah.”

“…It’s not like there’s only one or two people named Nicolaus in the world…”

Leo muttered with a skeptical face.

I agree.

But from the yellow press’s perspective, that level of fact-checking isn’t important.

They easily believe anything with moderate specificity and an appealing story. The fact that the public doesn’t scrutinize every detail of article authenticity also plays a part.

‘Let me check again at this point.’

First, the proposal.

〈 Chapter 4. Constant Drops Wear Away the Stone (2) 〉

Proposal 3: [Impression] Score 5 Defense (?/N) (152 hours 17 minutes 53 seconds)

* Route 1 — 〈 Chapter 5. Good Things Take Time (1) 〉

* Route 2 — 〈 Chapter 5. Don’t Praise the Day Before Evening Comes 〉

5 point defense.

It means to prevent it from falling below the 4 point range.

In a way, it’s a precarious situation.

Rounded to the third decimal place, it’s exactly 5 points.

Even rounded to the fourth decimal place, it’s 5.002 points.

Still, there’s hope.

The meaning that it becomes harder to raise points gradually is, for example, like this.

Going from stage 1 to stage 2 might need 1,000, but going from stage 2 to stage 3 requires 10,000. Even when the value drops, it doesn’t easily fall to the previous stage.

Lucas Rene Ascanien

Impression: -9.9 (+0.1) [+5.0015129]

‘The last digits dropped from 15131 to 15129 in that short time.’

Still, this level can be seen as fluctuating in place.

In a situation where a nationwide media outlet like Daslotte is attacking me, just like when 3 points rose during the live broadcast, this time too it could drop steadily by 1 point units.

While their reporting is beneficial to me, I have no intention of letting my guard down, so let me calculate thoroughly again.

“What time did today’s Daslotte come out?”

“Six in the morning.”

Leo answered quietly.

Newspaper publication times are 6 AM and 6 PM. Sales increase around these time periods.

Now that it’s past 11:50 PM, I’ve already experienced today’s impression score changes.

It would have repeatedly risen and fallen throughout…

Due to the influence of the live broadcast and Bavaria conference, it has maintained an upward trend so far.

‘The real test starts tomorrow.’

Daslotte is a daily newspaper.

From when they begin reporting in earnest about the speculation that I’ve been involved with seven different people, my impression score will gradually start declining.

To dismiss it as mere fantasy listing, there are too many people who seriously believe yellow journalism.

That’s why they can drive people to death.

Perhaps, depending on the credibility of the content, it won’t be a gradual decline but a sharp one.

“Leo, when are you going to make the threat?”

“I’m planning to convene a meeting tomorrow evening.”

Perhaps overwhelmed by all the headache-inducing matters, Leo answered with his eyes closed, pressing his temples.

“Alright. Thanks in advance.”

“I wish I could do it earlier… but if you really can’t stand it, tell me. I’ll just go back to Bavaria tomorrow morning and tell Mother.”

“Oh ho, so you can skip school like this~”

Elias laughed from the side.

“…! Do you think I’m skipping to go play around like you?!”

“Huh…? This time I was just being envious?! What have my usual behaviors been like for you to immediately react like this~?”

I guess… I have no choice but to accept it that way.

I thought the same as Leo.

“And I wasn’t fooling around! I was out exploring.”

“What kind of exploration takes three whole months?!”

I interrupted Elias and Leo’s argument and shook my head.

“It’s fine. That much time is enough.”

By tomorrow evening… the crazy story about seven affairs will be out there as is.

Anyway, whether this leads to a prolonged battle or not is what matters most.

From the day after tomorrow’s reports onward, stories about me will be cut off. Even if not completely cut off, at least all the overly sensational stories will be removed.

At this point, I need to examine their decisions one by one.

Isn’t the timing of breaking my story a bit inappropriate?

Why did they break this story specifically during the early phase when my approval ratings were rising?

‘Are they idiots?’

They should have waited until I was regarded as a saint that no one suspected, then dropped a proper scandal for maximum impact.

What’s the reason they didn’t patiently wait until I reached my peak?

I leaned back comfortably in my chair and tapped the pen tip against the paper.

Watching the ink seep in made my thoughts feel completely organized.

It’s obvious.

Their goal is to boost immediate sales numbers with provocative comments and photos.

If their purpose had been to socially bury Nicolaus, they wouldn’t have put out this kind of sensationalist “37 Reasons Why He Wears a Mask” nonsense either.

Right now, when interest has exploded due to real-time broadcasting, is the optimal time to boost sales.

‘Here they’ll scratch at an appropriate level to milk some profit, and if my approval ratings rise again later… then they can catch me with something real and bring me down for a second sales opportunity.’

Sorry, but by then I’ll be a student so they won’t be able to do this kind of reporting again.

Anyway, the purpose is clear.

Since there was no lobbying to drive Nicolaus to the edge of a cliff, this fight is manageable.

I just need to enjoy watching the truth get muddied like dirty water, while preventing my impression score from dropping to the 4-point range.

* * *

“Lucas, what are you reading?!”

At 3 PM, Fai climbed onto my shoulder and looked down at the booklet I was holding.

“Trash.”

“How do you read trash? Isn’t that a magazine?”

“No. That’s what it became now.”

I threw the booklet into the school incinerator and turned around to head back to the dormitory.

‘Status window.’

Lucas Rene Ascanien

Impression: -9.9 [+5.0008931]

From 15129 to 8931.

The 10000s had collapsed.

The reason is obvious.

Because there are people who believe Daslotte’s realistically impossible reporting.

Do they really think I have time to meet seven people?

Or do they just believe it because it’s entertaining?

‘Still, losing 6000 is manageable.’

The reporting was more sophisticated than I thought.

Yesterday’s Daslotte cover was just a typical yellow journalism cover, but today’s had my photo as the cover from the start.

They cropped a photo taken from the window during the charity event, zooming in so my eyes were clearly visible.

Due to the editing, angle, and the mask’s contours, I looked extremely villainous. It’s amazing how they picked exactly this photo for the cover.

On top of that, there were three or four fake interviews included.

This was a method they commonly used regardless of the controversy field.

And the most shocking thing was the fabricated photos.

They dressed someone with a similar build to mine to look like Nicolaus and staged plausible situations.

‘You can tell they put some effort into making this.’

Looking at the score changes, the results don’t seem very good compared to the effort they put in.

If they had gotten the reaction they wanted, my impression score would have already dropped to what, 4 points? It would have fallen to the 3-point range.

Of course, it’s not a level to ignore. If I just leave the current trend as is, it will really hit the 4-point range before midnight.

Still…

‘About 3 hours left, I guess.’

The decline will end in 3 hours.

Let me watch how far it falls before then.

I changed clothes and warped to the Bavaria border, got permission, and moved to the Investigation Bureau Office.

Since I happened to meet the chamberlain today and had tea, I could skip school with a reasonably valid excuse.

Looking at the time, it was now around 3:30.

When I found and entered the room number I had received in advance, a detective recognized me and greeted me.

“You’ve arrived.”

“Yes, could I know how far the investigation has progressed?”

“We just finished organizing everything a moment ago.”

He pulled out the paper that had been on the typewriter and bundled it together.

“There wasn’t a single Bavarian. They were all Prussians, commoners, people whose economic situations weren’t very good. All four people mobilized weren’t the type to have much external contact. Naturally, there were no mages.”

“I see.”

“Here, please take a look and let me know if there are any parts that need further investigation.”

“Yes.”

I took the file he handed me.

[Analysis Results of Daslotte Issues 11-14]

Yesterday, I contacted Bavaria to request an investigation into the Daslotte that would be published at dawn today.

To devote an entire day’s worth of pages to content about seven affairs, they would need clear evidence that could capture people’s attention.

But naturally, such evidence couldn’t exist, so they had no choice but to fabricate the evidence themselves.

And indeed, fake interviews and photos were published.

Turning the page, a photo I had seen in Daslotte appeared.

‘Greta Belter.’

It was a photo of the person claiming to be in a romantic relationship with me.

No, to be precise, this person didn’t make the claim herself.

The interview was entirely written by Daslotte’s side, and this person probably only provided the photo.

Next to it were personal details written out: residence, occupation, workplace, family relations, etc.

As far as I know, the period that served as the novel’s setting was a time when such investigations couldn’t be conducted this quickly… but indeed, since this is a world intertwined with magic, it feels like this aspect developed about half a century faster.

‘Fast and good. In the real world’s past, they wouldn’t have been able to find this.’

I closed the file and put it in the envelope he handed me.

“This is sufficient. Thank you.”

“Not at all. Where are you planning to go now?”

I recalled the residence of the person who appeared on the first page and answered.

“I’m thinking of visiting Schlaub first.”

“Then, I’ll inform His Royal Highness the Crown Prince that you moved to the Schlaub region at 3:50.”

“Yes.”

I gave him a brief greeting and left, heading back to school.

I needed to bring Narke.

* * *

“Is Ms. Greta Belter in?”

Together with Narke, I had come to find someone who had apparently been meeting with me for a long time without my knowledge.

Narke, wearing a suspicious white mask, seemed to find this situation amusing and kept snickering.

Though I couldn’t see his expression due to the mask, I could reach that conclusion from his breathing that seemed mixed with laughter.

‘Looking at this guy… he doesn’t seem like a completely normal person either.’

High school students facing college entrance exams are all like that, I suppose.

Of course, this is just a generalization based on my own high school sophomore days.

Anyway, the reason I brought Narke was because I needed his insight ability today.

From now on, I’m going to make the person in the photo tell the truth with their own mouth and guide them to go testify to the investigative authorities.

For that, I need someone who can verify the facts.

I feel a bit like I’m using him… but Narke had said before that he wanted to go to the Restricted Area in disguise like me, so I could bring him along with a clear conscience.

Since Leo skipped school today and went to Bavaria, it was convenient to bring Narke along for business purposes, especially since he hasn’t decided which purification contract to sign yet.

He’s actually here, but that’s the official reason.

Just then, the wooden door rattled.

Creak―

“Who might you be…”

Someone opened the door, then looked at us with wide eyes.

The person I had seen in Daslotte’s photo raised their voice with a bewildered yet excited expression.

“Oh, Count Nicolaus? That’s you, right?!”

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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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