The Genius Professor Wants An Easy Life - Chapter 4

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 4
“Ha, what is that? Just a spark of that caliber…?”
The one who’d been sneering fell silent.
As if he’d felt something amiss.
“Why does the flame have a core? Didn’t you draw the Primordial Star?”
A star has a core.
Since I’d drawn a different star, the appearance of its core differed from what came before.
“I attempted to manifest the star in my own way.”
“Ha! What nonsense are you spouting?!”
It wasn’t an exclamation of admiration.
“Modifying 1-Rank Basic Elemental Magic isn’t difficult. But no one attempts such a thing!”
He rebuked me as though I were a fool.
“Because there’s no way to surpass this orthodox star by any method. Countless mages throughout history have tried to create a new Primordial Star, but it’s all been wasted effort…!”
“You talk too much. I’m bored. Shouldn’t we get started soon?”
He wore an irritated expression again.
“Please be careful not to get hurt!!”
Whoosh!
His flame came flying at me.
I shot my own flame forward to meet it.
The size of the fire, its momentum.
There was no comparison on the surface.
At this rate, my flame would be devoured in an instant by his flame and vanish.
But strangely, I felt no concern.
It was an instinctive premonition.
My star couldn’t possibly lose.
Just then, this message came to mind.
<Gambler’s Judgment is manifesting!>
-Winning probability against an upper-rank mage in Flame Magic battle: 100%
An absolute probability that no variable could interfere with.
And at that moment.
The flames collided.
Boom!!!
I saw his eyes widen as if they would tear.
My flame shredded his flame to pieces.
* * *
Hans.
An upper-rank mage who, after graduating from the Four Prestigious Academies, had reached 5-Rank at the age of forty.
But that had been the end of his growth.
Hans knew his own limits well.
That 6-Rank was a height not permitted to him.
There was no discontent.
Even at 5-Rank, he could live receiving the finest treatment anywhere he went.
In that respect, the Eclesia Ducal House was the finest workplace.
A respectable duke, excellent heirs, generous treatment.
If there was but one flaw, it was Ban, the duke’s third child.
‘A worthless one unlike the ducal house’s fine siblings.’
He was no mere failure.
If you gathered all the newspapers that had reported Ban’s misdeeds thus far and stacked them on the floor, they would reach and surpass the ceiling.
Ban was truly the empire’s lowest refuse.
The worst part was that this Ban aspired to be a mage.
‘A mage with Mana Insensitivity.’
No, Mana Insensitivity was manageable enough.
It wasn’t as though he’d chosen to be born with it.
If one didn’t pursue becoming a mage, Mana Insensitivity was barely an impediment at all.
The problem was that Ban didn’t understand his place.
‘Drawing a new Primordial Star to oppose me? Something even 8-Rank Grand Masters wouldn’t dare attempt?’
In truth, drawing a new star that manifested Basic Elemental Magic wasn’t particularly difficult.
It was fundamentally elementary, after all.
Any mage who understood Elemental Attributes could manifest their own star in their own manner.
But it amounted to nothing more than idle play.
No one, not even a Grand Mage, could surpass an established Star Core.
That was why a Star with Elemental Attributes was called the Primordial Star.
‘He dares challenge me with some crude, ad-hoc Star? He doesn’t know his place.’
Hans resolved to give him a thorough beating he’d never forget.
But the moment the two flames collided, Hans’s eyes snapped wide open.
His flame was scattering to pieces.
‘No—how is this possible?!’
What had happened was clear.
The Star Core Hans had constructed was collapsing.
That couldn’t occur unless the opponent’s Star was overwhelmingly more solid.
‘This fool’s Star surpasses the Primordial Star? It’s impossible!!’
Hans stammered.
“I—I think I must have made some mistake.”
“You refuse to accept the result?”
“N-no, that’s not it… please, just one more attempt—”
Huam lifted his chin.
An utterly arrogant gesture.
Combined with features sculpted as if by divine hands, it radiated an overwhelming pressure.
“Fine. I’ll grant you one more chance as a special privilege. But there’s a condition.”
“…What condition?”
“If you lose again, you won’t merely be a demonstration instructor—you’ll be my servant for a month.”
“…Your servant?”
Huam spoke words designed to wound all the deeper.
“It’s not a bad proposal for you, I think. An opportunity to serve someone like me won’t come easily to someone with as miserable a life as yours.”
“Shut your mouth!!”
The curse slipped out before he could stop it, but he had no mind to care.
‘That must have been luck. There’s no way this reckless fool could have conceived a Star that surpasses the Primordial Star…!!’
But.
Whoosh!!
The miracle occurred once more.
…….
Huam smiled at the dumbfounded Hans, mouth agape.
“I look forward to the next month.”
And so Hans became Huam’s servant.
* * *
‘…I didn’t actually need to make him my servant.’
I broke into a cold sweat internally.
My original condition had been “obey my orders for a month without question.”
But the Black Flame Dragon’s Charisma had translated it into something far more extreme.
‘…It doesn’t matter. Without something this severe, he wouldn’t have cooperated easily anyway.’
I cleared my throat.
Hans stood beside me with a look like he’d swallowed something rotten.
It was a type I’d seen often enough back on Earth.
The stubborn sort who refused to acknowledge others easily.
‘I needed a mage I could work with freely to pursue the kind of “study” I had in mind. This works out well.’
I gazed at the mountain of basic magic texts piled before me.
‘When am I supposed to get through all of this?’
By conventional methods, I’d need to spend at least several years buried in these books.
‘I need a shortcut.’
I recalled the nature of Grand Master.
-Intuitively pierce through the essence of magic!
There was a method perfectly suited to this ability.
“From now on, recite the foundational theories corresponding to 1-Rank.”
“…Recite them?”
“Yes. Just summarize the essential points and leave out the rest.”
I couldn’t ignore the existing theory.
My goal was to become an instructor, after all.
I had to understand it whether I accepted it or rejected it.
‘My Grand Master ability should be more than sufficient to absorb the essence just from listening to his summary.’
Hans answered with a snort.
“Understood. I’ll recite whatever you’d like.”
Hans still wouldn’t accept what had happened.
He couldn’t seem to process the very event that had just unfolded.
“…I’ll begin then. First, the section on the properties of star patterns. White Magic encompasses Elemental Attributes, Manipulation Attributes, Summoning Attributes, and Sacred Attributes.”
“Skip the common knowledge.”
I already knew that much from the game settings.
“Each attribute has its own pattern for manifestation through stars, and Elemental Magic fundamentally follows the Seventeen Geometry pattern. If I explain the first pattern….”
I was listening intently when another problem surfaced.
I couldn’t grasp the explanation.
Or rather, it bothered me.
The way it had when I first saw the Primordial Star.
“May I ask something? For the first geometric pattern, the Triangular Convergence — is there a reason the second angle was set at forty-five degrees?”
“That’s the most efficient for mana acceleration….”
“What if you dulled the second angle instead, and made the opposite side proportionally shorter?”
……
Hans fell silent.
It seemed he didn’t follow what I was saying.
“…Never mind. Just continue with the explanation.”
“…The second pattern is….”
The explanation went on, and the discomfort persisted.
I decided to drop it rather than nitpick endlessly.
Instead, I closed my eyes gently.
“The fifth pattern utilizes the rotation of mana. The transformation of mana beginning from the vertex of a five-pointed star….”
In the darkness behind my eyelids,
a star rose into view.
I traced the star as Hans described it.
I wasn’t satisfied.
This time, I drew the star my own way.
First, I warped the star Hans had shown me in various directions.
That was better than before.
But it still wasn’t perfect.
Now I drew the star entirely in my own manner.
‘That’s it.’
A quiet sense of satisfaction washed over me.
“Young Master? What are you doing?”
“Don’t mind me. Just keep reciting.”
“…Understood. After moving mana through the method of coefficient transformation….”
The same cycle repeated.
As I listened to Hans, I sketched and erased stars in my mind over and over.
‘Why have mages all this time been drawing stars so inefficiently?’
I couldn’t fathom it.
‘It would be good to actually implement it.’
Since I’d only sketched it in my imagination, I needed to verify how it would actually manifest.
Fortunately, I had an excellent test subject.
“Now try manifesting a star the way I tell you.”
“…The way you tell me?”
His pride was wounded—his eyebrows twitched.
“Go ahead and draw a star with this pattern.”
“What’s so bizarre about it?”
“Just try it.”
Hans’s expression darkened.
But he’d made a promise, so he followed my instructions without complaint.
And then—
Whoosh!
……
Hans’s face went blank as he beheld the magic he’d manifested.
It was the same expression he’d worn when we’d clashed with my Flame Magic earlier.
A radiant “light” magic unfurled before me.
“What… what is this?”
“I need to get some rest. Hurry along. The next pattern is….”
He laid out each pattern one by one, and as time wore on, Hans’s expression grew increasingly bewildered.
* * *
Huam paced the corridor of the Mansion, his brow furrowed deep in thought.
It was because of something his incompetent son had said not long ago.
—That day, Father, I shall present you with astonishment.
“Ha. The fool.”
A bitter laugh escaped him.
Merely thinking of it set his teeth on edge.
‘That’s enough. This time I’ll strip him of the family name and cast him out for good.’
He should have expelled him long ago.
But clinging to him out of affection despite his hatred, all this time had slipped away.
Then, across the corridor, a familiar face appeared.
It was Hans, the mage privately employed by the ducal house.
“Your Grace, I am honored to meet you.”
“Ah, it’s been a while.”
The Duke’s expression dimmed.
“I hear my son has been troubling you lately. Please accept my apologies.”
Yet Hans’s reaction was peculiar.
“…That is not the case, Your Grace.”
“What do you mean?”
“…If I may be bold, Your Grace, how much do you truly know of your son?”
It was an unexpected question.
“What are you getting at?”
Hans’s response grew stranger still.
His face was full of confusion.
“Perhaps… we have not understood your son properly at all.”

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