The Nerd Next Door Turned Out To Be The Magic Tower Master - Chapter 87

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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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Episode 87
The topmost floor of the Magic Tower, its very heart.
In a chaotic space scattered with books, parchment, and half-finished scrolls, Kirien sat reviewing a stack of documents piled on one corner of his desk.
He’d spent so much time at the Academy lately that the Tower’s affairs had backed up far more than expected, and even after the banquet ended, he couldn’t rest—he was working like an ox.
How had he, who once led such an idle life, ended up in this predicament?
‘I should palm off the position of Tower Master to Hiltan.’
It was a thought he’d write his resignation letter on the spot for, if Hiltan heard it. Then, abruptly, the door swung open without so much as a knock—bang.
He’d already sensed the approaching magical presence. Kirien fixed the culprit who’d arrived with such convenient timing with an irritated stare.
“My apprentice, how have you been!”
An elderly man in a loose shirt of uncertain origin strutted in with an air of importance.
Only one being could enter and exit the Tower Master’s chambers in such a manner—Kirien’s master, his sole advisor, and the former Tower Master who’d shirked his duties and departed: Pervan Chetwind.
“Does it look like I’m doing well right now?”
His pen snapped in half between his fingers.
Pervan paid him no mind, weaving between the books to sprawl across the sofa with an exasperated sigh.
“Your limbs look fine, so you seem well enough? Now you’re a proper Tower Master indeed!”
“If all that matters is having intact limbs, I’ll hand the position right back to you. You take the Tower Master role again.”
“What, give it then take it back? I’m not so thoughtless an elder as that!”
“You didn’t give it—you foisted it on me.”
Since childhood, Pervan had sung about wanting to retire, and the moment his apprentice came of age, he’d recklessly abandoned his duties and vanished on a journey, leaving behind vicious rumors that the former Tower Master’s throat had been slit and the position stolen. Because Kirien had no interest in gossip and didn’t even bother denying anything, the rumors had snowballed like a gathering clump of snow.
His master’s neck remained perfectly attached, contrary to the sinister whispers, but the rumor had long since spiraled beyond control.
Pervan cleared his throat loudly—”Ahem!”—as if struck by guilt, then deliberately changed the subject.
“I haven’t seen you in ages. Aren’t you going to ask how your master has been?”
“……How was the journey?”
“Wonderful!”
Pervan waxed eloquent about how beautiful the islands he’d visited were, how vast the world turned out to be, what people he’d met, and what feelings he’d experienced.
Yet his apprentice merely read the documents with listless indifference.
Pervan observed his student, who’d shown almost no emotional fluctuation since childhood, in silence.
In his absence, the depth of the boy’s magical power had grown even deeper—now even Pervan couldn’t gauge it.
It was a growth that ought to have filled him with pride, yet instead it only filled him with sorrow.
The genius that had surpassed even Pervan before reaching adulthood had isolated the child. One who could achieve anything was paradoxically denied the experience of yearning for something, or even of dreaming. And so the child had naturally lost interest in the world and in people.
Pervan found himself wishing that someday a great stone would be cast into this lake-like boy—stagnant without rot, dry without withering, merely still—and that a miracle would arrive in the form of someone to disturb it.
Suppressing the pang of pity in his heart, Pervan deliberately raised his voice in exaggerated excitement.
“On the last island, I even met a fateful lover! I’ll introduce you to them soon.”
“No.”
Kirien made no attempt to hide his disgust.
At the blunt rejection, Pervan clicked his tongue in disappointment.
“Poor boy, knowing nothing of love’s splendor!”
Kirien let his master’s reproach wash over him unheeded.
‘Love’—it was a word he’d never had anything to do with and never would, embarrassingly foreign to him.
He didn’t even understand its definition in the first place. He couldn’t believe in something so immaterial.
In books, love was described as something grand that could overturn the course of an entire life. That existence itself could be swayed by a formless emotion struck him as fundamentally absurd.
Yet why did the image of a certain person suddenly come to mind?
Cecilia Webberdin.
She was a truly peculiar woman.
For a Saint, she walked willingly into the tiger’s den; not only did she see through her own identity, but she even knew minor secrets of her body that her own parents didn’t. When he threatened her, she showed no fear whatsoever, and she’d made that strange assertion that even if the whole world terrified her, she would never fear him.
Because his life had always been a succession of tedium, he’d simply left this unexpected, accident-like woman as she was. For one reason alone: a passing curiosity.
Interest, as always, would extinguish like a candle and never reignite. Yet she arrived in his domain without warning, as though she’d been waiting all along. She turned it into chaos. Irreversibly so, perhaps.
She taught him that a room where he was alone was actually quiet; that her breathing drawing near need not be unpleasant.
Moreover, she was the first person he could not fully comprehend. She laughed carelessly one moment, then swallowed a hollow breath in silence the next. He couldn’t fathom what thoughts occupied her as she looked at him, or whether she was drawing closer or pulling away.
Her parting was no different.
When they’d first held hands and drawn close, he’d been surprised by the fact that it wasn’t unpleasant. More than that—it had almost been pleasant.
Then, without warning, she announced the end.
[I think I’ll return to Webberdin now.]
[……What about the Academy?]
[I only enrolled through irregular admission because I had a purpose. I was always planning to attend just one semester anyway, so it’s time to leave.]
[What was your purpose?]
[I came to find something very important, and now I’ve found it.]
Her voice, tinged with resignation, tasted bitter for some reason.
For the first time in his life, he suffered a violent surge of will beyond his control. He wanted to seize her shoulders, shake them, demand answers.
What was she thinking? What was she giving up? If it had anything to do with him, then it couldn’t be allowed.
[‘I’m sorry for the trouble all this time. Well then, take care of yourself.’]
The moment he heard that farewell—one laced with the finality of never seeing each other again—he felt a profound displeasure, though he couldn’t have said why. Something like anger stirred in him.
This person had appeared out of nowhere, turned his quiet, mundane existence into chaos, and now spoke of leaving as though it were their own prerogative.
He couldn’t allow it.
His face darkening, he pulled out fresh paper and a pen. The recipient was the Emperor.
* * *
After returning from the banquet, Cecilia began preparing to leave the Monastery with Nox.
Though it might seem somewhat impulsive, in truth she had ample reason to go home—reasons that had nothing to do with the matter of Kirien.
The Emperor had readily approved her departure and even promised to assign a mage as her aide.
Moreover, she had just received a letter from the Marquess urging her to return, as the Relief Festival was nearly upon them.
With such solid support now secured, she could no longer avoid the greatest problem of all—she had to face the Pope, who had driven Cecilia to her death.
[‘I am waiting for someone who can recognize this diary at a glance.’]
[‘At first, I believed that person was you… but sadly, it was not.’]
The Pope had said he was waiting for someone who could identify the diary. This time, since she couldn’t confirm whether she was truly that person or not, she had kept herself meek—but that too was only a temporary measure.
He would use the Relief Festival as a pretext to summon her to the Temple, and he would try to verify it. If he reached the same conclusion as before, he would threaten her life again.
If she wasn’t going to spend her life fleeing, then whether she chose to go on living or to find a way back, she would have to return to the Temple where the Pope dwelt and settle this matter once and for all.
And so, on the day of her departure from the Monastery:
“Finally heading home! You’re not leaving anything behind, are you?”
Nox’s voice carried a note of excitement at the prospect of returning home.
Cecilia, by contrast, moved with heavy steps.
‘I should have said goodbye to Kirien one last time.’
Such regrets kept surfacing, but she quickly steeled herself against them.
For Kirien’s sake, it was right to leave like this. Even if the scenario she’d imagined at the banquet was wrong, it changed nothing.
If he were a different Kirien from a parallel world, then he wasn’t the person she held in her heart, and there would be no reason to stay by his side. And if he simply hadn’t recovered his memories despite being in his forty-fourth cycle, then given that she would be offered the choice to return to the modern era, she would inevitably choose to go back—so claiming she would remain at his side was itself a deception.
She had simply been avoiding reality because the situation was too overwhelming, because she wanted to see him.
Cecilia, carrying a small travel bag, stepped out of the Mansion. Now she had only to depart with the reinforcements the Emperor had sent.
Several robed mages were already standing beside the carriage. She approached to greet them, but the moment she laid eyes on them, every word of greeting fled her mind.
One of the mages was none other than Kirien.

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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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