‘Ell!, he’s sturdy for a scholar.’ Verd tried to pull the light blue-haired man down to his eye level but failed spectacularly. The tall man didn’t even budge. Even though Verd was a Grand Mage, he had above-average physical stats for a mage so he was surprised the scholar-looking man didn’t so much as flinch.

It hadn’t been easy asking out his colleague on the pretence of recommending her a spell. It was common sense that mages don’t poke their mental senses around in the Mage Association as a basic courtesy. The ignorant creep who had his mental energy poking about was a great opportunity for him to show off. It was even better that his colleague sensed it and looked uncomfortable.

Verd sized up the tall man. Staring at the request board like some poor bloke looking for a job and dressed like a scholar with barely detectable mana leakage. Verd smiled internally at the good target who’ll make him look better.

Unexpectedly, the tall man fanned the flames but adding to his already rude behaviour with a single “And?”

After Verd pulled on the disrespectful man’s collar, he finally caught the man’s attention. Not about to be daunted in front of the woman he was wooing, he was about to demand an apology when a pair of pitch-black eyes stared into his.

He couldn’t utter a word.

Verd didn’t know how much time passed but his hands already let the collar go.

His eyes were staring at the ground where his feet were with his chin placed on his chest before he even realised the reflexive motion.

He couldn’t feel his legs when he noticed he already let the man’s collar go and he returned to his senses.

“No-nothing. So-sor-sorry for creasing your shirt.” Every line he prepared to raise his colleague’s opinion of him went down the sewers. There were no other words that came to mind.

“It’s okay. What else.”

A tingle went down Verd’s back, ‘so it’s not okay at all, that's not a question…’

He gulped, “I got the wrong person. I apologise for the rudeness.”

The tall man nodded and walked off.

The moment he was out of the building, Verd’s tense body relaxed.

‘Oh crap, that was so lame. Haaa, I guess my chances with her are gone.’ Verd completely forgot that he was trying to show off to the woman he was wooing.

When he looked at the pair of clear, pitch-black eyes he felt like he was drawn into its endless depths. Looking away was his survival instincts at work. Never in his career had he faced a creature that instilled as much fear into him.

Before becoming a professional member of the entertainment industry he was an actual dungeon clearer. Standing out from his colleagues who only learned skills and spells for fancy, showy effects but didn’t know how to fight.

The tall man was looking at him without any hint of emotion. Not arrogance or anger or anything at all. Verd had never seen such a creature and he feared the unknown.

Verd sighed thinking the game was up and scratched the back of his head while he checked his date out. He simply didn’t expect to see a starstruck expression.

“So cool…” His date hadn’t looked away from the exit.

“Yeah.” Verd did not expect those words, from both of them. On the bright side, it seemed like she didn’t even notice his pathetic attitude.

❅❅❅

‘Weird actors. Was he practising some acting skill?’

Ebony found a small bookstore that sold odd books. The genre went from torture techniques to monster anatomy to basic mana-draining enchantments to the mystery of the creature known as a woman.

The torture techniques were unpolished, the writer clearly didn’t understand the human body well enough. He was sure he could write a book that would give better results.

The rest seemed like they could add value to his knowledge base so he got a copy. They would suffice for a leisurely read.

‘No international language books, that’s too bad.’ Ebony couldn’t decipher an entire language from Kong Jing’s books on the common language Gia that was used outside of Elcra.

“It’s you and me, buddy.” Ebony greeted his pet tree and uncovered the piano. “Grow up fast, we have a lot of experiments to do.”

Ebony played the same tune till his neighbour came over with complaints about the noise.

‘No effect. Let’s ask.’ He asked the old lady who used to be an inn owner what the difference was between what he played compared to the one that Muse played a few days ago.

“So it was someone else who played that? No wonder it’s so different the past two days.” His neighbour wasn’t surprised that there was a second player.

“Different, how so? I played it with the same tune, volume and timing. There’s nothing different.” Ebony couldn’t believe a random old lady could hear the difference when he couldn’t with how high his Perception that was passively buffed by his Core Skill.

“Its soulless boy.”

“What is?”

“Your music.”

“Of course it is. Music is a combination of sounds in a particular order. Sound is just a mechanical wave that propagates through a medium, typically air. It is produced by the vibration of matter, which creates compressions and rarefactions in the surrounding particles.”

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“I don’t understand half of what you said but I’m telling you that is what’s different from that melody that night.”

“...Do you have some kind of soul element perception skill?”

“Haaa, young man. Emotions, I meant emotions. How do I explain it to someone like you..,ah, I know. Anyone with over 300 in Perception can sense emotions in music.”

“What? That’s the first I’ve heard of that.”

“...forget it, just keep it down today or play something else.”

“Hold on, was that a joke or were you serious?”

Ebony was back to the drawing board.

‘So all that talk about putting emotions into music was not full of nonsense. Okay, I’ll back up. Let’s think about it scientifically. I should have read about what effects music had on the brain when I was on Earth…come on, I like music, I should’ve studied about how it affected me other than the rhythmic flow and cognitive function impr-- I was too dismissive, I should’ve at least tried this emotion thing.’ Ebony was struck with the sudden realisation that he had been completely ignoring the possibility that maybe music was as mechanical as he assumed.

‘Huh, this might not be so different from using Will. I’ll try treating it like using Will, so it means I shouldn’t have a clear mind when playing an instrument. Will is closely linked to thoughts. So are emotions. Okay, strong thoughts, what should I be thinking of?’

Ebony’s hands were frozen above the piano keys.

His mind was blank.

What was one supposed to think of when playing an instrument?

He only knew that other thoughts were a distraction when using muscle memory to play the piano.

He didn’t move in that position till Ning Xin returned when the sun was setting.

“Xin, welcome back.” Her presence woke him up and he turned to greet her.

“...I’m back. Sorry for being late, I’ll get dinner ready soon.” The smell of coffee was heavily stuck on her.

“Take your time.”

“Why weren’t you playing anything?”

“I didn’t know how to before.”

“?” She might have picked up too many habits from him with her cute head tilt.

“I think I know how to start.”

“Great. I’ll call you when I’m done. Is sister Jing inside?”

“I don’t know, I haven't entered the house since I returned.”

“Mmkay.”

Ebony tried again. He was able to push down his fingers, one after the other. After 4 long minutes, the last key echoed within his ears. ‘There is a difference.’

He put the lid back on and went back in to get changed.

“Can you tell if there’s a difference?”

“...”

He didn’t get a reply for a long time.

“I didn’t mean to ignore you.”

Ebony smiled, it seemed like he succeeded. ‘I was right, strong thoughts work similarly and are closely linked with emotions. Since she can sense emotions to a certain degree, she can sense how I didn’t like the way she is avoiding me'

Happy with his initial success, he didn’t push her for reasons. She would’ve continued speaking if she wanted to share why she was avoiding him.

“What do you and Mallory even talk about?” He changed the subject so that it wasn’t so awkward for her. With how their conversations can take half a day, he was quite curious what they could talk about for so long.

She was taste-testing the soup she made and coughed it out.

“Did you mess up? That’s rare.” He took another spoon and tried the soup, “hmm? It’s great, I don’t taste any sediments either.”

“Don’t come up so close to me so suddenly!”

“...Did I do something that angered you somehow? Please tell me.” Although she restrained her palms, she was already about to push him away.

“You didn’t. Now get seated or go call Sister Jing up, I’ll serve it now.”

“Guess I have to read that book first.” Utterly confused, Ebony muttered and went to check his forge.

“Dinner’s ready.” He knocked on the door. Kong Jing was in the zone. Getting her to lose focus now was pretty much impossible. It was the same as when he fell into a trance.

Unlike his expectations, dinner went rather well. The awkwardness he was expecting wasn’t there and she was acting normal again.

“I’ll be outside.”

“Yeah yeah, go prepare. I’ll be making my dense soup stock as energy potions through the night too.”

“I didn’t expect you to remind me what a good time to test out my pet tree was.”

“Heheh, luckily we’re both grandmasters now. Maybe it won’t even take us a year to hit 500.”

“Haha, that sounds unlikely even for us.”

“True, I barely hit 303.”

“I heard you almost suffocated the town and burned down the floor. Your new spell is that powerful?”

“N-no, I was just blasting fire around and it spread when a denser forest got hit.” Her shy voice didn’t match the horror that she almost committed.

Ebony connected to the congregated Will in his pet tree. He couldn’t change it easily, it was more dense and compact than his maximum capacity. The most he could do was add on more, new instructions needed to be slowly incorporated. The direct connection allowed him to charge it up with all he recovered constantly and make gradual adjustments to what he already imbued.

“Looks cosy in there.” Ning Xin peeked into the tree hollow where he sat.

“It is but the floor’s hard, maybe I’ll buy some cushions.”

“Ah, that’s a great idea.”

“Want to come in?”

“Nope, I have to roast these lead rhino bones before using them in stock. Help me carry the rosewood charcoal from the storeroom, I’ll get the outdoor grill out so the house doesn’t smell.”

“As you wish.”

He was glad their closest neighbour was two units down and they were in a relatively quiet area because they were probably quite the nuisance with the cooking and the music throughout the night.

“You’re finally joining me for conditioning again.” His internal clock told him that it was time for morning exercise.

“You don’t have to get so happy, it’s not like we’re sparring or even in the same training room.”

“Should I introduce you to my classmates?” Ebony felt like he had been looking past her mask for some time now. He was afraid he was getting delusional whenever he imagined what her expressions were. He was pretty sure she was smiling now.

“Those children you were talking about? Sure.”

“There’s an old lady instructor who feels quite strong too. She might be there.”

“Ooo do you think she’ll be up for a duel?”

“I doubt so, don’t bully your elders. I don’t think she is quite that powerful.”

“Aww.”

When they arrived at the Quest Hall’s doorstep, Ning Xin turned towards him. Despite not being able to see her eyes, he could sense her glare.

“That woman’s here, is she the old lady? No, she doesn't smell old.”

“That’s rude.”