It was obvious what she was trying to do, and I had a guess as to why. I didn’t like the implications of those thoughts though. The only possible reason I could think of was the incident between her father and myself. Was that really enough to push her to suicide? I wasn’t that close to her, but I didn’t want to see her die, and I definitely didn’t want her blaming me when it happened.

  She was still wearing the same dress that she had been for the past few days, now much dirtier, and torn in a few places. Did that mean that she never went back to her family’s place? Did she just come straight here after she left? When did she even leave? I thought I remembered Natalya saying she had left in the morning. What had she been doing all day?

  I stopped that train of thought and refocused on what I needed to do. What would be the best way to stop her? She hadn’t jumped yet, so I could use [Hold Person] to prevent her from doing so, but she was so high up it might be outside of my range. I hadn’t unlocked [Flight] or [Levitation], which were advanced applications of [Telekinesis], so I wouldn’t be able to get up there quickly enough to catch her. I could wait until she jumped, and then try to catch her with a combination of my shield spells, and maybe some water manipulation. There was plenty of snow around.

  I started passively gathering snow and melting it into water as I thought further about the problem. [Ventriloquism] was a much simpler spell than [Hold Person], so I should be able to get it to reach there, and from there talk her down. [Enhanced Senses] was high enough level, and its multiplier had increased my [Perception] to such an absurd level that I would probably be able to hear her without magical assistance. I could also try using [Earth Manipulation] on the temple to grab her. The cathedral was made of stone, so it was a candidate for modification, but that might not work. The church would not take kindly to that, and it was possible that the stone was spelled to prevent people from doing just that.

  Sylvia stood on a windowsill at the top of the castle, looking down, with a tear occasionally falling from her face onto the snowy ground below. I was on top of a roof below her, but it was dark, and I was dressed in all black, and her eyes were puffy from crying, so she had not seen me. She had not moved at all, other than wiping her nose on her sleeve occasionally, but I knew she would not stay that way forever. Eventually, she would either change her mind, or finally resolve herself to jump. I needed to act before that happened. I cast [Ventriloquism] and started speaking to her.

  “Don’t jump,” I said from directly in front of her.

  She flinched violently, and her legs shook, but she managed to stay in place as she looked around for the source of the voice.

  “Relax,” I said. “Don’t fall. I’m on the ground and don’t have a way to get up there quickly.

  “L-L-Lucy?” she said, her teeth chattering from the cold.

  “That’s right, it’s me. I’m sure you probably blame me for everything, but I’d rather not watch you die, so don’t jump.”

  She stared blankly for a few seconds, then started laughing hysterically. She doubled over from laughing so hard, and I frantically cast [Gust] to push her against the wall. She laughed for almost a full minute, but her tears never stopped.

  “You already ruined my life, and now you’re here to ruin my death too!” she shouted. Ha!”

  She started laughing again.

  “How did I ruin your life?” I said. “I just rejected a bad offer! So what if your father doesn’t care about you! You’re still the daughter of a duke! You live in a castle! You have more money than most people will make in a lifetime! Stop being ridiculous!”

  “Had,” she said. “I had all of those things. Until you literally spit in my father’s face! You wanna know what he said when I got home? He said ‘You dare show your face to me after bringing that thing in here?!’ And then he disowned me!”

  She laughed more while I just stared, speechless.

  “What about now, huh? Am I still being ridiculous? I’m a disowned noble lady! I have no skills, no connections, no experience in the real world… My only option is to become a nun, and live out the remainder of my life in miserable silence and ignominy! Given that, I think I’m being pretty reasonable here.”

  “No, you’re still being ridiculous,” I said.

  “Oh, but of course, the great Lucy knows everything better than me!” said Sylvia. “Lucy, the archmage’s apprentice! Lucy, the aura prodigy! Lucy, the genius who learned all six elements in four months! Lucy, who got the better of a former paladin using only basic skills! Lucy, who knows how fathers are supposed to act! Of course she knows better. She knows that life is worth living! And she’s going to be a noble hero and save the poor misguided me from a terrible death. How wonderful is Lucy!”

  “You said earlier that you have no skills, but I disagree,” I said. “You’re really good at pissing me off.”

  “How wonderful!” said Sylvia, putting on a wide, false smile. “My talent! I’ve found it at long last! A new purpose in life! I can be your antagonist! The great hero Lucy, archmage, aura master, and apprentice to the hero who slew the Demon King, and her nemesis, Sylvia, wielder of basic water magic, ballroom etiquette, and formerly 40th in line for the Lyon ducal throne! What a thrilling tale it will be!” Her laughter rang out from the top of the tower.

  “You’ve gone completely insane,” I said.

  “Oh, just noticed that, have you?” she said. “And whose fault is that?”

  “Not mine,” I replied.

  “Of course, of course. Because nothing is your fault! You’re infallible! Perfect in every way! It is I who am wrong! I’m just some crazy person with bad luck.” She let out a short bark of laughter. “Now that I think about it, maybe I should live. Living as a crazy person is fun! I haven’t laughed like this in… No, actually I don’t think I’ve ever laughed this much. Why didn’t I think of this before? All I had to do was lose my mind, and everything got better!”

  “Well, if you had been crazy from the start, I probably wouldn’t have gotten involved with you,” I said.

  “Exactly!” she said, pointing at me. “I should have just done this! It’s brilliant! Well, now that I’ve resolved to live, I don’t need to jump, but how often do you get a view like this? And if you’re going to save me no matter what… Well I’m sure as hell not gonna make it easy for you.”

  She made a motion as if to jump.

  “And what if I don’t catch you?” I said, seriously considering doing exactly that.

  “Oh well,” she said, shrugging.

  And then she jumped.

  For a second or two, I did nothing. I just watched her fall, headfirst, staring directly at me, her eyes open wide and no longer filled with tears and her lips stretched back to show her teeth in a way that didn’t look much like a smile. I almost let her fall like that. It would certainly be easier. This was what she had originally planned to do, after all. And there was no one else around. None that could see me at least. If I just let her fall, no one would ever know I was here.

  But I didn’t do that. I wasn’t just going to let her die, still blaming me for something that was clearly not my fault. I may have been the catalyst, but the duke had been an uncaring asshole long before he encountered me. In fact, what I had done might actually be better for her in the long run. Realizing that her father doesn’t care about her would free her from constantly trying to impress him and live a happier more fulfilling life without him. But instead she decided to choose the nuclear option and jumped straight to suicide, ignoring anything other than the worst of her options.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  I took all the water I had been gathering and moved it directly below her in a long column. I also used [Telekinesis] to slow her fall. I was too far away, and she was too large to fully stop her, but I could at least prevent her from going too fast to break the water’s surface tension.

  She hit the water, and immediately her fall slowed. I formed the water into an orb with her at the center. She started laughing, still upside down, bubbles streaming from her mouth and covering her face, then she took a deep breath, inhaling as much water as she could.

  “Bitch,” I said, as I manipulated the currents so that she was facing upwards with her head out of the water, and siphoning the water out of her lungs.

  She immediately dove back down under the water and took another breath full of water. I flipped her back up, and then cast [Hold Person] to keep her from moving. All the while, the orb was slowly floating down towards the ground. I jumped off my own roof. And ran towards her, and when she was a few feet off the ground, I canceled both my spells, letting her fall, where she landed on her ankle awkwardly.

  “Owwww,” she said as she sat on the cobbled stone rubbing her ankle.

  “Alright, now I’ve saved you, and you’ve decided to live, so I’m leaving. Goodbye. Have a nice life.”

  “That was fun!” exclaimed Sylvia, not seeming to have heard what I said. “I’m gonna do it again!”

  She sprang to her feet and started limp-sprinting back towards the temple.

  “Dammit,” I said, casting [Hold Person] again to keep stop her.

  “Heyyyy,” she complained. “Let me go!”

  “No. You just said you had chosen to live, so stop trying to kill yourself.”

  “But I won’t be killing myself! I have a great hero right here to save me! I’ll be perfectly fine!”

  “Fucking hell,” I muttered. “No, I’m not letting you jump again. You can go anywhere else, but not up there.”

  “C’monnn,” she whined. “Please? Just one more time!”

  “No,” I said firmly.

  “Fine,” she said, pouting.

  I eyed her doubtfully, then reluctantly released the spell that was keeping her in place. She stood still, leaning on one leg, giving me the poutiest look I had ever seen. I slowly turned around, and then started walking away. The moment I turned my back though, I heard her start running, and turned around to see her limping towards the steps up to the cathedral again. I froze her again. I stomped up to her angrily, then picked her up and threw her over my shoulder.

  “Wo-ho-ho,” she giggled. “Where are we going?” she asked as I started walking away.

  “Natalya’s. I’ll let her deal with you,” I said.

  “Oh. Is Anatoly still there?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “Hooray,” she exclaimed, squirming. “Now I can see the other person who helped ruin my life! I need to thank him! Without the two of you, I never would have gone crazy!”

  “Stop moving,” I said.

  “Ok,” she said cheerfully as she stilled.

  We walked in silence for a minute or so.

  “You’ve got a nice butt,” she said suddenly, smacking the object in question.

  I jumped a little, then cast [Hold Person] on her for the third time.

  “I am aware,” I said.

  “Awww,” she said, sounding disappointed.

  A few minutes later, she spoke again.

  “Lucy, are you a Demon King?” she asked.

  “What?” I said. “No.”

  “That’s what someone who’s a Demon King would say,” she said smugly.

  “That’s also what someone who’s not a Demon King would say,” I replied.

  “Oh yeah…”

  A few minutes later.

  “Hey, Lucy, are you-”

  I didn’t wait around to hear the rest of her question, casting [Mute]. I ran the last half hour of the journey, enjoying the silence, and ignoring Sylvia’s limp form flopping around in what was likely a very uncomfortable manner.

  When I reached the manor, the doors did not open on their own for me like they usually did. I guess Natalya had removed Sylvia from the list of people they recognized. I raised my free arm up and used the giant brass knocker to make my presence known. It was still early, and the sun had only just begun to rise, but that would be a problem for Natalya, not me.

  It took about a minute before the doors finally opened, and I found myself facing a very sleepy-looking Natalya. She was wearing thin, white nightclothes, and her normally neat and straight hair was pointing in every direction.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Here, take this,” I said, tossing Sylvia at her. Natalya caught her deftly and gently, and cradled her in her arms.

  “What? What’s going on?” she asked, confused.

  “She tried to jump from the top of the Cathedral. Apparently she got disowned. Thinks it’s my fault. I saved her, but she kept trying to go back and do it again, so I brought her here. Now she’s your problem. Have fun.”

  “Wait! Where are you-” I didn’t hear the rest of what Natalya said because I closed the doors, and then began circling around the mansion towards the training grounds.

  A few hours of practicing my shields against Jerome later, Natalya joined me outside.

  “You weren’t kidding about her being my problem, what the hell,” she said. “What did you do to her?”

  “Nothing. I just stopped her from jumping. Well, I tried to do that. She ended up jumping anyways, and I saved her from dying.”

  “And she became that way because of that?”

  “Well, she was kind of already that way when I started talking to her.”

  “Damn…” she said. “Well, she eventually fell asleep, and Dad is watching over her right now. Unlike you, he actually feels guilty about what happened, and is trying to help her.”

  “I did try to help her,” I said. “And then she just kept deliberately misunderstanding everything, and just kept getting worse.”

  “Hmmm. Sure,” she said, clearly not believing me. “Well, that aside, did you finish the task I assigned you?”

  “Yep,” I said.

  “Perfect! Now we can start the next lesson…”

  I spent the rest of that day learning everything there was to know about shields. I practiced all the different kinds of shields, both statically, and in miniature sparring sessions. Natalya was much better at sparring than her granddaughter, and didn’t intentionally injure me, so our sessions were highly productive, and I actually enjoyed them. That night, before Natalya went to bed, she brought out a much nicer looking golem named Horace.

  It was a more advanced training golem that was able to use different types of attacks, both ranged and melee, and it would help me practice my shields. Natalya set him to the lowest difficulty, then showed me how to adjust it via the dial on the back of his head, and told me to practice my shields against him until the morning. I did exactly that, making excellent progress on my levels, and even gaining a User Level. The next morning, Natalya floated down from the mansion as usual, but this time with a grim look on her face.

  “Sylvia is gone,” she said as soon as she made it to me.

  “Ok. And?” I asked. “Did she sneak out while you were asleep?”

  “Yes, but I didn’t notice her leaving. Neither did Dad. We both had spells going to watch over her, and now we can’t find her.”

  “Oh,” I said. “How did she manage that?”

  “I have no idea,” said Natalya. “It shouldn’t be possible.”

  “Well, clearly, it was.”

  “Clearly…” Natalya rubbed her chin. “Well, you should be careful. If she managed to avoid our surveillance, she’s definitely not as helpless as she once claimed to be. And Dad never managed to talk her back to sanity. She could be dangerous. Don’t get caught off guard.”

  “I won’t,” I said.

  “Good, now for the next lesson…”

  That day, we spent the first half of the day finishing up the unit on shields, then moved onto offensive magic. She showed me the best, simple attacks for each element, and having me practice on them. That night, she brought out a new golem named Geoffrey, or Jeff for short. Well, calling it a golem would be a bit of a stretch. It was just a large boulder with a frowny face carved into it, and a very powerful self-repair spell cast on it. It would be able to withstand whatever I threw at it, and I was to use it as target practice for the night, to avoid damaging the training grounds too much.

  We spent the next week on offensive magic, moving onto some more advanced spells, and each night, I continued to practice them out on Jeff, doing my best to try to erase his stupid face. At the end of the week, Natalya took me down into one of Claude’s famed Dungeons to earn some experience points, and practice my new spells on real opponents.

  My days continued to pass like this for some time. One week learning spells, then to the Dungeons to practice them and gain experience. Rinse and repeat for five years, until finally…

User Level 74 -> 75

[Archmage’s Apprentice] lvl 74 -> lvl 75

You have unlocked an evolution for your class! [See details]