...
Birdsong filled the morning air, though not the gentle sort that drifted softly across garden blooms. These were the cries of vicious little sparrows who, instead of carrying a meter tape gently in their beaks, used those sharp edges to cut into ferocious mouses that didn't go down voluntarily as it bit one down with its sew needle teeth—a usual occurrence on such a beautiful day.
"Every day, it's a-gettin' closer," Alexander sang, his voice light. "Goin' faster than a roller coaster…~♪"He strode by, pausing only long enough to note how ants began swarming the duel, transforming them into their banquet.
'Ah, isn't nature beautiful? Like Cinderella, all is in harmony,' he continued, his footsteps surprisingly buoyant on the manicured path, humming a carefree tune between screams of despair and terror.
As he stepped into the mansion's grand foyer, his voice rose into a carefree tune, the melody echoing off warm marble floors and gilded pillars. Servants paused in their bustle, their eyes flicking to him and as quickly away.
He grinned at them, wrapping up his impromptu serenade—"Love like yours will surely come my way"—before stopping abruptly at a figure by the window, her luminous wings catching his sight, delicate patterns of iridescent blues and purples.
It was a butterfly-kin girl, trembling with each staccato breath, ready to bolt, as her posture spoke of terror. When Alexander, hand extended in a casual greeting, noticed her tears welling at the corners of large, anxious eyes, his smile faltered. This was no dance partner waiting to swing but a creature cornered by some rumored monster.
He tried a gentle, almost playful gesture, offering a hand. "A-hey… a-hey…," he began, but his voice scraped awkwardly, ending on a frustrated note, as he noted the shivering. "Hey… fuck me," he muttered, stepping back. His voice dropped to a whisper as he moved away, the cheerful tune evaporating.
"Why does everyone think I'm going to murder them?" he grumbled under his breath. Frustrated humor clung to the words, but it did nothing to lift his sinking mood.
Alexander's smile faltered. With a resigned sigh, he ran a hand through his hair, messing with its careful arrangement. 'Nobody runs from Sarah,' he mused bitterly, his hand lowered toward the third marking he received.
He rubbed his tingled skin—a memory of intimacy and connection that reminded him he wasn't all edges and menace. Just last night, he'd shared something real, something warm. But no one else saw that side, only the grumpy boy whose scent was a mix of nothing or blood.
The thought swirled in his mind as he navigated the mansion's busy halls. Dust motes glittered in light streams, and servants bustled and bickered in hushed tones. He naturally slipped into the role everyone expected, making everyone he met on his way calm and respectful toward him—a frustrated hunger gnawed at him as he wanted to share his happiness, but it found no easy meal here.
Each step carried him deeper into the estate through crowds of servants, attendants, and the newly arrived young nobles who swelled the estate's occupancy far beyond comfortable limits. The halls felt crowded and tense: curt whispers, clinking trays, and scuffling feet scratched at his ears, making his tail bump into everyone as it still waggled happily.
Alexander wanted to retreat to a quiet nook, but duty called. He was expected at his strategy room—annexed from Klili's bedroom and now repurposed for his growing ambitions—the first step toward world domination.
It was an odd repurposing symbolizing the estate's overcrowding. Alexander wondered if he should build another mansion outright as he neared the door, seeing how the estate was bursting at its seams: young nobles, artisans, their servants, their servants' servants—enough to drive even his iron-willed Mother to the brink. He pictured another sprawling structure rising on these lands, forging space and order from chaos. Or, more darkly, he considered that the problem might resolve itself if a few inconvenient individuals simply had an accident while sparring. He shook his head to dislodge the thought. Humor or not, it felt too grim, even thinking about the paperwork it would bring.
When he pushed open the door, he found maids arranging neat rows of snacks and drinks along a sideboard. Their eyes darted away from him, shoulders rigid. The tension in their posture spoke louder than any complaint—here was the noble who brought chaos. His ears flinched slightly, and he could almost taste their bloodthirst but jokes on them; Alexander was already getting miserable on his own—no need to wish him the worst; it would come naturally.
However, Alexander's self-deprecating humor aside, it was really bad. The servants were used to a certain order, a known routine. Now, everything had changed as the young nobles nested themselves under one roof, servants from different masters and mistresses squabbling over tiny comforts—pillows, softer sheets, fresh pastries.
Ironically, the young nobles adapted more easily, accustomed to arduous travels and rough lodgings. They'd learned to live in tents and train under harsh conditions. Their servants, pampered into a routine, found these new circumstances intolerable. It was a quiet, ridiculous drama unfolding behind every door. Alexander almost smirked—almost.
Not his problem. As long as no one turned up dead, the situation would sort itself out, hopefully without his involvement, as he hated to mediate between others. Yes, it was wrong to stab someone with silverware, and yes, it was also equally bad to impregnate their daughter out of revenge—funnily enough, it already happened more than once.
With a shrug and wary of dangerously sharp cutlery, he strode to the room's centerpiece: an enormous magical board, three meters high and five wide. Its uneven, grainy surface shimmered with faint arcs of mana. Nearby stood a hulking metal contraption that hummed and rattled like a caged beast. The device's glow was patchy, flickering uncertainly. It looked ridiculous—half genius, half-drunken blacksmith's night terror—and he took pride in that. It was his invention, a testament to his peculiar blend of ambition and frustration.
He allowed himself a thin, private smile. 'Creating that calculator was the breakthrough,' he mused, folding his arms. Most people had mocked it at first. Why invent a strange device to save and organize things when paper and ink existed? Why rely on intricate mana devices and gems when you could simply use the contraptions and paper everyone knew? They dismissed it as an expensive toy, ignoring the potential he saw shimmering behind the rough and occasionally explody edges.
Using [Mana Sense], his gaze drifted over the gadget's components—pipes of cheap alloy, ink infused with mana, and gems arranged in patterns that created a hazardous wonderland. He remembered Earth and its computers—tools that transformed societies. On Orbis, people still clung to rudimentary administrative methods as enchantments were expensive, and no one cared if an administrator needed much more time to process something. This mindset made them slow to embrace something so alien, so seemingly unnecessary. He sighed, thinking of how easily he himself might have scoffed at new ideas if he'd never experienced Earth's technological leaps.
'Have I dismissed others like that?' The thought stung. He tried to recall if he'd belittled anyone's innovations. Granted, he often sent reckless experimenters to the Temple for healing when their projects went awry, but that was practical caution, not dismissal. Still, he wondered if his impatience or arrogance had stifled someone's genius.
Alexander recalled a concept he had once read about—"the tenth man," a person tasked with challenging every decision to prevent groupthink. He almost laughed at the notion of employing not just one but several "tenth men" here. 'I'd probably end up murdering them,' he thought grimly, a wry smile tugging at his lips. The dark humor tasted bitter. Yet the idea held merit: he needed someone brave enough to question him, demand explanations, and poke holes in his plans before disaster struck.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
In the quiet of the strategy room, doubts buzzed at the edges of his mind. He glanced at the towering magical board and the contraption beside it. This was supposed to herald a new age of organization, calculation, and efficiency. But what if it was just another needless complexity in a world already rich with magic and resources he simply overlooked? He clenched his jaw, feeling self-doubt creep through him. Before, stress and urgency had always driven him forward, pushing him to innovate at a relentless pace. Now, with Sarah's mark softening his sharp edges, he found himself pausing to reconsider. He missed that unyielding drive—even if it had made him irritable, it also made him confident.
'Fuck this marking,' he swore inwardly, hating how the gentle warmth of Sarah's influence tempered his fierceness. He fiddled with a small metal case in his pocket, extracting a candy. Popping it into his mouth, he savored the taste, a poor substitute for old Earth vices like cigarettes or a cup filled with six espresso to start the morning. The candy's sweet hush dulled his irritations and made the edges blur. He refused to yield to that calmness and swiftly used his [Mana Overload] to burn through the candy's soothing effect. The craving for more candy flared—an addiction of sorts—but it restored his familiar edge. Not healthy, he admitted silently, but familiar.
Cracking his neck and exhaling a poisonous mist, he whispered, "Well, you'd never turn me into a wimp, right, baby?" He addressed the mechanical monstrosity as if it were a sulking lover. The room stood silent except for the faint hum of mana, which reminded him of distant bees in a hidden orchard.
Stepping closer, he pressed a hand to the board's surface, letting his [Mana Sense] roam, checking whether it would explode during the meeting or work as intended. 'Oh, were you lonely, my little pup?' His pride swelled to unimaginable heights as everything seemed as it should—unexpectedly safe with a tinge of danger to spice things up.
This lovely fire hazard comprised three parts—the back wall, the front wall, and the space between them, with a complicated device underneath. Even though not directly part of it, the device that used the principle of his first prototype of a calculator stood to the side.
The back had a nest of soldered mana gems, with small pipes made of Manullium, a mana-repellent metal, going through them—a much better way to connect them than through wires. The mana would seemingly flow between them and not erode the material. The only problem was that his mana gems, usually used to light up when used, were delicate and tended to heat up. Because of that, a particular risk was involved—one that loved to burst and splitter, creating more explosions. To avoid it, he took a small piece of metal, enchanted it, and glued it to the bottom. A wind enchantment, now a fan, would cool them down, pushing the warm air to the top, where it was partly open, allowing it to escape.
The front was made of glass, a rectangular box that fit the measurements of the whole magic board. It was filled with mana ink that he painstakingly distilled from various ingredients that had to be purified numerous times. It had an extraordinary mana density that was as viscous as oil. Behind it was an extremely thin piece of paper, devoid of any mana and fitted with numerous, barely visible holes.
The space between them was empty, except for the bottom and top. Glued to the walls were two pieces of metal with an enchantment that had cost Alexander an arm and a leg—literally, as it cost ten large gold coins, the price in the Temple, for regrowing two limbs. What did it do? It was a way to direct mana from one part to another without deviating.
The box to the side was his actual calculator, minimized and compacted so that it became a literal heater. It had already destroyed his laboratory once, so he had to create multiple layers of wind and frost enchantments to cool it down. Ultimately, it followed the same principle as previously. It had various mana gems that could hold myriad quantities of mana that, when activated, would send the mana toward the gems of the back, creating an astonishing amount of patterns. To change it, he assembled a dozen sliding Manullium plates in different forms, which would interrupt the flow and change the actual pattern.
The greatest thing was that because the mana went through the Manullium pipes, there was barely a need to replenish it as any would barely get lost. He had to use mana stones for the middle part, but they could be used for weeks and were even cheaper than mana gems.
The most interesting question was: How did it work? How did it create various images and texts, like those on the magic board in his school? While the paintings were simple artworks enchanted to follow a specific pattern and react programmatically to certain sensations, his boards were much more complex but flexible—able to store data.
All thanks to reading a battered manuscript (acquired through less-than-legal means) that mana took on strange properties when it was influenced by nearby mana inside other material than itself. It would suddenly create predictable patterns on how the influenced mana would move, something Alexander could never achieve before—finding out any predictability or pattern of ambient or stored mana. It was an enormous breakthrough for him, sadly ignored by everyone else.
Alexander explained it by assuming that mana particles moved differently inside various materials when stimulated, which caused them to radiate part of their mana. The radiated part would then hit mana in different materials, such as air or liquid, creating patterns and, better yet, adding to the strength of the effect, creating even greater radiation.
So, what was it exactly? Alexander had no idea, but he would still test it on numerous mana-dense materials, like mana ink, and be able to create beautiful patterns, such as images, numbers, letters, and more while experimenting.
Alexander activated the calculator by sliding out the uppermost plate that blocked the mana entirely, making the magic board rattle slightly. His maids immediately started preparing spell constructs for a mana shield.
In all honesty, Alexander agreed with them as he similarly prepared for the worst. In truth, the contraption still hovered at the edge of chaos—sometimes it worked, sometimes it shook violently and threatened to explode. Like a newborn foal, it tottered, and he had to teach it to walk. That he'd managed to build something so intricate with half-trained blacksmiths and his own patchy magical engineering was a triumph in itself.
He slid various other plates into the calculator box, changing the amount and pattern the mana flew out toward the back of the magic board. The mana gems emitted a different amount of mana and influenced the mana that flowed in between, which added to the effect, able to influence the mana ink in the front through the neutral and the holes it flew through. The ink shifted beautifully, leaving only a few parts on the top, while the rest flowed down, creating the title "First Meeting."
Usually, moving mana ink was painfully hard, so Alexander used contraptions to manipulate its physical properties. But with this, he could do it without just switching and rearranging some plates.
'Sadly, I had no time to create a storage for you,' he mused bitterly. The magic boards in school were similar, but they were far safer and had a small storage device. It was a box with thousands of small plates, all different shapes and forms, and a calculator. On the side, some enchantments would be triggered by the student's voice, [Energy], and [Mana], automatically shifting and arranging them precisely.
Fortunately, the enchantments were similarly modular and could be quickly exchanged to inform them individually, depending on class changes or other organizational shifts inside the school.
Beneath the humor and pride lay a quiet anxiety. Alexander had forced progress in a world that resisted it. With no pressing crisis hammering at his door, he was floating, unsure if his innovations mattered. Would the world embrace these gadgets, or were they destined to be curiosities in his private chamber?
His fingers traced a seam in the contraption's frame, "Ow! Motherfucker!" But he forgot it was cooking hot, even with cooling. He stood still, listening, a first aid spell constructed, healing his burnt finger. Behind him, the maids had finished setting the table and were slipping out, silent as ghosts, relieved to escape his presence and the machine that could tear them to pieces. Their fear and misunderstandings weighed on him. He wanted them to see him as driven but not a monster. Perhaps one day, when his gadget proved its worth and eased their burdens, they would laugh with him instead of trembling—depending on the explody factor.
Exhaling slowly, Alexander squared his shoulders and looked at the board.
"You're the right decision, aren't you?" he asked softly as if it might answer. His voice was gentle, which he rarely used. Inside him brewed a strange cocktail of defiance, doubt, and determination.
He had come so far and knew so much, yet there was always more to learn. Standing amid half-finished dreams and jittery mana flows, he recognized that he might need the stress, the tension, and internal conflicts to keep pushing forward. Complacency was the real enemy, not the naysayers or the fearful servants. To better himself and prove that his ideas weren't just folly, he needed challenges and maybe a few good cynics to keep him honest.
The door suddenly opened, and a cacophony of youthful voices echoed in the room. Alexander turned around, his smile fresh as if his earlier contemplations never existed, "Hello there!"