The school chime rings, cutting the afternoon clean in half. Chairs scrape. Like synchronized machinery, students stand—me included—and we bow our heads in practiced unison before entropy resumes and bags unzip across the room.

  Once free, I sling my bag over my shoulder and pull out my phone as I head for the door.

  “Good work for today,” a girl says. She’s holding a broom, sleeves rolled, already halfway into her cleaning duty.

  I don’t look up. “You too. Good luck with the cleaning.”

  Curt. No garnish. I don’t even know her name, but ignoring her outright would be inefficient. She’s a classmate. A node in the same social network. Acknowledging her existence costs nothing and avoids unnecessary friction.

  Humans are animals—social ones that is. Total isolation isn’t stoicism; it’s just another kind of maladaptation. There’s nothing wrong with solitude, but refusing even minimal interaction is like refusing lubrication in a machine with moving parts. Pointlessly abrasive. Besides, small talk is low-risk. Occasionally, the random variable surprises you.

  And this is my first year of high school. Weak ties still compound. Networking is just long-term investment wearing a friendly mask.

  Start small, they say.

  My phone vibrates. A group chat lights up my screen.

  Don’t be late for the raid later. New boss is a limited-time event!

  I type back: I’ll be there, same as everyone else. Consensus achieved.

  No assignments. No cleaning duty. The day has granted me a rare, perfectly legal indulgence for digital recreation.

  My steps quicken. Then become a brisk walk. Pulse up. I’ve spent months optimizing—grades, routines, energy expenditure. A system allowed occasional rewards performs better than one that doesn’t. This is basic behavioral economics. Even lab rats get treats, you know?

  I cut through pavement, weaving between passersby, crossing the intersection as the light turns green. A few turns more and I’m home. This neighborhood thins out near evening—fewer eyes, wider sidewalks. My personal signal that sprinting like a kid is socially acceptable.

  I’m just about to break into it when a sound snaps me in place.

  A voice. Rough. Playful in the way predators pretend innocence.

  “Hey, missy. C’mon, a little hangout wouldn’t hurt~”

  …

  I stop.

  The sound leaks from the alley to my right, the kind of narrow mouth the city forgets to close. It’s dark inside. Two men, silhouettes pressed close. And between them—a girl. Pinned. Trapped by walls and confidence she doesn’t have.

  There’s no shouting, oddly. No dramatic struggling, even. Just her mouth parted, soundless, as if fear has short-circuited speech itself. Then her eyes lift.

  They find me.

  I can’t see faces clearly—the light doesn’t slide far enough into that space—but fear has a wavelength all its own. You don’t need illumination for that.

  Ah… What does she expect me to do? Step in? Get myself slimed on concrete? I’m just a kid. Barely a teen. The last fight I had was with a guy two grades above me, and that was back when scraped knees were the worst-case scenario. I am not built for allat.

  Cold settles in my chest as one of the men reaches for her wrist. She inches away, murmuring something too soft to hear. They chuckle, amused by her arithmetic—distance versus desperation.

  If I hadn’t noticed, everything would be fine. Walking away would be both logical and, by most definitions, morally okay. But seeing it and choosing blindness feels… incorrect. Still, logic remains stubborn. I can’t actually do anything here.

  I consider options. Call the cops and leave—response time unknown, damage potentially immediate. Step in and threaten to call for help—escalation likely, hostage scenario probable. That’s how scum behaves when variables shift against them.

  Seriously. On the exact day I’m looking forward to game night, I get dropped into a trolley problem.

  Whatever I do hurts her. So the least damaging outcome—for me—is to walk away, maybe dial emergency services, and hope statistics lean kind.

  That’s what I should do. Yup.

  Huh…? My body won’t move… She’s… still looking at me.

  My brain supplies a convenient excuse—it’s her fault for being out here at this time—a thought so ugly it barely finishes forming before I reject it.

  ………

  ……

  …

  Ah…

  My body moves anyway—toward her.

  We continue to give chase to the cart.

  I’ve never pushed Magical Energy through my body like this. Every muscle hums, reinforced and screaming at the same time, like I’ve overclocked hardware without checking cooling. My stride stretches, ground blurring beneath me. I’m brushing horse-speed—an absurd benchmark to discover firsthand.

  The road is mercifully clear. The cart ahead barrels forward like a mad theorem, scattering coaches and the occasional automobile in its proof. Genovefa is there too—this kingdom’s princess sprinting in broad daylight, skirts and titles forgotten, people parting instinctively before her.

  “Hey!” I shout, glancing sideways at her. “We should call the cops! Why are we chasing that cart?!”

  For once, she looks at me like I’ve asked whether the sky needs permission to be blue. “Cops?” Her brow creases. “Do you mean the reeves? We cannot. The nearest station lies five leagues hence.” She faces forward again. “And why should we not give chase? Art you not a Hero?”

  Reeves. Right. No police here yet—just an older model with similar architecture to modern police somehow. I didn’t expect reeves would have dedicated stations here… Still, focus—

  “I didn’t choose to be a Hero!” My breath stutters but the words stay clean. “Realistically, even if we catch them, we can’t do anything!”

  The bandits are adults. Magic-capable. Almost certainly overleveled compared to me who’s sitting at eighteen even after unlocking gesture-based activation. Morally, yes—we should pursue. Save Iustitia. Save Eris. Logic, however, is ruthless: we are far more likely to get slimed.

  And we cannot afford that.

  “And aren’t you this kingdom’s princess?!” I push harder, panic sharpening my voice. “Get a grip! I can’t let you put yourself in danger!”

  The cart snaps into a sharp turn. We mirror it, shoes screaming against stone as momentum drags us into an ugly slide. Anime lies about this part—without reinforced joints and magically padded tendons, I’d be kissing pavement and reconsidering my life choices.

  We’re still almost fifteen meters behind.

  We’re not catching up.

  This is insane. This is exactly why officials exist. Systems. Redundancies. People whose job description includes handle this.

  “Your Highness!” I shout again, lungs burning. “We should get someone more capable to deal with this!”

  She doesn’t look at me. Her jaw is locked so tight it could crack teeth. “Even should you say so… My body yet runs. I cannot make it halt.” She stumbles, nearly eats stone, then forces herself upright. “I know full well I shall avail naught even if we reach them. Yet still—my legs obey not reason.”

  What the hell.

  She’s the princess. Since when do people with responsibility move before thinking?

  Something inside me twists. Once—only once—I did the same thing. Ignored the rational voice. Chased an ideal because it felt right. It was the worst mistake of my life—not because it ended badly, but because I knew better and did it anyway.

  Heroes.

  That’s what they call us here.

  The word almost makes me grin. Not out of pride—out of something closer to a grimace. A muscle memory of irony.

  If there’s any chance of going home, it probably involves me playing along. Wearing the title. Embodying the role long enough to find an exit. I can’t fight seasoned warriors head-on. I’m not built for it. But just this once—

  To keep her safe. To keep the king from mounting my head on a decorative spike for endangering his daughter—despite this whole mess being the result of her idea of a casual, unescorted outing. And to remind Genovefa, princess or not, that it is not her duty to throw her life into traffic.

  “I’m not telling you to stop,” I say, forcing calm into my voice. I point ahead, toward the bend cutting through the street. “I’ll keep tailing them.” Then I look at her—really look, for half a heartbeat. “You go get help. There has to be adventurer guilds in this world. Scattered around the Kingdom. There has to be,” I add, half prayer.

  For the first time, I’m building a plan on fictional precognition—something I actively despise. But worlds like this always follow patterns. When common folk can fight with training, an adventurer guild inevitably appears. Likely to ease the military’s load, to plug holes when Heroes are absent, to keep monsters, bandits, and narrative convenience neatly outsourced… Actually I don’t care why they exist. I just need them to exist now. Anything to get her out of this. I can’t think clearly with another variable sprinting beside me!

  Her eyes widen. She looks at me, mouth opening—argument already queued. Then she stops. Closes it. Her expression hardens, resolve snapping into place with a single nod. “See your own safety once their den be found. Flares are common wares in the markets. Procure one and fire it, that I may find you when I get aid.”

  “Don’t need to tell me,” I shoot back. “Unlike you, I don’t rush—!”

  She kicks off hard, soles biting stone, and vanishes around the turn, breaking away clean.

  I slow. Not stopping—just enough distance to sell the illusion that the chase has ended. The cart rattles on, unaware. I stay in its shadow, feeding more Magical Energy into my eyes and legs. The world sharpens. Edges brighten. I vault onto a canopy, then a stall, then another, using them as stepping stones to the rooftops above.

  So this is how it goes.

  I used to think scenes like this belonged exclusively to fantasy media—rescuing noble blood from kidnappers, leaping across roofs, proving one’s worth in a blaze of competence. Every young man dreams of it. Maybe I did too, once. Back when I still confused spectacle with substance.

  But I can’t really show off.

  My only notable Skill shrinks things. Hardly heroic. The optimal play is simple: locate their hideout, keep my distance, buy a flare, signal for help. That said, if I did play it safe and sit put after launching a flare, something bad might happen to those two in the time frame where help is still being sought out. Genovefa might feel guilty if that happens.

  That’s a lot of “ifs!”

  This is so unlike me. A life built on rationality doesn’t consider what ifs. And yet—here I am.

  I run the rooftops with my breath measured and my thoughts… less so. Stone and wood rushes beneath my feet in chopped rhythm. Wind tears at my ears. And all the while, I can feel the marble clenched in my fist—smooth, stupid, insignificant.

  I still haven’t found a proper application for my Skill. No elegant use case. No heroic abstraction. But earlier—back when everything was quieter—I tossed this marble into the air and misjudged the distance. My fingers closed on nothing. The marble fell.

  Suddenly, an intuition that borders on gambling starts to form.

  “Let’s try that one…”

  Fuck… Well, here goes…

  Time to fulfill my unwanted duty!

  We are cast unceremoniously into a barn devoid of light save for the small rays slipping through boarded windows. Our bodies are bound together with a rope as black as ill intent. The floor is cold stone—weathered. The air smells of damp and iron.

  Eris struggles beside me—small of frame, fierce of spirit, thrashing like a cornered fox. “Y’all brutes best be preparin’ fo’ a mighty reckoning when Ah get loose!” she snarls. “Ah swear by heaven, Ah’ll beat the sin clean outta y’all—”

  One of the dozen masked men laughs. A short, ugly sound. “This one’s loud.” He kicks her in the stomach, making Eris fold with a choked gasp, all the fight knocked clean from her lungs.

  “M—Miss Eris…!” My hands strain uselessly. I attempt to fortify my corporeal form, to circulate Magical Energy through muscle and bone—but the rope drinks it in greedily, leeching strength as though alive. “What is it you seek from us, villains?!”

  “Hold your tongue,” another says flatly, “lest you join her in silence.”

  They disperse then, scattering to corners and shadows, unconcerned with my fury.

  “Prepare to contact their noble houses,” one commands. “Demand the agreed ransom. Should they refuse—” He makes a slicing gesture at his throat. “—their daughters bleed.”

  Eris coughs weakly. “Unrefined… despicable curs…!”

  I lean toward her as much as the rope allows. “Fear not,” I whisper. “Her Highness gave chase. Aid shall surely come—”

  The room erupts in laughter.

  Even behind their masks, I feel it—their depravity seeping out like rot through cloth.

  “Pray not upon false hope,” one says. He raises his hand, fingers unfurling from a fist. Flame blossoms there, obedient and bright. “We know our trade well. You could say, we’re well-versed with magic.”

  My breath catches.

  Someone trained in magic…?! An adventurer?!

  That realization strikes harder than the blow to Eris.

  I lurch forward despite myself. “That cannot be so! Adventurers are sworn to serve the Crown’s interest—!”

  “Alas, young lady,” one answers mildly, and I know at once he is their leader. His garb bears a dark red hue, worn with intention. “You seem to not grasp that we were adventurers.”

  He turns, plucks a knife from the table, and casts it toward me. It strikes the stone an inch from my face, the blade grazing my cheek on purpose. Warmth slides down to my chin.

  “Your are in the keeping of mercenaries.”

  Steel sings as the others arm themselves—swords checked, blades weighed. Some lift weapons of metal and wood, one people called battlerifles. And then, they don short cuirasses and chainmails, vambraces, and greaves ranging from leather to light steel.

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  The leader gestures toward a towering man, a brute easily six feet tall, shoulders like a fortress wall. “You. Guard the entry. The princess may yet have followed. Should she arrive, see to her. Another hostage would only sweeten the bargain.”

  The giant inclines his head, retrieves a long sword, and exits. The double doors shut with a heavy finality.

  Eris jerks violently beside me. The rope cinches tight, biting into my skin as though punishing us both for her defiance. “Don’t ye dare lay them filthy hands on Her Highness!”

  Blood reaches my lips. I bite down, anger and shame tangling in my chest. We are of noble blood. To be reduced to leverage—tools for extortion—stains not only us, but our houses. Our names.

  “We should not have wandered without escort,” I whisper, the truth sour on my tongue.

  Eris glares at me, eyes fierce, almost petulant. “Now’s no time fo’ that. If we hadn’t slipped away, Ah wouldn’t have tasted those sweets. Ye know how iron-bound our homes be.”

  Is it worth this? The memory of sugar on my tongue feels obscene now.

  Then—

  Thud.

  A dull sound echoes from beyond the doors.

  Every man stiffens.

  “Did ye hear that?”

  “Somethin’ happened outside.”

  The leader chuckles, slow and assured. “Some fool likely challenged the big man and met his end.”

  Laughter swells through the barn—coarse, echoing, bouncing off rotted beams and stone. It churns my stomach like spoiled milk.

  “Was he not once a high-rank adventurer?” one adds with a shrug, as though discussing livestock. “It’s convenient, havin’ a brute of such strength in our employ.”

  The leader strolls toward us then, boots unhurried, gaze heavy. He looks down upon us as one might upon animals snared in a trap. An unkind comparison—and yet, painfully apt.

  “You see? Aid was never to arrive.” I cannot see his smile beneath the mask, yet I feel it. “If you believe men would dare seize noble daughters without preparation, you are grievously mistaken.”

  He crouches, bringing himself to our level. Even in the dim, his delight is palpable, a warmth that does not belong. “We have observed Miss Eris’… spirited habits for some time. Her fondness for peril made planning most convenient. And for insurance—” he gestures vaguely toward the door “—we employed a formidable ex-adventurer, one with ample reason to despise the Crown.”

  His hand lifts toward my chin.

  I jerk away.

  He chuckles, straightening, unoffended.

  He speaks truth. The surroundings confirm it. This barn is abandoned, boarded and forgotten, hemmed in by fields and rot. A farm, far from the capital’s breath. We were transported deep—ten, perhaps sixteen miles. No patrols. No casual passersby. To search for us here would be akin to hunting a needle flung into a wheat sea.

  This was no impulsive crime.

  They planned this meticulously.

  Bandits, yes—but not careless ones.

  How… did it come to this?

  “Oi,” the leader says, turning. “Go and see to that noise.”

  One of the men with a rifle strides toward the exit, fingers tapping the stock in idle anticipation. “I do hope it is the princess,” he mutters. “Forcing the king’s hand would be a rare delight—”

  He does not finish.

  The door opens of its own accord.

  No—someone else opens it.

  Noonlight spills inward, pale and thin, insufficient to banish the barn’s gloom. The man blocks my view, silhouette framed against the glare.

  “A brat—?”

  The word scarcely leaves him before an unseen force hurls him backward. His body lifts, folds, and slams hard upon the floor. He clutches his upper abdomen, gasping like a fish cast upon shore.

  “What in blazes—?!” Eris stiffens beside me.

  I feel it too. Something off. A pressure in the air, like a misaligned chord.

  Then the figure steps inside. Small of stature. Likely our age—no older. His face is hidden by a paper bag, crudely cut with two eye holes. Simple garb: light brown shirt, dark blue pants, black boots. Nothing remarkable.

  “It really is a brat…”

  The boy drags something in behind him. A body—a large one. My breath catches as I recognize the ex-adventurer they so proudly boasted of—now limp, head bloodied, hauled like refuse across the floor. The boy lets him fall with a dull thump, as though discarding rubbish.

  Then—astonishingly—he looks at us. He raises two fingers: index and middle. The gesture is alien—casual—entirely out of place. Before I can divine its meaning—

  “You’re a dead meat!” one of the bandits roars, swinging a sword.

  What follows steals my breath.

  The sword slice air, the boy vanishes. No—he moves. Too fast. Faster than sense permits. In a blink, he is airborne. Mid-leap, he reaches out, clenching empty air, and pulls—pulls—as though grasping an invisible tether.

  The charging man lurches forward, yanked off balance. In that same breath, the boy’s fist arcs in a tight right hook and strikes the man’s temple—protected only by a flimsy mask—with terrifying precision. There is a sickening sound. The bandit collapses at once, body crumpling as though strings were cut.

  The boy lands poorly, feet skidding, shoulders sagging—unsteady, breathing hard. As if this violence is not native to him. As if his body is learning its limits in real time.

  Eris and I can do nothing but stare, mouths agape.

  This is not what we expected.

  Not salvation wrapped in absurdity.

  Not a masked boy.

  But most alarming of all—

  He stands alone.

  Outnumbered. Outarmed.

  The of the fallen bandit before stirs, forcing himself upright just enough to stretch out a trembling hand. “Scalding Torrent!”

  A burst of boiling water erupts from his palm—violent, hissing—and yet it sails wide of the boy despite the scant three paces between them. Too wide.

  I understand at once.

  The man clutches his head, blood matted in his hair. Blunt trauma. Magical invocation depends greatly upon cognition—the brain—focus, trigger recognition, control. Damage the brain, and most Skills turns unreliable. It’s almost… appropriate since the boy is fighting with mere hands. The bandits only wore flimsy mask for head protection and he took advantage of it.

  Three riflemen panic. They raise their weapons and fire in unison. The boy clenches his hand.

  The bullets do not find him. They converge instead—warped inward, drawn toward empty air—as the space he occupied is suddenly void. He is gone.

  This is no mere bodily enhancement. I have seen veterans move with unnatural haste, muscles reinforced by spellcraft. This is different. This is motion so swift it steals causality itself—here, and then not.

  I search frantically—

  —and find him already standing before one of the riflemen.

  He seizes the barrel with his left hand and wrenches it upward. With his free hand he makes that same strange pulling gesture, and the man bends forward involuntarily, as though an unseen force pulls him. The boy strikes—once to the stomach—then twists the weapon and drives its butt hard beneath the man’s right ribs, just under the diaphragm—unprotected by the short cuirass.

  The man folds. Instantly. Like strength itself has been evicted from his body.

  The boy does not appear strong. That is what unsettles me most. His blows lack brute force. Instead, they are precise. Deliberate. Each strike seeks a place the body cannot defend—a nerve, a vessel, a fulcrum only one who understands anatomy would choose.

  A… amazing…

  “What do you all stand about for?!” the leader bellows. “Strike together! It’s but a brat!”

  At his command, the riflemen rechamber their arms while those bearing blades surge forward in a ragged line.

  Everything dissolves into a blur my eyes can scarce untangle.

  The boy fires a rifle—once. The recoil knocks him backward, clumsy and ill-braced, yet the shot finds its mark. A rifleman cries out and falls. In the same breath, a spearman lunges, steel flashing—only for the boy to vanish again at that now-familiar clenched motion, leaving the blade to cleave nothing but air.

  He reappears behind a swordsman caught mid-step. A kick snaps into the back of the man’s knee. Bone yields. The swordsman drops to one knee, perfectly positioned. The boy strikes his temple—quick, efficient—and is gone again before the body fully understands it has lost.

  “Saxum Erinnys!”

  The cry rends the air. Stone answers. Rocks materialize overhead and rain down upon the space where the boy was—and then is not. He flickers through the barn like a broken image, appearing and vanishing amid falling stone, never where the attack lands, always just beyond it.

  My heart pounds.

  Teleportation? Is that his Skill?

  Yet that makes no sense. He is but a boy—our age, perhaps younger. One does not awaken a Magic Skill until young adulthood, until one’s level hath crested thirty. That is the law of this world, as immutable as gravity.

  And yet—

  He defies it.

  He fights with awkward with recoil, breathless after motion, learning even as he strikes. Whatever his art is, it is not polished. Which makes it all the more terrifying. Because if this is him unrefined—what manner of being have we just witnessed step through that door?

  Before the thought settles, the fighting ends.

  Silence drops hard, broken only by labored breaths and the soft clatter of fallen arms. I realize, belatedly, that neither Eris nor I were struck by the raining stones and—

  Ah…

  Weight settles against my shoulder. Eris’ head lolls there, her body slack. She has fainted. The absurdity, the terror, the relentless surge of it all—her spirit finally gave way.

  The quiet stretches—

  Then it cracks.

  The leader—bloodied, broken—drags himself toward us, dagger clenched in shaking fingers. He reaches the rope binding us and yanks it tight, pressing the blade to Eris’ throat.

  “S—stop—!”

  “Brat!” he snarls, digging the edge closer. “Another step and she is slain—!”

  A footfall.

  The boy is suddenly in front of us and the leader.

  No flash. No warning.

  The threat evaporates.

  “Hyiii—!”

  The boy seizes the man’s arm, twists. Bone protests. With a short, downward hook, he strikes the back of the leader’s head.

  The man collapses.

  A single boy against a dozen ex-adventurers.

  It should be laughable. A child’s fantasy. A badly told jest.

  And yet reality chose the scenario no one expected.

  It feels torn from the very fairytales I read as a girl—damsels bound, villains gloating, and one lone figure arriving to undo them all with impossible ease.

  I find myself grimacing.

  The boy kneels before us, dagger in hand.

  Instinctively, I lean back. He saved us, yes—but salvation does not always wear kind faces. What sort of child could do all this?

  But the blade slices only rope.

  Clean. Careful.

  He tosses the dagger aside, then raises both hands and steps backward, slow, as though calming a startled animal.

  That strange, casual gesture again.

  My breath leaves me all at once.

  Then—blink.

  He is six paces away.

  Blink.

  Again.

  The barn door frames him in noonlight, swallowing his small form whole.

  And then—

  He is gone.

  Ah…

  Questions riot through my mind, colliding, multiplying. Yet above them all floats one helpless thought, thin and incredulous:

  “What… just happened…?”

  The moment I locate their nest—a boarded barn on a farm skirting the capital—I deploy the first flare ten meters out and bolt. That was the plan, anyway. Every five kilometers, another flare. A dotted line of fire stitched across the sky, crude but readable. Breadcrumbs for Genovefa, assuming she found help.

  Now I crouch atop the roof of an abandoned house a short distance away, staring at the barn and praying the universe follows my flowchart for once.

  I still feel bad about the flare gun. I did explained the situation to a merchant—emergency, noble blood involved. He handed it over without hesitation. No questions. No haggling.

  I really need to find that guy and repay him.

  “Speaking of paying…” I mutter. “What do they even use here? Coins? Ingots? Vibes?”

  I haven’t paid for anything since arriving. Food, clothes, lodging—everything just appears.

  …all five nations pledge their support in nurturing your growth…

  They really meant that one, huh?

  ?!

  Sound.

  I enhance my sight.

  Five kilometers out, a group is running hard toward the farm—armored, organized, unmistakably adventurers. At their head, hair streaming, is Genovefa.

  Relief punches the air from my lungs.

  Thank God. She found help.

  I drop from the roof and hit the ground running. When I’m close enough, I jab a finger toward the barn. That’s all it takes. The adventurers surge forward, boots pounding earth, acceleration snapping sharp and sudden—noticeably faster than Genovefa and I managed earlier.

  Right. Being in that level thirty threshold makes scaling finally stop pretending to be subtle.

  I pivot and run back alongside Genovefa as we fall behind them. “Took you long enough.”

  “It was difficult locating an adventurers’ guild with men immediately at hand.”

  “Good thing you’re a princess. Anyone else would still be filling out paperwork.”

  We reach the barn just as the adventurers flood it. Some fan out to secure the perimeter. Others rush inside. A moment later, I see them supporting Iustitia—wobbling, alive—and carrying Eris out, utterly limp.

  Genovefa skids to a halt. “What…? They’re safe?!” Her voice cracks when her eyes land on the bodies scattered across the dirt floor. Bandits. Maskless now. Broken, unconscious, folded in ways that suggest poor life choices.

  I stop beside her. “Didn’t get the chance to mention it while we were sprinting,” I say. “Some boy barged in and went feral.”

  She blinks. “A… boy?”

  “I didn’t exactly have front-row seats,” I add. “But twelve armed ex-adventurers don’t usually trip over themselves like that.”

  Iustitia spots us. She peels herself out of an adventurer’s grip and jogs toward Genovefa—then promptly slips. Genovefa catches her just in time.

  “What happened?” Genovefa asks, gripping her tight. “Shin said someone intervened.”

  “Your Highness…” Iustitia pants, clinging to Genovefa like gravity has personally betrayed her. “Yes. A boy. He wielded a Magic Skill—teleportation, I believe.” She swallows, steadying herself. “He fought awkwardly. Poor stance, poor recoil management. Yet he felled them all. He flickered about the barn as though distance itself were optional, as though his Magical Energy reserves had no bottom.”

  Teleportation. A word people fling around like it means “went fast.”

  True teleportation—if we’re being pedantic, and I am—requires the subject to disassemble at point A and reconstruct at point B in a single causal blink. No traversal, no acceleration curve, no space being politely shoved aside. Fast travel is still travel. Warping space is still motion. All known variants are monstrously expensive in terms of energy. Even my own Skill, Distort—simple, elegant, permanently shrinking objects while preserving geometry—chews through Magical Energy because of how it goes against conservation laws. A full teleport loop should drain a small lake. Which makes a boy doing it repeatedly… indeed troubling.

  Genovefa lowers her voice. “The bandits are dealt with,” she murmurs, gripping Iustitia’s shoulders to keep her upright, “but it seems we have a vigilante at large now.” She meets Iustitia’s eyes. “Tell me. What did this boy look like?”

  Iustitia hesitates. Her gaze flicks to me. I freeze internally, like a computer running a sudden threat-detection subroutine.

  “Well… he wore a paper bag upon his head, so I could not see his countenance,” she says carefully. “But his garments—simple shirt, trousers, boots—were much like your companion’s.” Another pause. “Save that he lacked the brown longcoat.”

  Genovefa glances at me. Not accusatory. Evaluative. The look of someone assembling a puzzle and discarding the wrong pieces.

  “I see,” she says. “That is… a lead.”

  They nod together, satisfied. Case temporarily closed.

  Of course it isn’t me. My Skill shrinks things. Entirely different category. No displacement, no blinking, no dramatic entrances through doors. Even if the clothes match, I’m still just a Hero-in-training learning the ropes. Perfectly normal. Perfectly boring.

  …

  THANK GOD THEY DIDN’T THINK IT WAS ME!

  My pulse finally catches up with the last five minutes and starts trying to escape my ribcage. I didn’t even have time to think—ditched the coat, grabbed a paper bag, improvised anonymity like an idiot savant under pressure. If they figure out I single-handedly folded a dozen ex-adventurers, my life becomes parades, questions, expectations—absolutely not!

  An adventurer jogs up. “Lady Asbj?rn and Lady Dekeyser must undergo immediate treatment.”

  Genovefa gives Iustitia a steady smile before passing her into waiting arms. “You and your fellows have rendered great service.”

  “Ever at the Crown’s call.”

  Order settles in. Bandits—now unmasked—are dragged into a miserable knot, wrists bound with black rope that drinks Magical Energy like a sponge—elegant and terrifying (I approve). Eris and Iustitia are carried off. The barn exhales, emptied of panic.

  I scratch the back of my head. “What a day…”

  We were just strolling through the capital. Marvel local architecture. Maybe eat some snacks. Instead: a noble abduction, armed ex-adventurers, and me doing masked vigilante nonsense to protect my long-term goal of a quiet, academically productive early life before graduation detonates everything anyway.

  We haven’t even started our Heroes’ journey properly. We’re still learning how this world breathes, and somehow I’ve already stumbled into a scene straight out of those trashy isekai paperbacks—the kind where saving noble blood conveniently earns affection, titles, and narrative momentum.

  Utterly ridiculous.

  More ridiculous that it all worked well.

  “Shin…” Genovefa slows, chewing on the word like it might bite back. “Thank you. For… earlier. For stopping me.”

  My body yet runs. I cannot make it halt.

  “Don’t worry about it. I know that feeling—moving before thinking. I’m just glad you are aware of it now.”

  I’ve done it before. Moved when logic said stay still. Acted when efficiency argued against it. That itch in the chest that says if you don’t intervene now, regret will metastasize later. Completely irrational. Totally unbecoming of the version of myself that prides itself on optimization and clean decision trees.

  And yet—this is exactly why I did all of this.

  I don’t want her carrying that same frustration. Acting because something feels wrong, then hating yourself afterward for being human about it.

  “This was meant to be a simple walk,” she says quietly. “I wished to show thee more of the city.”

  That catches me off guard. This isn’t our usual rhythm—no sharp retorts, no casual disregard, no effortless confidence that lets her change clothes in the same room as long as I’m facing the wall. This feels… earnest. Like I’m actually talking to a girl. Which is alarming, given my résumé in that department back on Earth is aggressively theoretical.

  “We can do it again,” I say, aiming for casual and hopefully landing somewhere near it. I watch the adventurers load the bound bandits onto a cart. “The four of us will be buried in magic studies soon, but… yeah. I’d like another date when things open up.”

  She tilts her head. “A date…? As in the day of the month or the year?”

  Oof.

  “It has a secondary meaning back in my world,” I explain. “It is the act of spending time with someone—intentionally—so you get to know each other better.”

  That’s the modernized version that’s been getting more popular on Earth, at least. I don’t mention romance, expectations, or the strange social rituals Earth attached to the word in its creation. No need. This is clearly her first encounter with the term, and honestly, it’s impressive she and everyone else here can parse our modern vocabulary at all. Cultural translation lag, but still remarkable uptake.

  “You use many curious words.”

  “Different world culture.”

  She smiles.

  It shouldn’t be a big deal. I’ve seen her smile plenty of times—polite court smiles, sharp smirks when she’s verbally dismantling me, casual expressions worn like armor in the palace. This one is… quieter. Unpracticed. It lands differently, and I can’t immediately reduce why into variables, which is unsettling.

  “We shall be roommates for a long while,” she says. “I wish to understand you better. To know you more. That way… we may at least be friends.” She clasp her relaxed hands. “You’ve taught something. And I hope we can learn from each other from now on.”

  …

  I can’t be friends with someone I barely know.

  What the heck? Isn’t this kind of too fast of a development?

  “You’re not the only one who’s learned something in this messy day.” I smile. “Sure thing.”

  This probably violates my usual operating philosophy. Efficient living discourages emotional deviations, unscheduled risks, and spur-of-the-moment heroics. And yet—those exact deviations have produced something unexpected. A connection. Data I didn’t know I needed.

  Earlier, I charged into that barn with zero preparation. No benchmark for the average adult combatant in this world. No clear understanding of how lethal Magical Skills truly are outside controlled demonstrations. From a statistical standpoint, it wasn’t just dangerous—it was borderline suicidal.

  I got lucky.

  Luck, plus an experimental application of my Skill, plus learning under pressure. A forced crash course in practical combat, complete with recoil mismanagement, stamina bleed, and that half-forgotten thrill of being in a real fight where consequences are immediate and non-negotiable.

  I still have time. Plenty of it. Time to test the limits of this new application. Time to formalize what I did instinctively and sand down the rough edges—make up for my not-so-pragmatic choice that could have ended very badly.

  And besides… there’s an old saying from my previous life: a man who has made no mistakes has made nothing at all.

  And I hate how it brings me comfort…

  “Pray… don’t you look a bit tired?”

  “Huh?” I step back without thinking, fingers brushing my neck and face. I’m sweating. Sweating a lot. Not the light sheen you get from exerting energy for a long time—this is, like, sweat-sweat. “Oh. Uh…”

  She frowns, sharp-eyed as ever. “I know I sent you running alone to fire those flares, but enhancing one’s body for scarcely an hour and a half should not leave you so depleted. How fare your Magical Energy reserves?”

  Right. That.

  As I said, I have exactly zero reliable benchmarks for what a fully grown adult combatant in this world can do. So I compensated the only way a rational, terrified boy would: max enhancement, precise targeting, no trading blows. Jugulars. Temples. Add constant short-range blinking to evade attacks (that would’ve killed my underleveled ass in a blow)—whatever the hell that actually counts as—and of course I’m wrecked. Anyone would be.

  I raise both hands, panic climbing my spine. “I—I’m fine! Really! Maybe my Magical Energy reservoir is just… smaller than average?”

  Please accept that.

  Please accept that.

  Please accept that.

  She reaches behind her and pulls out a small pouch.

  My soul leaves my body.

  From it, she produces a small vial filled with blue liquid.

  “N—nyo…!” The sound escapes me before dignity can intervene.

  She advances with the calm inevitability of a disappointed parent. “This cannot be helped. How can you call yourself a Hero if you are exhausted so easily?” She uncaps the vial in a twist, already angling it toward my face.

  I was tired because I fought a dozen armed ex-adventurers using experimental physics-adjacent magic and adrenaline-fueled problem solving. I cannot tell you that. I absolutely cannot tell you that. But please—anything but the potion—!

  She shoves it in.

  The taste hits instantly. Bitter. Woody. Like someone liquefied tree bark, resentment, and bad life choices.

  Yep. Still awful.