‘That’s a good thing.’
Yerina had been restless for the past few days, unable to sleep well.
But now, after seeing the review results, she could finally breathe a sigh of relief.
With various subsidies available, it would be even more helpful in taking care of Luke.
“Luke, living in the forest, isn’t it uncomfortable?”
“I’m fine. I find the forest more comfortable.”
“Hmm…”
However, Luke still decided to stay in the forest.
Just because mana support was coming in didn’t mean she could receive all of the 3 million gil.
Mana Accumulation Syndrome, abbreviated as MAS, could provide support to circle patients up to a maximum of 1.5 million gil per year.
Of course, that amount of support would be sufficient for most households and patients…
“Luke spent twice that amount in just one month.”
Yerina must have been quite surprised at that time.
It seemed like it wasn’t an ordinary amount of consumption.
“It was not her mistake. There’s no point in scolding her.”
Anyway, it was much better than having nothing.
So, even if the support given annually was small, there was nothing to complain about.
Yerina knew very well that the entire system couldn’t be altered for the sake of just one exceptional case.
The government’s welfare system had already been helpful enough.
And Luke herself found such cities uncomfortable.
Circle One. Still at a stage where mana was continuously needed.
Circle One was a very basic mana circle, so one couldn’t ignore the loss rate.
It could be likened to a bottle without a lid.
Just leaving it there would cause it to gradually evaporate, and if left unattended for a moment, it would spill out.
When mana was lost like that, the circle would continue to demand to be filled.
The cries of the circle linked to the heart naturally brought pain, and if it got severe, one could become bedridden or even die from shock. So, in the end, the wizards would continue to need mana.
It was similar to the principle of ‘compressed mana’ used in mana power plants.
Condense the volatile mana and leave it in a controllable state.
Rotate it with one’s own heart to maintain its volatility and stabilize it.
The ‘volatile’ mana contained in the circle could then be easily transformed into magic.
That was the principle of circle magic.
The reason why magic failure was dangerous for higher-leveler was because of that.
If the volatile mana lost control in the heart, it would be a big problem.
“Nowadays, we can compress mana without tying it to the heart.”
In the past, needing mana wasn’t considered a penalty.
Mana just existed everywhere.
It wasn’t given any value.
It didn’t matter even if a magician consumed an enormous amount of mana.
As long as they didn’t use potions and magic stones.
Nevertheless, Luke didn’t regret placing a circle around her heart.
“I’ll need Circle Two soon.”
As the layers of circles increased, the loss rate of mana contained in the circle decreased.
Luke had only been rotating one circle, so the loss rate had been noticeable.
A circle was like a gear.
When one circle rotated, there was no choice but to have some friction.
No matter how talented one was, it was difficult to balance with just one circle.
But with two circles?
“The second circle rotates opposite to another circle, bringing about stabilization.
As the number of circles increases, the stabilization and power intensify even further.
With each increase in circles, mana loss diminishes.
And finally, when reaching the entirety, up to 10…
At the individual level, mana generation akin to the world tree becomes possible.
“Well, in this era, perhaps up to 10 circles may not be necessary…”
There’s also a new system called class magic, and the privileges gained upon reaching 10 circles seemed rather useless.
Since the world is exceedingly peaceful, reaching only 7 circles should be more than enough for a divine rank.
“But 7 circles… in terms of classes, what level of authority does it represent?”
Luke flipped through the pages, reminiscing about the events at the mana power plant.
Previously, Gerald had shown her ‘Strength Enhancement.’
It was clearly categorized as a 3rd class auxiliary magic.
Why was it classified as 3rd class?
Her thoughts trailed off, recalling the incident in the high-pressure mana zone.
“What did the spirit who gave me mana say its name was? I regret not studying spirit language.”
For some reason, she seemed to have a high affinity with spirits.
Because she could see, hear, and feel them.
In reality, there was a considerable gap between a wizard who interprets mana, incorporating it into their body, and spirits, for whom mana is an intrinsic part of their being.
Therefore, since there was quite a gap between magicians and spirits, Luke had never bothered to learn spirit language, considering it knowledge he would never use in her lifetime.
Now, however, she regretted it.
As if suddenly remembering, Luke turned to Yerina and said,
“Yerina, there’s something I want to ask you.”
“Hm? Go ahead.”
Yerina, who was fixing her hair with pins, looked at Luke with a bright smile.
Seeing her radiant smile directed at her made Luke feel embarrassed for some reason, so she looked away and asked,
“Can you speak spirit language?”
“Spirit language…?”
Yerina was taken aback.
Spirit language? In this era, spirits don’t exist.
Even if they did, they can no longer speak.
So, the idea of a spirit language seemed far-fetched.
Deeply contemplating how to respond without shattering Luke’s innocence, Yerina decided to give up on an answer and chose to flee instead.
“Ah, I suddenly remembered something! I’ll be right back!”
With that, she escaped.
Thunk!
“..…”
Luke had no chance to catch her.
Whatever it was, it seemed urgent.
The feeling of something arbitrary captivated Luke’s senses, but he didn’t bother to mention it.
In fact, even the spirits claiming to be from 5000 years ago were a tiny minority who knew how to properly use spirit language.
Spirit language was equally difficult and unsystematic.
So, it wouldn’t be too strange if Yerina didn’t know. Come to think of it, they hadn’t been in contact with spirits lately.
Maybe communication wasn’t going well.
Friendliness and communication skills are not the same.
“Erre, Erre…”
The only word that came to mind among the languages spoken by the spirits.
This was not a problem with Luke’s memory.
In fact, most of the spirit language consisted of voices that humans couldn’t articulate. Their conversations, lacking tongues and vocal cords, were composed more of waves of sound than language.
Understanding that subtle melody perfectly was almost impossible unless you were the same spirit.
The human brain perceives such signals as ‘noise’, not as language.
The old Luke hadn’t even thought about deliberately learning such a difficult language to listen to.
In the first place, while spirits often learned human languages, humans rarely learned spirit languages.
However, spirits always use pronounceable voices for ‘nouns’.
Like mana that exists almost everywhere in this world, spirits also exist almost everywhere.
And they always hope someone will call them, naming themselves in a language that humans can pronounce.
It was also a characteristic of spirits who liked attention.
“So ‘Erre’ must be a name…”
Erre.
What could that possibly mean?
Somewhere there was a memory of hearing it, but she couldn’t remember where.
She squeezed her memory and thought hard, but the frustration didn’t seem to disappear at all.
“Hmm…”
‘Maybe I should go see Gerard later.’
“He was the person Luke had met so far who was closest to being a ‘wizard’, so maybe he could figure out what ‘Erre’ meant.”
***
A while later, Yerina returned during lunchtime to see Luke reading a book inside the box with a troubled expression.
Why was he making such a troubled expression?
“Luke, is something difficult bothering you?”
Upon Yerina’s question, Luke immediately looked up at her and said,
“Oh, Yerina. I didn’t realize you were here. Just wait a moment. I’ll get up soon…”
“No, don’t. Just relax, relax. By the way, why were you making such a troubled expression?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. Just lost in thought, that’s all.”
“Is that so?”
When Luke quickly relaxed and started looking at the book again, Yerina suddenly remembered her promise with Daphne.
“Surely, I asked for a cute picture of Luke, right?”
Daphne, who had informed her about the temporary protection extension system, could surely send her a picture of Luke.
She had received a picture before, and Luke didn’t seem to have any aversion to being photographed.
Holding up her phone, Yerina said,
“Luke, take a look at this.”
“Hmm? Oh, a photo, is it? Hold on.”
Luke smoothly formed a V sign with her hand and placed it beside her face.
“Click.”
Oddly enough, whenever Luke had her photo taken, she always made that V sign.
I wonder if he enjoys getting her picture taken?
She seemed to really like it when I showed her the first photo we took together. It would’ve been nice to capture that moment in a photo.
“Hey, does she know she’s cute?”
I struggled to contain my laughter, causing my shoulders to shake slightly.
As we paused for a moment for the photo, Luke suddenly asked, “Why are you laughing? Stop laughing and take the picture.”
“Oh, sorry, sorry. I’ll take it.”
Luke found it strange how Yerina suddenly burst into laughter.
-Click!
And so, the picture captured Luke, holding a book inside a box, making a V sign.
“Daphne would probably like this.”
Yerina smiled satisfactorily as she looked at the photo.
“Do you want to see how it turned out?”
Upon Yerina’s suggestion, Luke immediately responded, “Of course.”
She didn’t want to miss the chance to check her phone.
“So, how does it look?”
As Yerina handed Luke the phone, she carefully received it and admired the photo once again, marveling at the magical process of turning three-dimensional into two-dimensional.
“It came out well?”
“Yeah, it did. Well, not bad at all.”
Truth be told, Luke wasn’t particularly interested in what was in the photo, but there was no reason to say it wasn’t good, so she gave a vague positive response.
After getting Luke’s approval, Yerina took back her phone and said, “Right, Luke. How about we grab some food and go for a walk?”
“A walk?”
“Yeah, let’s eat and get some fresh air. Don’t you get tired of staying indoors all the time?”
Yerina hadn’t had much time to relax for the past week, so she suggested they go for a walk with Luke.
Luke, being a child, loved going for walks, and she felt sorry for not being able to do it because of Yerina’s busy schedule.
“Sure, let’s do that.”
Luke agreed because she knew that walking outside would replenish her mana more than staying indoors.
“Great, let’s have lunch now.”
Luke nodded as she accepted the lunchbox Yerina had prepared.
As usual, the menu consisted of salad and canned food. While she hadn’t complained before, she was starting to get tired of it.
After opening the canned food and mixing it with her portion of salad, Luke suddenly thought she wanted to eat Dighton’s cooking again today.
The taste of those skewers was deeply ingrained in her memory.
After finishing their meal, Luke asked Yerina, “I haven’t seen Dighton around lately. Do you know what happened?”
Yerina hesitated for a moment before asking seriously, “Do you miss Dighton?”
Miss him? That wasn’t exactly the sentiment.
Luke shook her head and said, “It’s not that I miss him. I’m just a little worried. We haven’t seen him at all this past week.”
“So you’re worried?”
“Yeah, and I quite liked the dishes he made. Since he’s not around, I guess I can’t ask for them again.”
Yerina pondered with a troubled expression.
“I should visit him sometime… Perhaps together.”
…But last time, I got a bit too excited and messed up my strength control.
‘That’s a good thing.’
Yerina had been restless for the past few days, unable to sleep well.
But now, after seeing the review results, she could finally breathe a sigh of relief.
With various subsidies available, it would be even more helpful in taking care of Luke.
“Luke, living in the forest, isn’t it uncomfortable?”
“I’m fine. I find the forest more comfortable.”
“Hmm…”
However, Luke still decided to stay in the forest.
Just because mana support was coming in didn’t mean she could receive all of the 3 million gil.
Mana Accumulation Syndrome, abbreviated as MAS, could provide support to circle patients up to a maximum of 1.5 million gil per year.
Of course, that amount of support would be sufficient for most households and patients…
“Luke spent twice that amount in just one month.”
Yerina must have been quite surprised at that time.
It seemed like it wasn’t an ordinary amount of consumption.
“It was not her mistake. There’s no point in scolding her.”
Anyway, it was much better than having nothing.
So, even if the support given annually was small, there was nothing to complain about.
Yerina knew very well that the entire system couldn’t be altered for the sake of just one exceptional case.
The government’s welfare system had already been helpful enough.
And Luke herself found such cities uncomfortable.
Circle One. Still at a stage where mana was continuously needed.
Circle One was a very basic mana circle, so one couldn’t ignore the loss rate.
It could be likened to a bottle without a lid.
Just leaving it there would cause it to gradually evaporate, and if left unattended for a moment, it would spill out.
When mana was lost like that, the circle would continue to demand to be filled.
The cries of the circle linked to the heart naturally brought pain, and if it got severe, one could become bedridden or even die from shock. So, in the end, the wizards would continue to need mana.
It was similar to the principle of ‘compressed mana’ used in mana power plants.
Condense the volatile mana and leave it in a controllable state.
Rotate it with one’s own heart to maintain its volatility and stabilize it.
The ‘volatile’ mana contained in the circle could then be easily transformed into magic.
That was the principle of circle magic.
The reason why magic failure was dangerous for higher-leveler was because of that.
If the volatile mana lost control in the heart, it would be a big problem.
“Nowadays, we can compress mana without tying it to the heart.”
In the past, needing mana wasn’t considered a penalty.
Mana just existed everywhere.
It wasn’t given any value.
It didn’t matter even if a magician consumed an enormous amount of mana.
As long as they didn’t use potions and magic stones.
Nevertheless, Luke didn’t regret placing a circle around her heart.
“I’ll need Circle Two soon.”
As the layers of circles increased, the loss rate of mana contained in the circle decreased.
Luke had only been rotating one circle, so the loss rate had been noticeable.
A circle was like a gear.
When one circle rotated, there was no choice but to have some friction.
No matter how talented one was, it was difficult to balance with just one circle.
But with two circles?
“The second circle rotates opposite to another circle, bringing about stabilization.
As the number of circles increases, the stabilization and power intensify even further.
With each increase in circles, mana loss diminishes.
And finally, when reaching the entirety, up to 10…
At the individual level, mana generation akin to the world tree becomes possible.
“Well, in this era, perhaps up to 10 circles may not be necessary…”
There’s also a new system called class magic, and the privileges gained upon reaching 10 circles seemed rather useless.
Since the world is exceedingly peaceful, reaching only 7 circles should be more than enough for a divine rank.
“But 7 circles… in terms of classes, what level of authority does it represent?”
Luke flipped through the pages, reminiscing about the events at the mana power plant.
Previously, Gerald had shown her ‘Strength Enhancement.’
It was clearly categorized as a 3rd class auxiliary magic.
Why was it classified as 3rd class?
Her thoughts trailed off, recalling the incident in the high-pressure mana zone.
“What did the spirit who gave me mana say its name was? I regret not studying spirit language.”
For some reason, she seemed to have a high affinity with spirits.
Because she could see, hear, and feel them.
In reality, there was a considerable gap between a wizard who interprets mana, incorporating it into their body, and spirits, for whom mana is an intrinsic part of their being.
Therefore, since there was quite a gap between magicians and spirits, Luke had never bothered to learn spirit language, considering it knowledge he would never use in her lifetime.
Now, however, she regretted it.
As if suddenly remembering, Luke turned to Yerina and said,
“Yerina, there’s something I want to ask you.”
“Hm? Go ahead.”
Yerina, who was fixing her hair with pins, looked at Luke with a bright smile.
Seeing her radiant smile directed at her made Luke feel embarrassed for some reason, so she looked away and asked,
“Can you speak spirit language?”
“Spirit language…?”
Yerina was taken aback.
Spirit language? In this era, spirits don’t exist.
Even if they did, they can no longer speak.
So, the idea of a spirit language seemed far-fetched.
Deeply contemplating how to respond without shattering Luke’s innocence, Yerina decided to give up on an answer and chose to flee instead.
“Ah, I suddenly remembered something! I’ll be right back!”
With that, she escaped.
Thunk!
“..…”
Luke had no chance to catch her.
Whatever it was, it seemed urgent.
The feeling of something arbitrary captivated Luke’s senses, but he didn’t bother to mention it.
In fact, even the spirits claiming to be from 5000 years ago were a tiny minority who knew how to properly use spirit language.
Spirit language was equally difficult and unsystematic.
So, it wouldn’t be too strange if Yerina didn’t know. Come to think of it, they hadn’t been in contact with spirits lately.
Maybe communication wasn’t going well.
Friendliness and communication skills are not the same.
“Erre, Erre…”
The only word that came to mind among the languages spoken by the spirits.
This was not a problem with Luke’s memory.
In fact, most of the spirit language consisted of voices that humans couldn’t articulate. Their conversations, lacking tongues and vocal cords, were composed more of waves of sound than language.
Understanding that subtle melody perfectly was almost impossible unless you were the same spirit.
The human brain perceives such signals as ‘noise’, not as language.
The old Luke hadn’t even thought about deliberately learning such a difficult language to listen to.
In the first place, while spirits often learned human languages, humans rarely learned spirit languages.
However, spirits always use pronounceable voices for ‘nouns’.
Like mana that exists almost everywhere in this world, spirits also exist almost everywhere.
And they always hope someone will call them, naming themselves in a language that humans can pronounce.
It was also a characteristic of spirits who liked attention.
“So ‘Erre’ must be a name…”
Erre.
What could that possibly mean?
Somewhere there was a memory of hearing it, but she couldn’t remember where.
She squeezed her memory and thought hard, but the frustration didn’t seem to disappear at all.
“Hmm…”
‘Maybe I should go see Gerard later.’
“He was the person Luke had met so far who was closest to being a ‘wizard’, so maybe he could figure out what ‘Erre’ meant.”
***
A while later, Yerina returned during lunchtime to see Luke reading a book inside the box with a troubled expression.
Why was he making such a troubled expression?
“Luke, is something difficult bothering you?”
Upon Yerina’s question, Luke immediately looked up at her and said,
“Oh, Yerina. I didn’t realize you were here. Just wait a moment. I’ll get up soon…”
“No, don’t. Just relax, relax. By the way, why were you making such a troubled expression?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. Just lost in thought, that’s all.”
“Is that so?”
When Luke quickly relaxed and started looking at the book again, Yerina suddenly remembered her promise with Daphne.
“Surely, I asked for a cute picture of Luke, right?”
Daphne, who had informed her about the temporary protection extension system, could surely send her a picture of Luke.
She had received a picture before, and Luke didn’t seem to have any aversion to being photographed.
Holding up her phone, Yerina said,
“Luke, take a look at this.”
“Hmm? Oh, a photo, is it? Hold on.”
Luke smoothly formed a V sign with her hand and placed it beside her face.
“Click.”
Oddly enough, whenever Luke had her photo taken, she always made that V sign.
I wonder if he enjoys getting her picture taken?
She seemed to really like it when I showed her the first photo we took together. It would’ve been nice to capture that moment in a photo.
“Hey, does she know she’s cute?”
I struggled to contain my laughter, causing my shoulders to shake slightly.
As we paused for a moment for the photo, Luke suddenly asked, “Why are you laughing? Stop laughing and take the picture.”
“Oh, sorry, sorry. I’ll take it.”
Luke found it strange how Yerina suddenly burst into laughter.
-Click!
And so, the picture captured Luke, holding a book inside a box, making a V sign.
“Daphne would probably like this.”
Yerina smiled satisfactorily as she looked at the photo.
“Do you want to see how it turned out?”
Upon Yerina’s suggestion, Luke immediately responded, “Of course.”
She didn’t want to miss the chance to check her phone.
“So, how does it look?”
As Yerina handed Luke the phone, she carefully received it and admired the photo once again, marveling at the magical process of turning three-dimensional into two-dimensional.
“It came out well?”
“Yeah, it did. Well, not bad at all.”
Truth be told, Luke wasn’t particularly interested in what was in the photo, but there was no reason to say it wasn’t good, so she gave a vague positive response.
After getting Luke’s approval, Yerina took back her phone and said, “Right, Luke. How about we grab some food and go for a walk?”
“A walk?”
“Yeah, let’s eat and get some fresh air. Don’t you get tired of staying indoors all the time?”
Yerina hadn’t had much time to relax for the past week, so she suggested they go for a walk with Luke.
Luke, being a child, loved going for walks, and she felt sorry for not being able to do it because of Yerina’s busy schedule.
“Sure, let’s do that.”
Luke agreed because she knew that walking outside would replenish her mana more than staying indoors.
“Great, let’s have lunch now.”
Luke nodded as she accepted the lunchbox Yerina had prepared.
As usual, the menu consisted of salad and canned food. While she hadn’t complained before, she was starting to get tired of it.
After opening the canned food and mixing it with her portion of salad, Luke suddenly thought she wanted to eat Dighton’s cooking again today.
The taste of those skewers was deeply ingrained in her memory.
After finishing their meal, Luke asked Yerina, “I haven’t seen Dighton around lately. Do you know what happened?”
Yerina hesitated for a moment before asking seriously, “Do you miss Dighton?”
Miss him? That wasn’t exactly the sentiment.
Luke shook her head and said, “It’s not that I miss him. I’m just a little worried. We haven’t seen him at all this past week.”
“So you’re worried?”
“Yeah, and I quite liked the dishes he made. Since he’s not around, I guess I can’t ask for them again.”
Yerina pondered with a troubled expression.
“I should visit him sometime… Perhaps together.”
…But last time, I got a bit too excited and messed up my strength control.
