Chapter 297: Shapeshifting

Come dawn, the scroll in question was finally completed. I couldn’t find words to express how thankful I was to Aste who played along with my sudden request and spent five hours on it.

“Here, it has Polymorph sealed within. Needless to say, it’s single-use.”

“O-Okay… Thanks.”

I’ve been relying on this guy one-sidedly. I wanted to pay him back in the future somehow.

He, however, was frowning quite a bit, perhaps dissatisfied with how the scroll turned out.

“What’s wrong, is there a problem?”

“Yeah. To be honest, that scroll is incomplete as a magic item. I suppose it couldn’t be helped since it was a rush job.”

“How is it different from the regular spell?”

Maxwell, being the magic nerd he was, cut into our conversation. Even if it was a failed product, it could still be useful based on how you used it. Since he encountered one now, he couldn’t just overlook it.

“First, it forcibly draws out the user’s magic power, so a reaction occurs. Specifically, you can’t use it in succession. If you use it once, you can’t reuse the Polymorph spell itself again for the duration of a month.”

“Are you saying… For example, if you use the scroll to transform, you can not reuse it for one month even if you used the spell normally?”

“Yeah, be it the scroll or your own spell, you will be unable to use Polymorph itself. You should keep that in mind.”

“Got it.”

“Also, that effect extends to the scrollmaker too, so it can’t be mass-produced. In other words, I can only make one per month too.”

“That’s… Troubling.”

If possible, I wanted to go back to my previous form more frequently, but since I could only use it once and get it once per month, I couldn’t store them up. Not just to meet Cortina, I also wanted to keep it as a trump card for battles, so it was a little unfortunate.

“Also, the spell effectiveness is also lowered. It forcefully draws out double the required magic power, while the effect is only around half a day.”

“Half a day, huh… I suppose it’ll at least be enough for the confrontation.”

“There will also be times when it is insufficient. As someone who has thrown himself into magic tool making, it makes me quite a bit dissatisfied.”

“Aren’t you aiming too high there?”

“If it was my specialist wife instead… I can’t help but think that. But well, it was a rush job so it can’t be helped. I will research it some more.”

“So your wife makes magic tools too? And yeah, sorry for rushing you.”

Following that, he explained a few more things, and then I decided to use the scroll on the spot.

It was already dawn. Even if I used it now, it should last until the evening. It should have been enough to comfort Cortina.

“Okay, here goes nothing…”

“It is quite painful, so prepare yourself.”

“Yeah, leave it to me. I am confident in my endurance.”

I reassured the worried Maxwell with a baseless promise and activated the spell.

Apparently, this was not a technique for humans at one point. It has been forcefully adjusted to human use, so it was quite an absurd spell.

And now, it has been loaded into a scroll on top of all that, so the degree of perfection was even lower. What assaulted me was the sharp pain stemming from that imperfectness.

“Agh…gah! Agfu… AGHAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!?”

My field of view got dyed in red, my body arching backward like a shrimp. And following that, I curled into a ball and fell onto the floor.

My flesh melted, my bones broke, and they were forcefully reconstructed. The sensation that was far from mere discomfort assaulted every part of my body.

In my brain, I could hear my nerves snapping one by one, and my ears were ringing as if they’d burst any moment.

It was unbearable pain even for me who had experienced death once.

Tormented by it, I writhed in pain for… Who knows how long. Perhaps it was only an instant, perhaps a few hours.

I could longer grasp how long I laid there gritting my teeth, almost to the point of breaking, and endured the pain.

But before long, that pain started to go away, and so did my consciousness.

“—Awake.”

I heard Maxwell’s relaxed voice. His familiar voice forcefully brought my consciousness back.

Opening my eyes, I was met with Aste and Maxwell with worried expressions.

“How do you feel?”

At his question, I brought my hand to my face.

It was no longer the slim hand that I had gotten used to seeing in these eleven years. No, accurately speaking, it was still slim but also strong, and the fingers were long, but also rough and bony like the fingers of a strong person.

“Yeah, I think… I’m fine.”

Even the voice coming from my mouth belonged to the me of the old.

I tried moving my limbs around, but while the uncomfortable feeling was still there, there were no abnormalities.

“How long was I out?”

“Only a few minutes. I woke you up right after the spell was over.”

“So this is the reason you don’t use it in battles. Makes me not want to ever experience it again.”

It was painful enough to make even me faint. If it was Maxwell, he would definitely get knocked out too. If he fainted in the middle of a battle, it would make holding the line difficult.

Then I finally stood up and looked around.

My point of view was about 40 cm higher. The mirror set against the wall reflected my old self.

The moment I saw my body, I felt like some kind of switch got flipped inside me.

My consciousness that was still biologically girly until then seemed to have switched completely into that of a man.

“Yeah… I’m back, huh.”

“Only for half a day, that is.”

“That’s fine for now. Just gotta do whatever I can in that time. Oh, right. Can we leave your compensation for later?”

“Sure. I’ll just choose something from your hideout. I’m not gonna rip you off, don’t worry.”

“That would save me the trouble.”

Den was there too, so he wouldn’t take too much.

That aside, Cortina’s matter came first.

It was already nearing the time for the sun to show its head. Cortina probably finished her hunt already too.

“Looks like a good time to return.”

“Well then, let us return at once—Reid.”

Maxwell addressed me with a smile, his words filled with nostalgia.

Similarly, I responded back with a thumbs up.