Chapter 24

Fortunately, I didn’t have to pick a pony.

The less I received from the emperor, the better.

………After a day of thinking that……….

The next morning, the corners of all the furniture in the emperor’s room were rounded and thick rugs were laid out on the floor.

Not only the room, but also the floor of the emperor’s palace, which you can see when you open the door. Every step in the long hallway was an endless stretch of fluffy rugs.

Argen struggled to ask what this was and had no choice but to gape at the emperor’s answer.

“I don’t want you to fall over and get hurt……”

******

I walked back and forth. If I really fell, I wouldn’t be hurt.

However, the rug kept tickling by bare feet so I had no choice but to walk slowly.

In the end, I had no choice but to take the courage and ask for shoes. The emperor wore light slippers in his room, so we were given a similar one.

However, it was a problem when the slippers we requested that fit our shoe size, were given only after 3 hours. I wasn’t studying at all when the teacher came and taught me the theory of magic.

I wondered what was taking so long in the Imperial palace and as usual with the many things that came to us, the slippers with a small and compact size were in front of me.

The elderly teacher gazed at the slippers that the servant brought. He raised his single eyeglasses once and looked at the maid’s hand carrying a tray with the slippers as if he couldn’t believe it.

“That’s…… what is it?”

“His highness the Crown Prince prepared…….The things for His Highness the Imperial Prince and Her Highness the Imperial Princess……But….”

The teacher turned his head back to the slippers after taking turns looking at me and Argen.

I just asked for slippers because my feet were itchy, but I tilted my head to see why the prince’s name was in it.

“You two have ‘this’ one in your palms….‘That’ one is another…….”

This one? That one?

After checking the bottom of my hand to see what was in our palms, I grabbed Argen’s hands and faced them in the direction of the sky.

But there was nothing even when I rubbed my eyes.

When we were puzzled, the teacher sighed and explained it in a way that was easy for us to understand.

“It’s magic.”

The man who taught us even before we moved to the emperor’s room was strict like Ishina. He didn’t scold us, but if we tried to miss classes or didn’t understand anything, he said something so logical beyond words that we gave up.

His logical nagging affected me enough to strengthen my enthusiasm for studying with Argen.

After listening to the first lecture by that teacher, Baron Chembo, who is 63 years old this year, we became model students with bright eyes for every class.

“The magic in both of your hands is white. It’s the magic of the Second Prince.”

Is there something like that? It seemed that he had just skipped the intermediate process of learning by linking the birth of the continent with the birth of magic.

“Magic has its own color. His Majesty is green, His Highness the Crown Prince is black, His highness the Second Prince is white, and His Highness the Third Prince has the same green as His Majesty.”

Wearing slippers worn by the maid, I gleamed at the baron’s lecture. It is said that the mana possessed by the imperial family is beyond imagination.

Baron Chembo told us that the blood of the imperial family would be enough to use magic at a high level, even if it were not pure blood.

I clenched my empty fist in sight.

“You may not see it, but a very powerful white magic is surrounding you.”

Only then did I think about it carefully, I remembered the second prince drawing something in my hand, saying that he would give a gift to me and Argen not long ago.

“…… What kind of magic is it?”

We, who listened intently and eagerly asked questions in every class of Baron Chembo, almost asked  the same question. He shook his head as if he couldn’t turn toward us with our red eyes shining.

It is said that Baron Chembo taught magic to the emperor before he made the manifestation. As the royal family has the same trust in him as the former Ishina, we believed in his skills.

“It’s a protective magic that prevents you from dying. Life is so dangerous that children often instantly die.”

He soon continued, pointing to my shoes.

“Here is black magic. It’s the color of His Royal Highness, and the magic of His Royal Highness is the most unusual and unique color of all who exist.”

I walked a step with soft slippers, keeping the information in my head.

‘Ah…..’

‘It’s fluffy.’

‘It’s Soft.’

‘It feels good.’

The moment I took a step forward, I almost drooled in ecstasy. The shoes that fit my feet were very soft and fluffy. The warmth of the feet was beyond description.

I never thought I could feel the greatness of science in my shoes.

“Maybe no matter how hard you walk, you won’t be tired. It’s the magic that rich nobles like.”

……It was not science, it was the greatness of magic.

I sat down again and looked at Baron Chembo. He liked our attitude in class, so he took out the candy that the emperor had given him to give whenever we were in class and gave it to us.

I felt as if I had become an animal that alternated between sticks and carrots, but I decided to forgive the candy because it was delicious…….

“The size of magic depends on the user’s ability. Now you have the magic of the Second Prince. The size of the mana contained in this magic is significant. Perhaps whenever the Second Prince feels like he’s running out of mana, he can cancel the spell and take it with him.”

Indeed, a few steps were skipped in the intermediate course, but I listened without a word. With my stiff hands, I engraved the dragon I learned for the first time today

“That’s what magic is. There’s a condition that it can be recovered at any time.”

As an example…..Baron Chembo grabbed a thin book and threw it lightly into the air.

Soon the book went down and he used magic to fly it into the air just before it fell to the floor.

We opened the book in front of our eyes and turned it over a few pages and put it back in place.

“The same goes for this type of mobile magic. Use magic while floating in the air, or retrieve it when you put it down again. That’s all magic. It means he can always retrieve the magic from both of you.”

He was as much a person as Ishina. Is this what all the Emperor’s subordinates were like?

Come to think of it, what happened to Ishina? I haven’t seen him since he came to the emperor’s castle.

It was time to squint one eye and recall Ishina’s face.

“Arien! Argen, where are you!”

“……!!”

“Ah…….Surprise……Hey…”

Argen, who was changing his posture at the really loud sound, lost his balance and fell, and I spoke reflexively.

As I turned my head toward the side where I heard the sound, I could see familiar blonde hair. An brilliant blonde that shines even in the light of an artificial chandelier.

“You were in class? Baron Chembo, long time no see.”

“It’s been a long time since I saw the Third Prince.”

The Third Prince greeted him lightly and approached us. A good physique even for a child was enough to make us look infinitely small.

“It’s been a while, you two.”

No…..It hasn’t even been five nights since we’ve been together…….

His eyes were wide open and he looked so moved that I was speechless. I had no words to respond, so I quietly didn’t look at him and tried to get down, but soon I had to listen again.

“I hear babies grow up day by day, and that’s true! I think you’re getting bigger and bigger.”

Pitch.

Flinch.

I just heard a story that neither me nor Argen could easily pass. The third prince, Eiji, painlessly grabbed our cheeks steadily against eye contact.

Surprised by his sudden physical affection, I stepped back and Argen fell down. He almost fell, to be exact.

When the third prince saw Argen fall after fiddling with our cheeks, he suddenly glanced lightly at the ends of both his fingers and muttered an unknown word.

Unlike a little while ago, when he was smiling broadly, he only raised his eyes with trembling lips and a calm face, which gave me goosebumps.

Fortunately, Argen didn’t fall. Actually, I don’t think I’ll ever get hurt if I fall in this rug.

The maids tried to properly seat Argen, who was standing in an awkward posture in the air, but the Third Prince blocked it.

“Do you want to do something fun?”

Argen tilted about 45 degrees into the air and struggled with his hand in the air. The third prince lifted his index finger and shouted in a short, low-pitched voice.

Then Argen’s body floated. Fortunately, it was easy to hold a posture in the air, so he moved his body that had been stopped strangely.

This time, Argen began to fly when he  lightly shouted something a little longer.

Argen exclaimed that It was amazing that he’s just moving. The Third Prince led us to the bedroom, forgetting that Baron Chembo was present or not.

The emperor’s room had dozens of doors, so the place where we had just taken the class and the bedroom were quite different.

The Third Prince held my hand while Argen floated in the air. We came into the bedroom and slammed the door shut.

Can he just enter the emperor’s bedroom like this? I thought it wouldn’t matter because he was the third prince, but it did matter.

“If my father finds out, I’ll get in trouble….….But, I’d be fine if I said I played with you.”

I heard clearly that he would be scolded except for the words I couldn’t understand that followed. Argen fell on the bed and I was put in a chair.

“What do you think, fun?”

“Fun…Fun…..It’s fun!”

“I’m not good at it because I haven’t manifested yet, but I can still float a baby.”

The Third Prince spoke confidently. Outside the door, there was a cry of “your highness, your highness,” from the maids not being able to follow us into the bedroom.

“Because I don’t have my father’s permission, even my own maid can’t come in.”

As we looked out the door, the Third Prince looked at it disapprovingly and held his hand at his waist.

“I can’t help it, I’ll keep them quiet because it bothers you.”

“No! It’s okay!”

I stopped him violently, recalling the appearance of the Third Prince not long ago. Why don’t you take our word for it? Smile broadly.

Then, he sat next to me and swept my hair away, but then something came to mind and he stood up.

Then he opened the door and accepted something from the maid.

I could see because his body covered it, but I was somehow filled with anxiety and it was very rare for me to miss an ominous feeling.

“Argen, Arien, this is a present!”

Small, cute, fluffy… like it was just born in the hands of the Third Prince.….