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Selendia

In the skies, under the dark night, was a giant transparent jellyfish.

It continuously fired off a jet of water from its bottom, maintaining its altitude in the process.

And inside said jellyfish was two figures—two women, one wearing a white and cyan maid dress with a pair of peculiar fins attached to the sides of her head while the other wore a luxurious deep blue dress, wielding a staff on her right hand.

It was Selendia Brine and her maid.

"Do you believe they could do it? That they could win against her, Ma'am?" the maid asked, her tone curious yet respectful.

"Hmm, maybe they could. I certainly hope they do. Vera will most likely underestimate them. She wouldn't use her artifact to be sure, and she wouldn't go all-out immediately as well. That sadist always loves torturing her victims after all."

"If they can't?"

"Well, it would just be a polite visit. We're neighbors after all."

The jellyfish then rapidly descended, free falling as it no longer fired off its water.

And then, it landed right in front of Vera's mansion, only resuming to shoot out its water when it was about to land so its occupancy would feel a softer, more comfortable landing.

The jellyfish then disappeared, leaving only the two figures behind outside.

"No snowstorm. That means the fight is over."

"There are no guards around, Ma'am. Vera must have told everyone to evacuate."

"Yes, I can see that."

"A-apologies…"

The water mage then casually walked into the already opened gate, before turning around to glance at her maid.

"Well, what are you waiting for? Let's go inside. Let's see if our little Vera is triumphant or not."

"R-right, Ma'am."

It didn't take long for them to find out that there were only two people inside—Alincia and Marina, both sleeping soundly in their own rooms. And after looking around outside, the maid also found Vera's body and staff, almost buried under the snow.

When the maid reported it to Selendia, she was having a seat on Vera's throne, finding the chair far more suited for her than Vera's small body.

"So they actually did it. They managed to kill Vera." The mage began to laugh uncontrollably,, covering her mouth with her left hand in the process. "Oh, it went just like I wanted! I thought the chance of two ex-S-rank adventurers and their son winning against her would be slim, but they did it anyway! That gnome really did use one of Mira's artifacts to win against Lana all those years ago! She isn't an Archmage-level mage after all! Not in the slightest!"

Archmage. One step beyond Grandmaster. No one in the Magocracy currently laid claim to the title, as you would need to be able to cast one of the legendary spells Mira herself apparently used a millenia ago. In the Magocracy's history, the true history, hidden from the public, only a few had ever reached that height. And if a mage reached that level, they could very well make themselves a Mage-King. The mage families occupying the Council would have to bow down to them. The Magocracy's history books claimed that only Mira had ever reached said heights, hiding away any records of other mages reaching that level, so that no one would question the ruling Council's legitimacy. The Magocracy also taught its citizens that the many Saints of the Milicis Faith were never actually Saint-level in their Holy Magic (as the two positions were equivalent). After all, they never displayed any Saint-level Holy Magic to the public. Not to mention that if they were truly Saint-level, they would have them on the front lines, not hidden away from the fight.

"I assume the rest of the Council would be overjoyed as well, wouldn't they, Ma'am?"

"Indeed. We've only been tolerating her for so long because of the chance that she really had reached Archmage-level in her Ice spell, as she demonstrated in her fight against Lana. But now, with how she died so pathetically to a bunch of nobodies, there was no doubt that she was just a weakling. Possibly even the weakest amongst all of us. She only got that strong because of that artifact."

"Do you think she'll keep it in this place, Ma'am?"

"I doubt it. It must be in a safer place somewhere, away from any and all prying eyes. That's why we're here, to find any clues where she could be hiding it."

She then rose. "I'll go look in her library right now. Tell Alincia not to disturb me when she wakes up."

"Oh." She suddenly stopped for a bit before she left the room, tilting her head backwards to her maid with a smile. "And cook her some breakfast, would you? The poor girl must be starving."

---------

Alincia

"U-uuuhhh…"

I slowly opened my eyes, before stretching my arms upwards, yawning in the process.

I sat up groggily, rubbing my eyes, before yawning once again.

That's right. I'm sleeping in Vera's mansion right now.

Hmm?

What's this smell?

This smells like… bacon?

But who could—

I quickly jumped out of my bed, wore my leggings and sandals, and ran out of the room, immediately running to the kitchen.

Only to find a complete stranger there, cooking what indeed looked like bacon on one of the stoves.

"Oh, you've woken up, Miss Salamander. Please wait just a few more moments. Your breakfast will be ready soon." She gave me a sideways glance.

I was speechless. The situation was too bizarre and unexpected for me to comprehend.

"W-who are you? You're one of Vera's servants?" I drew my wand from my pocket.

She didn't answer immediately. Instead, she lifted the pan and then put the cooked bacon on a plate she had placed on the nearby table. Only after that she turned to face me.

"You don't remember me, Miss Salamander? I believe we've met before."

I paused, looking at her more carefully. She was mature yet youthful-looking. Judging by her outfit, she looked to be a maid. Hmm? Those fins… she's a sea-folk? And those large breasts—their shape jutting out her uniform…

"Ah, I remember!" I pointed my finger. "You're Selendia's personal maid, aren't you? You're the maid that would always be beside her whenever she goes, aren't you? I'll never forget that scary lady with her creepy grin!"

"Please address Milady with the proper respect."

Eek, a chill just crawls on the back of my neck! T-that glare… s-scary...

"A-ah, sorry about that," I quickly apologized. "...Wait, hold on! Why are you even here?"

"Because Milady is here."

"Selendi—I-I mean, Mrs. Brine. She's here?"

"Yes. She's currently upstairs, at the library. And she has asked not to be interrupted, so there's no need for Young Miss to wait for her to have your breakfast. And, before Young Miss asks, we haven't touched your friend in the slightest. Rest assured that Milady wishes her no harm."

"I-I see…"

"Wait, no, why are you two even—" Her sharp glare returned. "I-I mean, why are Mrs. Brine here?" I quickly corrected myself yet again. "T-this is Vera's territory! Shouldn't you two be back in your own territory?"

...Hmm? She's pausing? She's not answering immediately?"

"...Milady has a certain matter that she needs to attend to here. That's all there is to it."

...Ah, I got it!

"Ha!" My confident smile returned. "I know what your master is doing! She's ransacking Vera's magic books and research notes, isn't she? Grandpa always says that we have to guard our magic knowledge from any outsiders, even if that outsider is another member of the Council. And now, she's here to plunder the Marjoram Family's knowledge, knowing that Vera is dead. Am I right, or am I right?"

No response.

"What's the matter? Cat got your—"

"I have no need to converse further with you. Please enjoy your breakfast."

Deciding that the conversation was over, she exited the room.

What? Running away? As if I'll let you!

"You know that I got here first right?" I shouted at her down the hallway. "Shouldn't I be the one to get the right to Vera's knowledge?"

She stopped in her tracks, before turning back, immediately sending me that terrifyingly sharp glare once again.

"You're welcome to try. But you shall have to fight my mistress for that." Water suddenly manifested near her right hand, before transforming into a solid trident, promptly aimed right at my direction. "And I will not hesitate to pierce anyone who threatens her, no matter who they are."

W-what is this… p-pressure?

M-my legs are shaking. I-I can't move.

I-I can't speak either. M-my body… i-it's not moving the way I want it to.

I could only stand there like an idiot, completely speechless as the maid went upstairs, no doubt going to meet up with her master.

T-the pressure… i-it's gone. W-what was that?

I now knew that there wasn't a chance for me to get my hands on those grimoires anymore.

Dammit, I should've taken them last night! They must have come when I was asleep!

And I want to give them to Marina too…

Unlike Grandpa, I wasn't obsessed with "reaching the new heights of magic" as he always said. I just felt that Marina deserved them, after all the things she had gone through. I was sure that she could make great use of them. She was a magic prodigy after all! And I'd certainly rather have her possess the grimoires rather than that scary lady and her scary fish maid!

-----------

After having my breakfast, which I begrudgingly accepted as delicious even though the one who made it was that maid, I decided to pay a visit to the library on the second floor. Only to find that maid standing in front of the door, shooing me away.

"Hey! I just want to greet her, you know!"

"Mistress doesn't want to be disturbed. And you are a disturbance."

"You know I can report this to Grandpa, right? Do the rest of the Council even approve of—"

"Yes, they do. Now go away and attend to your sleeping friend or something. I won't tolerate you disturbing Milady with your noiseness."

Tch, she just drops all pretense of politeness towards me now. If only you work for my family instead, I'll have you fired at once! Fired, you hear that?

In the end, I had to retreat. There was no other entrance to the place, and there weren't any windows either that I could use as an entry point. Vera probably designed the room intentionally that way. I couldn't imagine spending hours inside a library with no fresh air coming in though. Not that I would ever spend hours reading books in a library in the first place. Books are just not my thing.

I didn't know whether the maid was telling the truth, that they were really approved by the Council on doing this, but I was definitely going to report them to Grandpa for sure!

I ended up spending my free time just watching over Marina. I couldn't trust those bunch to guard her of course! Sure, they really didn't do anything to her, but they must know that it was her family who killed Vera. In fact, now that I thought about it, it's more likely that they were involved in this whole mess from the start.

...Oh I am such a complete idiot!

In my surprise of their sudden appearance, I had completely forgotten that Elun was Selendia's daughter. And since she knew what was going on, then Selendia must know as well!

Furious, I once again climbed upstairs to face the maid once more.

"Hey! You two know about this whole kidnapping business, don't you?" I yelled right to her face.

"Kidnapping business?"

"Don't play dumb! Marina got kidnapped under Vera's orders and you knew about it!"

"Oh, about that. I believe it would be best if Young Miss discusses it with my mistress instead."

"Then let me in!"

"Apologies, but you'll have to wait until she's finished. It shouldn't take much longer."

Seeing her neutral, unconcerned expression… it only made my blood boil even more. It's as if she doesn't care about Marina's horrible treatment in the slightest.

"MOVE. OUT. OF. THE. WAY!"

Without thinking, I sent a slap right towards her face. And not just a normal one, but a flame-covered, superhot one as I instinctively cast a Fireball on said hand at the same time.

Only for her to grab my hand with her own mid-air before it could even land, somehow dousing the flames in the process.

"W-wha—"

SLAPPP

She slapped me back, sending me flying to the floor.

"You're just like your sister, aren't you? Doesn't know her own limits. Always underestimates her opponent," she spoke coldly. "If you weren't Master Merlinus' granddaughter, I would have killed you right on the spot."

And then, the door behind her suddenly opened.

"Oh my, what is going on here?"

It was her mistress, and her eyes immediately darted towards me, who was still knocked down on the floor, glaring in complete anger and contempt.

"Did you knock her down, Lucentia?"

"I did, Milady. She tried to hit me so she could barge in."

"I see. Well, that's a shame."

She then walked towards me before kneeling down, offering her hand.

"Apologies. Lucentia can really be too overzealous at times."

I slapped her hand away.

"You know about Marina's kidnapping, don't you?" I yelled as I stood up on my own. "How could you not do anything about it, huh? And not only that, you sent Elun to stop me from rescuing her! Do you know just what—"

"Of course I do," she quickly interrupted me, standing back up and towering over me with that unnerving smile of hers. "In fact, all of the Council members knew, even your grandfather. Vera herself brought it up in one of our meetings, saying that she wanted Marina to be part of her family. And we all agreed to turn a blind eye on her actions."

"But that's—you can't just do that to someone!" I yelled back. "Do you know that Marina has lost her father and mother thanks to Vera and your stupid Council for just allowing this to happen? Don't we have a law that forbids kidnapping someone?"

"Oh, but we can." Her smile widened, making it even more unnerving. "We can do whatever we want to her. Or to any other weakling that is unfortunate enough to attract our attention. The law exists only for the weak and foolish. We stood above the law, my dear. We are the Sages of Mira, the inheritor of her wisdom. Haven't Merlinus taught you girl, that power is everything in this world?"

For the first time in my life, I felt repulsion towards Grandfather.

I always accepted his teachings, that strength was a virtue. Even if I wasn't that strong myself, I looked up to strong people, like Big Sis and him. Even if he was always strict and demanding towards me, I still held some fondness and admiration towards him. And I knew that Big Sis felt the same, knowing just how hard she tried to make him proud. It was the same with Marina. One of the reasons why I admired her so much was because she's strong.

And yet, only now I realized where that way of thinking could lead.

Grandfather let Vera kidnap Marina, possibly because he believed that if Marina wasn't strong enough to fight against her, then she deserved to be kidnapped. Grandfather also prevented me from chasing after her, only telling Elun to let me go if I could prove my power to her. And he most likely believed that if I wanted to save Marina that bad, I had to do it by my own strength. He wouldn't care in the slightest how much Marina and her family suffered from Vera's actions.

"You—you're monsters! All of you! Marina suffered so much because of you all! And yet… and yet, you don't even have a single speck of compassion towards her!" Before I knew it, tears started to fall out of my eyes as I clenched my fists.

"But that's wrong. I do have compassion for her. Now, come. Wipe those tears. We're going to meet with your friend."

"Compassion? What kind of compassion? It's far too late for you to decide to apologize! Marina lost her parents to Vera! Hey, don't just ignore me and run away!"

In the end, I had to follow her and the maid all the way to Marina's room.

"Look at her! She's like this because of you just allowing Vera to do what she wants!"

"She's just cold sleeping, right? Why haven't you woken her up? You should be able to do it, with that family spell of yours."

"W-wait, you know about the Flame Regeneration?"

"I see. So that information was right after all. Thank you for clarifying that," she replied with a small grin.

Oh crap! My hands immediately went to cover my mouth.

"...Wait, how did you get that information in the first place? Have you been spying on Grandfather? Hehe, you're in trouble now! Just wait until I tell him!" I grinned triumphantly.

"Oh no, I just had one of my people ask one of his servants. They didn't even know they were leaking quite the precious information. Just like you, my dear.

Hmph! I don't believe that for a second! I'm definitely telling Grandpa!

"Well, let me guess, you're afraid of accidentally killing her in the process, aren't you? I know how the cold spell works. And I know it would be incredibly difficult for a mage of your level to lift it without killing her in the process."

...She's right. I certainly could have tried. But what's the point, when she should wake up on her own if I would wait for a few days? Not to mention that the spell is nothing like her little brother's hypothermia. He would have definitely died if I didn't cure him. And so I did, thankfully not popping any of his blood vessels in the process.

But this is an intentionally casted cold sleep spell. I will be attempting to dispel a spell cast by a Grandmaster-level mage. It's too risky! There's no way I'll do it, especially when there's no good reason to do so!

"However, I can help you with that. I can stabilize her body with my healing water while you warm her back up as carefully as you could."

I looked at her in disbelief. Did she really just offer to help me heal Marina?

"Look, your friend here—she'll soon be declared as a criminal by the Council. She'll be blamed for Vera's death. Her punishment would be even graver than that necromancer girl who killed your big sister. This is my compassion. I want to give her a headstart, so that she can run away from this country before the Council officially gives that declaration."

"Y-you can't be—"

"Oh, I'm serious. And not just her either. Her entire family would be branded as criminals as well. The Council wouldn't care if they are foreigners. We can demand the king of Marchen for their extradition and he will obey, no questions asked. She will have to travel far away, to a country that won't kneel to the Magocracy. She still has a little sister back home, right? And a little brother as well, if I remember correctly."

"That's—that's not fair! Not only you let Vera kidnap her and murder her parents, you're not forcing her to run to some faraway country on her own?"

"The world is never fair, my dear," she replied with a smile. "This is simply the cards that are dealt to her."

"No!" I stamped my right foot to the floor. "I am not going to let you or the rest of the Council do this! I'm going to tell Grandpa to go against this stupid decision!"

"Feel free to do that. He'll probably ask you to fight him first though."

"Hmph, I'll do exactly that! But I still don't trust you enough and your water magic! You're part of the Council that will vote for her criminal status, right? You can just kill her right now, or even make me kill her accidentally just because you find it funny!"

"Oh please." She rolled her eyes. "I am not a sadist like Vera. I don't enjoy inflicting needless suffering to people. And I could've just killed her when you were asleep if I wanted her dead."

She then walked away to the corner of the room, before sighing, speaking with her back turned to me. "I sympathize with her a little. You see, I was nearly a victim of forced marriage myself, just like her. So I would rather have her live a happy life."

"Then you should've stopped this from happening in the first place!" I shouted.

She turned back to face me with an uncharastically glum expression. "Well, as a Council member, I can't do that. And I can't tell you why unfortunately. If you really want to know, confront your Grandfather about it."

"Then at the very least don't make her a criminal!"

"Just my vote wouldn't be enough."

My body shook. My anger once again was reaching its boiling point.

"...I'm sick of it. I'm sick of everyone hiding everything from me."

"Then you know what to do. That old coot will only listen to power."

"I promise. I promise I'll make him tell everything, even if I have to fight him for it! And I'll make him and the rest of the Council members change their minds as well!"

"Good girl." She patted my head through the hat. "Merlinus would be happy to hear that for sure."

In the end, I decided not to take on her offer. I still couldn't trust her fully in the end.

She and her maid left soon after, telling that I and Marina would be welcome to take anything left in the house. So she probably already got the grimoires that she wanted. She also promised me that she would try to delay the announcement of Marina's bounty as much as she could.

As for myself, I started training my magic right away.

Fine. Grandpa wanted strength? I'll show him strength. Maybe I won't be able to beat him right away. Maybe Marina would have to flee for a time. But I promise her that one day, she will be welcome once again in the Magocracy. She and her entire family.

I didn't know what happened to her little brother. He never returned. I just hoped that he would be wise enough to realize that the Magocracy would be after him as well.

I just hope that Marina will recover soon. In the meantime, I'll gather up all the valuables and magic books I reckon she can use for her journey. Vera's servants never returned, as well as her grandson. They probably have realized Vera has fallen, and thus they decide to flee instead.

Good. Because if I see Thomas, I'll burn him with my flames until he begs for mercy. Only after he regrets what he's done to Marina, then I'll take his life.. He no longer has his grandma to protect him after all.

I never killed anyone before, and I'm perfectly fine with him being the first.

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