Chapter 33.3 A Walk in the City

Yeah, those idiots got a lot of valuable jewelry and money. "I carry all my stuff with me," huh? It's even easier than I thought. Mages and simpletons are more different than I thought, though if we take the knowledge of magicians' energy highways, denser auras, and more layers as a basis, the difference is obvious.

Greater energy saturation of the body causes certain improvements, directed mutations, like better memory in mages, natural protection of the mind, improved metabolism, slightly larger blood volume.

 And I haven't studied anything in detail yet, just listing the common knowledge. So logical, and I didn't get there — I needed an incentive. By the way, another characteristic of magicians — eccentricity — all magicians are a little "off", at least in some way. This is also an accepted fact.

In short, it turned out to be quite easy to fix the mind of a simpleton, set the mind on an "idea-fix", accompany it with a context of small details and clarifications, and everything is ready.

Yes, I even liked it! And the style is funnier than any superheroes: no one killed, no torture, and in the crimes of the bandits will confess "by themselves" and "sincerely", and checks will confirm the absence of hypnosis and drugs — that is, the comrades villains will be fully justified ...

 Well, and if somehow get away with it, then the deep tab will work, more rigid. The target will write a full confession, send it to the prosecutor and kill himself. Creepy, right? And I think so: a skilled magician can twist even a mage's brain to create a whole new personality, not to mention a simpleton.

Now I begin to understand why marriages between mages and simpletons are frowned upon: if a weak influence on a mage's mind brings only a weak idea/thought, then a simpleton will take it as his firm decision and act upon it. Let's imagine the situation: Someone influences the wife, she starts to hate magic, kills the child mage, attacks the husband, he wins, but is morally trampled and doesn't want to live anymore. Fun?

While I was thinking about all that, I had time for a complete wardrobe change. And no, I didn't forget the stuff I bought on the road with my mom. The thing is, all the clothes were kept by my mother, and when we stayed in Kyoto, I was not given any clothes other than the traditional ones. They were definitely up to something. Along the way, I sent four more naked people to the nearest police station to confess their sins, shook off three young prostitutes who reeked of depravity and immorality, and castrated a pedophile.

What fun these big cities are! It was an interesting walk, instructive, if I may say so. For example, I'm not holding back my magic now, and I can feel the people around me. No, empathy is too terrible a gift, more like a curse. Why is that? The thing is, magic and magical abilities are only studied by magic users, and only crumbs of knowledge are leaked to ordinary people.

So they have a lot of misconceptions that various gifts of narrow specialization, like empathy, are something super useful. In fact, the difference between a gift and a skill is that a gift is just there, it's ALWAYS there, it doesn't let you rest, you can't brush it off, "turn it off," and so on.

Empathic magicians seldom choose other than three paths: suicide, "giving up the gift", and hermitage. I won't dwell on that. A skill, on the other hand, is a specific magical ability that can be learned, trained, and turned on and off. In the case of Hoshino, as I was told by Junko-sensei, this is not the case.

Our clan was born a VERY long time ago, back when humans were free to mate with non-humans, and marrying an ayakashi or magical werewolf was not as rare as many people believe today.

The women alone were beautiful, statuesque, and sexy to the point of insanity, especially compared to ordinary Japanese women, even if they had horns. Do not confuse these beauties with ten-foot mountains of muscle, for they belong to other subspecies, and they are really close to the infernal demons — bloodthirsty maniacs.

So who of the mystical beings trampled in the genealogy of Hoshino — it is not known, but in our nature clearly expressed animal characteristics: sight, smell, and perception of moods, states, such as friendliness, fear, anger, and so on, more subtle. But if the above is present from birth, and not particularly noticeable, then the use of magic "accelerates" all the processes to the level where the thought/desire, directed attention activates the "scanner", and Hoshino begins to easily read the intentions, and not only.

Here I am walking down the street and feel many people around me. But my attention is drawn to a man in a business suit, stern and important. He is approaching a building, near which stands a schoolgirl in the uniform of some school. The girl looks quite ordinary, clacking a flip phone with hanging things.

It seems to be nothing special, but if you listen to the emotional background, everything falls into place: the man reeks of lust and impatience, the girl reeks of boredom and a weak thirst for profit. It all makes sense, doesn't it?

That's what I think. The thing is, I've seen scenes like this a dozen times. It makes me think. In my previous life, when I graduated from high school, I knew that there were only three prostitutes in our stream, and even then, two of them were doing it out of necessity, and the third was just a nymphomaniac. And that's out of five classes of twenty-eight to thirty-one people. An indicator.

But now I'm going to a certain place. If at the beginning I just wanted to have fun and, what's more, to get a cleaner girl, now, having learned something from the head of the "leader" of the idiots, I have a goal.

And it's behind the building on the corner. It's an American-style bar in a semi-basement, and it's owned by a big guy. I saw a lot of interesting things in my memory, including the appearance of the owner — a pumped-up, brown-colored boogeyman and his three "brothers". In addition to the four regulars, the bar is staffed by immigrants, mostly Americans, though there is a Thai, a red-haired Brit, and a couple of giant Maoris.