Life before Academy (1)

Ten Years later

(Klaus POV)

Ten years passed by since I had been reincarnated into this world. Since then I learned a lot of things about this world, about who am I.

The world I'm currently residing in is called Asdir. No one truly knows how big this world is. They are six continents currently known. The one I located is the most powerful one, which everyone refers to as the central continent.

I believe that the name was more political than geographical. No one knows the entire world, so no way one could say it is the central continent.

There are many kingdoms, empires, tribes, federations, and even republics that exist in this world. The central continent's main players are the Kale Republic, Tyke Federation, and Gerret Empire. I belong to Gerret Empire.

My father Elloden Emsier, Archduke of Emsier Archduchy. There are two more archduchies beside ours. At first, I believed this was done on purpose. Though for what purpose this was done evaded me.

I later learned that Archduchies were former kingdoms that merged with the empire without a clash.

Enough about politics and other unrelated things.

Coming to my family, I already mentioned my father. As an Archduke he can command a large army as commander during wars. He is actually famous for it. Though he is a 6-star swordsman, he is renowned for his excellent battle command.

My mother, Tela Emsier, is a magician, though from what I heard she is only a 3-star but from my point of view she is awesome. Unlike my father who goes out to war or to hunt monsters or bandits in the territory, my mother has other obligations.

I'm the fourth child out of the five children in the household. All my elder siblings are brothers, and the fifth is a sister. From what I listened accidentally, my parents wanted a girl after two sons but two more of us came before our sister arrived.

When I was born, I got fascinated by magic but I know what this new life could entail. So I started to prepare myself.

From the time I could read, I spent most of my time in the castle's library. There are a lot of books and from that, I got an idea for the future. Though I wasn't sure much about the idea, for now, I can experiment with that later.

I learned geography, especially about the empire. I only glanced at others as they aren't important for now.

I read about the state of the empire and the way the world lives. What is available out there and what isn't?

These are important as I decided to make my living as a merchant. This decision came after I deeply contemplated my future.

After we grow, my first brother Jaden would inherit the title and lands. Even if something happens to him, it goes to my second brother Haden.

It is unlikely for a fourth son to inherit the title unless our father decides to make a fair competition or something along those lines. Inheritance always causes trouble. Though I don't sense any problems as of now, there is always a chance of one rising in the future.

Anyhow, I decided to make my own path in life. From every light novel I read, the MC would always face too many troubles and in many stories, there are many deaths involved.

I don't know if I'm the protagonist. If I'm, troubles will find their way to me. Even if I'm not, everyone would have their share of troubles.

I need to become strong, strong enough so that troubles won't trouble me. I need to keep my family together. Though I want to enjoy my second chance at life, I have a feeling that it won't be easy. The only way to have such a life is to become strong but at the same time be out of the spotlight.

In order to live a good life, I need to be strong, wealthy, and be an unknown.

The first two parts are easy, while the third is pretty problematic.

As a son of Archduke, I can learn a lot of things about how to proceed in life. I have access to many things that make me strong before I had to go to the academy.

Oh, ya, when people of empire reach fifteen, they can go through the Ceremony of Heavens. This is what the locals call the ritual through which one is gifted some powers. These can attend an academy when they reach sixteen.

At first, I thought that people would get a gamer-type interface and such when I first heard about the event. My dreams crashed down when I learned it is only a process where one can learn what path they can take and how high their talent is.

There are only two paths, one is a Knight and the other is Mage. This is too primitive. It doesn't even tell the element of a mage or the weapon of choice for a Knight.

Other professions like blacksmith, alchemy, etc... are available to dabble for anyone who successfully awakened. Others can dabble too but they are too costly for them to even lay a finger on them. They can only choose the lesser costly ones such as tailoring, leathering, butchering, etc...

From what I see, this world is not developed much either by my old world's technological standards or by magical standards.

As I chose to become stronger and wealthy, and more importantly to remain unknown, I chose to become a merchant.

A successful merchant would have a lot of wealth and also information about various items that can improve one's strength. The problem here is as a merchant I had to come in contact with many people, which would only spread my name further.

I only way to remain unknown is to show them that I'm weak. No one expects a merchant to be strong in the first place. I need to create and sell items that wouldn't appear as items of strength.

For the first business, I have a perfect set-up, food. The food here tastes awful. It tastes like... I don't have a clue to describe it. Only the monster meat tastes good, so I would concentrate on commoner foods. Though the prices would be low, commoners occupy a majority of the population.

This would be a gold mine but first I need some investment and I need to speak with my father.