WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Malfoid
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◈ I Don't Need a Family ◈
Episode 5
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It was not as though Vivette Ashwilt had been unable to handle mana from the start.
When she was first born, she had possessed a healthy mana heart and undeniable magical talent inherited from both parents.
Her father was the next head of the renowned magical Ashwilt family. Her mother was also a genius born with a powerful magical bloodline.
The chances of a child without magical ability being born to two outstanding mages were very low.
And true to that belief, their first child, Gillian, had been born with qualities more than worthy of an heir. Vivette, born three years later, had been exceptional as well.
Her mana heart had now been destroyed, making measurement impossible, but another indicator offered a glimpse of her magical potential.
Magic resistance. The ability to resist all forms of harmful mana.
Magic resistance was innate. Unlike the quantity or purity of one's mana, it was extraordinarily difficult to acquire through effort. That made it an enviable quality when it was high.
Generally, magic resistance was proportional to one's other magical abilities. Someone whose resistance was low compared to their mana would be easily injured.
And Vivette's magic resistance had been incomparable even to Gillian's.
'That was why people even said Vivette should be named heir instead of Gillian when she was a baby.'
If not for that accident.
In Erenston, a city famous for magic, it was customary for mage babies to receive a baptism from another mage around the time they began to walk.
The mage would infuse the baby's body with their sacred mana. Like a blessing, it was a commemorative rite that neither harmed the child nor held any great significance.
On Vivette's third birthday, a female relative had taken on the task.
Then an accident occurred during the baptism that should have ended without incident.
“Waaah!”
The baby screamed in agony. The panicked woman shrieked hysterically in the middle of it all.
“This isn't my fault! Th-that child couldn't accept my mana because she lacks talent!”
The baby's fragile mana heart was utterly ruined before anyone could do anything, and she was diagnosed as unable to use magic for the rest of her life.
Vivette's mother collapsed from the shock and did not live much longer.
From then on, Vivette became the family's burden.
Was that why Duke Ashwilt shunned his daughter so much? Because his wife had fallen ill and died because of Vivette?
I could understand why Vivette had become so obsessed with magic, too. The mother who had never acknowledged her had died.
“So there is supposedly a mana heart somewhere in this body...”
Maybe because it had been destroyed, I could feel nothing.
Compared to an actual heart, it was complete necrosis. Recovery was impossible now, so it was right to let go.
“My lady, then you won't be going to the Mage Tower treatment room anymore?”
“No. I've passed my twentieth birthday, so there probably isn't anything more they can do either.”
“But we received a letter from the Mage Tower.”
“What?”
“They say a new healer wants to try treating you with a new technique...”
“Give it to me.”
I snatched the letter from Lola.
“M-my lady! There must still be hope, right? If the head of the treatment room is so certain...!”
Lola's fingertips trembled as tears welled in her eyes.
Regardless, I merely narrowed my eyes and read through the ridiculous nonsense they had written.
“My lady, hurry! Go get treated!”
“No. I'm not going.”
“Pardon?”
For seventeen years, they had collected treatment fees, research costs, and investment money every month under the pretense of treating Vivette.
Yet there had not been a single meaningful improvement.
Whenever the test results came out, the Duke became angry, and the whole household had to walk on eggshells.
I understood why he had not even been curious about the final test results. He had always been disappointed.
Great expectations always brought even greater disappointment, and the Duke was deeply displeased at feeling he had received nothing in return.
In the end, it was Vivette, not the Mage Tower, who had to watch her step around his anger.
Judging by the circumstances, the Mage Tower's healers were quacks. Spending seventeen years on any treatment meant to improve a condition rather than simply preserve life was absurd.
It was like refusing amputation because you believed a rotten limb would come back to life.
'Didn't they just cling to a treatment with no results to squeeze money out of the Duke?'
There were doctors like that sometimes.
In theory, restoring an already destroyed mana heart was impossible. There was no denying that after the age of twenty.
Even if desperation had made him easy to fool until now, the Duke would not stand by if the Mage Tower kept being showered with money.
I'd get scolded for being stupid, things would sour with the Mage Tower, and...
'The Duke, head of the Ashwilt family, cannot fall out with the Mage Tower.'
They were both powerful forces, so the repercussions would be immense. Not only in Erenston, but in other regions as well.
If I wanted to live doing everything I wanted, the world needed to stay peaceful. I would pass on needless conflict.
'Still, those Mage Tower people have some nerve. They knew their own capabilities were lacking, yet they kept taking someone else's money.'
Every now and then, they would tempt the Duke with plausible words and obtain additional funding.
Seeing that, perhaps Duke Ashwilt was secretly a bit of a patsy.
'Because it's about his daughter... perhaps.'
But remembering how he had looked down on the daughter who could not recover because she had failed to be worth the money, my sympathy vanished. I shook the thought away.
“Yeah, I'm not going. Did they think I'd let them take advantage of me forever?”
The letter from the Mage Tower crumpled in an arc before landing in the distant fireplace.
For the next three days, the Mage Tower could not bring itself to abandon such a major source of income.
“My lady, is this really all right? Letters from the Mage Tower have been arriving for three days straight, trying to persuade you...”
“Burn them, Lola.”
“They say timing is important when treating a mana heart!”
And here came another patsy.
Listen, Lola. Since childhood, I had undergone every treatment imaginable. Physical therapy and occupational therapy were the basics, followed by aquatic therapy, horseback riding therapy, even robot therapy.
But illnesses that modern medicine could not cure simply could not be cured. Some illnesses could be overcome with effort, while others would not improve no matter what you did.
I had only realized that at the end of my life, after staking my family's lives on it.
'Vivette's condition is one that cannot be cured.'
And my life would not be ruined just because I could not handle magic. I could be perfectly happy, so why would I do something so pointless?
Even though I had clearly stated that I would not go,
“My lady, your assigned healer wishes to see you.”
Someone from the Mage Tower came in person.
Honestly, I was a little surprised. They were truly persistent.
“It wouldn't be polite to just send him away, would it?”
“What are you saying, my lady? Go see him, quickly!”
Perhaps Lola thought I might change my mind, because her face brightened.
“Ah, it has been a long time, Lady Vivette.”
“Have you been well, too, Teacher?”
“I am always healthy. Um, as for you, my lady... Oh dear. You have grown noticeably thinner.”
I snorted inwardly. Thinner, my foot. I was living more happily than the original Vivette ever had.
Still, I carefully concealed my thoughts and gave a suitable response.
“What brings you all the way to our home? Weren't you soooo busy that you said you could not even provide home visits?”
They really had been so busy.
They would roughly put Vivette inside a chamber said to emit beneficial mana, then all leave together to conduct their research.
They had not treated her with care, either. Even as she felt them growing neglectful, Vivette had no choice but to cling to the Mage Tower.
Her twentieth birthday had been drawing closer each day.
“Well, something happened.”
“Something?”
“Yes. The Mage Tower's treatment research laboratory has been thrown into an uproar.”
Could it be because they had lost their funding? But would they say that so openly in front of me?
“We do not know precisely when, but after the day you came to have your mana heart examined, one of the most important medicines in our laboratory disappeared.”
“What?”
A medicine disappeared?
“As you know, the Mage Tower has strict security at multiple levels. It is structured so that a thief could never enter.”
“And?”
“My apologies. We do not mean to suspect you, my lady, but we are investigating all recent visitors.”
“I see. I don't know anything about it... I'm sorry I can't be of help.”
“Not at all.”
Contrary to my image of him as a greedy opportunist, the Mage Tower representative looked dejected, his shoulders slumped. He even seemed desperate as he asked on the off chance.
Curiosity quietly rose in me, and I asked.
“What kind of medicine is it? Is it important?”
If the treatment room was searching so hard for it, it must be extremely important. Was someone's life at stake?
Losing such a medicine would be terrible.
When I looked at him anxiously, the Mage Tower representative answered awkwardly.
“It is... poison.”
“What?”
“An extremely potent poison. Even one drop would stop an ordinary person's breathing. A mage would surely be overwhelmed by nausea merely from approaching it and run away instinctively...”
As he spoke, his gaze subtly turned toward me. Among the Mage Tower's visitors, Vivette was one of the few who was not a mage.
Almost the only person who could touch that ominous vial without hesitation.
'Is that person suspecting me right now?'
His attitude made my head throb.
Then, suddenly, a memory that had not been there until moments ago flashed through my mind.
Vivette's final memory.
The day she had been declared to have permanent damage to her mana heart.
“Your mana heart will not be able to recover in the future, either, my lady.”
The Mage Tower staff glanced at Vivette as she sat down heavily, dazed, then left the laboratory to give her some time.
Left alone, Vivette felt as though she had been driven to the edge of a cliff. But perhaps falling from that cliff would be better. If she could not become a mage, then what was the point?
“If I could only become a mage, I would do anything. Truly, anything...”
Then a small vial caught Vivette's eye.
“...If it is a potion stored in the Mage Tower laboratory, it must contain powerful mana, right? If I drink it, perhaps mana will build up in my body, too.”
It was an absurd assumption. But Vivette was that desperate.
She knew Mage Tower potions were substances powerful enough to take a life with the slightest mistake, but she wanted to regain her magical ability no matter what risk she had to endure.
Was she meant to repeat the life she had lived forever?
She no longer had the confidence to endure it. She did not want to live that way for even one more day.
'It would be better to die than live without being a mage.'
After the Duke had come and left in a fury, Vivette had thought for a moment.
Perhaps Father would become a little kinder if she could use magic.
The instant that thought reached her, Vivette reflexively swallowed the potion she had hidden in her clothes in one gulp.
That was Vivette's final memory.
'...I'm doomed.'
Vivette really had stolen a potion from the Mage Tower.
“Senior, in here...”
“I understand.”
When the subordinate who had been standing behind him without moving whispered, he nodded.
“We have troubled you greatly, my lady. Since you do not know anything, we will take our leave. You appear to be low on strength, so we will see you again later. Please visit the Mage Tower.”
'Phew.'
It looked like they were simply leaving. I secretly sighed in relief. I had been nervous they might catch me.
Lola raised a fist toward their retreating backs.
“Those rotten Mage Tower bastards! How dare they spy on the Ashwilt estate?”
“Spy? What are you talking about?”
“Didn't you notice, my lady? Those people were searching for mana flowing from our estate.”
“You saw the man standing behind the healer like decoration earlier, didn't you?” Lola huffed.
“They dared to do that in the Ashwilt family estate?”
I could not use magic, so I had failed to notice, but all the mage servants must have noticed and been offended.
Wouldn't word reach Duke Ashwilt as soon as he returned from work?
No! It was as if I could hear the sound of peace shattering into pieces.
“They were not openly spying. I am probably the only one who noticed, since I was in the same room. It seemed as though they were only trying to determine whether... enormous mana existed nearby.”
“Really?”
“Yes. I suppose the poison they are looking for emits an enormous amount of mana. Is that why they said even one drop could kill someone?”
...But Vivette had drunk all of it and lived. At the very least, her body had remained intact.
'Could that be...'
Magic resistance. The ability to resist all types of external mana.
If Vivette had been born with magic resistance at the highest level in history, perhaps she had somehow survived even after drinking the poison?
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