WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

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Chapter 252

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I was a mage. Naturally, I never wanted to let go of anything that fell into my hands. You could call it possessiveness.

That was why I had come to the Magical Power Council to fix Isabella. I could not just sit and watch the talent I had acquired in her disappear.

However, everything I was doing now was not simply for Isabella's sake. If anything, it was more for mine.

If I completed Isabella, I would be able to move on to the next stage. I felt that instinctively, which was why I was willing to deceive others to keep moving forward.

Then why was this feeling leading me? It was probably because of Isabella's uniqueness. I quietly thought about life.

First, a central soul was born. Then came the division into a body to contain it and a mind to move the soul. That was the principle by which life was created. In that sense, the mind sometimes felt like a byproduct of the soul.

Therefore, no matter what kind of life one created, making the soul first was the easiest and surest method. Had I not planted a soul Sapling first before preparing a body for it?

But I could not use that method for Isabella. Her soul was firmly bound by her contract with Domitian.

No matter how perfectly I refined her soul, she would never escape Domitian's clutches. That was why, in remaking Isabella, I had centered the process not on her soul, but on her mind.

It was not so much my choice as an unavoidable result of the external pressure called Domitian. Still, that did not mean I lacked faith in my choice.

I believed in Isabella's talent and strength. I had seen with my own eyes how her mind endured despite her soul collapsing and burning for countless years.

That was why I made the patchwork tree. It was a false tree made by grafting together tree branches, something that could not even become a soul.

It was very different in nature from the soul Saplings I had made until now.

Soul Saplings also used tree branches as materials, just like the patchwork tree. But instead of grafting, they chose unification. I mixed tree branches with fragments of my soul and sought to make them become one through conflict.

The soul Sapling created that way became a complete whole and took root in my foundation. It already contained something that could be called its own soul.

If I tried to plant that inside Isabella, a powerful rejection would surely occur. Even without a soul, Isabella's mind already possessed enough individuality.

What Isabella needed was not a complete soul, but an ambiguous mass that her mind could take control of. That was the patchwork tree I had created.

As Isabella's soul crumbled, the patchwork tree began replacing the place her soul should have filled.

And Isabella's strong mind succeeded in refining it into a convincing vessel that could contain her. Instead of the existing flow of life rooted in the soul, she had created the possibility of new life.

But there was a problem. As things stood, Isabella only held that possibility. She had not created a new soul. That was why her tree was still unstable.

That was not Isabella's problem. It was a problem with the materials.

A soul could be called a single painting. Different flows were painted onto a canvas, each containing its own individuality. For mages, that individuality became even more distinct through the tree they carried.

From that perspective, Isabella's patchwork tree was merely imitating a soul by gluing together pieces from different paintings.

To create a soul, Isabella had to paint a new picture over it. But whenever she tried to add new paint, the pieces that already held their own colors naturally resisted.

No matter how strong Isabella's mind was, it was impossible to unite a mass of soul fragments like the patchwork tree. It was remarkable enough that she could keep it from exploding.

So if I could help Isabella solve her problem, if I succeeded in giving her a new soul, she would possess life once more.

A life based on the mind, unlike anything seen before. And that would certainly become the foundation for growing my unique magic, Fake Life.

That was why I decided that the solution would be to create an environment where Isabella could easily form a soul. The solution was to bleach her patchwork tree completely.

If the canvas was too dirty to paint over, then all I had to do was wash it clean. Isabella would surely be able to paint on it much more easily afterward.

I had come to the Magical Power Council to find such a method. My own knowledge was not enough to safely bleach a tree. The Council, which knew more about magical power than anyone else, might have an answer.

And the Magical Power Council had not betrayed my expectations. I quietly recalled when I had first arrived here.

After reaching the Magical Power Council with Merov, the first thing I did was learn about its structure.

It did not take long to learn how the Council operated. As Merov had promised, everyone who set foot on this mountain treated me, a guest, with considerable respect.

The Council's structure was fairly ordinary. There were said to be around two hundred council members in total. Like Merov, they were all upper-floor mages who had surpassed the 7th floor.

And just as Merov had brought me here, they gathered on the mountain every fifty years to share the knowledge they had brought. Based on that, they decided the direction the mountain would take.

The person who brought the most valuable thing would determine the mountain's course for the next forty-nine years and inherit a portion of the mountain's magical power.

Considering the power this mountain possessed, it was impossible not to realize what a precious opportunity that was.

Everyone must have had their own thoughts and caused countless conflicts. But I did not care much about those disputes. I had come here only to study the knowledge piled up inside.

So I headed to the Council library at the heart of the main tower. Then I began greedily taking in the knowledge stored there.

The knowledge in the library was cheaper than I expected. There were countless things that would have cost more than ten times as many points through the Trading Company.

The knowledge Merov had said would help me was surely the knowledge in this library. As I looked through countless books, I accumulated knowledge.

Then, at some point, I found a possibility.

It concerned magical power curses.

In some regions, magical power curses were also called severed veins. They referred to bodies that were born unable to contain magical power. Even if magical power was forcibly injected into them, their bodies could not accept it.

They were called curses because nobody knew who would be born with one. It was a fate that even great families could not avoid.

Of course, since they were called curses, treating them was possible. But because there were so many varieties, finding the proper treatment was difficult.

That was why magical power curses were rarely seen within the university, where mages were everywhere. Those marked by such curses could not become mages in the first place.

I became interested in magical power curses because, in the library, I found records of attempts to process them into forms of magic.

For example, one could directly carve the flow of a curse into a mage's tree and corrupt its magical power. It was quite a plausible hypothesis, but I could not find a completed spell.

They had probably given up halfway through creating it. Naturally. Completing a spell required countless repeated experiments, and who would want to carve curses into their own tree?

Nobody but a madman would try it.

But to others, I was that kind of madman. And to me, this magic was quite appealing.

If I could combine and layer these magical power curses, I might be able to decide the direction of corruption myself. I could turn poison into medicine.

So I began trying to turn magical power curses into spells.

Turning curses into magic was fairly easy. The Council had accumulated materials about magical power, and information about magical power curses was easy to find.

All I had to do was conduct enough experiments and examine the spell's stability. So I pulled out one of my tree branches, carved the curse's flow into it, and observed the process as it became contaminated.

Six months passed after I arrived at the Magical Power Council. By the end of that time, I had created a spell.

I glanced at Isabella. She stood quietly by the door, met my eyes, and gave me a gentle smile.

I gave her a slight nod, then concentrated magical power and focused my mind on my connection with her. Following that connection into her inner world, I saw a snake coiled around her patchwork tree.

It was a huge serpent covered in black scales etched with magic circles. Sensing my will, it quietly met my eyes. I could almost feel the heavy presence of curses flowing through its body.

There are still no problems.

I nodded and fed it more magical power. It flicked its tongue and swallowed my magical power.

That was the spell I had created, the Snake of Curses. As its name suggested, it was a creature formed by weaving together the various magical power curses I had created into spells, using them as scales.

Many magical power curses flowed through the Snake of Curses. If it could bite a tree directly, even a fairly capable mage would surely be unable to endure it.

But it was a failure.

I let out a soft sigh and rubbed my forehead.

Although the Snake of Curses held many magical power curses, it was still not enough to bleach Isabella's tree.

Of course, the snake itself could still be considered a sufficient achievement. It was currently coiled around Isabella's tree, using the curse flows in its body to prevent the patchwork tree from expanding.

If it bound the tree like this, the tree might endure for quite a long time.

But it was only enduring. It had not created a soul. It was a kind of seal. As long as Isabella was bound by that snake, she could no longer grow.

What meaning was there in binding someone who dreamed of becoming a mage? A mage who could not advance was no different from a corpse.

Besides, what I wanted was to create life born from the mind. To do that, it was not enough to stop at sealing her. I needed to spread a perfect curse throughout her tree.

So I needed to obtain more magical power curses and turn them into spells. But there was a problem. I could no longer find books about magical power curses in the Council library where I had been staying.

If I could not find more information even in the Council, which possessed the most knowledge about magical power, then I would naturally not find such high-level information outside.

What should I do?

With that concern in mind, I continued visiting the library. I had succeeded in stopping Isabella's collapse for now, so I went there to acquire more varied knowledge.

Then, at some point, I noticed something strange.

There was knowledge that did not enter the library.

There were guests on this mountain besides me. They had been brought by other council members, and they surely carried new knowledge unknown to the Council, just as I did.

So I put some effort into building connections with them. Being invited to a place like this meant they had something special about them. It was always pleasant to form connections with people who had promising futures.

But while talking with them, I heard something strange.

They said that while visiting the library, they had found books containing information about themselves.

The moment I heard that, I could not help but freeze. I had never found a book containing information about me.

After hearing that, I even released puppets and searched the entire library, but the materials Merov had investigated about me were nowhere to be found.

That could only mean one thing.

There were things that guests like us were not allowed to see. Knowledge the Council itself considered precious.

There would surely be knowledge about magical power curses among it. The moment I realized that, I approached Merov and asked about the hidden knowledge.

Merov told me that there was knowledge only council members could access. He had probably never intended to hide it. He surely never imagined that someone only on the third floor would covet the knowledge of people from the upper floors.

But that was exactly the knowledge I needed. So I tried to obtain information about magical power curses through Merov.

Fortunately, Merov readily accepted my request. He did use it as an excuse to squeeze an enormous number of points out of me, though. He charged more than five million points for a single book.

When I frowned at the ridiculous price, Merov said it could not be helped. Even council members could not borrow higher-level books freely. They had to pay a certain amount of contribution to obtain them.

Still, the new curse I obtained contained rather satisfying information.

The magical power curses I had previously made into spells had been nothing more than one-dimensional magic circles. But this new magical power curse, called Blood-Forged Vessel, could be constructed beyond two dimensions and into a three-dimensional form.

When I carved that complex spell into the Snake of Curses, its size nearly doubled.

That was the result I had achieved by last month.

It was a spell I could hardly believe I had completed in only nine months. But at the same time, I clearly realized that this alone had limits.

I might have squeezed plenty of points out of Domitian, but I could not keep paying such enormous prices. Even if I spent every point I had, I would surely only be able to buy a few books.

So I needed to change my way of thinking.

The reason Merov could squeeze so many points out of me was because I was in the weaker position. Then all I had to do was become the one with the upper hand.

Instead of going to them with points in hand, I would make them come to me carrying information. That was the only way to obtain more things in the little time I had left.

And my attempt had been very successful.

I let out a quiet laugh as I recalled those who had contacted me after the last lecture.

Quite a few council members had contacted me as well. They said they would attend the lecture carrying books containing the knowledge I wanted. I looked at the books piled in one corner of the workshop and nodded in satisfaction.

But since I had made things this big, there was one problem.

What was I supposed to talk about in next week's lecture?

The council members had paid the cost without causing a scene partly because of what I had done so far, and partly because Professor Irian had started supporting me rather than merely treating me as a toy.

They were quietly watching their step because they did not know what might happen if they got greedy. But even if they were being cautious now, they would surely raise a huge fuss if I could not show them something convincing next week.

Even the Professor would not be able to stop their anger. I had brought this upon myself. I might even become a debtor because of it.

But the reason I had made such a big move was because I had something to rely on.

The thing that had bothered me most while researching magical power curses was that I could not obtain test subjects besides Isabella.

Magical power curses differed from person to person. Naturally, I needed to examine their progression carefully across many samples.

But Isabella was the only sample I had. Naturally, constructing spells became slower, and my research often reached dead ends.

Then there was only one way to solve that problem.

I needed more samples.

And if I presented those samples next week, I could transform them into convincing evidence for the Artificial Tree Project. That was why I was pretending to be such an enthusiastic genius mage.

I sat calmly and waited for time to pass.

Before long, someone lightly knocked on the workshop door.

Isabella, who had been waiting beforehand, approached the door and released its seal. When the door opened, I saw a man who looked quite frail standing outside.

“This way, please.”

Isabella smiled gently and led him inside. Following her guidance, he entered and began looking around my workshop with curiosity.

For a mage, that was a great discourtesy. No mage liked having someone observe the inside of their workshop.

But there was no need to be angry at that man.

He was not a mage.

I looked over the body of a weed without even a speck of magical power and gave him a bright smile.

“Thank you for coming.”

I bowed deeply toward the man, who sat carefully in front of me. It felt a little strange. This was the first time I had bowed my head to a weed since becoming a mage.

But before being a mage, this was the courtesy I should show as a citizen of the Empire.

The man waved his hand lightly and smiled.

“Please speak comfortably. I am not a mage, and I am only a twenty-year-old brat.”

“Ha ha, no. How could I possibly speak casually to Your Highness, the Imperial Prince?”

I quietly met the eyes of the man, who wore a gentle smile. Inside his golden eyes, strange magic circles shimmered.

They were a token only those of the Imperial family could possess.

This man was the sample I was after.

If he became my sample, the other council members would surely not dare raise objections.

And since even an Imperial Prince was participating in the project, more people would flock to hear the lecture.

Since I was doing this anyway, I intended to make the entire Council burn with excitement.

If I succeeded in planting a tree in this man in the end, would that not be proof of the Artificial Tree Project?

I could also build a connection with an Imperial Prince.

From that perspective, it was a plan that benefited me, the man, and the Council all at once.

Of course, that was only if it succeeded.

I smiled and stroked my chin.

The greatest risk was not taking risks.

If I kept pushing until it worked, results would surely come eventually.

So I was certain to succeed.

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