Genius Wizard Conceals His Origins

Due to Lena’s habit of always focusing on paperwork at her desk, her eyesight isn’t very good.

So normally, she shouldn’t have been able to recognize an acquaintance just from seeing a person’s silhouette from two hundred feet away.

But this case was an exception.

The build and attire were familiar, and above all, that ash-gray hair swaying in the wind.

“…Huh?”

“I don’t want to disturb that. Tsk, such an indecisive guy.”

“Huh?”

It was undoubtedly Eugene.

Ignoring the man’s grumbling, Lena’s mouth gaped open.

She immediately hid herself in the nearby bushes.

Despite achieving her initial goal of ‘checking how Eugene is doing in the lab,’ she felt perplexed rather than satisfied.

Eugene and the female student sitting side by side on the bench. She never imagined she’d suddenly witness such a scene.

Was her previous guess correct? [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

Could that female student be the person Eugene has feelings for?

The probability seemed high. It wasn’t that she had the skill to discern the relationship between a man and a woman from 200 feet away, but simply because she could see the female student laughing with her shoulders shaking.

She was confused.

Lena herself didn’t know what expression to make. It was an unsettling feeling.

While experiencing emotions difficult to describe as simple likes or dislikes, the man who had been standing with his arms crossed, openly observing the bench, spoke.

“They’re frustrating, aren’t they? Don’t you think?”

“Why are you asking me that…”

“Hmm. Besides, there’s no reason to come like this for paper-related matters when you could officially visit the lab or school. What’s your name, lost one?”

Lena was peeking at Eugene’s figure with her head slightly out.

Focusing on her sight, she had little room to engage in conversation with the man.

So, she answered carelessly. 

“Lena Oslo.”

The man showed a slight hint of surprise.

“Oslo?”

“Yes. Be quiet for a moment.”

She closed her mouth and focused more.

She looked at the bench.

Eugene’s posture was quite stiff, but the female student’s wasn’t.

She sat demurely with her knees together, leaning her upper body slightly towards Eugene.

After talking quietly for a while, the two engaged in some light hand play and then…

Whoosh.

Eugene suddenly turned his head and looked this way.

It wasn’t clear if it was just a coincidence or if their eyes had met. The only certain thing was that Lena was inwardly terrified.

Soon after, Lena became even more terrified.

Eugene, who had stood up from the bench, was striding towards her.

Room 402 of Research Building 3.

People passing by often say it’s a place that feels chilly even in broad daylight, but that’s not always the case.

When Room 401 is empty, Room 402 is quite lively.

However, that liveliness is still cold by undergraduate standards.

Johannes smiled slightly and spoke.

“Hahaha. You’re getting ten inquiry letters about your paper every day?”

“I expected it, but it’s more than I thought.” [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

“That must be tough. Are you managing to reply?”

“Yes.”

“Good. When the ‘Magic Studies Yearbook’ is published, you might even have to stand on the podium to explain your paper directly. But I’m not too worried about you, Eugene. There’s a short vacation after the summer semester ends, so hang in there for three weeks.”

I nodded while rolling up my shirt sleeves further.

Even though it’s the end, summer is still summer.

The Research Building of the Frauzen Federal University of Magic was a very old building, and its performance in both heating and cooling was quite poor.

Therefore, it wasn’t easy to concentrate on work.

…Especially since that work was the tedious task of grading assignments for the [Mathematical Magic Studies] lecture.

While Johannes, Eva, and I were all intoxicated by the strange drowsiness brought on by the heat, I once again completed grading a student’s assignment.

“Correct answer, please write your solution in more detail during the final exam…”

Still, as I mumbled to myself while grading assignments, I gradually entered a state of selflessness.

It felt like my hand scribbling with the pen and my head were working separately.

I’m not sure if you can call it concentrating on work when you’re thinking about other things while grading assignments, but anyway, I started using my body and head in parallel.

On the other hand, this was the very reason why I’ve been spending more time zoning out lately.

Imagination.

Ever since writing my first paper,《A Heuristic Perspective on the Generation and Transformation of Light》, I’ve been sinking into imagination whenever I had a chance.

Since I started replying to letters a few days ago, this phenomenon has gotten much worse.

There was a reason.

It was because there was magic in it.

I knew that the formulas written on paper and the mountain of papers piled up were all valuable knowledge.

But as I continued my imagination, there was a certain exhilaration. The exhilaration that comes from asking absurd questions and answering them.

I had fallen into an exhilaration that couldn’t be known with pen and paper.

For example, something like this.

What is the standard of the world?

I held the pen in my hand upright and brought it in front of my eyes.

About five inches in length.

Eva Torricelli, in the next seat, looked at me with eyes that seemed to say, ‘This guy’s at it again,’ but I ignored it and checked the length.

A cheap dip pen I had bought in bulk at the market about two years ago, intending to use it for half a lifetime.

I can estimate its length as five inches because space has been quantified like that, and space is an excellent standard.

As I shifted my focus from the pen to the wall behind it, I saw the wall clock.

A pendulum clock utilizing the isochronism *1 of the pendulum.

The reason I can estimate the time it takes for that minute hand to move one space is because a minute has been defined as such, and at the same time, time also functions well as a standard of the world.

Space and time.

Those two were the absolute standards of the world that Jean-Pierre Auchlimé had thought of.

Are they really absolute standards?

It was rational, logical, and mathematically consistent. It provided a solid foundation for Auchlimé to create the discipline of magic studies.

But now, Auchlimé’s classical magic studies are being questioned.

The foundation is shaking. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

Going back to the question.

Is there a standard or something absolute in this world?

It would be good if there were. Just as magic studies were born through Auchlimé’s premises, a solid foundation brings about the prosperity of a discipline.

However, as concluded 200 years ago, motion is not absolute.

Time and space are still solid foundations, but I’m somewhat skeptical about their absoluteness.

When I fall into such random imagination like this, I sometimes have this thought.

The moment I make one bold assumption, perhaps I could correct the errors that magic studies are facing.

I turned my head to look out the window.

The daylight of a summer afternoon.

Bright and warm, I looked at that sunlight shining down on the whole world with a quite different perspective…

Wait.

I quickly turned my head to look at the clock again. Around 2 PM.

“Ah.”

No wonder the sunlight seemed bright.

Clatter.

I casually got up from my seat, pretending to be relaxed.

To Johannes, who asked where I was going, I raised my right hand to show him the usual object.

It was a pipe.

“I’m just going out for some fresh air.”

“A pipe? As I said before, you can smoke it inside the lab as long as the scent isn’t too strong.”

“No, I can’t bother my senior and colleague.”

“Alright. Take care.”

Johannes is a non-smoker. A layman who knows almost nothing about pipes.

That’s why he didn’t find it strange that I was leaving without tobacco leaves or matches.

Eva Torricelli narrowed her eyes at me but soon smiled bitterly and picked up her pen again.

And so I left the lab.

It’s really a pain.

I chose to pretend to be someone going out to smoke because I didn’t want to become an eccentric who goes out for fresh air at set times every day, but thinking about it now, it didn’t seem much better. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

It seems my lab mate had already caught on.

But what can I do?

Half resigned, I stuffed the pipe into my pocket and stepped out of the research building.

Sure enough…

“Hello. Have you had lunch?”

“…Yeah.”

Julia, sitting on the bench in front of the Research Building, waved her hand with a bright smile.

The second reason for my increased time spent zoning out was there.

“I’m going back in ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes?”

“Yeah.”

“Ten minutes?”

“…Fifteen minutes.”

As I said that, her crimson lips curved into a smile.

“Alright.”

In the world, there are as many implicit rules as there are explicit ones.

This peculiar meeting was like that, too.

Twice a week. Between 1 and 2 PM. The bench of Research Building 3 in the time after lunch.

Nominally, it was still to monitor whether I, the notorious arsonist, would set fire to the research building, but somehow, it had solidified into a form of meeting at a set time for a brief conversation.

The topics of conversation were always trivial, as usual.

I was a doctoral student, and Julia was the Student Council President. Just talking about stressful incidents would be enough for the conversation to never end.

Except for having regular meetings, it wasn’t really different from our relationship during our undergraduate days.

We often had small talk back then, too.

But something changed after the day we rode bicycles together.

We touch.

Frequently.

Julia moved her lips.

“More importantly, a pipe? Were you really smoking after all?”

“No. Even if you told me to smoke, I wouldn’t. It tastes bad.”

“…Then why did you bring it out?”

Even when we’re having such trivial conversations…

Every time Julia sways her body slightly, her right hand brushes against my left hand.

Just enough contact to tickle, but not so much as to seem accidental. It’s definitely intentional.

“How’s the Student Council work?”

“Same as always.”

“Same as always… Busy, you mean?”

“Exactly that. Don’t say this in front of others. Even if it’s an open secret, a secret is still a secret.”

Conversations with little meaning, or almost like wordplay.

Is it a ploy to relieve the boredom from the conversation with her hands?

Tap.

Julia even covered my hand with her right hand and began tapping the back of my hand with her fingers as if it were an instrument.

It was so ticklish that I slightly raised my hand, then spread it out, and closed it again.

This resulted in our fingers being loosely intertwined.

“……”

The conversation stopped.

Julia’s face was calm. However, her amber eyes were looking somewhere far away.

Soon, Julia lifted her hand and pushed it firmly towards me.

It seemed like she was trying to shake it off, but given the difference in hand size, it seemed impossible for her to break free by her own strength.

Then Julia widened her eyes, pretending to be surprised. She made excuses.

“Oh my, Eugene. Look over there. Isn’t that Mr. Diemann?”

“Why would that guy come here?”

“And next to him is a neat black-haired… female student I’ve never seen before. Who could it be?”

By this point, I was feeling awkward, too, so I decided to go along with her excuse.

I turned my head, following Julia’s gaze.

What came into view was Werner standing proudly and a female student.

More precisely, it was Lena, who looked like a student.

“What the…”

Why is she here?

More importantly, why is she with that guy?

It took only 20 seconds for Eugene, who was briskly walking across the lawn, to stand in front of Lena.

Lena looked up at Eugene.

It seemed like he was asking, ‘Why are you here?’ with his eyes.

She was surprised but didn’t show it.

Rather, there was much more she wanted to ask.

Just as she was exercising her businesswoman-like brain rotation to craft logically coherent language.

Squeeze―

Suddenly, Eugene changed his posture, put his arm around the shoulder of the man standing next to him, and started to strangle him.

“Ugh, wait.”

“Werner. I thought you were my friend. This is unfortunate.”

“This bastard, he’s lost it.”

Eugene and the man were similar in height, but Eugene had the advantage in build.

The man couldn’t even resist and was dragged away, disappearing somewhere…

Lena was left alone.

They say that when a person is stunned, they become calm instead. That saying was right.

Lena was looking at the backs of the two men leaving in the distance with an utterly bewildered expression.

Tap, tap―

Someone was tapping her shoulder with their finger. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

When she turned around, the familiar dark-brown-haired female student smiled and said:

“Hey. Would you like to take a walk around the campus with me?”

T/N

The isochronism of the pendulum means that the oscillation period of pendulums of equal length is constant. It basically means that the time it takes for the pendulum on the wall clock to return to its initial state is constant.