[V2C11] Creatures that Want to Become Something
Translated by Jodas 2: Daily Lives of a New Teacher and the Apprentice MagesAhead of Tia, Wren stomped as he ran. Tia waddled to catch up to him.
Stomp, stomp, waddle waddle.
Stomp, stomp, waddle waddle.
Tia was still not used to running with human feet. As a result, she was slow, but since she had lots of endurance, she could run for much longer than humans could.
Wren wasn’t particularly fast himself, nor did he have much endurance, so Tia caught up to him before she knew it.
After leaving the First Spire: White Smoke, in some place that looked like a garden between the Spires, Wren came to a stop with ragged breaths.
Wren spun around and glared at Tia. Maybe he was tired from running, as his face was all red.
“Why are you following me?”
“Umm……..Why was I, again?”
She felt like there had to have been a reason she decided to follow after him.
Reason~, reason~ Tia tilted her head, and Wren let out a loud sigh as he sat on the ground.
There was a thick, fluffy layer of grass growing in this garden. Tia decided to sit down next to Wren.
She sat holding her knees to her chest just like Wren was doing, then Tia began to sing.
It wasn’t because she wanted to cheer him up, to give him time, nor to lighten the gloomy atmosphere.
Harpies were creatures that sang inadvertently for simple reasons like when the weather was good, or when they liked the smell of the grass.
Even when pretending to be a human, she prided herself on that.
“Lalalua lalalua metea, lalalua lalalua metea, lalalua arche diava.”
“……..What’s that supposed to mean?”
Holding his knees, Wren looked at Tia. Tia thought it a shame to do so, but she stopped singing.
“A song. About how the weather is nice, so everyone should come out!”
“Why did you start singing?”
“Because I wanted to sing?”
“…………”
“Piyo! That’s right! I remembered once I started singing! The reason I chased Wren!”
Wren’s face stiffened up. His expression looked like he expected something painful to occur soon and he was bracing himself for the impact.
Why was he making that face? She wasn’t going to kick him or anything.
Thinking it strange, Tia opened her mouth.
“You know. Back there, Mr. Hütter asked us what we wanted to do with magic? Yeah?”
“…….Yeah.”
“And then, Wren, you said you wanted to become rich, and that was weird.”
Deep creases formed between Wren’s eyebrows. And yet, his face was also red for some reason like he was embarrassed.
Wren grumbled.
“I bet you also thought it was stupid, vapid, and lame, didn’t you?”
“Pirorororo……..That’s not it at all.”
Chirping “Piro, piro” Tia desperately searched for the right words.
“When asked ‘what do you want to do with magic?’ I said I wanted to fly through the sky, and Sevil answered she wanted to use magic swords, right? And yet, I don’t understand why Wren answered with something you wanted to become.”
“You’re saying my answer didn’t fit the question?”
“Something like that. Do you want to become something, Wren?”
“Of course I do. I want to be a good mage, I want to be rich, I want to be special…….it’s normal to want to become something else. ‘What do you want to do’ and ‘what do you want to be’ are interconnected.”
Tia was a little shocked by Wren’s words.
After all, Tia had never once thought about what she wanted to be. She was fine being a Harpy.
Even though she had taken a human form for the time being, that was simply a means to learn flight magic, not because she particularly wanted to be a human.
“……..So humans always want to become something?”
Tia mumbled to herself. Wren’s eyes widened slightly, then he relaxed his face and laughed.
“You’re a strange one.”
“Piyo!?”
“It’s like your ambitions are completely different from everyone else…….Ahh……”
As if his own words had made him realize something, Wren buried his face in his knees and rustled his beautiful golden hair. The tie on his hair slipped slightly and some of his hair flopped onto his back.
“That’s right. I was afraid of people thinking that my ambitions were too small, so I tried to think of something that rules.”
“Rules? Like the thing you measure stuff with?”
Tia asked in all seriousness. “Fwaha!” Wren barked out a laugh.
“You’re weird like that, sometimes.”
Wren stretched out his legs and planted both hands in the grass as he looked up to the sky.
When they first met, she had thought of Wren as a strong creature who didn’t avert his eyes. Now, he seemed a little weaker than that.
“You know, I never really dreamed of becoming a mage. As long as I could get out of that house and feed myself, anything would do.”
Wren’s ordinarily strong face was clouded by weakness.
“……..That’s why I couldn’t answer Hütter’s question of ‘what do you want to do.’”
Wren Bayer was the son of the Bayer Trading Association’s President.
However, he was not the son of his wife. He was a mistress’ son.
“Tia, has anyone ever told you that ‘beauty is a blessing’?”
“Piyo? Beauty is a blessing? …….Does that mean they have an advantage in mating?”
“What kind of idea……no, you’re not wrong about that…… but there’s more to it than that.”
Wren stared intently at Tia’s face.
Her eyes were a little unnerving, but her face had a cute and lovable shape. In a few years time, she would probably enter the ranks of beautiful women.
However, Tia’s face said she had no clue what he was talking about. Wren let out a sigh.
“My mom is crazy beautiful, but she hasn’t been blessed one bit. She caught the eye of some old man from a huge trading family and was forced into becoming his mistress. Even though she already had a boyfriend she loved, y’know? …….And that’s how I was born.”
His mother had resisted and tried to refuse. But her father would not allow that.
His mother’s family had been poor, and they jumped at the chance to sell their daughter for a little cash.
“Before I was born, my old man already had three sons with his legal wife. That wife and my older brothers put my mom and I through the wringer.”
When Wren was very young, his father would occasionally come to his defense.
However, the wife was not amused. Her and her sons would escalate their attacks day by day, until she finally crossed the line.
“One day, that old hag paid off the butler and made him dump boiling water on my mom’s face.”
His mother had survived, but half of her beautiful face had burned off.
From that day onwards, his father stopped visiting the cabin where Wren and his mother lived. As if he’d seen something smelly and just decided to put a lid on it.
Wren had thought that he would finally let them go free after that.
However, his father seemed to think that if he abandoned his scarred mistress, he would lose face, and that would negatively affect his business. So, he simply left his mistress and her son to die in that cabin.
Wren desperately pleaded for books. If he was to leave this cabin and support his mother, he would need to learn. He wanted to read and write in foreign languages, and to learn how to do difficult arithmetic.
However, the legal wife intervened.
—You don’t need things like that, do you? You’ve got a pretty face, just like that woman. You won’t have any trouble finding somewhere to live.
Beauty is a blessing, the legal wife would always laugh as she slapped Wren in the face.
“I’m a pretty boy, y’know? I look just like my mom. Just looking at my pretty face, can’t you tell how beautiful my mom is?”
Tia stared at Wren with her amber eyes.
Tia did not pity or sympathize with Wren’s circumstances; she merely listened with a blank expression.
Her lack of reaction strangely set him at ease.
“……My mom cries when she sees me. She says ‘I’m sorry you have to look just like me.’ She says ‘Since you look like me, you also get bullied. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’”
The legal wife would always curse any time she saw Wren, complaining ‘you look like that woman, and I don’t like it.’
Even after injuring the mistress’ face and her husband no longer going to see that mistress, her mood never improved. So she switched her target to Wren.
When his mom saw that, she cried and apologized to Wren. ‘I’m sorry you have to look just like me.’
(Mom, you did nothing wrong.)
Of the legal wife’s three sons, only the youngest of his brothers was willing to share his old clothes and sneak books to Wren. The reason Wren could read and write was thanks to that brother.
Wren learned about the Wedge Tower from the books his brother sent him, then ran away from home to bet it all on the triennial entrance exam.
If he was at the Wedge Tower, even he would be allowed to study. He might even be able to become a mage, he thought.
“It’s just as Sevil said. I wanted to show off how happy I had become to that old hag and my shitty brothers. I wanted to say ‘I’m better than you now.’ and ‘look how much happier I am.’ Then…..”
Briefly, his voice got stuck in his throat.
Even though he was saying such great and awesome things, how come it hurt so much to put his true thoughts into words?
“Then?”
Tia prompted him to continue. With innocent eyes, she looked directly at Wren.
Wren’s face scrunched up. Surely no one would call him a pretty boy at this moment.
“Then…..I wanted to tell my mom. Thanks to her giving birth to a boy who looked just like her, I’ve had all the blessings in life! Everyone dotes on me, and I am the happiest most beloved pretty boy out there!….or something like that.”
“Then you should have said that honestly from the start, you fool.”
He heard a voice from directly behind him. When he turned around, he saw Sevil looking down at him and Tia with her arms folded.
Sevil strolled up towards them and took a seat to Wren’s left. Sandwiched between Tia on the right and Sevil on the left, Wren felt a little uncomfortable, but then Sevil took a cookie out of the paper bag she was holding.
Then she shoved the whole bag into Wren’s arms.
“Pass it along to Tia as well.”
“……What is this?”
“Piyo! Ooh, candy!”
The paper bag contained two large cookies.
Wren took one, then passed the bag over to Tia.
Tia also took a cookie, and once everyone had one in their hands, Sevil spoke.
“Mr. Hütter asked me to buy these…..but,”
Sevil raised the corners of her lipstick-painted mouth, and smirked.
“I took it for myself”
“Huh?”
Sevil looked at Wren and Tia’s faces and snorted.
“Because I wanted it.”
Sevil properly said her grace before biting in to the cookie.
Tia also shouted “Thanks for the food!” as she nibbled on hers. As usual, she took very small bites. Even though she was so energetic, for some reason she always ate quietly.
Wren whispered “Thanks,” and bit into the cookie. The taste of butter filled his mouth. Sweet. Delicious. When was the last time he’d had sweets?
As Wren ate through the cookie, Sevil wiped the crumbs off of her mouth and spoke again.
“My mother was given to my father as a hostage.”
“Ah,” Wren’s voice came out quietly. He just realized what it was that had made Sevil angry.
The previous emperor was famous for his womanizing. He’d heard that man made countless women cry. Sevil’s mother would have been one of them.
“If you intend to create a harem, do so with the determination to make each and every one of them happy. Only gather those who love you from the bottom of their hearts.”
“……………..Yes, ma’am.”
Wren said quietly. To which Sevil replied “Very good.”
While quietly eating a cookie, a flightless Harpy turned to her thoughts.
(Humans are difficult.)
Wren’s mother apparently had a boyfriend she loved.
Sevil had said that if you were to build a harem, one must gather those who love them.
(It’s as if love is some great thing.)
Of the songs Tia knows, tons of them sung of love.
It was a precious thing; it was a beautiful and amazing thing; the songs humans made about love always spoke praises of it.
—I love you, Tia. You’re my most precious friend.
That young voice whispering of love has always stuck to her ears.
It’s a menace. Make it go away. Tia thought.