Chapter 191: Discovery

TL: SHW

[Teacher. I heard that some Dungeons have places with especially high concentrations of mana. If I used magic in a place like that, wouldn't the power of my magic change regardless of my intentions?]

[And I had another question about Mana Control. After talking with Hye-eun, I noticed there was definitely a difference in our Mana Control. Of course Mages and healers are different, but I've also seen papers saying the difference between the two isn't actually that significant.]

The message was just as prim as the sender's prim little face that came to mind. Looking at the questions written in impeccably proper sentences, Kim Chae-min found herself straightening her posture for no reason and tapping at her phone screen with a serious expression.

Tap. Tap tap tap. After typing out and sending a fairly lengthy reply, Kim Chae-min checked another chat window.

[teachteachrteachteach]

The atmosphere was different from the very first line.

[No like what was that thing u told me abt last time]

[In dungeos its Resonance? Resnance right]

[in]

[Resonance]

[You said Resonance happens in Dungeons]

[Does it only happen if the attribute thing matches??? Or does it just happen no matter stuff like that???]

The screen filled with typo-ridden messages.

She could almost hear the voice of the young Mage who had only recently become one. Face-to-face, he pretended to be well-behaved, imitating Park Seo-hyun and putting on a dignified air, but even that looked nothing but adorable to Kim Chae-min. Was this why everyone took disciples? No, probably not....

Kim Chae-min once again put sincere effort into her reply.

She had heard that, for the time being, they would be studying ordinary high school subjects unrelated to Dungeons, so she had worried they might neglect magic as well, but apparently that concern had been needless. A Mage did not so easily give up something that had fallen into their hands. Especially someone like Park Seo-hyun, who had grown up as a Mage since childhood.

Kim Chae-min had heard about the environment Park Seo-hyun had grown up in from Hong Seok-young, and from Park Seo-hyun herself. She did not know what other people might think, but from a Mage's perspective, Park Seo-hyun had been raised rather gently for a Mage.

Even an Archmage famous for being utterly ruthless must have had a soft spot for his granddaughter after all. Perhaps that was why Park Seo-hyun, who had initially been cold by nature, had only been awkward at first and soon got along quite well with the other students. At least, that was what Hong Seok-young had said. Though she wasn't sure how much she could trust that man's word....

It wasn't that she distrusted Hong Seok-young, but matters inside a Dungeon were one thing, and matters outside a Dungeon were another. Especially when it came to judging a teenage girl, could she really trust the opinion of a man already past fifty?

Kim Chae-min nodded. Absolutely not.

Still, judging by Park Seo-hyun now, Hong Seok-young's assessment probably had not been entirely wrong. Or perhaps spending time with children her own age had rounded off her prickly personality. Every single one of them was so kind that it made her wonder where on earth anyone had found kids like these.

‘Looking at it that way, Jin-woo really does seem less like a Mage than Seo-hyun, doesn't he?’

In the end, Mages were human too, so the environments they grew up in had a major influence on them. Choi Jin-woo, who had grown up in an ordinary family and only Awakened recently, would probably remain exceptionally easygoing for a Mage even in the future. That wasn't a bad thing.

Some Mages might look down on him for it, but others would like Choi Jin-woo precisely because of that. Kim Chae-min knew. She knew from personal experience.

...Of course, more accurately, Kim Chae-min had been an Archmage, so no one had dared even think of criticizing her.

‘If they've got a problem, they can say it to my face!’

She was not naive enough to be swayed by the words of cowards who lacked even that much courage.

‘I should teach Jin-woo to stand his ground too.... Seo-hyun seems to have a rough idea of how the Association works, though.’

Kim Chae-min was not coldhearted enough to leave an eighteen-year-old kid to fend for himself over something like whether they were master and disciple. She had no intention of taking him as a disciple, but if she kept about as much distance as a schoolteacher....

Kim Chae-min knew that she was a Mage with a somewhat unusual temperament.

A Mage grandfather and father. A grandmother and mother who were not merely non-Mages, but had never even Awakened.

Growing up among such family members, Kim Chae-min was a little more... well. Different from the average Mage. To put it simply, she was more human. She wasn't particularly obsessed with magic, nor did she think Mages were inherently superior to everyone else.

No, obviously! It wasn't like Mages were only ever born to Mage parents!

Of course, Mages generally married other Mages, which was why Kim Chae-min's family was constantly talked about even within Mage society as an unusual case.

Creeeak....

Still holding her phone, Kim Chae-min carefully took a step forward. The wooden floorboards creaked ominously. She was now paying the price for having sealed the place in a fit of anger after her Domain was destroyed.

Despite the bright midday sun outside, it was dark inside. Dry vines had wound themselves tightly around everything, not just the windows. The roof, the walls, the floor, even the few pieces of furniture that remained. As though they would not permit even a single intruder.

For someone who knew what this house had once been like, nothing could have hurt more to see.

Whenever the sun was up, the inside of the house had always been filled with bright sunlight. Flowers and trees had bloomed luxuriantly all year round, and thanks to them, the fresh scent of greenery had easily calmed the mind. Like every other Mage, Kim Chae-min treasured her Domain. It was a house she had decorated entirely to her own tastes from beginning to end, so Domain or no Domain, how could she possibly not have cherished it?

Had she been in her right mind, she would never have left a space she loved so dearly in this state. Unfortunately, Kim Chae-min had not been capable of thinking straight at the time, and as a result, she had shut even herself out. Kim Chae-min crept cautiously into her ruined Domain as though she were some kind of thief.

Creak.

Kim Chae-min glared at the floorboards. There wasn't the slightest breeze inside, yet a tiny sprout poking up through a gap between the boards swayed gently back and forth. Its two fresh, pale-green cotyledons kept twitching as if they were dancing.

“...Where did this little thing scrounge up mana from?”

Naturally, the sprout was part of Kim Chae-min's magic.

More precisely, it was a remnant of mana. She had unleashed her mana without regard for anything when her Domain was destroyed, so there was nothing strange about a sprout like this taking root.

What was strange was that it was still alive.

A sprout born from mana should have quickly withered if it went without a regular supply of mana.

Why?

Why was that thing still alive?

Kim Chae-min slowly retraced what had happened the last time she was in her Domain. There hadn't been anything particularly remarkable... She had caught the bastards who destroyed her Domain, hung them upside down, and then....

She had heard something break around then. Probably some of the materials she had brought in for various experiments. Or perhaps one of the flasks she had an experiment running in.

Had there been anything among them with enough mana for that sprout to feed on?

Kim Chae-min tilted her head to one side.

There must have been something.

No, of course there had been.

This wasn't just anywhere. It was her Domain.

And not just anyone's Domain. An Archmage's Domain!

Most Mages did not bother because they said it made them feel as though the government were watching them, but Kim Chae-min had a grandmother and mother with perfectly ordinary respect for the law, so she had diligently completed her Mage Domain Registration as well. The moment she established her Domain, she went to the local community center and filled out the paperwork. She respected Mages who chose not to register theirs, but what had people done wrong to deserve having a Mage as a neighbor?

'Ah. Most Mages probably wouldn't even think like this.'

Still, a Domain that had gone through the registration process, as long as it was located on the Mage's private property rather than in a public place, could receive more definite legal protection. It was easier to have personally punishing intruders recognized as self-defense, there were tax benefits as well....

Kim Chae-min designated her entire two-story detached house as her Domain. Since it was not in an urban area but in a sparsely populated rural village surrounded by nothing but fields and paddies, getting approval had been easy. There were no other private homes within a one-kilometer radius, so Kim Chae-min could grow plants and conduct magical experiments to her heart's content.

She had already layered the place thickly with magic meant to keep intruders out anyway, so she had freely used somewhat... dangerous materials as well.

“Aaaaaah....”

Kim Chae-min clutched her head and crouched down.

“I should've checked sooner! How much of a mess is it in there? It's a mess, right? Of course it's a mess!”

She should have listened more carefully when her mother nagged that she was exactly like her father and never cleaned up after herself.

Wasn't this what Mom had meant?

But failing to clean up had gotten her into trouble now too, so in the end, wasn't it basically the same thing?

Creak. Creeeeak.

The floorboards let out a long groan. To Kim Chae-min's ears, it sounded like a wounded baby animal crying.

Kim Chae-min dismantled the rest of the Seal magic remaining on the floor, then examined the sprout, which was still dancing merrily away.

When Kim Chae-min's finger touched the sprout, a bright glow blossomed across the tender leaves. The veins glowed blue.

“Hmm.... It doesn't seem to be in bad shape.”

Kim Chae-min tilted her head, then poured even more mana into the sprout. Saturated with mana, it shot up and grew in an instant.

Kim Chae-min expected it to bloom into the roses she always saw. After all, her magic was based on roses.

“...Huh?”

But the plant that appeared before Kim Chae-min was not a rose.

“What? Why isn't it a rose? Where did my rose go?”

She had been seeing roses since childhood, so she knew perfectly well what they looked like. If it wasn't a rose, the next thing she frequently used was vines. And if it wasn't those either....

Kim Chae-min narrowed her eyes.

The rapidly growing sprout looked nothing like any of the possibilities Kim Chae-min had expected.

But if someone asked whether it was a completely unknown plant she had never seen before, that wasn't true either.

“Why is this showing up here?”

Kim Chae-min reached out with a bewildered expression.

The long, slender stalk, like a reed, rose almost to Kim Chae-min's eye level. She hooked one thin stem around her finger and pulled it closer, making the tip, laden with tiny blossoms like baby's breath, sway from side to side. Blue pollen burst outward like dust, then softly melted into the air and vanished.

Kim Chae-min shook the flowers once more. The blue blossoms reacted to Kim Chae-min's mana and began to glow faintly like fireflies.

“This....”

As far as Kim Chae-min knew, this plant, this flower, could only be found inside Dungeons. Since it had so many uses, naturally many people had tried to cultivate it outside Dungeons.

But no matter what method they used, flowers brought out of a Dungeon never lasted long before drying up completely and dying. Just like monsters that came out of Dungeons could not survive for more than three months, the same was true of this plant.

Three months. As far as Kim Chae-min knew, that was the longest this flower had ever survived outside a Dungeon.

“It's a Mana Herb.”

There was no Mage who would fail to recognize blue flowers like these.

Unable to hide her bewilderment, Kim Chae-min stood there for a long while, gently running her fingers over the flowers.

***

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