Sage 14

“Seeing that the three of you can’t even break a single barrier, you seem like a bunch of nobodies. If you don’t get lost now, you’ll all die here?”

At my casual threat, one of the mages, who seemed to be the youngest, stopped his busy hands.

He even abandoned the formula he was solving and turned his head towards me, so it seemed that the mages knew more about me than those knights. My slightly damaged pride was restored just a little.

I reached out toward the outside of the barrier, intending to scare them. I should just blow something up to intimidate them. I can’t hit people directly, so I’ll have to hit something with people in it.

“We have no intention of invading the forest. We just came to escort the Third Prince, who is said to be here.”

“Escort? You came to kill him. Is escorting someone to their coffin also called escorting? Kids these days are so naive.”

I don’t think Irkus will fall for these idiots, but it was clear that he wouldn’t stand a chance if he went into the imperial palace. There’s a reason why they say there’s no match for a fight with sheer numbers. Judging from the fact that he had fled from the imperial palace to the Southern Forest, it wasn’t yet time to usurp the throne.

No matter how much of a genius Irkus is, he is only twelve years old now, and like the cliché of a protagonist in a fantasy novel, he will live a life of hardship until he properly obtains his powers.

There must be a narrative for there to be an ending. I don’t know how many years that process will take, but I was willing to invest in Irkus for 20 years at most. If I can die, what’s 20 years? I’ll invest 200 years.

To consider Irkus’s peaceful future political life, it was necessary to build up his power. Of course, the imperial palace was better than the Southern Forest for building up power, so he had to go back to the imperial palace someday.

But that ‘someday’ was not now. It would take at least five more years to properly teach him all the special magic other than attack magic. No matter how much of a genius Irkus is, he can’t solve college math without learning high school math first, can he?

You want to just take away a kid who hasn’t even started real magic classes yet? Even a gifted school gives you six years. You guys are such thugs. Give the child enough time to study.

I cast an explosion spell on the sword held by an ordinary knight standing behind the middle-aged knight commander. Since I only intended to scare them, it wasn’t a great explosion spell, and it was just supposed to make the sword and the hand of the knight holding it ragged.

I wanted to just annihilate them all here, but then they would come and ask me to take responsibility for their lives, which would be annoying, so I had to control it well.

Above all, the forest and the tree spirits are also vulnerable to fire, so if I miscalculated the intensity, Dane and Gilbert would go crazy saying I burned their kin. I can’t burn trees because of humans.

Along with the sound of the sword exploding, screams spread like a domino effect. Even though I was the one who detonated it, it was objectively a perfect magic control. You have to be able to do this to become a Great Sage.

I didn’t spare any self-praise and cast an explosion spell on the sword held by the knight next to him. And on the guy next to him and the one in front of him. Fireworks are spectacular when they don’t stop exploding.

At the continuous explosions, the mages stopped dismantling the barrier and hurriedly got up from their seats. Those guys were also just employed by the imperial palace, so their own lives would be more important. No worker wants to die while working their ass off for the boss.

“Next time, I’ll blow your heads off instead of your swords, so be careful.”

“You will pay the price for disobeying the emperor’s orders. Even if you are the only Great Sage on the continent, you will be held responsible for this matter…”

“Uh-huh, yeah. Pay. Keep paying, pay twice.”

The knight commander still didn’t get the point and was spouting villainous lines at me as he left.

Like I did with the Kaman royals, I wanted to set fire to that guy’s abundant hair, but I held back like an adult, thinking about the forest and the tree spirits, which are vulnerable to fire.

I stood crookedly and even kindly raised my middle finger at the guys who were preparing to escape.

“Hey, on your way out, tell your boss this, too. I don’t know who the emperor is now, but if he keeps acting up, I’ll just replace him with someone else.”

I kindly left a warning message for Irkus’s father, whose face I didn’t even know.

I don’t know if the imperial army, retreating at the speed of light, properly took note of the warning message I left behind. But it will probably be quiet for a while. If they don’t get the message and someone comes to the Southern Forest again, I was planning to show them the taste of thrilling electricity this time.

I think I’m doing a good job as a guardian at this level. I didn’t know I would take care of him so diligently, but I think it suits me surprisingly well.

If your charge has a lot of enemies, you can just defeat them all before your charge awakens. It’s the true meaning of a ‘guardian.’

I was becoming more and more confident in parenting and education. Yes! When it comes to parenting and education, if the guardian is stronger than the charge, half the job is done.

* * *

[There are intruders again, Yoo-an. Dane says he’s going to kill you.]

“Oh, that’s great. Tell Dane to hurry up and kill me.”

[Go tell him yourself.]

“No. He nags too much.”

The Southern Forest has been a popular meeting place these days. Ever since I scared away the imperial army, all sorts of people have been coming to the Southern Forest again.

It felt like we had become a famous restaurant with a long line outside before it even opened. But if this were a restaurant, it would have already gone out of business, since nine out of ten of the customers were from the Magic Tower.

The mages from the Magic Tower gathered in groups of three or five to tour the Southern Forest after hearing that I had taken the Third Prince as my disciple. The guys who usually don’t even come out of the tower because they’re busy with their research were loitering around the Southern Forest, pestering me and asking if I had any plans to take on a few more disciples.

It’s hard enough to raise one child, there’s no way I’m going to take on more disciples. Those disciples will grow old and die faster than me, so what’s the point of increasing such a bothersome task?

Because of that, I couldn’t even relax and had to chase away the Magic Tower guys who were pestering me to accept them as my disciples.

Since the Magic Tower mages were showing their faces like this, the imperial palace also seemed to feel a sense of crisis and periodically sent monitors. They seemed to be afraid that I would actually take a few mages and replace the emperor. If I was really going to replace him, I would have gone alone already. They know one thing but not the other.

Thanks to the warning I left last time, no one came directly to me and demanded that I hand over the Third Prince, but the guys from the Magic Tower were circling around the forest to the point of disturbing the privacy of the tree spirits, so Dane’s hysteria was getting worse by the day.

[But, this time it’s a bit strange.]

“Why? Is the intruder a non-human? A dragon? A dwarf? An elf? Or a spirit?”

[No, it’s a human, but they’re alone. And they’re a child again.]

“I’m going crazy. Is this place a daycare center in a soup restaurant or something?”

[What’s a daycare center in a soup restaurant?]

“It’s a thing. Anyway, this place is 200 times more dangerous than a daycare center, so why do they keep coming in so fearlessly? Is it rumored to be a good place to play?”

[There’s no way. The Magic Tower mages must have secretly sneaked in while the barrier was being dismantled… The intruder isn’t even a mage.]

“The Magic Tower guys are the problem, as expected.”

As I put on my robe again, Irkus, who had been listening to Gilbert and my conversation and diligently solving the magic formula, looked up.

After learning that the imperial army had come while he was sleeping last time, he had been quietly minding his own business for a while, but he couldn’t hide his curiosity at the news that a child similar to him had entered.

“I’m not taking you, so go back to solving the formula.”

“I already solved it.”

“Don’t lie. Spatial movement is more difficult than weather control.”

“It’s true.”

How could he lie like this?

Spatial and temporal magic were often intertwined with physics, so even I, who had spent 400 years diligently solving math problems, often got confused by the formulas.

I looked suspiciously at Irkus, who held out the parchment with the formula written on it with an expression that said he was wronged.

After making it flurry, he made it snow heavily, and now he says he can do spatial movement right away?

No matter how much of a protagonist he is, that was too much of a scam. I scanned the formula that Irkus had meticulously solved from beginning to end. It was a neat solution, but fortunately, the conclusion was not a perfect answer.

I let out a sigh of relief in my mind. Good. He’s still twelve years old, so there’s still something to teach him. I almost threw away the well-organized curriculum before I could even properly start it.

“It’s wrong, so do it again.”

“The solution is correct.”

“The answer is wrong. You may not know this, but in studying, the result is more important than the process.”

“…….”

“No pouting. Solve it again until you get the answer. If you can’t solve it, you’ll have to do the weather control assignment one more time.”

“…That’s too much.”

I glanced at Irkus’s head, who had quickly become sullen, pulled back the parchment he had held out, and buried his head over it. His bright blond hair flowed down as he lowered his head.

“If you get the answer right, I’ll go out with you one more time next time.”

He’s so cute when he pouts his lips in a sulk that I felt my heart soften.

I sighed and looked at the child, who had raised his head again. I tried so hard not to get attached, but it was very difficult not to care for a smart and cute child. I wonder if I’ll be able to get my act together when that guy goes through puberty.

So, grow up quickly, please.