Chapter 29 Sorcerer’s Talent and Magic Power Genetics꞉ A Nude Return
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
”Well, welcome back!”
I was wrapped in light for only a few seconds, or so it felt, before I arrived right between the two halves of the Great Phantasmal Soulstone. It seemed the teleportation had gone off without a hitch.
”Wait… Shou. Your attire…” Ami-chan remarked with an uncertain look when she saw me.
”Huh?”
I checked myself out, and the reason for her reaction became instantly, horribly clear.
”Huh… WH-WHAAAT!? Naked…!?”
That was it. The clothes I’d been wearing just moments ago had simply vanished. Naturally, anything I’d stuffed into my pockets was gone, too. Even the things I’d been holding, and the stacks of old magazines and newspapers I’d set next to the Soulstone on the Japanese side, were nowhere to be seen.
”Ami-chan… wh-what is this!?” I stammered, feeling the chill.
”Hmm… when you teleported to Japan from here, your clothes went with you, but… when you teleport back here from Japan, you can’t bring anything with you? Is that the condition?” Ami-chan wondered aloud, her voice light and inquisitive, as this was a first for her, too. I mean, this was a massive problem, wasn’t it?
”So, nothing that could be converted into a Resource Point can be brought from Japan?” I confessed, frustration creeping in.
”At this point, that’s the only conclusion we can draw, don’t you think? Is there some kind of condition for the transfer, kashira¹?” she mused.
Damn it all. This just made going back to Japan even more pointless! Even if I had to go back regularly to dodge my pursuers, there was almost no benefit to staying long-term.
”Sigh… so, I can’t easily raise Resource Points that way,” I muttered.
”Hmm…? But I feel like it should be possible to bring things over, you know? What on earth is going on?”
Even with the feeling that it should work, the fact remained: nothing came back with me. And this was tied to Ami-chan’s power, so it probably had nothing to do with my Quester level… I think.
I pulled up my operations window to quickly create some new clothes and boots. Taking the new items in my hands, I got dressed quickly.
”It’s been five days, you know. I wanna see Cleonora soon.” My bruised spirit needed her to heal it.
With that thought, I headed outside and immediately saw Cleonora practicing her sword nearby.
”Ah…”
Our eyes met, and she immediately put her sword aside and rushed toward me. We met in a warm, much-needed embrace.
”Welcome home, Shouichi!” she whispered, a rush of relief in her voice.
”I’m home, Cleonora. I’m glad… you look well,” I returned, holding her close. I felt her fingers press slightly into my back. Ah… her warmth was so precious to me.
We held each other for a long moment, but the sun was close to setting. I had dinner prepared, and over the meal, we talked about what she’d been up to for the last five days.
”There weren’t any big problems. A demon monster passed by once, but it didn’t come this way,” she reported warmly.
”That’s a relief…”
Cleonora explained that she hadn’t transformed even once in the last five days to conserve the Magic Power of her Magic Girl form. Now that I thought about it, she hadn’t really had a chance to see what she looked like in that form, had she? There wasn’t a mirror here, so she could only see her reflection in the water. She probably knew her limbs and chest were much smaller, though.
”What about you, Shouichi? You went back to your original world for the first time in a while, didn’t you?” she inquired, her tone genuinely curious.
”Ah, yeah, I guess…. I got some minimal results, but it wasn’t anything spectacular, you know? ” I confessed, shrugging. All I really managed to do was throw off my pursuers’ scent, and even then, I had no proof that a five-day stay was enough to actually fool them.
Besides, the biggest problem remained: besides the issue of bringing things back from Japan, I still had no other source of income. I’d bought some things, and I knew five man² yen was going to be missing from my savings next month. My problem of raising funds in Japan was still completely unsolved, and given the situation, I had to be suspicious of how many things I could even bring from this world to Japan.
”Speaking of which… I feel like my Magic Power has increased a little, even in this form,” Cleonora observed, thinking hard.
”Really?” I asked.
”Yes. Usually, Magic Power grows the fastest from childhood to the mid-teens, though.”
Truthfully, I still didn’t fully grasp what Magic Power even was in this world. Ami-chan seemed to be on the same page, opening her mouth to ask.
”Hey, hey. Do all humans in this world have Magic Power? And is the growth rate different for everyone?” she chirped.
”Not everyone has it. But the predisposition for it is generally inherited, so most noble families in every country possess it,” Cleonora explained simply.
According to her, those in the high-ranking nobility tended to awaken stronger Magic Power. In a world like this, it seemed like a suitable power for the privileged class.
”Magic Power grows fastest until the mid-teens. After that, it grows slowly, but it tends to decline around the age of thirty,” she revealed.
”Wait… Magic Power fades with age?” I asked, surprised.
”Yes. However, some people still have the same level of Magic Power as a twenty-year-old, even when they’re elderly. The rate of decline varies from person to person, I guess,” she concluded.
That’s why those who maintain a certain level of Magic Power into old age are said to desire more children. The belief is that the next generation might produce even more gifted offspring. This is especially true in the Emmeld Kingdom, where there are many sorcerers—an expert like a Guru might surround himself with many young women, even as an old man. This is one of the reasons why the Emmeld Kingdom has so many sorcerers, apparently.
”Hmm…? Cleonora, you have Magic Power, but not the talent to be a sorcerer, right? So, just having Magic Power doesn’t mean you can become a sorcerer?” Ami-chan asked, trying to figure out the rules.
I remembered her saying that before I went to Japan: she lacked the talent to be a sorcerer, but she could draw out the ability of the Secret Orb in the Holy Sword Mizeric. I still didn’t even know what a sorcerer actually was.
”Yes. Having Magic Power and being a sorcerer are completely separate things,” Cleonora affirmed. “I can’t use my own Magic Power to cast sorcery. At best, I can draw out the abilities of a Secret Orb or handle magical tools.”
Magical tools, she explained, were things designed to be used with Magic Power. Simple things, like the lights on the street, were considered magical tools.
”But what is sorcery in the end?” I pressed, wanting a clean answer.
”It’s the secret art of taking a spirit into your body to make various mysteries possible,” she explained, her gaze distant as she recalled the ancient knowledge.
”A spirit…?”
This world, she said, was filled with four types of Aether: Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind. The concentration of the Fire Aether, for example, affected the climate, making the land hotter. When these Aethers combined and gained power, they were called Spirits.
Sorcerers are people who can take a Spirit into their bodies and use their own Magic Power to reconstruct the Spirit’s inherent power, creating phenomena that are impossible for ordinary people. This included things like summoning fire or creating ice—the kind of things people from Japan would imagine when they thought of sorcery.
”In the distant past, there were times when even the sorcerers themselves didn’t fully understand how they were able to use sorcery. But the Emmeld Kingdom was the first to quickly treat sorcery as a subject that could be researched and studied, rather than just a ‘mysterious phenomenon,’” she recounted, a touch of historical pride in her voice.
In those ancient days, people who could perform the miracles of sorcery were revered as emissaries of the gods, and some even went on to found kingdoms. That’s how much faith the power commanded. However, the Emmeld Kingdom researched the process of sorcery and the difference between those who could use it and those who couldn’t. The result of their research was the discovery that sorcerers possess a specific constitution that allows them to absorb a Spirit into their body.
”It’s common knowledge now, but at the time, the Emmeld Kingdom was the only one that realized this. The definition of a Spirit didn’t even exist yet. And so, the Kingdom was able to find talented children early and educate them as sorcerers,” Cleonora finished.
This allowed them to amass a large number of sorcerers faster than any other country. They then used that power to rapidly expand their influence and become one of the great powers. That was all a long time ago, though. Now, every country has a good number of sorcerers. Still, the Emmeld Kingdom has the longest history of sorcery research, and they can still perform some great sorceries that other nations can’t easily replicate.
”Hmm. So, Cleonora, you can’t host a Spirit in your body?” Ami-chan summarized, trying to tie it all together.
”Yes. There are quite a few people with Magic Power… but the proportion of people with the talent to be a sorcerer is quite low,” she confirmed.
Especially in the Emmeld Kingdom, where the historical context has given sorcerers a high social standing. Most of the people who sat on the throne were sorcerers.
”That’s why… when I transformed into a Magic Girl and could fly and cast spells, it made me feel like I was using sorcery,” she confessed softly.
”But the power a Magic Girl wields isn’t sorcery—it’s magic, you know! It’s probably a completely different power from the Magic Power you already have!” Ami-chan was quick to point out. After all, no sorcerer could fly, and it was a power that could be wielded without absorbing a Spirit.
But just talking about the Magic Girl form made me suddenly feel like I wanted to hold Eme-chan tonight. The sun was about to set, so it looked like I’d finally have a passionate night after five long days.
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Summary:
Shou’s nude return from Japan reveals a major logistical flaw: the Great Phantasmal Soulstone only allows one-way resource transfer, frustrating his plans to acquire Resource Points. The emotional reunion with Cleonora offers him comfort, and they discuss the historical and genetic differences between having Magic Power and being a sorcerer in the Emmeld Kingdom, which sets the stage for a romantic night.
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Character Insight:
Shou is emotionally reliant on Cleonora to recover from the stress and failure of his Japanese trip. Cleonora harbors a quiet, personal longing to use true sorcery, a feeling that is temporarily fulfilled by the power of her Magic Girl transformation.
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Behind the Scene:
The ‘no items back from Japan’ rule creates a huge resource and plot challenge for Shou, forcing him to find other income sources. The final paragraph sets up a highly anticipated romantic scene with Eme-chan (the Magic Girl form of Cleonora), following the five-day separation.
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T/L:
*¹ Kashira: A soft, feminine, sentence-ending particle that expresses doubt or questioning, common in Japanese. It’s used here by Ami-chan to maintain her slightly formal yet light personality. ↩
*² Man: A unit of currency in Japan, where one man (万円, man-en) is equal to ten thousand yen. Five man yen is 50,000 yen. ↩
Notes:
• Ami – A palm-sized fairy-like being from a world separate from both Earth and the isekai realm. She has light blue hair tied in a ponytail, mischievous blue eyes, and tiny wings that flutter behind her. Her outfit consists of a provocative high-cut leotard and a short jacket that looks like a miniskirt from the back, leaving her legs bare. Despite her playful appearance, she is actively searching for a contractor who can protect her from dangerous pursuers in exchange for the powers she offers.
• Cleonora – The second princess. Have a yellow blonde hair. Usually styled as hairbun.
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
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