Genius Wizard Conceals His Origins

“Lie down and get a good night’s sleep. And, we’re all going to stay in this room tonight, so please understand if it’s cramped… Okay?”

The conversation was one-sided. Not intending to give time to understand the meaning, Lena repeated once more.

“Okay?”

“Wait, all of a sudden?”

“Okay?”

I sensed that the same word would be repeated from Lena’s lips until I answered that I understood.

I nodded, and only then did Lena change her response.

“Good.”

It was a notification disguised as a suggestion.

I wanted to ask if ‘staying in this room together’ really meant four people staying in this tiny storage room, but before I could open my mouth, Lena turned around abruptly and left the room.

The door closed softly, and soon after, the sound of clattering came from the kitchen.

Come to think of it, had I been escorted during a meal?

Dish cleaning is one of the household chores that becomes much easier when shared.

I should help. With that thought, I was about to get up when.

Squeeze―

I felt resistance.

I turned my head and stared intently at the source of the resistance.

Half-open green eyes were directed at me.

“Ellie. You’re stretching my shirt.”

“Where are you trying to go, Big Brother?” [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

“I was going to help with the cleaning.”

Ellie shook her head while lying on my bed.

“No. You have to sleep. Lie down here.”

“Well. That might be difficult.”

“Huh? Why?”

Instead of explaining the reasons in detail, I quietly looked at the bed.

Ellie, who had been tilting her head this way and that, suddenly seemed to realize that she was lying down far too comfortably.

…And also the fact that space is needed for me to lie down.

Rolling over once, Ellie settled deep into the bed and patted the space to her right with her palm.

“Sleep!”

Does she mean I should lie down now that there’s space?

I let out a shallow sigh.

I was slowly beginning to understand how stubborn my three younger sisters were, and it seemed better to comply rather than chase the twins out or sleep alone in the living room.

“Alright. Let me just change my clothes first.”

“Okay. Got it, Big Brother.”

I was still in my outdoor clothes. While it wouldn’t matter much after having lived and slept in the laboratory, ironing shirts is no easy task.

When I started unbuttoning it one by one…

I said to the two pairs of green eyes staring intently at me:

“…Won’t you step out for a moment?”

At that moment, Sally frantically dropped her book and covered her eyes with her empty hands. Her cheeks were flushed red enough to be visible even in the reddish room.

However, Ellie calmly shook her head.

“No way. If we go out, you might lock the door.” [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

“There’s no lock on the storage room door, Ellie.”

“Anyway, no!”

“Alright.”

Sometimes it’s wise to give up on persuasion.

I was satisfied with turning my back, then completed the change of clothes in the blink of an eye.

And when I turned back, Ellie’s eyes might have been too bright for someone lying in bed, or I might have made eye contact with Sally through her widely spread fingers, but anyway, having completed my preparations for bed, I sat on the edge of the bed.

“Lie down!”

Ellie’s words were accompanied by action.

Ellie succeeded in pulling me, who was sitting on the edge of the bed, to lie down, using the strength of a girl her age and the basic axiom of this world that ‘you shouldn’t shake off the hand of a sister ten years younger’.

“I’ll cover you with the blanket.”

Then, the blanket covered me.

When my mind, clearer than during dinner but still hazy, was starting to mistake Ellie for someone with the ability to make everything happen as she said…

Ellie said:

“Yeah. Now rest deeply, Big Brother.”

Instead of resting deeply, I closed my mouth.

Soon after, no sound other than breathing and the faint clattering from the kitchen could be heard in my room.

It was a picture-perfect pre-sleep scene.

Late September. The scorching sunlight is slowly being forgotten, and bedding like blankets is starting to serve its proper function.

I feel warmth.

The marks of flickering candles are etched on the ceiling as the breathing of three people intersects.

For someone who told me to rest deeply, Ellie herself didn’t seem to have any intention of falling asleep. Judging by how she kept glancing at me while lying turned towards me.

Sally, occupying the small space at the foot of the bed, inevitably started turning the pages of a book.

But soon she furrowed her brow and tilted her head. It’s a natural result. What Sally had picked up was my college major textbook, filled with as many formulas as there were lines of text.

An unusually peaceful time continues.

I’m not sure if forcibly given peace can truly be called peace, but anyway, it became an opportunity to organize my thoughts that had become complicated beyond measure.

I remembered something I had to do.

Until that business with the statement I was told to sign, I had been engrossed in studying the mathematics paper that Professor Müller had introduced to me.

Quite apart from it being a difficult paper, it’s certainly a groundbreaking tool to advance my ideas.

Right. Before going to bed, should I take a quick look?

Rustle―

“…?”

An unfamiliar sensation. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

When I turned my head to the right, I realized this sensation was Ellie gently stroking my forehead with a blank look in her eyes.

Ellie murmured softly.

“Scary eyes again.”

“Scary eyes?”

“Uh-huh.”

Soon after, Ellie made a fierce expression and glared.

“Eyes like this.”

At least they don’t seem to be scary eyes.

Ellie, her expression relaxed, clenched her fist. Instead of stroking my forehead, she started tapping it.

It hurt.

“Big Brother. Don’t make scary eyes, close your eyes and sleep, okay― Ow, ow, ow―!”

“You keep telling me to rest, to sleep quickly. I’ll sleep if you tell me what your ulterior motive is.”

“Th-there’s no ulterior motive!”

“Really?”

“Yeah, yeah… So, let my cheeks go…”

Ellie pleaded with me while her cheeks were being pinched.

For some reason, it was satisfying to hear her make ‘mmph’ sounds every time I shook my hand slightly, so I kept doing it for a while.

“There’s no such thing as an ulterior motive.”

Sally took over the conversation.

I listened to the voice coming from the foot of the bed.

“It’s just that, the house is lonely. When you came back, Big Brother Eugene, we planned to sleep together. Big Sister Lena reluctantly got dragged into it. But…”

“But?”

“You look so, exhausted, Big Brother. We’re trying to make you rest, even if we have to force you.”

“I’m fine.”

“That’s a lie.”

“I’ve been sleeping well lately, Sally. Back when I was taking the entrance exam, I used to stay up for days. Wouldn’t that have been harder?”

“Being tired and being exhausted are different. Earlier, you looked like, you’d collapse if someone just poked you.” [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

“…”  

Just as Sally was finishing her words, the tightly closed door of the room opened quietly.

Lena, not in pajamas but in quite comfortable clothes, entered my room stealthily, carrying various things.

“Uh.”

Then her body flinched.

Judging by her careful footsteps, she seemed to have thought we were asleep, but she appeared a bit flustered when three gazes, including mine and the twins’, were fixed on her simultaneously.

Lena parted her lips with a startled expression.

“You’re still not asleep? What have you been doing?”

“We were just talking a bit.”

“…Whew, at least you’re lying down. Good. Now that the housework is done too, don’t do anything else and just sleep like that.”

Saying so, Lena quietly sat down at my desk.

Of course, my bed was already quite crowded with three people on it. I don’t think the desk would be a better place to sleep, though.

“Lena. What’s that in your hand?”

“A pen.”

“What did you put on the desk?”

“…Documents.”

“You told us not to do anything else. Your words and actions don’t match.”

Lena tightened her comfortable clothes even more. That means she adjusted the drape of the blanket over her shoulders.

“I won’t sleep until you fall asleep, Eugene.”

“What?”

“So, if you want me to rest, hurry up and rest deeply. Okay?”

If there was such a thing as the most ridiculous threat in the world, it would look like this.

Watching Lena immediately start her paperwork, I obediently followed the threat.

I close my eyes.

Instantly, I realized how much of a burden had been placed on me.

It wasn’t just my lack of sleep. The lethargy, worthy of being called mental fatigue fracture, began to emerge endlessly, changing its form into drowsiness.

My eyelids became as heavy as a thousand gold coins.

It was embarrassing how I had ignored the words to close my eyes and rest several times just a moment ago, but now, I couldn’t even open my eyes.

A long time passed like that.

The only ways for me, trapped in the darkness under my eyelids, to gauge time are through hearing and touch. And through these two senses, I realized that the night had deepened.

Ellie, using my arm as a pillow, began to breathe shallow, colorful breaths, and Sally, who had closed her book at some point, also curled up like a cat near my legs and repeated deep breaths. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

In the warmth surrounded by the two body temperatures, while actively traversing between unconsciousness and consciousness…

Suddenly, my sense of hearing reacted.

Very carefully, as Lena stood up from the desk…

Whoo― 

She blew out the candle.

A little later… I realized that the half-mystical concept of sensing a presence actually existed, while simultaneously doubting whether one’s gaze also had thermal energy.

The sound of breathing gets closer and…

“I’m a fool for thinking he would come for counseling.”

Finally, my cheek was poked by the darkness.

The whisper continued.

“Seeing that he didn’t mention a word about research, it seems something happened, but there’s no way to know.”

Poke, poke.

“With a face like he’s shouldering all the burdens… Who do you think is covering Benjamin’s hospital bills in the first place? Private rooms are surprisingly expensive. It’s beyond what a research assistant’s salary could dream of.”

Poke, poke.

“It’s lamentable that improvement is still far off, but…”

The sigh she exhaled tickled my hair.

“…Eugene. Rely on us. You’re the one who taught me that. How can you forget it yourself?”

That was the end of the soliloquy. The sigh lengthened, and after poking my cheek a couple more times, I heard Lena, who had been crouching, stand up.

My eyelids are heavy.

My lips weren’t heavy. As a bonus, neither was my arm.

“Thank you.”

“Eep.”

I grabbed what I presumed to be Lena’s arm and gently pulled it. ‘Huh, huh?’

Lena, who fell helplessly towards the bed just as I had, naturally ended up lying on the edge of the bed.

We squeezed four people onto a small bed. It was cramped and warm.

I feel warmth.

I remember warmth.

I remember the warmth of hugs, handshakes, kisses.

Only in this truly most irrational situation, where drowsiness and unconsciousness mixed, could I truly understand Benjamin’s words.

I don’t take sides with anyone. I shouldn’t intervene rashly, and even if they ask for intervention, I should remain silent. I am a magic scholar… in the literal sense of the word.

As a scholar, I must not waver.

Even if the waves of the world come crashing down as if to swallow me, I must stand firm and protect what needs to be protected. What?

This warmth.

A voice of shock was heard right next to me.

“D-Don’t tell me you were listening the whole time―”

“Sleep well, Lena.”

“Ah, that. Uh… sleep well.”

#September 26th. Cloudy.

I thought it was good that I came home because a sight I had never seen since coming to the Federation and settling in Frauzen was before my eyes.

Lena oversleeping.

In the end, the four of us slept crumpled together, and I, wedged in between, had to perform half an acrobatic act to get up.

The bed scene I checked after waking up was quite a sight.

Both Ellie, pressed against the wall, and Lena, who might as well have been sleeping on a cliff, had strange expressions. Sally, curled up like a cat, looked the most peaceful.

I chuckled, then rearranged Ellie and Lena’s positions while fixing the blanket.

After gathering my clothes, I snuck out and quickly finished my morning preparations in secret.

At a glance, it looked like I was fleeing in the early hours, but it was just a normal commute. It just didn’t look like morning because the day was cloudy. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

After finishing my preparations, as I grabbed the doorknob…

Sally came out of the storage room, rubbing her eyes and staggering.

After looking around a few times, she finally spotted me and came straight towards me.

Sally, drunk with sleep, said:

“I’ll see, you off.”

Instead of answering, I patted her head a couple of times.

Sally, her hair messed up, squinted one eye, but she didn’t seem to mind.

“I’m off.”

“…Okay.”

Click―

I opened the door and…

Click.

I closed the door.

I hugged Sally in my arms with my back to the entrance. Naturally, a puzzled voice was heard.

“Big Brother Eugene?”

“Yes?”

“What’s, wrong?”

“It’s nothing. Just feels like something’s coming.”

“…?”

I stepped out of the entrance for a moment.

I laid Sally, who kept tilting her head, back down on my bed.

It’s still morning. Sally, still tilting her head, went back to bed. It was typical of Sally, who was even more of a heavy sleeper than Ellie.

And so…

I peeked at the outside scenery through the window attached to the door to the entrance.

I remember when I first met Dorothy.

Back then, I was sick, and I felt anxious every time I received a meal, unable to believe that a soldier was taking care of me. [Only on Galaxy Translations! / Axiomatic]

Of course, Dorothy was a person who, though cold on the outside like winter, was deep-hearted.

But soldiers aren’t like Dorothy, and the nature of soldiers should basically be heartless.

“…”

Heartless signs were roaming the streets.