Reincarnated as a Dragon and Raised by a Demon

Several people showed interest in Dahlia’s solicitation and approached her.

Some guests, seeing that the price was not listed, turned to leave.

When there were about three guests who were clearly interested left, Dahlia smiled and spoke.

“The price of this car is 15 gold, 20 silver, and 350 kupes!”

Although it fell short of Aila’s initial mention of 20 gold, it was still quite a high and detailed price.

“It seems a bit expensive, doesn’t it?”

When one guest inquired about the price, Dahlia maintained her smile and spoke in a slightly lowered voice.

“That’s because this car has been a tremendous help to our family.”

That was a lie.

In fact, it was practically a stolen car.

Whether it was acceptable to sell it while hiding that fact was questionable.

“Hmm, I see. Then I….”

“No. I’ll buy it.”

“Um. I need to think about it a bit….”

One person hesitated, while the other two began to compete over who would buy it.

“I will sell it to the person who offers a good price.”

With Dahlia’s one statement, the price of the car began to rise gradually.

The competition was quickly decided.

One guest gave up, claiming they couldn’t afford to pay more than the amount the other had offered.

In the end, the car we arrived in was sold for 17 gold.

Since there was no system like a vehicle registration in this world, it was simply transferred.

I now understood how Riki had been able to loan cars to people in the past.

“I couldn’t sell it for 20 gold, but doesn’t this amount satisfy you?”

“Yeah.”

Aila seemed to acknowledge Dahlia’s sales skills as well.

Dahlia’s share, which was half of the sold amount, was set at 8 gold.

The rest was taken care of by Aila.

Once we returned to the train station, we purchased tickets heading to the capital and waited at the station.

With the departure time vaguely left, there wasn’t enough time to leisurely look around.

Sitting at the station, memories of the previous city’s terror kept resurfacing.

I still vividly remember the loud explosion and the surrounding destruction.

As I brought up that story, Aila spoke to me gently and warmly.

“It’s alright. This place is far away from the border and it’s a safe city. Such things won’t happen here.”

Aila tugged my head slightly, burying it in her chest.

Watching this, Jema pulled me away from Aila’s embrace.

“Ririan, you’re getting spoiled. Don’t coddle him too much.”

“Who’s really getting spoiled here?”

“Anyway.”

Jema mumbled.

When the train arrived and we looked for our seats, something felt off.

“Is this really the train?”

“Yep.”

Inside the train car, the unique layout of beds and seats made an impression.

“It’s a first-class car.”

“It must be expensive?”

“You’ve earned a lot of money. It’s okay to indulge in such luxuries sometimes.”

We were going to use the entire first class car.

At the entrance leading to the other cars, men in suits stood guard.

“It’s an honor to serve you.”

They not only carried swords by their sides but also had guns hidden in their clothing.

“There’s even security?”

“A lot of strange things have happened lately. Just in case, we hired them.”

These were the guards Aila had hired to prepare for potential terrorist attacks or the assault of thirsty dogs.

While we could handle enemies on our own, having more allies was always better.

Once the train departed, everyone laid down on the beds instead of sitting.

Understandably so, as the previous day had been spent in cramped quarters with little sleep.

We enjoyed a fairly comfortable time in the train car, resembling a hotel room.

First-class provided meals at regular intervals.

Though it wasn’t a full kitchen, the prepared food was not bad.

The green lunchbox named after the departing train station offered fresh food that turned my understanding upside down.

While all the ingredients were made from vegetables, the taste was excellent. The accompanying meat complemented them perfectly.

Having finished our meal, as dusk began to set in, Catherine called out to me softly.

“Why?”

“You know how to handle mana, right?”

“I do know how to do that.”

“Can you teach me a bit?”

I suggested that it would be best for her to ask Jema or Dahlia about magic.

“No, those two are a bit extreme.”

“Extreme?”

“Dahlia just grabs the mana and shoves it in, and what Jema says is too complicated for me to understand.”

Dahlia, being a demon, likely played with mana like a toy.

Jema was a prodigy, having learned magic entirely on her own in Latnia without anyone’s help.

Catherine must have sought help from both at least once during her travels, but their responses were too absurd, leading her to finally come to me.

“Does Aila not use magic?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t answer me.”

I figured that as the captain of the Knight Order, Aila could use magic to some extent.

For now, I decided to help Catherine with her request.

“First, let’s close our eyes and feel the mana around us.”

“At least you explain it in an understandable way.”

Catherine was the only human among us.

For humans, it takes an incredibly long time to feel mana.

While a demon might realize it in a matter of days, it could take a human months or even over a year.

I relayed this explanation to Catherine first.

“So, even if you can’t feel it right away, don’t be too disappointed. That’s completely normal.”

“Okay.”

Catherine practiced and meditated whenever she had time to awaken her mana.

Throughout the two days we spent on the train, Catherine hadn’t made any significant progress.

“It’s just not working.”

“Don’t rush it. It’s only been two days.”

Aila, seeing me teach Catherine on the train, approached with curiosity.

“What are you two up to these days? Are you dating?”

At Aila’s words, Jema hurriedly approached.

“No. It’s just that Catherine wants to understand mana.”

“What are you planning to do with mana?”

“I thought it might help in combat if I can use magic.”

Upon hearing Catherine’s reply, Aila took her hand.

“This is mana.”

“Uh?”

Aila placed a ball of condensed blue mana into Catherine’s hand.

“How does it feel?”

“It’s warm.”

“And you don’t need to learn it beforehand. Once you enroll in the Academy, the dedicated professors will rush to teach you.”

“Really?”

After throwing that ambiguous statement, Aila returned to her bed.

“By the way, what do they teach at the Academy? Do they train magic swordsmen too?”

The Tolris Academy’s purpose was indeed to produce magic swordsmen.

Since I had never been to any other academy, I was curious about what they taught.

“The basics are magic. They also teach weapon handling.”

“Aila graduated from the Academy too?”

“Do you think a lady from the Carlos family wouldn’t have attended the Academy?”

“I didn’t.”

Dahlia was astonished by Aila’s statement, her eyes wide with disbelief.

“You didn’t graduate from the Academy? You?”

“I went directly to a military school.”

“But the captain of the Knight Order graduated from the Academy.”

“Sister, stop. The captain graduated from both military school and the Academy.”

I struggled to comprehend the fact that she had attended both places.

However, Dahlia, who understood its significance, was so surprised that she could hardly speak.

“You graduated from both? How old is the captain?”

“About ten years older than me.”

“The timing of her appointment as captain fits perfectly.”

I looked at Dahlia, hoping for more explanation.

“Oh, you guys don’t know. To put it simply, she went to school twice.”

That explanation was far too simplistic for me to grasp.

“The Academy simply requires you to attend to graduate, but the military school requires exams for both admission and graduation. I failed a few times myself.”

Dahlia explained that her goal of going to the capital was to attend military school.

“Military school isn’t that big of a deal. I think you have more than enough skill to pass the entrance exam.”

“What? Are you teasing me right now?”

“No. That’s my honest impression from what I’ve seen. If your skills are that good for the entrance exam, you’ll definitely pass.”

Dahlia’s displayed ability was indeed quite remarkable.

Being able to use area-of-effect magic to handle dozens of enemies at once was an impressive capability.

“I didn’t use magic at the exam.”

“Why not? The ability to use magic is also part of the evaluation, isn’t it?”

“It doesn’t look very good.”

Aila made a bemused expression at that response.

“There’s no such thing as looking pretty when using magic. You just do it.”

“But I can only use my magic with full power three times.”

“You can gradually increase your usage over time. All that is included in the training process.”

“Then, why don’t you use magic?”

At that question, Aila turned her gaze, looking out the window.

Despite her grumbling about not wanting to answer because of the Demon King, she was not much different herself.

Not wanting to answer, she avoided the conversation.

“My magic has some issues, so I’m not using it right now.”

“Can’t you just slowly fix it like you did when speaking to me?”

“Um…I’ll explain later.”

The conversation halted, and everyone decided to lie down and sleep.

Thinking I might be of some help, I let Catherine touch a thread of mana.

“Hmm. I didn’t even know I could let someone else touch my mana.”

“It feels just like a light thread despite being mana.”

Catherine twirled and played with the mana thread for a while.

After playing with it for some time, Catherine finally went to sleep.

Looking out the window, I extended threads of mana here and there.

Using various magic from here would become special techniques.

However, every magic I knew caused the threads to dissipate when applied.

If I made the threads strong enough to endure the magic, conversely, the magic could not be cast.

The extent of my inheritance from Alium was just to make the threads.

How to apply them afterward was not explained to me.

I pondered over this in my own way, but as of now, I still could not arrive at a clear answer.

As I closed my eyes to organize my thoughts, a wave of drowsiness washed over me and I fell asleep.

When I woke up bathed in warm morning sunlight, the train had stopped.

Fearing something might have happened, I drew my dagger and got up from my seat.

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