Just as Rodos had expected, quite a few eyes turned toward him.
Everyone remained seated with proper decorum despite the commotion, but they could not conceal how much wider their eyes had grown.
The Rodos before them looked nothing like the one they remembered.
“Is that really the Rodos we know?”
“Even the God of Magic would be astonished.”
His siblings could not resist whispering among themselves.
They simply could not remain silent.
He had smashed down the doors.
And of all people, Rodos had done it?
“…….”
Rodos ignored them and surveyed the enormous dining table.
Everyone was seated without regard for age.
That could mean only one thing.
‘They are seated according to rank.’
Quite a few seats remained empty.
They were at the farthest end of the table, in the corner seats most distant from the head.
Rodos spoke in a deep voice.
“Show me to my seat.”
“P-Please sit… over here.”
The servant, visibly flustered, guided him to an empty seat.
Rodos followed without a word.
Once seated, his expression was strangely calm.
He was merely intrigued by the rectangular table.
In the North, everyone had eaten seated together in a circle.
All manner of delicacies from land and sea covered the table.
Behind it, servants and maids cautiously watched the atmosphere as they cleared away the remains of the shattered doors.
‘It suddenly became quiet.’
Rodos looked toward the empty seat at the head of the table.
That was undoubtedly Marcos’s seat.
‘Everyone remains silent until the Head of the House arrives.’
It was a rule of House Augustus.
Marcos disliked noise.
As a result, family gatherings attended by the Head of the House were conducted in near silence.
The fact that his siblings had been unable to stop themselves from whispering despite that rule showed just how shocking Rodos’s entrance had been.
While waiting for Marcos, Rodos began examining those around him.
Although this was an official family gathering, it was not attended by every member of the family.
It was reserved solely for the direct descendants.
There were thirteen of them in total, including Rodos.
With a serious expression, Rodos carefully observed his siblings.
This was the first time he had seen them since taking over this body.
To accomplish his goals, he needed to understand as much as possible and prepare accordingly.
Rodos recalled the memories of the body’s original owner.
Including its branch families, House Augustus numbered in the hundreds.
If the mages who operated under the family were included, the number rose into the thousands.
Every one of them was at least an Intermediate Mage, and half of all High-Ranking Mages active across the continent belonged to House Augustus.
It was an enormous organization that even the Empire could not easily interfere with.
‘As expected of House Augustus.’
The keen instincts of a warrior were telling him something.
The siblings gathered here were incomparably stronger than the House Augustus mages he had encountered in the North.
Those born into the direct bloodline of the family could naturally use magic from the moment they were born.
Magic was not something just anyone could wield.
Only those born with mana could become mages.
Even someone born with mana normally needed at least five years of effort before they could properly use magic.
That was the nature of the magical world.
Unfairly enough, the blood descendants of House Augustus were mages from birth.
As befitted a family said to have received the blessing of magic itself, they were fundamentally different from everyone else.
Ordinarily, a mage needed at least ten years of training to reach the 5th Circle, the realm of an Intermediate Mage.
The youngest mage outside House Augustus ever to reach the Intermediate Mage level had been twenty-five.
Yet the family’s blood descendants reached that realm before the age of fifteen.
Those who inherited even greater talent naturally entered the ranks of High-Ranking Mages once they passed the age of twenty.
In short, they were monsters who practically embodied magic itself.
And Rodos had been born among those monsters as a dullard.
Even at twenty-two, he had never advanced beyond the 2nd Circle.
Then the accident had robbed him of even his ability to use magic.
So there was nothing strange about his siblings frowning at him as though they had seen something unpleasant when he looked their way.
Rodos paid them no attention and pushed his senses as far as possible, attempting to gauge their strength.
‘Impressive.’
Even though everyone was concealing their power, he could still feel powerful currents of mana.
The higher their rank, the more intense those currents became.
As the Great Warrior of the North, he would have been capable of defeating them.
In his current state, however, he doubted he could even leave a scratch on them.
That did not mean he could defeat his lower-ranked siblings either.
He had destroyed a training dummy that supposedly required the strength of a full-fledged knight, but he currently had no way to properly counter magic.
‘I need to become stronger.’
Whether it was aura, aether, or some other power, he needed strength.
A properly trained swordsman could use aura to defend against magic.
In the past, when Rodos had fought mages in the North, he had used aura and aether to neutralize their spells.
For now, he needed to quietly build his strength.
‘Who was it?’
Someone here had taken an interest in Rodos.
Someone who had secretly watched what happened at the training grounds and arranged that ridiculous little scheme afterward.
Rodos had not seen the person’s face at the training grounds, but he had sensed a powerful presence of mana.
It had felt as though something were blazing fiercely.
The person possessing that aura had most likely been the one who summoned Rodos to the banquet.
But whoever it was appeared to be hiding their power now.
Rodos had a strong suspicion about their identity, but he decided to wait and see.
If it was who he thought it was, that person would probably reveal himself soon enough.
“The Head of the House is late.”
The man who broke the long silence had curly red hair.
His name was Kaiser, Marcos’s eldest son and a 9th-Circle mage.
“You already know how busy the Head of the House is, Brother.”
The one who responded to Kaiser was the second child, Nerva.
She was also an 8th-Circle mage and primarily specialized in Light-Attribute Magic.
“I was not asking you.”
Kaiser glared at her with murderous intent.
At the same time, black mana spread around him.
It was a curse filled with the aura of death.
“Urgh!”
The servants clutched their throats in pain.
Even the other siblings had to turn away from the powerful curse magic.
“Ha.”
Nerva frowned and snapped her fingers.
Mana resembling light spread outward and erased the curse.
“You killed someone last time too. Are you trying to do it again?”
Nerva looked at Kaiser with open disgust, thoroughly fed up with his behavior.
“Quiet.”
Their conversation ended there.
Chief Steward Kshar, his expression impassive, conveyed the will of the Head of the House.
“The Head of the House instructed me to inform you that he is too occupied with work to attend today.”
“Then I should leave.”
The moment Kaiser heard that Marcos would not be coming, he immediately rose from his seat.
A gathering without the Head of the House held no value for him.
“I am leaving too. Our dear brother ruins the atmosphere and acts as though nothing happened.”
Nerva cast recovery magic on the servants who were still shaken from the curse before leaving as well.
Once those ranked second and third departed, the table emptied rapidly.
The siblings ranked fourth through eighth exchanged glances before leaving too.
Kshar did not stop them.
No, he could not.
Rank within the family was absolute.
If the Head of the House was absent, the highest-ranked person present could do as they pleased.
However, the remaining siblings could not leave.
The one ranked ninth had not yet risen.
“Kshar, we can eat now, right?”
A man with short hair and narrow eyes asked Kshar.
“Yes, Young Master. Please enjoy your meal. I have other matters to attend to, so I will take my leave.”
Kshar bowed elegantly before departing.
The maids who remained behind would be more than sufficient to serve them.
“Wine.”
The man spoke without touching any of the food.
He merely drank wine.
His name was Harka.
He was Marcos’s tenth son.
He specialized in Flame Magic and had reached the 5th Circle at the young age of sixteen.
Now twenty-four years old, he stood on the verge of reaching the 7th Circle.
Even considering that he was a direct descendant of House Augustus, his progress was exceptionally fast.
Among the six factions within the family, the Flame Faction, which possessed the greatest influence, supported him.
That was why he had risen above his other siblings to ninth place in the family hierarchy.
However, the lower-ranked siblings, servants, and maids disliked him.
“Father really is busy.”
Everyone else called Marcos the Head of the House, but Harka called him Father.
Yet no one at the banquet could reprimand him for it.
At this moment, Harka held the highest rank among those present.
Harka looked at a maid and crooked his finger.
“What are you doing? It is empty.”
The maid bowed and refilled his empty glass.
Harka drained it in one swallow, then crooked his finger again.
He wanted more.
As the maid respectfully poured the wine, Harka’s arm struck hers while he was cutting his food.
The impact caused her to lose her grip on the bottle with one hand, and wine splashed outward.
SPLASH!
Dark red wine soaked Harka’s robe.
The pure white robe, decorated with golden thread, was stained crimson.
The maid hurriedly bowed her head.
“My apologies. I will take care of it immediately.”
“No, there is no need.”
Harka waved dismissively and gave her a faint smile as though everything were fine.
BANG!
At the sight of Harka’s reaction, the maid began trembling uncontrollably.
“I was enjoying the banquet for once, but now I cannot stand looking at any of it. I should burn it all.”
Harka cast a spell at the plates of food.
A fiercely burning sphere of flame appeared.
FWOOSH!
The Fireball struck the food and exploded lightly, incinerating even the plate beneath it.
The surrounding dishes soon caught fire as well, and the smell of burning food filled the air.
Harka smiled brightly, apparently pleased by the scent.
“Yes, that is better. I feel much better after burning it. Hey, clean this up.”
“My apologies. We will clear it away immediately.”
The maids hurriedly removed the burned food and plates before bringing out fresh dishes and setting them on the table.
The siblings appeared indifferent, as though they were accustomed to this kind of behavior from Harka.
“Now get lost. Unless you want to burn alive.”
Harka waved a hand engulfed in flames.
He was telling them to stay out of his sight.
Watching the scene, Rodos summed Harka up in a single thought.
‘A contemptible bastard.’
Weak before the strong and cruel toward the weak.
Rodos had seen plenty of people like him in the North.
In the past, he would have split Harka in half along with the table without hesitation.
But he could not do that now.
He merely maintained a calm expression and continued eating the food he had placed on his plate.
“Come to think of it, the youngest arrived last.”
Harka did not remain quiet.
Rodos had become his new target.
“I suppose that can happen. Why were you late?”
“…….”
“You are not answering. But you will have to answer this one. Kradil was unconscious, was he not? And a pathetic bastard like you was the one who did it. How did you manage that?”
Just as Rodos had expected, it had been Harka.
The man’s mana burned as fiercely as his temperament.
Rodos did not answer.
Why ask when Harka had seen it himself?
“…….”
“How dare you ignore your older brother?”
When Rodos remained silent, Harka drew his staff.
A large flame began blazing at its tip.
Rodos did not so much as blink.
FWOOSH!
Harka’s burning staff moved close enough to Rodos’s ear that he could feel the heat against his skin.
Even so, Rodos continued eating.
“Huh?”
Harka found Rodos’s reaction strange.
In the past, this alone would have been enough to make Rodos tremble and fall to his knees.
But now he was different.
Far from being terrified, his expression remained perfectly calm.
“Interesting.”
Harka grinned.
What he had witnessed at the training grounds had not been an illusion.
Something about his youngest brother really had changed.
CRASH!
Harka swept away the food and tableware Rodos had been eating from, then raised his staff.
“From now on, you would be wise to answer my questions honestly.”
With those words, Harka cast a spell.
A small spear formed entirely of flame shot toward Rodos.
‘I need aura.’
He needed aura to defend against magic.
But he had not yet awakened it.
Rodos gripped the tomahawk strapped across his back.
Just because he could not use aura did not mean he intended to simply let the spell hit him.
‘If I use aether….’
Rodos drew in the surrounding aether.
Tiny white particles began gathering around him.
It was possible to wield aether in a manner similar to aura.
The technique was so difficult that Rodos had succeeded only once before.
Aether.
The most fundamental element composing the world and the source of life itself.
That also meant aether contained an immense amount of power.
The aether gathered along the blade of the axe and began to glow.
Only a tiny amount had accumulated, but it was enough to sever the weave of the spell.
FWOOSH!
The blazing spear of fire closed in directly before him.
Rodos sprang to his feet and swung the tomahawk.
SLASH!
The glowing axe blade cut through the weave of the magic.
The spell split cleanly in two and vanished in a shower of sparks.
CRACK!
The dining table splitting in half along with it was merely collateral damage.