I Paved a Flower Path for My Nephew and Ended Up Becoming the Hero
"It was really delicious!"
Leo patted his full stomach with a satisfied face. That smile was so adorable that Alex smiled along with him.
[It really was delicious....]
[Alex. Next time let's try a different cut.]
[This one was a little low on fat.]
Alex, who by now was quite practiced at ignoring Two Hundred's voice as it came through like noise now and then, opened his mouth.
"Leo, let's wash up and get ready for bed."
He had no idea how many years it had been since he had said something like this.
In the 'future,' Leo had cried so much that he had not even eaten the food the neighbors brought properly before falling asleep.
"Yeah!"
At the sight of Leo answering so stoutly, Alex felt tears coming.
[This guy's a total nephew-fool.]
Alex, who let Two Hundred's words — a term he had never heard before, yet somehow understood — go in one ear and out the other, got ready to wash up as well.
Perhaps because so much had happened today, he was tired.
The battle with the Demon King. Leo's death.
The regression to the past. The encounter with the otherworld lich.
And the reunion with the young Leo on top of it.
'And I got a body, too.'
Perhaps because he had gone from a ghost's state, in which no fatigue could be felt, to having a body, his frame felt all the heavier.
Going to the bathroom with Leo, Alex filled the wooden tub to the brim with warm water. Leo had spent the whole day catching fish by the river and playing, so he needed a warm wash too.
When he got into the tub together with the tiny Leo, the water spilled over a little.
"It's warm!"
"Aaaaah...."
At the feeling of washing properly for what seemed like the first time in twelve years, a sigh of pleasure escaped Alex's lips on its own. He felt as though his body were melting.
[Ooh... that's refreshing....]
He had no idea why Two Hundred, who should be feeling much the same as he was, would call it refreshing, but Alex did not pay it any mind.
He simply enjoyed this peace.
This peace was so happy that it felt like tears might come.
***
After they came out, washed clean.
Alex swept up Leo, who went pattering off toward the bed, and lifted him high. At that Leo giggled brightly. Alex smiled widely too and played around with Leo this way and that.
Then before long he laid him down properly on the bed and drew the fluffy blanket over him.
"Uncle, cook meat again tomorrow. It was really, really delicious!"
Leo, who normally would have talked excitedly about what he would do with his friends tomorrow, kept talking only about the meat, apparently because tonight's dinner had been that good.
"It was the best meat of my life!"
A six-year-old talking about the best of his life.
Alex burst out laughing, but at the same time felt sorry that he had not fed him delicious cooking all this while.
Perhaps because of that, he became slightly grateful to Two Hundred for teaching him such a recipe.
"All right. I'll make it again tomorrow evening."
"Whoaa!"
Leo's sky-blue eyes, the color of the sky itself, sparkled brilliantly.
"Hey, Uncle. Can you cook more so I can share with my friends?"
"Of course you can."
"And Mister Mark and Granny Jessie and...!"
Under the blanket, Leo folded down his small fingers one by one as he named his friends and the villagers.
[At this rate it's going to turn into a village feast.]
Well, quite.
The sweet Leo seemed to want to share the meat he had enjoyed so much with every single person in the village.
"And... Grandpa Dean, and...."
And then he slowly fell asleep.
Leo, who had played to his heart's content, whose uncle had come home safe, and who had eaten the most delicious meat of his life, fell asleep with a very happy face.
'Unlike back then....'
At Leo's young face, without a single tear track on it, Alex felt his throat tighten even as he was moved.
"I'll have to keep him happy from now on too."
What should he do to make Leo happy?
'I have to get rid of the Demon King and demonkind.'
And he had to stop the monsters that did so much damage to the continent as well.
'To do that, I can't just stay in the village.'
He had to build up his skill and use his knowledge of the 'future' to obtain the treasures scattered across the continent and grow strong.
'Fortunately, I know a great deal of swordsmanship.'
That was thanks to spending his time in a ghost's state, where he had seen not only the 'Hero Leo's' swordsmanship but had also encountered many knights and mercenaries.
The sword arts of the Knight Empire's knights, the sword arts of the Holy Kingdom's holy knights, the swordsmanship of mercenaries, and even sword arts passed down to a single successor.
Since Alex the ghost could easily come and go from training grounds that no one but authorized persons could ever enter, it had been all the easier to learn swordsmanship.
The knowledge of swordsmanship built up that way filled Alex's head. He could pick and learn whichever he liked.
'Of course it'll take quite a bit of time.'
If it was for Leo's happiness, he intended to learn diligently.
'And for that, I have to leave the village.'
Now, twelve years before the ruin.
This was an important opportunity to head off in advance the schemes and plans of the Demon King and demonkind, and the incidents that had accelerated the Age of Ruin.
'But that doesn't mean I can leave Leo alone for years.'
There was no telling how long it would take a mere ordinary farmer like himself to destroy the Demon King. He might even die along the way.
'That can't happen. It'd be exactly the same as the future.'
The most important thing was Leo's happiness.
That Leo grow up happy and cheerful.
'So he has to be happy in the present as well as the future.'
And so Alex decided to leave the village and travel together with Leo, so that Leo would not be lonely.
'I'll teach him swordsmanship, get him lots of friends, eat good food, and travel.'
He wanted to do all the things he had not been able to do for him because he had died too early.
Picturing Leo delighting in a wider world rather than a small village, Alex smiled contentedly.
The dangerous work was something he alone could handle.
"Shall we talk? Otherworld lich."
Before that, he had to deal with this one.
[It's Two Hundred, I told you.]
Alex, who had eased carefully out of bed so as not to wake Leo, headed for the living room.
"Have you thought of a way to get out of my body?"
[The surest way is to make one more life vessel.]
That was a method Alex had thought of as well.
"The materials don't sound easy to come by."
[That's right. You have to use a top-grade magic stone, and you need a lot of gold and silver too. The other materials are extremely rare as well.]
[Gathering it all won't be easy.]
"If a life vessel is that hard to make, why did you make yours so weak?"
When Alex asked, recalling the glass marble that had crumbled to powder and vanished when he had merely held it, Two Hundred hurriedly objected.
[I made it sturdy!]
[Maybe it weakened from the shock of crossing over into another world plus being transferred into your body?]
"...Is the shock that great?"
[Crossing dimensions can't be an easy thing.]
At that, Alex put the plan of fleeing to an otherworld with Leo on hold for now.
If even a lich's life vessel, protected with all kinds of magic, ended up as powder, then crossing dimensions in a soft human body would be even less easy.
One wrong move and his whole body might burst.
Frowning, Alex returned to the main point.
"Then making a new life vessel would be difficult."
Thanks to traveling with the Hero's party, he did know the locations of rare materials, but it was obvious that obtaining them with his current ability would take an enormous amount of time.
'It'd probably be faster for the Church of Solenium to find me out and kill me first.'
Alex let out a sigh.
"Any other method?"
[Nope.]
At Two Hundred's easygoing answer, as though he had not even considered it, Alex ground his teeth.
"You bastard. You have no intention of leaving my body, do you?"
[Nope!]
It was an answer of the purest innocence.
[Think about it.]
[If I leave your body I won't be able to taste anything, so would I want to leave?]
[That was the first food I've eaten in decades.]
He could understand it, but that did not mean he could keep Two Hundred inside his body.
Alex thought over a few methods himself.
The first, easiest and fastest method was to inform the Church of Solenium.
But if he did that, it was obvious that Two Hundred would be annihilated and Alex would suffer harm as well.
'Death at minimum....'
Having no intention of dying again, Alex immediately turned to the second method.
That was to commission the mages of the Mage Tower Federation for a solution.
But that too was as terrible an option as going to the Church of Solenium.
"Those lunatics are no good either."
The image of mad mages charging at him shouting "A test subject!!" came to mind on its own, and a chill ran down his spine.
Here too he would have to worry for his life.
"That leaves finding an ancient relic, but...."
Among ancient relics and cursed objects there were quite a few soul-related items, and he wondered whether he could use one of those to detach Two Hundred's soul.
'The problem is that items able to separate and extract a soul that delicately are extremely rare.'
Naturally there were none near his house; they were all hidden away in very deep places in distant regions.
"If that's how it is, finding an ancient relic and making a new life vessel seem about the same...."
A sigh came out on its own.
It seemed he had no choice but to spend quite a long time with the otherworld lich from now on.
[I'm fine with things just as they are!]
"I find it appalling."
At Alex rubbing his face dry, Two Hundred snickered and said,
[Look on the bright side.]
[I'd rather you live a long time too. Because I get to feel sensations.]
It was the first sensation he had felt in decades.
Two Hundred wanted to eat delicious food and feel warmth and coolness for a long, long time.
[So I'll protect you and keep you from dying.]
He was not sure whether he was supposed to be grateful for that.
"But you can't use magic."
At Alex's words, Two Hundred answered as though he had been waiting for them.
[That's why I've been thinking about it.]
[If I can't use it because I've gotten into your body, then wouldn't it work if you used it instead, Alex?]
Alex's eyes went wide.
"...Me?"
[That's right. I'll teach you the mana cultivation method and magic.]
At that, Alex thought it over.
Being able to learn magic was good. It was powerful and useful in all sorts of ways.
'And I might be able to find a safe way to travel to an otherworld.'
He had not given up yet.
Escape to an otherworld.
Alex was thoroughly set on running away with Leo, just the two of them, if things ever got truly dangerous.
'But....'
Alex did not want to give up swordsmanship. Having gone to all the trouble of knowing so many sword arts from the 'future,' it would be a waste not to learn them.
'Besides, there are enemies magic doesn't work on.'
But the magic power cultivation method, which was the foundation of magic, and the aura cultivation method, which was the foundation of swordsmanship, could not be trained together.
'You can only learn one.'
Magic and swordsmanship.
Which one would make him stronger?
At Alex sinking into deep thought, Two Hundred grew puzzled.
[You don't want to learn magic?]
[That's odd. Everyone I knew wanted to learn it.]
"I do want to learn it... but I'm planning to train in swordsmanship as well."
Alex spoke as though sighing.
"Since I can't learn both, I have to pick whichever has more potential."
[? You're training in the sword too?]
[Hm.]
[Then can't you just learn a mana cultivation method that lets you use both?]
[Like a magic swordsman.]
"A magic swordsman?"
[I mean the job that uses magic and swordsmanship together.]
[You don't have that here?]
At the term he was hearing for the first time, Alex shook his head.
"No. Mages can only use magic and swordsmen can only use swordsmanship."
[Aha. So that's the kind of world this is.]
[Then you'd be the first magic swordsman, Alex!]
[That's completely great!]
[I'll teach you!]
At Two Hundred's words, Alex asked back in astonishment.
"You can really use the sword and magic together?"
[Sure! Whether it's the magic power a mage uses or the aura a swordsman uses, the basis is 'mana,' isn't it?]
[The mana cultivation method I made is a way of handling mana itself!]
[On top of that, you can use it while moving or talking. As long as you can concentrate, you can even train as easily as breathing.]
At those words, Alex marveled without meaning to.
It seemed the lich inside his body had been quite a considerable being in his own world.
"All right. Teach me."
If he could learn Two Hundred's magic, and if it would help Leo's happiness, then it seemed it would be fine even without detaching Two Hundred's soul.
'Though the Church of Solenium is a danger.'
Couldn't he just avoid them as much as possible?
"But can I even learn magic from another world?"
[It'll be fine.]
[If the laws by which magic works were different, I'd have been annihilated already.]
[The way a human can't live underwater.]
A lich was a being made by magic.
If the magic of Earth and the magic of Solenium had been different, there was no way the lich Two Hundred would be intact.
[Well, it'll seem a little foreign, sure.]
[Just talk your way around that part.]
"Right, understood."
Just as there were sword arts passed to a single successor, there were small schools in magic too, so it would not become a problem.
[First let's try feeling mana.]
[Try sitting on the floor.]
At that, Alex sat cross-legged on the living room floor with his hands on his knees, the way the mages he had seen in the 'future' had done.
[That looks natural.]
[Wasn't this your first time learning magic?]
"I've seen mages training."
But since it could not be learned by eye the way swordsmanship could, he did not know much about magic.
[Hm, is that so?]
[Seems the mages here are similar to the ones back on our side.]
Two Hundred, who had found it curious, went on.
[Now close your eyes and try to feel 'something new' in the air. It'll feel different from usual.]
[In our world it usually takes a few weeks, but I don't know how it'll be in this world.]
"It's similar here. A few days if you have talent, a few weeks if you're average, more than a year if you're slow. And if you have no aptitude you can't feel it at all."
[That's the same as ours too.]
[Still, since I'm inside your body, Alex, it won't be that you can't feel it at all.]
Since the soul of a lich, which was magic itself, was inside his body, he would not be entirely unaffected.
[Mana is the source of life. People, animals, plants — the amount differs, but they all have it.]
[When it enters a person's body, it becomes magic power and becomes aura.]
Alex listened closely to Two Hundred's explanation.
[Mana feels like hard rock. It's heavy too, so it can't be moved easily.]
Alex closed his eyes.
Since he was nothing but a commoner farmer, it was certain to take some time, so Alex tried to feel mana without impatience.
'Something new. A feeling different from usual. Heavy, hard rock.'
Just as Alex was about to concentrate in earnest in order to feel the mana in the air.
'...Huh?'
[...Oh?]
Two Hundred, who was sharing sensation with Alex, felt 'a certain thing.'
Heavy and hard, with an overwhelming presence unlike the air,
[Insane! You've already felt mana?]
It was mana.