Chloe Facial was a witch worthy of the name.
She hadn't become a witch from the shock of her brother's death.
That's an argument with cause and effect reversed.
Chloe was simply born a witch.
In my past life, her brother's death had merely made that talent (?) bloom in a different direction.
Especially that personality of hers that never lets go once she fixates and obsesses on something.
A manic obsession that genuinely wears a person down.
Damn it!
Why am I like this?
In the end Chloe made me spit out the word 'sis'.
At this point isn't that reaching down my throat and dragging the word out by force?
-Hang in there, Master.
He's mocking me again.
Hoo. Calm down and wrap up the situation first.
"So, Kai, tell me. Why are you here?"
For this I actually had an excuse prepared in advance.
I turned to the servants in the room and spoke.
"Step out for a moment."
My manner brought a puzzled look to Chloe's face.
But to complete this story, setting the mood was the most important part.
The feeling of telling the most important and secret story in the world.
After the servants left, I shut the door and latched it.
Not content with that, I even made a show of checking the room.
In case anyone was eavesdropping.
Needless to say, I was certain nobody was spying on this room.
Neik Renhardt would never do such a thing.
In any case, after building the mood for a good while, I sat back down beside the bed.
And spoke in the lowest voice I could manage.
"I came to have my illness cured."
"W-what did you say?!"
CLAMP!
I covered the mouth of Chloe, who had shouted with a horrified face.
"Mmph, mmph mmph!"
Normally she'd have shaken my hand off, but she'd taken internal injuries from Neik's [Coercion] and couldn't control her body.
She had no choice but to be quietly held back by my hand.
"Quiet. Be quiet, sis!"
Ah, damn it. 'Sis' came out far too naturally without my noticing.
"We have to speak quietly."
At my repeated urging, Chloe nodded.
When I took my hand away, Chloe asked in a trembling voice.
"Cure your illness? You mean Ether Hyperventilation Syndrome, don't you?"
"That's right."
"Who in the world could cure that?"
Chloe asked with a disbelieving expression.
Of course she wouldn't believe it.
And she's right.
It's an incurable illness.
What I did wasn't a cure either. If it had been, the phenomenon of excessive Ether accumulation would have to be gone.
What I did was less a cure than a transformation of the phenomenon.
And it's also something only I can do.
"That's right. Strictly speaking it isn't a cure. Someone just made it so that the seizures don't happen."
"That alone can be called a cure. But who on earth?"
"Aizel Renhardt."
Chloe paused, her eyes darting about as she thought.
Then she asked as if something had come to her.
"House Renhardt's second son, that Aizel Renhardt they call a magic genius?"
"You know of him."
"Talk of the Three Great Houses is some of the continent's best gossip. And we're constantly compared to one another. I've often heard that House Renhardt has a genius mage on my level."
Wow, she calls herself a genius without the slightest hesitation.
'Isn't it embarrassing to call yourself a genius with your own mouth?'
-You did too, Master.
'When did I? I've always been a humble, self-effacing, quiet genius.......'
-Pfft!
'Hey, did you just laugh?'
This skull-head bastard. We'll settle this later.
"Yes, that Aizel helped me."
"By what method? And how would Aizel know you had that illness?"
"Hoo!"
I caught my breath.
There were many questions, and I had to answer them one at a time.
In any case, the excuse for this, or rather the whole chain of events leading up to this situation, I'd already constructed.
And I'd made very good use of Velkarion in the process.
As befits a shut-in Archmage, he knew a very, very great deal.
His vast knowledge would keep being a great help.
"I don't know if you're aware, sis, but I did my own investigating in every direction to fix this illness."
This was true.
It's in Kalian's memories as well.
"Yes, I know. And I know how much our youngest suffered because of it."
Chloe's face reflexively turned sorrowful.
I went on.
"And in the course of it I learned something. Precisely, of one person."
"Who?"
"Robein Renhardt."
"Hm?"
"A figure of House Renhardt from about three hundred years ago. Looking into it, there were records of him having seizures similar to mine during outside activity......."
"There were, and?"
"From some point those records stop. He kept up his outside activity and yet had no seizures. So I wondered, could he have had the same illness as me and been cured?"
"A-and?"
It was something I'd learned through Velkarion.
For a skull-head, his memory is insane.
From now on he's the Velkarion Encyclopedia.
"So I secretly sent a letter. To the mage here, of House Renhardt."
"Aizel Renhardt?"
"Yes, and as it happens he's the same age as me. I first hid the fact that I was Kalian Facial and sent a letter to confirm the situation."
"And then?"
"He said we should meet. But......."
I fixed my gaze quietly on Chloe.
"Hm?"
Chloe tilted her head.
"Nobody at Summer Castle would allow me to go outside."
"Ah......."
Guilt flickered across Chloe's face.
I had been reading constantly through Kalian Facial's memories.
The Kalian Facial in those memories was overprotected.
Because of Ether Hyperventilation Syndrome.
Despite being born with outstanding martial talent, he was forbidden to train beyond a set amount of time.
If a seizure occurred, everyone in House Facial's Summer Castle was thrown into anxiety.
Never mind going out; if it was even slightly cold or hot, he was barred even from the garden and the training ground.
So traveling anywhere far was unthinkable.
"So....... you were kidnapped, and while you were at it you came here alone?"
Tears poured again from Chloe's eyes as she spoke.
A witch's tears. No matter how I look at it, I can't get used to it.
Time to wrap the story up.
"So I came here, and I met Aizel Renhardt."
Chloe suddenly asked with a look of recollection.
"Did the seizure happen on the day you met? Is that why you were carried in on someone's back?"
How did she know that?
Is that intelligence gathering, or obsession?
Frightening.
"That's right."
"A-and....... what happened?"
"It was cured."
"Hup!"
Chloe clapped both hands over her mouth.
And from the eyes that had stopped, tears poured once more.
She wept like that for a long while.
Ah, this is awkward.
I don't know what I'm supposed to do at times like this.
Comfort, or something.......
No, what reason on earth do I have to comfort a witch?
So I simply waited for the crying to stop.
Chloe stopped only after her eyes were swollen and her face was a mess of tears and snot.
Then she asked.
"H-hnngh, sob! T-then how was it cured?"
I said it boldly.
"That's a secret."
"Hm?"
"There's a special material handed down in House Renhardt, and I was treated using it. That's as far as I can tell you. And I promised never to let this out. So please keep this quiet too, sis."
"Uh, uh, uh......."
Chloe looked at me with flustered eyes.
But what could she do?
It's a secret.
Renhardt and Facial are two of what are called the continent's Three Great Houses.
And one of them digs into the other's secrets?
Unthinkable.
Still, just in case, I pressed once more.
"Aizel treated me behind his House's back. He did it accepting that he'd face serious censure if it came out. Of course, he had his own appetite for magical research as well. Either way, he's clearly my benefactor. So don't put my benefactor in a difficult position, sis."
At my firm words Chloe stammered and nodded.
And then.
"Now rest and recover. The Patriarch of Renhardt has summoned me separately, so I'll step out for a while."
"K-Kai!"
Chloe called after me hurriedly, but I was already slipping out of the room.
***
"Serviceable."
That was what Neik, who had said he'd see me in the evening, threw at me the moment he saw me.
No greeting like 'come in' or 'sit down.'
No. Considering Neik's personality, that may have been the greeting.
At times like this, the truth will do.
"I do think I'm rather serviceable myself."
A gleam rose in Neik's eyes once again.
He didn't deny my words or press me down.
He nodded instead.
Only natural.
I lived as that man's son for far longer.
Whereas I have no bond at all with Douglas Facial, the father of my current body.
I merely grasp that father-and-son relationship as one more piece of knowledge, through the memories held in this body.
Having kept a father-and-son relation for so many years, I know his character very well.
So it's only natural that I can pick out the answers he'll like.
"Then I'll ask a question."
"Yes."
"A secret art of your House, you said?"
He meant the technique I'd shown earlier.
And this time I gave a different answer.
"In truth, it isn't."
Neik's reaction was unremarkable.
He simply nodded.
As if he'd known.
"The reason for the lie?"
"There were people of my House present, and people of House Renhardt as well. I did not want the questioning to run long there."
"The reason for telling me now?"
"Because the Patriarch of Renhardt would see through to the truth."
Neik nodded again.
The gleam in his eyes shone a shade brighter.
"Strangely, you resemble my second son."
That gave me a start.
Because I am your real second son.
Neik soon added an explanation.
"But that unaccountable maturity is a side you won't find in my second son."
That was probably a facet that came from my having been an old man past seventy before the regression.
Well, a misunderstanding at that level suits me fine.
If I resembled his second son too closely, he might grow suspicious.
"How did you come by that technique?"
"A fated encounter."
"Do you not wish to say, or can you not say?"
Neik's questions are always like this.
How to put it? Questions that subtly pierce to the essence. Or a kind of trap.
This question is one of them.
Ordinarily, saying you cannot speak of it serves as an answer meaning 'ask no further.'
But Neik sees past such an answer.
Whether there is truly a reason you cannot speak, or whether you broke some taboo or used an illicit method.
His essence-piercing insight is very accurate, of course. So I could pretend to have a reason I can't speak of.
But my choice was different.
"I do not wish to say."
This answer makes him skip the process of exercising that insight.
That makes the conversation easier to continue.
Neik nodded as if satisfied.
And then, abruptly, he spoke again.
"Would you train under me?"
"Cough!"
Old man, use a turn signal before you cut in.