Lolita

After receiving an order issued personally by His Majesty the King, the Magic Academy showed remarkable efficiency. It immediately processed Donald's enrollment and arranged an obviously over-the-top private room for him in the Dormitory Area.

After assessing his progress, Donald asked the Academy to place him in the third year. His request was granted at once, of course. No one questioned his magical foundation, and tuition was never even brought up. Still, Donald dutifully asked Mr. Victor to pass along half a year's tuition: two magic crystals.

Neither the King's commendation nor the Academy's special treatment had much effect on Donald's state of mind. As he saw it, nothing he might encounter could compare to the unbelievable journey he had made across worlds ten years earlier.

And so, with a calmness that others found difficult to understand, Donald accepted his sudden change in status—from a penniless odd-job man at the Academy to a star student who was the center of attention. His calm, low-key manner also allowed people to gradually put aside the shock of that day.

At last, Donald had gotten his wish and officially begun to study magic in a systematic way.

The more than one hundred third-year students attended class together, without being divided into groups. The atmosphere was casual and relaxed. Most professors simply lectured and called it a day; they neither took attendance nor assigned homework. Surprisingly, the vast majority of students were still very diligent. Donald guessed that the Academy's steep tuition had something to do with it.

Lucia used helping a transfer student as an excuse to talk with Donald after every class. This had two consequences: it objectively helped him keep up with the lessons, and it made him the bane of every third-year boy's existence.

Every afternoon, Donald still showed up at the Library to read and discuss his thoughts with Wesley. What had changed was that the cleaner-and-poet duo had become a more conspicuous trio, thanks to their changed roles and the addition of a new member, Lucia. Even with Lucia right there beside him, Wesley still made advances toward different girls from time to time. Lucia had even started giving him advice, but the results remained disappointing.

Ten days later, Donald received a letter from Natiya Vida. During the mid-March break, he followed the address in the letter to the new Laboratory she had set up in Dorn City. There, Donald finally met Natiya Vida's two daughters, twins named Ailimanda and Ailimiya. Compared with Natiya Vida, who had a child's body but an adult's face, the sisters looked perfectly normal: they were simply two exquisitely cute human girls of about six or seven.

"Uncle Ada, why is he so young? He doesn't look all that impressive. Is Mom lying again?"

"Uncle Ada, is he really a mage? Why isn't he wearing one of those pointy hats?"

Dwarf Aidaruy had presumably come along to look after the two girls' safety.

"Who told you mages wear pointy hats? It must've been something you read in another one of those nonsense books." Aidaruy always looked like he was about to blow his top. "Donald, did Natiya mention in her letter that these two little rascals are here to be your assistants?"

"Um... aren't they a little... young? Laboratories can be pretty dangerous..."

The Laboratory wasn't actually all that dangerous, but that wasn't necessarily true for children. This time, though, Donald had misjudged the Gnomes' age again.

"But we're already sixteen. We're not any younger than you."

"That's right, that's right! Don't underestimate us—we graduated at the top of our class from the Engineering Academy!"

Sixteen? Donald looked at Aidaruy in confusion. He nodded, confirming the sisters' age.

"All right, then. What should we do?" Donald scratched his head. He still couldn't accept that the two little girls in front of him were about his age.

"This is your Laboratory. Mom only agreed to let us come and be your assistants."

"Right, right! It's your Laboratory."

You talk like children, and then you say you're not children. Donald grumbled to himself as he inspected the Laboratory equipment.

It seemed Natiya had indeed read Victor's paper carefully. The Laboratory was fully equipped with all the devices that might be needed for the series of metal alloys mentioned in the paper. It even had some metalworking machinery Donald had never seen before. Natiya must have seen that forging press and figured Donald was interested in making machines.

"But I can only spend so much time in the Laboratory..." Seeing that she had gone to the trouble of preparing such a lavish Laboratory for him, Donald felt a little bad.

"We know, we know. Donald is a really powerful mage, and he still has to keep studying magic. Mom told us."

"Donald the Great Demon King only needs to set up the experimental plan. Leave the rest to us!"

"Great Demon King?"

"A powerful mage is a Great Demon King."

"That's right, that's right! Donald the Great Demon King."

"Could you stop saying 'that's right, that's right'...?"

Donald felt as though the two little rascals were about to make his head spin. He turned to Dwarf Aidaruy with a pleading look.

Aidaruy gave Donald an apologetic shrug, then simply walked out of the Laboratory and closed the door behind him.

And so the innocent, helpless young man and the two curious little girls with their big, blinking eyes began their first day of work amid a pile of strange metal machines. By evening, Donald had finally figured out what every machine did. The Laboratory assigned to him was practically a School-run Factory. If this world had gunpowder, he might even have considered making a few firearms.

During a break, Donald asked about the Extreme North Country. It was only through the two girls that he finally learned why conditions there were so harsh: it was because of the gravity. The farther north you went in this world, the stronger the gravity became. Only strong Dwarves could endure the gravity in the northernmost mining region, while Gnomes could live only in the south of the Extreme North Country. Human Knights could certainly use Battle Qi to resist the gravity, but only the abundant Battle Qi of a High Knight could sustain that constant exertion.

Because their frail bodies couldn't withstand the gravity there, no High Mage had ever visited the Extreme North Country throughout history. He had even heard that they rarely went to the Knight Federation, since its gravity was also much stronger than that of Middle-earth.

"So it's gravity. Then lightweight metals should be really useful there," Donald murmured to himself.

"But lightweight metals are too soft."

"That's right, that's right! They're too soft. What good are they?"

Did being light necessarily mean being soft? Not at all. Donald didn't argue with the sisters, though. Instead, he gave them a task: gather samples of every kind of metal they could get their hands on.

After arranging all that, he left the Laboratory.

When Richard heard that his brother had enrolled, he was overjoyed. The brothers celebrated together at a tavern in Dorn City, something they rarely got to do.