Underage

Donald had always thought Lucia might share Roger's status as the child of a duke. If he dared to guess further, she might even have royal blood. But in the end, the truth was more astonishing than any of his guesses.

Lucia was the princess of the Feymont Empire, King Auston's only daughter.

Roger's mother was the queen's sister, and every prince and princess of the empire followed in the footsteps of Emperor Louis Fermont, beginning their study of magic at Tris Magic Academy.

In recent years, Tris Magic Academy had failed to produce any outstanding students, yet it still maintained the lavish privilege of having almost all its classes taught by Formal Magicians. Its allocation of Magic Crystals had never been cut, either. This was because the academy held special significance for the Feymont Empire.

Of course, Donald knew none of this.

On the way back to the Magic Academy, Captain Kaz politely asked him about the bandits, and Donald told him the truth. He said nothing about his suspicions that the kidnappers might have been soldiers in disguise or that Lucia had been their target. He simply recounted everything that had happened, leaving Captain Kaz to draw his own conclusions.

Donald knew what it might mean if the army had kidnapped a princess within the borders of the empire. So he had decided to say only what he had seen and not let his imagination run wild.

Captain Kaz showed no change in expression after hearing Donald's account. Naturally, he didn't ask for his opinion, either. In his eyes, Donald was probably just an ordinary student who had happened to be caught up in the incident. The only time he looked slightly surprised was when he learned that Donald could cast magic without chanting. When Donald described their escape, Captain Kaz even reminded him that they should have released the horses as they fled.

In front of the Crimson Knights, Donald finally saw Lucia display the bearing of a princess: an elegant posture and a faintly distant smile, completely unlike the Lucia he knew.

For Donald, the kidnapping incident was over as soon as he returned to the Magic Academy. Whatever investigations Lucia, Captain Kaz, and the academy would have to conduct—and whatever undercurrents might be stirring throughout the empire—had nothing to do with him.

He immediately returned to his familiar routine and continued his studies and training at his own pace.

His self-created Meditation Method continued to increase his Water and Fire Divine Elements by four each day. He also persevered with Rune drawing, though it seemed futile for now. In Alchemy class, he worked hard to identify and record the traits of different plants; in chanting class, he merely pretended to mouth the words. As for the Magic Array course he was interested in, it wouldn't be offered until the fourth year.

With all his other spare time, aside from continuing to practice Six-Element Attack Magic, Donald began trying to create Twelve-Element Defense Magic, also known as the Six-Element Nesting Model. After successfully casting it once, he had a sudden impulse to try combining Divine Elements of multiple types to form the nested model. The experiment failed, just as he'd expected.

Almost every model collapsed the instant it was cast. The one that didn't collapse was the most dangerous of all. After the model of Water Divine Elements nested around Fire Divine Elements produced a tiny ball of ice, it exploded the moment it left his hand.

Even though Donald's resistance to fire was far greater than that of an ordinary Low-level Magic Apprentice, the blast still injured his palm. He had to ask the Alchemy professor to apply a medicinal salve, which cost him a Magic Crystal.

Since receiving the new Meditation Method, Wesley had successfully advanced to Intermediate Magic Apprentice. He had also become a little less carefree and seemed to be working harder. Donald wasn't sure whether he had been spurred on by Donald's training progress or had started thinking about the beauties of the Magic Continent again.

During the early April holiday, Donald saw the twin girls in the Laboratory, both of them unusually excited. An alloy of Light Iron and another, somewhat rarer lightweight metal had proved far stronger than Light Iron when mixed in a certain proportion and cooled at a certain rate. Even Dwarf Aidaruy had marveled at the result.

After witnessing Donald's almost miraculous creations, the twins' attitude toward him had shifted from curiosity and confusion to complete trust, along with a little admiration. The nickname "Demon King Donald" had stuck, too.

Perhaps because they had grown familiar with him, the two girls began showing their talkative sides. Whenever they started chattering endlessly, Dwarf Aidaruy did his best to avoid them. As the one responsible for guiding their experiments, Donald could only grit his teeth and listen to them ramble.

"Demon King Donald, what should we call this alloy?" Ailimanda pressed a finger to her dimple and gazed up to the side, as if pondering an important question.

"Right, right! What should we call it? Hmm... How about Devil King Light Iron?"

After saying the name, Ailimiya liked it more and more. Her sister seemed to agree. Their eyes met, and they each flashed an exaggerated smile. It seemed that, to them, coming up with a good name for an invention was even more exciting than the invention itself.

Donald worried that if the name caught on and people eventually learned it was connected to him, he really would end up with the nickname Demon King. So he put on a serious face and told the twins to bring over the experimental sample. Then he asked, "When did you test its strength?"

The sisters answered that they had tested it immediately after the experiment, about four days ago.

"Test it again now," Donald instructed.

"Even a Gnome couldn't mess up a little test like this," Ailimanda said.

"Right, right! Why do we have to test it again?" Ailimiya chimed in.

But Donald insisted, so the sisters had no choice but to pout and test it again. When they saw the result, their nearly identical faces lit up with excitement and a hint of embarrassment.

"Wow... How did it get so hard? Huh, we really did get it wrong last time..."

"Right, right! That's so embarrassing. We got it wrong! Manda, you said you were sure it was right!"

"You said it couldn't be wrong either!" Her sister tapped her on the head. The younger girl pouted, unable to argue back.

"All right, you didn't get it wrong. This is normal. Some alloys harden over time after cooling."

The twins immediately asked whether it would keep getting harder if they left it for longer.

Donald said it wouldn't. Although age-hardening in alloys could continue for a long time in practice, they generally came close to reaching their peak within a few days.

Setting aside this little mishap, the test results still left both sisters flushed with delight. After sitting for three days, the alloy had become considerably harder, nearly as hard as ordinary steel.

Then came something even more exciting for them: Donald had a new task to assign.

This time, they would continue experimenting by adding other ingredients to the alloy. They would use various expensive, rare metals, especially those with exceptional strength or toughness, such as Dwarf Fine Steel or the even more expensive Mithril. The amount added would be much smaller this time, ranging from one ten-thousandth to one hundredth of the mixture.

Since these additives differed greatly from Light Iron in density, Donald instructed the sisters to stir quickly after heating the mixture to a high temperature, helping the ingredients blend and preventing them from separating into layers.

After setting the Laboratory's work in motion, Donald mentioned his younger brother's studies at the Knight Academy while chatting with Dwarf Aidaruy. Aidaruy scoffed at the way knights were trained in Middle-earth.

"The way you train knights in Middle-earth is complete nonsense!"

"Why?" Donald didn't know much about the Knight Academy's curriculum, but he was curious to hear Aidaruy say that.

"Didn't you know that Middle-earth has never produced a high-level knight above the seventh rank? I heard that around here, a Formal Knight under eighteen is considered a genius. Ha! In the Knight Federation, you have to reach Level 2 Knight at that age to count as a genius. And the Dwarf warriors of the Extreme North Country can reach Level 4 Knight strength before they're fifty."

"Fifty?" Donald thought that wasn't exactly a fair comparison.

"Huh? You didn't know that dwarves don't reach adulthood until they're fifty and live at least four hundred years? Though those dwarf miners who work in the mines..."

At that, Donald remembered the sadness on Natia Vida's face when she had spoken of the dwarves' fate. But another question immediately came to mind.

"How old are Gnomes when they reach adulthood?"

Aidaruy couldn't help snickering, his expression seeming to say, "You're only thinking to ask that now?"

"Gnomes reach adulthood at forty, and live an average of five hundred years. Heh heh."

"Then aren't those two little girls just children?" Donald pointed toward the room. The door was shut, so the twins couldn't hear their conversation.

"I never said they weren't. You just asked me how old they were. They are indeed sixteen!"

Donald was so annoyed by the answer that he didn't know what to say. He'd never imagined that the supposedly honest, hot-tempered dwarves could be so sly.

Aidaruy was still holding back a laugh. With his bearded face, Donald might not have been able to tell if he'd really laughed, but his attempt to suppress it was even more exaggerated and obvious.

Only then did Donald realize why Aidaruy always slipped away whenever an experiment began. He must have thought it was funny to see Donald earnestly conducting experiments with two children.

"Have they really attended engineering school?"

"They have. Natia Vida's two children are famous prodigies in the Extreme North Country. They graduated from the Engineering Academy a year ago. Most children their age haven't even started school yet. They're always shouting about wanting to do experiments, but who would actually bring two children along to do experiments?"

That dwarf even covered his mouth after saying the last sentence, as if he wanted to make sure Donald knew he was laughing.

"What level Knight are you?" Donald asked bitterly.

"I'm not a Knight. We cultivate Battle Qi, too, but dwarves aren't called Knights."

"Come on, you know what I mean. What Knight level would you be equivalent to?"

"Level 5 Dwarf Warrior!" Aidaruy puffed out his chest as he said it. At last, he stopped laughing.

Donald was stunned by the answer. Captain Kaz, commander of the Crimson Knights and a symbol of the empire's top military strength, was only a Level 4 Knight. Yet this dwarf standing before him was actually one level higher. Donald couldn't help scrutinizing the dwarf as if he'd only just met him. Aidaruy grew a little uncomfortable under his gaze.

"What are you planning?"

"Could you train my younger brother?"

"Our dwarven training methods would be too much for him."

"Why not give it a try?"

Early the next morning, Donald brought Richard and Kelly to meet Aidaruy. From that day on, they began trying the dwarves' methods of training warriors.