Nighttime Chat

Once night fell, Lilia prepared hot water for the bath.

Hilde and Rudeus went into the bathroom one after the other to wash.

After they were done, both of them were steaming with heat as they changed into their pajamas and returned to their room to get ready for bed.

"Hey, Rudeus, come dry my hair."

"Yes, yes..."

Given a casual order by Hilde, Rudeus stepped forward half-heartedly and used the wind magic he had only learned recently to dry Hilde's hair.

Because her hair was long, drying it by herself was a real hassle, so every time she finished bathing, Rudeus would help dry it.

Hilde's hair color was the same as Zenith's, a soft gold.

Rudeus's, on the other hand, was brown like Paul's.

Their eye colors were the same too. Hilde took after Zenith with blue eyes, while he took after Paul with pale green ones.

Apparently, when he and Hilde had been born, Paul and Zenith had agreed that once they grew up, he would learn swordsmanship and Hilde would learn magic. But looking at it now, it seemed to be the exact opposite. Hilde was born with monstrous strength and was better suited to learning swordsmanship, while his talent for magic was far better than Hilde's...

Fate sure loved playing tricks.

Rudeus muttered silently to himself, and before he knew it, the movements of his hands had slowed.

Hilde glanced behind her, her eyes narrowing slightly.

While Rudeus wasn't paying attention...

She aimed at his vital weak point! Bent her finger and flicked!

"Hiss! Motherf—!"

Rudeus sucked in a sharp breath, his expression instantly twisting into something savage.

As a man, there were lines that absolutely could not be crossed. Not even by his own little sister!

A dragon had a reverse scale; touch it and die!

The king descended from the heavens, furious and ferocious!

"Hilde, what the hell are you doing!"

"Who told you to slack off and space out?"

"Damn it, take this..."

Rudeus vigorously rubbed Hilde's hair.

As a result, Hilde slapped him across the forehead. "Gentler! A girl's hair is her life! Why are you using so much force? Are you trying to die?!"

Rudeus, in a fit of rage, got angry for a moment.

Then he behaved.

After quite a bit of effort, he finally finished drying Hilde's hair. Before he could even speak, Hilde grabbed him in return and pressed him down onto the chair.

"Thanks for working so hard to dry my hair just now. I'll massage your shoulders for you," Hilde said with a smile.

Looking at the ill-intentioned smile on Hilde's face, Rudeus subconsciously swallowed and hurriedly begged for mercy.

"U-um, I don't really need that, do I?"

"Don't worry. I'll control my strength."

"I'm not wor—ooooooooooooooooooooooo—"

The room was instantly filled with screams like a pig being slaughtered.

Lilia, who happened to be passing by the door, sighed when she heard it and silently walked away.

After being thoroughly ravaged, Rudeus was finally let off by Hilde.

His entire body lay limp on the bed. He could no longer move so much as a finger, his eyes lifeless as drool trickled out.

"I finally... survived..."

"Don't make it sound like I'm some kind of demon."

Hilde stood by the bed, looking down at him expressionlessly.

This was what happened when a subordinate defied their superior.

Without understanding the gap in strength, he had dared to challenge her. He didn't even have a one-in-ten-thousand chance of winning.

"All right, hurry up and move. I need to get into bed too."

Hilde kicked Rudeus.

Reluctantly, he rolled over and freed up half the bed.

After Hilde lay down, she found Rudeus staring at her with a look of defiance.

Hilde tilted her head. "What, not convinced?"

"I didn't say that..."

Rudeus sighed. "We're siblings, aren't we? Shouldn't we get along a little better?"

"Hmph, hmph."

Hilde gave two little snorts, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

"Come to think of it, Paul's really popular with girls. If I end up looking more like Paul, then I'll probably have tons of girls liking me in the future too, right?" Rudeus began to fantasize.

"You give me the feeling you're one hundred percent the type to cheat after getting married," Hilde said casually.

"How is that possible? Besides, this world seems to allow taking multiple wives, right? Then that counts as having a harem. A legal harem!"

"Idiot. Having a harem and cheating are two different things. A deadbeat shut-in virgin brat like you, with nothing but dirty thoughts in your head, would definitely cheat the moment some girl flirted with you even a little."

"Stop calling it cheating every other sentence. I'm a pure-love guy!"

"Yeah, right."

Hilde rolled her eyes.

Although she couldn't remember her previous life, there was always some kind of stereotype in her head telling her that reincarnation into another world basically always evolved into a harem ending.

Rather than believe that Rudeus would honestly stick to monogamy in the future, she might as well believe he was actually impotent.

The kind who wouldn't be able to get it up even if a girl threw herself at him.

Before they knew it, another year had passed.

Recently, Rudeus discovered a key point.

Although the textbooks said that each person's total amount of mana was decided at birth and would not increase later, the actual feeling didn't seem to be like that. As long as he completely exhausted his mana, once it recovered, the total amount would be slightly greater than before. He had come to that conclusion through his own body.

Then he had Hilde help him test it as well, confirming that the conclusion was correct.

From then on, he began training his mana and magic even more actively, practically exhausting his mana until he fainted every day, and he had to trouble Hilde to help cover for him. Fortunately, children spent most of their time sleeping anyway, so for the moment, it didn't arouse suspicion.

Some time passed.

Rudeus felt that he had already mastered beginner magic to perfection, and it was about time he started touching on intermediate magic.

Intermediate magic basically began to have a certain degree of offensive power.

Hilde did try to advise Rudeus not to experiment in the attic, but Rudeus was clearly very confident in his own magic skills. After hearing Hilde say that, he instead declared that he was a god in the field of magic, and that someone like Hilde, who only knew brute force, should stop making irresponsible comments.

Hilde couldn't hold back, so she beat Rudeus up.

After the beating, Rudeus still didn't change his mind. He chose to use intermediate magic in the attic anyway, because judging from his previous experience, as long as he controlled his mana properly, there was no need to worry about the power...

And so, tragedy occurred.

Boom—

Along with the uncontrollable burst of a water cannon, the wall of the Greyrat family attic vanished.

Brilliant sunlight spilled over Rudeus's stiff face.

He was done for. He'd caused trouble.

"Hey, Hilde, what do we do now..."

"Hilde?"

Rudeus instinctively asked for help, but received no response at all.

He turned his head and saw that Hilde had already run off without a trace.

Siblings in heart.

But when something happened, the call wouldn't go through.