“Come to think of it, I should probably give you a name, at least.”
In any case, it seemed I would be staying near this cabin for quite a long time and taking it as a conversation partner, and calling it “flower” every single time felt a little odd.
Of course, it really was a flower, but just as we call our friends by their names rather than calling them “person,” I felt it needed some kind of name.
“How about Flora? Do you like it? If you like it, move up and down a little. If you don’t, move side to side.”
—Wriggle!
“I’m glad you like it.”
After a brief moment of thought, the flower—no, Flora—lightly moved its blossom up and down upon hearing the name I had chosen, and I nodded lightly as well.
“I’ll be in your care from now on, Flora.”
—Wriggle!
***
—Whoong!
“Is it because it’s not balanced after all? Or am I just bad at this...? Flora, from what you can see, do you think I’m the problem, or is the tree branch the problem? Answer left and right, respectively.”
—Wriggle!
“Right? Yeah, I’m glad you think the branch is the problem, at least more than me.”
It had already been a week since I fell into this world, and my daily routine over that week could be summarized very briefly.
Wake up before sunrise, water Flora, then train by swinging a tree branch according to the contents of the swordsmanship manual until the sun set. After that, return to the room and sleep.
In truth, demons were fundamentally a race that did not need sleep, so it was possible for me not to sleep at all, but I was deliberately sleeping anyway. There was nothing like sleep for relieving mental fatigue.
“Anyway, what should I do about this...?”
I scratched my head as I looked at the branch in my hand.
This branch was something I had torn off by force from some nearby tree for swordsmanship training, but perhaps because it had not been trimmed, its balance was completely off, making it extremely difficult to handle.
Whether or not the nameless demon who had originally owned this body could have performed swordsmanship even with a branch like this was unclear, but at the very least, my swordsmanship skill was nothing more than a beginner’s, so I couldn’t train with something like this.
“Tsk, is there nowhere I can get a decent wooden sword?”
I muttered that without thinking, but soon changed my mind.
“No, no. Now that I think about it, it wouldn’t be a good thing for me to get a wooden sword, would it?”
After all, if I got my hands on a wooden sword, there was a very high chance that it meant there was a human village nearby.
It seemed better to simply be unable to obtain a wooden sword.
But that did not mean I liked the idea of my swordsmanship training continuing to run into problems.
I needed to build up a certain level of martial strength in preparation for the day this hideout might be discovered.
If the hideout were discovered, the humans who found me would immediately try to kill me, and in order to flee from such humans, I would naturally need a certain degree of strength.
“Tsk, since it’s come to this, should I try reading the magic book?”
Since it was unclear whether I had any talent for magic, I had just left it alone until now. But now that things had turned out this way, I found myself thinking I might as well read it, as though grasping at straws.
“What do you think, Flora? Do I have the talent to learn magic?”
—Wriggle!
At my question, Flora bobbed its flower up and down slightly without the slightest hesitation, and at the sight of that, I let out a faint smile.
“Yeah, I hope so too. Then let’s give it a read.”
With Flora’s positive response, I opened the magic book.
[What is magic? Many answers could be given to this question, but I shall define it as follows. Magic is the general term for the act of refining and transforming mana in order to bring about a desired result...]
“...This somehow feels oddly like a thesis.”
The writing continued with an atmosphere almost identical to the papers I had sickeningly searched through for assignments back in my university days.
If there was a difference, it was that the papers I had seen in university were dull and long-winded, while this magic book was rather interesting—whether because I was interested in magic, or because the author was simply good at writing, I did not know.
Only after reading through that long introduction did I finally reach the section titled “Chapter 0: Sensing Mana.”
[In order to train in magic, one must first sense mana. Unfortunately, those without talent are blocked from the very beginning at this stage.]
“Hmm... Can I do it?”
With anticipation and nervousness mingled together over whether I could succeed or not, I sat cross-legged on the grass, closed my eyes, and began to meditate.
‘Mana, mana... The feeling of something warm inside my body...’
I had more or less expected it, but it was not easy.
Even though I felt as if I had kept my eyes closed for more than thirty minutes, not only could I not sense mana, I could not even tell if anything had changed at all.
However, according to the magic book, when trying to sense mana through self-study, it could take as long as eight hours, so I continued meditating with my eyes closed.
—Thump, thump...!
Had about an hour passed since I began meditating, at least by my sense of time? Perhaps because I had kept my eyes closed for so long, the sound of my heart beating suddenly began to ring out loudly, like the pounding of a drum.
—Gurgle...!
Time passed again, and once about two hours had gone by since I began meditating, I heard the sound of something flowing.
There was a pond nearby, but it should not have made a flowing sound like this, so I wondered what it was. Then, when I realized it was the sound of my own blood flowing, goosebumps rose over me.
...To think I could hear the sound of my blood flowing. Whether it was because meditation was that effective, or because the senses of demons were that outstanding, whichever the reason, it was a strange sensation I had never even imagined before.
And so, while I continued meditating with my eyes closed for quite some time once again—
—Wooong...!
‘...Is this it?’
Suddenly, I felt something warm inside my body—more precisely, near my heart—letting out a humming vibration.
—Woong, wooong...!
I tried sending my will toward the mana humming near my heart, attempting to move it as I desired, but the mana merely continued to hum and showed no particular response.
Well, according to what was written in the book, this was normal.
It said that in order to become capable of handling the mana within one’s body to some extent, an average of about a week was needed even after sensing mana, and only after forming a circle near the heart could one finally use magic.
—Rustle!
“Ugh...”
As soon as I opened my eyes, I frowned at the sunlight immediately shining into them.
Wait, the sun was still up?
‘I thought I’d be meditating until the sun went down entirely, but less time passed than I expected.’
Comparing the position of the sun to when I first began meditating... It was not exact, but it seemed roughly four hours had passed.
“...Am I more talented than I thought?”
Compared to the statement that it could take as long as eight hours to awaken to mana through self-study, I had succeeded in only half that time.
But thinking about it calmly, it said it could take “as long as” eight hours, not that eight hours was the average, so there was far too little basis to judge whether I had talent or not.
“Well, anyway, I should be thankful that I was able to sense mana at all.”
I had even considered the possibility that I would not be able to sense mana at all, so the fact that I could sense it was already quite fortunate.
“Then what do I do now?”
I had made my plans under the assumption that sensing mana would take the entire day, but because I sensed it far faster than expected, I suddenly had time hanging in the air.
I had not realized it before opening my eyes, but once I actually opened them and tried to sense mana again, it did not go well—perhaps because of mental fatigue—so it seemed impossible to try moving mana right away today.
But it felt a little wasteful to go to sleep now...
Hmm, should I have tried to move the mana earlier, even if I had to push myself a bit?
No, rather than overdoing it and possibly fainting, it was probably better to stop at an appropriate point.
“Anyway, seriously, what should I do...?”
I was blankly stroking my chin, lost in thought, when—
—Tap...!
Hm?
At the sudden cold sensation touching my head, I lifted my gaze, and the sky filled with pitch-black rain clouds greeted me.
What was this? Hadn’t the weather been clear and sunny just a moment ago?
—Tap, patter-patter! Swaaaaaa...!!!!
As I stood there staring up at the sky in slight confusion, as if displeased by my attitude, an enormous downpour suddenly began pouring from the heavens.
“Uwaaagh, what the hell?!”
At the sudden heavy rain, I hurriedly opened the cabin door and went inside.
My body getting wet in the rain was not a big problem, but my clothes were. I did not have that many clothes to begin with, and if they got completely soaked like this, I wouldn’t be able to wear them.
“Ugh... What now?”
I had gotten inside the cabin for now, but there was nothing like a stove to dry my soaked clothes with, and if I just took off the wet clothes and left them anywhere, it seemed like mold would grow on them.
“...I guess there’s no choice.”
In the end, I made up my mind, took off the clothes I was wearing, and wrung out the water.
—Squeeeeeze...!
—Patter-patter!
Of course, doing this naturally spilled water onto the floor, but if I had to choose between my clothes and the floor as the place where mold would grow, the floor seemed preferable to my clothes.
After wringing the clothes out as hard as I could until almost all the water was gone, I spread them out and neatly placed them on top of the table. What remained was the drenched floor—and me, stark naked without a single thread on, just like when I had first opened my eyes.