08-04 All at Once, No Elsa

The next day, Jin was woken up by the hallway being noisy.

He put on his clothes in a hurry, went to the hallway to see what’s going on, and there were several men in military uniforms going back and forth.

One of them noticed Jin and approached.

“Excuse me. But I’d like you to show me your room.”

“Huh?”

Suddenly getting asked to show his room, Jin was surprised. But the man continued,

“Okay? If you’re not going to say no then I’ll go see it by myself.”

He said and pushed Jin aside, then entered the room Jin was staying in.

“…What.”

Jin didn’t have anything to feel particularly guilty about in the slightest, but the man’s att.i.tude displeased him a little. The soldier soon came back out and,

“Hmm, nothing unusual. Sorry for the trouble.”

He said and walked back into the hallway.

“Really, what.”

Jin returned to his room. There Ann said,

“Master, I got the feeling that he was looking for someone.”

Jin listened to Ann’s report while thinking about pointless things like that Ann p.r.o.nouncing the word ‘master’ with an extreme lisp could’ve been to the original creator’s tastes.

“He ignored places like the built-in drawers of the desk, while searching under the bed and in the wardrobe, and so he must’ve searched for something large, most likely a person I think.”

Ann’s report was rather outstanding in its insights.

“Someone, but who?”

“Well, to that extent I–”

At that moment there was a knock on the door. Jin told them to come in, and it was Reinhardt.

“Good morning, Jin.”

“Good morning.”

Reinhardt said and looked around the room. Jin noticed that and,

“Even you’re involved, what’s the matter?”

He asked. With a complicated look on his face, Reinhardt then said,

“Elsa is…gone.”

“What’s that you say?”

Jin was astonished. In that case, the earlier soldier must’ve been Fritz’s subordinate or something, looking for Elsa.

“Elsa didn’t seem to wake up and get out of her room even though it was morning. Mine who’d usually be awake by then couldn’t be found either. I tried going to her room, but somehow the two seem to have disappeared.”

“And so Fritz is going around looking for her.”

“That’s right. Did they also come here?”

“Yeah.”

Jin looked out of the window. The soldiers who appeared to be Fritz’s subordinates seemed to be splitting into groups to search. They must’ve been all together looking for her through the whole town.

“What a mess.”

Jin muttered but he could somehow sympathize with the reason behind Elsa’s disappearance.

“If we a.s.sume she’s together with Mine, those guys probably won’t find them.”

Reinhardt said subduedly.

“In the first place, Mine is from a town near this Ikasanaato. She must be familiar with the terrain, and probably has acquaintances too. If Mine’s seriously running away with Elsa, then there’s no way they’d be found just like that.”

The tone of his voice carried the feeling that it would be better if they weren’t found.

“How do you feel about this, Reinhardt?”

Jin suddenly wanted to ask.

“About what? About Elsa’s marriage? Or about her disappearance?”

“About both.”

Jin said, and Reinhardt began to speak with a low voice.

“I don’t think that marriage is a particularly bad thing. Bear in mind when thinking about it that in the case of a marrying a n.o.ble who manages territory, he’s got butlers and stewards to a.s.sist him. For ch.o.r.es he has maids, so to put it bluntly being a decorative figure is enough. That’s a n.o.bleman’s wife. And for children, it’s enough to hire a wet nurse.”

After all that, he grinned widely and,

“But that’s just in the case of old n.o.bles.”

He said and carried on.

“It’s much different for Elsa, who wants to build a warm home. Her ideal is to marry a partner with mutual liking for each other, although there’s also people who say that love grows after marriage.”

After saying that, for a brief moment Reinhardt had a lonely look on his face. But the next second he returned to his normal expression and continued talking.

“Well, I can’t say I don’t understand their running away. Jin, have you noticed? Mine’s and Elsa’s relation.”

“Mmh, a little. So that means you have too? Well, I guess that’s obvious.”

“Yeah. It’s just a guess, but Mine is probably Elsa’s real mother. It’s a guess because that’s something that even if I asked no one would tell.”

That was probably the case. There’s no way you could hear about it from Elsa’s father. Much less the from person in question herself.

“Mine’s way of talking to, her att.i.tude towards Elsa, and the time she became her nanny, I thought about it a lot and I came to the conclusion she’s likely her real mother.”

Jin also shared his own opinion. Then,

“Well, I still can’t say I agree with things like her method of teaching.”

He added. Jin too had seen a lot of troubled children, and because of that he thought no matter how much time pa.s.sed Elsa couldn’t become independent.

“However, the question is what are we going to do now?”

Jin had a place in mind. Mine’s parents’ home should be around here, and if Elsa and Mine returned there they’d surely be found. Having said that, they could hardly wander around forever.

“Mine is in some respects broken, you know.”

Reinhardt said. In this world, the expression ‘broken’ was used when a person had a mental illness, a trauma, or something like that. In addition it was used with personality flaws.

Hearing that, Jin thought that that was for sure. He had felt that Mine’s att.i.tude towards Elsa was strange in some parts.

“I wonder why Elsa’s father hired Mine as her nanny.”

Jin unintentionally spoke out his mind. Reinhardt replied to that,

“Elsa’s body wouldn’t last without Mine.”

“Eh?”

The shocking truth made Jin lost for words.

“Actually, to be accurate it wouldn’t precisely have to be Mine. However, I think it unlikely that a person similarly good with her circ.u.mstances could be found.”

Reinhardt was about to continue but Jin interrupted him in confusion. He seemed to have been told something unexpected.

“Ho-hold on, Reinhardt. This is the first time I’m hearing about this, what would happen if Elsa didn’t have Mine?”

Reinhardt tilted his head in confusion but,

“Ah, so I had not told you yet, Jin. I thought for sure I had talked about it, sorry.”

After a word of apology, he began explaining.

“I told you that Elsa’s been tomboyish since way back, right? One of the reasons was because of the ’emissions’ she had. Elsa has a, it’s not a disease but, she has a flaw. It’s called the ‘excess Magic Energy disorder’.”

“excess Magic Energy disorder?”

Jin had never heard the expression before.

“Yeah. The Magic Energy that magi possess varies from person to person, but each one has their upper limit, right? Elsa’s limit isn’t very large. It’s just a bit higher than a regular magus’s.”

“Is that bad?”

But Reinhardt said,

“No no, here’s the point.”

He appeased Jin who seemed to want him to get to the point quickly.

“Magic Energy decreases when you use magic. That’s correct, right?”

“Mh-hm.”

“So, by resting the decreased Magic Energy naturally returns to normal.”

“Certainly.”

“In Elsa’s case, it returns to more than usual. So, the abundance of Magic Energy eats into her.”

In this case rather than Magic Energy he must mean Mana.

In the case of eating too much and getting excessive nutrients, one grows fat, and then problems like diabetes appear. The case with Magic Energy is similar, there’s no general rule what happens but the fact is that one’s physical health becomes poor.

Jin tried imagining it. For example, if a golem’s Ether Converter created large amounts of excess Mana while operating, the Mana Driver would be unable to deal with it.

The excess Mana would be stimulated and transform because of small amounts of magic entering from the outside, and it would probably have a negative influence on the containing body.

Would the same thing happen within a human body? Jin could understand Elsa’s problem. And so, that was likely the reason why Mine tried to have Elsa not overexert herself much using magic.

“Her symptoms can be held back if she has a person nearby as an adequate safety valve.”

Jin understood. It was sure that blood relatives had a similar Magic Energy wavelength, and in the same way a person whose wavelength of life was similar could become a path for Mana and as such hold back the symptoms.

“Are there no other remedies? If Mine were not there, what would happen to Elsa?”

“If it’s not more than for seven or ten days, being apart from her isn’t a problem. Also, during that time by releasing Magic Energy using magic there wouldn’t be a problem. Unlike in her childhood, Elsa can understands that herself.”

Reinhardt saying so wiped out Jin’s worries.

“Hey Reinhardt, couldn’t she carry a Magi Tool to release Magic Energy?”

Jin asked in curiosity. But Reinhardt made a lonely smile and,

“Yeah, in theory it would be settled with that. But there’s one large problem.”

He said with a strained voice.

“That is?”

“In the form of magic it can be done, but there’s no such person who could build a Magi Tool that releases Magic Energy before invocating magic.”

“Eh?”

“Eh?”

Hearing that Jin knit his brows in wonder, and after seeing Jin like that Reinhardt’s expression turned to surprise. Their gazes met.

“There’s no one who can make one?”

“Don’t tell me, Jin, you can?”

Reinhardt timidly asked Jin who replied with a large nod.

“I think I probably could.”