The great library on the Sword Tower’s second floor.

Holding Arian’s hand, Kyle stepped inside. This was a treasure trove of knowledge accumulated over five hundred years.

Works left by successive bearers of the Alastor name, by retainers who had served them, and sometimes offerings received from outsiders—only those deemed truly worth preserving earned a place on the great library’s shelves.

“So the little troublemaker has returned.”

As they marveled at the enormous bookshelves stretching out below the railing, a voice suddenly rang out.

“Aunt!”

Arian called out with a radiant smile. A beautiful, orange-haired woman in an old-fashioned robe was smiling at her and Kyle.

“Say hello, Kyle. This is Nelia Alastor, an elder of the house and the librarian here.”

“Hello, little one.”

Nelia approached slowly, then crouched to meet Kyle’s eyes.

“So you’re Arian’s son. I hear you put on quite a charming performance for the head of the house.”

“Hello. My name is Kyle Alastor.”

Kyle greeted her politely. Apparently finding him adorable, Nelia smiled and stroked his hair.

“I also heard you thoroughly defeated Lucia. How could such a tiny child manage that?”

“May I call you Great-Aunt?”

“I’d like that too, but this is the great library, and I am its librarian. For now, call me Librarian.”

“Yes, Librarian. Did you teach Lucia too?”

“No. I’m better at magic than swordsmanship, you see, so I haven’t taught her.”

He had thought the hand stroking his hair did not feel like a swordsman’s. So he had been right. Kyle nodded and looked up at Nelia with sparkling eyes.

“Do I need your permission to read the books here?”

“You need the head of the house’s permission, not mine.”

Nelia answered with a smile. Alastor’s purebloods certainly enjoyed many privileges, but that did not exempt them from its rules.

Because they were so closely tied to Alastor’s future, they bore many responsibilities. Living in the Sword Tower meant constantly being under the scrutiny of the head of the house and its elders. A position that demanded one prove oneself at every turn could feel like a bed of thorns to some.

Of course, Kyle did not see it as a bed of thorns. Didn’t that mean he could enjoy all the privileges he wanted as long as he proved himself?

Simply being allowed to live in the Sword Tower was an enormous privilege. He could not say for certain, but the collateral relatives and retainers living in Gladiheim surely faced all sorts of difficulties for want of opportunities to prove themselves, however much they wished to.

“What kinds of books are in the library?”

“Books on swordsmanship and other weapons. There are spellbooks too.”

“Are there mana cultivation methods?”

“Of course, but you can’t learn them yet. You haven’t even awakened your spiritual root, have you?”

Five hundred years really was a long time. When Kyle tilted his head at the unfamiliar term, Arian stroked his hair and explained.

“A spiritual root is an organ that helps you sense mana better.”

Human children developed a spiritual root inside their bodies at the age of ten. It was an evolutionary change humanity had achieved in a world where magic had become widespread and mana familiar.

“Long ago, spiritual roots were exceedingly rare. There wasn’t even a word for them. But the world changed a great deal when the Dark Age ended and a new era began. All thanks to our founder.”

Kyle’s eyes shone as he took in one new fact after another. Spiritual roots and mana cultivation methods. His heart raced at the mere thought of how bizarre and powerful the mighty warriors of this age must be, learning such unusual things.

“Mom, I’m only five. That means I don’t have a spiritual root yet, right?”

“Hmm? That’s right.”

“But I saw a goblin in Fenris earlier. Does that have nothing to do with spiritual roots?”

“Affinity for spirits has nothing to do with whether you have a spiritual root. It’s a very rare and special gift. But once you gain a spiritual root, spirit arts can be a great help to your training.”

Arian moved her fingers in demonstration. A sharp wind swirled around her fingertips.

“I have a wind spiritual root. That’s why the first spirit I contracted with was a wind spirit.”

The choice of a mana cultivation method usually followed the spiritual root’s element. Subsequent training also specialized in that element. Someone with a fire spiritual root would learn a fire-aspected mana cultivation method, then sword techniques that wielded flames or fire magic. Their training, too, would become closely tied to fire.

Arian had awakened a wind spiritual root, contracted with a wind spirit, and learned wind magic. Born with a gift for wind separate from her spiritual root, she had been able to accumulate mana and learn magic quickly.

“Kyle, you haven’t awakened your spiritual root yet, but you take after me—no, your affinity for spirits is even greater than mine. I’ve never contracted with a goblin, but I’m certain your gift will be a tremendous help as you learn the sword.”

Kyle nodded eagerly. It was disappointing that he could not learn a mana cultivation method until his spiritual root awakened, but he felt no urgency.

‘I’m only five, after all.’

He was curious about these mana cultivation methods, which he had never learned in his previous life. Still, now that he thought about it, he had wielded a sword perfectly well back then without any mana cultivation method or spiritual root.

Five more years until he turned ten. That was hardly a long time, and training too hard in this little body might actually damage it before it matured. Kyle decided not to rush and to work his way steadily through the basics first.

‘There’s still plenty I don’t know about this era, too.’

Putting that small disappointment behind him, Kyle left the library with Arian and went up to the fourth floor, where the purebloods lived.

“...”

He had heard that Rose Manor would be moved here in its entirety, but had been utterly unable to understand what that meant.

The moment he reached the fourth floor, he understood.

They were supposed to be inside a tower, yet the fourth floor was vast. The first floor’s size had already given him a sense of how extraordinary the Dragon King’s spatial magic was, but it was nothing compared to this.

An entire grassland stretched across the fourth floor. He could see hills and a lake in the distance, along with several large mansions. There was no ceiling, either. Looking up, he saw blue sky, clouds, and the sun.

“Is that... real?”

“No, it isn’t. Hmm, think of it as a giant lamp.”

Arian smiled and pinched her astonished son’s cheek.

“That sky looks like the sky, but it isn’t the real one either. The moon and stars come out when the sun sets and night falls, and sometimes it rains or snows. But we’re still very much inside the Sword Tower.”

Rose Manor had already been moved in its entirety to the fourth floor. The servants who had helped Arian care for Kyle since he was a newborn opened its doors to welcome him.

“Lady Arian, didn’t you say you probably wouldn’t be back for a while?”

Seril asked with a teasing smile.

“I didn’t know Father would tell us to move into the tower right away, either.”

The inside of Rose Manor was exactly as they had left it earlier. They really had moved the entire mansion. Arian and Seril chatted beside Kyle as he gaped in wonder.

“What would you like to do for dinner today?”

“I’m not sure. I imagine the whole family will eat together.”

It happened just as Arian had said.

As Lucia had explained while showing him around the first floor, the purebloods normally ate in their own mansions on the fourth floor rather than in the great dining hall on the first.

Very occasionally, however, when the house had a special occasion to celebrate, as it did now, everyone gathered in the great dining hall.

“Hello. My name is Kyle Alastor. I’m five years old.”

He had already introduced himself when they first met, but Kyle introduced himself once more in a composed voice at the table laid with a feast.

“Uncles, aunts, I look forward to getting to know you.”

CLAP, CLAP, CLAP.

Applause answered him, but it did not sound particularly cheerful to Kyle. Many of his relatives were openly wary of him.

He raised his head slightly and surveyed the great dining hall.

Apart from the adults, four children were staring at him. They were his cousins.

The eldest son Cartan’s two boys, aged thirteen and ten.

The second son Varkas’s ten-year-old boy.

The fourth son Dante’s seven-year-old girl.

And there was one more.

“...”

His youngest aunt, Erika Alastor. Only thirteen herself, she was giving Kyle a sullen look. They had yet to exchange a single word, but she looked deeply displeased about something.

Kyle beamed back at her. He was putting the old saying that you couldn’t spit in a smiling face into practice, but Erika merely clicked her tongue and furrowed her brow.

“Eat.”

Julius broke the awkward silence. The meal began when he picked up his utensils first.

The feast was lavish, but the meal was quiet. Everyone refrained from unnecessary conversation, concentrating on their food and moving only their utensils.

‘Now I see why everyone eats at home.’

Julius, the head of the house, radiated tremendous pressure merely by sitting there. Even his own children were cowed by their father, so there was no way the younger cousins could eat comfortably. Indeed, they were merely picking at their food, unable to eat properly.

Kyle, of course, ate heartily without a care for the atmosphere. He acknowledged Julius’s imposing presence, but the aura he exuded was not the sort of killing intent meant to harm anyone.

In other words, Julius was simply a sword lying still. A sharp sword that left people breathless at the mere sight of it, making them fear they might somehow be cut.

It would have been another matter if that sword had displayed clear hostility. But why get frightened just because its edge was sharp? Not only his cousins but even his aunts and uncles were weighed down by the pressure emanating from Julius. Kyle simply let it weigh on him and kept eating.

“May I have another helping?”

The food at Rose Manor was excellent, but the Sword Tower’s food was even better.

To grow big and strong, he needed to eat plenty at every meal. His empty plate was cleared away and replaced with a fresh plate of food. Kyle had his plate replaced four times.

Around then, Julius rose, signaling the end of the silent feast. He was about to leave the dining hall without a word when Kyle sprang from his chair and ran over to him, as though he had been waiting for this very moment.

Arian had no time to stop him. Varkas, the second son, had been swallowing a sigh of relief at the end of the suffocating meal. Now he stared at Kyle with his mouth hanging open. Everyone else watched with much the same astonishment.

“Grandfather!”

Regardless of everyone’s reactions, Kyle did exactly as he pleased. Julius stopped at the call from his grandson, who came scampering toward him.

“What is it?”

“I’ve come to play.”

“You’ve come... to play?”

“I asked you earlier, remember?”

Julius blinked down at him.

“If I could play with you too.”

He had answered that if Kyle proved worth playing with, there was no reason he could not oblige. Yet this adorable grandson apparently understood neither what he had meant nor how exalted the position of head of the house was. To think he would openly ask him to play in front of so many relatives.

“Hah...”

He could have scolded him for his insolence, but strangely, Julius felt no desire to do so. Instead, he found this insolent grandson endearing.

‘Has anyone ever said such a thing to me in my life?’

He had six sons and three daughters. Before Kyle arrived, he had three grandsons and one granddaughter.

Yet neither his children nor his grandchildren had ever asked him to “play.” Before he was a father or grandfather, he was the strongest and most exalted person in Alastor, the head of the house. His descendants treated him accordingly.

Even Cartan, Katarina, and Varkas, who had been born before he became head of the house, had found him unapproachable since childhood. That was the sort of father Julius had been.

“Well...”

Before becoming head of the house, when he had been merely a father, Julius had driven himself relentlessly to attain that position. He had fathered children, but he had wanted to become the head of House Alastor more than he had wanted to become a good father.

After taking the position, he had driven himself harder still. The head of House Alastor was the lord of Gladiheim. The ruler of thousands of knights and soldiers. Beyond that, he was the lord of Vivrid, a territory home to hundreds of thousands.

Alastor was acclaimed as the continent’s foremost martial house. Countless eyes looked up to it, while countless others watched it warily and with hostility. Julius could not afford to soften. He had spent his whole life striving to become a hard, sharp blade.

Because that was how he had lived, and how he had wished to be seen, his five-year-old grandson’s request felt unfamiliar and bewildering. At the same time, it brought him a curious pleasure he had rarely felt in his life.

“Very well.”

Julius did not want to ignore that pleasure, nor did he want to turn away from the bright eyes gazing up at him. With a soft chuckle, he patted Kyle’s shoulder.

“Grandfather will play with you. Where would you like to go?”

“The Hall of Sword Pinnacles.”

Kyle answered without hesitation.

“Why there? There’s nothing for you to play with.”

“There are swords.”

Kyle grinned as he answered. Yes, swords. Fenris, with that goddamn mutt growling inside it, was in the Hall of Sword Pinnacles.

“Heh heh.”

Everyone in the dining hall was aghast, but Julius laughed quietly. He nodded and took his hand off Kyle’s shoulder.

“Very well. Let’s go to the Hall of Sword Pinnacles.”

Julius resumed walking. As Kyle followed his grandfather’s long strides out of the dining hall, he whipped his head around and waved at Arian.

“Mom! I’m going to play with Grandfather!”

“Uh... huh? Oh, all... right...”