…
3rd POV
"Hey, is it just me, or has the Sword Saint not been patrolling these last few days?" a knight asked, casting a curious glance toward his comrade.
"Yeah… It's weird. Miss Sword Saint is known to be one of the most reliable and dedicated knights we've got. The idea that she's missed multiple patrols is almost unbelievable," his friend replied, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
"Don't tell me she's sick or something," the first knight muttered, visibly horrified by the mere possibility.
"Are you kidding? Isn't it obvious?" chimed in a third knight, suddenly joining the conversation. "She's clearly been assigned a top-secret mission—something really important!"
The other two nodded sagely.
"Indeed. For her to miss not one but several patrols, it must be something that concerns the safety of the entire Kingdom!" the second knight added, sounding rather serious.
And so, all three of them could only sit there, heads filled with vivid fantasies, admiring and imagining what grand, world-saving mission the Knight of Knights must be carrying out.
Meanwhile, the subject of their admiration—Reina—was currently using multiple Divine Protections to observe Subaru… who just so happened to be taking a bath.
A very important task indeed.
Her face flushed bright red as she spied on him, invisible and undetected, from the shadows of the hallway. Subaru's well-defined muscles, his chiseled six-pack, the way water ran down his body—it was all more than enough to make her heart pound like a war drum.
Her breathing grew shallow, her gaze completely locked onto him. Her lips trembled slightly, and before she even realized it, her hand started drifting downward.
'C-Calm down, Reina! You're just observing... for strategic purposes!' she told herself, biting her bottom lip.
Just as things were about to escalate, however, the door creaked open—and someone entered.
Reina's eyes widened in panic, and she quickly yanked her hand away, turning her gaze to the intruder. It was none other than Roswaal.
"What are you doing here? It's rude to interrupt when someone is bathing," Subaru said flatly, clearly unimpressed by the intrusion.
Roswaal only smiled in his usual drawn-out, theatrical manner. "Thissss is myyy mansion, dear Subaru. I can enter wherreeeever I pleaseeee."
He stripped and stepped into the water without hesitation.
"I must sayyyy… your body is realllly something," Roswaal added, eyeing Subaru's abs with a predatory grin and licking his lips.
Subaru visibly shivered. "Hey! Don't say stuff like that, man! I don't swing that way!"
He quickly stood up in protest—naked.
Reina's eyes shot down before she could stop herself, and her jaw nearly dropped.
'I-It's big!' she screamed internally, her face turning a deep crimson. She immediately bolted away from the door, trying her best to suppress the wild thoughts invading her brain.
Outside the bathroom, she was panting heavily, her face still burning red.
'I-If… If that thing were to go inside me…' she couldn't finish the thought and shivered involuntarily.
She shook her head, trying to calm herself down, but then—suddenly—she felt a strange warmth spread through her chest. A new Divine Protection had been acquired.
The Divine Protection of Bedroom Wiles.
Her entire face flushed even deeper. 'W-What kind of Divine Protection is this?!' she thought in utter disbelief.
Even Od Laguna seemed to be supporting her romance quest at this point.
If the three knights back at the barracks ever discovered what she was truly doing instead of patrolling… they would lose their faith in the gods forever.
(A/N: I had lost it long ago XD)
…
"Hmph! Betty shall now determine the final velocity and solve this equation, I suppose!" Beatrice said with determination, her tiny hands moving across a parchment filled with numbers and symbols.
After Subaru had revealed that he came from Beyond the Great Waterfall, Beatrice had been absolutely shocked. A deal was made—he would share the knowledge of his world, and she would allow him access to the forbidden archives.
As part of this arrangement, Subaru decided to test her understanding of his world's science, skipping the basics and jumping straight into high school physics. So far, he had explained Newton's Laws of Motion, friction, and the three equations of motion.
To his surprise, Beatrice was grasping it fairly quickly.
Now, she was trying to solve ten problems he'd given her as homework.
Meanwhile, Subaru sat in the same room, reading a floating book filled with information about Yin magic spells. After a few days of regular physical training, he had discovered that it helped improve his mental energy too—perfect for magic study.
'Alright, while she's busy solving problems, let's see what kind of Yin spells I can mess around with,' he thought to himself.
Betty had already recorded various spells across all magical attributes, so it would be downright foolish to ignore the treasure trove in front of him.
The first few spells were the most commonly known Yin spells—Shamak, El Shamak, Ul Shamak, Al Shamak… and one lesser-known variation: Ol Shamak.
Shamak, he noted, was a spell that separated the user's senses from their surroundings, making them unable to perceive their location or orientation. But there was more—if enough mana was used with perfect control, the spell could even distort space to create teleportation effects.
'Damn, that could be insanely useful. I should definitely train with this one more,' he mused.
El Shamak was next. It caused temporary paralysis by completely shutting off motor control in the target's body.
'A paralysis spell… This could be clutch in real combat. I should ask Reina to take me to a Mabeast-infested area for live practice,' he thought. Reina had always gone out of her way to help him, so he wanted to make sure she never felt burdened or uncomfortable around him.
Then came Ul Shamak, a spell that literally generated a black hole of gravitational force. The image alone was terrifying.
'Holy crap… This thing could crush me and everyone in the vicinity if I mess up.'
But the next spell was even more broken.
Al Shamak.
This terrifying spell created a separate dimension, pulling its target into an isolated space that was virtually inescapable.
'Virtually inescapable, huh? If Reina used her sword seriously, she could probably slice the dimension in two,' he thought with a wry smile.
It was an overwhelmingly powerful spell, something only a few beings in the entire world could hope to escape.
Finally, there was Ol Shamak—a strange outlier compared to the other Shamak variations. It was classified as a forbidden spell due to its terrifying effect. Not only did it paralyze the target physically, but it also targeted their gate, effectively shutting it down. There was an ominous note scribbled beside it: this spell could only be used at full power by someone possessing a Witch Factor.
'Does Return by Death count as an Authority?' Subaru wondered to himself, brows furrowed in thought. 'There's a pretty strong hint that RBD is the Authority of Envy, but nothing's ever been confirmed outright… I can't be sure.'
He decided not to dwell on that particular question for now and continued flipping through the book, letting his eyes scan the ancient text.
The next spell he came across was Minya. It created crystallized stakes of mana that were coated in light purple flames. These stakes weren't just for show—they could pierce through some of the toughest magical and physical defenses. What made them even deadlier was their special property: the stakes would explode mid-air, scattering into dozens of smaller ones, creating a wide area of damage.
El Minya, the evolved form, functioned similarly but could conjure up to forty stakes at once, depending on the caster's mana reserves. It was essentially a rapid-fire version, overwhelming enemies with sheer volume.
Ul Minya took it a step further—it bound the target's movement and began the process of crystallizing their body. If left unchecked, the spell would completely immobilize the victim and turn them into a statue-like structure made entirely of crystallized mana.
And then came Al Minya, the most terrifying of them all. It didn't just crystallize the body—it targeted the very soul of the enemy. The spell would anchor the soul, bind it, and begin turning it into pure, hardened essence, effectively trapping the person in a frozen limbo between life and death.
Subaru exhaled sharply. 'So Minya isn't just flashy… it's downright horrifying at its peak.'
Next in the list was a category of spells under the name Vita. These were gravity-based.
The basic Vita spell increased the weight of the target exponentially, making it hard for them to move or even stand. It could crush someone with their own body weight if used right.
El Vita did the same thing, only at a much higher intensity—it could flatten smaller beasts instantly.
Ul Vita distorted gravity completely, causing it to behave chaotically around the target. It would literally pull their body in multiple directions, shredding them apart piece by piece.
Finally, Al Vita. This was the complete opposite of a black hole. While a black hole sucked everything in, Al Vita acted more like a white hole, forcibly repelling everything. It created an area of reversed gravity, where everything was pushed outward violently, like a burst of energy constantly rejecting matter.
There were a few more spells listed in the book, but they seemed to be minor variations of the existing ones—different names, slightly altered effects, but nothing entirely new. He decided to skim those for later.
As he closed the floating tome, he glanced over at Beatrice. She had finished solving the numericals he'd given her and was now looking up at him, clearly waiting for his feedback.
"Betty has completed everything you gave her. You should check how well Betty did, I suppose," she said, her voice notably softer compared to when they had first met.
He took the notebook from her and started checking the calculations line by line.
"All of them are correct," he said after a few moments, genuinely impressed by the accuracy.
Beatrice's eyes lit up with pride. She puffed out her non-existent chest, standing as straight as she could. "Betty is smart—one of the smartest people in this world, in fact!"
'So cute!' he thought, unable to hold back his grin. Almost instinctively, his hand moved toward her head, and he began gently patting her hair.
"W-What do you think you're doing?! I suppose!" she stammered, clearly flustered but not exactly pushing him away either. She gave him a half-glare, half-pout.
"Me?" he smiled. "I'm just rewarding you. Betty deserves praise for her efforts and excellence."
"I-Is that so? Very well then! You may praise me more, I suppose!" she said with a slight blush on her cheeks. Her voice had lost its usual haughty edge. He was tempted to twirl one of her drill-shaped curls but held himself back—for now.
"Say, Betty, would you help me with practicing some of these spells? I want to test them out in the forest," he asked with a hopeful tone.
Beatrice tilted her head thoughtfully before answering.
"Hmph! If you promise to share more of that so-called 'science' of yours, then Betty can spare some time for you, I suppose!" she replied, pretending to act indifferent but clearly pleased.
Her response made him relax. He had been considering asking Reina for help initially, but this felt like a perfect opportunity to deepen his bond with Beatrice.
To be continued...
(A/N: I know I said updates would be slow, and yet this somehow became the fastest-updating fic I've ever written. Irony, huh?)