Gluttony Demon King with the Swampman ~A Man with No Magic Power Who Dreamed of Magic, Wielding Knowledge from His Past Life Through Steady Research and Hard Work to Become the Most Vicious Final Boss~

Chapter 3: The Invitation from the Lady Sisters

—Come to our place starting today.

At first, I couldn’t quite wrap my head around what Zaria meant by those words.

Well, putting that aside, I first invited the two into the tower. We couldn’t just keep standing around talking forever.

Inside, things were naturally not tidy at all; it was a place scattered with instruments and materials here and there.

But they didn’t make a single displeased face; instead, they looked full of interest as they picked up documents from all around.

“Whoa, I’ve never seen this magic formula before… Is it original?”

“Well, sort of…”

“You’re seriously amazing! And you’re younger than us?”

“Are the experiment records from that thesis still around?”

Having inherited memories from my previous life, it felt a bit like cheating to be called younger, but setting that aside, I answered Noiche’s question.

“Yeah, they’re here. The samples are still intact too. All those potion bottles around there are them.”

“For real? I’m glad we can see them directly.”

That experiment my brother had summarized into a thesis on his own was actually still under observation.

Lined up on the pots were countless glass bottles.

Inside the sealed ones, various creatures like slime splits or mice were confined, and I’d been observing them up to today.

The influence of the morphological characteristics of magic power on the land—

To put it simply, this was an experiment proposing the hypothesis that “magic power might have a material form.”

In this world, there are occasionally “lands eroded and mutated by strong magic power,” so I drew inspiration from those and built this research.

To begin with, magic power refers to the energy generated in the bodies of plants and animals to produce magic.

And in this world, magic power is recognized as something like air that has no form.

Well, in reality, I also think magic power is probably some kind of invisible fluid or particles… but I had doubts about that one point of “having no form.”

For example, in the world, there are magicians who can only use fire magic or magicians who can only use water magic.

This difference is mostly due to bloodline.

That would make it a genetic “difference in the nature of magic power generated in the body,” and it’s hard to deny that it’s a difference derived from shape.

Just as air is composed of molecules like oxygen or carbon dioxide, magic power might have some kind of materiality—

This was a verification experiment that started from such doubts.

The experiment content was simple: confine living things in glass bottles and observe the process accompanying magic power generation.

As one example, put sand in a bag with an air hole and hang it inside the bottle, and also leave the glass bottle itself on a potted plant bed with sand laid out.

Then, you can compare how the sand affected by magic power changes, and whether there’s a difference between the sand in the bag and the sand outside the glass bottle.

As a result, over a long period, the state of the sand changed slightly.

The sand inside the bag showed various changes like “discoloring,” “becoming gritty,” or “faintly glowing.”

And the inside of the glass bottle also showed a rough, deteriorated appearance.

Also, the sand outside the glass bottle had little change, but around some bottles, there was no lack of change either.

From this result, what we learned was—

Magic power has a physical effect on touched objects.

The magic power of living things has individually different influence.

Magic power is hard to get out from a sealed state.

But it’s not absolutely unable to leak out.

In other words, this suggests that magic power has a certain degree of physical properties and physical shape.

For example, just as sand grains blown by water flow or wind gradually erode the surrounding terrain, magic power damages the surroundings precisely because it has form.

“Well, of course, this result isn’t proof that ‘magic power is always a physical substance.’ It’s just to a certain degree.”

“I-It’s getting a bit difficult! What does ‘always’ mean?”

“Ah, that is… Since even the potted sand showed some change, we naturally have to consider the possibility that some magic power is passing through the glass, right?”

That would make magic power perhaps a quantum-like existence that “physically exists at times and doesn’t at others,” or maybe a wave or a fourth-dimensional existence—I explained that as best I could, breaking it down into words from this world.

Well, there are various other ways I’ve tinkered with the experiment methods, and this hypothesis has already been reinforced in several stages—

But that side is based on knowledge that people in this world don’t know from the premise, so even my brother probably couldn’t decipher it.

“I also tried genetic experiments using parent-child mice and such, and as a result, the sand changes were quite similar… I think that means the shape of magic power is inherited through blood relations.”

“A-Awesome! Haro, you’re really amazing! That’s what we came to hear!”

“…Huh? Brother didn’t say anything about the genetic experiments?”

“He didn’t. Even with the basic content, he sometimes hemmed and hawed.”

For real.

Among the secondary experiments, that was the simplest one, so I hoped he’d at least understood that much.

Well, to begin with, the main theme of this research is “magic power might have individual shapes,” not “the influence of the morphological characteristics of magic power on the land,” so from the title, brother was a bit off.

Anyway, this has gone on long, but up to here it’s light jabs. After finishing the small talk, to the main topic.

“So, um, that…”

“Ah, made up your mind? When to move? Can you do it from sunrise?”

That’s too sudden. I can’t.

“To begin with, are you really planning to take me in?”

“Of course! A genius like you, it’s not okay to mistreat you in a place like this!”

“We’ll cover as much as you need for research expenses and equipment. I don’t think it’s a bad deal.”

…Are you sane.

Indeed, it’s not a bad deal. For me, it’s all gain. But—

“…What’s in it for you two?”

“Teach us magic!”

“We’re magicians too. A new perspective like Haro’s is very welcome.”

The sisters said it in unison.

From a head higher up, clear gazes looked down at me.

“…I still can’t think you’re sane.”

But they were serious, probably.

With a flexibility in pride unbefitting nobles, they were trying to gain sparks of knowledge even from someone without magic power like me—these sisters were lumps of desire for self-improvement.

…There was hesitation.

Even so, the reason I nodded was that it felt like I’d met comrades who shared the same feelings for the first time.

Zaria grinned strongly, and Noiche smiled softly.

“Alright, decided! Then from sunrise!”

“Sunrise is too early.”

“Earlier the better, right? It’s running away from home!”

Why is this lady so frank. Where’d she learn that? The tutor? No, to begin with, it’s already weird for a duke’s daughter to wander around a place like this without any attendants.

“Well, there are various reasons.”

“What is it?”

“Various.”

I’ll tell you later, Noiche dodged, and I let it slide.

Well, anyway, that’s how it was—

And so, that day, I ended up running away from home at dawn.