3 – Just Good at Using Charm
There must be give and take,
For what is gained must also be lost, as is the way of the world.
I still didn’t know why the royal family had increased the subsidy, but given the circumstances, it seems my hard carry allowed me to receive the blessing of ’30-fold subsidy.’
It makes sense that 95% of this should go back to the one who earned it.
But it seemed the master of the Amethyst Tower had some objections to the fair distribution of the funds.
“It’s my tower…! The Amethyst Tower is mine!”
“But it’s the funding I earned.”
“Just because you did, doesn’t mean you get to hoard it all to yourself!”
“The remaining 5% still represents a 1.5 times increase from last year.”
“Increased, it has!”
When I received my allowance of 10 million won and was left with only 50,000 won after my parents’ merciless promise of “We’ll give it all back to you when you grow up,” the purple tower lord was sprawled on the floor, weeping pitifully.
“M-my students… They’ve been using mana stones so carelessly that they’ve all run out… I was expecting to at least be able to use low-grade mana stones now instead of the lowest… Waaah-!”
As the purple tower lord poured out his sentiments of “a desperate father trying to feed his family,” even my hardened conscience began to feel a twinge of guilt. After all, the seniors who had joined the purple tower before me were all like that.
On the day when the various towers gathered to scout me, other towers had throngs of students following behind their tower lords. They were all wearing robes with the crests of their respective towers emblazoned upon them.
However, there was not a single student behind the purple tower lord. I thought it was because the purple tower wizards were all loners, but I later learned that they simply didn’t have uniforms, so they didn’t bother to come.
Yes, the purple tower was so shabby that they didn’t even have uniforms.
I even saw a senior licking the crumbs left on his plate, saying he was trying to save on research funds.
It was certainly a bit sad to see wizards, who were supposed to be a high-income profession, living in such a pitiful manner.
However, if I were to give in here… my research would be delayed.
My thrilling and ambitious research of implementing virtual reality for TRPGs.
‘I need to introduce a formidable dragon and have the players heroically defeat it in an epic battle.’
The inner whispers seeped into my mind, stirring my emotions.
Perhaps the suffering and tears of the tower seniors were an unavoidable sacrifice.
As if it had read the wickedness that flashed across my eyes, the purple tower lord entered phase 2 of his tantrum.
He crawled over on his knees, clung to my pant leg, and began to whine.
“Scholarship moneeeyyyy…!”
“Hmm.”
My resolve began to waver.
Did I really have to offer up my research funds (for the time being) to the tower?
Just then, an inspiration struck me like a bolt of lightning.
“It’s the seniors who need the scholarship money, right?”
“Wh-what?”
“So if all the seniors in the tower say, ‘We don’t need scholarship money,’ then I won’t feel guilty, right?”
Is that possible?
The purple tower lord responded with a wry smile.
Wizards have always been obsessed with research funds. Even among the relatively poor towers, the purple tower was in the fortunate position of receiving support from the royal family. And yet, it was strange that they were licking their plates clean, didn’t have uniforms, and couldn’t participate in extracurricular activities.
They were poor because they were pouring all their money into uniforms and delicious food into research.
People who devote their lives to creating something have this kind of tenacity.
A wickedness that I could respect, even if it fell short of mine. They wouldn’t be willing to give up their research funds easily. But I had a plan.
“Let’s try to persuade the tower seniors. If persuasion fails, I’ll take a clean 50% cut.”
“Hey, hooray!… I’ve consumed 50%…!”
As though he never thought I would succeed in persuading him, our subject had already begun to cheer. The bubbles of joy had started to bubble up around him, as if he was really enjoying himself.
On staring at the rising bubbles, images of me hearing harsh words from the seniors like ‘You’re insane if you think you’re going to take my research funds!!’ ‘I’ll confess if you don’t leave immediately.’ floated by.
Every now and then, when he’s in a good mood, the things he imagines in his head tend to escape.
Straight up saying ‘My research is more important, so I will use 95% of the research funds.’ would result in a reaction like the one just seen.
However, it’s a universal truth that attractive people are more persuasive. Isn’t there even a proverb that says one can’t refuse a handsome man with a pretty smile? So, the answer is clear.
“Use beauty.”
“?”
Applause rang out.
With determination, I invoked magic and behind me, Heart-Chan appeared in an odd pose.
It’s customary in otaku culture to strike bizarre poses when summoning a humanoid something.
The weakness of individuals buried in their studies is glaring. Beauty.
Compared to the insiders who build resistance against temptations by socializing and friending, the resistance of a self-canner researcher is just scraps.
From Noble mtl dot com
The third revised edition of the heart-chan NPC, created with fantasy magic that strikes the heartstrings of numerous men in the continent, is deployed here.
The face of our subject turned red.
“He, you’re going to use fantasy magic to play a role and… se… seduce other male seniors for research funds…?!”
“Because a player and character are different.”
“But… half of the magic users are… females! They… they will not be influenced…”
“That would be true if it was just Heart-Chan.”
If you have a female character, you also need a male one. Simple logic.
A few weird people exist who always choose female characters and play TRPG with all female cast, but I always pursue the harmony of yin and yang inherent in humans. Why could I not bring male characters into play?
Clap.
A mature cyclopic bespectacled old man with white hair.
Clap.
An innocent looking but secretly mischievous butler in shorts.
Clap.
A slightly rebellious butler with raven hair who grumbles but takes care of things diligently at work.
Clap.
A suspicious butler with a s*xy voice equipped with romance novel rhetoric.
“Master, your North Pole coffee, suitable for autumn weather, is ready.”
“Master, Master! Not Joseph’s—try mine! The jasmine tea has steeped beautifully!”
“Hey, Master! You said it was too astringent last time, so… I took extra care in brewing it this time.”
“Hohoho… Miss. This is black tea imbued with my very own brand of love. Will you do me the honor of accepting it?”
“Yeeaaargh…!!”
As the four butlers surrounded the tower master—caught in a ‘would you like some tea?’ siege—she quivered and shrank like a trapped capybara.
Bowing my head to examine her expression, I noticed her face flushed red with embarrassment, yet the trembling corners of her mouth were turned up. Even in embarrassment, it seems there is delight.
It appears one of the four standard butler archetypes ABCD resonated with her.
“Are you feeling unwell, anywhere? Please tell Joseph.”
“Master, your face is all red! You might have a fever; I’ll take your temperature for a moment…”
“Well, what is it, if you’ve caught a cold, I happen to have made a scarf recently. It’s yours, Master.”
“They say colds are easier to cure when you pass them on to someone else. If I may be so bold, I’ll gladly take Miss’s cold away with a kiss—”
The tower master’s expression screamed ‘Ugh, No!’, and the last half-hearted butler quickly rescinded the offer. Was the problem that his character was too buttery? The rest of the butlers, though, seemed to pass as her countenance brightened once more.
After enduring the relentless butler carpet bombing and mindless petting for 10 minutes, the tower master had completely melted away.
“Trial run complete.”
I was convinced. Though the tower master seemed particularly susceptible to persuasion, I believed that, even taking that into account, we could manage to ‘convince’ the seniors.
At the snap of my fingers, the heart-wielding butler brigade began to march in unison step by step. Their mission: to extract from every person in the tower the declaration ‘I will not covet research funding’.
“Uh… Ah… No…!”
The tower master, now flimsy as could be, strained to reach out with the last of her energy.
She must have sensed it, too. That as things stood, my NPC army would peacefully conquer the tower.
But with her face already melted and her legs wobbling, what could she possibly do?
All that was left for the tower master was to ruminate on her happiness like Bambi the fawn and observe the moment of the tower’s fall. I pushed my hood down and languidly stretched out on the sofa.
The time it took to take over the tower was two days and two hours.
Two more years had gone by since I greedily hoarded all the research funding and began my study alone.
It was an idyllic time, deftly thwarting the vile schemes of the tower master who sought to steal the funding from me, using illusion magic all the while.
I encountered headaches trying to implement automatic NPC control. A realistically immersive world needed at least 10 NPCs, the more, the better.
I couldn’t keep manually controlling them forever. I acutely felt it on the days I operated the butler brigade by hand. Felt like I was going to sprout a migraine.
They needed to move according to their set personalities, but in an emergency, I should be able to take the helm and steer them. Yes… I needed AI technology.
Could I achieve that with a one-size-fits-all illusion magic tool? Or should I look into collaborating with other schools of magic?
My preoccupations deepened when the purplish mage tower master plunked down beside me.
In South Korea, there exists a chair imbued with mind control that induces those who sit upon it to spill all their family affairs. It’s that uniquely enigmatic atmosphere that loosens one’s heartstrings.
Yes, the atmosphere.
I felt that atmosphere.
After a moment of silence, the purplish mage tower master cautiously opened her mouth.
“What kind of magic do you want to create?”
Her seriousness was a change from her usual flippancy, and it cast a certain mood.
The kind of dawn feeling that unwraps the bolt of the heart and compels one to reveal their innermost thoughts.
I answered succinctly.
“The world.”
“The world here… the one we’re standing on now, is it not enough?”
“If you talk in circles, I won’t understand.”
“Well, aren’t you a clever one…”
Hesitantly at first, it seemed as if the mage tower master made up her mind to throw a fast ball.
Determination flickered across her round eyes—a core so strong it seemed it couldn’t break.
“Do you realize you’ve never once called me by my name?”
“You’re the mage tower master.”
“And the others?”
“……..”
Nonexistent.
In fact, I didn’t even remember them.
It was a kind of mental illness. I couldn’t hear other people’s names.
I thought I could hear them, but before I knew it, I’d forgotten the names.
Since my allegiance to the mage tower, I wondered if this reincarnation perk was actually a curse, so I underwent various tests. Both body and soul came out clean, with no trace of a curse. It was declared a pure psychiatric condition.
I scrutinized the expression of the girl I could only remember as ‘the purplish mage tower master.’
That look is called sorrow and concern.
“Sometimes, very occasionally… I don’t feel alive. It’s as if my heart is somewhere else.”
“……..”
The mage tower master was right.
It was an unwanted reincarnation. Or perhaps, a reincarnation riddled with flaws.
I should have lived without the memories of my previous life. I remember many things. The air that could not be called fresh, the pine scent from the back mountain, the doenjang jjigae my mother made, the fried croaker, the torn green onion kimchi.
The burst garbage bag on the roadside, the street light that only turned on after flashing four times at night.
A photo of my ex-girlfriend that’s still in my phone album. All the TRPG records I’ve built up until now.
Yes.
My soul was stuck in Korea in the 21st century.
“If it’s a problem I can help with…”
“Shall I show you?”
“Huh?”
“My world, would you like to see it?”
I blurted impulsively, and the purple mage nodded.
My first mastery since reincarnation began like this.
“God did not grant me oblivion.” – Mc (name unknown)