LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 4 - Seymour Mausoleum (3)
I silently looked at Sia.
“…….”
“…….”
A brief silence.
“…Ah.”
Sia, realizing her mistake, began to fidget, her eyes wavering.
“Ahaha.”
I chuckled softly.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Ah. Well, that…”
“You, I mean.”
When I reached out, Sia squeezed her eyes shut, seemingly lost in thought.
However, my hand only reached over to scoop up Lucis, lifting him into my arms.
“There’s nothing you can’t say in front of the child.”
“…Huh?”
Sia spoke in a surprised voice and opened her eyes.
I gently raised Lucis’s right hand and waved it toward Sia and Simon.
“Say hello. This is your nephew and distant aunt.”
I lowered my head and met Lucis’s eyes before speaking.
“Say hello. They’re your uncle, aunt, and distant relatives.”
“Oh…”
At my words, Lucis looked at them closely, inspecting them as if they were his kin, clearly pleased by the mention of blood relations.
Lucis nodded slightly and said briefly,
“Hello.”
Simon and Sia, both startled, looked at each other and greeted him after a brief cough.
“Hello.”
“Hi.”
The two of them simultaneously greeted Lucis, then quickly turned their heads, looking at each other as if seeing a mad person.
I could read the thoughts behind their gazes.
-“Talking informally to your aunt?”
-“Using formal language with your nephew?”
After hesitating for a moment, they turned back to Lucis and greeted him once more.
“Hello.”
“Hello.”
This time, the roles were reversed.
As the two of them quickly turned to each other once again, Lucis couldn’t help but burst out laughing.
“Heeheehee.”
Lucis, laughing brightly with his neck drawn in as if genuinely enjoying himself, looked so joyful.
As a child who rarely showed his emotions, his laughter was all the more dazzling.
“Ah…”
Even the two siblings, who had been looking at each other with strange expressions, were now left staring blankly at Lucis’s smile.
Lucis, with a proud expression of self-satisfaction, tilted his head back.
I could almost read the thoughts behind the sky-high nose.
-“It’s okay to adore me more. I am a great being who deserves admiration.”
They said young dragons are full of pride, and it was exactly as described.
Of course, that attitude suited Lucis well.
He was a dragon, and above all, he was incredibly cute.
“…….”
But I couldn’t fully enjoy his cuteness.
A storm of emotions was swirling inside me.
-“Are you planning to kill Uncle too?”
Uncle too.
What could that possibly mean?
***
The second son of the Mausoleum family, Simon, had no memory of ever receiving love from his family.
His mother passed away shortly after giving birth to the youngest, Sia, and his father had little interest in the family.
As for his older brother, Seymour… Simon preferred not to talk about him.
For that reason, Simon had poured all his love into Sia, the youngest.
With a mother who didn’t exist and a father who was nearly nonexistent, he wanted to fill those roles for her.
He had often been criticized for being weak, which was unlike the Mausoleum family, but he was just happy to see Sia grow up bright and healthy.
-“Don’t expect too much.”
Don’t expect too much from this family.
Don’t expect anything from his father or his brother.
Don’t expect to be loved.
Don’t expect to be treated like family.
Just survive.
But.
-“Say hello. This is your nephew and distant aunt.”
“Hello.”
Seeing that, one can’t help but have expectations.
When he shows a simple, warm side, it’s natural to wonder if maybe—just maybe—there’s a different side to him.
The walls he had built up in his heart, the barriers he had set to avoid getting hurt, began to waver.
“…Oppa.”
At the sound of his name being called, Simon looked up.
They were in the attic under the roof, the secret place that the siblings shared. Sia was sitting on an old sofa, hugging her knees.
Her gaze seemed to be calculating something, yet also holding on to a hope where calculations didn’t matter.
“Do you trust Seymour Oppa?”
Simon knew that by asking this question, Sia was really asking herself if she wanted to believe.
Usually, he would have said something like “I think the same as you” or “I believe that too,” even if just as an empty phrase.
After all, Simon was someone who always sided with Sia when Seymour wasn’t around.
“……”
But Simon couldn’t answer.
He was too afraid of Seymour to respond.
Sia watched her brother bury his face in his hands. She could see his fingers trembling.
To Sia, Simon was like a second parent.
He was always confident and proud in front of other nobles or servants, always the composed older brother.
But in front of their eldest brother, he became small—like a seven-year-old boy who had encountered a giant.
What exactly had happened between the younger and older brothers that made Simon so fearful, Sia didn’t know.
She understood that this was not a small issue that could be dismissed.
But Sia didn’t want to let this opportunity slip by.
Her father had died.
Her older brother had changed.
She now had an adorable nephew.
Perhaps this was the first—and possibly last—chance for their family to change.
It might be their only opportunity to become even a little bit of a normal family.
“Simon Oppa.”
Sia carefully opened her mouth.
“Seymour Oppa smiled at us.”
“……”
“Has Seymour Oppa ever smiled at us, other than with a mocking smile?”
He hadn’t.
“Has he ever joked with us, as an uncle or distant aunt?”
He hadn’t.
“Maybe… Could it be that Seymour Oppa will change too? Could he possibly change?”
Simon knew it too.
Objectively, he knew that Sia’s words were right.
But…
“I don’t know.”
He couldn’t imagine it.
“I can’t imagine that person changing.”
Even now, when he thought of Seymour, the sound echoed in his ears.
The sound of the wind brushing across the cold lake surface.
The creaking of a small boat beneath his feet.
– …….
And the emotionless gaze of Seymour, who had weighed the lives and deaths of the people in front of him.
***
“…Huh?”
While I was reading a book in the study, I suddenly raised my hand and placed it on my stomach.
“It’s already digested?”
I had devoured the steaks from lunch without leaving a single bite.
My stomach was so full, it felt like it would burst and I could barely breathe. Yet, in just a few hours, everything had digested cleanly.
‘Youth is truly beautiful…!’
It was not only my age, but also Seymour’s strong physique that likely helped. After all, his bloodline was exceptional.
I thought of my old body back on Earth, which would feel bloated after eating meat at lunch and would stay that way until I got home after work. With a contented smile, I turned the page of the book.
After lunch, I had shut myself in the study to read, as I had something I wanted to look into.
‘Since I’ve fallen into the game world, I should try using magic too.’
It was partly out of personal interest, but it was also essential to be able to use magic in this world to survive.
‘Whether or not you can use magic, or more precisely, your sensitivity to magical energy, determines how your life unfolds.’
In this world, capital and magical power were just as important as social status.
Seymour, who had everything except magical power, had risked his life to enter the Mausoleum of the Morsalium family.
I turned another page of the book. Fortunately, despite it being a completely foreign language, I was able to read it fluently, so there was no need to relearn the language.
‘Hmm… So unlike in the game, simply chanting the spell name doesn’t activate the magic.’
In this world, using magic was more about sensitivity to magical energy, mental strength, and willpower rather than clearly spoken incantations.
If I were to compare it to a game, there were no active skills, only stats and passive skills.
‘Passive skills, huh.’
I took my eyes off the book and turned my head to the side. There, as soon as I started thinking about magic, there was a ‘spear’ that came to mind.
┏━━━━━━
┃ Faint Dragon’s Bloodline
┏━━━━━━
┃ Faint Dragon’s Bloodline
┃ Basic Gravity Magic (0%)
┃ Basic Magical Affinity (0%)
┃ Highly Educated (17%)
┃ Solid Physique (67%)
┃ Superior Mental Strength (32%)
┗━━━━━━
At first, I was confused about what it was, but upon closer inspection, it was a list of skills that had been applied to Seymour from the beginning, even during the setup phase.
‘Is this the skill window? But it looks different from the game interface.’
It wasn’t a sleek, modern-style window; it was a window that seemed to be formed by black flames creating the text.
‘I remember that Seymour’s magic took this form in the original story.’
Considering that Seymour’s magical power came from the contract with the Mausoleum family, I had to assume that this ‘skill window’ was also made from the Mausoleum’s magical power.
‘Could this also be part of the contract between Seymour and the Mausoleum?’
The thought suddenly crossed my mind, and it seemed plausible, so I nodded.
For Seymour, who didn’t know how to handle magic, to conquer both the family and the underworld within a year and become the villain threatening the protagonist, he would need at least this level of power.
The fact that the direction and progress of growth were visually displayed was an enormous advantage for someone who had to grow.
I once again carefully looked at the skill window.
┏━━━━━━
┃ Faint Dragon’s Bloodline
┃ Basic Gravity Magic (0%)
┃ Basic Magical Affinity (0%)
┃ Highly Educated (17%)
┃ Solid Physique (67%)
┃ Superior Mental Strength (32%)
┗━━━━━━
Fortunately, the format of the skill window was the same as in a game system.
The prefixes like ‘faint,’ ‘basic,’ and ‘solid’ indicated the level of each skill, and the percentage number would increase up to 100 before leveling up.
Out of curiosity, I tapped on one of the skill names, and just like in the game, a detailed description window appeared.
━━━━━━
[Faint Dragon’s Bloodline]
You have faintly inherited the blood of an ancient magical creature.
– Dragons have a mild favor towards you.
-> Your magic is strengthened by 7%.
━━━━━━
This was a passive skill based on Seymour’s bloodline.
Next, I tapped on the skill below it.
━━━━━━
[Basic Gravity Magic 0%]
Your bloodline is skilled in handling spatial magic.
<- You receive a 15% targeting correction and a 15% damage correction from the ‘Highly Educated’ skill.
<- You receive a 6% destruction power correction, a 6% mana efficiency correction, and a 6% magic activation speed correction from the ‘Faint Dragon’s Bloodline’ skill.
━━━━━━
Gravity Magic.
It was a magic that was almost synonymous with Seymour Mausoleum’s trademark.
The reason it had 0% at the first level, “Basic,” was because it was a skill that awakened only after he began to handle magic through the contract.
I stroked my chin and sank into thought.
‘What kind of contract did Seymour make with Mausoleum?’
A miraculous contract that transformed a successor in danger of death into the most influential figure in the capital within a year.
Gravity magic, the skill window, and even Lucius were granted.
If the protagonist hadn’t interfered, Seymour might have swallowed the entire empire, not just becoming a behind-the-scenes villain.
‘What did he have to offer in exchange for receiving this kind of power?’
The price of the contract.
I was curious about that.
What did Seymour, and what do I, need to fulfill?
‘Did Seymour from the original story pay the price of the contract and die?’
As I was pondering, I shook my head and stood up.
No matter how much I thought, this was a problem I couldn’t solve right now.
‘For now, maybe I should try using magic.’
I looked around.
The library, filled with books. It seemed like this wasn’t the place to try magic.
“Doo-roong-.”
Perhaps because of a food coma, Lucius was lying on the sofa, drooling in deep sleep.
I quietly opened the library window and stepped out onto the balcony.
Looking at the sky, I saw a white dove flying at a low height.
‘This is the perfect target to test gravity magic.’
I reached out my hand toward the bird.
Then, I focused my will and mental strength, just as I had read in the book.
‘The basic principle of magic is prayer. If you desire strongly, magic moves and helps make it happen.’
Magic in this world was similar to a prayer offered to the gods.
The difference was that the power to make this prayer come true came from within myself.
‘Fall.’
With my wish, I felt the magic move from my heart.
The magic began to manifest.
And at that moment,
The world turned upside down.