[Nothing, nothing at all]

When Lynn came back carrying a box of gardening shears and a hand saw, he saw Isaac sitting on the second-floor steps, his elbows on his knees, hands clasped over his forehead. He looked incredibly solemn, as if he had encountered a monumental problem, with long shadows cast across his face by his bangs.

Lynn remembered that before he left, his roommate had the refined appearance of a typical noble mage. His elegant magic robe was without a single wrinkle, the lace on his court-style shirt had more stitches than all his own clothes combined, and his hairstyle was impeccable. He looked like he could immediately go out to a ball.

Now, the refined Isaac was sitting on the steps with his legs apart like a farmer. The dark-patterned magic robe had been taken off and was casually draped over the stair railing. His cravat was askew, and he had even rolled up the cuffs of his lace shirt. His chest and back were drenched in sweat, as if he had just finished a long-distance marathon. His breathing had just returned to normal, and even his hair was damp.

“…Isaac, what’s wrong?”

His roommate’s appearance startled Lynn. He first looked up at the magic clock to confirm that he had only been gone for about fifteen minutes, not several hours. He had only gone to borrow some tools. How had his roommate managed to get into this state in just fifteen minutes?

“You look… a bit…”

Lynn struggled to find the right words:

“A bit disheveled.”

Isaac, who didn’t know how to explain that he had tried to pull the staff and had gotten all sweaty without it moving an inch, was speechless.

Nobles were taught proper etiquette. Regardless of how much they learned, young masters and ladies who grew up in this environment had some concern for their image. Even though Isaac was a free-spirited and forward-thinking person, he was too embarrassed to tell a roommate he had only known for a little over a month that he had been ungracefully hunched over, trying with all his might to pull the other’s staff. So he moved his lips and said quite tactfully:

“Lynn, don’t you think there’s something not quite right about your staff?”

With a staff of this weight, forget about mages who never did physical training and only focused on honing their mental power. Even swordsmen who trained their bodies all day couldn’t necessarily wield it effortlessly. You couldn’t expect a mage to roll up their sleeves and reveal bulging, powerful, and incredibly strong muscles, could you?

Isaac secretly mused that the staff Lynn bought might have a gravity spell on it that was keyed to its owner. For example, it would only have a normal weight when held by its owner, and as soon as it sensed an unfamiliar magical presence, the runes hidden within would immediately activate, increasing the staff’s weight a hundred or a thousand times over. After all, it couldn’t be that the staff was just naturally this heavy. He had seen Lynn hold the staff easily before—how could a mage lift something so heavy?!

This was probably a measure mages used to prevent their staffs from being stolen. Many well-known mages would put this kind of insurance on their staffs to prevent them from being stolen or to ensure that even if they accidentally fell into the hands of an enemy, they wouldn’t become a helpful tool.

But staffs that had a “theft-prevention” spell or runes on them were extremely rare. The runes engraved on them would mostly be for warning or attacking. At the very least, an archmage’s or grand archmage’s staff would be worthy of so much effort. Why would Lynn’s basic staff with a grade-two magic core be worth this kind of theft protection?

Isaac felt there was something fishy going on. He thought that either there was a hidden force behind Lynn or that Lynn had accidentally bought something of unknown origin. He knew that many opportunists would go to the Magic Beast Forest to try their luck, picking up the weapons and equipment of unfortunate adventurers or mercenaries who had died and secretly selling them. Was it possible that Lynn had accidentally bought a staff like that?

While that was a way to get a good item, it could also have serious consequences. If the family of the staff’s original owner found out, and Lynn was a commoner with no last name, wouldn’t he easily become the target of their anger for the loss of a family member?

In just a few seconds, Isaac’s mind went through several twists and turns. He was quite satisfied with his roommate. Lynn had high talent, was easy to get along with, and the benefits of being on good terms with him were definitely greater than being a bystander. Isaac didn’t mind giving a little tactful heads-up, but what he didn’t expect was that his roommate didn’t seem to get his line of thought at all and instead showed a confused expression.

“What’s wrong with it?”

Under his roommate’s wide-eyed gaze, Lynn lifted the staff with one hand. The contrast between his thin arm and the thick staff was abstract, but he himself didn’t think there was anything wrong and even waved it lightly in his hand.

The heavy staff cut through the air, making a deep *whooshing* sound. Isaac’s eyelid twitched. He recalled seeing a heavy swordsman using a two-handed greatsword and, out of a survival instinct, couldn’t help but inch his butt to the side.

“This is a low-quality staff, so it’s normal for the details to be a bit unrefined. Once I polish the staff body, it’ll be fine.”

As Lynn said this, he set down the wooden box that he had just held in one hand. The toolbox, filled with nails, hammers, saws, and large gardening shears, hit the floor with a heavy *thud*, accompanied by the clattering of metal tools colliding inside. The ground even shook slightly.

“The vendor who sold me the staff said the body is made of ironwood. I told Uncle Gardener I needed tools to trim ironwood, and he brought me all the tools from the gardening shed…”

Lynn sighed:

“Uncle said ironwood is very hard and might be difficult to trim. He said it would be best to take it to a blacksmith or ask a senior who can use advanced magic to cut it with a magic blade. I wonder if these tools will even be useful.”

Isaac’s eyelid started twitching again. “…”

‘No, something isn’t right.’ This time, what wasn’t right was Lynn. Judging by the sound of the box hitting the floor, it wasn’t a weight that a normal person could just move around, was it? Isaac remembered seeing the gardener needing a few people to push a cart with a toolbox. If he remembered correctly, Lynn had lifted it with one hand just now. ‘One hand?’

Before Isaac could even consider the most obvious and ridiculous correct answer, he saw his frail roommate, who was half a head shorter than him, pull out a jagged hand saw from the box without hesitation. He pressed the saw’s teeth against a section of the staff body where a sharp branch protruded and then, with a calm expression, effortlessly pulled the handle, making a *squeaking* sound as he began to saw.

“…”

The sound of the steel saw grinding against the ironwood was exceptionally harsh, but the noise only lasted for two strokes. Then, there was a crisp *snap* in the air. When Lynn, a bit dazed, lifted the saw in his hand, he saw a very noticeable crack in the saw’s teeth. Glancing back down at the staff in his hand, the obstructive branch stubbornly clung to the grip, utterly unmoved save for two faint scratches marring its surface.  

Lynn: “Huh, it broke? I didn’t even use much force.”

Isaac: “…”

“No wonder Uncle Gardener said it would be difficult to trim…”

Lynn couldn’t help but look troubled:

“A steel saw won’t even work? The water magic test with Teacher Ariel is tomorrow, and it’s too late to go to a blacksmith’s shop now.”

Since he enrolled, he had never had a proper magic staff. For the past month, he had been using a random branch he picked up with a glass bead attached to it to fake a staff. Fortunately, the requirements for mages and swordsmen were different during class, and he wasn’t required to successfully cast spells in front of everyone, so he was able to stall until today.

But it wasn’t just the swordsman academy that had training assessments; the magic academy was also about to face its first magical assessment for new mages after being open for more than a month. Lynn’s magical affinity included the water element, so he absolutely had to pass the water magic assessment tomorrow.

The consequences of failing the magic assessment were severe, especially for Lynn, because it would mean losing his tuition, fees, and room and board reduction…

It would definitely not be okay to go to the assessment with a staff that had branches sticking out everywhere. Students going to a place like the black market was against school rules, which was why Lynn had to wrap himself up like a mummy. But a staff that could be called a “semi-finished product” wouldn’t be sold through official channels. If a teacher were to ask about its origins, not only would the fact that he was casually wandering around the black market be exposed, but his substitute work might also be uncovered. At that point, the consequences would be severe.

The magic academy’s punishment for substituting or cheating on tests was much more serious than the swordsman academy’s. Such magical cheating was strictly prohibited; otherwise, Lynn wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of traveling halfway across the city to a swordsman academy for a part-time job. But then again, the school never mentioned what the punishment would be for a mage student substituting for a swordsman. Maybe no one ever thought a mage could actually substitute for a swordsman…

Thinking about this, Lynn fell into a deep thought. Beside him, Isaac had a strange expression. After struggling for a while, he held back from asking a question that would be very offensive if it turned out to be true: “You’re not a swordsman pretending to be a mage to illegally enroll, are you?” Instead, he was silent for a moment and then hesitated to speak:

“Actually, I know some—”

However, as soon as Isaac’s words came out, before he could finish the sentence, Lynn reached out in distress, grabbing the branch that the steel saw had only left a shallow scratch on. While muttering worriedly, “What should I do?”, he unconsciously gave it a twist.

With a *snap*, the world immediately fell silent.

Even Isaac’s unfinished words came to an abrupt halt. He just stared wide-eyed at the ironwood branch that his slender and delicate roommate had just snapped off with his bare hands.

Lynn was also stunned for a moment.

‘Well, it seems it doesn’t really need a tool after all. Just using my hands seem to work too?’

“Anyway, it’s a good thing I found a solution…”

The black-haired apprentice mage muttered to himself. Then, as if remembering something, he turned to his roommate. His smooth hair fell along the sides of his cheeks, and a curious expression appeared on his innocent-looking face as he asked:

“Oh, by the way, Isaac, what were you about to say?”

Isaac, who had been about to say that he knew some advanced magic and could help: “…”

Isaac: “Nothing, nothing at all.”