? Memories of the Hero and the Mage ?

    “...Ugh.”

    I let out a groan, then slowly opened my eyes.

    I found myself in a place engulfed in darkness, without a glimmer of light.

    “What’s this place?”

    Bewildered, I radiated stellar mana in all directions, but for some reason, it didn’t work.

    ‘...Damn it, I hate darkness.’

    I really loathe the dark.

    To be precise, I truly hate being in a dark room without a glimpse of light.

    Of course, the room I’m in right now, although it seems vast, I don’t like it because I don’t know where it ends.

    “Ugh...”

    Because of this, I was struggling with disgust. But soon I felt a presence at my feet.

    “Meow.”

    “...A cat?”

    A black cat... No, a cat doll was nibbling at my feet.

    “...I’m glad you’re here with me.”

    I lifted the cat doll up, feeling a bit reassured because of its presence. The cat doll, however, meowed and began licking my face aggressively.

    “What’s wrong?”

    “Meow... meow...”

    I was trying to get the cat doll away from me, but suddenly it lashed out at me and knocked me down, then began licking my face.

    “...What?”

    Having been suddenly defeated by that little cat doll, I ended up scratching the back of my head while the cat kept licking me for a while.

    “Meoww...”

    By the time my face became glossy, the cat curled atop my chest and began rubbing its face.

    ‘...Is this sleep paralysis?’

    The dream seemed way too wholesome for it to be sleep paralysis, so I kept lying on the bed. But suddenly, the surrounding darkness began fading.

    – Woosh...

    Eventually, green fields and trees entered my field of vision, and only then did I realize what situation I was in.

    ‘...It’s the same dream I experienced back then.’

    Perhaps, the situation now is similar to that time when I saw Ferloche’s past.

    “...Mom?”

    Sure enough, soon, I saw my younger self.

    “...Yes, didn’t I get lost while playing hide and seek in the woods?”

    Back then, I got lost in the woods while playing hide and seek with my mother.

    I’m sure I did.

    It should have bee...

    ‘...Something’s strange?’

    Now that I think about it, something really is strange. Why did I get lost while playing hide and seek? Why was it that my mother, the greatest stellar wizard, couldn’t find me?

    “Mom... where are you...?”

    Eventually, the words that came out of his mouth were quite different from what I remembered.

    “Mom... how long do I have to hide...? Mom...”

    With an anxious expression on his face, my younger self continued to cry out to my mother, but he couldn’t see a glimpse of her, and as such, the night deepened in the woods.

    “I-I’m scared... sniff...”

    My younger self, who had been crying and trembling in fear while waiting for my mother for a long time, soon leaned against a tree as he fell asleep after being exhausted.

    “Sob sob...”

    And after a while, a wolf, who found him asleep, slowly crept up to him.

    ‘...That’s what happened?’

    I tilted my head because the memory seemed completely different from what I remembered. And at the next moment, a fireball flew in from somewhere at high speed.

    – Whoosh!!

    “Whimper!”

    Then the fireball hit the wolf in its tail, and it ran away with its tail still set on fire.

    “H-Huh..?”

    My younger self woke up from that commotion, and after looking around for a moment, he found a red-haired girl in front of him.

    The girl was Irina from my childhood, whom I used to play with secretly in the streets for several months at that point in time. Eventually, we became acquainted because I kept talking to her unilaterally.

    “Y-You’re...”

    “Frey, why are you here?”

    “That’s...”

    The young Irina, who ignited a fire in one hand while examining the crude paper in the other, crumpled it up and put it in her pocket. She then muttered.

    “All right, now that I have found the missing first son of the Duke... If I get the amount written here, I can live on my own for a year.”

    “...What do you mean?”

    When he inquired with a slightly scared expression, Irina frowned and replied.

    “The handsome ‘Noble Master’ doesn’t need to concern himself.”

    “But still...”

    “Fine, I always say this, but... I hate talking to nobles. I’m doing this for money in the first place.”

    “...Huh?”

    “Just get up already. Don’t you want to go home?”

    While Irina was getting irritated by his constant barrage of questions, my younger self stood up in a hurry and exclaimed.

    “I want to go home! I miss my mother!”

    “Then shut up and follow me.”

    “All right...”

    Thus, my younger self and Irina began heading down the mountain through the darkness.

    “...By the way, what was that paper from before?”

    “......”

    “And how did you find this place? Hm?”

    “...Ugh.”

    Irina, who was quietly going down the mountain, closed her eyes tightly upon hearing my constant questions, and soon became annoyed.

    “Be quiet!! You’re hindering me from finding the way!!”

    “...But I know the way as well.”

    “What?”

    But when my younger self answered clearly, Irina looked slightly perplexed. She then frowned and asked.

    “Then why were you missing?”

    “Missing? Me?”

    “Yes, according to this paper...”

    Having said that, Irina closely inspected the paper. However, she soon froze on the spot and turned around while letting out a cough.

    “Ahem... Anyway, let’s go down.”

    “If I go down the mountain, will I get to see my mother?”

    As a result, the ground quaked violently, and my younger self, who was holding Irina in a precarious manner, lost his balance and stumbled forward.

    “Aaaaaah!!”

    “Nooooo!!”

    Thus, both of them fell down the cliff helplessly.

    “...Is it a dream? If it’s real, there’s no way Irina and I would have survived the fall. “

    “Meow.”

    As I stared blankly at the scene, I speculated for a moment that this scene wasn’t real and it was just a dream...

    – Whoosh...

    But in the next moment, when the scene began to change slowly, I changed my mind.

    “Hey... wake up...!”

    “Uh... uh...”

    Because Irina was shaking my younger self, who lay there unconscious. Both of them were drenched in water.

    – Ripple... Ripple...

    To their right, a river was flowing briskly, and to the left, a firewood was burning that Irina had ignited with her magic.

    – Crackle! Crackle!!

    “...Damn it, when are they coming?”

    Irina, who stopped shaking me for a while, sparked a flame in her left hand and shot it into the sky. Upon seeing his unconscious self, she became anxious.

    “You moron... you should have just run away... Why did you come back?”

    Having said that, Irina ignited a flame in her right hand and began warming up his frozen body. Soon, she muttered with a look of incomprehension.

    “You are an esteemed noble Young Master... you go out on the streets to play around with commoners like me just for your amusement.. You’re just an annoying noble...”

    “Ugh...”

    “But then... why did you come back...”

    Irina muttered to herself while staring at my younger self as he moaned and groaned for a while. However, when she sensed a presence in the distance, her expression stiffened and she quietly stood up.

    “Grrr...”

    The werewolf, who had been chasing them all the way to the bottom of the cliff, was slowly approaching them at that time.

    “Haaa!!”

    Irina, who was glaring at the werewolf, soon tried to ignite flames in her hand with all her might, but...

    “Damn it, I used a lot of mana on the search magic spell...”

    With little mana left in her body, she soon stumbled and collapsed.

    ‘...?Search Magic? spell is a large-scale magic that can only be performed by 5 mages from the Magic Tower...’

    “Grrr.”

    I was momentarily amazed by the discovery that Irina could use ?Search Magic? at that young age, and before I knew it, the werewolf approached my younger self. She drooled at the sight of him.

    – Boom!!

    “Hooowll!!!”

    However, Irina, who was lying on the floor, mustered all her strength and shot a fireball right at the face of the werewolf. As a result, the werewolf covered her face while rolling on the ground.

    “Qu-Quick... I need to get out of here...”

    At that moment, Irina staggered up and tried to move, but ...

    “...Hooowl!”

    She stopped when she glanced at the unconscious body of my younger self. Soon, she began dragging him along.

    “If I just make it to the bushes over there... I can hide his body...”

    “Hooowl!!”

    “Kyaa!!”

    However, her clothes were soaked wet, and her abdomen was hurt pretty badly. As a result, she soon reached her limit while dragging him, and eventually, the werewolf caught up to them.

    “Roooaaar!!

    “Kyaa!!”

    Before long, the furious wolf slammed her fist on Irina.

    Then the sharp werewolf’s claws tore her clothes and left a deep cross-shaped scar on her cheeks.

    – Pow! Pooow!!

    “Ugh... Ugh...”

    The werewolf adjusted the intensity of her punches to inflict utmost pain on young Irina. The werewolf then grinned when she saw that Irina was about to lose consciousness and aimed her sharp claws at her throat.

    “Grrr...”

    “What a shitty life...”

    Seeing the scene, Irina burst into tears and spat out curses in a melancholic tone. In the next moment, just as the werewolf’s sharp claws were about to pierce her throat...

    – Thud!!

    “Hooowwwll!!”

    Suddenly, a dull sound resounded, and the werewolf collapsed while foaming from her mouth.

    “Why... did you come back...?”

    Young Irina, who was staring blankly at that figure, soon found my younger self holding a thick stick behind the collapsed werewolf.

    “I’m a Starlight...”

    “F-Frey...”

    “...We’re a family of the Great Hero... Weak or strong... We protect them all.”

    After saying those words, my younger self uttered a few more words before losing consciousness, collapsing into Irina’s arms.

    “...That’s what my mother always told me.”

    And soon silence lingered for a while.

    “Here!! The signal has been fired from here!!”

    “Young Master!! Are you okay?”

    “Son!!”

    Eventually, the servants of the Starlight household along with my father arrived at the scene, and at that moment, my eyes were once again dyed with darkness.

    “...Sigh.”

    Having glimpsed through the memories of my past, I heaved a deep sigh and muttered.

    “I... was supposed to awaken my stellar mana after seeing the prophetic book... it was also mentioned in the setting...”

    “Meow...”

    “Now... I don’t know.”

    Having said that, I hugged the cat doll, who was staring at me with a sullen look, and lay down in the dark room.

    .

    .

    .

    .

    .

    “Young master... please wake up...”

    Meanwhile, at that time, in Frey’s dormitory.

    “...You promised to go out with me.”

    Kania, who just came out of Frey’s subconscious, muttered as she looked at him with a haggard face.

    “How can you delay the promise for 3 months..?”

    Before long, the first semester of Sunrise Academy was already coming to an end.

    Advanced chapters are available on our kofi.