Ok… the bird is already cut up, now it just needs a pinch of salt and pepper, and I can add it to the stew.

I still can’t believe those boys were eating just meat every day for every meal, who taught them that? All that training too, whoever found them had the time to teach those weird movements but couldn’t take them to an orphanage?

Honestly, adventurers have no heart lately, it used to be good practice to help abandoned kids.

Maybe they weren’t helped because they’re mixed race? No, it couldn’t be, adventurers these days are accepting of even seafolk and half demons, wars are a thing of the past, after all. Well, except for the one in the ruined continent, but that doesn’t count.

Besides… They’re just so cute! Who could abandon these adorable things?

But it’s not just that, Cona learns so quickly, he might be a genius, and Toba has an unnatural strength for his age, even accounting for how quickly beast hybrids develop.

I wasn’t planning to go straight into teacher mode, but Cona kept pulling my robe and pointing to random words on books, how could I say no to that? He even tries his best to pronounce every word I teach him. When we met, he tried telling me his name, he said it completely wrong but later he just pointed at himself and Toba so I could understand, and he waited for me to introduce myself too. He’s a clever kid for sure.

The guys at the clan always made fun of me for being named Luna, but his name is even weirder, so we match! Also, whoever taught them all this stuff at least bothered to name them.

He’s way too serious for his age though, and when I carry him close to my chest he puts on an even more intense expression. At first, I thought he didn’t like it, but when I put him away, he pulls himself right back. Poor thing… He must be missing his mother.

Could it be that he’s older than Toba? The only thing different in him is his green hair after all, maybe he doesn’t age as quickly as other half demons, or maybe he’s just human.

But if that’s the case, why would he be here in the forest? Maybe his parents died?

Well, regardless of that, I’ll stay here for a long time anyway, so I might as well raise them. This wizard tower is a goldmine after all, and it will take years to copy all these circles and read all these books. Who would have guessed that the famous old hut in the dwarf forest was actually this all along?  

It’s been only two days and I already can’t take my eyes off them, even if this place wasn’t packed full of rare magic circles, I still would have stayed a bit.

It’s just so fascinating to watch their routine, I’ve never seen training like this, maybe it’s a military drill from far away? No, I would definitely know about it if it was. Regardless, these kids are just too interesting!

I’ll admit that I was shocked at first when they started swinging that gilded short sword, but they wouldn’t part with it no matter what, and their movements weren’t so bad for kids, so in the end I just accepted it. Maybe I’ll even instruct them later.

If they get hurt, I’ll heal them, but I’ll also take away the sword for a while. The materials for healing spells are expensive after all.

Anyway, they must be getting hungry.

“Cona, Toba, food is ready!”

I could hear the “tap tap” of their footsteps already, I can’t get enough of these boys.

Noctra forgive me, but I’m about to pass out from the cuteness. Seeing them walking in my direction with those serious faces… I don’t think I can take much more!

I served them both with my travel tableware and we ate on top of the blanket I had laid on the grass. Everyone makes fun of me for carrying around this stuff, but it always comes in handy. Adventurers need to make all sorts of places into their temporary home, and no one likes a messy, uncomfortable home.

They seemed to be enjoying my food, but Toba was having a little trouble eating it. The stew kept dripping off the side of his mouth that was missing, and the vapor was getting into his exposed eye.

I placed down my bowl and put him in my lap, two days ago he would never let me do this, but he was starting to trust me.

I took away his spoon and gave him a fork so he could skewer the meat and vegetables, which he learned to do after I fed him for a while, then I reclined his head a little bit, and tilted the bowl with the edge on his mouth so he could drink it without spewing.

It took a little trial and error, but when he went for seconds (and thirds, and fourths) he was already feeding himself.

What a shame, I wish I could feed him forever, but it seems I’m just too good of a teacher, hehehe.

Cona was looking at us the whole time, like he was analyzing something. I wonder what he’s thinking, this boy is such an enigma.

Just as I thought that he started spewing the stew on purpose! I couldn’t help but laugh out loud, but I wiped him up and fed him too, despite his obvious jealousy.

They’re just children after all, and they must have been through a lot, a little spoiling wouldn’t do much harm. I also had a soft spot for Cona, since he started calling me big sister after he learned the word, I even had to hide my tears.

I wonder how long I’ll stay with them… It’s not like I have a mission to do right now, and there’s plenty of research to be done here, not to mention the countless magic circles I need to copy. I’ll try my best to raise them up and teach all the basics, if I need to leave early, I’ll drop them off at Alport, but I prefer not to do so.

Adventurer towns aren’t good for children; there’s also a good chance that their parents live there and abandoned them in this forest to die.

Honestly, this practice should end already. If your wife cheats on you with a different race, the baby has nothing to do with it!

Maybe if I ask to be relocated to this area I can stay with them, if I do it under the pretense of gathering all the resources in this tower, I’m sure the boss will understand.

But enough worrying about the future, for now I’ll just enjoy this moment, it’s like I have two little brothers, and I love every second of it.

Maybe I should try teaching them animal names today, I found an illustrated encyclopedia in the tower that’ll be perfect! It could be a good idea to teach the numbers first though… Cona seems to be smart after all, what if he turns out to love calculating as much as me? That would be a dream.

                                                                                          ***     

I woke up quietly, and immediately looked to my right. Toba was still sleeping peacefully.

Nice, I woke up early, this is my chance

I carefully lifted my head from my pillow, it was a good pillow, even if I had to share it with Toba. It did not come for free, however, and today, I wasn’t willing to pay the price.

I got up slowly and walked to the shelf without making a sound. I needed my sword, otherwise I wouldn’t have much to do all day. I managed to grab it without a single clatter and began walking towards the exit.

Finally, this time I’m sure I made no mistakes, I’ll train with the sword all day and return at night. I won’t even count my sword swings, no numbers for today.

Just thinking about it was enough to send a wave of relief over my body, and so I finally set out.

Jesus Christ, I can’t believe I’m free from that witch. I hope this little trip gives me enough rest; she’ll grind me to dust when I return.

I managed to take a single step onto the grass outside, before a hand grabbed my hair and lifted me up.

“Gaaaah! Stop Luna, stop”

“Bad Cona, no running away from math class”

“Hair hurt, stop” I said as I put on a helpless face and looked at her, forcing tears into my eyes. In reality, being lifted by the hair didn’t hurt one bit, but I needed to play all the cards I had, or it would be double the equations for today.

It seemed to have worked, because she started carrying me the usual way, my head rested against her chest. Little did I know, it would be triple the equations today.

We were living together for a week, and this was my fourth attempt at escaping. I wasn’t ungrateful for finally being able to learn from another human, it’s just that… Luna was a huge math nerd.

When she started teaching us the numbers, she decided to show us simple addition as well, for some reason. Then, I got bored and made the mistake of showing her that I already knew it.

It was arguably the worst decision of my life, now she thinks I’m a genius, and forces me to study math every day. I also couldn’t show her I knew too much, and had to pretend to be just learning fast, otherwise she could realize I’m not a kid, and God knows what she would do.

I was faking not understanding equations, in hopes that she would give up after a while, but she was persistent. It did help that I screwed up once in a division problem, but let’s pretend it was on purpose.

What’s even worse is that she quickly gave up on Toba, who had the appropriate reaction for his age. If I had a little more patience, I wouldn’t be going through this.

It wasn’t just a lack of patience though, was it? I was trying to impress her… Ok, maybe I deserve this.

Although I had to suffer through that, I really was learning a lot from her, in just a week I learned more words than I thought would be possible in a month, and it was nice having her around. Really nice, actually. I couldn’t have enough of her smell, her warmth, and most importantly, her breasts.

To think that I used to hang out in a moist cave with wolves… I have certainly moved up in life. I just needed to escape the math lessons, and things would be perfect.

There was one other thing nagging me: Toba wasn’t learning much. I don’t know if he was too shy or just slow, but he was still having trouble speaking. Maybe that’s normal, since he doesn’t have memories from a past life like I do, and he has spent a long time being raised by just wolves. Either way I shouldn’t worry too much, oneesan was taking good care of him, and he was strong.

Anyway, I didn’t give up on escaping math class. My initial plan didn’t work, but a week had passed, and that meant it was time to show her that I knew how to use magic… Well, I actually didn’t, but maybe puking is already enough to impress her?

If I could shift Luna’s focus from math to magic, I would be able to learn something more useful.

I was carried away inside the tower again. Thankfully, she usually taught us by the evening, and the mornings were free, aside from the workout. Today was a rest day, however, so I could take the time to persuade her.

I pulled on her robe and led her upstairs, she seemed to be curious about my intentions, and was giggling to herself. I joked before, but she never got mad, she always looked happy to take care of us. It made me happy, especially for Toba.

We got to the second floor, and I stood in front of a bookshelf.

“Up” I said as I pointed at the book I wanted, but instead of picking it up for me, she lifted me so I could take it myself. It was hard not to blush.

Honestly, if she keeps at it like this, I might agree to study math every day. Women are scary.

I got down and carried the book near the window as always, this was my usual way of practicing it, since the puke would end up on the grass outside and I wouldn’t have to clean it. This time, however, I would do something a little different.

I opened it on the page with the usual red magic circle, showed it to her, then flipped to the pages depicting the correct movements, and showed her again.

“Can… big sister… this?” I tried to scrape a sentence together to ask if she could cast this spell, I still couldn’t talk properly, but what’s important is being understood.

She paused for a while, thinking about something, but then took the book and traded places with me. She said something but I could only understand the words “show”, “you”, and “careful”. Either way, this was finally my chance to see what I was doing wrong, and to witness a spell for the first time!  

She carried the book on her left arm, quickly touched the circle with her right hand and- Wait, isn’t she supposed to touch it with the left and keep touching it during the spell? She raised the hand she had touched the circle with to shoulder level, briefly closed her hand into a fist, and almost in the same motion she extended her arm and pointed her finger outside the window.

“[Ignis]”

A fist sized firebolt exploded out of luna’s fingertip like a bullet and flied fast, crashing into the barrier and making a loud noise. The flames expanded beautifully against the invisible forcefield; it was like watching a slow-motion video on the internet.

I stood there in awe, now it was my time to be frozen in place. My ears were ringing from the small explosion, and my face betrayed me, opening into a wide smile.

I wanted to try it right away, I finally understood what I was missing, it was that word! Since I couldn’t read, I could only imitate the movements, but the spell seems to be activated by speaking. It all made sense now.

I was frantic to try it out, I feel like it wasn’t her initial intention to let me, since she looked conflicted, but I was so excited that she just couldn’t say no.