Mushoku Tensei: Sword, Magic Hats, and the Romance System [124]

The midday sun was radiant—

But even its warmth couldn’t drive away the chill that had settled in everyone’s bones.

All eyes were frozen on Ghislaine.

Even Allen, who had been ready to sit back and enjoy the show, was stunned.

He had, after all, been the one to steer the conversation into this uncharted territory—but even so, his expression of dumbfounded disbelief was entirely genuine.

In the original story, Ghislaine had only ever said she had to eat monster droppings due to a lack of food. There had been nothing about eating human flesh.

Sure, labyrinth delving wasn’t child’s play—but this level of “hell” was something else entirely.

And Allen wasn’t the only one rattled.

“Ugh—!”

Even the ever-composed Edna—who could keep a straight face before a crumbling mountain—couldn’t take it anymore. She bolted out of the classroom, hand clamped over her mouth.

But from the corner of Allen’s eye, even as her body fled in distress, her face… still held a soft smile.

Got it.

So she did have emotional reactions. She’d just welded that professional smile onto her face through sheer discipline.

Even a “normal” private tutor in the Boreas household was this out of the ordinary.

As expected of a top noble family in Asura, the most powerful country in the Mushoku Tensei world.

Truly a land of “hidden dragons and crouching tigers.”

This once again reminded Allen that experiencing the world solely through Rudeus’s first-person lens in the original story had, in some ways, limited his perception of how deep and bizarre this world could be.

Ghislaine, as always, was oblivious to the atmosphere. She merely glanced at Edna’s retreating figure, then continued her story, her expression still grim.

“Afterward, I got sick. First stomach cramps, then diarrhea, then fever. By the time I felt like I couldn’t lift a limb…”

“There were monsters all around me.”

Gulp. The three kids swallowed in unison.

“And then?” Eris’s voice trembled slightly.

Ghislaine rolled her neck. Her tension melted away, and she let out a small sigh of relief.

Of course.

The solution had come to her swiftly.

“I ate them.”

“And I felt much better.”

She said this with the hint of a smile.

“So clearly, eating food without monster bile won’t give you stomach trouble.”

“And I’m a beastfolk. Raw meat doesn’t really upset me.”

Then she looked around and finally realized—

She was supposed to be teaching arithmetic, not giving a live report on dungeon meals.

Ghislaine gave a slight cough.

“In summary.”

“What I went through in that labyrinth taught me one important thing.”

“When entering a dungeon, your eyes shouldn’t only be on your sword.”

She raised her gaze to sweep across the three students. All of them stiffened immediately.

Then, in a firm voice, she concluded:

Not that a good appetite was important—

But that:

“Arithmetic is just as important.”

No one spoke.

Allen ran a hand down his face in silent despair.

Gotta say—

Still gotta be Ghislaine.

Brutally effective. You had to respect it.

He took a deep breath, straightened up, and clapped his hands, drawing everyone’s attention.

“In short—math is essential. Learn it, and you can survive anywhere. That includes—but is not limited to—labyrinths.”

“Got that, Eris?”

Eris stayed quiet for a moment. Ghislaine’s story had made her realize arithmetic mattered—but the imagery that came with it… Eating monster droppings still had some tragic, heroic edge to it. But eating human flesh? Or gulping down monster meat?

That part clearly had no heroic flair at all.

She looked a little dazed.

But then, when she thought of “heroes,” a familiar image flashed in her mind—

That night in the rain. The figure who shielded her from a blade, who chased down the enemy, and came back with their head.

She turned to glance at Allen.

And instinctively—

She tried to extract from him a more wholesome version of heroism. A story that could restore the noble image of Ghislaine in her mind.

“What about you, Allen? Have you ever had anything happen to you in a labyrinth? Come on, tell us!”

Allen blinked.

Truth be told, he’d never actually entered a labyrinth.

This question had genuinely caught him off guard.

Clearly, Eris just wanted to hear some dungeon stories—but this was still a math class, and he needed to keep it on track.

Still, if the topic was arithmetic—

As someone trained in Water God Style, he knew plenty.

“When it comes to labyrinths, not much happened—mostly just cutting down monsters. But actually, arithmetic is closely tied to swordplay. At least in Water God Style, it is.”

Everyone turned to him.

Even Ghislaine straightened up when she heard “Water God Style,” adopting a respectful student’s posture.

She was always sincere in acknowledging others’ strengths. The way she had earnestly called Rudeus “sensei” when it came to magic in the original story—that was who she was. Fierce on the outside, genuine at heart.

Then Allen’s voice rang out again.

“The core of Water God Style is perception.”

“Perceiving everything in your surroundings—and calculating how to respond. Only by grasping every detail of your environment can you anticipate your enemy’s actions and counter them with flawless defense.”

The next moment—

Under everyone’s gaze, Allen calmly closed his eyes.

He extended his hand, holding it above the table.

The spring wind from outside rustled past his fingers.

Allen spoke:

“Perception.”

“The direction of the wind—southerly, at three meters per second. For novice swordsmen, that’s enough to cause a slight deflection of their blade. If the weapon is iron, the resistance is minor—the deviation is around 0.1 mm. If it’s wooden, about 0.5 mm. For swordsmen above beginner level, this windspeed is negligible.”

He flipped his palm.

“The origin of sounds—birds chirping, leaves rustling, everyone’s breathing and heartbeat. And then—”

Still eyes closed, he folded his fingers and pointed toward the door.

“Footsteps. Edna will arrive at the classroom in three seconds.”

“Three.”

“Two.”

“One.”

Just as he finished counting, Edna hurried in. She glanced at Allen—but professionalism carried her onward, straight to Rudeus’s side.

As she moved, Allen continued.

“Judging by her stride, she’ll be beside Rudeus in four steps. By her third—”

Everyone thought the sunlight just flickered for a moment.

Click.

A soft, sharp sound—his sheath moving at his waist.

Edna blinked in confusion, but said nothing, taking her seat.

A few strands of hair drifted down from her forehead, caught by the breeze and swirling through the air—

Then fell.

Allen’s voice came again, finishing his sentence:

“She’ll enter the range of a lethal slash.”

The room fell into absolute silence.

Edna’s smile looked like it had been nailed to her face. She swallowed hard and discreetly wiped the sweat from her brow.

Ghislaine squinted slightly, her gaze flicking to the blade at Allen’s hip.

Eris, meanwhile, was staring at his face, her eyes sparkling with awe.

Sylphy and Rudeus, having long since grown used to Allen’s dramatic “Showing Off” moments, barely reacted.

They didn’t catch the blade’s full arc like Ghislaine did—or glimpse the edge like Eris, already a Sword God Style beginner.

But they knew—

Allen had just executed a [Twenty-Fold Slash].

And yet he still sat there, eyes closed, calmly resting his hand on the table.

A moment later, one of Edna’s drifting hairs “just happened” to fall on his index finger. He caught it between two fingers and held it up to his eyes.

“The tremble of the air. The shape of matter. Edna’s strand of hair moved through the air, producing ripples—those ripples touched my skin, resonated, and allowed me to calculate its position in advance. So I placed my hand right where it would fall.”

“Of course, sensing that much information is difficult—so I entered a brief state of [Perception Flow].”

Eris blinked rapidly, visibly delighted. Her body rocked side to side in her seat, which groaned under the strain.

In her mind, the image of Allen catching arrows barehanded in the rain played once more.

Allen flicked the hair away. Ghislaine finally looked away from his blade and followed the hair’s arc through the air.

“The release of killing intent—when I drew, someone here radiated intent. It was Ghislaine. It wasn’t hostile—her eyes were locked on my hilt. A defensive posture. In [Perception Flow], I saw it clearly. That kind of ‘calculation’ is mostly instinct, though—not the arithmetic we’re learning.”

“That’s about it.”

He turned to Eris.

“Understand?”

She blinked.

“Nope!”

“Impressed?”

“Totally!”

“Want to study math now?”

“Not at all!”

Rudeus’s mouth twitched. Sylphy sighed, already covering her face to chide Eris—

But then Allen spoke again.

“Expected. This kind of ‘calculation’ is too abstract. A bit vague, hard to follow. Let me be more specific. Let’s use division—‘even distribution’—as an example.”

“The meaning of ‘even distribution’ in swordplay is…”

Allen looked at Eris, then pointed outside the window.

At that instant—

A leaf floated into the room, spinning in the spring breeze.

It hovered, tumbled, and—

Landed precisely on Allen’s fingertip.

The next moment—

The leaf split cleanly down its center vein into two symmetrical halves. As they floated downward, Allen waved his hand—

And stirred the air, making them twirl.

Spinning.

Gliding.

Landing gently on the tabletop.

Eris turned her head to look.

The leaf, sliced perfectly in half by Allen’s battle aura, rested on the desk like wings mid-flutter—like a fledgling bird opening its wings for the first time.

Then Allen spoke again.

Clear and calm:

“To make a cut… beautiful.”

“That is the meaning of ‘division’ in swordplay.”

He rested his chin on one hand, gazing at Eris.

“Understand?”

“Nope!”

“Want to learn?”

“Yup!”

“Then let’s start with division.”

“Okay!”

Sylphy blinked at the leaf fragments, smiled as Allen’s familiar “pretty words” drifted past her ear.

Rudeus also looked at the leaves—dazed.

The scene reminded him of that ambush the other night.

Rain poured in torrents. He’d just poked his head out of the carriage.

Through the sheets of rain—

Just outside, ahead and to the left—

The first assassin had reached Allen. The two locked eyes for a split second through the window.

The man didn’t stop. He reached through with a blade—

And then—

His entire arm was sliced into perfectly even slivers by Allen’s sword.

They fell.

His scream tore through the storm.

Then fell silent.

He was dead.

After Allen had chased down the rest of the attackers, Rudeus had wandered back in a daze to where the carriage had been cut open.

Only then, with nothing blocking his view, did he fully take in the scene.

A corpse lay twisted beside the road, the scattered remains grotesque and horrifying. Death seeped into his mind as a real, tangible thing.

Slices of flesh littered the carriage floor, red and white muscle wrapped neatly around the severed bone, each piece arranged like sashimi on a tilted platter.

Now, in the sunlight—

That gruesome scene melted into the spring breeze.

Rudeus blinked.

Allen was smiling at him.

The exact same smile he’d worn that night.

In that moment, Rudeus suddenly understood what Allen really meant by those words.

He hadn’t been saying “to make a cut beautiful.”

What he meant was—

If you apply “division” to swordplay…

It means giving death a sense of beauty.

...

The arithmetic class wrapped up shortly after.

The conclusion? Division—of all things—yielded the most unexpected breakthrough.

Lady Eris, unsurprisingly, did not suddenly grasp single-digit division in one go.

However—

She did understand fractions.

1 ÷ 2 = ½.

Utterly absurd.

But also… somehow made perfect sense.

It all started with a question Eris asked mid-lesson:

“If a leaf is evenly split in two, does that mean it’s two leaves?”

Rudeus blinked and replied blankly:

“Um… I guess that would be two leaves?”

“I got it! Then 1 ÷ 2 = 2!”

Sylphy stepped in gently.

“From a math perspective, it’s actually 1/2.”

“1/2?”

“One half of one—that’s what 1/2 means.”

“Huh?”

“If something that can’t be split is split into two equal parts, each part is called one-half.”

“Then why split it at all?”

“To share.”

“Ugh? Why share? Wouldn’t it be better to keep the whole thing for myself?!”

Sylphy looked at her, red-brown eyes blinking.

“What if that thing belonged to Ghislaine in the first place? Something you had no right to?”

Eris frowned, then glanced at Ghislaine in confusion.

“Then I’d give it back to her!”

Sylphy nodded.

“As you should. Because it wasn’t yours.”

She paused, then added softly:

“But… what if you really wanted it?”

Eris folded her arms, thinking hard for once. After a long pause, she hesitated.

“If it’s Ghislaine, then… then I’d ask her! I’d ask for half! But! If she doesn’t want to share, then I won’t take it!”

Ghislaine looked at her. Her tone remained flat, but there was a barely perceptible warmth in it.

“I would share it with milady.”

“Really?!”

“Really.”

Sylphy rested her chin on her hand, gazing at the two of them. After a long while, she spoke.

“If someone wants to share…”

“Then ½ has meaning.”

“You’re amazing, Sylphy!”

Eris lunged forward to hug her by the neck, making Sylphy laugh awkwardly.

She glanced to the side—

Class was over. Allen was politely inviting Edna to lunch, and Edna was smiling brightly, declining with enthusiastic hand gestures.

Her face and her body language couldn’t have been more contradictory.

Sylphy blinked, a little exasperated—but not especially upset.

She’d thought about a lot of things the night before.

So now her expression was calm.

“But if they don’t want to share…”

“That’s okay.”

“Because—”

“That ½… was never mine to begin with.”

---

T/N: HMMMMMMM???????? GIRL UR ONLY 7

This is a fan translation of 无职转生：剑，魔法帽与恋爱系统 by 意外火灾 All rights to the original work belong to the creator. Please support them by exploring their original work or sharing it with others if you can. Thank you for reading and supporting my efforts to bring this story to a wider audience!