Genius Wizard Takes Medicine [EN]: Chapter 18

“Are you coveting Ban’s abilities?”

He’s a mage who survived against a Kraken of Pandemonium, no less.

The fact that he survived the clutches of that brutal war mercenary is already enough for many to inquire about Lenok’s identity to Jenny. The reputation of the Pandemonium was that strong in this world.

“It’s not just his abilities… his personality is perfect too. Have you ever seen a mage who works alone and is so easy to talk to?”

“…I see what you mean.”

To be blunt, it’s not that there aren’t mages more skilled than Lenok in this world.

However, most mages with such outstanding or powerful abilities are affiliated with organizations or groups and are treated as very valuable assets.

There are freelancers like Lenok who refuse scouts or offers, but most of them are either personality-flawed individuals who are useless anywhere or demand astronomical fees.

Forming a cooperative relationship with a mage, who is considered the most professional and adaptable among all professions in Balkan, was not an easy task.

The chance to meet a mage like Lenok, who seems to have come down to the city not long after training, is even rarer.

Jordan easily understood Jenny’s words and nodded.

“In the end, all we can do is arrange jobs that suit Ban well and offer good pay. If we try to overstep that, it could backfire.”

“Damn it, I know.”

Jenny said, turning on her computer and connecting to the network.

She started looking for requests that would suit Lenok.

“It’d be best to mainly recommend requests from corporations, right? They usually have the cleanest endings.”

Sweet Home.

At her words, Jordan clicked his tongue and poured whiskey into his glass.

“After what happened, do you think Ban would think that way?”

“Ah… right.”

It’s a blessing if he doesn’t have a fit at the sight of a reptile for a while.

“For the time being, it’s best not to recommend requests from corporations or syndicates. Their financial power is so immense that something could happen in an instant, like hiring a Kraken. It’d be better to look into jobs from gangs or mercenaries.”

Gangs roaming the 50s districts and mercenaries working as freelancers in the 40s districts.

Compared to corporations, the request prices are somewhat lower, but there are many requests that could be helpful to Lenok as they are closely related to the nature of this world.

Where would be a good place to find requests or postings that offer decent pay and aren’t too dangerous?

Gangs are simple but have dirty endings, while mercenaries are clean but brutal.

The dilemma was quickly resolved.

“Gangs… are a bit much, mercenaries are better. They can blend in reasonably well. I’ll contact some of the relatively mild ones.”

It’s not like mercenary offices are ever short of manpower, but if that manpower is a mage, the story is completely different.

Just the fact that Lenok is a mage would make any organization positively consider hiring outside help.

For an organization, just making connections with a hired mage is a profitable deal, and if their skills are outstanding, they can be treated well and even be brought on as a full-time member.

Lenok, having worked with a skilled person like Dylan, would also have less aversion to the mercenary profession.

Jordan, watching Jenny pick up the phone, let out a small sigh.

“I’m helping your business at Kaise’s request, but remember that I can’t always watch your back. You’re smart and quick-witted, but you tend to skip other options because you’re impatient.”

“Hello? Dray, it’s me.”

Jenny winked as if she understood and immediately started talking to the person on the other end of the line.

Jordan silently shook his head and picked up a towel to start wiping the glasses.

It was almost time for the bar to open. He had to start preparing to receive customers.

#

At an unnamed franchise hamburger joint.

Lenok ordered a hamburger set, immediately tore open the wrapper, and took a bite.

It had the form of a hamburger he knew well, with a thick meat patty between the buns, but the sauce and the name of the burger were completely different.

Even in a world where magic exists, is the fast food that people want still just bread and meat?

Lenok pondered this for a moment but quickly forgot his thoughts and became engrossed in his newly opened phone.

“Hmm.”

Come to think of it, it’s been almost two months since he’s paid any attention to his phone.

Even when he was engrossed in games on Earth, he always had his phone nearby, but he had completely forgotten about it while focusing on surviving, thinking about various things, and researching magic.

Since he added the option to use the network function as well as calls when he opened the phone, Lenok was able to search for various things with the same feeling as when he used a smartphone on Earth.

News, society, sports, economy, magical engineering, research… Lenok’s finger, which was moving slowly between various unfamiliar words, suddenly stopped.

[The explosion at the manufacturing plant in District 42 has caused difficulties in the release of Charlotte Corporation’s new product… Residents within a 2km radius have been evacuated, but no significant damage has been reported]

“……..”

Lenok immediately clicked on the news article to check the details, but it only stated that an explosion accident occurred due to an unknown gas leak.

Nowhere was there a photo of Lenok or the Kraken, nor was there any mention of unidentified attackers.

Although no facts or truth were properly revealed in the article, Lenok could easily guess the interests involved behind the incident from the blank spaces.

A tacit expression of the desire of those involved with the factory to dismiss the explosion as a mere accident.

The huge funds of the city government that supported the construction of the factory had gone up in smoke, but since the incident was covered up like this, no one would investigate the truth of the matter.

‘Is this how it is when working with corporations?’

They order reckless things like blowing up a factory, but when it succeeds, they make sure the compensation and cleanup are handled properly.

He didn’t know if other corporations were like this or if it was just a characteristic of Valitz, who had hired him, but it was clean if clean, and thorough if thorough.

‘I like that I don’t have to worry about it anymore, but…’

The fact that additional cleanup is being done in places he doesn’t know about doesn’t feel entirely comfortable.

There might not be any problems while working under Ban’s face, but there was no guarantee that it would continue to be like that.

It was like suddenly encountering a monster like the Kraken… If he ever has to work with a corporation again, he needs to approach it more carefully.

He threw away the finished hamburger and walked out of the store.

On the way, the part-time worker standing at the counter looked at him as if they had something to say, but he ignored them.

Lenok took out a cigarette, chewed on it, and walked down the street.

He had a few things to take care of since he had created an identity with Jenny’s help yesterday.

“Welcome. What brings you here?”

“I’ve come to look at some rooms.”

He was going to leave the cramped hotel room and have his own space.

Until now, he had been satisfied with cheap hotels where he paid daily rates because he had no identity or money, but now he had enough to afford monthly rent.

Lenok, who had studied Balkan’s real estate to some extent using his phone in advance, was fortunately able to look at several rooms without any trouble with the broker.

He wasn’t hoping for anything grand in his poor situation. A studio with hygiene, plumbing, and a kitchen would be enough for now.

Security… it would be nice if he could care about it, but he could give it up if it was too much. That was a problem that could be solved to some extent with magic.

Lenok, who had followed the broker and looked at a few studios, chose a studio on a street near the hotel he was staying at and completed the contract.

350,000 cell per month with a deposit of 5 million cell. The monthly rent was paid to the landlord, and the deposit was paid directly to the city government.

Since the room was empty and he didn’t have much luggage, Lenok was able to move in with just a few clothes, food supplies, a notebook, and various medicine packets that he had piled up in his hotel room.

“Hoo…”

A faint light flickering on the ceiling and a creaking wooden floor.

It was a small studio on the third floor of a shabby villa, but it was the first time he had his own home since coming to this world.

In fact, the scenery wasn’t that different from the hotel, but Lenok was satisfied enough with just this for now.

He checked if the refrigerator was working and pushed in the food supplies that were still plentiful.

Lenok, who had cleaned the dusty room, plopped down in the middle of the room and closed his eyes.

Hooooooom!!

He strongly pulled up his mana, focused his mind, and maximized his senses.

In the darkness beyond his eyelids, the small space of the studio came closer as if it could be grasped.

He drew a sphere made of mana around this small space and placed security magic on the surface of the sphere.

Originally, it was a barrier technique that had to be performed through drawing a magic circle and a precise ritual, but Lenok easily succeeded in imbuing the space itself with magic just by concentrating his mind without much effort.

Realizing that a simple barrier magic belonging to common magic had succeeded at once, Lenok did not stop there and immediately added various defensive techniques.

He set up a trap to activate 14 consecutive bolts of magic when an intruder other than him entered, and also devised a plan to bind and squeeze the intruder’s limbs by activating [Gravity Bind].

In the hotel, he had only made minimal preparations because he didn’t know when he would have to check out, but now that he had his own space, even if it was just a monthly rent, he was making sure to defend against intrusion.

Squeak!

He tore off a few pages from a notebook he had bought at a nearby stationery store and stuck them directly on the wall.

Lenok picked up a pen and started writing something on the paper.

“Get a job from Jenny and look into it, and cook my own meals. I also need to order nutritional supplements and vitamins… I decided to delve deeper into the auxiliary magic system, but I still have a long way to go. What else was there?”

Even though he was muttering like that, his hands didn’t stop moving.

His extraordinary memory didn’t miss even a single inspiration that came to mind, and he pulled it out from the depths of his consciousness and completed it into a plausible goal.

Even if he didn’t do this, Lenok had a complete list of things to do in his head, but writing it down by hand and checking it with his eyes gave him a different feeling.

It was a ritual that Lenok deliberately put effort into, not just to remember his own motives and goals, but to solidify the process and his determination.

“That’s right. Unique magic… It’s not enough to just research common magic.”

Lenok, who had been busy with his pen, frowned and pondered with his chin in his hand.

Lenok didn’t doubt the talent he had created himself, but he was gradually feeling dissatisfied with the common magic he used with that talent.

Common magic had overwhelming versatility that encompassed all attributes and systems, but in terms of deep expertise or power in the relevant system, it was inevitably far behind unique magic.

For example, the limit of the electric magic used as common magic was simply summoning lightning, but if one reached the end of the electric system with unique magic, it was possible to change the weather of the sky and summon a thunder dragon.

However, he thought that the versatility of common magic alone was enough to work as a mage, so he had planned to postpone learning unique magic as much as possible… but the encounter with the Kraken had changed Lenok’s mind a little.

‘There’s no guarantee that I won’t encounter such a monster again.’

The cards he had now were too weak to wait until he obtained unique magic of the time system.

Even if he couldn’t defeat such a monster head-on, he had to develop his own magical abilities to the point where he could survive and escape.

And the fastest way for a mage to grow was to learn the unique magic system and break new ground.

‘It’s not like I can’t learn unique magic of the time system if I learn other unique magic. But…’

To learn a new unique magic, one must first see the end of the unique magic system they have already learned.

Even if he obtained unique magic of the time system later, the time it would take to learn it could be delayed due to the unique magic he had learned first.

‘It can’t be helped.’

It’s not like there’s no other way even if he doesn’t learn unique magic.

If he takes the time to increase his mana, and steadily develops his magic control and casting ability, there will come a time when he won’t be lacking in power or strategy even with just common magic.

What couldn’t he break through if he fired [Thunder Calling] four times in a row with quadruple casting, bound the opponent with two [Gravity Bind] spells, and repeated freezing and melting with ice and fire magic, and then hit them with impact magic?

Considering Lenok’s magical talent, it was by no means an unattainable level. Rather, Lenok was confident that he could raise his magical abilities to the point where such one-sided bombardment was possible within a few years.

The talent he possessed was nothing less than a seed suitable for a transcendent, having reached the end of the limits set in this world.

But the problem was that even those few years were an absurdly long time for Lenok now.

What was the probability that Lenok, who had entered the dark world of Balkan to earn money to maintain his health, would not encounter a monster like the Kraken for a few years?

For him, who had encountered a criminal organization called Pandemonium just two months after starting work, it was an optimistic assumption that was not very realistic.

“……”

To increase his chances of survival even a little, he had to devise various means, not just magic.

Lenok, who had put down his pen, put on his clothes with a determined look and left the room.

District 29.

The edge of a bustling street with numerous shops. A street with a lively and cheerful atmosphere, clearly different from the 40s district where Lenok worked.

A place with lights that brightly illuminate the evening sunset as darkness falls. A huge store with loud rock music piercing the ears.

Gun and Barrel. The most famous and high-quality gun store in this area was there.

Designated Request

In a spacious space that surpassed most supermarkets, all kinds of guns and bullets were densely displayed, and besides Lenok, many customers were carefully choosing products while looking around the store.

A world where buying and selling guns and bullets was not considered strange at all.

It was a somewhat unfamiliar scene for Lenok, but it was a scene that must have existed on Earth where he lived.

Tatatatatatang!!

People testing products directly in one corner of the store amidst the ear-piercing rock music.

“This product’s magazine is too big. It’s uncomfortable on the collarbone when shouldering it.”

“The barrel heats up too quickly. Recommend something with more durability.”

“The spray is bad. The zeroing isn’t right.”

Even customers who complained while listing all sorts of terms.

Lenok also joined them and started looking around at the products on display.

He had been seriously thinking about the development of his magical abilities just a moment ago, but the fact that he had come to a gun store meant that Lenok had a plan.

The shooting combo magic of the Gun Mage that he had used as if possessed while cornered in the fight against the Kraken.

Lenok had confirmed a possibility in a different direction from what he had now in the shooting ability enhanced by using auxiliary magic.

‘I made that monster react with four auxiliary magic spells placed on a cheap pistol. If I delve into this a little more, I might get some good results.’

No matter how great Lenok’s talent was, his mana itself was limited, and it would take a lot of time to increase it.

However, in the case of auxiliary magic, its use was very limited compared to ordinary common magic, so the amount of mana required was also small.

If he plastered shooting auxiliary magic on a decent gun, he could greatly increase the firepower that could be unleashed with a small amount of mana.

Of course, since his talent was focused on magic rather than shooting, he had to be careful not to reverse the order of priority… but…

It was undeniable that it was an attractive option for Lenok now.