Ch#201
"Namu Amida Butsu, Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva...... Father God, Lord......"
Chae Bok-su, pushed all the way to the wall, muttered an incomprehensible prayer.
Jeong Myung-ja also clung tightly to her side, staring at Marbas wriggling alive on Tie's hand.
[Master, in my judgment as Marbas, this is not a good idea. Humans are not familiar with the world we share, are they? If you show them something unnecessarily and they have a sudden biological reaction instead, what then?]
"Sudden bio......?"
[Sudden biological reactions. Like fainting from shock. Or having a heart attack.]
"Gasp!"
Tie's eyes went wide.
The child hurriedly checked the complexions of Grandma from 107 and Aunt from 203.
'They really look bad?'
Indeed.
As Marbas said, the two looked completely terrified.
Tie fell deep into conflict.
'What to do?'
But she had resolved to completely open up about being super strong.
And it was none other than Grandma from 107 who had insisted on hearing Tie's full story this time.
Tie cautiously asked first.
"Grandma and Auntie, you okay?"
"Father......"
However, Chae Bok-su still couldn't tear her eyes from Marbas.
Tie drooped her eyebrows.
"Marbas is really not scary at all and super nice......"
At that moment, a brief glint flashed in the child's eyes.
The child exclaimed "Ah!" and snatched Marbas, lifting him toward the ceiling.
Then thrust him in front of the flickering living room fluorescent light as if to show off.
"Marbas, do it!"
Marbas tilted his head with a puzzled face.
[Do what, exactly......?]
"Fix that. So Grandma won't be scared of Marbas."
[This?]
Marbas asked back.
He pondered, then turned to Tie.
[But Master, aren't we gathering mana in the Harmonium right now?]
"Harmonium...... orb?"
Tie eyed the orb circling above her head.
Marbas nodded.
[Yes. Our goal was to gather mana as quickly as possible, right? So we can return to that world soon......]
"Marbas!"
Tie hurriedly cut off Marbas.
The child glanced at Chae Bok-su and Jeong Myung-ja before fumbling on.
"J-Just do it. We can gather the orb later."
Marbas nodded.
He hopped into the air, and a transparent Barrier made from Tie's mana enveloped the surroundings.
Marbas circled the fluorescent light fixture, beginning his inspection.
[Fascinating. This is engineering-based after all. Engineering truly is an alluring discipline wherever you go. If this place had a fourth energy like mana, applied magitech devices would have emerged here too!]
"......"
[First, shall I show you the array I'm implementing? Look here—the central circuit is key. It's like the mana receptors and refinement organs inside a mage's body......]
However, Marbas couldn't finish.
Tese tan, who had stood up, grabbed his floating body.
[Master's father? Do you need something......?]
Tese tan sighed.
"Keep it simple."
He gestured toward Tie, who sat with her mouth agape in bewilderment.
Tie stared with round eyes, utterly confused.
"No one here will understand anyway."
[Pardon? But Master is a mage, isn't she? She needs to understand mana receptors......]
"She's a mage, but she's a kid."
[But still.]
"A kid."
Marbas shut his mouth.
He averted Tese tan's gaze and muttered.
[Even so, the first step of all scholarship is understanding...... Knowledge can accumulate passively, but not scholarship...... True inquiry begins with curiosity and questions......]
Marbas stopped again.
Giving up, he slipped out of Tese tan's hand.
Then began examining the fluorescent light with a very, very sullen face.
[Understood. First, I'll convert your mana, Master, into this place's energy, reestablish the damaged circuits and core, and......]
A few seconds later.
"Wow!"
The flickering fluorescent light brightened with a tick- sound.
Passing by the bouncing Tie, Marbas went before Chae Bok-su and Jeong Myung-ja.
[There! I fixed it! As Master said, I'm not scary at all—I'm truly amazing and worthy of admiration!]
Chae Bok-su swallowed hard, looking at the perfectly repaired fluorescent light.
And murmured to Marbas in a trembling voice.
"Possessed doll......"
[Possessed?! How can you say that!]
"Demon......"
Marbas staggered in place.
"Grandma Babs, he's really a good kid, right?"
Then Tie scampered over, shoved Marbas aside, and wriggled into Chae Bok-su's arms.
"Another thing Tie can do is call bone friends from the ground too."
The child giggled to herself mid-sentence.
Showing off her newly acquired power in front of her family made her heart race.
'I really want to show them.'
But Tie knew.
Summoning bone friends carelessly in Jongno-gu would cause huge trouble.
'Ten, no, twenty-three police uncles would come. Absolutely not.'
She couldn't scare people, so Tie had to hold back just this once.
"And Tie can do Subspace too...... Huh?"
The child tilted her head.
Upon saying Subspace, something suddenly became visible to her eyes.
'That's it?'
The entrance that appeared every time Ppuppue opened Subspace.
But originally, Tie could only open Subspace through Ppuppue.
When Tie shouted "Ppuppue!", the cute baby elephant would open the treasure-filled Subspace without a second's hesitation.
But that meant.
Tie couldn't use Subspace when Ppuppue wasn't around.
It had always been that way.
'Why is it visible?'
The Subspace entrance.
Tie blinked slowly.
Subtle mana currents flowed around the cross-shaped entrance.
As if it would open if she just controlled and sent power carefully.
'But can Tie do it?'
However, finely controlling mana had always been the hardest for Tie.
She often failed to regulate her power.
Like summoning seventy bone friends when trying for one.
Or exhausting herself completely when summoning just one subordinate.
'Hmmmmm.'
After glaring at the rippling cross, Tie finally resolved something.
Then focused her mind and gently sent mana from her fingertips toward the entrance.
And then.
"Gasp! It worked!"
The mana reaching her fingertips was controlled freely and flexibly.
Exactly the amount she envisioned, extending precisely in the direction she planned.
At the starkly different sensation, Tie tilted her head.
'I didn't do anything, but I grew?'
What had changed?
It was then, as she pondered.
"......No matter how I look, I'm going crazy."
Chae Bok-su slapped her cheek upon seeing Tie's visualized mana.
Jeong Myung-ja also couldn't close her gaping mouth at the thin mana threads floating in the air.
[Master! Did you newly master control in the meantime?!]
Marbas was excited too.
Even Tese tan, who knew mage realms thanks to Aleric, couldn't hide his surprise.
"Gasp! It touched!"
In that instant.
The mana Tie sent reached the cross in the air.
The mana clung like a magnet to the cross, and
"Wow......!"
The next moment, Subspace opened wide with Tie's power alone—the same as Ppuppue had done.
Chae Bok-su fell backward at the massive black hole in the air.
Jeong Myung-ja supported her while gasping for breath.
Tie hurriedly shoved half her body into Subspace.
"Kkamangi! Uncle Basto! Brother Veil!"
Remembering meeting the members through Subspace days ago, she called out, but
"Hng, no good after all. This isn't the upgraded one by Lucarion!"
The child's eyebrows drooped.
'I wanted to take Grandma and Auntie to Talochioum and show them Tie's house.'
But disappointment was brief.
"Huh!"
Tie's eyes caught something piled high in the corner of Subspace.