Ch.5ASMR – Sound of Burning Firewood

# The Villainess Hersy

As the main villain, she’s a character everyone dislikes. Both readers and characters in the novel.

In a survey once published, she proudly ranked as the “Most Detestable Villain #1.”

Especially in this incident, despite losing the feather due to her own carelessness, she turned around and got angry at the protagonist, which received much criticism.

But Ruide thought differently.

‘I still think Hersy is pitiful, both then and now.’

It was clearly Hersy’s fault for getting angry at the protagonist, accusing them of stealing her feather without properly checking.

But the protagonist was problematic too. Regardless of how it happened, shouldn’t you return something when its rightful owner appears?

Yet the protagonist, finding Hersy detestable, simply swallowed it up.

Afterward, true to being the protagonist, they awakened tremendous magical talent and achieved fame through various accomplishments.

The magic wand made from the Phoenix Feather played a significant role. While Ruide only used it as a pillow, a Phoenix Feather provides tremendous advantages when crafted into a wand, making it a powerful item.

From Hersy’s perspective, it must have been maddening.

Not only did she lose the precious Phoenix Feather given by her father to someone else.

But some commoner who never mattered before had risen higher than her.

She must have thought that if she didn’t somehow get revenge, she’d be disqualified as a successor candidate to the Minerva family.

Beyond that, the story’s setting was medieval. No noble would quietly tolerate being humiliated by a commoner.

But why would the protagonist be called the protagonist?

Far from being humiliated, it was Hersy who ended up thoroughly defeated.

Afterward came the changing attitudes of students who had previously looked up to her. Hersy, born a noble, couldn’t possibly endure it.

In the end, Hersy crossed the line, was expelled from the academy, and was cast out from the Minerva family, meeting a catastrophic end.

A noble young lady completely ruined.

Isn’t it a bit harsh to face ruin just for upsetting the protagonist?

‘So, helping Hersy isn’t a bad thing.’

While part of his motivation was fear of getting on Hersy’s bad side, the above reasons played a larger role.

Ruide truly hated when people used emotional manipulation to slander others.

**

“What’s with him, really?”

Hersy grumbled as she walked.

“Help me? Ha, what does he think Minerva is?”

Thinking about it, it was too absurd.

She stopped walking and looked toward Dellin’s Lake.

A magical prodigy born into a swordsmanship family.

Ruide Christopher.

She knew the name well since it had been famous since childhood.

-I can help you, that’s all.

“No thanks. I don’t need it. Who does he think he is?”

That was her response now, after failing to answer earlier.

In reality-

-If you would… thank you.

That’s what she had said.

Hersy’s face flushed.

But it would have been foolish to refuse when the genius Ruide personally offered to help.

It didn’t align with the Minerva family motto of always being rational and reasonable.

The genius wasn’t called a genius for nothing.

Even the academy’s principal, famous for being “fair,” told Ruide he didn’t need to attend classes.

Some say the principal received massive donations from the Windsor family, that it was a ploy to hide the flaws of an incompetent young master.

But that’s truly nonsense.

The Northern Duke, whom even the Imperial family couldn’t easily handle, wouldn’t need such tricks, and the Windsor family was famous for not caring about others’ opinions.

They were a “my way” family from the beginning.

Above all, staying at “Dellin’s Lake” all day and even sleeping there wasn’t easy even for active magicians. Even she could only stay there for 3 hours at most.

Just seeing that alone proved his magical talent was undeniably real.

“Ugh, how embarrassing.”

Hersy sighed deeply.

But she didn’t really dislike it.

Hersy’s pride was high. If she truly disliked Ruide, she would have refused regardless of the benefit.

“…He’s handsome, I’ll give him that.”

Rather than handsome, he was more on the cute side.

Anyway.

Ruide was Hersy’s type.

“…Could we become close?”

Hersy’s inner thoughts slipped out.

But deep inside, she thought:

‘If I become close with Ruide, would Father acknowledge me?’

“I’m trash.”

Hersy moved on with a bitter smile.

**

Ruide visited Dellin’s Lake again today without fail.

The emerald lake sparkled to welcome him, but Ruide wasn’t pleased.

“Did I sleep too much?”

Despite using the Phoenix pillow, he was wide awake rather than sleepy.

It seems yesterday’s 20-hour sleep was the problem.

“This is troublesome…”

Academy classes ran until 4 PM.

Quite a long time. If he couldn’t sleep, time would feel frozen.

Ruide felt a sense of crisis.

‘What did I do in my past life?’

Ruide had suffered from insomnia in his past life.

He had tried countless methods to fall asleep.

Since his insomnia had disappeared after the possession, methods should be more effective now.

“Usually…”

Ironically, YouTube had been most effective.

Watching ASMR or space videos helped him fall asleep faster.

Of course, they only worked initially and eventually lost effectiveness, but he still watched consistently.

Without them, he couldn’t fall asleep at all.

“But there’s no YouTube here.”

No matter how versatile magic might be, he couldn’t summon a space science YouTuber from another world.

“…Magic?”

Ruide blinked. Thinking about it, couldn’t he somehow implement ASMR using magic?

“I’m a genius.”

Ruide smiled with satisfaction.

He decided to implement it immediately.

First, he briefly considered what kind of ASMR to create.

The ASMR he mainly listened to was the sound of burning wood.

In other words, a campfire.

“I just need to bring some wood pieces and light them, right?”

With ‘odor blocking magic’ and a ‘barrier,’ it should be roughly similar.

‘So I need to find firewood first.’

Ruide stood up with his pillow.

The area around the lake was a dense forest.

Finding firewood was like finding sand in a desert.

He walked to the nearest spot.

“It’s too big.”

Dellin’s Lake, perhaps due to its high mana concentration, had no ordinary trees.

There were only massive ones, like “baobab trees” from his past life.

“Let me cut one and split it.”

Ruide found a suitable tree and reached out.

He pondered briefly.

How could he cut the tree?

Magic required specifying a concrete form to use.

For instance, just thinking ‘I want to cut this tree’ wouldn’t make the tree cut itself.

‘Cut the tree with an axe’ wouldn’t work either. Magic couldn’t create an axe.

“Hmm.”

It wasn’t a difficult problem. There was a reason Ruide Christopher was such an overpowered character.

He was just considering too many possibilities.

“What kind of blade could I use…”

Blade.

Ruide first thought of wind.

“Compressing the wind…”

The problem was that Ruide’s magical power was too strong.

If used carelessly, only the stumps of Dellin’s Forest trees would remain.

“Let me specify the range.”

Ruide imagined a thin rectangular frame, then placed the tree within it.

Then he compressed the air’s wind and swung his hand.

-Slash!

With a crisp sound, the tree was cleanly cut.

It was so clean that at first it looked like it hadn’t been cut at all.

After a moment, the diagonally cut surface of the tree became visible.

-Creak.

The tree was enormous, and it seemed like it would cause a big commotion if left as is.

Fortunately, there was a magic he could use without much thought.

Telekinesis.

Ruide stopped the tree with telekinesis before it hit the ground.

-Thud.

Then he divided the tree into 10 pieces using the same method as before.

-Plop.

The 10 pieces of wood floated up. He had caught them all with telekinesis.

This was actually an extremely difficult magical implementation. Telekinesis works on “one object.”

But since he had divided the tree into 10 pieces, Ruide was essentially using 10 spells simultaneously.

Considering that the average magician can handle up to 2 spells, this truly justified calling him a genius.

Ruide discarded most of the 10 wood pieces and brought only one floating piece.

-Thud.

Even that single piece was quite large due to the original tree’s size.

Still, this should be enough to make an excellent campfire.

-Crack.

Ruide instantly chopped the wood and stacked it neatly.

Good-looking ASMR tends to sound good too.

After stacking it meticulously, Ruide lightly dusted off his hands.

He raised his index finger. A spark appeared above it.

“This should do, right?”

With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the spark lightly.

-Tick.

But the fire didn’t catch. It hit the wood and bounced off.

“…”

Feeling slightly awkward, Ruide threw a much larger spark than before.

-Whoosh.

“Oh, shoot.”

This time it was too big. He hurriedly reached out to lower the flame.

“Phew.”

He almost turned his painstakingly(?) stacked wood to nothing.

“Now it’s better.”

Ruide cast the two spells he had thought of earlier, then lay down using his pillow.

-Crackle.

His masterpiece campfire was a success.

The exact ASMR sound he used to hear on YouTube reached his ears.

A sound that was neither too loud nor too soft.

Ruide felt drowsiness and quickly fell asleep.

Today was March 1st, 52 in the Remed calendar.

It was the day before the “placement exam,” a major milestone at the Imperial Academy.