In this world, everything is different. A world not born ordinary, but forged from magic itself. Humans were born with the natural affinity to manipulate the forces of nature, to command the seas, shape the land, bend the winds, and control all manners of phenomena beyond common sense.
Every baby entered the world carrying the seed of such affinity, and the creatures that roamed this land, from the smallest crawling insect to the most terrifying beasts, were also blessed by magic. Through it, they evolved into forms far greater than their original lines of evolution ever allowed.
In the land of Corin, a modest town populated by middle-class folk, not rich, not poor, just the kind of middle that nobody ever found interesting, the household of the Greyhound family welcomed a new life.
A son.
A gift they had long prayed for.
After more than six years of marriage, the child they had desperately hoped for was finally within their grasp.
It was, without a doubt, a day worthy of celebration.
Or rather day five of celebration.
Greyhound Derek, his wife, and their slave girl sat around a large wooden table, its surface crowded with dozens of plates overflowing with delicacies.
The rich scents in the room were almost intoxicating, enough to make Derek's mouth water uncontrollably.
Derek Greyhound was usually the type of man who would have already torn into the food, devouring everything in sight without sparing even a moment to breathe.
He was tall, broad-shouldered, masculine, and heavily muscled. With a body like that, an equally monstrous appetite was only natural.
But today… today was different.
He rose from his seat and walked toward a small cradle placed beside the table. Each step he took caused the wooden floorboards to creak under his weight, as though protesting his presence.
Reaching the cradle, Derek leaned over and grinned widely. Inside lay a baby boy with short red hair and bright eyes full of wonder, staring up at the world as if it were a fascinating puzzle waiting to be solved.
Derek smiled even wider at his son.
"How are you today, Young Ray?"
He spoke while expecting a response from Ray Greyhound. None came, of course. Still, that did not mean Ray was dumbfounded by his father's words.
Another benefit that came with the blessing of magic was the ability for even newborn babies to gain a certain degree of understanding about life shortly after birth.
The higher this understanding at a young age, the greater one's magical potential tended to be.
Ray could understand his father perfectly well. He simply lacked the physical ability to respond.
Well… that wasn't entirely because of magic.
It was because this wasn't his first life.
'I was reborn as an elf after dying in my previous life as a hard-working slave to society. Hehehe! A handsome elf, too. Bagging girls won't be an issue,' he revelled inwardly, laughing to himself.
Throughout his time as a baby, Ray—the young transmigrator, possessed enough intelligence to know that listening was far better than rambling.
So he did just that, silently observing and studying his family during the first years of his life.
Apparently, he had not been born into an average household.
'My father, Derek, was once a powerful adventurer. So was my mother…' Ray thought.
'Father is hotheaded, obsessed with finding talent, loves fighting, and never seems to stop being childish from what I can tell.'
'Mother, on the other hand, is calm, loving, and somehow even more excited than him when it comes to discovering talent.'
While Ray was able to form a clear image of who his parents were, he struggled to do the same for the maid. Understanding her was difficult, she rarely spoke and always behaved exactly as a maid should.
Not that it was high on his list of priorities.
Ray continued doing his best to understand his parents and the language of this world throughout his early years. Eventually, when he turned two, he began forming words he had learned along the way.
This left his parents both excited and utterly bewildered.
A child showing such intelligence at such a young age could only mean one thing, he was destined to be an extremely talented mage.
What they didn't know was that Ray had possessed this level of intelligence from the moment he was born.
Naturally, this development led to a few squabbles, as the question of what to do next immediately arose.
Derek began yelling senselessly, "I'll tutor the boy! He'll learn the native tongue from his papa! Won't you!? Baby boy! My big boy!"
He finished the last part while making the most pitiful attempt at a baby face imaginable. It was deeply embarrassing.
To Ray's absolute joy, his mother refused.
Ria grabbed Derek by the ears with shocking force and shouted directly into his face, "The only thing you know how to do is fight! I don't want the first thing my child learns to be how to beat other kids! Hire a damn tutor!"
Ray's lips curved upward at the sight. He loved how fiercely his mother kept his father in check.
The thought of someday being on the receiving end of that intensity made a lump form in his throat.
"Terrifying…" he whispered to himself.
And so, Derek hired a tutor.
A male tutor with strict laws and rigid conduct who taught Ray for two solid years. By the end of it, Ray had completed an education that usually took other children three years to finish.
That wasn't particularly impressive by Ray's standards.
Unfortunately, the villagers had much lower standards. Gossip quickly spread throughout the town, and perhaps even beyond it.
Ray didn't care. It was merely popularity, and as long as it didn't interfere with his goals, it was tolerable.
Now, at the age of four, he was only one year away from awakening his magic.
Ray sat alone in his room on the upper floor of his home, staring down at a massive textbook laid open on the floor before him.
The book was titled Arcane Magic.
Its pages were old, thick, and heavy, far too much for his small, feeble hands to flip through comfortably. Hundreds of pages lay within, silently waiting to be read.
Ray imagined it had been written by ancient professors, men so crooked with age that they couldn't walk without a cane specifically for children like him.
Those who had yet to awaken their magical properties.
"I've learned the language and the entire continent's history in the span of two years, and I've read this textbook three times already," Ray sighed, letting his small head fall forward onto the pages in frustration. "I still can't fully understand it."
He bit his lips slightly and tried reading the words again despite his face being pressed against the book.
It did not work.
At all.
Reading something while lying directly on it turned out to be practically impossible.
This only increased Ray's frustration.
"How do I actually learn how to use magic?" he muttered, voicing the single question that had been haunting him all this time, the very reason he had pushed himself to understand the world so quickly.
Ray had never been fascinated by many things growing up.
But magic?
Magic was something he yearned for with every fiber of his being.
And now, faced with an insane textbook filled with terms he barely understood, he could only sigh.
"Yeah… learning magic might just be harder than I thought."