The Prince Of Magic

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The pair became amused at his reaction.

Penerelle giggled, while Nicolas smiled.

"Haha, we're fine being called by Nicky and Penny, if you like?" Nicolas offered in a joking tone.

Hadrian blinked rapidly, snapping out of his surprise.

"Err… you are Nicolas Flamel? The legendary alchemist?" The young mage inquired.

Said 'legendary alchemist' raised a brow at his question before answering with a grin.

"Why yes, I am." Nicolas confirmed with a slight nod, a light accent coming through as he said so. "I'm sure you can tell that I'm not lying, don't you?"

"And how do you know I know that?" Hadrian returned calmly, eyes slightly narrowed.

"Zel has informed me that you are quite keen in sensing lies, and that you prefer to be direct and honest than to swerve around topics during discussion. While it would have been fun to introduce myself with a different name, I don't think you would appreciate that, especially upon our first meeting. Harmless it might be." Nicolas admitted with a short laugh.

To his right, Penerelle smiled wryly as she shook her head at her husband's antics.

"Oh, Nicky…" The brunette woman sighed.

Hadrian frowned, a thoughtful look on his face.

Indeed, his instincts were telling him that the man was not lying, and he had enough experience to recognize the truth in his words.

Even the automaton itself had double-checked it for him by analyzing the couple's body language, heart-rate and their speech pattern.

In hindsight, the amount of data that the Moon Cell had gathered within the few seconds of his interaction with them might be a tad excessive.

Nodding to himself, Hadrian accepted the man's reasoning without fuss.

To be honest, he already believed the man the moment his grandfather was mentioned.

While he would often strive to be the embodiment of mischief and chaos, Zelretch was not the kind of person to trust someone easily. His grandfather would almost always use his goofy antics and ridiculous behavior to catch people off guard, to observe and judge their true characters as they react to his actions.

It was the kind of subtle deception that only a true trickster like his grandfather can pull off without much effort.

And if the old man had decided to help the couple before him, then the one thing that Hadrian can do was to be on his best behavior and help them.

With a small sigh, Hadrian leaned back against the sofa.

"Okay, if you're friends with opa, then I can trust you." Hadrian admitted quietly.

The couple smiled at him, a bit surprised but happy to hear his words nonetheless.

"Now, if you don't mind me saying this, but I was informed that you can enlighten me with some of the questions I have in mind." Hadrian said with a small thoughtful frown.

In response, the couple perked up.

"Ah, oui. I can do that!" Nicolas said with a hint of excitement in his tone.

Penerelle chuckled, laying a hand on her husband's knee.

"We can do that for you, child. Now, ask away." Penerellle prompted with a fond smile.

"First, what year is it now?" Hadrian inquired.

"It is February 15, 2018." Nicolas answered with a slight nod.

At his response, Hadrian's eyes narrowed thought.

'Hmm… almost 51 years into the past. Interesting...'

"Where are we?" Hadrian asked next after a few moments of thinking.

"We're in Nice, France. This mansion is one of our secret safe-houses." Penerelle answered, doing a sweeping glance around the room.

"We had this built off the records, in case some of our enemies thought of ambushing us in the future." Nicolas added with a shrug.

"Which can always possibly happen, given your achievements recently, dear." Penerelle commented slyly.

The man in question sputtered, amused and surprised by her words.

"Pft! Ahahaha, I didn't even do anything this time!" Nicolas protested.

"This time." Penerelle repeated, smirking.

Hadrian raised an eyebrow at the couple's interaction, but remained quiet.

He had no right to either judge nor question their reasons, considering as his own family had their fair share of enemies in the shadows.

With that in mind, Hadrian moved on.

"Do you have books based on the history of this world?" Hadrian asked.

"We do, but which side are you talking about? The non-magical or the magical side?" Penerelle inquired.

"Both." Hadrian answered.

"We have that. You can peruse them in the library on your own time since I doubt you would want a long lecture about the history here." Nicolas joked with a laugh.

Smiling faintly at his good-nature, Hadrian nodded in thanks to the man's offer.

"I will, thank you. But, can you tell me of the major events that occurred in this world? You don't need to make it long, just give me the short versions of each, so I can at least get an idea of what they are when I look into them later in the library thoroughly." Hadrian explained briefly.

The couple smiled at his response, pleased by his studious nature.

"Oui, sure." Nicolas grinned.

"We would love to." Penerelle smiled in agreement.

For almost an hour, Hadrian was subjected to a short-but-somewhat-long lecture about history, specifically about the major events that affected the magical and non-magical societies.

Through it all, the young Schweinorg scion was silent, listening attentively to them and asking a few questions from time to time.

It was an enlightening experience for him, to discover how similar yet different this world was to his own.

This world had almost went through the same path in regards to how the Age of Gods had ended and how the Age of Man began. But, what is different was how the magical society had started and how the non-magical side was affected. Instead of mages, humans with magical capabilities were known as wizards and witches.

One hundred years before the year of Christ, magical and non-magical people had proper cooperation, with many wizards and witches being involved in politics and religion. Such a relation between magical and non-magical individuals had been often seen in ancient Egypt and Greece.

By the time the medieval era had come, the non-magical people started to fear the wizards and witches. Some had tried to manipulate their magical brethren for their own gain. At the same time, the magical community persecutes and marginalizes the goblin and house-elf populations.

The last detail had caused Hadrian shook his head in disappointment, who found irony in the situation.

The normal humans fear and ostracized their magical counterpart, while the latter does the same to the other races that they deemed below them.

'I suppose such idiotic prejudice would always be present, no matter where I go…' Hadrian mused with a slight frown of disp.l.e.a.s.u.r.e.

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