Elsa's mom looked at Rain and asked, "Ahem, young man, do you understand me now?" A floating text appeared in front of Rain, like a subtitle for the translation.
Rain was surprised. Elsa's mom was speaking English! However, her way of speaking was so ancient that he couldn't understand most of it. Rain shook his head, then borrowed the pen and ink. He carefully copied the rune marks she had written on her arm and said, "I still can't understand you. Your speech is too ancient for me."
(A) Nē, ic ne mæg þē hīeran, þīn sprǣc is tō eald fōr mē. was the subtitle that appeared when Rain spoke his words using the runes.
The ink vanished from both their arms after just one sentence of translation. It seemed to be some kind of magical ink, and the rune had already used its magic.
"Mom, it seems the translation rune successfully translated our speech to him, but maybe our speech was translated the same way," Elsa said to her mother.
"Yes, I noticed that too. I can somewhat understand him because I've studied ancient texts when I was learning rune language back in the high elf city," Elsa's mother replied, frowning. It seemed they'd found a solution for translation, but it wasn't enough.
Rain thought to himself, 'If I can read rune language, maybe I can also read other forms of letters? What if I try reading magic language instead?'
He imagined a water ball, and a ball of water emerged from his hand. He gestured to Elsa to cast a water ball by mimicking his movements.
"What? You want me to cast a water ball? Well, if it's just a water ball, then fine," Elsa said, starting to chant. As she chanted, magic text appeared along with a magic circle, and in three seconds, she cast it. "Here! I did it. So, what now?"
Rain focused on reading the magic letters that appeared in the magic circle when Elsa cast the water ball.
(M) "Oh water spirit, help me manifest a ball of water in my hand," Rain read aloud, surprising Elsa and her mother as they heard the magic chant clearly.
"Nice! It seems he knows how to speak magic language!" Elsa exclaimed, excitedly cheering with her mother.
(M) "How about this, Rain? Do you understand me now?" Elsa asked, speaking in magic language, but Rain still couldn't understand her. "Rain? DO, YOU, UNDERSTAND, ME, NOW?" she repeated, thinking he might have misheard.
Rain noticed that Elsa was speaking in a slightly different language, one that was similar to the chanting. He came up with a plan. Using his magic, he conjured the magic language that had appeared when Elsa cast the water ball again.
He pointed to each letter and read it out loud, "(M) Oh, Water, Spirit." Elsa and her mother finally realized that Rain could read both runes and magic language, but didn't know how to read them beforehand.
Now that they understood, Elsa's mother gave Elsa a piece of paper and a pen. "Can you read this language, Rain?" she asked, writing a short sentence in the most common language of their world, with options at the bottom: "Yes, you can?" or "(M) No, you can't."
Rain smiled and responded, "Yes, I can read this language." He had formed his own sentence using the text he had just read.
Suddenly, a notification popped up from his status window: "Your skill 'Reader - Rank A' has ranked up to 'S' after reading Ancient Text, Rune Text, Magic Text, and Cyrel Text." His status window shifted, showing a new message: "Reader - Rank S: Can read, comprehend, and remember most texts with ease."
'Ohh? It seems the language here is called Cyrel,' Rain thought. He was sure because that was the only set of letters that made sense.
He was delighted. 'This will help me so much more. My plan to get stronger by cultivating can wait. I can also get stronger by helping Elsa's mom read rune language and learning more about magic language.'
Rune language was essential. Those runes were forms of text that activated automatically with the right catalyst. They worked even better with a stronger catalyst.
For example, if a rune was written on the body and used one's mana as a catalyst to cause an explosion, it would be limited by the body's capacity. However, if a stronger catalyst, such as a pure block of mana like a mana stone, was used, it would destroy the stone and result in a much stronger explosion. The power and size of the explosion would depend on the quality of the catalyst.
Rain also realized that he could pretend to chant spells in public to hide his true skills, which was why he needed to learn magic language as well.
Later that afternoon, Elsa and her mother gave Rain a book to read. He stayed inside her mother's rune language lab to let his skill absorb the text, saying it out loud as he read.
After three hours, Rain had already read four storybooks.
Elsa approached him with a note. 'Hello, Rain. It's already afternoon. Do you want to eat now?' she had written it down in case Rain still couldn't speak Cyrel.
"Hahaha, don't worry, I can talk and understand basic Cyrel now," Rain replied, smiling.
Elsa giggled, happy that they could finally talk. "Your # is weird! Hahaha," she said with a grin.
"My what?" Rain asked, confused. It seemed she had used a word that didn't appear in the storybooks he had read.
"Your #! Oh, wait, you don't know what # is yet, right? Let me write it for you," Elsa said, grabbing a pencil and writing something on the paper. After reading it, Rain saw the word "Accent."
"Ohhh! Yeah! I guess my accent is a bit different, right? Well, that's normal. Just because I know how to read some words doesn't mean I'll always pronounce them correctly."
Rain thought about his future plans. 'I'll eventually become the villain everyone hates, but that's for later. For now, I can live normally while steadily growing stronger.'
"So, what are we going to eat, Elsa?" Rain asked, excited at the thought of tasting some fantasy meat and wondering if it would be similar to the food from Earth.
"We eat meat, wild fruits, and vegetables! The forest we protect and take care of always has a bountiful harvest of fruits and vegetables. We also manage the wild animal population carefully, regularly hunting while making sure the ecosystem stays balanced," Elsa explained.