'Hangover is a real ugly thing no?'

A young man with crimson hair slowly tied his hair into a ponytail, the headache after the night of drinking was worst in his opinion. It's probably what Adam and Eve felt like after eating the fruit and getting thrown away from the Garden of Eden. For a momentary pleasure, they jumped into the pit of sins and damnation.

Alcohol is like making a deal with a devil, it promises you a pleasant time lures you to the edge of a cliff, and encourages you to walk off from it. And it's a matter of luck if you gonna wake up by being caught by something before your inevitable death or simply fall to your end.

Yet here he was, spending most of his days drinking away heading to that stupid like an idiot one after another until there was nothing that remained to catch him or someone to pull him up again. That's so like him no? The bastard of the Count Albion Family.

He closed his eyes and felt the breathing of the world through the winds, the wind was gentle simply sending a breeze for his answer but for some reason there was always this uneasiness lingering with it.

'Cold shower would have been so good right now.'

He misses his previous life, he misses the earth, he misses the technologically advanced world, he misses the society that knows human rights, he misses the entertainment his old world contained. He wanna live as Edward Larvens once again not as Edward Sylviana-Albion.

Born from the affair of two noble family scions his life was nothing short of hell in this world, no matter what he does he will always be the loser in everyone else's eyes. If he achieved positive results then it was purely because one of the families pitied him and showed him the grace of victory and if he failed then it was because he was well... Edward Silviana-Albion.

'No talent for magic or martial arts it's kind of sucks you know. I'm not even those famous novel characters who know what will happen in advance or possession of a system window.'

Here hard work doesn't mean much, simply because without talent you might not be able to achieve anything in the first place. Sorry, he should have been a little more confident, so let's remove the 'might' So yeah. You won't be able to achieve anything without a proper talent.

He touched his head and his face grimaced as he felt the throbbing headache, before letting out a defeated chuckle.

'Let's not get too attached to the past. I still got homework to finish before tomorrow.'

Then he felt his stomach start rioting because of his lack of biomatter consumption making him let out another chuckle.

'Fine, let's have a breakfast then.'

***

The smell of freshly prepared meal and tea tickles his nose making a gentle smile appear on his face. But it didn't last long as he heard the surrounding customers start murmuring about him.

"Is that who I think it is? Edward from Albion Family?"

"I heard he tried to assault a sister at the church."

"Really? Then why is he still there? Sitting and dining so causally. Doesn't the church have the holy knights to take action for something like that?"

"You don't know it buddy but I heard both Albion and Sylviana families each donated a huge sum of money suddenly to the church so they buried the incident silently."

"So that's what happened, I guess noble families are noble families after all, even the bastard son is treated like a prince compared to us civilians."

The smile on his face quickly dropped so did his mood, food lost its refreshing taste and even his stomach lost its appetite. He clenched the pork in his hand so hard it started bending a little.

'It wasn't me, it was that bastard David. Why do I need to take the fall for that bastard all the time.'

David the official heir of the family and Edward the bastard of the family, it was obvious which one was the golden child and which one was the black sheep of the family. The things his family has been dropping on him as he's doing to keep David's image clean is pretty scary you know?

Currently, he who is the youngest in the family is being held as a suspect for more than a dozen murder cases and other various crimes, at least that's what the majority of the civilians' knowledge of him says.

'You bastards are surprisingly good at spreading rumors. I would have even suspected you guys possess phones to spread the news so fast.'

But it can't be helped if he wanna survive in this world he must stay like this, being an official member of a noble family shields him from many things and offers many boons to him. Some might say that the price isn't worth the boons but everything is worth it as long he survives long enough.

"Sir it's your bonus drink."

The pretty pretty-looking waitress came to him with a smile on her face and placed the glass of pale pink liquid on his table. Edward looked at her with a surprised look which she simply replied with a smile and left the table.

"Right, this place offers bonuses for their regular drinks and I remember telling them to bring me drinks, not meals."

Should he do it? Should he take another shot? Drink another glass of the liquid that is ruining his life even more. A chuckle escaped from his mouth this one was low almost sounding like a whisper and filled with feelings of self-mockery.

'Could I even say no? After all, I am an alcoholic no? That's what the family wants from me after all.'

With that, he shoved the drink into his throat in one go not even bothering to try to taste it.

***

Sun was setting, and while sitting beside the open window he wondered what is the meaning behind his life. He looks at the book in his hand which was called "The Theory Of Solus Delux" It was a famous theory book among the alchemists and wizards. The reason behind that is it wanders to the still-in-research realm of the soul and reincarnation research.

Compared to mages who are gifted with powerful souls that are connected to the magic of this world through natural connections the wizards and alchemists were different. The wizards bend the laws of the world using their theories and knowledge forcing the magic of the worlds they exist to cast the spells for them while the alchemists twist the laws of matter using the formula of equal exchange.

Anyway, the reason it is such famous among them is because it contains a theory for spiritual immortality which attracted both sides for different reasons. The wizards are because the spiritual part currently the field of souls are only possible to be mastered by those ones with the gift of the magic aka the mages. There is currently no known record of wizards turning into a necromancer or warlock. Both of those demand one to have a great affinity for souls and spirits to start training to become one.

Edward even considered becoming one of these two after all as someone who's reincarnated his soul should look pretty delicious for those evil gods and demons right?

But in the end, he decided to give up on that because becoming any of the two simply means having alignment with the chaotic and evil faction resulting in him becoming the enemy of both nations and churches that have alignment with the order and righteousness faction.

Perhaps his family might be even waiting for this moment where he causes a mess that can't be forgiven and uses it to paint that bastard David in an even brighter light. The idea of being used by those bastards made him sneer as his eyes burned with the flames of hatred.

'Fuck, I got distracted again and forget to finish my homework. Should I just skip school all together tomorrow? Anyway, they won't say a thing as long I won't quit the Academy.'

Being sent to the Academy isn't for learning in the eyes of the noble families they have private tutors for that but it's mostly to earn the royal family's trust. By sending their scions to the Academy you will show the king and rest of the royal family they are trusting them enough to hand over their children as the hostages. Of course, if they can get away with it the noble families don't wanna get their future heirs are being held hostage by the royal family at the Academy. But the law demands to send at least one child and what cha know his family just happened to have a bastard child lying around to use as a scapegoat.

'Staying at the library in a grumpy mood won't do any good to me anyway. Let's return to my room.'

He gets up from his seat trying to head to his dormitory but realizes something rather eerie.

He doesn't remember ever coming to the library or even leaving the restaurant...