However, as a demon, Ash was extremely sensitive to magic power, allowing him to clearly detect this subtle difference.
At first, when Roxy heard about Ash's discovery, she was somewhat skeptical. After all, she had never heard of such a thing before, nor did she have any experience to support his claim.
However, out of her trust in Ash, along with the fact that Ash said he had Magic Eyes, she ultimately chose to believe his judgment and began conducting targeted magic training with Sylphie according to his suggestion.
And this training really did produce significant results.
After half a year, Sylphie had made great progress in terms of magic power. Both her total amount of magic power and her ability to control magic had improved greatly compared to before.
She had even mastered voiceless casting quite easily under Ash's testing. Although she was still somewhat slower than Ash when casting, she still needed to chant when using more advanced magic.
This directly resulted in Sylphie becoming more admiring of Ash than her master, Roxy. Even though he would occasionally tease her.
———
Another summer had come, and sunlight poured across the land as the wheat in the village once again reached its season of ripening.
Looking across the fields, everything was golden. Whenever a breeze passed through, waves of wheat rolled with it, carrying the rich scent of wheat through the air.
That day, Ash was sitting quietly under a tree reading as usual. Besides the scent of wheat lingering around him, there was also an unfamiliar faint fragrance that smelled somewhat like milk.
The smell was so familiar that he didn't even need to look up to know who had arrived.
A childish voice also came from beside him.
"Lord Ash, are you reading another strange book?", Sylphie bounced over to Ash's side. After sitting down next to him, she curiously stuck out her little head, her big eyes fixed on the densely packed words in his book without blinking.
"It's not strange at all. You just can't understand it."
"Then teach me too~", Sylphie said, reaching out her little hand to grab Ash's arm and gently shaking it as she started acting spoiled.
Back then, she had been a timid little girl. Now, although she was still a girl, her personality had become much livelier, at least when she was around Ash and Roxy.
Moreover, every time Ash appeared here, Sylphie would stick to his side like a little tagalong, as he saw it, she was even starting to interfere with his ability to tease Roxy.
So now, seeing Sylphie dressed like a little boy, he felt somewhat depressed and couldn't even understand why he was so popular with children.
Another thing worth mentioning was that she called him "Lord," because it seemed like none of the other forms of address were quite appropriate. Ash had a relationship with her through Roxy, but he also had a relationship with her parents.
"You have no use for learning this. Just obediently follow Roxy and learn magic properly," Ash reached out and gently pinched Sylphie's soft cheek, then helplessly pointed toward Roxy in the distance, "You too. You're already someone's master, so stop slacking off all the time and come over."
"I'm not slacking off. I'm just feeling depressed!", Roxy puffed out her cheeks slightly, like a child throwing a tantrum.
After all, compared to Ash's somewhat "luxurious" worry, her current mood was much more complicated. She couldn't help drawing circles on the ground as if secretly cursing Ash while looking enviously at the old disciple who had stolen away her new disciple.
After all, who could have expected that Sylphie was supposed to be the one stealing her away from Ash at first, yet somehow... she had become the one who was robbed instead? The person who was supposed to do the stealing had been stolen away, while the one who was supposed to be fought over was left unwanted?
Especially now, seeing the little girl reluctantly coming over because Ash was urging her, Roxy felt as if she had somehow inexplicably become Ash's inferior replacement.
"Why do you like that guy? He bullies you too, doesn't he?", Roxy couldn't help complaining gloomily.
But the moment this came up, Sylphie immediately became energetic. She excitedly waved both little hands and began talking nonstop.
"Because Lord Ash knows so many amazing and powerful kinds of magic! Mom even said that the reason this year's and last year's wheat grew so well was all because of Lord Ash! The bad guys who used to bully me now get scared and run away as soon as they see me, and even the adults don't say bad things about me anymore. And before, when Lord Ash went to the watchtower to drink with Dad, he even helped chase away all those annoying monsters. And! And..."
Last year, seeing how hard Sylphie's mother worked growing wheat while apparently making very little money, Ash couldn't help feeling that it was strange how the people who worked the hardest and were the most capable, the ones directly involved in agricultural production, always seemed to have a difficult time in every era.
So, driven by some emotional feeling, he casually cast a spell he had once learned from the drunk elf when he was bored.
Under the effect of the magic, the wheat in the fields instantly underwent a strange transformation.
It was as if it had been given a new life, growing wildly. The number of grains produced by each stalk increased by seven or eight times compared to before.
This brought her family an unprecedented year of harvest. This year was the same. Ash had merely cast a simple spell, and the wheat grew as if it had been replaced with an entirely different variety. It was unbelievably good.
The children who bullied her did show up again later, but only after Ghislaine, whom Ash had brought along, had a "friendly" talk with them.
Although no one knew what exactly they had talked about, from then on, those children went around her whenever they saw her, and their parents didn't even come to complain.
It turned out that because her father had been born from an unknown man and an elf grandmother whose origins were unclear, Sylphie had inherited her hair color across generations. Her family had basically been at the very bottom of the village.
Even when she was bullied, her father couldn't argue with anyone about it and could only let things happen. Yet their position had now improved dramatically.
"I want to learn that kind of magic too, the kind that makes the wheat grow really~ really well. And I want to become someone respected like Lord Ash! But I can't understand what Lord Ash says. Master, can you do it? Can you teach me?", At the end of her animated speech, Sylphie looked at Roxy expectantly.
However.... even though Ash had explained the principles to her, Roxy still couldn't learn how to do it. She could only force a smile and say, "Th-that kind of magic is something I don't know, but, but! I know lots and lots of combat magic!"
"But...", Sylphie pouted, looking extremely unwilling.
This made Roxy unconsciously look toward Ash. Even though she wasn't very happy about it, she still signaled with her eyes for him to come over and solve the problem.
"Sigh! I wanted to read my book," Ash helplessly walked over, directly slipped his hands under Sylphie's arms, and, amid the girl's surprised cry, lifted her onto his lap. He also flicked one of her long ears.
"Roxy isn't only your master. She's my master too. Show your master a little respect, okay? Even if you're really disappointed, you should still act happy. That's the attitude a mature child should have."
"I... I know~", Sylphie was a little unused to it, but she still pursed her lips and nodded seriously.
That obedient appearance made Roxy feel that his method of teaching was very wrong, yet she still looked extremely envious.
"Why do your words work, while mine don't..."
"Because an elder brother is like a father."
"When did you become this child's brother?", The strange saying left Roxy completely confused.
"More accurately, an uncle is like a father."
"How did it become an uncle is like a father?", The rapid upgrade, as well as the direction of the upgrade, left Roxy completely dumbfounded, but he spoke with complete seriousness.
"Actually, when I went to the watchtower to drink with Laws the night before last, he acknowledged me as his big brother."
"H-huh? No... wait? My head's a little confused, but, but you're clearly younger than him, aren't you?"
"But I can drink more than him. After I got him drunk, wasn't it up to me to decide what I wanted to be? Or... are you expecting a drunkard to have the ability to refuse?"
"Is that really something you can be proud of?"
"Why not? Anyway, Laws can't become insecure over being unable to outdrink me."
Ash's confident explanation made Roxy want to cover her face with her hat and keep anyone from knowing about her relationship with him.
It was only now that she finally and completely believed that Ash really could borrow a huge amount of money from someone every time he went to a new place.
After all, besides getting people to acknowledge him as their younger brother through drinking, he was even so capable that at such a young age, he could discuss the hardships of raising children with Laws, a father himself, and even find plenty of common ground with him. After one drinking session, they had become old friends who had met too late in life.
But under normal circumstances, how could he possibly have children?
For now, though, she could only put aside all the things that were impossible to finish complaining about and teach the little girl the corresponding magic knowledge.
Ash himself simply continued reading his book, completely unaware of Roxy's troubles over having her dignity as a master stolen away.