-Chapter 6: Laplace's plans-

AN: Another Laplace POV, this'll take place right around the end of chapter 4 forwards. I'm still thinking about whether I want the next chapter to take place during the same time as this chapter and have it be from Rudeus's POV potentially going forwards or have it take place afterwards. Sorry if you hear the same information twice in some of my chapters.

-Laplace POV-

I should establish some concrete plans. I've been winging everything thus far because there isn't much I could do. Now that I'm around 3 months old I can crawl it seems Rudeus has been using this ability to attempt escapes but has continually failed. It also seems that a useful individual is roosting in the nearby canyon that I could crawl or fly to. The first problem is that there are dragons inside the canyon that can rip a baby body to shreds. The second problem is that my parents want to keep me in the house until I'm older. It seems that both of my parents are hunters, so it may be possible to leave while they're both out hunting if I can evade being detected by their demon eyes, which I should. Strength wise I will have no trouble with some random earth dragons, but I feel wrong killing dragons… How could one not after having a dragon as brave and honorable as Saleyakt? I'll have to get through without killing… Now that may be difficult.

I will have to plan a way to get through without killing. Rudeus appears to know a lot about the war that happened here before. Should I ask him? No. I doubt he'd want me going through a place like that if he thinks I'm a kid. I can't let him know I'm an adult either because he would narrow me down to one of those that can reincarnate. I doubt it would matter though… he's going to see everything I do anyways, right? Should I keep up the lie? I could try to separate our souls with a bit of magic, but I'd have to make a whole new body or wait until our parents have another child to put him in. If they have another that is. He'd also be confused as to how he got put in another body, or he'd be worried about me leaving the house when I leave then. I could try to convince him I never existed, but that solution is unreliable especially with someone who has lived a full life. I'm also keeping this art a secret from a certain evil god. That leaves brute forcing it by going anyways or convincing Rudeus some other way. I could also try putting us under some kind of attack like Badigadi's so long ago.

No matter what I do I'll have problems to come with it… Maybe I'll leave talking to Badi for some time. What else can I do? I could try to find the current dragon god and pass on my abilities, but it would take some time to find the current dragon god. It would also result in some of the same problems that heading into the canyon would bring with Rudeus. I can't kill Rudeus because he appears to have many unique magics that could help bring down Hitogami and before worrying about that I must worry about finding a body to separate one of us into so I could kill him. It would also strip me of the massive amount of mana that he possesses. Many of my techniques cannot be taught because of my pathetic quantity of mana. It has hampered my abilities for too many years. To throw away the solution so soon in this new life would be a travesty for my future teachings. I could see waiting several years to follow through with my plans. In the meantime, I should gather more information from Rudeus. I would talk to him now, but it seems that he is busy writing down his plans in stone. It seems he plans to leave at seven and return to his family, Or-huh? Orsted? Has he already been reborn!? Calm down. Calm down…

Rudeus nearly noticed me react to that. It would be a problem if he questioned me on it. It's rare for an adult to be able to read let alone a child. He might even guess that I'm one reborn if he sees my reaction. …This changes things. If Orsted is reborn then the defeat of Hitogami may well be underway already. I'll have to support him as much as I can. I doubt that he'll be fighting Hitogami directly any time soon. Other than that, it means that Rudeus knows of him too… He put down that he was going to help fight Hitogami so he's probably on my side. Maybe I should reveal my identity? No. I still don't have any real confirmation. It could be a trick by Hitogami. Rudeus must have made contact with him if he's here with me, so it may be something to worry about. If he isn't a subordinate of Hitogami then he's surely helping us out. I can observe him for many years and see what he does and decide from there. Actually, I should and will do that. It's not like I have much of a choice either way with us being stuck together. Is there anything that I should do with Rudeus? It does seem that he wants to learn more about his body according to this writing… I can provide the information he wants on our demon eye and our tail. I can't tell him directly how to use them, but I can use them myself for him to see… He won't guess it's me if his eye suddenly acts up, right? I mean he's never had a demon eye before, so I don't see why he would blame me. Alright. I'll use the eye… but I should wait. It may become more apparent that it's me if it's done right after he writes about it. I'm probably being paranoid but being paranoid about everything is how you deal with Hitogami.

I guess I'll get back to figuring out this whole Orsted thing. If he's in this world now, then that would mean the time to defeat Hitogami is near. Unless I'm incorrect about this being the Dragon God's son, it could be someone else with a name that is spelled with the same characters. That might be more likely than the Orsted I know being here already. Either way, I should try to get this person to help me kill Hitogami. Considering they are friends of the magic king it should be expected of them to be strong regardless of whether they're the one I've known and seen. Granted I haven't seen them very much and haven't seen them in a long time… Even if they're the one I know we might not even recognize each other… It's sad considering that we're brothers… I thought family was supposed to be like how I was with Lunaria… The First Dragon God can be counted as an exception because he was always busy, and he had lived a longer time, granting him more experience than most parents had…

I can't go down this path again. Time to go to sleep.

-The next day-

It's been a little while now, I think it's safe to use the demon eye. I'll only use a little bit of the eye's potential. I'll use it for about this room's diameter, if I use the ability to its full potential then it may seem off to him when he hears other Superd's experiences with the demon eye. Usually, when a Superd uses their eye for the first time they only get a small fraction of the detectable distance. Their true potential is much, much bigger.

I can feel Rudeus's reaction, he seems surprised at the sudden awakening of his eye, probably questioning why it occurred now. We don't really know when or why a Superd eye usually activates other than with age, so it doesn't matter if he gets curious about this. This is the information that I can provide him right now, if I do anything more than this it may alarm him which could lead to him blaming me and figuring out my identity… Of course, that's me being paranoid again. In actuality he probably would think that it's because his eye triggered that something else happens to him, or he'll think that their two results of the same cause. The latter would be true, but the former may lead him to come to some wrong conclusion that may harm him some time in the distant future. A lot of things can mess you up later down the line I've learned. It's preferable to have a lack of information than to have incorrect information. Hitogami instilled that in me after many, many years of fighting him.

It appears that Rudeus doesn't have the same paranoia that I have. He's trying to use the eye as much as possible. To get used to it? He seems to be effective at figuring out how to use the eye for the first time… Is it not his first time? Kishirika Kishirisu had the ability to give other eyes, so he may have gained another eye after those first ten years he told me about… I should ask him about what happened after those ten years.

'Hey Rudeus.'

'Hmm?'

'A while ago you told me about the first ten years of your life, can you continue telling me the story? It was entertaining.'

'Ah. So, you remembered that? Hmph. I suppose I can tell you the rest of the story.' Yes. I get to know the rest of the story. I may be used to reincarnating like this, but it does get boring being trapped in a baby's body for so many years…

Rudeus continued, 'We finished off with the mana calamity, yes?' I nodded our head in response. 'Well, when the huge blast hit us…' He told me about the adventures he had with dead end, we didn't quite finish but we'll probably just start it up again tomorrow morning. Like I thought, he gained a demon eye from Kishirika, it was interesting to learn about what happened to the Superd race… but who is this other Laplace? Did he steal my name? Has my name become popular? Is Hitogami trying to feed me some info? Is it another trick? If it isn't one of his tricks, then what is it? I don't know. It doesn't seem that Rudeus would know much about it either. I don't remember much from my past… My brain has become overloaded with memories. No. No it's not overloaded, the memories are stored in your mana after all. The brain's function is to call upon those memories. If my memories were anywhere else, then they wouldn't come with me when I reincarnate. Rudeus's mana capacity should've greatly increased the number of memories I can use at a time, so it's not that either… Unless maybe his mana is interfering with my memories? That could be dangerous, and it would explain Hitogami's motives in putting me in this tiny little body. …Or maybe I'm just tired. It's time to go to bed after all.

-The next morning-

Rudeus was already awake when I got up. We may share the same body, but our souls are what need to rest before even worrying about the body. My body has been even more tired within recent months… Probably do to being fed a lot more mana than it has for a long, long time. Rudeus was just wandering around the house some more. It seems that he gets bored being in a child's body as well. I can sympathize. I sympathize with him even more so because he's got an adult's mind and we don't have anything that would interest a commoner in this house. Sure, there's stuff from a culture he's not used to, but the effect wears off within the first week. It does very between culture, but the demon continent doesn't store many interesting items that can't just be seen as a worse version of whatever he had on the central continent… Although, we are on the central continent, or some place similar, which is quite weird for the Superd. It probably has something to do with what Rudeus was telling me about yesterday. Once he's done exploring, I'll ask him more about his life. Last time we got up to leaving the demon continent and it seems he's having many lucky occurrences along the way. It's probably some kind of blessing that he had from birth or maybe some weird result from the mana calamity? There are many theories I could dig into about it. Luckily for him and me blessings keep from life to life; we will both feel the effects of this great blessing. That is if it is a blessing. It's also possible that numerous other individuals went down the same path he has but didn't have as much in the way of luck. If that's the case, then this is just a lucky individual and there's not much more to it. I suppose a good portion of it could also be that he's a saint-class water mage, but I don't know how good that skill is for the time period. Many great mages from the time I was in dragon world were above king-tier in capability but I remember that Hitogami was changing the standard so that other races would be weaker to the human race.

Rudeus is now done wandering. I'll ask him to continue the story now.

'Hey, Rudeus, can you continue the story from last time?' I asked

'Oh sure, so let's see… Ah! That's right I left you off with me leaving the demon continent.' I nodded. 'I suppose we'll go from what happens their…' He told me about the time from meeting Kishirika to being kidnapped by the beast tribe and then it was time for lunch… I'll have to ask him about the rest later.