The decision brought a cold, hollow peace to his chest. He was choosing the safe path his parents wanted, but he was doing it with the calculation of a man who knew the world was coming for him.
He pushed the covers off. His legs felt like lead, and his balance was skewed by the splint on his arm, but he managed to stand. He walked slowly to the door and opened it.
The smell of vegetable stew hit him first, followed by the sight of Marta at the hearth. She turned, her eyes widening.
"Lencar! You shouldn't be up!" she cried, wiping her hands on her apron and rushing to his side.
"I'm fine, Mother," Lencar said, his voice softer than usual. "I just... I needed to tell you something."
Rion entered from the back door, carrying a bundle of firewood. He stopped, his eyes fixed on his son.
"I've been thinking about what you said," Lencar began, looking from one to the other. "About not trying so hard. About being safe."
Marta's face lit up with a fragile hope.
"I'm going to go to the Capital," Lencar said, and the hope flickered. "I have to. If I don't, the Magistrate will cause trouble for the village. I have to use the pass."
Rion's jaw tightened. "Lencar—"
"But," Lencar interrupted, "I'm not going there to win. I'm going there to finish the process. I'll do the exam, I'll show them I'm not what they're looking for, and I'll come back. I'll come home, and I'll stay here. With you."
The room went silent. Marta looked at Rion, then back at Lencar. She saw the bandages on his arm. She saw the exhaustion in his eyes.
"You promise?" she whispered. "You'll come home?"
"I promise," Lencar said. It was the second lie he had told them, but it was wrapped in a truth. He would come home. But he wouldn't be the boy they thought he was.
Rion sighed, a long, heavy sound of a man who knew he couldn't stop the tide. "If that's what it takes to get that Magistrate off our backs... then go. But you rest first. You don't move a muscle until those bones are knit."
Lencar nodded. "I'll rest. I'll take a few days. Then, I need to talk to the Tower Master."
The next three days were a blur of enforced stillness. Lencar spent his time sitting in the sun on the farmhouse porch, his grimoire hidden in his lap. He didn't practice spells. He didn't "Mana-Forge." He simply watched the village.
He watched the orphans at the church. He saw Asta, who was already back to training with a bandage around his head, his screams of "I'M NOT GIVING UP!" echoing across the valley. Asta didn't have a pass. He didn't have a recommendation. But he had a stubbornness that Lencar realized was its own kind of magic.
Subject A (Asta) will likely attempt to walk to the Capital without a pass, Lencar noted. His persistence is a variable I cannot account for. He will be the storm that draws the attention. I will be the quiet failure that slips through the cracks.
By the fourth day, the swelling in his arm had subsided, and he could breathe without a sharp pain in his side. He wasn't healed—not by a long shot—but he was functional.
He walked to the Grimoire Tower that afternoon. The structure looked different now—less like a repository of destiny and more like a gateway he was planning to close.
Inside, Drouot was dusting the shelves of unused books. He looked up, his eyes twinkling behind his spectacles.
"Ah, the Qualifier! Come to ask about the journey?"
"I came to ask for your advice, Tower Master," Lencar said, his tone respectful. "About the exam. And about... the expectations of the Captains."
He spent the next hour listening to Drouot talk about the history of the exam. He gathered data on the types of tests—magical power, control, creation. He took notes on which Captains were the most observant.
Strategy: To fail convincingly, I must show a lack of 'Growth Potential.' High output but low control. Or high control but no stamina.
As he left the tower, the sun was setting, casting a long shadow of the demon skull across the village. Lencar looked at the pass in his hand.
He had 150 days left. He would use them to recover, to refine his "failures," and to prepare for the trip to the Royal Capital. He was no longer training to be a hero. He was training to be a shadow.
"The parents want me safe," Lencar whispered as he walked home. "And I will be. But to be truly safe in this world, I have to be the one who knows where all the monsters are hiding."
He looked at his blank grimoire, its leather cool against his palm.
"Phase Five: The Capital. Objective: Strategic Dismissal."
The Data Analyst was back, but he was no longer just running numbers. He was playing a game of hide-and-seek with the gods, and the first move was to convince the world that he wasn't even playing.