The Faulen Family
[Leylin Faulen, Strength: 0.2; Agility: 0.1; Vitality: 0.3; Spiritual Force: 0.7; Condition: Healthy.] The A.I. Chip projected Leylin’s current data in a small blue font next to the image in the database. It was a tragic sight.
‘Alright... Except for spiritual force which is closer to that of an adult because of the memories I’ve retained, the rest are standard stats for an infant.’ Leylin Was rather embarrassed. He was currently more weak than when he’d first crossed over into the Magus World.
‘However... the standards of the adults here are different from those of the Magus World. They can’t be compared.’
Leylin understood the new criteria that the A.I. Chip had adopted. The current statistical units represented the standard of the commoners of the World of Gods. As the laws were more rigid in the World of Gods, there were even changes in the physical constants of the world. It was thus perfectly normal for the average stats here to be greater than in the Magus World.
At this moment, the A.I. Chip’s voice sounded once more. [Beep! Unknown energy source has been discovered. Radiation is determined to have a beneficial effect on the host’s body.]
‘Hm?’ Leylin identified the location of the problem discovered by the A.I. Chip, and saw a milky white brilliance within his lower abdomen which was continuously spreading outwards.
“This is... the divine force of the bishop from earlier!” Leylin was very certain about this.
“What effect does this radiation have?”
The A.I. Chip quickly gave an answer, [Radiation appears to be in a state of weak radioactive decay. Estimated to completely dissipate in 279 hours, and at the same time increase the host body’s strength by 0.1, agility by 0.1 and vitality by 0.2.]
‘Is this the blessing of a god?’ Leylin laughed sarcastically, ‘A privilege that only the strong get!’
Of course, Leylin recognised that this was indeed a privilege. With these blessings, his growth would definitely surpass his peers. He would also possess greater strength and a more well-built physique when he grew older.
‘The disparity between classes is set from birth! The difference in the starting lines mean that the children born of the commoners are destined to be unable to match up to the children born of nobility, favoured by the gods. Even if they put in a hundred times more blood, sweat and tears, and get a little lucky, perhaps all they can see are the backs of those noble children.’
Although Leylin was confident in eventually reaching the peak even if he started off as a lowly commoner, he obviously wouldn’t reject a higher social position.
“Where’s the baby? I want to see my cousin!”
*Clang!* The door to the room was pushed open even as a tender and lovely voice sounded. The person speaking evidently wasn’t very old, talking in a childish manner. The other maids seemed to recognise the source of the voice, and allowed her to lean against the side of Leylin’s cradle.
“Oh! He’s awake!” The little girl cried out in surprise.
‘Is this a relative?’ Leylin opened his eyes unhappily, and sized up this reckless person who interrupted his train of thought.
The girl had azure pupils like him. Strands of her silky gold hair caressed her fair and delicate forehead, lending a delicate charm to it. Her beautiful small nose was raised up slightly, and below it was a little mouth which revealed her cute canines as she smiled. There were also two tiny dimples, one on each side of her cheeks.
“Isabel, you’re disturbing him!” The voices of the other adults could be heard at this moment, accompanied by footsteps. The little girl was pulled to the side, and the occasional discontented voice sounded out from her.
‘Isabel, eh? What an energetic little brat!’ He sensed great trouble from those inquisitive eyes, she clearly had great interest in him. He predicted that this elder cousin wouldn’t let him have peace.
What drove Leylin a little mad that he had absolutely no power whatsoever to resist her right now.
‘Dear God, Please send that Isabel back home right away. It’s best if it’s on the other end of the continent...’ he started to pray piously. Such a pity; the World Will didn’t seem to hear his prayers.
Soon after, his elder cousin Isabel decided to stay in his family’s manor. Apparently, this young lady would be staying with the Faulen family for a long period of time.
Leylin’s next few days were extremely tough. He could still tolerate her squishing his cheeks or smothering his face with cream, but the most serious of all was that this female cousin actually tried to imitate the adults by changing his diapers!
Oh goodness! It was already shameful enough to be fiddled with like a baby after reincarnation, and now his elder cousin who was still a young girl wanted to change his diapers?
‘Dear God!’ Leylin really had an urge to kill himself right there and then. If only the gods knew of their plight in the future, they would definitely show their strong support and approve of this decision. Unfortunately, there was no such thing as ‘if only’ in this world...
With Leylin’s bottom line and character, these were just trivial matters. After simply blushing in embarrassment a few times, he no longer had as many mood swings. He even quickly discovered the ultimate trick to deal with Isabel. It was crying— loud, relentless crying!
In any case, he was a young baby, and it couldn’t be more normal to wail when he was bullied. Once he did, either his mother or some servant or maid would come to his rescue. They even firmly reprimanded the girl at times, which made him feel inexplicably carefree.
After a few such incidents, Isabel didn’t dare to do anything unusual that would make Leylin unhappy. She even seemed to be a little afraid of him, which pleased him greatly. It also had to be said that, in certain aspects, Leylin’s strong character made one’s hair stand on end.
These awkward incidents of life were just trifling matters. Thanks to his identity as a baby, many adults didn’t intentionally stay away from him when they discussed matters. Who could guess that a child just a few months old would have the ability to remember anything?
Leylin thus managed to gather a lot of intel. With the A.I. Chip’s valiant ability of gathering information and the things the subordinates and servants unintentionally revealed as they chatted, his understanding of the family quickly surpassed that of most others. He even learnt many secrets of theirs.
After all, being able to gossip about their masters without worry while they were not around was practically instinctive to those servants. On top of that, Leylin was still an infant and they wouldn’t avoid him. Yet, they would never have imagined that their little master already had a will, and even remembered every single thing that they said clearly.
Although the majority of the things these subordinates discussed were very vulgar and were accompanied by exaggerated imagination, Leylin soon managed to gain a profound understanding of his own family, and even used the A.I. Chip to produce a family tree.
First off would be his father, the baron of the kingdom. Jonas Faulen’s father had great military accomplishments. Because of his inheritance, he’d obtained some feudal land, becoming a rising nobleman in the kingdom. He had a few younger siblings and they formed the current line of descent for the Faulen family. His mother, Sarah, was a gentle and benevolent upperclass woman.
As a noble family in military service, they’d had to go through an extremely wretched process to obtain a fief. There was nothing that could be done about it.
Leylin’s respected paternal grandfather seemed to have been the head imperial bodyguard of the kingdom. He was on friendly terms with the previous prince, who was also the current king. In the wars that followed, there were a few times when his grandfather almost lost his life, and he ended up with a body full of injuries that couldn’t be cured fully even by divine spells. Only then had he barely managed to seize the opportunity to develop the kingdom’s territory and became a noble landowner. He was then conferred the title of baron, and breathed his last not long after.
And that was exactly where Leylin’s manor was.
Speaking of which, his father Jonas was actually a highly accomplished leader. Upon arriving at his feudal property, not only did he actively open up new lands for agriculture, expand production processes, and breed numerous kinds of cash crops, but he also established a decent port on a remote island. Through providing potable water, food and maintenance services for boats that passed, it had slowly developed.
They had managed to resist a few pirate attacks, causing them to retreat.
Now, the Faulen leadership had already undergone earth-shattering changes as compared to before. Their land was acclaimed as the “jewel off the coast of the kingdom”, and it certainly led to veteran nobilities lusting after it.
However, all of this was still within the range of Jonas’ capabilities. At least there weren’t any intense conflicts at present, which made Leylin heave a sigh of relief.
Isabel was also living in the manor with the family of three. Her parents seemed to have forgotten about her after throwing her here, and she herself seemed to be indulging in too much pleasure to care about her home.
Apart from Isabel, the entire manor was filled with servants of the Faulen family. The grey-haired butler Ryan had the highest status, and there were also a large bunch of kitchen ladies, maids, servants, apprentice knights, and the like present.
The Faulen family’s feudal lands were really huge. There was an independent farm, mill, stable, workshop, vegetable oil extraction factory and other facilities. There were even entire plots of fertile farmland that employed farmers, both male and female.
The entire manor was able to supply flour, vinegar, wine and similar items in large quantities, as well as iron farm tools in smaller amounts. Even if they closed their doors to the outside world, they would still be self-sufficient for a very long period of time.
Leylin viewed it as the typical economic situation of a feudal villa.
Due to the Faulen family’s short history, they still didn’t have the financial ability and physical resources to build their own castle. In actual fact, constructing a castle required the consumption of vast quantities of stone and food, and even the assistance of priests and numerous extraordinary beings. Even ancient noble families often did not have the money to finance a castle.
Of course, once construction was complete, it would be the pride and symbol of the family.
The defensive abilities of castles belonging to noblemen in the World of Gods were top-notch. The castles were protected by spell formations, and even military troops wouldn’t be able to bring it down in a short span of time.
When interacting within the circle of nobility, one would often feel as though he was shorter than others by a head without a castle of their own.