I AM A MAGE BUT WITH MILF SYSTEM

Julian could feel the joy from the memory—the Duke’s proud face, the Duchess pale and beautiful in her bed with a newborn in her arms, the gathered household expressing congratulations to the duke and duchess.

The memory continued. Kraven as an infant. Then a child. They moved quickly through the early years—magic lessons, an elder correcting a young boy’s stance, the first controlled flame appearing above Kraven’s palm.

Every memory was accompanied by his father’s expectation.

His mother moved through these early memories as normal mothers do. Julian watched carefully for what he was looking for and didn’t find it. No particular change to the boy’s attention when she entered a room. No lingering looks. Just an innocent love of child for their parents.

So it hadn’t started here. He noted that away and continued.

Kraven’s cultivation progressed steadily through his adolescence. By fifteen he had already broken through to Supreme Mage.

It was then that his father began bringing him into ducal matters.

Julian watched the memories of it—the long sessions in the Duke’s study, the maps of the territory and overwhelming burden of someone born as heir. He couldn’t hear the conversations, but the shape of them was familiar enough. His own father had done the same.

Kraven received it seriously. That was the thing that kept striking Julian as he moved through these memories—how serious the young Kraven was. How little he resembled the man currently sitting blank-eyed on a bed in a provincial inn.

Something had happened to the distance between these two versions of the same person.

Julian kept moving.

Eighteen years old.

The memory that surfaced here was larger than the ones before it. It was more vivid, more detailed.

It began with a journey. The roads widening as they approached the capital. It was large— way larger than anything Kraven had seen before.

His sister rode beside him in the memory. She was older than Kraven by two years and already carried herself with the composure of a girl who knew her true worth.

She was going to meet her future husband. The crown prince.

Julian watched the royal capital unfold through Kraven’s eighteen-year-old eyes. The massive castle, the bustling market, the opulence.

And then finally the throne room.

The King. The Queen. The Crown Prince.

Kraven’s sister met her fiancé and the match was confirmed almost immediately. The couples left, leaving only Kraven with the king and queen in the hall.

The king’s eyes were on Kraven. He descended two steps from the throne, stepping close to Kraven.

“Supreme Mage,” the King said.

Kraven blinked. “Your Majesty?”

“Your cultivation level.” The King tilted his head slightly. “You’re eighteen, and you’re already at Supreme Mage. At that rate—” He did the calculation visibly. “Archmage before twenty-five. Grand Mage before forty, if you don’t get lazy or stupid.”

“I intend to be neither, Your Majesty.”

The corner of the King’s mouth moved. Not quite a smile. “Everyone intends that. However, considerably fewer manage it.” He studied Kraven for another moment. “Fire right?”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“Rare combination. Fire is very powerful yet harder to control in early stages.” His eyes were steady and entirely unreadable. “How do you manage the latter?”

It was an unusual question. Kraven answered it honestly, because he was eighteen and hadn’t yet learned that honesty in throne was a double-edged sword.

“I don’t always, Your Majesty. But I find that pushing the cultivation further helps control the mana effectively.”

This time the King actually smiled. Brief, but genuine.

“Practical,” he said. “Good.” He turned slightly, glancing back at the courtiers maintaining their careful distance across the throne room, and then back to Kraven.

“I hold a private gathering,” the King said. “Only cultivators of exceptional talent are invited.” A slight pause. “There is no agenda beyond good food and better conversation. I find it valuable to know who the kingdom’s genuine assets are before everyone else figures it out and starts trying to marry them to things.”

Kraven recognized an invitation when he heard one. “I would be honored, Your Majesty.”

“You haven’t heard the date yet.”

“Irrelevant, Your Majesty.”

The King looked at him for a moment.

“I’ll have my secretary send details,” he said, and turned back toward the throne.

Kraven watched him go, his chest full of pride so complete it didn’t leave room for anything else.

Meanwhile, Julian, watching from inside the memory, felt no pride at all. He knew where this would lead. This was an open trap.

Kraven found his sister near the throne room’s side entrance, standing by a narrow window that overlooked the castle’s eastern courtyard. She had her arms crossed and was looking at nothing in particular.

“The King spoke to you,” she said, without turning.

“For several minutes.” Kraven stopped beside her. “He invited me to a private gathering. Cultivators of exceptional talent, apparently.”

His sister was quiet for a moment.

“I’ve heard of those gatherings,” she said finally.

“Good things, I hope.”

She turned and looked at him directly. She had their mother’s eyes. “Unclear things. Nobody who attends them talks about them afterward, which is either secrecy or something else entirely.”

Kraven smiled. “Or simply people respecting a private occasion.”

“Perhaps.” She didn’t smile back. “Be careful, Kraven.”

“Of a dinner.”

“Of being noticed by powerful people who have no obvious reason to notice you.” She held his gaze steadily. “Father always says that sudden attention from kings is never actually sudden. Someone always pays for it eventually.”

Kraven considered this for approximately two seconds.

“Father also says fire aspected cultivators peak early and burn out by fifty,” he said. “I intend to prove him wrong about that too.”

His sister took a deep breath. She turned back to the window.

“Just don’t be stupid,” she said.

“I’m never stupid.”

“You’re eighteen.”

“Gifted eighteen.”

She said nothing, which was its own kind of answer.

Kraven left her at the window and walked back through the throne room corridor with his hands clasped behind his back and his mind already moving ahead.