Genius Mage in a Cultivation World

"That's…" Irea said in an exasperated voice, unable to form an entire sentence. Shocked and surprised by the question, she could only stare at her partner as if he was some kind of monster. "Are you seriously thinking about teaching others? But even with everything that I know, what could I teach under you?" Once the girl finally managed to utter some words, she instantly swarmed Layn with her doubts.

"Don't worry, dear," said Layn while rubbing Irea's shoulder. "Nothing is going to happen overnight. There is no need for anxiety yet." Smiling to his own thoughts, Layn turned silent. Then, after just a few moments, he suddenly stopped in his tracks before turning around and gazing at yet another view of the inner academy.

"It's so beautiful here," said Layn while admiring the view. 'It's a pity I won't be able to see anything like this if I will go through with this idea.' Even though the proposition of creating a new school had long-reaching consequences, Layn just couldn't help himself when imagining it.

While he was calling a place where he would convey his teachings an academy, it would be actually no different from a seat of power, where more and more modern mages would propagate his influence to the outside. And in order to properly teach his future students without constantly striving for resources… There was no better place to set his academy at than the nefarious dessert he first appeared on when moving back in time!

"Okay, okay, you can tell me your plan now." Suddenly breaking the silence, Irea didn't even bother to look at Layn as she said it. Snuggling to the archmage's chest, she poked his side with her finger. "I can fell how giddy you are. Just spit it out already."

Layn moved his eyes down, at the hair of the girl. With how cuddled she was to his upper body, that was all he could see of her right now.

"You know me better than I do myself. What a fearsome woman." Patting Irea's back, Layn smiled before turning silent for one more moment. Then, as there was no need to hold back at all, he started.

"First off, if we want to create an academy, we are not going to start with a building itself. We need to start with students." Presenting a view that appeared to be in direct opposition to common sense, Layn failed to surprise the girl in his arms. After all the training of ignoring what common sense was when near him, Irea could no longer be shaken by such small news.

"For that step, we could simply hire a huge party of adventurers, some weak and some strong, before taking them with us to the desert." Finally acknowledging his own feelings, his own wish to remain in this time, Layn could, at last, pour his intellect into working this problem out. "Once there, we could see how each of them behaves, and pick the suitable ones to follow us even further. Once we will be down to a manageable number, we could offer them to join our idea."

Layn's eyes glistered at the sheer idea of creating a place in this world that he could call his own. And given how every other spot of land was likely to be already occupied by another force, there was only one place where he could look for some free room.

"Wait, are you going to let all those less-talented die out?" Suddenly pushing herself away from his arms, Irea moved her head up before sending the archmage a threatening glare. 'She's so fierce,' only enamored even further in the girl after her act, Layn smiled in response to her true feelings.

"Don't worry. While that would be obviously the cheapest and easiest way to go about it, it would cast a shadow on the morale of those who I would like to follow us." Shaking his head, Layn grabbed Irea's shoulders before pulling her back into his embrace. Yet, instead of just remaining standing, he pulled the two of them to the ground, using the slightly wet grass as the sitting pillow.

"Good. I don't want to ever feel like you are the bad guy," turning herself around on Layn's lap, Irea grabbed his chin before pulling his face down and planting a gentle kiss atop his lips, "mkay?"

Her soft voice was enough to cause Layn's spine to shiver in excitement. But while this feeling was pleasant, Layn was already too deep into his planning mindset to pay much of his mind to such small details.

"Okay, okay. But listen to this," allowing the excitement to take over him, Layn continued to boast about his plan. "Once we will have the core disciples recruited, we will impart to them just enough to make them as strong as the powerhouses of this world. Then, with another batch of new recruits under each of the disciples would go to the desert again. This way, we will create several seniorship groups in our small society, allowing to induce competitiveness between the new recruits."

Now that Layn was in his full, planning swing, nothing could stop him. Not when he finally had a chance to project his long-standing wish of creating his own academy and a mage's tower inside of it could come true in this world of the ancient!

"Wait a moment," stopping the cuddle for the third time in short succession, Irea once again looked Layn deeply in the eyes. "isn't that desert appearing in your plans a bit too often? What are you, trying to set the academy in the middle of it?" 

"Huh? How did you know?" Fully immersed in his own planning, Layn was unguarded when Irea's unexpected prediction came.

"So you really do plan something like that…" Falling back into Layn's lap, Irea's body fully relaxed… or rather, lost all its strength.

"What's wrong with that idea?" Puzzled by the girl's reaction, Layn stroked her cheek. "Out there, no one owns any land. Out there, all we need to do to get the stones is to fight those weak monsters. Oh," Suddenly recalling one element, Layn's lips curved upwards. "have you ever wondered over how I defeated that monster back then?"

'Thinking about it, for her, that desert is a scary place.' Finally realizing what might be the source of Irea's worries, Layn patted her head. With the two of them combed together as they were right now, playing around with her hair, picking on her ear, or even patting her head were things that Layn just couldn't stop himself from engaging with.

"What, are you going to tell me it just decided to give up and die?" Irea rebuked, clearly annoyed by her worries coming to the light.

"Nah, it was actually far simpler. You see, when I first appeared before you, I wasn't a cultivator. I was a mage." Not giving away his real title of archmage just in case if it had some kind of meaning in this world, Layn gently hugged the girl to his chest. "In other words, I simply stole all its energy before using it for my own purpose."

Shrugging his arms, Layn lowered his head before attaching his lips to the side of Irea's neck. Sucking on her delicate skin for a moment, the mage could feel when a shiver shook Irea's body, only giving testimony to how this little caress was enough to fire up the girl's instincts.

"You see, for me, that dessert is nothing but a playground. Back in the place where I come from, the monsters are protected by law as they are just too few." Releasing a huge amount of air through his nose, Layn used this substitute of laughter to keep his lips on Irea's delicious skin. "There is a real threat of eradicating every single last one of them, so some righteous idiots took up the cause and enforced the limitations…" It took a long while before Layn realized that he was actually speaking a little bit too much. Pursing his lips, he decided to follow the call of Irea's smell instead.

"If you say so…" Leaning her head to the side to give her man even better access to her neck, Irea clearly no longer had any intentions of keeping the discussion up.

"In fact, I plan to set the headquarters right in the middle of the desert. And yes, I wish to keep everyone there during the periods when it will be closed off from our world." While Layn still continued his caressing, that news were a little bit too much to the girl.

"Wait, just wait for a moment." This time, Irea decisively separated herself from Layn, even going as far as to stand up and move a few steps away. "You do realize that no one who has ever ventured to the desert and failed to return… No, maybe there are some rare exceptions, but that's not the point here." Unable to calmly gather her thoughts, Irea's hands were trembling, as if someone just sentenced her to a dreadful type of death.

"You only have any problem with fighting those monsters, because you guys are challenging them where they are strong. If you hit them where they are weak…" Layn couldn't blame the girl for such a reaction. He was in the desert only once, but he already experienced a death of an ally there. Given how diligent Ayda was, she was bound to participate in a huge number of trips like that, making it only more likely that she was already traumatized by that place. "If you hit them when they are weak, they just turn into a huge blob of magic, free for anyone to take."