When Wolfe returned back downstairs, everyone in the room was giving him strange looks, which he attributed to the missing old woman, who was currently enjoying the best sleep of her life.
But that was not the case.
The young witch that he had just awakened had discovered that the [Levitation] inscription that he had given her could be used on herself, and she was now on the roof with an entire tray of cookies.
"I don't suppose that you could go get her down from there before she gets hurt?" One of the men asked with an embarrassed glance at the step ladder they had attempted to use to reach the roof, which was now beside her on the shingles.
"With great power comes great responsibility. But the spell is still active. She won't fall off the roof. If anything, if she stepped off, she would gently float down until she willed herself back up again." Wolfe replied.
One of the women, presumably her mother, came and grabbed Wolfe by the shirt collar, turning him to stare directly into her enraged eyes.
"Demon, get my daughter down from the roof before she eats an entire tray of cookies for dinner." She demanded.
"Well, when you put it that way. I suppose that I can help." Wolfe laughed, then used [Levitation] to steal the tray of cookies and bring it back to the waiting kitchen staff she had stolen it from.
"You're no fun, Mister Wolfe." The girl pouted.
"Now that you have magic, you need to think long-term. Cookies for dinner are great, but you must consider how much trouble you'll be in once you get back down for the evening."
Wolfe turned her mother around to look at the girl on the roof. "Look into these lovely green eyes. Do they look like the eyes of a merciful and benevolent partner in crime?"
The family members did their best to hide their laughter while the girl's mother was spluttering in rage, and the little girl gave Wolfe a very serious look.
"You are right. But I think it might be safer to stay up here for a while until she calms down."
The Captain laughed at the girl's response and shook her head. "You think she's going to calm down before you leave the roof? You don't know your mother very well. You might as well come down now and take your punishment before it gets worse."
With a sigh, the newly awakened witch glided to the ground, where her mother rushed out to pull her into a hug, then grabbed her by the ear and dragged her inside, ranting about the amount of sugar in all those cookies she ate, and how it was going to spoil her dinner.
"All is well that ends well. Should we awaken a few more who are near the same age? It would be the best for their future development. You will just need to train them and keep a close eye on them since they will know how to use magic on each other."
"Perhaps we should start with some at a more responsible age. How young is it possible for them to awaken their aura anyhow?" The Captain's mother asked.
Wolfe could see that it was a real concern for most of the adults in the room. If Wolfe purged the Curse, then they might end up with magic-using toddlers, which would be a complete and utter disaster.
"From what I understand out of the history books, it won't activate until the start of puberty, so not too many will be younger than their early teens, I guess? I'm sure that there are outliers, but that seemed to be the standard in the old stories, so it should be the standard again now if they are cleansed."
The witches breathed a sigh of relief and looked around at each other as they silently considered whether to take on more debt to Wolfe to awaken more of their kids early.
On the underage witches' side, they would happily be awakened right now with the promise of being more powerful than their parents, but the boys looked pretty sour. They didn't stand to gain anything at all out of this, and they would gain magic using sisters who could bully them without getting caught. It was a lose-lose from their point of view.
One of the girls, about fourteen years old, with her hair dyed nearly the same blue as Ella's but with more natural-looking gray-blue eyes and extremely pale skin, snuck over to Wolfe while the others were discussing the possibilities.
"What price do you want to awaken my powers? I've got a cute silk dress that I just designed if you have someone my size that you want to give a gift to." She whispered.
She was on the short side for an adult, but Ella was still smaller than she was by a little bit. They were similar in coloration, so whatever it was should look good on her.
"You have a deal, and I hope that you're a skilled seamstress, or I'll be losing out on this one," Wolfe whispered back.
The girl smirked and produced a towel from behind her back, then dropped it subtly on the floor before backing up to stand on it. That should prevent the floor from getting dirty with the purged Curse, so Wolfe got right to work.
The curse in her body was a thicker sludge than in the younger witch, but it wasn't fully dried in any spots yet, and the damage was minimal, so she should have a fairly solid future, despite a mediocre innate talent.
She probably wouldn't make Rank Two on her own, even with the Mana Gathering Array, which had almost got the energy in the area up to the array's full potential, but she should be a reasonably strong Rank One witch, one that would be considered outstanding by the current generation's standards.
The whole process only took a few seconds, and Wolfe finished with a subtle dose of mana to awaken her aura before the girl picked up the towel as if she had accidentally dropped it and snuck away to her room to get the dress she had promised him.
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