TL/ED – Miso
“Linl…! I’m going to miss you!”
“Rian unnie…!”
The day the knight ca to take Linl away.
The Orphanage turned into a sea of tears.
“Sniff… Linl! I’ll miss you, boohoo!”
The Director was weeping while blowing his nose into a handkerchief like soone had died, and because Linl had gotten along with just about everyone, not only the children her age but everyone ca out to the yard to see her off.
…No, was it really that serious?
It’s not like she’s going off to die. It’s only a 20-minute carriage ride away. You could walk that if you really wanted.
For Linl, it would take about 10 minutes one way.
Still, it didn’t feel right to ruin the mood with a tactless remark, so I just stood there quietly, and at that mont, a carriage pulled up at the entrance.
It was a knightly carriage, made of oak and luxurious, yet without a single decoration.
When the door opened, a middle-aged knight with an impressive mustache saw the sight of dozens of people crying and flinched in surprise.
“Ahem, I’m here on ti… What, what is all this?”
“Sniff, Knight-nim, you’re here?”
“Uh… yes. What exactly is going on here?”
“Everyone gathered to send Linl off. Sniff.”
“…My daughter truly is blessed with people.”
When the knight got off the carriage,
“…”
“…”
Everyone went silent.
It was my first ti seeing him, and wow.
Sure, I’d seen plenty of aspiring knights at the Academy, but a real knight was definitely sothing else.
More like a gorilla than a human in build, and even under thick clothes, his muscles made their presence known.
Less like a human, more like a weapon designed to kill humans.
That’s the impression he gave.
Holding a sword far too small for him by the sheath, he stood before Linl with a solemn expression.
“Linl. My na is Gwallan. I am the vice-captain of the Red Knights Order, a knight who has defeated five necromancers, seven demon tars, and one witch. Can I take your standing here now to an that you accept becoming my daughter?”
“Y-Yes!”
Linl responded confidently, even with a bit of a stuffy nose.
“Then, my daughter, this sword and armor are now yours. I swear before your family here that soday you will surely beco the greatest knight. This is my goal as well, so I will make sure you never forget these words for the rest of your life.”
“Thangk you!”
Linl bowed deeply and took the sword, which was far too big for her, and unsheathed it.
-Shring!
The texture was different. You could tell it wasn’t ordinary steel from how gleaming white the blade was.
“It’s a sword made of rhodraite. No matter what you face, it will never break.”
“Wow…”
Linl blinked at its beauty and gave it a few swings.
“Ooh…!”
Seeing that, Gwallan’s eyes went wide, and his hands began to tremble.
“It is decided then…”
“What is?”
“It’s nothing.”
With a pleased expression, Gwallan wiped his nose and, as if he rembered sothing, pulled a box out of the carriage.
“Director, this is for you.”
“Huh? What is-huhhh?!”
When the Director opened the chest, he was so shocked he nearly fainted and waved his hands frantically.
“I-I’ve done nothing worthy of receiving such money.”
“Retract that statent. It would be deaning the kindness of raising my daughter. I will continue to sponsor this Orphanage monthly from now on. And for the children, I’ve prepared this.”
Gwallan took out another box.
Inside was sothing far more precious than silver coins.
“L-Luinel candy!”
“That’s super expensive…!”
“I tried my best to find snacks the children would like, but this was the best I could do. Still, it should be enough to feed everyone, so please share it.”
Gwallan’s evaluation shot through the roof.
A little stiff maybe, but seeing how he even prepared gifts for the kids, it seed Linl wouldn’t suffer under his care.
Taking advantage of the mont when the children’s eyes turned to the box and they sward around it, I approached Linl, who was still inspecting the sword.
“Linl.”
“Ah, Jern!”
Linl sheathed the sword and smiled as she looked at .
Aside from the faint tear tracks, she wasn’t that different from usual.
“…”
And then, she looked at with sparkling eyes full of expectation.
I had only co to say goodbye.
“Uh, do your best.”
“Yeah!”
“…”
“…”
“…That’s it?”
“What else am I supposed to do? You’re going to co here every day anyway. If we cry and say goodbye now, it’ll just be awkward when we et again.”
“Humph…”
Linl puffed up her cheeks and pouted in protest, then soon let out a “Heh-” and smiled again.
“It’s fine, I already knew Jern was kind of stupid. I can handle it!”
“What? No, I’d take that from anyone else, but from you-”
“See you tomorrow!”
“Arghhh!!”
Linl hugged so tightly I thought my bones might break, then got into Gwallan’s carriage.
“…”
Lying on the ground, I glared at the carriage, waving until it disappeared from view.
“Sniff… I’m so proud… Jern? What are you doing lying there?”
“…Watching ants.”
She was a noisy one until the very end.
*
With Linl gone, I returned to my routine of eavesdropping on classes at the Academy.
By now, the vacant lot behind the classroom of the children’s section felt like my cozy little space. There were spots where the sound carried well, places that had good shade… I even had my own pri spots.
Today, the sun was blazing, so while I cleaned in a shady spot and listened in on a lesson, I couldn’t stop myself from chuckling.
“Hehehe…”
I had sothing in my arms that was worth laughing about.
A textbook. A monster priced at 599 silver coins.
This single book could buy you a house. I still didn’t really get how nobles thought about money, but at the very least, this book was worth that much.
Sweep, sweep. As I swept with a broom, I read the book that floated in mid-air.
Doing sothing like this so naturally really made feel like a wizard.
“And that’s why none of you are wizards yet.”
“?”
Guess I wasn’t.
After today’s class ended during the extra ti, I was reviewing when I heard sothing strange.
I had ignored them when they started with bullshit like tell us about your first love, but apparently they had started an important discussion.
I closed my textbook for a mont and perked up my ears.
“We use magic, so why aren’t we wizards?”
“Hmm, that’s because what you’re using isn’t exactly magic.”
“…Huh?”
“How should I explain this… Ah, can you see this?”
After a pause, the teacher clapped her hands and held sothing up.
Of course, I had no idea what it was.
Maybe this will help.
I activated tide sense and covered the classroom.
And just like that, the classroom’s scene ca into view.
…Why didn’t I think of this sooner? Anyway, what the teacher was holding up was a fan.
“When you wave it like this, wind cos out, right? Doesn’t that feel like wind magic?”
“That’s a stretch! How is that magic?”
“But it produces the sa wind. If we go further, striking flint to make fire, splashing water, or even farming, all of those are magic too, right? They create the sa result, so why are they considered different? Just because one uses mana? Then, should waving a fan be categorized under muscle magic because it uses physical strength? Do we need to give every action a different na based on the source of power?”
“…I an, I guess not, but still, magic is way stronger…”
“Don’t get wrong. I’m not saying magic isn’t special. Mana is definitely the most efficient fuel. I just wanted to tell you that using mana and performing magic are two different things.”
-Clack, clack. The teacher wrote sothing on the blackboard with chalk.
Of course, tide sense is the best. I could even deduce that much from here.
“Magic is- the act of creating sothing that does not exist in reality within your own world, and then projecting it back into reality. That’s what we call magic.”
“??”
The kids looked like they didn’t understand a thing.
The teacher gave a wry smile and began to explain at the students’ level.
“There’s fire in reality, and wind too, right? There’s also light, water, earth, grass, and trees, right?”
“Yesh.”
“Then in the end, we’re just taking things that exist in the Material Realm, uh, in reality, and bringing them into the world inside our hearts, then spitting them back out. We didn’t create them, we just used mana to spit out sothing we had brought in. Rather than calling that magic, it’s more accurate to say it’s an output of sothing we received as input.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“No. In fact, the level of one’s output is one of the biggest elents that defines the realm of a wizard. It’s just that input is equally important.”
“But all of those things already exist in reality. What do you an by sothing that doesn’t exist?”
“Usually, it ans combining elental magic to create sothing new. For example, carefully condense fire so it doesn’t go out midair, then harden it into the shape of an arrow, and shoot it using wind magic, that’s a spell. Fire arrows, for instance, don’t exist in reality, right?”
“Right.”
“Taking that one step further, if you organically combine dozens of elental spells… hmm, this is technically the next level, but I’ll show you for clarity. Have any of you ever seen sothing suddenly float in midair in real life? Without any external force?”
“Nope.”
“Right? So, this is what I an by magic.”
Floating, one of the cadets who had been dozing in the front row suddenly began to rise gently into the air.
“H-Huh?”
“Telekinesis. If you reach the realm of Faint Heaven, the minimum condition to be called a wizard, you’ll be able to do sothing like this too.”
“Wow…! How do you do that?”
“It’s too early to talk about that now. Once you study hard and achieve greatness, your family elders will teach you then.”
“……………..”
Ah.
Right.
The higher-level magic is all taught within their own families.
“Seriously, should I just get adopted…”
I sighed in frustration.
Marriage was also an option, but no noble in their right mind would accept a proposal from an orphan, so I was the one refusing that route.
In the end, joining Dersia as her apprentice was the top priority. I sighed and started doing what I could for now.
Using wind magic, I gathered the trash around .
It was a task I used to do with ocean currents, but I was doing it this way now to improve my wind magic proficiency.
It was inconvenient.
No, rather than inconvenient…
The Deep Sea had already beco familiar to .
It felt like eating with my left hand or writing with it.
Like having my dominant right hand, the Deep Sea, tied behind my back.
But it was sothing I had to do.
“Telekinesis…”
Faintly, I could see a path to eting Dersia’s requirents.
I diligently gathered the trash using wind.
“…Hm?”
In the middle of that, sothing was picked up by tide sense.
One of the Orphanage kids was heading this way.
Judging by the height, they were young. No one ever cos to this lot, so they were probably just passing by.
I blocked the floating textbook with my body to keep it hidden and kept gathering the trash.
-Brrr…
“…?”
But suddenly, the magic went strange.
‘What is this…?’
As if sothing had been blocked, the broom started shaking on its own.
The control over the spell had twisted slightly.
Sothing was off. Wondering what was wrong, I grabbed the broom, because the cadet was approaching.
Worry later. Act first.
I calmly swept the trash as the cadet sat down on a nearby bench and let out a deep sigh.
“Haa…”
Naturally, I ignored it.
“HaaAAAAaaa…”
The sigh got even deeper. It felt like if I stayed any longer, I’d get found out, so I tried to finish sweeping quickly and make a hasty exit with the broom.
That was my mistake.
“…Huh? You’re that janitor, right?”
It was soone I knew.
No, soone whose face I recognized.
I frowned slightly without making it obvious and responded.
“You must have mistaken for soone else.”
“What are you talking about, it’s definitely you. But hey, why did you just leave like that back then without saying anything? You should’ve at least accepted my thanks!”
Elysia said that as she patted the bench beside her.
She probably ant for to sit down. As much as I disliked it, since she was a noble, I couldn’t refuse.
Grinding my teeth, I sat down next to her, and Elysia imdiately started chattering away like she’d been waiting for it.
“First of all, thanks. If you hadn’t helped back then, it would’ve been a disaster. But why did you leave in such a hurry?”
“If I rest too long, I get scolded.”
Truthfully, I just didn’t want to listen to her talk, so I left.
She was probably here now too because she’d run away from Huins’s gang.
“Really? Ah, right. I’m not blaming you or anything, but couldn’t you have at least said sothing before tying up with bandages and throwing out the window? I was seriously scared to death…”
“…”
Chatter chatter chatter.
I sighed, and thinking even this ti was too precious, I secretly activated wind magic above us.
She seed like she was going to talk for a while, so I might as well get so practice in. I figured she wouldn’t notice since her head was bowed anyway, not looking at my eyes.
But the magic wouldn’t activate.
No, it did activate, but… only the faintest, tiniest breeze was produced.
What? I could feel the mana flowing, so I was thrown off.
Did sothing happen to ?
…Or maybe.
“Excuse , one mont.”
I cut Elysia off and stood up, putting so distance between us.
“Wh-what is it?”
Leaving Elysia with a puzzled expression, I summoned wind again, and though it was slightly distorted, it worked.
Then, I stepped closer to her.
With every step I took, the wind wavered and twisted in an unstable manner.
No doubt about it.
This girl. She possesses a world with the purpose of destabilizing magic.
“…”
“Wh-what? Why are you looking at like that? It’s creepy.”
“It’s nothing.”
I quickly lowered my head to avoid revealing the Astral Wheel.
She’s not fallen… I think.
I’m not sure. Should I take her to Dersia? But how?
…No. That doesn’t matter right now.
I completely changed my approach and sat down right next to Elysia.
“Please, tell more of your story.”
“Eh…?”
“I’d really like to hear more.”
As I looked at her face, part puzzled, part happy, I forced my pounding heart to calm down.
I had no idea what kind of chanism this was. I had no idea, but-
One thing was certain.
It was sothing I could use.
*
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