Wfb: Chapter 103

After Using Something Improperly for Decades, it’s Magical to See it in its Proper Use for the First Time

<Previous Chapter]   [Index]   [Next Chapter>

Currently, Desmond and I are a little bit outside of Warden’s Post, in a clearing.

Hibiki-chan is tagging along, but she’s sitting a bit away from us.

Because she’s the test subject.

Desmond is currently trying to teach me a Light-based detection spell, the one that originally got us talking about Light magic and avatars and stuff.

‘If it’s you, then certainly, it would be easy to cover a large part of the forest,’ with that, Desmond finally bowed his head to Hibiki-chan’s stubborness and agreed to teach me.

“The chant is [Smaoinichsolasan aetheragus còmhdaichidhmi a’stiùireadh moshealladhnasfhaide agusa’toirt a-machan rudatha mia’sireadh].

Uh.

Right.

I get that the chant activated the spell, since a light has flown out from between Desmond’s hands and lit his entire body in a faint glow, then pulsated lightly. But, although I certainly heard it…

“Could you tell me the chant without actually chanting it?”

I wonder why the chants aren’t translated.

Well, in the end, I probably won’t be using the chant as long as I can pick up the feel of how to activate the spell.

I feel like Lor is rolling his eyes somewhere.

Desmond seems a bit bemused, but he nods.

“Ah, of course. Ahem. ‘May the light of the aether flow and cover me, guiding my sight beyond and bringing forth that which I seek.’”

Okay. I can remember that. Although I’ll have to say it in Japanese, I wonder if it will be okay.

“Flow, aether’s light, and cover my eyes, bringing forth that which I seek.”

Un? Even though I said it exactly as I heard it, it’s a little different.

See, Hibiki-chan tilted her head too.

*ping*

Eh? A text-based Friend Chat appeared – oh, Hibiki-chan?

[I think the language here has a different sentence structure than Japanese. That’s why it’s different?]

Oh wow, I didn’t think that Friend Chat could be used like this to talk in secret. Maybe because I always used voice-based Friend Chat with the others.

But the mysteries of Translate-sama never seem to cease.

[Got it.]

I quickly replied to Hibiki-chan. There’s no keyboard, but it seems to register what I want to say alright.

Returning to the task at hand, I take a breath, fix my stance, and repeat the chant.

“Flow, aether’s light, and cover my eyes, bringing forth that which I seek.”

… Hm? I’m just saying the words.

Are? How do you chant?

I look over, kind of confused, at Desmond.

“What’s the matter?”

“No, well, even if I know the chant, how do I activate it?”

Oh, his eyes seem to have turned into dots.

I’m just as confused, though.

“… Perhaps I should see how you usually use Light Magic.”

Nn, but I’ve used it in front of you before, you know? It became a new Skill called [Reinforce Physical], but when I fight, I reinforce [Augment Body] with Light Magic. Certainly there’s a light glow all over my body when I do so, but it’s annoying so I forcefully repress it. It takes a lot more magic power, but that doesn’t really mean much for me.

This time, without repressing the glow, I trigger [Reinforce Physical] pretty easily.

“-!”

As expected, he’s pretty surprised.

But it’s not like chantless is impossible, it’s just rare, right?

“… I can’t believe you’re manipulating existing Light Magic as if it’s your own.”

Huh?

The surprise went in a different direction than I expected.

“Well, it is mine, though? At least, it was developed and originated in my hara.”

“No, no! That’s not what I mean by ‘yours’! Even as an avatar, it shouldn’t be that easy to manipulate already existing Light Magic! Normally, one should be petitioning Light Magic to follow your orders.”

… ah… right.

I was totally treating ‘Light Magic’ as qi, but come to think of it, there’s no reason that such a comparison should be accurate.

The fact that it’s been ‘accurate enough’ so far is a coincidental miracle.

That’s right, elemental magic was something that had to be cast through elements, wasn’t it?

No, well, you can manipulate pre-existing fire with Fire Magic even if you don’t cast it through the element, though?

When I say so, Desmond, who had calmed down, said,

“There is quite a difference between the four elements of reality and the two primal elements, you know? It already isn’t exactly easy to manipulate Fire, Water, Wind, and Earth that are already in existence, but Light and Dark are far more difficult. In the first place, it’s difficult to have a clear image of Light and Dark elements.”

“What about manipulating non-elemental magic?”

“That’s… I see, if you can truly manipulate non-elemental magic however you want, it’s not a stretch to think you can do the same with Light Magic, especially after becoming an avatar.”

Okay, so manipulating raw magic is actually a lot rarer than I thought, too.

Strange, Lor didn’t say much about it… or did he even know that I was straight up manipulating it? Or is it that there are some ways to manipulate it that are easy enough for other people to use, and that’s all I’ve shown him? Or like, it’s common sense for magical circuits to use non-elemental magic, but manipulating it without tools is NG?

I don’t know the answer, so let’s put all that on hold.

I’m actually a little upset.

No, well, the first Light Magic I saw was Pelma’s ‘illusion’ for Hibiki-chan, but then I thought, oh, it shouldn’t be that hard to emulate, but when I tried to do it later, it was a lot harder to emulate than I thought.

It seems like I’ve been getting conceited, since magic seems so easy for me, but in reality, I haven’t been really using Light Magic at all!

I mean, just manipulating some flames isn’t the same as producing a fireball.

So my Chinese fantasy qi manipulations were only ‘something like that’.

I can’t help but groan and hold my head.

“So that’s what it was…”

Desmond coughed, looking a bit apprehensively at me as he said,

“No, well, it’s actually more impressive that you’re able to manipulate Light Magic that isn’t placed under your control. Put another way, it’s something that’s rather a topic of concern for some members.”

Hm? He used ‘members’, rather than ‘people’.

It doesn’t feel like he’s talking about Aislin and Aidin, the elf twins he’s been traveling with.

No, well, I guess he could be talking about them; it just feels unlikely.

Although that’s just my instincts, so I could be wrong, I guess.

Well, anyway, I HAVE had practice casting through elements, although I usually think it’s too troublesome to do so, and I HAVE come into direct contact with the Light element (supposedly), so I should be able to cast the Search Spell based on biometrics that Desmond is trying to teach me.

Hey, do you think you could…

With that kind of feeling in mind, I reach out to Light, and… whoa!

Unlike other elements, as soon as I reach out, it feels like Light is just straining at the reins.

“Release.”

I can’t help but say that, and boy, did they(?) just go!

“Ah. There’s a glow all over the place.”

Like ripples going outwards, with me as the origin, waves of light spread out into the surroundings.

We’re trying to see if I can find Hibiki-chan, several meters away, but it seems I’m finding all the elves within 20 km.

Overshoot?

As expected, most of the elves are in Warden’s Post, but there are some wandering in the forest. Since they don’t seem to be in an excited state, I suppose they’re simply traveling. At least, they don’t seem to be hunting or being attacked.

Desmond sighs.

“It’s amazing to see. Indeed, you have magic power far beyond what people, elves or otherwise, have. If you have the extra room in you use of magic power, I would suggest requesting the light to be invisible. Otherwise, it would alert everyone to the fact that a large-scale magic is being used.”

“Ah, right.”

“Ne, then, did Jun-kun pass?”

Hibiki-chan asks. She can see the lights, but she can’t tell if it worked.

Well yeah, the data is accumulated in my head.

Since Desmond’s used the spell before, he can tell if it’s succeeded or not, but naturally Hibiki-chan hasn’t, and can’t.

Desmond chuckles at Hibiki-chan.

“Yes. My goodness, passed beyond my wildest expectations. I haven’t seen a true Light Magic user, no, an aether user, in ages. The Head Elder Deep Elf grandfather might have been the last one; I wonder.”

Ah… is that so…

But I still don’t know a lot of Light Magic spells.

I mean, I can grasp an image on how Fire, Water, Earth, and Wind spells should be, but Light? Or Dark?

Un, I can understand why Light and Dark are put into their own categories.

Rather than thinking I can bungle through satisfactorily, I think I should be humble and ask to be taught Light Magic spells.

I won’t know how to develop them otherwise.

As I was musing over this thought, Desmond sighed and said,

“The decline of true aether users has made it so we’ve lost much of the ancient technology. Like Living Swords, for example.”

Please continue.

Right before I can ask about it a ruckus sounds from behind us, coming from the direction of Warden’s Post.

“Sir Desmond, what has happened just now?!”

Ah. It seems like the light waves were noticed in the community.

Um… oops?

◇◇◇

Although the land was more arid the further south they went, there was a lot of flat space, and with irrigation systems developed through water stones, many farming communities were sprawled out on the second half of the journey between the two Labyrinths Cities, Nyl and Tren.

Rather than Tren City, it was a certain one of these farming communities that Seimei and Lor were interested in.

Although, with Masaki and Hyde in tow, of course they would be headed towards Tren Labyrinth in the end.

Hyde was just coming over to swap places with Tatsu, and was looking forward to hunting in Nyl Labyrinth, but was immediately dragged away by Seimei. If they didn’t go to Tren Labyrinth, Seimei was certain that Hyde would rebel.

◇Seimei◇

“This area produces the most libalm. It seems that if it’s not within this valley, cultivated libalm tends to have a much weaker efficacy.”

Listening to the half-elf, Lor, I looked out of the carriage window at the fields of herbs.

At first it was nice to see something other than arid plains, but now we’ve gone past field after field of libalm, a strange, wasabi-like plant with small, pale, white-blue flowers that grew off one stalk in ball-like clumps, not unlike hydrangeas.

Strange, in Japan, both wasabi and hydrangeas are plants that like being well watered.

It’s interesting that this libalm is a plant that grows in a much more arid climate that requires full sun. Although it needs more water than the natural climate tends to allow.

That, however, is easily solved with water stones.

Magic is an amazing thing.

In our world it could be considered free energy – well, of course it’s not something so convenient.

Magic stones that can effectively irrigate fields of these sizes aren’t really so cheap and must be handled carefully. The amount of magic needed also increases as the size of the stones increase.

Fertilizer for these herbs are also expensive.

A rare mineral mixed in with peat and ash made from certain trees… well, I don’t know the details, but Professor Lor seems to be aware of them.

Running a farm like this is rather expensive.

But libalm is the main ingredient of Mana Pots, so despite the expenses this business can be quite lucrative.

Technically, these farming communities are Unaffiliated territories.

However, as always, politics tend to muddy things up.

Merivolt, this town ahead of us, is the largest producer of Mana Pots. Of course, it is also Unaffiliated. However, this status of “Unaffiliated” has caused quite some trouble.

If the people of Merivolt established an organization for the security and safety of the town and the Mana Pot factories, it would be a sign of trying to self-govern, and would be a seen as a Kingdom.

If you’re not aware, this means that the non-infringement treaty would be void, and other countries could move in and wage war to annex the territory.

I suspect that even Carnus wouldn’t be entirely reluctant to take over the prime producer of Mana Pots.

It really is a dirty trick, perfectly sublime in its simplicity.

Without a way to keep order, obviously the Mana Pot factories would be at risk. However, even if they made a way to keep order, the Mana Pot factories would still be at risk.

Not just the products, the Mana Pots, but the facilities, the workers, and the owners are all at risk for greedy people who wish to lay their hands on some part of the business.

Currently, each factory is responsible for hiring their own security.

Trustworthy adventurers, strong enough to repel people with designs on the factory or Mana Pots, are expensive, which drives the costs up, and drives the prices of Mana Pots up.

It’s little wonder that some factories have taken to allying themselves with certain countries for guaranteed protection., despite the ‘tax’ that the countries would put on them.

Well, I’m not concerned with the factories but the farms themselves.

I will leave the mad scramble for Mana Pots and their factories to others.

Instead, I’d like to buy a farm or two.

I wonder if it will go smoothly.

---

<Previous Chapter]   [Index]   [Next Chapter>

---

<a/n: Omg, Jun, tell him you got turned into an avatar above the altar in Nyl City. Asdkfgh I just can’t deal when the characters get so close to the answer, and are yet so, so far away. Also, I was expecting to give at least a hint of an explanation, but somehow Jun just noped the eff off the topic.  Well, the detailed explanation is still slated for an arc in the future, and Desmond actually doesn’t know all that much, which would have turned it into having more questions than answers, so it’s not worth re-working.
orz
Jun’s been going a little more off-script than usual, but I guess since I didn’t have this part well-planned out, that was inevitable.
Anyway, we’re starting the transition towards Seimei’s side. Don’t worry, Jun’s still the main so we’ll only be hitting the ‘highlights’ for Seimei.>