Wizard of the Deep Sea Chapter 18
TL/ED – Miso
“Linmel…! I’m going to miss you!”
“Rian unnie…!”
The day the knight came to take Linmel away.
The Orphanage turned into a sea of tears.
“Sniff… Linmel! I’ll miss you, boohoo!”
The Director was weeping while blowing his nose into a handkerchief like someone had died, and because Linmel had gotten along with just about everyone, not only the children her age but everyone came 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.
Still, it didn’t feel right to ruin the mood with a tactless remark, so I just stood there quietly, and at that moment, 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 time… What, what is all this?”
“Sniff, Knight-nim, you’re here?”
“Uh… yes. What exactly is going on here?”
“Everyone gathered to send Linmel off. Sniff.”
“…My daughter truly is blessed with people.”
When the knight got off the carriage,
“…”
“…”
Everyone went silent.
It was my first time seeing him, and wow.
Sure, I’d seen plenty of aspiring knights at the Academy, but a real knight was definitely something 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 Linmel with a solemn expression.
“Linmel. My name is Gwallan. I am the vice-captain of the Red Knights Order, a knight who has defeated five necromancers, seven demon tamers, and one witch. Can I take your standing here now to mean that you accept becoming my daughter?”
“Y-Yes!”
Linmel 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 someday you will surely become 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!”
Linmel 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…”
Linmel 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 remembered something, 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 statement. It would be demeaning 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 something 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 seemed Linmel wouldn’t suffer under his care.
Taking advantage of the moment when the children’s eyes turned to the box and they swarmed around it, I approached Linmel, who was still inspecting the sword.
“Linmel.”
“Ah, Jern!”
Linmel sheathed the sword and smiled as she looked at me.
Aside from the faint tear tracks, she wasn’t that different from usual.
“…”
And then, she looked at me with sparkling eyes full of expectation.
I had only come to say goodbye.
“Uh, do your best.”
“Yeah!”
“…”
“…”
“…That’s it?”
“What else am I supposed to do? You’re going to come here every day anyway. If we cry and say goodbye now, it’ll just be awkward when we meet again.”
“Humph…”
Linmel 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!!”
Linmel hugged me 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 Linmel 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 prime 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 something 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 something like this so naturally really made me 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 time, I was reviewing when I heard something 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 moment 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 something 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 came 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 comes out, right? Doesn’t that feel like wind magic?”
“That’s a stretch! How is that magic?”
“But it produces the same 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 same 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 name based on the source of power?”
“…I mean, I guess not, but still, magic is way stronger…”
“Don’t get me 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 something 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 something 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 something we had brought in. Rather than calling that magic, it’s more accurate to say it’s an output of something we received as input.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“No. In fact, the level of one’s output is one of the biggest elements 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 mean by something that doesn’t exist?”
“Usually, it means combining elemental magic to create something 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 elemental spells… hmm, this is technically the next level, but I’ll show you for clarity. Have any of you ever seen something suddenly float in midair in real life? Without any external force?”
“Nope.”
“Right? So, this is what I mean 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 something 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 me.
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 become familiar to me.
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 something I had to do.
“Telekinesis…”
Faintly, I could see a path to meeting Dersia’s requirements.
I diligently gathered the trash using wind.
“…Hm?”
In the middle of that, something 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 comes 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 something had been blocked, the broom started shaking on its own.
The control over the spell had twisted slightly.
Something 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 someone I knew.
No, someone whose face I recognized.
I frowned slightly without making it obvious and responded.
“You must have me mistaken for someone 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 meant for me 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 immediately started chattering away like she’d been waiting for it.
“First of all, thanks. If you hadn’t helped me 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 something before tying me up with bandages and throwing me out the window? I was seriously scared to death…”
“…”
Chatter chatter chatter.
I sighed, and thinking even this time was too precious, I secretly activated wind magic above us.
She seemed like she was going to talk for a while, so I might as well get some 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 something happen to me?
…Or maybe.
“Excuse me, one moment.”
I cut Elysia off and stood up, putting some 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 me 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 me 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 mechanism this was. I had no idea, but-
One thing was certain.
It was something I could use.
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