Despite the army commander's insistence that I should be executed or at least imprisoned for the destruction of the magical tomes, I was fortunate enough to be opposed by the soldiers of the duchy he despised, who sided with me, if not out of sympathy then out of utter contempt for Fanon's army: they caused news of the slaughterof the Baron reached superiors who had not necessarily been convinced to kill me at all costs.
— ...It's so soft and fluffy. — I saw myself wearing satin robes and lying on a large double bed filled with goose feathers. — I can't even call the straw turds I've been sleeping on all my life 'beds' after this. Maybe by accepting this reward I've ruined the experience of sleeping for myself for the rest of my life?
So, I found myself in a guest room of some nobleman in the capital, waiting for my scheduled meeting with some members of the elite, where I would be recognized for my deeds, receive a reward in the form of money, and perhaps an honorary noble title, non-transferable to my descendants, all a great spectacle to celebrate the fall of the last of the greatest nobles of the Shadow King's army.
— Except that if I step foot in the regions controlled by that big-nosed Knight or Master Rodrigues again, they will definitely do everything they can to kill me, and the money will go straight to their pockets to compensate for the expensive tomes I blew up. In fact, I'm in the red right now, because I had to pay for my promotion to special-class adventurer! How can that be fair?! I won, I saved the day, didn't I?! — I thrashed around on the bed like a jealous maiden. — Urgh, I need to distract myself with something — I got out of the extremely comfortable bed, put on my delicate guest slippers, and left the rooms larger than the house I grew up in.
Across the halls, the servants glared at me with barely concealed contempt, as if they were some sort of elite commoners just for working in a noble's house.
— ...Excuse me, I would like to visit the library — I asked the butler who had been planning to clean the doorknob to that room for about ten minutes.
The man took a deep breath before exhaling the longest and heaviest sigh I had ever heard, even when compared to that of soldiers being sent to deal with tasks with such high chances of death that it made the battlefield after the fight look more like the Hell of legends than anything built by the monsters and their Shadow King.
— Sir, I am sure you will find more entertainment in the stables. We have a couple of donkeys for you to talk to, and some heavy stones in the garden for you to try to lift.
In my career as a military man, adventurer, and commoner in general, there have been many times when I've wanted to kill a number of nobles and superiors, but that butler was certainly near the top of the list of killable people. Especially considering that he was also just a commoner and didn't have the same protections as a noble.
— ...Okay, right? Good luck cleaning up that piss stain I left in the corner, then — I pointed in a direction with my thumb, and the employee followed it as if I had had just reported to him that the Shadow King himself was attacking. Once he was distracted, it was easy to use my superior speed to enter the library. But as a reward to myself for acting so maturely instead of just beating the man up, I held the door ajar, watching as the butler tried his best to open it and kick me out, failing due to my 10 points in Strength. — Excuse me, sir, but I’m going to be a little busy here. But there’s plenty of shit in my chamber pot for you to talk to. Bye! — Finally, I locked the door, savoring every detail of the purple face of an arrogant butler biting his tongue in anger. — Right! Where do we start, then?
The answer was obvious: magic!
Much like how strategies, moves, and combat stances had been taught to me in the army, Spells were not something you could just get by depositing points into Occultism, but were learned. Unfortunately, however, the nobles, merchants, and scholars maintained a tight grip on that kind of knowledge, a strictly controlled and regulated monopoly. As an honored guest in the home of one of those nobles, however...
— For God's sake — for the first time in my life I came across magic textbooks. In fact, an entire bookshelf more than three times my own height, with six levels, all filled with tomes, scrolls, notebooks, and even some divine metal tablets, strangely enough. — Okay, where to start? Learning any Spell would already make a huge difference, but if possible, I would like to learn something with great offensive or defensive potential, or perhaps something that helps me with my left eye.
I selected one or two dozen various miscellaneous texts on the topic of magic, and the first one I opened was a volume entitled “Magic: What Is It, What Is It For, and How to Use It?”
— If I rush too much, I'll just end up blowing myself up by accident, like those goblins Julia saved me from. I still have a week or two of rest here, so let's start with the basics.
?
Despite being basic, that volume proved to be surprisingly enlightening and interesting.
— Huh. I wasn’t exactly expecting that. — Leaning on just two legs of the chair, I leaned back, looking up at the high ceiling, and pondering what I had just read. — When I saw Wizards throwing flying rocks and fireballs around, I thought magic was something much more… chaotic. But according to this book, it’s almost like mathematics: you write down the action to be taken step by step in your mind, the price for that action is automatically calculated, and then you deposit that price, and the Spell is performed automatically as well. Repeat that action enough times, and you learn a new Spell. That last part is a problem, though. In that training camp, I saw guys training two, three times as hard as others before unlock the Skills needed to join the military properly, and vice versa. This is what they call talent, or the lack thereof.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
I got up from my chair and walked past the dozens of shelves containing at least thirty thousand books, and went to the window of the large library, which was also larger than my childhood home... And maybe I should stop buying rich people's rooms with the house I grew up in, because everything seemed unbelievably larger than it. The windows alone were twice my height, and about three paces wide, and looked out onto a small rose garden.
— No, what surprised me the most was not the endless rules describing how fast the Spell must be cast, its size, its effect, and all the infinite factors that are calculated in its creation. It was the descriptions of the System itself. I guess it makes sense for mages to study it, since that's where their power comes from, but... — sweat broke out on my forehead and ran down my face to the tip of my nose. — Command: access advanced user interface — I repeated the instructions, and the effects were immediate; my little magical stamina from a mere 4 points in Occultism was completely drained, and I had to lean on the glass to keep from losing control completely.
Before my eyes, the following window floated:
Name: Wrong Way Haicard
Potential: Low
Strength: 10
Perception: 9
Occultism: 4
— Potential. In the book, this secret Attribute is described as the amount of God’s favor we possess, and it can vary depending on the actions we take. They advise aspiring Mages to take religious oaths, or find a purpose in life of the same nature, and while this makes sense from a theological point of view on the surface... It seems a bit at odds with the rest of the System, so regimented, such a vague rule — I talked to myself, trying to make sense of what I had just read, but I was sinking even deeper into doubts and questions.
— And apparently, Potential interferes with all other Attributes, and even the System as a whole, so a person with High Potential levels up faster — sitting on the floor and leaning my back against the wall, I scratched my head. — Could it be... Weren't we so superstitious after all? When my colleagues talked about good or bad luck, when I commented on psychological effects... Maybe it could all be the result of a High Potential or Low Potential? I mean, if I remember correctly my most successful colleagues, like Owl, they did have goals and promises to fulfill, of revenge, for example... And as soon as they fulfilled them, they died.
The pieces fit together, only to reveal a much larger puzzle.
— But wait... If that's true, why did I see monsters benefiting from such a secret Attribute? Only that would explain the actions of that hobgoblin who gouged out my eye! Maybe Demonia has a similar system for monsters? But why? Every generation or two, God and Demonia create their champions to compete for control of this world and bless them as best they can, because if they fought directly, they would destroy the world. But they're also willing to bless a bunch of other people and monsters, if they're faithful enough? Except that doesn't make sense, do you want followers or to win this fucking war? I mean, literally 100% of the elves already worship God, and 100% of the monsters already worship Demonia, so what's the point of testing their faith like this? If you can bless a bunch of people at once, go ahead and do it at once!
I stood up, feeling my breathing normalize, my magical stamina returning to more comfortable reserves. One of the words that came out of my mouth, however, caught my attention.
— War? Speaking of which, the Hero won, didn’t he? In fact, God’s champions of the past have won many times. Why don’t our deities, then, leave their realms to enjoy their victory? They used to do that in the past, didn’t they? I mean, these divine-metal ruins are proof of that. At least that’s what the… historians say…
Unconsciously and while I was still forming theories, my legs took me to the magic bookshelf, right in front of the most curious items in it. Hesitantly, I picked up one of the divine metal tablets.
— I... don't understand anything.
Literally: the words on the object were completely unfamiliar to me. In fact, none of the symbols on the tablet were comprehensible to me; curved and straight lines blended together in a pattern I had never seen before.
— It doesn’t make sense. It’s almost as if it wasn’t written in our language — there was only one language, that of the System. It’s always been that way. — Or so the historians say. — Architectures, Spells, and Abilities, species, and four thousand years of different yet parallel history, connected by one language, by one System.
Did the deities even care about what was happening in the world? If not, then why did they bless us? If so, why did they not enjoy the fruits for which they made us fight?
Once I thought about it, even the architecture of the ancient divine ruins didn’t make sense when compared to that visible in Paradise, or the Abyss City. Once I thought about it, the Shadow Baron I killed had been blessed with much more than the ability to level up faster than others; he said his Attributes had been increased out of thin air. Once I thought about it, weren’t the oaths that increased the potential of both elves and monsters exactly the same, of revenge, of great rewards in exchange for great suffering?
Once I stopped to think about it, something didn't make sense.
— Not with official theology, not with official history. Potential based on oaths? No, I have seen many a lowlife swear that one day they would fight alongside the Hero himself, only to die in the next battle. Those who succeeded were the lucky ones like me, or those who had seen Hell with their own eyes, and those with great passions, those with blood for tears, and those with unshakable smiles, truly worthy of mummers’ plays, each one. Divine architecture and will distinct from our deities — my hands shook and a terrified smile came to my lips. — It is almost as if-
The desperately comical realization sent my hand from trembling to a complete loss of coordination, and I let the tablet slip from my grip. But it never fell to the floor. I watched it hover in midair, and suddenly I was exhaling white clouds of condensation, the temperature inside the library having dropped to freezing degrees.
Slowly, I raised my eyes from the floating tablet and to the huge, horrific shadow before me, cast by the moonlight from the window behind me and displaying the irrational contours of the being that now stood behind me.
