03 - Regarding a Returning King’s Magic

‘I’m… tainted! I will never die a peaceful death!’ Roa bit his lips with great grief.

The first time he ever had a full meal; his mother’s gentle voice while singing him a lullaby; his first gold coin… Roa expected to see joyous moments such as these to ease his passing. Instead, horror took over at the thought of Solitaria’s nonsense playing out at a heightened speed.

—Hah! So those irritating things relieve themselves and pass waste at the same time?

‘No! I can’t die! Not like this!’ A surge of energy shot throughout Roa’s body. Though living with the same limitations as his past life would be unfavorable; dying with his final thoughts being about an avian’s genitalia… was a worse indignity.

He had to live, even if it meant losing an arm again.

‘Your technique, Hadar! —I’ve seen you use it enough times. It’ll be the only thing of use right now. I hope it’s enough, dear friend!’

Infusing mana into his blade was insufficient against the Seed of Fire. And sword aura? Roa had yet to awaken it. Right now, he was undeniably weak.

Even so—the 10th, seat of Hadar’s signature spell, Roa would try to imitate it. He raised his left hand and slammed it against the face of his weapon. He drew what little mana he could and with his fingers, etched them onto the blunt edge of his blade.

‘You said only a genius could pull this off—?!’ Roa smirked slightly. A warm current of mana culminated in his hand, a feeling he had lost when his right arm was cursed. He yelled out, “Quench!”

Water—enough to fill a cup—formed from the light of mana and enveloped his blade. The result was a pale imitation of the seat of Hadar’s spell, looking as if it would soon disperse. Roa had a faint hope that his splash of water would be enough against the barrage of vines radiating immense heat.

He swung his blade to deflect the first attack—splattering droplets of sap from the vines that were hot enough to burn one’s skin. Again, he swung towards the second vine, and then the third, the fourth…

In a short span of time, he had deflected numerous vines. Soon, his blade was deformed and was not too far away from breaking, meanwhile underneath his clothes, numerous red burn patches were scattered on his skin. His exhaustion was nearing its peak.

‘Silly, why don’t you just cut down all these things?’

“You think I can cut anything using a stick with some spit?” retorted Roa, though after doing so, his mouth remained agape.

‘Tsk! Shouldn’t something sharp be used to cut? Why use a stick? It is savior’s fault for using something like that to cut! Even I know that to cut, one must use something sharp!’

Nonsense mentioned with a proud stance—Roa wasn’t wrong to lose his composure. Initially, he thought that a fragment of his memory replayed itself in his head when in fact, it was the actual self-proclaimed dragon!

—Solitaria was here!

‘I’ll help you out, Savior. A small flame like this is easy, heh—snap! I’ll return to my nap after, but you better talk lots with me when I wake up!’

An ominous giggle skittered around Roa’s thoughts and a chill raced down his spine. He suddenly saw his left arm moving independently from his will, towards his front, breaking his stance. Now, it was positioned to grab Ariene’s vine.

‘This jabbering lizard—what did she do!?’

The situation went out of hand, literally. All at once, a barrage of questions tried to fit themselves through the gate of Roa’s mind, causing his train of thought to cease.

‘There’s no helping it… I hope Ariene only takes the hand,’ Roa lamented, and prepared for the inevitable searing pain that was about to crawl up his left arm.

As soon as the burning vines touched his fingers, a brand appeared around his left arm—a stigma—emanating a luminous cyan glow, dispersing Ariene’s magic—poof!—leaving behind nothing but fizzling remnants of the dying fireworks.

In Roa’s eyes, past the embers that beautifully floated down, reflected Ariene. Her expression was dull and her eyes in full disbelief. She slumped down in surrender and collapsed onto the ground, depleted of her mana and will to fight.

“Hah…” Roa let out a wry chuckle. “I really hate surprises.”

His expectations were turned on its head. He’d won.

He turned to the referee who’d become slack-jawed, and tossed his deformed blade to their feet. This reminded the man to announce Roa’s victory, and finally ended the second assessment. Inwardly though, Roa started cussing the man out.

‘This was a simple spar. This bastard should have stepped in the moment Ariene unleashed her signature spell.’

Roa knew full well why his safety wasn’t assured in the mock battle. In the eyes of the majority, he was supposed to lose this match. For the academy, him being crippled or losing his life only served to gain benefits from Forest Riviera, and they would only lose a red tier student from the slums.

‘They were taking advantage of Ariene’s precarious status. When did the great Luveris Academy fall so far?’

Perhaps not all of Luveris was privy to these malicious plans. Roa knew that there were those still upholding the beliefs of the academy’s founder, the belief where all talents were to be equally given a chance to be nurtured. However, the influence of those few had already been buried by the majority falling into corruption.

If there were any chance of holding up against the Spirit Domain’s inevitable encroachment, it would be in their best interests to undergo a reform. —The earlier the better.

Roa mulled over the things he had to do, the things he needed to accomplish in this fresh start as now, he lay comfortably incapacitated in the infirmary.

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Minor burns; bandages; the ceiling’s white paint; a soft, familiar bed—whilst taking in the lingering scent of disinfectant in the air, there were only two things in this room that were foreign compared to before: Ariene Diadora, resting unconscious on a different bed, and his left arm, still firmly attached to his shoulder.

Of the two, you’d think that a healthy young man’s attention would divert to the slumbering beauty over at the next bed but currently, Roa was busy holding his left arm in the air, inspecting it for any abnormalities.

A roll of each finger; a flick of the wrist; a twist of his elbow—eventually, he began to converse with the arm.

“Hey, I know you’re awake,” Roa bluffed, but his arm only responded in silence. He continued, “Keeping quiet won’t do you any good, I thought you wanted to talk?”

Solitaria followed him over from his past life, of that he was sure. She had done something to his arm early on and saved him from an unfavorable outcome. How she had done so, or where she was hiding, whether her presence would be good or bad—to avoid having any unwanted surprises, Roa eagerly wanted to know.

“Fine! If you don’t want to talk, then keep sleeping. See how I knock on that head of yours if you ever show up in front of me again!” Roa heaved a helpless sigh before shutting his eyes. A minute later, he had fallen sound asleep.

Grasping every dull moment to get some shut-eye in the Spirit Domain was a skill ingrained into his very being. Such that even after coming back to his younger self, he had taken advantage of this time to quickly recover from his lethargic state.

Meanwhile, whilst he had begun his recovery, over on the other bed, a slightly trembling Ariene was already awake.

Even earlier than Roa, she had already opened her eyes to the white paint of the infirmary’s ceiling, but pretended to still be asleep as she spotted him suddenly reaching his hand into the air. She listened to his grumbling—developing a crude misunderstanding that would soon be to the benefit of the unwitting Roa.

Thoroughly suppressed, and by a stupid-looking boy who looked no less young than her—unknowingly she’d developed a small fear of him. Even more so now that it seemed like he had marked her, threatening to knock her head if she showed up in front of him—whatever that implied.

Still, with the amount of pride instilled in her, she furrowed her brow, cursing softly, ‘Hmph! Roa Fariche—is he right in the head!? How dare he embrace someone and suddenly threaten them!?’

Recalling that certain incident from the corridor, blood rushed to her cheeks. And then their mock battle—the dumb smile he wore; the way he fought; and that sudden kick to her jaw. She felt infuriated!

‘He was leading me on!’ she realized earlier, and thus, that was when she had lost control of herself and her magic.

What immediately poured water over her searing pride was the moment she’d witnessed her signature spell dispersed by a mere wave of the boy’s hand, and her remaining mana mysteriously drained.

‘How did he do that? Who is he? I’m sure he wasn’t sent by those old fogeys from the woodlands…’

Ariene snuck a peek at Roa. He was mumbling, and now he was suddenly asleep. Whether he was faking it or not, Ariene decided not to move against him for now. Not until she was certain of his identity.

In the meantime, while both Roa Fariche and Ariene Diadora lay in the infirmary, inside a large room located at the heart of Luveris Academy, an assortment of people gathered around a huge circular table.

Inlaid in the middle of the table, a mana crystal gave off a bright cerulean hue whilst arcane runes displayed vivid imagery overhead. The images playing were of the earlier sparring matches, an accurate depiction of the second assessment.

On each corner of the arena used for the sparring matches, were embedded with four particular mana crystals, capable of temporarily recording the flow of mana between themselves in the form of information and three-dimensional images.

Configuring a mana circuit onto the surface of a material called draumadite, and utilizing arcane runes, the information stored within the mana crystals could be extracted and shown through countless refractions of lights bouncing rapidly between crystals. —A way of recording a scene with the use of magic research.

Through these recordings, the results of every match were carefully scrutinized by the board of Luveris Academy. When it finally came to the match between Roa Fariche and Ariene Diadora, an enormous amount of attention was suddenly drawn.

“Huh? This is the Seed of Fire? She lost? Weren’t we supposed to keep an eye on her?” One person said apathetically, his curly mustache dipped into a cup of tea he held shortly after.

Across the table, a fae—someone with long, pointed ears and green hair admonished him, “Noreau! Watch your mouth! Do you think a mere spar would elicit the Seed of Fire’s full strength!?”

“What? Seeing her unconscious hasn’t convinced you?” The man called Noreau replied. “I’m more interested in the other party. Which kingdom taught him to fight like that? What of his background?”

“Roa Fariche,” answered another member of the board, “-from Bellona District, Lyria City. Kingdom of Luveris. —Says here, he was assessed with a red tier spirit.” The member held a stack of papers, likely information about the assessment’s notable applicants.

About what was said, there were two types of reactions that generalized what everyone at the table thought.

Hailing from the Kingdom of Luveris, the aristocrat, Noreau Philitte raised his curiosity, “Bellona? The way he applied a simple spell onto his weapon—did that come from the slums as well?”

A guest professor from the woodlands, a fae with green hair protested, “Being a red tier makes sense, but holding his own against Forest Riviera’s Seed of Fire? That’s impossible! I don’t believe it! He must’ve used some kind of trick!”

The member holding papers took a certain sheet from the stack and displayed it for everyone else to see. On the front was an image of a boy with a dumb smile; lining half of his face and on the paper was a distinct seal stamped with red ink.

This particular seal caught everyone’s eye.

“He… applied with that? Is the seal legitimate?”

“You think anyone can fake the founder’s token?

“Then, he’s a student endorsed by the founder? A kid from the slums? Bah!”

Noreau Philitte was astonished, while the woodlands’ professor voiced doubt; the fae’s following sentence touched a nerve amongst the other professors, “Is it possible that the seal he submitted was stolen?”

“Stolen!? The founder hands over the applicant’s invitations personally! If a seal was stolen from an applicant, the family would have reported it before the end of the admission period, which was today!”

There were few instances of this logic being rebuffed, such as: the founder’s seal being sold on auction; or stolen from the academy founder directly; both instances proving highly improbable. And a kid from the slums couldn’t have possibly obtained it from either choice.

There was a long list of other ways to go about it, but most people would never think of selling the seal, and would keep it secured until the date of admission.

“—Hmph! Such are the narrow views held by those mentoring the current generation,” a certain Roa Fariche mused. Although the person being discussed was lying on a bed in the infirmary, he had already inferred that there may be a problem with his admission to the academy.

This time, he lacked Forest Riviera’s recommendation. He hadn’t lost against Ariene, and he wasn’t debilitated. He was sure that he was now suffering from STD—social and traditional discrimination—and that his passage into the academy may be seeing some unforeseen difficulties.

A slum brat applying for the prestigious Luveris Academy was unprecedented, Roa was well aware. His decision to apply, and what had enabled him to do so… He wasn’t a bastard son of any noble; he wasn’t the son of a rich aristocrat that was able to pay into the academy; nor was he admitted because of an incredible talent in magic.

All Roa did was to try and sell an odd looking coin he had once ‘procured’ to a greedy shopkeeper.

“Ah,” Roa took out the coin from his inner pocket and held it in front of himself. Scrutinizing its tasteless design, he thought, ‘I remember I stole this thing from some rich looking old man. Who’d have thought that it was a token of admission for the academy?’

Roa smiled as continued to recall and organize more details from his distant past.

—End of Chapter 3