Ascendance of a bookworm.., p.7
Ascendance of a Bookworm, Part 3, Volume 5, page 7
Having taken my advice seriously and incorporated it into his training, Damuel now knew how to vary the amount of mana he used in combat: he was using a little more when taking on the larger fetzes, and less when fighting the smaller ones.
“Damuel, it’s been some time. Take a step back and drink a potion.”
“There is no need, Lord Karstedt. I am doing just fine,” Damuel said, shaking his head as he stabbed a zantze with his sword. Maybe it was due to him being positioned between two absolute powerhouses this year, but he was swinging with a lot more confidence and making sure to confirm each kill.
“There’s no need to push yourself.”
“I truly am fine,” he replied quietly, not taking his eyes off the feybeasts for even a moment as he continued to swing his sword.
The battle continued for quite some time before Damuel eventually announced that he was falling back. This time, however, he was doing it on his own terms. Leaving the area he had been protecting to Karstedt and Ferdinand, he took a step back and leaned against the tree, downing a recovery potion. He would be resting until it took effect.
“Damuel, you’re so much stronger now,” I called down, leaning out the window of my Pandabus.
He looked up in surprise, then gave me a small smile. “Thank you.”
A short while later, I noticed that he had closed his eyes. I could tell from his careful breathing that he was checking how much mana he had. When he opened them again, his gaze was immediately fixed on the feybeasts. He morphed his schtappe back into a sword, then leapt into battle once again. It seemed that his limits had increased enough to give him a newfound confidence, and now he was fighting with much more leeway than before.
He must have been taking his training really, really seriously.
I knew how much Damuel had wished to grow stronger, so seeing his hard work bear fruit filled me with pride like I was watching my own son. His recent growth was a powerful reminder of just how significant of a driving force love really was.
As I was admiring how much Damuel had grown and grinning about his love life, Justus suddenly called out to me. “Milady, it’s time! I believe you should now pour your mana into the ruelle!”
After taking a deep breath, I leaned out of my Pandabus and reached for the ruelle fruit, which looked a lot like a purple crystal. Dyeing it with my mana was no easy task: all living things had an instinct to reject outside mana, so they violently resisted the process.
I gripped the hard, smooth ruelle in my hands and started pouring in my mana all at once, visualizing myself smashing its resistance to pieces. The fact that I could feel slightly less resistance than last year likely meant that I had grown a little myself too.
I continued adding more and more mana, focusing my gaze on the ruelle as I steadily overcame its resistance. It wasn’t long before it started turning from a translucent purple to a light yellow. Last year, it had felt as though my mana was being pushed back, but there wasn’t anything like that now; my mana flow was fast and uninterrupted.
“Justus, will this do?” I asked, looking around just in time to see him cut down an eifinte on his way over.
Once the threat was eliminated, he flew up to the ruelle, staying on guard. “That was fast, milady... But yes, it’s done. Upon removing it from the tree, please place it inside your bag at once.”
The ruelle had now completely changed color. I held it in my left hand as I cut the stem attaching it to the tree with my magic knife, then trimmed away all the excess parts before putting it into my bag. It was a bag that blocked the flow of mana, so I didn’t think I needed to worry about feybeasts snatching it away anymore.
“She’s finished her gathering!” Justus called.
Karstedt responded with a firm nod. “Then we retreat!”
“Not yet!” I shouted back. “Wait just a little longer! Damuel needs a ruelle too!”
Ferdinand blasted a crowd of feybeasts to bits, then shot me a fierce glare. “What are you thinking, Rozemyne?!”
“Doesn’t he need a sizable feystone for his proposal next summer? He won’t have any opportunities to gather one himself while he’s guarding me, so he might as well grab it now. I learned all about this from the knight stories,” I said, proudly puffing out my chest.
Both Ferdinand and Karstedt smirked at my remark, almost as if to say, “Look at this kid who can’t even distinguish fiction from reality.” I couldn’t help but blink in surprise.
“Did I misread them or something...?”
“No. However...” Ferdinand trailed off, then directed a meaningful glance at Brigitte. I immediately understood. You were obviously supposed to prepare the feystone stealthily, not in front of the very person you planned to propose to.
Gaaah! I thought I was being considerate, but was I actually just making things awkward for him?!
As I cradled my head in sheer horror, a wide grin spread across Karstedt’s face. “Go get one, Damuel. You won’t find feystones of a higher quality than those. They’ll be perfect for your proposal,” he said, continuing to cut down feybeasts all the while. Perhaps it was just my imagination, but I could have sworn I also heard him say, “Elvira really is looking forward to seeing what happens next.”
Having the approval of the knight commander had sealed the deal, so both Eckhart and Ferdinand told Damuel to hurry up and get it over with. I peered over at Brigitte and saw that she was silently continuing to hunt feybeasts, intentionally not looking this way at all. It was a little hard to notice since it was dark and she was so far away, but it seemed that her ears had gone a bit red.
Sorry, Brigitte... I really didn’t mean to embarrass you like this.
Damuel flew his highbeast up to a ruelle, then chanted “messer” to morph his schtappe into a knife. While I needed a high-quality feystone dyed completely with my own mana, Damuel needed a feystone meant for proposals. He wouldn’t have to dye it with his own mana right at the tree like I did.
He speedily chopped away some branches and gathered two nearby ruelles, one for the proposal, and one presumably for his own purposes. Then, with a pleased smile, he delicately placed them both in his own leather bag.
“This is my first time ever getting such a high-quality feystone,” he said. “I’ll bring it home and take my time filling it with my mana.”
Upon returning to Dorvan’s winter mansion, I slept as soundly as could be, filled with a mix of pride and satisfaction at having finally finished gathering all the materials I needed.
When morning came, I practically skipped down the hall toward Ferdinand’s room. He had told me to come and see him after eating breakfast, presumably to continue the paperwork we hadn’t finished the day before. I was planning to put my all into it so that we could start making the potion as soon as possible.
I’m going to be healthy soon! I’ll get strong and everything. I’m finally going to be a normal girl. Eheheh... Eheheheh!
Damuel had headed to Ferdinand’s room ahead of time, so I was currently being accompanied by Fran and Brigitte. I bounded along until we eventually arrived, at which point one of Ferdinand’s attendants waiting outside opened the door to let us in.
“Good morning, Ferdinand! What do you need help with today?” I asked, greeting him in a bright and lively tone. But the atmosphere in the room was so heavy and serious that I hurriedly shut my mouth. Nobody was working—that is to say, everyone but the attendant waiting by the door had been cleared out, leaving nobody to do the work. It was just Karstedt, Ferdinand, and Eckhart, all regarding me with deep frowns, and Damuel, who met me with a pitiable stare like he was begging for help.
Um, Damuel...? What did you do?
“Brigitte, Fran. Leave.”
I fought back the urge to cling to Brigitte and Fran as they sped out of the room, instead just blinking in utter bemusement. That gave Ferdinand ample opportunity to glare at me.
“I imagine you know why you are here, Rozemyne,” he said. “What exactly did you do to Damuel?”
I honestly had no idea what he was talking about. Were they mad at me because I had treated Damuel wrongly as my guard knight? I desperately tried to recall everything that I had done recently.
“Um, um... What did I do to Damuel...? Do you mean when I suggested that he gather ruelles last night? Or when I gave him sweets while he was on guard duty the other day? Oh, but I gave those to Brigitte too, so—”
“No! Nothing like that at all. I am inferring that you are responsible for the unnaturally large increase in his mana capacity.”
“...His mana capacity increased as the result of his own hard work. I did give him a little advice to help him out, but nothing would have happened without his rigorous training and dedication.”
Upon finding out that this was simply about Damuel’s recent growth, I let out a sigh, relieved that they weren’t actually mad at me. But Karstedt looked down at me with a stern expression.
“What in the world was that advice you gave him, Rozemyne?” he asked. “His growth is outright abnormal. A laynoble like Damuel at the end of his growing period should not be displaying such a considerable increase. It’s unprecedented.”
“I just taught him my mana compression method with a visual example, in the same way that he used gewinnen pieces to help Angelica understand tactics,” I said.
Karstedt and Eckhart frowned in confusion. Ferdinand, however, regarded me with angrily raised eyebrows. “Your mana compression method? I was not told of this.”
“Hm? I mean, you’ve never asked me about it, Ferdinand. It hasn’t really come up in conversation. Also, I developed it myself, so I don’t even know whether it’s a good thing for people to do. Maybe it just happened to work well with Damuel,” I said thoughtfully, but Damuel slowly shook his head.
“I believe anyone going through puberty would see an exceptional increase in their mana capacity by using your mana compression method, Lady Rozemyne. I simply didn’t report it because I did not want to return to being below average after finally getting more mana. Forgive me.”
If everyone learned the same method and increased their mana capacities, then the average would rise with them, putting Damuel back at the bottom.
“I understand why you would want to hide it,” Eckhart said. “It would make perfect sense to keep such a method a personal secret, or even have it passed down through one’s family.”
It seemed that Damuel wasn’t getting scolded for keeping the technique a secret, but then why were we even here? I turned to look at Ferdinand, who was watching me quietly with his light-golden eyes.
“Rozemyne, it seems that, unlike Damuel, you did not intend to keep this a secret. Why, then, did you not think to spread this method throughout Ehrenfest, knowing that we are experiencing a mana shortage?”
“Well, I mean...”
It was true that Ehrenfest was currently suffering from a shortage of mana, and that most people probably took great interest in finding ways to help increase the amount of mana available. But I wasn’t most people. I was wholly focused on spreading books, so it never really occurred to me that I should try to spread my method.
“Compressing my mana is something that I constantly needed to do to survive while living on the brink of death. I didn’t really consider it something worth teaching to nobles with magic tools, and it’s possibly a dangerous method that might actually kill people. I don’t want to spread something that dangerous.”
Karstedt gave an understanding nod, but Ferdinand pressed a finger against his temple. “Then why did you teach it to Damuel?” he asked.
“Damuel knows of my origins, so he understood the true meaning and weight behind me saying it was something that I did while on the verge of death.”
Everyone else here also knew about my origins, and they all seemed to be wearing the same difficult frown.
“I see,” Ferdinand eventually responded. “I understand your perspective, and why you did not feel motivated to make your technique more widely known. I will, however, ask you to spread it nonetheless. I wish for this mana compression method to be taught to other nobles in Ehrenfest. The mana shortage is a problem that must be solved as soon as possible, and nothing could be better for us than increasing the mana capacity of the children who shall support Ehrenfest in the future.”
I could sense the slight urgency in his voice, but my understanding was that, for the past two years, Ehrenfest had managed to meet its mana quotas and yield bountiful enough harvests thanks to me performing Spring Prayer. As much as I could understand him wanting to increase the mana capacities of the blue priests who helped us to offer up mana, I didn’t understand why he would so fervently want to increase the mana capacities of all nobles in general.
“It seems like you’re in a big hurry to do this,” I observed. “Is there a reason for that?”
“Not particularly. It is just one more way to prepare for Georgine using her position as Ahrensbach’s first wife to harm Ehrenfest. Raising the average mana capacity of our nobles would aid us considerably.”
If Ferdinand needed my help for some plan or another, then it would probably be wise for me to provide it. But my mana compression was hardly a reliable and safe process; I didn’t want to just throw it out there in its current state.
“I don’t mind spreading my method to help the duchy,” I said. “But I do have some conditions.”
Conditions for Compressing Mana
Eckhart and Karstedt inhaled with surprise, but Ferdinand simply raised an interested eyebrow. “Continue,” he said.
“First, it must only be shown to those who have already learned the method taught in the Royal Academy,” I explained. “This is a life-and-death technique, so I have absolutely no intention of showing it to people who can’t already compress mana on their own.”
Ferdinand, Eckhart, and Karstedt all nodded along slowly, as if my first condition were only natural. Damuel alone stood there awkwardly, clearly more concerned about whether or not he would be punished than what we were talking about now.
“Second, my technique may be taught only to those in the same faction as me. I have no intention of helping my opposition to get more mana.”
It was purely because of my mana capacity that I had been accommodated as an apprentice blue shrine maiden and then adopted as the archduke’s daughter, despite being a commoner. I wanted to preserve my superiority in that regard at least a little, and even I knew that it wouldn’t be safe to aid my enemies like this.
“Restricting my technique so that only those in the Florencia faction increase their mana capacities would help to destabilize the Georgine faction, would it not?” I continued. “And with Sylvester set on Wilfried becoming the next archduke, this should be a good way of showing that he’s firmly on our side.”
Georgine’s supporters were desperate to absorb Wilfried into their faction, but having both him and the archduke deny these ties, as well as making it clear that Wilfried was a member of the Florencia faction, would cause any rumors about such an alliance to die out over time. The only reason such hearsay existed in the first place was because there was a lot of uncertainty in politics and Wilfried wasn’t yet properly educated, so all we needed to do was tie him to his parents more.
“Would that not give you full control over the selection process?” Ferdinand asked. “I cannot say I would feel safe leaving such an important matter to your discretion.”
“I’m still not all that familiar with noble politics myself, so I feel the same way.”
I barely knew anything about which nobles had connections to which. It already took everything that I had to memorize the names of all the nobles related to my own family, and to put together a blacklist based on Bezewanst’s letters. But neither group was necessarily set in stone, and the value of what was at stake would surely cause people to become desperate, so I didn’t want to be in a position where it was solely my call whether or not any given noble was trustworthy.
“Instead,” I continued, “I propose that nobles should need the approval of six different people: the archducal couple, as they hold the highest authority in Ehrenfest; you, Ferdinand, since you can use your wealth of knowledge to make rational decisions not influenced by emotion; Father, because he is the pillar of our military as knight commander; Mother, as she is the de facto leader of the Florencia faction; and lastly me, since I am the one providing the mana compression method.”
Most of the people listed were quite simply my guardians; if someone had all of their approvals, then it was hard to imagine they would turn out to be one of my enemies. That was about as much insurance as I could ask for.
“Oh? That is quite a number of people. Is the archducal couple not enough for you?” Ferdinand asked with a slight, amused grin.
“I personally think Sylvester would prioritize his feelings as a father, freely giving away the information no matter what faction gets involved with Wilfried, and I similarly believe that Florencia’s motherly affections would allow her heart to be swayed.”
Karstedt gave a deep frown. “Rozemyne... are you saying that you don’t trust the archducal couple?”
“I do trust them, but they are parents; I feel as though they’ll put their children above all else. Just as my... Just as Mom and Dad did for me.”
Perhaps due to having met my lower city parents before, Ferdinand seemed to instantly understand what I meant. A complex expression arose on his face—a mixture of reminiscence and bitterness. “So you base your expectations of parental emotions on them...” he said. “You will find that such a perspective does not hold water in noble society.”
“Everyone has their own thoughts on parenthood, so I don’t really care whether or not it holds water.”
My personal opinions were rooted in my experiences with my Earth mother, who had given me all the books I could ever want, and my commoner parents, who stood up even to nobles to protect their children.
