Chapter 15

[Translator - Clara]

[Proofreader - Gun]

Chapter 15: Guardian of the Herb Field (3)

Unlike the city, the night in the herb garden was particularly dark, devoid of even a hint of light.

Perhaps because of that, countless stars sprinkled across the sky flaunted their presence.

Sitting on a cool platform and taking in the scene, Fran muttered to himself,

“They sure are shining bright. I’m a bit envious.”

“Envious? What do you mean?”

“I just wonder what it would feel like to live with such a brilliant light, being noticed by everyone.”

He directed his gaze towards Oscar.

“Well, someone like you, a genius, probably wouldn’t understand.”

“No… You’re quite exceptional yourself.”

“Even if it’s just flattery, thanks.”

It wasn’t flattery at all.

In reality, Fran had remarkable talent.

One didn’t have to look far to see that—he managed dual casting on his first attempt, after all.

To be blunt, he was a mage with a promising future.

‘I can’t even understand why Little Oscar would call this guy a problem child.’

If he had to point out a flaw, it’d be his occasional over-need for recognition.

He sometimes seemed lacking in self-esteem, which likely had something to do with his personal background.

“It’s not flattery. I’m not the type to give it anyway.”

“...Ahem.”

Perhaps sensing the sincerity in his words, Fran grew a bit awkward and changed the subject.

“Anyway, there really are a lot of stars.”

“Right. Back then, Sirin used to be like this too.”

Now, with streetlights illuminating the night, it was impossible to enjoy such a view in Sirin, but only about twenty years ago, watching the stars from the tower rooftop was one of his hobbies.

Fran shot him a skeptical look.

“Come on, how far back do you mean by ‘back then’? You’re born after me anyway. And by the way…”

Glancing around, Fran lowered his voice.

“Do you think Sirin’s herb industry can really revive?”

“We’ll only know once we try. But I don’t think it’s impossible.”

The thing he was most concerned about was whether the herb growers were still around.

If they had sold their land and moved away, restoring it would have been much harder.

‘But I heard that most of them stayed in Sirin, even after selling their land. So the skills remain intact.’

He couldn’t help but feel grateful to the Fourth Tower Master for that.

It would mean that the herb growers, who had wandered across the continent, truly considered Sirin their home.

“Hm. But can we trust them? Even if they were coerced, they still sold their land in the end.”

“……Do you think they wanted to sell their land?”

Oscar gave a bitter smile and replied,

“Fran, do you know the best way to break a strong will?”

“Something we learned at the academy, right? It’s softness, isn’t it? They call it ‘yu neng zhi gang’, where softness can control hardness.”

[PR/N: It’s a chinese idiom that means ‘the soft can overcome the hard’.]

That would be the correct answer on an exam, but Oscar shook his head.

“Hardness is the lowest approach, softness is intermediate, and from what I’ve learned in life, emotion is the best method.”

“…Emotion?”

“It’s what people often call compassion or sentiment.”

There are people in the world who won’t bend their will, even in the face of death.

But Oscar has seen that even those people waver when their loved ones are threatened.

“That’s why I don’t blame them. If the White Tower hadn’t fallen, if there had been power to protect them, the herb growers wouldn’t have been in that situation in the first place.”

In the end, if you trace it all back, it was indirectly his fault.

‘…But since I know now that the first button was fastened wrong, I can refasten it starting from here.’

Of course, the process would be inconvenient, tedious, and difficult.

But in the end, only a sense of satisfaction would remain, as always.

Because he has learned this well.

When you fall, just get up again; once you make a mistake, just avoid making it twice.

Oscar stood up from the platform, dusting off his pants.

“It’s late. Time to go to bed...”

In the middle of his sentence, Oscar suddenly turned his head to one side.

With narrowed eyes, he stared intently at a spot somewhere in the herb garden.

"What's with the creepy look? Did you see a ghost?"

"No."

Surprised, Fran turned his head as well, but he didn’t seem to sense anything unusual.

‘For Fran, who has decent magical perception, not to notice anything… That means whoever is approaching now is suppressing their presence as much as possible.’

Approaching silently under the cover of night was never a good sign.

Oscar spoke in a calm tone.

“Fran, we’d better prepare to welcome our guests.”

The cold night wind brushed past his hair.

* * *

“What’s gotten into them?”

Pop! Pop!

A green-haired man blew bubbles and popped them repeatedly, muttering with curiosity.

“I mean, last time when they offered to kill him, they refused, right? Kidnapping or threats were fine, but killing a ‘national treasure’ carries a different weight.”

The person who responded was an older spearman carrying a long spear on his back.

“Who cares? If the client pays, we do it. We’ve always done it that way, and we’ll keep doing it.”

“Do you get that indifferent about everything as you age? Ugh, I hope I never get that old.”

The three men walking through the night herb garden were mercenaries contracted by Dvor Powell.

While they called themselves mercenaries, they were actually wanted criminals with bounties on their heads, known as the infamous ‘Gunman Jack’s Gang’ in the northern region.

Jack, the leader, warned them,

“Don’t get careless. They said there might be a mage.”

“Hm. They said something about the White Tower, right? That’s a relief. It would’ve been harder if it were one of the other Four Great Towers.”

The green-haired man chuckled.

“Well, does it really matter? I’ve never met a mage who knew how to really fight. They all just walk around with their heads high, none of them are truly seasoned.”

“Yes, yes, we know you’re great, so don’t get too cocky.”

The spearman looked ahead.

“The map says it’s that house over there. But the lights are off. Seems early for bed…”

“Max, go check it out.” n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Okay.”

Max, the green-haired man, spat out his gum and quietly approached the cottage, crouched low.

With skillful ease, he picked the lock and silently opened the door.

Turning to look back, Jack gave him a nod, signaling to finish the job.

Max, keeping his steps light, pulled out a dagger as he approached the bed.

‘Hm?’

In the darkness of the cabin, something didn’t feel right, and his eyes narrowed.

Even with the blanket covering it, the shape beneath seemed too bulky to be a person.

“Damn it…”

It was a trap.

Just as Max realized this and began to turn to escape…

“You’re too quick to catch on.”

Thud!

The compressed air burst, and a spinning wind bullet drilled into his temple.

The result was instant death.

[Translator - Clara]

[Proofreader - Gun]

Max, who had long awaited his confrontation with a skilled magician, died without even a moment to feel pain.

"…Hmm."

Oscar's face showed a hint of surprise at the result he’d just created.

‘Wind Bullet, huh. Its lethality is higher than I expected.’

This was one of the spells from the book Reinterpretation of Basic Magic that young Oscar had authored.

A new style of attack magic that reinterpreted the weaponry of guns through the wind magic of the White Tower.

If Wind Cutter specialized in "cutting," then this was a magic focused on "piercing."

‘One down, three to go.’

Walking past Max's body, Oscar calmly stepped outside.

A spearman, meeting his gaze, asked,

"…What happened to Max?"

"He’s asleep inside. Go and fetch him, though he might be asleep for… quite a while. Maybe… forever?"

"Tch, foolish bastard. This is why I told him not to let his guard down."

The spearman clicked his tongue in annoyance.

Seeing this, Oscar nodded to himself.

'They're not amateurs.'

Despite the clear provocation, they weren't recklessly charging forward.

That meant they weren't the type to be easily consumed by momentary emotions.

"If he's already dead, then there's nothing we can do about it."

The gunman spoke to Oscar with a remarkably cold expression.

"Just tell us the location of the herbalist, and I promise not to hold any sentiment over Max's death."

"Heh."

Oscar admired his composure but had only one response.

"Just go ahead and hold on to your sentiment."

"If you're so set on seeing blood, then."

With a glare brimming with intent, the gunman gave the command.

"Kill him."

"As you wish."

The spearman, who'd nodded, closed the distance in an instant.

Oscar, still calm, watched his opponent carefully.

‘The main strength of a spearman lies in utilizing the long reach of their spear for a relentless barrage of attacks.

So the first thing is to neutralize that strength.’

Snap!

He clicked his fingers, and a Wind Shield materialized in front of him.

"Oh? Trying to block me with some shield?"

The spearman, scoffing, thrust his spear forward—only to pause, stunned.

For the Wind Shield had angled itself just right, deftly deflecting the spear.

Thrown off balance, Oscar seized the opening and moved in close.

'No way… was he aiming for this from the start?'

It was an eerie level of skill, a move that belied his young face with its sophisticated precision.

With just one exchange, he’d completely neutralized the spearman's greatest advantage—his range.

"…But, what a shame for you."

With a sinister grin, the spearman twisted his spear, which split into two short spears.

A strange and unique weapon.

His was a peculiar weapon designed to catch his opponents off guard, ensuring their defeat in a first encounter.

"Getting old means survival. Did you think I’d reach this age without compensating for my weaknesses?"

The two short spears sped toward Oscar’s vital points.

But Oscar muttered without a trace of concern.

"Oh, so that’s how it is."

Apart from a decent speed, everything about the spearman was ordinary.

He’d thought there must be a reason this man had survived to his age…

‘But what a letdown.’

Wind Bullet.

Pwoom! Pwoom!

In a flash, two bullets shot out, precisely hitting the tips of the short spears flying at him.

Unable to withstand the impact, the weapons splintered, and the spearman’s face twisted with shock.

"I-Impossible…!"

Such accurate shooting, at such close range, against a surprise assault with a unique weapon?

‘Even our leader couldn’t pull that off…’

Just as this thought crossed his mind, Oscar raised his long, slender forefinger and middle finger to point at the spearman's forehead.

‘Second one down.’

As Oscar gathered his mana to finish off the spearman—

“...!”

Every hair on his body stood on end.

His instincts, honed from countless battlefields and near-death encounters, screamed a warning.

You are in danger.

Wind Shield!

Reacting reflexively, Oscar stepped back and summoned three Wind Shields.

That movement ended up saving his life.

A bullet whizzed in from behind the spearman, piercing all three shields and grazing Oscar’s cheek.

Watching the blood trickle down Oscar's cheek, Jack shrugged.

"Too bad. If you’d let your guard down just a bit more, you’d have been dead for sure."

"…Wasn’t he your ally?"

"Technically, he was a subordinate. I can always find another one."

Criminals.

What a despicable bunch.

Looking down briefly at the spearman’s crushed corpse, Oscar asked,

"And what’s that toy of yours?"

"Oh, this?"

Jack shook the massive sawed-off shotgun he held in one hand.

"Well, calling it a toy wouldn’t do it justice. Just know it’s damn expensive."

As Jack leisurely loaded a new shell, sure of his victory, Oscar’s eyes narrowed.

"It’s enchanted with speed, power, and penetration—three effects, right?"

"…How did you know?"

"Because my shield couldn’t block it."

Had even one of those three enchantments been missing, his Wind Shield wouldn’t have been penetrated.

Only someone with absolute confidence in their magic would make such a judgment.

Jack, now finished reloading, murmured to himself.

"Arrogant, but skilled enough to back it up. So the White Tower wasn’t completely bereft of talent like you, huh?"

After a moment of contemplation, he shrugged and made an offer.

"Not bad. I like your battle sense, your sharp instincts, and your skill in reading magic… How about working with me?"

"No."

"Reason?"

Oscar jerked his chin towards the spearman’s body.

"I feel like my back would itch."

"Heh, I see."

Even Jack found the reasoning understandable and wiped away any remaining hesitation.

"In that case, there’s no need for further conversation."

Bang!

The gunshot echoed, resuming the hunt.

[Translator - Clara]

[Proofreader - Gun]