WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Irevi
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◈ I Became the Academy's Turn-Based Swordsman ◈
Chapter 113: Religious Zealot
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“Damn it!!”
Boom!
Climmud’s fist slammed into the innocent stone wall.
“You dare, you little brat...!”
Climmud thought of the name Halibal Velder.
Not long ago, in the Imperial Capital, the Empire’s Greatest Sword and that bitch from the Grace Family, both manipulated by Halibal, had nearly taken Climmud’s head. Climmud had only barely made it back.
As a result, the contact network painstakingly built with the White Usher Family over several years had been completely severed.
And that was not all.
Wanted notices had been spread throughout the Empire, making it impossible for Climmud to show his face outside.
It had been a long time since Climmud had experienced such humiliation, not since Climmud first joined the cult.
‘I’ll kill you, Halibal Velder!’
Under normal circumstances, Climmud would have acted the moment he returned.
First, thoroughly investigate everyone around Halibal and remove the things he cherished one by one.
Then slowly drag him into a swamp of despair, laughing as he delivered the finishing blow just before Halibal’s final breath. That was the Chariot’s way.
But the moment Climmud passed through the Return Magic Circle, Climmud noticed an unfamiliar magical power clinging to their body.
The Fire Seal Luna Grace had cast. Climmud had been too focused on guarding against Adeline until the end and had failed to evade it properly.
The location of the cult’s main headquarters, deep within the Demonic Realm, was the cult’s greatest secret.
Fortunately, the Fire Seal did not function properly amid the dense demonic energy overflowing through the Demonic Realm.
But the moment Climmud took even one step outside the main headquarters, the seal would immediately reactivate.
Those imperial bastards would instantly realize that the point where the magical signal came alive was the heart of the cult.
‘Damn it!’
Climmud’s position was already unstable as a newly appointed Bishop.
And to make such a blunder with the Grand Plan so close at hand.
Of course, the First Bishop could easily erase this paltry spell.
But the First Bishop was away to fill the gap left by Malias and Eliver.
Climmud’s furious gaze turned toward a long golden-haired boy in one corner of the room, his whole body covered in wounds.
The boy merely stared blankly into space, motionless as a doll.
“Ghk...”
Nobody knew when the First Bishop would return.
Until then, Climmud was trapped here and had been put in charge of training this mysterious little brat.
Climmud kicked the sword lying on the floor.
Clang!
The sword rolled across the floor and stopped at the golden-haired boy’s feet. The boy stared at it blankly.
“Pick it up!”
At Climmud’s growl, the boy picked up the sword.
After confirming it, Climmud pulled three books from inside their clothing and threw them onto the floor.
Accompanying Termina to the Imperial Capital had not been solely for the purpose of seeing Halibal.
The First Bishop’s direct order had been to teach the golden-haired boy suitable swordsmanship.
Upon arriving in the Imperial Capital, Climmud headed to the Imperial Swordsmanship Institute and copied every famous swordsmanship style apart from noble sword arts unavailable to commoners.
These were the three books Climmud had carefully selected from among them.
Before the boy could even pick up all the books.
Thud!
Iron bars dropped from the ceiling, locking the boy inside a cage.
At the same time, an unpleasant cry rang out from the darkness beyond the cage.
Kikikikikik!
The source of the cry was a Kobold.
“If you cannot master every swordsmanship style there, you will become that thing’s food.”
Climmud left the room, breathing heavily.
Clank.
Only the starving Kobold and the boy remained in the room.
Even with the Kobold right before him, the boy silently examined the covers of the books one by one.
[Belhart Style]
For whatever reason, the Mercenary King Belhart had openly revealed every aspect of this swordsmanship, including its Secret Art, to everyone regardless of whether they were commoners or nobles.
Thanks to that, the style itself was overwhelmingly more complete than the other two.
However, it seemed specialized for heavy swords or Strong Sword, making it unsuitable for the one-handed sword in the boy’s hand.
[Ruidel School Swordsmanship]
The Academy’s swordsmanship.
It had been adapted from the Empire’s military swordsmanship to suit students, making it easy to learn but pathetically weak.
And the final book.
“...”
[Halibal Style]
The instant the boy began reading the first page.
Kikikikikik!
Unable to endure any longer, the Kobold charged at him with its claws raised.
Without taking his eyes off the book, the boy raised his sword.
It was a sloppy stance from someone who had never learned swordsmanship.
Whoosh!
The sword cut through the air.
A moment later.
The boy’s eyes still did not leave the book.
On the Kobold’s chest, as it turned to dust at the boy’s feet, were wounds as though it had been cut twice in rapid succession.
⁎⁎⁎
The three of us had arrived beneath the Sky Nail before we knew it.
“What? It looks even more ridiculous up close.”
“Yeah. It’s pretty ugly.”
From afar, the Sky Nail had looked like a pillar, but in truth, it was little more than a patchwork tower piled high with useless scrap metal and ore.
When the dungeon had overrun the mine, the artisans erected a pillar made of Shards above it so that neither demonic energy nor monsters could escape.
But the anxiety passed down through the generations led the artisans’ descendants to repeatedly make repairs by attaching all sorts of junk to the pillar.
That was the result. I had meant it when I told Elia it was an eyesore.
A fence of tangled barbed wire stood near the Sky Nail.
Beyond it was a small, old, creaking door. That was the only entrance to the sealed crystal mine, the Demon Dungeon.
Two burly guards stood before it, holding hammers and pickaxes.
Having spotted us, they asked.
“...Your business?”
“We’ll be going inside briefly.”
“Denied!”
Thud! Thud!
When they forcefully struck the ground with their tools, I felt the energy of Shards amid the vibrations shaking the earth.
‘Abyss Cores.’
It truly was a city of artisans.
I had not expected even ordinary guards, rather than soldiers, to have Abyss Cores equipped.
‘This is the first time we’ve been stopped so openly.’
Of course, we had a free pass.
“I’m Adeline Windsor, an instructor at Ruidel Academy. We’ll go in and come right back out, so please allow us through.”
“I did not ask who you were, miss. Denied!”
Adeline turned to me with an impressed “Oh!”
“You heard that, right? They called me miss.”
The corners of her mouth twitched.
For some reason, she seemed oddly pleased.
‘That’s not what matters right now.’
“This is the Empire’s Greatest Sword, and this is the young lady of the Grace Family. We plan to scout the dungeon inside. Will you still deny us?”
Only then did the guards’ eyes waver.
Right. I needed to use the Empire’s Greatest Sword card instead of the Academy instructor card. I even brought out the Luna card in case that was not enough.
“E-even if that is true, denied! We are only following orders not to let anyone through here.”
“Would you still deny an order from Princess Alicia?”
“Bring us an official document, and we will open it. But if the young lady of the Grace Family enters without one and something happens, we of Gravner have no means to bear that responsibility.”
Unfortunately, bringing out the Luna card seemed to have backfired. I should have said nothing.
“What should we do? We were turned away at the door.”
“Yeah.”
“Still, weren’t they polite? Calling me miss, after all.”
Adeline poked me in the side.
I got it, so I wished she would stop.
Still, I could not believe my trump card had failed.
This made the trip pointless.
We could charge into other dungeons without scouting them first, but the Demon Dungeon absolutely required scouting because of its unique gimmick.
‘What do I do now?’
As I agonized over it, the other guard, who had been staring at me for a while, asked.
“So who is that boy there?”
“Me?”
“I know who the two misses are. The Empire’s Greatest Sword and the young lady of the Grace Family. They are certainly famous. But I have never heard the name of the one leading the negotiations.”
‘I did not mention it because there was no need to.’
My standing was fairly high as well, but it could not compare to the weight of those two names.
Still, the guard was not wrong, so I readily introduced myself.
“I’m Halibal Velder.”
“...The Funeral Sword?”
My epithet immediately came from the guard’s mouth.
I nodded.
Naturally, I thought nothing much would change, but for some reason, the guards began whispering among themselves.
They looked at me once, then at each other.
I had no idea what they were doing, so I waited quietly. Then one of the guards extended a hand.
A hand even bigger than Enedor’s came toward me, and I reflexively swallowed under the pressure.
But then.
“Bwahahaha! Are you really the Funeral Sword? The one who gave those religious zealots a beating?”
“...Excuse me?”
The hand landed on my shoulder.
“So it’s true! Look at this! It’s the great Funeral Sword who cracked the heads of those stuck-up religious zealots!”
“What? Why didn’t you say so earlier? So you were Halibal Velder!”
“You know me?”
“Of course I do! Word has spread all the way here that you are the one who exposed the hidden schemes of those shameless Church of the Main Gods bastards!”
Religious zealots.
Normally, that referred to the Tartarus Cult, but they were talking about the Church of the Main Gods.
The Church of the Main Gods had fully exploited the nature of religion to extort money throughout the Empire.
Gravner had been one of its main targets in particular, because the tools made by the artisans were all things the Church of the Main Gods would covet.
“Those useless freeloaders! Do you know what they did every year when they came here? They took money under the pretense of prayer, yet they could not so much as lay a finger on the monsters!”
Using the fact that Gravner was also a city with a dungeon as a pretext, the Church of the Main Gods visited the Sky Nail and bestowed blessings.
Naturally, those blessings were completely useless. Whether they bestowed them or not, monsters would never come pouring out from inside.
But with the logic of, “We bestowed blessings, so no monsters came out,” the Church of the Main Gods extorted an enormous amount of goods and ore from Gravner.
Because of that, the people of Gravner seethed at the mention of Erandar and the Church of the Main Gods.
But the Church of the Main Gods’ influence was so immense that Gravner could not defy them even if it wanted to.
My clearing of the Doll Dungeon had driven the reputation of that seemingly impregnable Church of the Main Gods into the dirt.
Since that incident, the Church of the Main Gods’ influence had plummeted, and as a result, it was said that the exploitation of Gravner had noticeably decreased.
“You are practically Gravner’s benefactor. Since you say you are doing something good, go on in. We will take full responsibility.”
“But earlier, you said you were following orders...”
“Bwahaha! As for that, see if you can put in a good word with the Princess for us.”
‘If they were going to let us in this easily, why did they stop us?’
When I looked at Adeline, she wore an expression that said she could not understand the situation at all.
How could the Empire’s Greatest Sword be less convincing than someone who cracked religious zealots’ heads?
“Miss, you should have said from the start that you came with this gentleman! We would have let you in immediately!”
Still, her expression softened like snow melting at the word “miss.”
“Wait a moment.”
The guard began unlocking the entrance.
Clack.
“Still, be careful, all of you. Our ancestors did not seal this place for no reason.”
“We will keep your advice in mind.”
As I gave the guards a slight bow.
Creeeak.
The closed door opened, and a gust carrying the smell of sulfur and dust poured out from within.
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