WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 56

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Reunion After Five Years (2)

"Kiril?"

"How are you here already?"

At Kiril Farreira's sudden intrusion, both Farreira parents' eyes went wide.

Cesar Duchy sat in the southeast of the continent, quite far from Farreira territory.

Three times farther than Krono Fencing Hall, at least.

So it couldn't be that she'd heard about Airen Farreira and rushed over.

His own parents hadn't even faced their son for a full hour yet.

But what Kiril said next left the couple utterly deflated.

"I just came."

"Just?"

"Yeah. I had this really strong feeling that Oppa was about to come out, so I left early. Glad I was right. He really did make it out. Out of that damn barrier."

The answer was absurd enough that Amel, despite hearing her daughter use such crude language, couldn't even bring herself to scold her for it.

Harun just opened and closed his mouth, at a loss for words.

Airen, though, wasn't startled at all.

He'd heard something like this from Lulu before.

Some especially gifted Sorcerers showed something close to foresight when it came to matters they cared about.

His sister's case seemed to fit that description.

And that meant Kiril had become a Sorcerer skilled enough to measure up even by Lulu's standards.

'I don't even need Lulu's word to see it.'

Airen studied the sister he hadn't seen in so long.

The last softness in her cheeks was gone, leaving her face slender and sharp. Her height had grown almost beyond recognition.

Her eyes still carried that slight edge he remembered, but even that felt different now. Colder, maybe.

More than any change in her looks, though, it was the change inside her that caught his attention.

A faint hum stirred in the air.

Was it because she'd awakened her Sorcery?

He could feel a mysterious energy in her that hadn't been there before.

That was likely the source of her power as a Sorcerer.

Even without fully understanding it, Airen could sense how formidable that power was.

His sister had grown. Just as he had.

The realization brought a smile to his face.

"What? You're smiling?"

Kiril caught the smile and glared at her brother.

Her eyes were sharp enough to cut. Airen flinched, just slightly.

Too late, though. Already irritated, she pressed on in a voice gone colder still.

"What's so funny?"

"No, it's just, it's been so long, I'm glad to see you..."

"That wasn't that kind of smile."

"Uh..."

"What was it, then? What did it mean?"

"Kiril. How can you snap at your brother again, right after seeing him for the first time in so long?"

"..."

Amel Farreira, having finally recovered her composure, scolded her daughter, and Kiril visibly quieted down at the words.

Some things, at least, hadn't changed. That much was a relief.

But she wasn't entirely cowed either.

Still with plenty of steel in her voice, Kiril spoke again.

"Anyway, let's finish what we were talking about."

"Which was?"

"The Subjugation Campaign. You don't need to go, Oppa. I'll go. That's why I came."

"Kiril? What do you mean by..."

"I'm not being stubborn about this, Dad."

Harun Farreira, about to scold her, shut his mouth instead.

It was the look in Kiril's eyes.

Nothing like the easily riled girl she used to be. A calm, steady gaze now.

Holding that gaze, she went on.

"Think about it. For the house's honor, one of us has to take part, sure, but it doesn't have to be Oppa. If anything, someone should be stopping him. He was trapped in that awful barrier for five years. Does it make sense to send him straight into danger after that?"

"You're..."

"Am I not in just as much danger? No. I'm not. You know that, right? I'm not who I used to be. I'm a recognized Sorcerer, even in Cesar."

"..."

"Whether you look at skill or circumstance, I'm the one who should go. Still think that's me being stubborn?"

Kiril Farreira's rebuttal came like a storm.

The Farreira couple found themselves with nothing to say.

She wasn't wrong. Just as headstrong as before, but unlike before, she wasn't being unreasonable, she had solid grounds behind her words, and there was no forcing her to back down now.

Even Airen let out a breath of admiration, watching how much his sister had changed.

But that didn't mean he agreed with her.

He spoke.

"Kiril."

"What?"

"Want me to show you?"

"..."

"What I spent five years training inside that barrier."

Whoosh.

Before Airen even finished speaking, Kiril's presence sharpened, visibly.

Even their parents, who knew nothing of Sorcery, could faintly sense the shift in the air.

"You confident?"

"Yeah."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Then how about a sparring match?"

"Kiril!"

Amel dropped her gentle tone and scolded her daughter outright. But this time, Kiril didn't back down either.

Feeling his sister's blazing gaze fixed on him, Airen let a faint smile cross his face, one barely noticeable.

Her feelings looked something like anger, but they weren't anger.

Something far more precious than that. His eyes softened, in contrast to Kiril's.

But his answer wasn't soft at all.

Airen Farreira nodded and spoke in a firm voice.

"Fine."

"..."

Watching the tension between their two children, both grown so much, the Farreira couple wore identical looks of not knowing what to do.

* * *

The quiet, steady rhythm of Farreira territory's days had been thrown into upheaval.

It had been coming, in a way. House Farreira's eldest son, shrouded in mystery for five years, had finally shown himself.

News like that would have stunned anyone, whether they'd served in the castle for years or been hired only recently.

But that wasn't the end of it.

Kiril Farreira, who hadn't set foot in the territory in over a year, had suddenly appeared and headed straight for the training grounds with Airen Farreira.

Judging by the mood, they were about to spar.

Jacob Wilshire, a knight who'd caught the drift of what was happening, murmured quietly.

"Never thought I'd see something like this."

"Same here. I figured I'd never see the young lord's face in my whole life."

"Me too. I thought the whole Sorcery excuse was just cover, and he'd... passed away somewhere. Guess it was true after all."

Tyler Johnny, the knight beside him, nodded at Jacob's words.

Neither of them had served House Farreira for even three years, so to them, Airen Farreira, who'd awakened his Sorcery long before they arrived, had practically been treated as a ghost.

But now here he was, showing himself, and not just that, sparring with Kiril Farreira, who'd made a name for herself even in Cesar, the nation of Sorcery. There was no way not to be interested.

Jacob Wilshire asked.

"Who do you think wins?"

"Does it matter?"

"Of course it matters. Watching a fight is half the fun, isn't it? Kiril, probably?"

"Well... yeah, probably."

Tyler Johnny said, glancing toward the siblings.

Kiril's reputation reached even distant Cesar Duchy fairly often, but almost nothing about Airen had ever traveled that far.

The only story anyone could recall was the old disgrace of 'the lazy lord.' Betting on the young lord's victory wasn't an easy call.

Of course, there was a good chance the match wouldn't even settle a clear winner.

Why put real effort into a sparring match with nothing to gain from winning?

Most likely, the point was simply to prove that House Farreira's eldest son was alive and well.

"Either way, good show to catch. Glad we kept up with training."

"Right. Rushing over the moment we heard a rumor would've looked bad, but stumbling onto it while doing our own drills, that deserves a pat on the back. Don't you think?"

A few soldiers who overheard the two knights chuckled in agreement.

If someone chased them off, fine, they'd go. But short of that, none of them had any intention of moving an inch.

A sight like a precious Sorcerer using her power wasn't something you got to see every day.

Kiril Farreira, of course, paid their attention no mind whatsoever.

She said, "Get ready."

"Ready."

"Don't make me say it twice. You haven't even drawn your sword yet."

"...Now I'm ready."

Answering his sister, Airen Farreira made a gesture as if grasping something out of thin air.

And astonishingly, a massive sword took shape out of nothing.

Unmistakable Sorcery.

Every onlooker's eyes went wide, the Farreira couple included.

Kiril's eyes tightened too, betraying her own surprise.

Airen felt a little embarrassed.

'This is really about all I've got, though.'

Once the Otherworldly Realm had served its purpose and vanished, most of his Sorcerous power had gone with it.

Being able to summon the sword the Man in the Dream once wielded, whenever he wished, was the one ability left to him.

Not that he minded. If anything, he was satisfied.

Worn and rough, but a sword that suited him more than anything else could.

Having gained that alone was enough.

Airen nodded and gave his sister a smile.

"...Tch."

Unlike her brother, who seemed perfectly at ease, Kiril Farreira found the whole situation deeply uncomfortable.

She didn't like it. That look of forced composure on his face.

'Why does he keep pushing himself.'

She thought back to the first time Airen had ever picked up a sword.

It had been the same back then. A total beginner who'd never held a blade before, overdoing it all day long, again and again.

Even after his hands had blistered and needed bandaging, he'd kept pushing himself past the point of sense.

It wasn't that she hated seeing him try hard. Far from it.

She'd always wished for it.

That her brother, trapped in the pain of his childhood, always wearing that gloomy face, would find his strength again and get his smile back.

When he'd come back from Krono Fencing Hall with an awkward grin and handed her a gift, she really had been overjoyed, jumping for joy.

But...

'I don't want to watch him push himself into ruin like that again. Not anymore.'

She'd heard, later, how he'd forced his way into the Subjugation and been humiliated by nobles from another house.

She'd learned, too late, that pushing himself to master Sorcery was what had gotten him trapped in that barrier.

And for five years, she'd regretted it.

She should have stopped him before it was too late.

'So...'

With a soft rasp, Kiril Farreira drew a sword from the pouch at her waist.

A tiny model of a sword.

But the moment she tapped it with a finger, it grew, instantly, into something enormous.

Far bigger even than Airen's blade.

She floated it in the air, gazed forward, and thought.

'I'll do it. You don't need to push yourself, Oppa.'

A deep hum rolled through the air. A fierce wind swirled up. Even people with no knowledge of Sorcery could sense the powerful energy gathering as the sword rose into the sky.

Originally forged to break through a barrier.

But now carrying a different intent entirely, the giant sword leveled itself at Airen Farreira.

Every eye there followed the direction the blade's tip pointed.

And then.

The blond young man, silent until now, brought his sword down.

Whoosh.

Nothing special about it.

A vertical strike, a horizontal strike. Then one simple thrust to follow.

Nothing more than an ordinary swordsmanship motion, the kind you could see anywhere.

Most of the soldiers watching the match wore puzzled expressions. They'd expected something far more impressive.

But not everyone reacted that way.

Jacob Wilshire and Tyler Johnny, the two knights, were among the exceptions.

'What was that?'

'Something just...'

It wasn't a clear sensation. More like a breeze brushing through your hair while half asleep, vague and hard to pin down.

Coincidence?

Or had something actually happened?

Both wore baffled expressions as they looked toward Airen, then toward Kiril.

And then, finally, they were certain.

"..."

The young Sorcerer was crying.

With a soft rasp, the sword shrank back down to its original size and returned to her pouch.

A beat later, Airen Farreira started walking forward.

He wrapped his arms around Kiril Farreira. Firmly, but gently enough not to hurt her.

And he said, "I'm not pushing myself."

"..."

"If you're worried about me, you don't have to be. This time, I really mean it, I have real confidence in this. And..."

You've worked hard, all this time.

Until Airen finished speaking, Kiril said nothing at all. She just cried quietly.

Relief. And something like a shiver running through her.

Caught between those two overwhelming feelings, for the first time, the little sister received comfort from her brother.

* * *

The sparring match ended. It had built up considerable tension along the way, but the ending landed with a strange flatness.

The soldiers watching from the training grounds had no choice but to return to their own drills with an unsettled feeling still hanging over them.

Kiril Farreira, of course, wasn't among them.

As a Sorcerer, she could see it clearly.

As his sister, she could see it even more clearly still.

How solid the will her brother had shown truly was.

How powerful the sword that would bloom from that will was bound to become.

"Still, be careful. This year's Subjugation Campaign is far more dangerous than usual."

"Huh?"

But she couldn't set her worry aside completely.

Next month's Subjugation Campaign was nothing like the ones held every year before.

"A Demon-person has appeared."

"A Demon-person?"

"Yeah. A month ago, south of Gairon territory... traces of a demon were found."

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