WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 93

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Vulcanus's Numbering Sword (7)

Rewinding the clock a little, back to when the group had first set foot in Derinku.

Airen Farreira had taken Kubharu's advice to heart and sunk into meditation for the first time in a while.

Kubharu had called it a useless exercise, but Airen didn't see it that way.

His decision to set out on this journey, the deeper hunger for growth he now carried compared to before, all of it owed something to Kubharu.

He nodded, closed his eyes, and posed himself a question.

'What is a fighting spirit, anyway?'

He didn't know.

He couldn't even get a sense of it.

That was Airen's honest answer.

It couldn't be helped.

He had never once, in his whole life, felt the urge to beat someone.

If he had to dig for something close, the friction with Viscount Gairon's household came to mind, but even that had nothing to do with fighting spirit or a will to win.

If anything, what he'd felt back then had been closer to a hunger for growth.

He had spent his days wanting to break free of his old useless self, wanting to become a son his family could rely on, a brother worth looking up to.

'So how do I do this?'

The question sat heavier the more he turned it over.

Of course, he wasn't without something to draw on.

His year at Krono Fencing Hall had been a good experience.

Everyone there, except him, had poured everything they had into surviving, into getting ahead of the pack.

Brett Lloyd and Judith alone had swung their swords with more heat than almost anyone.

No question that the two of them had lit a fire under plenty of the other kids.

The problem was...

'I wasn't one of those kids.'

Airen sighed.

It couldn't be helped. Back then, cold as it sounded, he'd been nothing more than a puppet for The Man in the Dream.

He'd drifted through those days hollow, thoughtless, never even asking himself why he was swinging a sword at all.

While everyone else burned, he alone had stayed cold. That thought stung more than usual today.

Then the scene from the Mid-Term Evaluation flickered through his mind, unbidden.

His body in strangely good condition, his vision wide and his head clear, his record beating every expectation, and amid all those fortunate variables, the back of a silver-haired girl running ahead of him.

And the small something that had bloomed in his chest as he watched that retreating figure.

The moment his thoughts reached that point, Airen Farreira realized he'd been thinking about this all wrong.

'I have felt it. I have.'

He'd clearly been lacking, back at Krono Fencing Hall.

The great blank stretch of his boyhood had left him without experience.

He'd had no convictions of his own, no stubbornness, no dreams to speak of.

Getting swept along by The Man in the Dream's ambitions had, in a way, been only natural.

But even while he'd been tossed around like that, there had been a flame that made the boy's heart burn.

Which meant there had been moments, real ones, when he existed as Airen Farreira and not as someone else's puppet.

That was where he started.

Airen focused on that faint ember he'd dug up from the past.

He revisited the feeling he'd had chasing after Illia.

He looked again at the fire Brett Lloyd and Judith had shown him.

And this time, he felt a heat he hadn't been able to feel before.

Over the course of three days, he nursed that small ember in his chest, coaxing it to grow, bit by bit.

Of course, what he'd built up wasn't anything impressive.

Something others might call trivial, still a modest little thing.

But that was fine.

Like Kubharu had said, "nothing" and "something small" were two completely different stories.

Airen carried that feeling carefully into the tournament, and up onto the stage.

To cross swords with Charlot.

To learn from Victor.

To beat Georgu and come out the winner!

And yet...

"I said I've decided! The owner of the tenth Numbering Sword is this young man right here!"

Before he'd even properly swung his sword once, he'd become the owner of a Numbering Sword.

Airen couldn't hide his bewilderment.

'Wait, I don't even need a sword.'

He meant it, too.

Of course, if it was offered, he'd gladly take it.

This was a sword that all but guaranteed you'd become a Sword Master.

Even if he never used it, just owning one would feel amazing.

But the reason he'd stood on that stage had less to do with gaining some material thing and more to do with sharpening his drive to improve, building up a fighting spirit by crossing blades with real swordsmen.

Which was exactly why Vulcanus's sudden declaration left him feeling a little hollow.

Of course, there were people even more hollowed out by this than him.

Namely Victor, who had been overwhelming challenger after challenger up until now.

And Charlot, whose skill matched his.

"Wait, hold on... hold on, hold on. What exactly do you mean by that..."

"Blacksmith, sir! What are you talking about all of a sudden!"

Victor closed the distance fast and confronted Vulcanus.

Charlot was no different. He leapt up onto the stage in one bound, wearing the same baffled expression, demanding an explanation.

And it wasn't just the two of them.

The crowd, who'd been looking forward to a match between Charlot and Victor, let out an angry roar too.

"What kind of garbage is this!"

"We didn't even see him swing a sword, what's going on! Was this rigged? Did you two fix this?"

"Who the hell is that guy? Some rich boy playing dress-up climbing up there and stealing the sword!"

"No, that young man isn't the type to get called a rich boy. He looks soft, sure, but he's from Krono Fencing Hall..."

"Oh, so that makes him stronger than Charlot or Victor? Forget all that, how does it make sense to hand it over without him swinging his sword even once! I mean, come on, this is just ridicu..."

"Everyone, shut it!"

Shut it, shut it, shut it!

The sound was loud enough to burst eardrums, and every onlooker clapped their hands over their ears.

Vulcanus's roar, amplified by some magical device, echoed and rolled through the crowd. A downright nasty temper on that man.

But it worked. Once he saw the crowd had gone quiet, Vulcanus scowled and spoke.

"I said it at the start."

"..."

"This tournament was never about deciding who's strongest. It's about finding the swordsman who inspires me. That's the only point of it."

"Hey now, Vulcanus. You're not the only one running this."

"That's right. We're here too."

"...Correction. It's a tournament to find the swordsman who inspires me, Pablo, and Dwanson."

Vulcanus kept talking after that.

Caught up in a mix of excitement and irritation, he rambled more than usual.

But the gist of it was simple.

No swordsman here inspired him more than the blond young man standing on the stage right now, Airen Farreira.

Hearing that, the crowd could only stare blankly.

'Wait, who even is that kid...'

'I heard he's from Krono Fencing Hall, but even so, isn't it too much to hand over a Numbering Sword without him even drawing his blade?'

'Inspired, my foot. Is the old man losing his mind?'

'Do the other blacksmiths feel the same way?'

While everyone stood there wearing confused expressions.

Pablo and Dwanson, who'd climbed onto the stage a beat late, studied Airen Farreira closely.

They looked him over the same way Vulcanus had, the way a smith might examine a blade of their own making.

A moment later, after trading a glance with Vulcanus, they nodded.

Then they spoke.

"We'll pick this young man too."

"I was hoping we wouldn't all land on the same one, but there's no helping it. He's too tempting to pass up."

"...So, with that, this tournament is over. Come with me."

"What? Ah? Ah..."

The instant he finished talking, Vulcanus hopped right off the stage.

Airen stood there caught between one impulse and another, reading the mood around him.

Because Charlot and Victor's expressions had gone sour.

Pablo and Dwanson caught that too.

Pablo cleared his throat and spoke first.

"Sorry about this. Vulcanus only ever thinks about himself. Doesn't consider anyone else's feelings. Did this hit you two pretty hard?"

"It's less that it hit us hard and more that we're just bewildered."

"Right, right. I understand completely."

"Me too."

Dwanson joined Pablo in trying to smooth things over with Charlot and Victor.

They threw in a few extras. Next time they came by, they'd get their swords at a discount. Small items like daggers or belts, they'd throw in for free.

Fortunately, neither of the brothers made a scene.

If anything, they scratched their heads and apologized, moved by Pablo and Dwanson's handling of it.

"This is embarrassing, sorry about that. Guess we let our discomfort show more than we should have."

"Yeah, exactly. We knew going in what kind of tournament this was..."

"Ha, well, glad to hear you say that."

Pablo and Dwanson each let out a quiet sigh of relief.

Airen felt the same way.

With a sharp exhale, as if shaking off some tangled feeling, Victor offered a clean smile and held out his hand for a handshake.

"Congratulations. I could tell from one look you weren't an ordinary guy, but I didn't expect you to become the owner of a Numbering Sword just like that."

"Um... uh..."

"No need to look so uncomfortable. I'll be honest, I'm not thrilled about it, but that doesn't mean I've got anything against you personally. Charlot, same for you, right?"

"Obviously. Though I am insanely jealous, I'll admit that much."

"Can't argue with that. Guess neither of us has cultivated enough patience."

Watching the two accept the outcome like adults, the two blacksmiths and the one swordsman on stage all wore smiles too.

With that warm mood settling over the stage, even the crowd couldn't muster any harsh words.

"Ugh, to think it'd end like this."

"Still, gotta hand it to Charlot and Victor for having some class about it. If it were me, I'd have smashed the place up."

"If it were you, you wouldn't even make it up on that stage."

"Hey, what's with the attitude all of a sudden..."

"Anyway, I'm curious about that kid. What's got the blacksmiths so worked up over him?"

"Same here. I've looked him over and over and I can't find anything special..."

"Airen Farreira, was it?"

Praise for Charlot and Victor, curses for Vulcanus, curiosity for Airen Farreira, the crowd scattered, tossing all of it into the air on their way out.

Standing among them, Randel Clancy watched Airen Farreira in silence.

* * *

After the chaotic tournament had wrapped up.

Airen Farreira's group followed the three blacksmiths toward the smithy.

Or rather, they stopped partway along the road to the smithy.

Because the blacksmiths, who'd been bickering playfully among themselves a moment ago, suddenly launched into a full-blown argument like their lives depended on it.

"No way! This is obviously my tournament, so I go first!"

"What are you talking about! All three of us hosted this together, didn't we?"

"In cases like this, seniority should decide..."

"Would you all be quiet?"

"...What's going on here?"

"Looks like they're figuring out the order among themselves. Fascinating, really."

"Fascinating?"

"Isn't it? Having to keep a swordsman by your side the whole time you're forging a blade, I've never heard of a crafting method like that. I've heard of custom orders where a swordsman requests a specific shape, sure."

Airen nodded.

It really was strange.

From what he'd gathered following them, his role mattered almost as much as the blacksmiths' own skill.

Radiating his presence so they could gauge his temperament and energy, demonstrating swordsmanship, working to convey the full feeling of a technique in motion...

'It's almost like this whole process is about getting a closer look at the raw material that is me.'

Once that thought crossed his mind, Airen's expression twisted slightly.

Now he understood.

They weren't after the real him. They were after the steel-like presence of The Man in the Dream, buried somewhere inside him.

"Hm. That could well be it."

Hearing this, Kubharu nodded as well.

The Metal energy Airen carried was, without question, extraordinary.

It made sense that a blacksmith who'd spent a lifetime working fire and metal could sense it.

"Well... I understand. The reason you came out onto the continent was to master that iron stake, make it your own. Being treated like that in the middle of it all, no wonder it doesn't sit right."

"I'm fine."

"Right. Don't let it weigh on you too much. This is still the middle of the process, isn't it? A day will come when that ember of yours melts down that stubborn iron stake for good. And once that happens, those men won't be able to treat you like a lump of ore anymore. Hm, thinking about it more, this is a little infuriating. Hold on a moment."

"Huh?"

"Think about it. You didn't even need a sword to begin with, and now your feelings are hurt on top of it. Seems like you ought to squeeze a little more out of this to feel better."

"No, that's really not necessary..."

"It's fine, it's fine. Looking at them now, those men are burning up with excitement. They won't be able to refuse if I ask for a few more things."

"Really? Then ask him to make me a sword too!"

"Noted. I'll be right back."

With that exchange with Lulu settled, Kubharu inserted himself among the blacksmiths.

Airen watched his back with an anxious heart, while Lulu watched with bright, sparkling eyes.

A moment later, Kubharu returned wearing a proud expression, holding up four fingers.

"Negotiation successful. Four extra bonuses secured."

"Did they say they'd make me a sword too?"

"Of course. That was the very first thing I brought up."

"Ooooh, you're actually useful!"

"..."

Watching the silver tongue he could never hope to match, Airen Farreira could only shake his head slowly.

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