WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
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◈ The Genius Knight of a Fallen Race ◈
Chapter 62: We Need More Resources
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After taking control of all of Pales’s administration, Serin spent every day buried beneath enormous piles of paperwork.
Shan entered the office, converted from what had once been a lounge, and frowned at the room’s stale mix of dust and parchment.
“Couldn’t you at least open a window? You said it was good to let in fresh air regularly.”
“Then all the papers would scatter. Let’s see, the tax collection records from Kodam Village...”
Serin, her eyes hollow as she rifled through documents, soon let out a strange groan and collapsed facedown onto her desk.
“I couldn’t do any more even if someone beat me to death. I need to rest.”
“Why not delegate some of it to other people?”
“There’s no one I can trust. My uncle spoiled them for too long, and every last one of them had been lining their own pockets. I let off the ones whose crimes were less serious, and it’s still this bad. If Kalion hadn’t been here, I might’ve actually worked myself to death.”
After they settled properly in Pales Territory, Roden’s father Kalion began a second life as an official under Serin, along with Tata, who had served as the family butler.
Having once served as head of the capital’s Merchants' Guild, he was skilled at handling ledgers and documents. Serin considered him an excellent addition.
The person she truly wanted to bring in was Roden, but he was busy helping Shan train the Alto mercenaries while coordinating the Brotherhood from within.
After quietly grumbling, Serin pressed her fingers against her eyelids and asked Shan, “So, what brings you here? It doesn’t look like you came just because you wanted to see my face.”
“Well...”
When Shan explained the symptoms he had been experiencing lately, Serin looked somewhat baffled.
“Shan, how old are you now?”
“I’m probably around fourteen or fifteen by now?”
“Then it’s just puberty and growing pains, isn’t it? It’s a little late compared to others, but that can happen.”
Seeing that Shan did not understand, Serin explained that what he was experiencing was part of a man’s natural growth process.
At the mention that he would grow facial and body hair, develop more muscle, and gain a deeper voice, Shan looked down at himself in wonder.
“So that’s what it was...”
Shan had secretly admired Roden’s and the other adult men’s sturdy builds, so this was welcome news.
He already possessed tremendous combat strength, but longer limbs and more muscle would be an even greater help.
“But didn’t you ask Roden about this?”
“I thought it might be a change caused by me being an Alto. Roden wouldn’t know about something like that.”
Shan’s unusual childhood had played a large part in why he had failed to recognize a natural change every man went through.
At Willow Vilalge, he had never been able to spend time with children his age or older boys. After leaving the village, he had never met other adolescent boys his age either, since he was always around adults.
Roden and the others, meanwhile, had never imagined Shan would not even know something like this, so they had not bothered to mention it.
“I see.”
Serin realized again that this boy’s upbringing had not been ordinary, and a look of pity crossed her face.
“What is it?”
“Nothing. Then, should we give you a proper examination while we’re at it? We finally prepared some of the necessary equipment recently. I kept meaning to bring it up, but I was too busy and kept forgetting. This works out well.”
Several months had already passed since they agreed to investigate the changes in Shan’s body after he hunted the ogre.
They had all been busy, and the examination tools had been inadequate, so they kept putting it off. Now that they had an opportunity, it seemed like a good time to find out.
* * *
The two left the office and headed for Serin’s workshop at the end of the corridor.
This place had also been converted from a storeroom filled with miscellaneous items, so it was quite cramped.
“Don’t step on anything on the floor.”
After warning him, Serin looked around and grumbled quietly.
Compared to the workshop she had built in the royal palace, its facilities were still terribly lacking.
Even this much had only been possible thanks to the mages from the Magic Society.
If they had not used the various tools those mages brought as samples to copy, they would still lack most of the equipment they needed.
Once Shan smoothly removed his shirt and sat in the examination chair, Serin sighed.
“It would’ve been better if Professor Maya were here to help. None of the mages currently in Pales have even half her knowledge of life science. I wonder where they all went. Or if they’re even alive...”
Even though Serin, who had held absolute influence over the Magic Society, had personally called for them, many of the mages who escaped the capital during the intensifying civil war still remained missing.
Many of them likely wanted to come to Pales but could not.
Modern mages had truly pathetic combat ability. Even Serin would be exhausted after killing a few ordinary monsters without proper preparation.
Some of the mages who had arrived had hired mercenaries just to reach Pales, only to have everything stolen from them and barely make it there alive.
There were likely many others who had become a monster’s meal in the wilderness.
Considering how great the mountain of knowledge they had built was, this could be called the greatest loss caused by the civil war.
“I’m sure they’re safe. Maybe someone has them detained somewhere.”
“I hope so.”
Professor Maya was not the only person Serin worried about. She was especially concerned for the Head of the Magic Society.
The Head of the Magic Society possessed magical skill equal to Serin’s, but was so old that enduring a long journey would likely be difficult.
Once they had the strength to expand outward, the Head of the Magic Society would be one of the people they had to locate.
Even while they discussed various matters, Serin’s hands and eyes never rested. She gathered the necessary samples from Shan’s body and examined him directly.
Peering at Shan’s joints through something like a translucent amethyst disc, she nodded.
“Yes, it’s certain. You’ll probably grow quite a lot. You’re already three centimeters taller than the last time I measured you.”
“Really?”
“There isn’t much time left before I won’t be able to look down at you anymore. That’s a little unfortunate...”
Serin had been teasing him by saying he looked quite cute dressed as a woman before, but now her expression turned serious.
“And, as expected, some of the ogre’s physical traits have settled into your body.”
“I thought that might be it.”
Unlike the cockatrice’s influence, which was barely noticeable, the effect of being drenched in the ogre’s blood was strong enough for Shan to physically feel.
It was not as though he suddenly possessed an ogre’s strength, but if he had to put a number to it, his strength and stamina, which had been close to their limits, seemed to have increased by around ten percent.
“Specifically, it seems to be enhancing your strength and stamina. Since it overlaps with your growth period, it also appears to be aiding your physical development.”
Serin repeatedly glanced over Shan’s body while writing something with a quill.
“You said the place where you fought the pack lord wasn’t in the Demon Realm, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then we can rule out environmental conditions. You were covered in blood in both cases... I think I’m starting to understand the criteria for a monster’s spiritual essence settling into a human.”
“What are they?”
“The key is Spirit.”
A puzzled expression appeared on Shan’s face.
Why was Spirit suddenly relevant here?
“You know that Spirit is a soul hardened into the body, right? It seems that a sufficiently strong Spirit acts like a container capable of receiving another creature’s spiritual essence. The cockatrice’s spiritual essence was too faint to observe properly before.”
“Ah, so that’s why...”
“The monster must be sufficiently powerful, even among large monsters. You must fight it in a small group, be covered in its blood, which acts as a medium, and the person who killed it must possess powerful Spirit. Hunts that meet all those conditions do not happen often. There was a reason they had rarely been observed throughout history.”
“Then Sir Lugh might qualify too. His Spirit was fairly strong, even if it wasn’t as strong as mine. I don’t really remember whether he got covered in blood, though.”
There were several ways to confirm how well a knight’s Spirit had been refined.
The most common were testing resistance to various forms of magic that affected the body and mind, and repeatedly exhausting and recovering one’s stamina by using Spirit continuously while under the blessing of vigor.
A knight with weak Spirit could run out of Spirit and become unable to exert their power even when they still had plenty of stamina. Stronger knights could repeat the process again and again while continuing to use Spirit.
As for Shan, when he made such bets with other knights, he had never once reached his limit.
“If we examined him, we could also learn the difference between the Altos and ordinary humans. But I suppose that would be difficult right now?”
“Yes. I heard he’s fighting under Prince Elvin.”
Shan had learned this from a letter he recently exchanged with Count Sedil.
After recovering, Lugh heard the news and rushed to Elvin’s camp in the south.
No matter how poorly he had been treated, Elvin was still the lord to whom Lugh had sworn loyalty.
“He said he won’t forget what you and the princess did for him, so I’ll ask him for an examination if the chance comes. Once his contract ends, we could even tell him to come over to our side for good.”
“I’ll look forward to it.”
Even as she said that, Serin did not seem to expect much.
“For now, the ogre’s spiritual essence could cause problems by accelerating your growth, so keep coming for examinations. Your skin could tear as you grow too quickly, so apply this ointment to your body every day...”
* * *
Serin’s examination proved perfectly accurate. Not long after the symptoms fully began, Shan’s body started growing at an explosive rate.
Even Shan, who adapted naturally whenever his body grew a little thanks to his exceptional athletic ability, could feel that something was different.
Naturally, the people around him did not miss the change.
In truth, it was so drastic that anyone short of blind would have noticed it.
“Hey, haven’t you grown again already?”
Roden compared his height with Shan’s in disbelief and clicked his tongue.
The thirty-centimeter difference between them had somehow shrunk to around twenty centimeters.
“My joints ache every night when I sleep because of it. I just have to endure it.”
As Serin had warned, the changes did not end with Shan growing taller.
Hair began growing along his jaw, above his lips, and around his genitals. His cracking voice deepened.
The thought of having to put a blade to his throat and face for the rest of his life left him with a strange feeling.
The bones throughout his body thickened, his shoulders broadened, and his muscle mass naturally increased, making him more solidly built.
Shan went beyond simply maintaining his body so it would not get rusty. He began training in earnest once again.
“Hah, huff, haa... Priest, please.”
“Yes, Brother.”
After setting down a massive rock, Shan made the request with difficulty. The mercenary corps’ military priest performed a healing miracle.
As Shan closed his eyes and focused, he could feel the muscles and joints damaged by excessive training recovering.
“Good. One more time...”
His training was not quite as brutal as when Sir Darkal had guided him in mastering Spirit, but it still far surpassed imagination.
His appetite exploded, and with such exercise added on top of it, the body that had become lean during his rapid growth filled out with muscle.
While Shan spent that time growing in a way that resembled evolution itself, he received an unexpected visitor.
Baron Yurk, Yurk Jul, the count’s brother-in-law whom Shan had crushed several months ago, came to see him.
“It has been a long time, Sir Shan.”
The man greeted him in a gloomy voice. He looked pale and hollow-cheeked, like someone recovering from a serious illness.
Nothing remained of the confidence that had once bordered on arrogance. His head was bowed, and his manner was dispirited.
“Yes, it has.”
“...You’ve grown a great deal since I last saw you.”
Only two or three months had passed, yet the boy who had appeared close in age to his nephew had grown astonishingly quickly.
His youthful appearance had not fully faded, but he had shot up in height and his voice had deepened, giving the clear impression that he was becoming a man.
After briefly looking Shan over, Yurk met his green eyes and lowered his own gaze.
It felt as if the terrible pain of that day returned simply from facing him.
“I came to apologize for my previous rudeness.”
Come to think of it, one of the conditions of their duel had been for the loser to formally apologize to the winner.
Since the baron had remained in seclusion, Shan had not bothered to seek him out and demand it. Still, it was a right he should have claimed.
Perhaps reading Shan’s thoughts, Yurk continued.
“I don’t say this simply because it was a condition of the duel. I now truly understand that what I said then was wrong. You are not someone who needs to make such empty boasts, Sir Shan.”
“Well, I’m glad you see it that way. Thinking back on it now, I think I went a bit too far too.”
Shan accepted the apology with some discomfort.
In retrospect, forcing Yurk’s face into Shan’s own urine and rubbing it around had been excessive.
It had been less about instilling fear, as Shan had originally intended, and more about inflicting needless humiliation.
If he could return to that moment, he would at least not do that.
Shan had already proven his strength and given Serin enough to seize control of Pales without going that far.
As they exchanged apologies and the mood relaxed somewhat, Yurk hesitated before speaking.
“There is one thing I wish to ask. Am I truly... nothing but a worthless worm? Am I only impressive on this small island, and nothing once I go beyond it?”
“Not to that extent... If they held a swordsmanship tournament in the capital, I think you could probably make the quarterfinals.”
Shan honestly gave his impression.
Yurk was naturally nowhere near a royal knight like Kamad, far weaker than Lugh, and roughly on par with Sir Gowell.
That was Shan’s assessment of the baron before him.
Considering the swordsmanship of the knights he had met after the jousting tournament, Yurk could be considered fairly high-ranking.
At the very least, he had been strong enough to proudly call himself the strongest knight in the Pales region.
Yurk stopped breathing for a moment after hearing Shan’s answer, then let out a deep sigh.
“I see. So that is my level...”
He said that he had suspected all the martial skill he had built up was an illusion, and that everyone had only played along because of his status.
With his pride shattered to pieces, he had begun doubting even his strength, the last proof of his superiority. He could not bring himself to go outside.
“Perhaps I would have remained like that if Bluea had not helped me.”
The person who came to see him and urged him to step forward was none other than the count’s son, Bluea, his nephew.
The young boy repeatedly visited him, urging him to boldly apologize for his wrongdoing and reconcile. That was what finally moved him.
‘So that’s what happened...’
Shan had not spent time with Bluea since things became awkward between them after the duel. He had not known that Bluea had been going to see his maternal uncle all this time.
“Anyway, it is enough to know that is not the case. If I am still worth that much even outside...”
Yurk murmured blankly for a while, then soon bowed, excused himself, and left.
Not long after, Shan heard that Yurk had begun acting publicly again as Baron Yurk.
Serin summoned Shan and asked what had happened. After hearing the story, she spoke with a strange expression.
“That’s odd. That’s all you talked about?”
“Yes.”
“Can a person really reflect on their mistakes like that...?”
Serin said she had kept a spider at the estate where he stayed ever since the duel.
She did not know when he might hold a grudge and attempt something strange.
Yet after apologizing to Shan, Yurk began acting publicly again. He even disbanded the group of followers he had gathered to plan retaliation.
“I’ll deal with those bastards soon. Once I come up with a suitable excuse.”
As always, the princess said something terrifying with a perfectly calm face.
In any case, it was not a bad thing for a skilled knight and baron of Pales to become active again.
They were in desperate need of knightly strength to patrol across the river and train the army.
Still, Serin said with a sharp glint in her eyes that she would keep watching him for quite some time.
* * *
As Shan grew in many ways, physically and through his awkward reconciliation with Yurk, much also changed in Pales Territory.
The greatest change was the arrival of light that drove away the darkness of night.
After ordering the mages of the rebuilt Magic Society into a thorough division of labor, Serin completed the process of splitting magic stones while keeping the core technology secret.
The magic stones of middling large monsters such as trolls, werewolves, and kelpies were divided into hundreds or thousands of pieces, becoming materials for magic devices that produced light.
“Wow...”
“It really just gives off light.”
Magic devices that created light originally had short operating times and became unusable after a few uses, like decorations.
Yet adding one tiny magic stone turned them into magic devices that could be used almost permanently.
The real reason Serin wanted to make these first was for her own use.
Unlike the royal palace, which had plenty of magic devices that produced light, she had to light lamps to work or read in Pales. It was dim enough to hurt her eyes, and maintaining them was bothersome.
Even aside from that, the benefits for the territory were immense.
Since certain areas remained bright at night, nighttime crime significantly decreased. People could work after sunset, increasing overall productivity.
The lack of fire risk and the need to consume neither oil nor candles were added benefits.
Shan and Roden also received several lamp magic devices and installed them in the mercenary corps’ residential district.
Looking at the bright light pouring out even in the middle of the night, Shan murmured quietly.
“If things like these get installed all over Hasra later, sneaking around like I used to will be impossible.”
“Well, isn’t it better not to have to do that sort of thing?”
“Not necessarily. Being in the dark makes me feel strangely good. I can see my opponent, but they can’t see me.”
It was a privilege only Shan and a few other Altos with exceptional night vision could feel, something Roden could never understand.
Serin also used magic device production to make various practical goods before directly producing weapons and armor.
She said they would make arms and armor after first building skill by making other items.
Storage rooms that emitted cold air to preserve food longer, waterworks support devices that pumped water upward, and heating devices that warmed beds or rooms without stoves...
It was like a miracle to see magic devices, which only some wealthy nobles had once enjoyed through Alto relics, being made one after another.
Seeing this, Shan could truly understand what Serin meant by the Age of Magic she dreamed of.
A world where everyone could enjoy the power of magic.
As Shan marveled at how miraculous that was, Serin summoned him and Roden.
Leaning her elbows on the desk with a grave expression, she muttered as if in lament.
“There are no magic stones left in the territory.”
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