authors note

Edit : Apparently I cannot post the first volume here on royalroadl.com as it is in the process of being published and would be a breach of contract.

Edit 18/04/2017

For those of you that have not read the story. I am sorry to say it is no longer for free. If you are still willing to read here is a summary for it. Sorry.

Spoiler:

Our story begins with Asura Shirogami gaining admission to the best school of magic on the Great Plains. He had learned how to use Warrior arts since he was a boy from his master Ainz Greetman and managed to learn everything this great master had to teach. Thus he was asked to go to Albion in which he gains admission to learn magic.

He is met with several new faces and managed to make new friends but it seems that his first days at school were not as mundane as he would have thought them to be. Asura finds himself stuck in a competition that included every freshman on campus in which they were required to defeat their fellow classmates. The objective of course was to see how strong each and every one of these kids and how talented they were. However as an intruder to the school began to stir troubles Asura had to break his promise to his master not using his warrior arts at that school in order to save the lives of his fellow classmates.

Although managing to get the upper hand Asura soon found himself overwhelmed by the strength of the metal mage that used a strange solution to change himself into a monster of horror.

In time of need and danger Asura awakens a dormant ability of his. And manages to defeat this mage with the help of the teacher who now agreed to teach him the proper ways of magic.

This is a super resume of the first volume it gives it not its right not by a long shot. I will need to discuss with the publisher of the first volume if I can put in more details for the readers so please be patient. There are several hints and points in the upcoming volumes that will explain what had happened in the first book although not directly if you keep reading you will understand. Once I get the permission I will gladly publish the first volume here on Royalroadl. I would also like to thank Ruffwriter for his awesome story (Savage divinity) it was an inspiration to me. Although both our genres are different his story made me pursue my dream. Please give it a look it is by far one of the best on this website.

Chapter 1: Contractor

(3rd person Pov)

‘Hmm… not long ago did I meet Greetman seeing this kid’s endurance I can vouch that this man is a real monster when coming to body enhancing. It is quite strange that his unorthodox methods seems to work I really need to give him his credit for it. This is amazing’ Osfor thought.

Deep down within a darkened forest laid a wooden cabin. In front of it was a bonfire, its fire was flickering throughout the vile of the night making the tree shadows dance in rhythm to it.

What would look like two men camping and spending time around the camp fire to normal people, was actually quite far from it. Osfor who was sitting on a small wooden stool, reading from a book, yet sending occasional glares at the figure in front of him from time to time.

He is a genius alchemist, a physicist and an incredible mage one of the seven heavenly demons of Alsa. Well known to the nobility and the four clans.

His researches were sought after from all over the world.

“The four known great countries Alsa, Astarte, Alikh and Astora are the last seclusions and safe zones remaining on the Great Plains. They however only accounted for less than one quarter of the entire domain that was once the lawful territory of man. After the Great War a great deal of land was usurped and taken over by demonic existences. These demons were corrupted and tainted by the abysmal blight. Making them extremely dangerous and almost impossible to exterminate. The blight that normally can corrupt any living being stealing away their sanity in a matter of seconds, merged fundamentally into the genes of these demons.”

Osfor who was reading from the book in his hand while watching Asura doing what seemed to be pushups supporting his entire body with his thumbs stated all of these facts concerning the history and basic knowledge over the origin of the current continent.

Asura interjected with a slight huff from the exercise saying

“Oh… huff… I mean I know most of this stuff. And why are you mentioning this, didn’t you say you were going to train me…huff if it is physical exercise I can manage myself with more exerting training than this… and where is your little bird isn’t it always with you?”

Osfor who folded the book standing up answered the upside-down Asura while getting closer to him playfully holding his Cain

“Oh it was not physical training I am trying to make you do, I need to see the flux of Magoi within your body. Usually when a person is exerting themselves they unconsciously release spiritual energy to reinforce their muscles and a bit of mana to fuel them, this is the easiest way to localize your Magoi network. And that little bird is a sacred beast…and he is protecting my lab at school right now.”

Asura was doubting his teacher over what he just said as he knew that it was not an easy feat to observe the Magoi flux within a body it needed great focus and an unimaginable comprehension over the body’s functions and quirks which seems absurd as this work was only possible via machines and takes normally very long times to deduce the results.

“Huff…I can’t seem to understand what you are saying, sensei.”

Seeing the dumb look on Asura’s face made Osfor giggle creepily which sent shivers down Asura’s spin or in this case they were sent up.

“It is quite easy actually… people now day complicate stuff with their fancy toys and machines, yet they could have the same result if they used their heads for a while. I wonder sometimes if the weights some people hold over their shoulders are even full …”

He had the tip of his cane touch the torso of Asura’s body.Within an instant the rubies on the handle shone dimly then a golden substance started spreading from the center of his body, it had a faint glimmer. The dispersion made it look like a spider web yet it started distorting a bit shaping like a nervous system. However these vein like golden traces condensed themselves on the arms, legs, and abdomen with the biggest concentration on the torso area.

“Hmm your spiritual network is quite advanced the rigorous training you took from Ainz is indeed amazing. But what about your mana network?”

Once again Osfor tapped the tip of his Cane onto Asura’s torso thus making the rubies dimly shin in an azure like color.

The spreading this time was a blue hue of veins similar to the golden one.

The network started spreading but unlike before the veins were extremely low numbered compared to the golden ones, condensing only around the heart area and a bit on the palms of his hands but the most was focused on the back of his right eye it is certainly the effect of the Eye of The Wise.

The weirdest thing was that both the spiritual and mana based veins avoided completely the heart area.

Seeing this, Osfor had an extreme look of worry and shock. first he taught it was weird that the golden veins were avoiding that part but both of them having the same reaction meant only one thing.

“… Asura-kun You…You…You are dying aren’t you?”

Hearing that Asura came crashing down. He was startled by the teacher’s revelation and couldn’t hold his balance. After making the contact with the ground the colored veins started dimming and completely disappeared.

=====================================================================================

(Asura Pov)

‘Huh what a sharp teacher I never knew that I would be found out that fast you gotta hand it to him, someone of this caliber should have found out about this eventually but I never taught that it would be this fast.’

Grinning I stood up dusting myself I was not mad that Osfor was on to my little secret but the look on his face was that of respect.

“How did you find out?”

A simple question that holds a lot of weight not denial nor an attempt to hide the truth but a question that made it obvious that I had no intention on hiding my illness from this specific teacher.

“…sigh… you sure are taking life easy. The death curse is by no mean simple,an average man would have gone mad from the pain, yet you are not even affected, or is it that you have high tolerance for pain… no I doubt that, you clearly have an enhanced body but the pain from that wretched curse is at the spiritual level, it’s not as simple as a physical one…”

Osfor turned around walking slowly toward the opened door of the wooden cabin yet before he entered he stopped adding to his speech

“What I did was a basic tracing. I imbued my own mana and spiritual energy which I changed its color into your system, it then followed the flux of Magoi and showed me your current circulation. I’d say you have a base of S class warrior spiritual energy which is a ridiculous result considering your age. That stage would take people decades upon decades of dedication to reach yet a 16 year old boy is already there… this would make a couple guys I know cry. Last time I saw Ainz he was a SS warrior to have a disciple reaching this stage is truly marvelous yet at the same time truly sad… On the other hand your mana distribution is horrible it’s really bad. I mean seriously I saw some bad mana circuits but yours is by far the worst. If you don’t take for account the charting to your left eye section that is. I would give you an F for mana and magic control.”

He then entered the cabin, taking a couple minutes he walked out holding a stone in his hand.

“You know what Asura-kun. I saw the fight you had with Migado that man was known as the grey iron demon he was an S class magician one of very few metal controlling mages he should have normally killed your entire group of friends but he underestimated you guys and that led to his demise… give me your hand”

I complied placing my hand forward then Osfor-sensei placed the jade colored stone onto my palm. I was thinking that it felt quite cold as it latched onto my palm.

He added.

“But what I find weird is that you did not show the power of an S class warrior. No I don’t think you even showed a half of your power not because you were holding back…no you were clearly trashed around … so I must say you were not able to… I know that you are able to use a magic so can you imbue that stone with a bit of mana please.”

Listening to his analysis, I started to understand what sort of a man Osfor-sensei is. He is the type to look at the situation from all angles deducting and deducing this was his way of reasoning. The stone started glowing a bit then shone as bright as a sun. This gleam almost caused me to go blind. On the other hand Osfor didn’t seem to be affected in the least by it.

My body started heating up a bit… nothing that I can’t tolerate yet I felt a little bit of tingling under my skin and over all of my body it wasn’t uncomfortable per se but it was a bit refreshing. The stone cracked after that and turned to dust.

“So tell me why you were unable to use you full power? and why on earth are you still alive even though you have The Death curse on you?. that nasty curse feeds on mana. It should activate after 30 day of administration, yet I am sure that Ainz is not an idiot he must have knew that you had that thing within you. As for why I know that that curse is older than 10 years is the visible distribution of your mana circuit. This circuit is like the aging signs of a tree after a period of time the natural mana veins strengthen themselves to make the body cast more powerful magic adapting to the age of the body but yours are still very young. This curse usually after activation makes the affected victim's body, Implodes then transform into a tree like figure. Anything within a radius of 200 meter will be infected with the same curse the instant the carrier passes away… back in my days this thing was a bitch to deal with.”

Sighing dejectedly as if he had remembered an awful past Osfor adds.

“Your current circuit is that of a 5 year old… it is extremely fragile and has a low density, except for the eye part. Your mana circuit did not evolve the least in 10 years so how come you stopped the evolvement or rather the aging of your circuit? Because the only way you can hinder the advance of that curse is if you either never use mana which is impossible… due to mana being linked to every activity the body can make subconsciously… or have a third party to fuel you with mana while holding the advancement of the curse at the same time. This seems the most logical way…yet I don’t quit get how did you do it… mind explaining?”

‘Heheh what a fearsome fella… I don’t suppose trying to cover this is going to work on this guy he will probably find out… let’s just come clean’

“To tell you the truth I don’t know perfectly how that process is working but it was thanks to Master Greetman’s weapon. The devourer that is… can I have it back please?”

The look on Osfor right now was of a disturbed person, he found it rather hard to believe that a weapon can cause such happenings yet he conceded the weapon to its rightful owner hoping that an explanation would follow.

Osfor stretched his left arm to the side and made a grabbing grip. what followed was a slight distortion through the air. The hilt of a sinister looking sword was showing slowly pulling trough the space the entire sword was grabbed from thin air what would look like a magic trick to anyone was in fact a dimensional storage area being accessed.

To Osfor’s surprise he noticed a small gathering of mana around Asura’s eye yet he didn’t want to mention it because he was still unsure of what he just saw.

Handing the blade over to Asura, the teacher made a face as if asking for a viable answer to satisfy his curiosity.

“Alright thanks … Warriors Blade arts… SECOND FORM Desert scorpion.”

A surge of spiritual energy enveloped Asura a golden glow emitted from his body and the sword started shifting. The aspect of the sword before changing was that of a thin scimitar with the hilt looking like a dragon’s snout it was a hilt without guard making the weapon seem that it prefers speed over defense and parrying over blocking. It transformed into a 1meter long sword but instead of smooth blades on the sides was what looked like saw teeth spreading on both sides yet before reaching the top of the sword was a needle like tip it was quit long almost 25 centimeter.

A demonstration of a blade that has two forms was probably not what Osfor was expecting as an answer but all his worries faded when he noticed what soon happened after that.

A sinister aura started spreading from the blade… origin is definitely demonic… black like the abyss the aura enveloped Asura and started emitting mana… the mana began to induce itself and charge Asura’s body as if it was a living battery the formerly dim mana veins started to overflow after Osfor flicked his finger to make the blue veins visible again as his mana was still inside Asura’s body .what happened was that not only the foreign mana was pumping itself onto his body but the same black mist was swirling inside and twirling around his heart area. Now Osfor changed his face to a complete serious one.

“… A contractor….”

I must have grinned as I was expecting him to figure it out instantly but that did not stop a cold sweat running down my spine.

The secret I was desperately trying to hide was discovered in this short exchange. My promise to Master was broken in few days after my enrollment and right now I am seriously thinking of a way to leave the school… as everyone know Contractors are hated by the masses and that is not a hidden fact because they are people who made pacts with demons in exchange for their life force. Gaining unsurmountable amounts of mana at the cost of a great reduction of life expectancy. That is not all the real reason why they were hater but it was the fulfillment of the contract that results in the death of the human party letting the demonic part possess the body and giving them the ability to freely walk in the territory of humans.

If that is not all. these possessed are able to fully hide their presence from even family members. As the demon copes in and takes full advantage of the past experiences and memories of the former host he can infiltrate anywhere. Leaving dead corpses in their wakes these contractors are considered even more frightening than Gores.

I know this very well as Ainz Greetman was the person who drilled these information in me he made it fully clear to me to not ever let anyone find out I was a contractor, and if by chance anyone ever did… killing them is a must.

However I think that Osfor is not the kind to rattle about stuff like this and if Ainz sent me to him then he must have had a reason but even so I am still nervous and couldn’t fully hide my restlessness.

Catching up on my anxiety Osfor added to his words.

“Wonderful!!!”

The look on Osfor turned had a 180 degree change he was no like a little kid who just got a new toy. This look is creeping me out.

Taking two steps back I told to him with nervously

“W-what do you mean by that S-sensei…”

Scratching his chin Osfor explained

“I mean I knew that you were an odd existence but to be a contractor is a sent from heaven. I always wanted to expir… euh…I mean to have a talk with one”

I said strongly disapproving.

“No-no you clearly want to do experiments on me and don’t try to hide it you suck at it… and seriously am not a guinea pig. Master said he will send me to learn magic not to be someone’s test subject…”

“Ah don’t worry about that didn’t you notice the change in your magic flux?” Osfor said.

“Huh what do you mean? Euh now that you mention it, I can actually pull more mana from the sword!”

“Yes thank god… it would have been awful if something bad happened after I gave you the prism stone”

“You lost me what are you talking about sensei?” I said with a look that demanded explaining.

“Well to tell you the truth. That prism stone a rare item that purifies the mana circuits, it’s really expensive…about a couple million Crona but don’t worry about that its the least I could do…” (Osfor)

Osfor began to avert his eyes from Asura’s and began to sweat quit a lot while fidgeting a bit…

“Sensei… what-Did-YOU-DO?”

I started walking toward Osfor bit by bit while releasing a pressure aura.

“I Mean you didn’t tell me you were a contractor and it’s lucky that it all worked out you don’t need to be mad he-he….”

While gulping down Osfor began to walk back trying to make distance from Asura.

“I am not going to repeat myself again what the hell did you do?”

This time my eye glowed in a deep gold shining even behind the eye patch.The pressure that was exerted before was nothing like the one being released right now. A wave of heat enveloped the perimeter and Osfor who took the full blunt of it flinched a bit.

“Okay, Okay calm down… I should have probably verified with you about your condition before presenting the prism stone. That thing while clearing away impurities it speeds the growth of mana veins it was going to boost the basic capacity of the mana you can hold within you and balance it out to your current age instead of a 5 year Old’s circuit that you are currently harboring. What I didn’t take in consideration was the fact that you were a contractor…”

“What do you mean?”

“Well…I taught that you had some sort of conversion done on your body to suppress the evolvement of your mana on the expense of extending your life expectancy I wanted to give you the prism stone so that it opens unnatural mana veins so that your already shortened lifespan can get a boost … this in theory should have gave you a couple more years more to live but what I didn’t know that you were not taking mana from within but you were getting supplements of it from an external source via your weapon…I found it weird that you were still alive after all those years but now I understand why…” Osfor said explicitly.

I found it disturbing that the number of strange words to me seemed to have formed a sentence and Osfor was saying it…in short I understood nothing from what he was saying so I said.

“ENGLISH PLEASE I can’t seem to understand anything of what you were saying Oh my god my head is starting to hurt” (Asura)

“… Long story short. You have a frozen mana circuit, I tried to unfreeze it by making mana flow from different unnatural veins. Veins that you won’t open while growing up, but because your body cannot use its own mana but have to use the demons’ mana what happened is that those new veins will now be used like a battery of some sort it will help you charge them and keep mana within you for a longer period”

“Huh… isn’t that a good thing?” (Asura)

“… Those veins will only be charged by the demon’s mana not your body’s… which will make his influence on you much stronger… I fear I just gave the demon more leeway into controlling your body…”

“Huh is that all… I taught that you messed up on something crucial…for the magic part I don’t really care and for your informations what you did will not change my life expectancy. Hell I think I got even a bit stronger. I am managing to suppress the demonic presence with my spiritual energy. As long the ratio of my spiritual energy is stronger than my current mana I will not succumb to the demon. But as you may have noticed that will not work forever I barely have few years to live now and I am planning to take full advantage of it. The demon can no longer halt the advancement of the death curse and he will be more than glad to have my corpse once I die from it. so getting him to prolong the contract is not a possibility.”

“So your contract is a halting of your own mana circuit so that the curse cannot advance yet at the same time you are taking advantage of the demon’s mana which is transmitted via the sword to you. I wonder what happens when you are away from your sword for a prolonged period of time and if you exert a lot of magic from your body…wait hang on a second… you clearly used my S class magic… that spell will easily cost Over 9000 mana unit you clearly didn’t have you sword so how come the curse didn’t activate?”

“Now that you mention it… I really don’t know…”

“This needs more tests… in the meantime how many units can you pull from that sword right now?”

‘Units what units what is he talking about? Probably a system to calculate magic energy.’ I said

“Oh…I have no idea I am new to this measurement system of yours”

“Ah wait a second…”

Osfor ran back to his cabin and brought what seemed like a wristwatch

“Put this on and let me see the result you got” he said expectantly.

I didn’t question him and placed the item on his wrist. After few seconds it showed a number

“It says 1600 MU”

“…that is impossible…I mean if it shows that and you said that you just felt your power rising after the prism stone addition… this means that your Mana units were even lower than this, giving the opening of new path for the mana to circulate this is obvious but… how were you able to cast an S class magic with this low Mu… if you had your sword with you I might have considered that it was the demon’s doing but you clearly didn’t have it… meaning that you were able to use external mana conversion…that’s it. The secret ability of that eye… Mana flux!!!”

“External mana? What do you mean …teacher in all my life I never got to process this many informations at once can u explain a bit more slowly?”

“You’re right you’re right. That eye of yours was suspected to have the ability to suck the mana from outside the body it could process pure mana which is lethal to any mage in its raw form and convert it into the body of the host… a truly frightening thing you are holding which is one more reason that you must keep this one a secret even more so than the fact that you are a contractor.”

After a clap of his hands Osfor adds

“Well then now that you have more mana to spare why don’t I teach you a bit about magic cladding?”

“Magic what???”

“Magic clad or magic armament. It’s a type of booster that helps the body to move and execute what could be impossible for a human body in a rather easy way. The idea is to coat the body in a thin layer of sustainable magic that will split the pressure and weight that should normally affect the body and absorb some external effects. This layer should be very thin yet as sturdy as it can possibly get. The point is to make the layer do the hard work while your body moves within it negating most of the stress.”

I dumbly said.

“You mean like a magical power suit?”

“Exactly. an invisible yet very thin one and mush stronger than metallic power suits. Tell me Asura-kun what is the maximum weight you can carry without spiritual buffs?”

“… It should be about 400kg… why?”

A frightening number that is and the look on Osfor changed accordingly he was surprised but even that was within his calculation because he knew that Asura trained under the most vicious of the seven heavenly demons of Alsa, Ainz Greetman.

“Then how about after using your spiritual buffs…”

“After a full buff I can manage to hold about 4 to 5 tons but…”Asura

Asura hesitated a moment before he added.

“I have yet to see the full limit because I need to reserve more than 40% of my spiritual energy to keep the curse from activating … as the demon is only supplying me with mana and stopping my natural mana veins from growing, yet every time I take mana from him the demonic aura is constantly entering my body and I need a huge amount of spiritual power to suppress and contain it, having a lot of mana within my body will activate the curse while having low spiritual energy will ease the hold of the demon on my body. Normally the mana boost I got from the prism stone should be dangerous but apparently I am still perfectly fine.”

“…So the more mana in your body the riskier it gets… and the less spiritual energy you have the worse your situation gets…ah in this is probably why you couldn’t go full power vs Mikado…complicated,your situation is very delicate hmm…well it doesn’t matter because you have the Eye of the wise. I think that in theory if you use it to absorb natural mana from your surrounding yet at the same time using it instantly without storing it in your body you will be fine… in theory that is, good this actually helps with the magic clad training more than I could hope for”

“What do you mean? “

“well I can’t help you with controlling the demonic energy because I never studied a Contractor but with time I might have ideas on how to make you benefit more of your unused power, however if it’s about magic I think that using the eye of the wise I can somehow make you stronger. “

“Hmm and how are you going to do that sensei?”

“well first off let’s start with basic cladding, it is similar to magic writing yet a bit different, while gathering energy in your finger then releasing it to write , Magic clad is used to condense and maintain that energy on a body part strengthening it. Try it”

I then started to imitate the same thing I did when I was with Shiki and the rest, after concentrating I gathered mana on his index and maintained it. A blue hue started emitting from my finger but because I did not release it my index started throbbing a bit then hating up. the blue colored light changed to a feint azure then changed to a black purple.

Interested by what happened Osfor said.

“Now use two fingers.”

I concentrated a bit and the glow transferred to my middle finger

“Now your entire hand, then clad your arm until your elbow.”

I began to sweat a bit after moving the purplish aura until it reached my elbow.

“…This is a bit tiresome I don’t think I can keep this up for a long time.”

“Yeah I know. But try not to pull mana from your sword and use only your natural mana. Now that you have access to three different types of mana you should master all of them the mana from your sword is rich but it is risky as your body is susceptible to the demon’s influence, the mana from your body is non-sufficient because you lack the veins and the mana from nature is a bit complicated to use we will start on that one after you experience your first magic poisoning”

“Huh magic poisoning that sounds dangerous… huff… guhhhhh”

Before I could finish my sentence my hand started showing blood veins. The aura started to dim and I could feel a strong pulse on my right arm. I dropped on my knees holding my right arm in agony.

“What the hell is this? Guhaaaa…”

“Here bite on this.”

Osfor threw me a black plume like fruit.

“Ugh it’s bitter…”

Biting on it my face started lightening up. My right arm turned back to normal.

“Hmm you have a bad case of incomplete combustion… your body cannot fully transform the mana you use thus the excess mana turns back and contaminant your blood streams. Before you can fully use mana clad you need to overcome this hurdle. Let take a look at that processor on your hand.”

I handed it to him while still feeling the pain from before.

“… this is bad your case is worse than that girl… but maybe this is due to the fact that you are just beginning to use magic this might change… you have a 70% rebound meaning that your blood will receive that sum every time you use a spell. that is dangerous using high grad spells will surly kill you”

“But didn’t you just say that I used an S grad spell earlier?”

“You did but that was because your eye managed the mana inside your body and fully exploited it leaving nothing to cause a rebound. That was caused unnaturally, you need to know how to control your mana and use most of it. A good mage can have a 15% rebound as max there are people who even have 0 rebound but they’re rare.”

“What is your rebound count Osfor sensei?”

“Ah you’re interested in this old fart heheh… not to brag but my rebound count is 0%.”

“Amazing… it’s going to be hard to reach where you stand sensei but I’ll try my best…”

“That what I want to hear. Now I believe we have a problem, your low Mu means that you can’t use magic clad for prolonged periods of time so start by cladding just your finger until you get the hang of it and until you rebound is less than 50% then move to other body parts this should take about two weeks until you master this.”

“Two weeks!! That is a lot of time how am I going to attend classes…wont there be a problem with the school administration?”

“No, No you are in my care although I will have to leave for few days and you will have to develop yourself alone for some time I will come back and teach you what you need for the exams. But the practical tests you need a lot of training to be efficient. I will leave a crystal orb linked to the school library this should give you access to all subject and information regarding magic and the history of the continents it should keep you occupied and relieve boredom.”

“You mean I will be alone in this forest…”

“Well technically yes but I will be back in a few days like I told you I need to get some information about that eye of yours and how it can harvest raw mana, this type of information is highly classified and it is not available to the public to view. I will have to go to the capital’s library and look through the classified archives I believe they will let me in considering my status heheh”

As always a creepy smile painted on the teacher’s face who was starting to cast his teleportation spell.

He noticed again the gathering of mana around Asura’s eye but yet again decided to remain silent.

A few moments after I was left in the darkened forest accompanying me was the sound of cracking from the enflamed lumber and the hushed sound of insects. But I was not one to panic in this situation I went through hell of a lot worse than this with Master. this should be easier than a walk in the park is what I taught.

Ps. I am sorry for the bad English I am from morocco and not a native speaker so please bear with the broken language. oh and please don't mind the punctuation...i know i know but i really suck at them...