Zell told me he’ll buy the books early, but I didn’t expect that he would wake up earlier than me. When I woke up, Zell was already out of the room. I don’t really know the place yet, so I’ll just do what I usually do. I’ll check the back and see if mrs. Dorall is swinging a wooden sword again. For some reason, I felt like bringing Azaroth with me.

So it’s an alternate schedule. This time, mrs. Dorall is alone in the back of the inn. It looks like she was waiting for me and there was a purple sword beside her. The handle was 2ft long and the blade of the sword was 5ft tall with a thickness of 2.5ft. She noticed me and waved her hands with smile on her face.

She made gestures asking me if I wanted to fight and the answer was obvious. For some reason, we were carrying real weapons and both of us were curious about each others' strength. I don’t know what has become of me, but my body was eager to fight her at full strength. Eugene, will you still like me as I am now?

I walked to the middle of the open space. We both stared at each other and poised our body for battle. Unlike yesterday, the weapon on our hands can kill, but for some reason it didn’t matter. Both of us simply wanted to fight at full strength.

I’m still not sure if I’ll use sword wave or lightning magic, so I ran to her. She started spinning her sword which soon created a circular gust of wind. I moved my sword to her abdomen, but she slammed her sword downwards and released sharp winds which pushed me and created a fissure on the ground.

I circled on the air, but sent a sword wave to her direction. A wall of rock raised from the ground and blocked my attack. At the same moment the sword wave vanished, a platform pushed her from the ground. She instantly closed the distance between us and waved her sword to my body. I blocked it with my sword but unlike yesterday, she was using all of her strength.

I was pushed back to the ground and a gust of wind was there to follow. She appeared beside me at the same moment I sent a sword wave to cancel the gust of wind. I entered lightning form to increase my speed and dodge.

Just like that, we distanced ourselves and looked at each other. I didn’t expect her to be that strong, but it was the opposite for her. It seems like she expected everything from the start. There was a wide grin on both of our faces, because the exchange earlier proved the we could use every bit of our strength on this battle.

I sent a lightning bolt to her and ran, but an earth spike appeared which turned into metal and absorbed my attack. I sent more lightning attacks, but it kept being absorbed by her earth spikes. She also sent earth magic to my direction, but it wasn’t fast enough to hit me. In the end, it came down to putting all our strength on our swords. She waved her sword to send projectiles and I did the same.

It continued until we were at the distance where it came down to swordsmanship. I was slightly faster, but she was a lot stronger. I couldn’t even push her back, the only thing I could do was send more attacks and hope that some actually hits her.

Despite the size of her sword and the wide motions she was doing, she was fast. I summoned lightning swords, but she summoned metallic walls from the ground to block them. Each time our swords connected, a loud exploding sound echoed throughout the open space.

In the end, I lost. She was a lot stronger and I was only slightly faster, not to mention that her fighting style was more refined. She obviously knows each motion she did, while I simply moved based on what my instincts were telling me. The thing is, it seems that she was still hiding more strength...I can’t assess her full power. Well, she was the leader of the strongest mercenary group after all.

She used earth magic to fix everything, and it seems that the metallic spikes turn back to being a rock after the mana around it is depleted. After a while, the place was back to normal, like we didn’t even fight there at all.

My body was dead tired by the end of the battle, so she lifted me back to the inn. She was completely fine after our battle, except for a few cuts on her body. She cooked breakfast for me again, and by the time I finished, Zell came back with books on his arms.

___

When I got back to the room, Faeran jumped on top of my head. It seems that he was scared when he couldn’t see me after he woke up. Well, it seems he was also worried about my messy look. I was covered in sweat and there were cuts on my supposed to be, invincible dress. I also had cuts on my body earlier, but it has already regenerated.

Zell was also worried, but he didn’t ask anything after seeing the bright smile on my face. How could I not be happy after fighting a living legend? Not to mention that I actually had the chance to fight with all of my strength. I lost, but I don’t regret fighting her and I feel like I’ll learn a lot from her.

Anyways, the next lessons were about me reading and asking Zell if I encounter words that are too hard to understand. I also realized that simple sentences are...simple. The way how the sentences are formed in the books are more complicated than what I have imagined. The book I’m reading now is about the founding of Seltia Kingdom.

___

It was 100 thousand years ago when the Rivania Continent revolted against the tyranny of Estalia Elois Crysalia, the empress of the Natria Empire. The empress was self centered and didn’t care about her own subjects. The whole continent suffered for 50 years under her rule, but none could stop her and her phantom legion. The empress used forbidden magic to give herself eternal life and strength, at the price of a thousand lives.

The empress knew how to use forbidden magic which converts a soul to magical strength. She used her own people as test subjects and increased her power. The continent revolted one after another, so she created the phantom legion to retaliate. Each member of the phantom legion could kill thousands on their own and had the same eternal life as the empress, but they can never be free as long as the empress controls their souls.

The empress enjoyed the heights of her new found strength, and even created a living fortress to show the world her might. Everyone lost hope as they saw the empress’ strength increase day by day. The only thing they could do was obey and hope that they can live another day. Everyone lost hope, until reinforcements arrived.

The other continents sent their strongest forces to defeat the empress. All wars against each other stopped, and every race turned their eyes on a threat that could destroy the world. They did their best to stop the empress from her tracks, and 7 people with unrivaled strength pointed their sword against the empress. Seltia Superbia, Aletra Avaritia, Leonor luxuria, Isandria Ira, Galtrus Gula, Ivalon Invidia, Asaros Acedia, those were the people that showed fearsome strength against the empire.

The 7 people were like a miracle sent by the the heavens to defeat the empress, although there was a problem. No matter how strong they were, the empress and her forces were immortal. No matter how many time they cut the empress, it was not enough to stop her. They had the strength to match her, but they did not have the same vitality as her. Slowly but surely, the forces formed by all the continents, were defeated.

If they couldn’t defeat her, then all they could do was seal her. Using most of their life, they sealed the empress, her forces, and the phantom fortress. It’s not known how long the seal will last, but all they could do was to give the people a temporary peace. The 7 lived the rest of their life on the continent, to protect the world if the empress ever got out of the seal. Not long after that, the continent was divided into 7 kingdoms which were named after the heroes.

In their last moments, they left a heir that would fight against the empress if she ever tries to take over the world again. Peace came to the world and the weapons that were once used to fight the empress, slowly lost their purpose and became the heirloom of the royal families. Azaroth the sword of darkness for the Seltia Kingdom, Lezaroth the spear of light for the Aletra Kingdom, Uvaroth the axe of earth for the Leonor Kingdom, Rukaroth the bow of wind for the Isandria Kingdom, Vantaroth the whip of flames for the Galtrus Kingdom, Molaroth the chains of water for the Ivalon Kingdom, and Temaroth the gauntlets of lightning for the Asaros Kingdom.

The next thousand years were peaceful and there was no signs of the empress, so most started to think that the past wasn’t real. The weapons weren’t strong based on the royalties that used them, so they couldn’t see how it was used to fight against an entity that could conquer the world.

The world slowly forgot about the empress and the world started to change for the better.

___

I think those from the royal family didn’t have enough strength to utilize the power of the weapons. So my weapon actually came from the legends? Doesn’t Zell have the same family name as one of the heroes? I think I have seen that phantom fortress before. If that’s the case, isn’t the world in great danger? And I didn’t read anything about any of the deity class monsters helping in the war. Not that they have to, but the world would have fallen, they should have at least helped a bit.

Say, where is the azaroth now? Did the royal family somehow lost it?

“I-I don’t know, but I think they still have it on the treasury room. It’s a valuable artifact for the country, so they wouldn’t dare to lose it.”(Zell)

Hoh, is that it? I believe that the so called artifact is inside this room right now, or does it just have the same name?

One of the heroes had a family name of Superbia, are you somehow related?

“N-no, it just a coincidence. People idolized them in the past, so my ancestors probably just used the name.” Zell looked down and covered his face with one of his hand.

I see

“I-it’s the truth.” Hearing my nonchalant voice, he raised his head and looked at me with a desperate expression. As he looked at me, his face was slowly dyed in red and was forced to look sideways.

It’s kinda obvious by the way you react. I don’t know why you are so intent on hiding it, but since you are helping me, I won’t ask anymore...there is a larger problem after all. I’m probably the only one who knows about the phantom fortress appearing. How am I supposed to tell everyone? Are they even gonna believe me when I don’t have proof?...tsk, one problem after another, and I don’t even know how to speak yet.

___

I started reading other books after lunch, but it wasn’t as interesting as the first. It was just about small conflicts with other kingdom. One worth mentioning is the fall of the other families. The Aletra, Leonor and Galtrus were replaced by different royal families. An example would be the fall of the Aletra family from the hands of the Cronia family. The Cronia family even tried to take Seltia kingdom 55 years ago, but of course, the monster called Eraisa Dorall foiled their plans.

Well, the others had legit reason since some of those royal families were blinded by greed. It’s a bit saddening to see the descendant of heroes turn into people that thirsts for power.

For religion, only a few actually believe in gods. By the way, they believe that the 6 deity class monsters are gods. Although the only thing they know was the appearance and the element that each god represent.

The first was the wolf, which was probably Faeran’s race, the Fenrir. Next was a horse, one that governs the wind element. Next was a snake, one that governs the water element. Next was an armadillo, one that governs the earth element. Next was a bird, one that governs the fire element. Last one was a lizard with wings, one that governs both light and dark elements.

These books doesn’t say anything about the magical technology.

“It just started recently, so there aren’t much books about it.”(Zell)

About the books, can we buy more?

It’s an hour before dinner, and I already finished all of the books. Well, he only brought 3 books which were all about the history of the Seltia kingdom.

“I’ll buy more tomorrow, for now, you should rest. You have been studying nonstop, you should relax your body from time to time.”(Zell)

I don’t really have anything to do, I’ll probably just sleep early if you won’t teach me.

“Then, we could start the speech lesson after dinner.You already finished 3 books, so you have enough knowledge about creating sentences.”(Zell)

After dinner, we finally started our first speech lesson. It’s easy if you know what you’re actually saying, so the teaching style we used is a success.

___

When I woke up, Zell was out of the room, as expected. The surprising thing was that Faeran was awake. The moment he saw me open my eyes, he jumped on top of me. Seems that the events yesterday worried him.

I started walking to the back of the inn; it’s starting to feel like going there is a part of my daily routine. When I got there, there were other people aside from mrs. Dorall. When they saw me, they all stopped what they were doing and waved their hands. Of course they got scolded for stopping. Seeing me made them all fired up and started swinging the sword with all of their strength.

Seems like mrs. Dorall doesn’t plan to ask me for a battle. Well, I also didn’t feel like it. Are we actually in sync? I mean we both wanted to fight the other day, then we both brought our weapons yesterday, and now we aren’t in the mood for a battle...

I watched as the burly man try to look cool in front of me, only to fail and get scolded by mrs. Dorall.

“You **** to ***** ** ***** *****?”(Eraisa)

I couldn’t understand a thing and it was shown through my expression. Mrs. Dorall laughed and made gestures telling me to forget about the conversation.

I went back after a while and waited for Zell on the 1st floor. Since the smell of food was spreading, Faeran’s tail swayed non-stop. By the time Zell came back to the inn, Faeran and I were eating on the 1st floor...one of the employees of the inn gave it to us. I didn’t how much it costs so I gave all 8 copper coins, but he rejected it and went back to the kitchen.

I can’t really move around if I can’t understand a thing, I need to learn the concept of money as fast as possible.

____

When we got back to the room, I started reading again.

Magic is something that only a few can use. About 10% of the world’s population can use magic. It seems that knowledge about magic is scarce outside of magic schools. Magicians tend to keep their discoveries for themselves or sell it for high prices, so the only way is to study at a magic school.

Magic is divided into different types and the common ones are called elemental magics. Light, Darkness, Earth, Fire, Water, Wind, and Lightning, those are the common magics used. There are also other types like Illusion, Manipulation, Necromancy, Summoning magic, and others that are yet to be discovered.

Magic schools only give you basic to advance knowledge about elemental magics , so if you want more, you have to enroll at a magic academy. The thing is, there is a hierarchy system in every magic academy. Magic academies only accept people every 5 years, and once you fail even one subject, you will get kicked out and will have to wait until the next time they accept students.

It’s quite normal for magicians to graduate from an academy after 25 years, but those that finish it in just 5 years are given status. Magic academies accepts students without a care if the person is a peasant or king, but are quite strict on their policy to kick out students if they fail once. It’s to show that a single mistake can affect one’s life greatly.

Although I disagree with their ways, it seems that magic academies give free education. As long as you pass, then you’ll get everything for free...so I can’t really say anything. Instead of those expensive books and scrolls, a chance for free education is a lot better, so people tend to repeatedly try and enroll on magic academies.

Will you enter the academy again when they start accepting students?

“If by that time you no longer need me, I will.”(Zell)

I see, when will the academy open anyways?

“About three years from now.”(Zell)

I see

“I-if you’re interested, want to enroll with me?”(Zell)

If I could get stronger by studying in the magic academy, then I guess it’ll be fine. If it doesn’t seem like I’ll get anything, then I’ll drop out and find a place to get stronger...since I need strength if the phantom fortress really shows up.

I’ll think about it, for now l’ll focus on learning and gathering information.

I finished reading all the books, 2 hours before dinner, so the rest of the day was spent on speech lessons. By the end of the day, I could speak and understand simple speech. I’m kinda excited for tomorrow. I’ll try talking to mrs. Dorall.

_________

Author’s Note:

Spoiler : You probably know the names of the other deities except for the armadillo, yup it’s a unique concept that came from me. It would have been a turtle, but I felt like an armadillo represents earth much better.