The castle is done, and it better go down in history as one of the world’s wonders from the metric tons of beauty I shoved into it. Even the goddamn secret tunnel is pretty, and the bridge is borderline heavenly. I made sure to add flowers and vines in aesthetically pleasing places without overdoing it, the royal gardener will have his work cut out for him.

I even gave the vases enchantments to turn the salty smell of the sea into flowery scents.

The only place I feel it’s a little too gaudy is the throne room, but whatever, as long as the history books remember that it wasn’t my idea to use so many jewels, it’s fine.

How would the history books know that, you ask? Because I’m the one writing it! There’s no way I’m letting the last three years of my life be excused as receiving a divine revelation or other such nonsense. I’m writing down what I did and why I did it, while leaving some details about security aside, of course.

Oh, talking about security, the attack last time was instigated by someone from Heiron, the country located beyond the monster territory to the west. Usually they just sponsor pirates to raid ships in our waters, but it seems they decided on weakening our national might after hearing of the alliance with Endel.

In light of this I made a few ships inspired by the idea of the dreadnought. The cannons in it aren’t as big as the castle’s though. The Chevalier grandpas and grandmas leading the navy loved it anyways, though. The arcane radar I put in there should be a big help.

The ship simply has more armor, speed, power and utilities than the enemies’, so it dreads naught. They can’t hurt it, outrun it, defend from it or hide from it.

I’m leaving asking for forbidden knowledge for later, I’m thinking it might be better to get curse magic for an idea I have.

While I was working on making airplanes with mana cores to finish off the trio of ground, water and air, the endelian prince arrived to marry our princess.

~~

Like most endelians he has pale skin and dark hair, his hair has a little bit of blue in it, not like a raven but more like some parts are blackish and some parts are dark-bluish. So this is my future king, huh? His name is Kurt Endel.

“And this is Lance Chevalier, the one I told you about.” The princess introduces me.

I bow respectfully. “It’s an honor, your highness.”

“Yes, it’s the same for me. Seeing you, I still can’t help but be surprised by your young age, even if I was told about it clearly.” Endel speaks the same language as Sylvian, and so do most countries nearby, but everyone speaks slightly differently. Endel pronounces sounds like ‘S’ and ‘A’ differently from us. But it’s not different enough to not understand, only slang terms sometimes aren’t shared.

“I was very impressed by that ‘train’ of yours, I was discussing with Catherine about building a ‘railroad’ crossing the border.” He continues. Don’t tell me that, the royal family has the blueprints, they don’t need me to make more trains or railroads.

Of course, I’m not saying that out loud. “Thank you for your compliments, your highness. I worked hard on those.” Neither confirm nor deny, Lance, just smile.

After that they moved on to introducing more people. Dealing with people with higher status than me is so awkward. I hate having to speak politely.

~~

After I’m done with the airplanes I had to teach a royal knight how to pilot one.

She chose the kind of plane that doesn’t have a co-pilot to learn how to drive, so I had to teach her the same way I taught Athena. In other words, I’m on her lap.

“No, Lady Joann, you need to pull it back to go up.” I explain calmly.

The thing is, Lady Joann is a charming young woman, and since I’m at the initial stages of puberty, being in close contact with her is distracting.

“Sir Lance, Athena told me about doing a loop, can I do that?” Goddamn it, it’s Athena’s fault she wanted to fly this style of plane, huh?

“Sure, we just need to get some altitude first.”

I teach her how to do it. She giggles happily when she succeeds. Stop giggling behind my ears! I can feel your breath!

Calm down, deep breaths, she’s old enough to be your… She’s not old enough to be your mother but she’s still much older than you…

Being a teenager sucks.

~~

Done! with the castle, land, water and air transportation AND the arcane telegraph under my belt, I should be able to get both the cannibal thingy and curse magic… That and I need to get it done before the coronation ceremony, don’t want to deal with that art nerd, who knows what she’ll ask for next.

The current queen is more reasonable.

“You want two sections of forbidden knowledge? Did you even study ritual magic at all?” Ah, right, completely forgot about that.

“… Is that a no?” I ask carefully.

She sighs. “Fine, you’ve proven yourself to be very helpful to the country… But I have a small task I want your help with.” I take it back, neither of them are reasonable. “I wanted you to make the new crown DURING the coronation ceremony, I’m sure it would be a nice spectacle, don’t you think, dear?” The king nods.

Well, that’s not too big of a deal, but it might not be that impressive. “Sure, but I’d need to practice a little bit to be able give it some flair.”

~~

There, the new queen has been crowned and I made a cool show with fire and lightning, now back to the stuff that matters.

The reason I wanted the Cannibal thing is NOT because I want to eat people, it’s because I wanted to see if I could learn something from it to use on blood (without drinking it, that’s gross) and stuff, because of my bloodline and all that.

And the curse magic, I was thinking it could be used to help commoners feel mana by disabling all other senses temporarily.

But that’s for later, for now I’m tired, so I’ll just study these things on my own while making swords and armor and training with the sword to relax my mind. Like a vacation… No, I know I just described work, but it’s relaxing for me and 100% resting would be boring and stressful

I’m not workaholic, I swear…

… Maybe I’ll just learn how to cook something other than just roast and boil things…

~Time Skip~

For the last half a year I’ve been focusing more on the sword and unarmed combat. Now that I don't have to divide my attention it’s a lot of fun. Even pain and injury isn’t scary since I can just heal everything, so it’s only annoying when you’re pumped up with adrenaline.

I’ve studied the ritual magic, curse magic and cannibal thingy. Out of ritual magic I only got a little bit of usable knowledge, since most of it involves sacrifices, but I managed to come up with enchantments through engraving symbols on things. Not sure if it’s better or worse, haven’t experimented enough, but there is potential here.

The cannibal thingy is as gross as you’d expect, I only managed to improve the amount of mana I get from blood by a little bit, so that’s a big disappointment. I should have gone with necromancy.

But curse magic is more interesting than it first seemed. Yes, decreasing all other senses can help with feeling mana, but as it turns out, mana sense is kind of connected to one’s sense of touch in general, so by focusing on that and reversing it, I managed to actually increase one’s mana sense through enhancement magic.

So I made a ‘sense chamber’ that is pretty much just a water tank with a breathing mask that weakens every other sense while strengthening one’s mana sense.

To test if it works I went to the place where conscripted soldiers are trained and brought the sense chamber with me on a truck, my bodyguards have their own cars. Kind of Ironic that children shouldn’t drive but a child was the one who introduced cars in this world.

Arriving there I look for someone I’ve met once. There he is.

“Hey, uncle! Can you help me with something?” I ask him.

“Hmm?” The trainer uncle turns to me, I don’t remember his name, but Lady Joann introduced him to me and asked me to heal his missing arm. “Oh! Sir Lance! How can I help?”

“I want to test something, follow me.” I walk back to the sense chamber without waiting for an answer and ignoring the recruits he was teaching earlier. I remember him because while introducing him, Lady Joann mentioned he did a great job for someone without mana and earned the rare chance to be trained in mana even without any instinct or bloodline.

But he couldn’t learn it and remained on the lower ranks until now that he is in his thirties.

If my sense chamber works on him it should work on almost everyone. “Just put this mask on, get in there and try to sense your mana and the mana in this jewel, don’t worry about getting wet, I can dry you later.” The jewel was enchanted to be as obvious to mana sense as possible. “If you manage to sense your mana, try to circulate it through your body. Go.”

He seems to take a moment to understand everything, and then he takes a deep breath and enters while leaving his sword and sheath on the ground.

This should take a while… What should I do while waiting?

Looking around, I see the recruits… and a blunt training sword nearby…

“Hey guys, how about some sparring?” I give them my brightest smile, they don’t seem to like it very much.

~~

After about one and a half hour.

“Ah, don’t be a baby, it’s just a broken arm.” I heal her. “There, good as new. Now, you five over there are already rested right? Let’s go round two.”

The chamber opens right then. Finally.

I approach him and dry him up. “Let’s see…” I concentrate on his mana and… Yep, it’s moving. It’s too slow to do much, but it’s good enough. With this sensing mana becomes much easier and he can work on it by himself. “Thanks for the help.” I say to the man who seems to be having an emotional moment or something as I pack things up on the truck and leave, bodyguards in tow.

In exchange for this I should be able to get necromancy.

~~

I made ten of those chambers in exchange for necromancy, but like the others it was mostly disappointment, the bastard that wrote these notes didn’t know jack about souls, just stumbled into something that kind of worked. And even then it didn’t quite work since he still had to turn the bodies into something similar to golems for it to work.

I’m feeling doubtful about disease and prayer magic. Well, prayer magic I was always doubtful about since it was written down that it was random and could make people who use it go bonkers.

Sigh.

~~

I started to get in contact with writers of various subjects in order to try and make standardized educational books with a gradual difficulty increase. I also got help from auntie.

“Lance, dear, are you doing this because you want to be a teacher?” Asks auntie.

“No way!” I hurriedly shake my head. “I just want to get the books and the system ready, the teaching can be done by someone else.” Teaching is not my kind of thing, thank you.

“Thought so. But what do you mean by system?”

“Oh, that. I’m thinking of starting a school to teach basic things like reading and math to commoners.”

Auntie looks at me with confusion. “Why?”

“To improve the quality of the country’s workforce.” Just basic education would do wonders for the country’s culture. Well, that and I’m hoping this will help prevent mass unemployment caused by sudden technological advancements brought by the mana cores down the line.

She frowns. “This just isn’t your style, Lance. In what way is this entertaining you?”

“Uh, exchanging letters with the best writers in the country can be pretty entertaining.”

She just frowns harder.

I sigh. “Fine, I just want to get disease magic.”

“Oh, that makes more sense, but why this of all things? Can’t you just make other things like the train?”

“How many things like the trains do you think I can make?”

“I’m pretty sure you already made a few.”

“… Whatever, education of the masses is just as important as trains, if not more on the long term.”

“But will it be enough to get you disease magic, though?”

“…”

Fuck, that art nerd won’t give me disease magic for this, will she?

I should just publish the books and move on to trying out the heads up display idea.

“Yeah, fuck schools.”

“Lance! Language!” Oops. I said that out loud.

At that moment, Athena opens the door without knocking, like always. At least it gives me a chance to change the subject.

“Lance, I’m going to a dance tomorrow. Can you be my pair?” She asks out of nowhere.

Geh, I’ve went to a couple of these before, not a big fan. I just eat the food and avoid people.

Seeing my displeased expression, Athena continues. “Oh, come on, Lance. You know I don’t have any male friends, you wouldn’t make me go alone, would you?” Athena doesn’t befriend men because they often approach her only for her status.

“But dancing with my sister is so lame…”

“It’s just one dance, you can go eat after that while I talk with my friends.” Well, I guess I can do this for her. But only because she reminds me of people’s names when I forget them.

“Fine.” I still remember you snitched me to mom, though.

“Thanks.”

~~

The dance is going like normal, that is to say, boring.

We walked in holding hands and walking at the same pace as we are announced loudly. After that, Athena talked to people she knows while I kept a smiling mask on my face.

The actual dancing part of the dance could be fun, but it’s so stiff it becomes boring after the first minute.

With that done, I’m about to go grab some food when suddenly. “Sir Lance, may I have this dance?”

I look at the girl and my eyes are only lacking the actual words to say ‘you focking wot, m8?’

“Lance, don’t be rude.” Athena grabs my hand and puts it on the girl’s.

This woman, she’s selling me out!

If I make a scene I’ll never hear the end of it, so I just go along for now. But I’ll never go with Athena to a dance again. This card of yours was single-use.

While dancing the girl begins the conversation. “Sir Lance, I’m a big fan of your work.” Yeah, sure, and I bet you’re an even bigger fan of my bloodline. “I picked up enchanting thanks to being inspired by a sword you made long ago.”

I still can't get used to be called 'Sir'. “Oh, you picked up enchanting?” Isn’t she trying too hard?

“Yes, I did. I was wondering why you never seem to make the popular style of fire shooting swords. Is there a technical reason?”

“…” Looking at this girl again, beauty aside, she looks to be my age. And yet, here she is trying so hard to make conversation. Oh well. “I don’t believe I caught your name?”

“My name is Sarah Morgan, sir.” She answers with a smile. The Morgans are responsible for a bunch of ports on the east, if I’m not mistaken.

“Well, Lady Sarah, do tell me, what is a sword for?” I ask.

“Sir? A sword would be… for killing?” She answers unsure.

At this part of the dance we do a little spin. “Yes, but I’m talking about the specific methods and situations where the sword is used. The sword kills by cutting, piercing and very rarely by blunt impact, usually on very short ranges. As you can guess, none of those have anything to do with shooting neither fire nor lightning.”

“But sir, doesn’t a heated blade become very sharp?”

“Duly noted, Lady Sarah. But heating the blade softens the metal and could even undo the benefits from quenching and tempering. The sword might even break apart if it hits good enough armor. “She makes a ‘Oh’ expression. “In any case, neither fire nor lightning is more effective than simply using a telekinetic aid for the cutting and piercing on their own, and if the swordsman really needs a little extra range, one can just enchant it with a force cut with minimal usage of room for the enchantments…”

When I noticed, I was babbling on. In my defense, she’s done her research.

When the song was over, “Thank you for the dance, Sir Lance. The conversation was also very insightful.” She gives me a curtsy.

“May I have the honor of the next dance, Sir Lance?” Another one?

I look at her offered hand while thinking for a few moments.

Oh, to hell with it. “Sure.” It beats sitting around waiting for the time to go home to arrive.

Now, did this one also study about one of my interests?

“I heard you have a pet monster wolf up north, Sir Lance? My family has a large selection of tamed monsters down south…”

Well, I’ll be damned. Maybe these seduction attempts aren’t that bad.

At least they’re entertaining.