NOVEL NEXT Chapter 43 - Doll Carrying Wishes (8)
“That’s mean.”
At Sillua’s words, I thought for a moment about what she meant, then laughed playfully.
“Aha, are you upset that your father is teaching me magic but not you?”
My words must have hit the mark as Sillua’s face turned bright red.
“Ah! No, I’m not!”
“No way, it’s written all over your face.”
“I said that’s not it!”
Sillua glared at me with an indignant face, puffing her cheeks.
I thought she didn’t resemble Geor much, but her glare was the spitting image of Geor.
Her actions and reactions were un-doll-like in many ways.
I don’t know much about the magical dolls of this world.
However, even after obtaining Geor’s legacy, Nivel, the head dollmaker and an executive of Arcana in
Nevertheless, the dolls modeled after her boasted considerable perfection as weapons.
Considering that, one could see how great a dollmaker Geor was and how absurdly impossible a doll Sillua was.
“Or is it because I’m taking your father’s time?”
When I asked playfully, the reaction was quite different this time.
She lowered her head with reddened eyes, grabbing her skirt with small hands.
Her expression looked like she would cry at any moment, but no tears flowed from Sillua’s eyes.
Lifeforms that use magic power as energy and whose bodies are composed of magic, such as the merfolk called sirens, vampires, and spirits, cannot shed tears.
The same went for magical dolls.
I knelt on one knee, gently hugged Sillua, and apologized.
“I was being mischievous. I’m sorry.”
Sillua also seemed to know about Geor’s physical condition.
Then she must also know he doesn’t have much time left.
Sillua, who had been trembling slightly at my consolation, seemed to collect herself and smiled as she left my embrace.
“…No. Sillua is a good daughter. So I won’t trouble Father. Ah! Looks like Zillian No. 77 has finished preparing dinner! I should go help!”
Sillua ran off to the kitchen, smiling as she left me.
Is it just my imagination that her laughter sounds like crying?
*****
Regaining consciousness, Gilbert raised his body and grasped where he was.
The place he woke up was the living room sofa of Geor’s mansion.
Precia, who had been meditating while sitting across from him, slowly opened her eyes and spoke.
“Eat, you must be hungry.”
At the end of Precia’s gaze was a sandwich on the table.
“Ah… thank you.”
Gilbert washed his face and checked his physical condition.
He thought he had quite overdone it, but his condition wasn’t bad.
No, he felt refreshed beyond compare.
Gilbert, thinking it was thanks to the Divet pills Yuan gave him, realized the carpet under the sofa was faintly glowing.
“What’s this?”
“It’s Lord Geor’s recovery magic circle. It helps not only natural healing but also magic power recovery.”
At Precia’s answer, Gilbert nodded.
“I thought the recovery was fast.”
“Helping magic power recovery means it condenses the surrounding magic power. In other words, it’s optimal for magic power training.”
“Aha! I’ll do it too.”
Gilbert sat like Precia and composed his magic power.
A knight’s magic power training was similar yet different from a mage’s magic circuits.
Unlike mages who unfold miracles by resonating with the world through their magic power, knights used it solely to strengthen their bodies and swords while isolating the magic power inside from the world.
Of course, some knights also manifested unique powers like magic.
After training his magic power inside like meditating for a while, Precia slowly spoke.
“Gilbert, if you can hear me, answer ‘yes’.”
Unlike Precia, who had the leisure to converse as training came as naturally as breathing, Gilbert, who was concentrating on training, had no time to answer Precia’s question.
Precia didn’t rush and calmly waited for Gilbert’s reply.
“…Yes.”
Seeing Gilbert struggling to answer while sweating, Precia spoke as if teaching.
“It won’t be easy, but from now on, I’ll have you practice training while moving when not in battle. Let’s start with having a conversation first.”
It was a terribly harsh training that ordinary knights don’t do.
Rationally, as training is to grow and refine the magic power within the body, it requires considerable concentration.
If one makes a mistake during training, the magic power could run wild and cause major injuries.
Despite the risk of injury, the reason knights train magic power is because the difference in strength between a knight who can handle magic power and one who can’t is as vast as an adult man and a young child.
“Of course, training takes priority. If the magic power runs wild, it defeats the purpose.”
At Precia’s words, Gilbert couldn’t answer right away and asked intermittently.
“Why… such… practice?”
“Good question. There are four main reasons. The first reason is because we are escort knights. Whether training or sleeping, we must move at any time for His Highness’s safety. The enemy won’t wait for our circumstances to attack.”
Yuan’s escorts are only Precia and Gilbert, just the two of them.
No matter how much Yuan is said to handle spirits, they couldn’t let their guard down as his magic power as a spirit mage was pitiful.
So they had to be able to immediately stop training and move.
“The second reason is we can’t secure space. As we’re busy escorting His Highness, we can’t have a stable training location like now.”
While traveling, the only training they could do was on the road before sleeping.
In such a situation, there was no guarantee they wouldn’t encounter wild animals or monsters during training.
Ordinary knights don’t train during war, escort, or practice, but Precia didn’t care about ordinary knights.
“The third reason is we don’t have time. Although His Highness considerately gives us training time now and then while moving, it’s not enough to train with dedication.”
Time was even tighter than training time.
Once Yuan finishes his business with Geor, they have to head straight to Bastille, called the hell of the human world.
Gilbert was still too weak to go to Bastille.
Even if he trains without eating or sleeping, it’s questionable if he can survive, so not training while moving is tantamount to telling him to die.
“The last reason is if you can train unconsciously, you can become even stronger.”
One can literally train nonstop and become faster and stronger than anyone else.
It sounded quite crazy, but Gilbert was convinced by Precia’s reasons.
He admired the strength of Precia he had closely seen in the past.
“I… understand….”
In fact, just the first reason was sufficient for Precia’s training to have value.
Precia had also been trained this way by Horazon for the first reason.
Of course, Horazon taught her to quickly gather magic power during training, not to train all day long.
“Good. Seems you understand, so let’s start practicing. Where did you learn to train magic power?”
“From… my late… gr, grand…father.”
Gilbert struggled to maintain concentration while sweating buckets.
“Grandfather? Was your grandfather a royal knight?”
“That… I don’t, know.”
“Really? It seems similar to the royal knights’ training method.”
Just as there are schools for mages, there are also sects for knights.
As magic circuit development methods differ by school, knights’ training methods also vary by knighthood, family, and region.
Precia also received and trained in the Jamileion family’s method, a knightly family.
“Well, okay. The royal knights’ method is one my teacher acknowledged, so it’s fine if it’s similar.”
If Gilbert’s method seemed strange, she intended to teach him one of the dozens of methods she learned from Horazon, but that didn’t seem necessary.
“If there’s anything you’re curious about, ask. I’ll answer whether it’s about swordsmanship or today’s training.”
“Yes… I under, stand.”
Gilbert began to subtly get used to Precia’s training method.
In the late night before dawn, I woke up from sleep as Navi firmly pressed my cheek with its lovely legs.
I went to bed early not only because I was tired from learning magic, but also to wake up at dawn when yin energy is abundant and good for summoning a water spirit.
“Yawn~! Thanks for waking me.”
-Nya!
-Bbororong~!
As I sat up, Navi perched on my shoulder and Nuni on my head.
Turning my head to the side as I felt no presence at all, Gilbert, who should’ve been sleeping on the bed next to me, was gone.
“Where did he go? Yawn!”
I left the room, stretching.
Opening the door, Precia and Gilbert were still training on the magic circle in the living room.
“Training is good, but do it moderately and sleep so it doesn’t interfere with tomorrow’s practice.”
At my words, Precia and Gilbert answered simultaneously.
“Yes, I understand.”
“I under, stand.”
Seeing Gilbert also answering, it seems Precia is passing down her crazy training method to Gilbert.
Seeing Precia’s training method, one of the Ten Swords Under Heaven, the Sword Devil, said this:
‘I lacked cultivation. I’ve seen countless madnesses, but true madness was here. Thanks to that, I’ve gained enlightenment.’
And another of the Ten Swords Under Heaven, the Sword Immortal, said this about her:
‘Have you seen such a crazy bitch.’
Leaving the two training behind, I went to the yard and the chilly dawn air brushed the tip of my nose.
Geor, who came out first and was waiting by the pond, clicked his tongue seeing me.
“You’re late.”
At his words, I took out my pocket watch and checked the time.
“There are still 2 minutes left until the appointed time.”
“If you made an appointment, you should come out 10 minutes early. Tsk, a disciple shouldn’t make the teacher wait in the cold wind.”
No, who said to come out and wait first?
If the weak old man waited from 10 minutes prior, how much was he looking forward to the spirit summoning?
“Yes, yes, I apologize for being a disrespectful disciple. But what is that huge stone tablet on the lake?”
At my question, Geor answered as if it was nothing.
“It’s Ebilibisk’s Lithograph.”
“Ah. I see… Wait, Ebilibisk? Isn’t that the tablet used to record the important legacies of magic schools?”
When I asked in shock, Geor nodded as if asking what the problem was.
‘Ebilibisk’ was one of the Eight Sages of Magic about 600 years ago, a mage called the ‘Sage of Records’.
Records magically inscribed on the ‘Ebilibisk’s Lithograph’ he left behind were considered impossible to damage by any means.
“The tablet itself contains magic power, so it’s good for summoning magic.”
“No, I mean, is it okay to use such a precious thing simply for spirit summoning magic?!”
I don’t know how many lithographs remain, but the ones Ebilibisk made are world heritages with few left.
Of course, Ebilibisk did leave behind the method to create Ebilibisk’s Lithograph.
However, at most only 1 or 2 tablets are made every 10 years.
Not only are the materials to create the tablet expensive, but the magic technique is so abstruse unless you’re a sage-level mage. In reality, it required around a dozen Supreme Mages, the highest rank in the mage hierarchy, to master it.
If all of Geor’s essence is Sillua, then all of Ebilibisk’s essence can be said to be the lithograph named after him.
“It’s fine. It’s leftover from making the core of the Archive anyway.”
Judging from his words, it seems the tablet was made by Geor himself.
Still, it doesn’t change that it’s precious.
“Well, if you say so.”
Certainly, as he said, the tablet is an excellent material for operating magic.
Using this tablet, I can summon much more stably than when summoning Nuni.
Of course, I was a bit reluctant about the summoning circle being permanently preserved, but still.
It’s a good opportunity, so I climbed onto the tablet and began drawing the water spirit summoning circle written in Lisbeth’s spirit book with Abasael’s magic engraving pen.