I received a terminal diagnosis when I was seven years old.
"It's Mana Reflux. Impurities enter during the process of absorbing mana through respiration, causing it to flow backward."
"Is there no way to treat it?"
"He was born with the condition, so even a cleric's healing magic has no effect. Infusing pure mana into his body can reduce the pain, but that too is only temporary."
At the time, I didn't really understand what they were saying. I only remember bursting into tears at the sight of my father's sorrowful expression.
"......How long can he live?"
"Based on recorded cases, most don't survive to adulthood."
My mother collapsed into my father's arms and wept.
"How can I ever forgive myself."
"When you say 'most,' that means there are those who survived to adulthood, correct?"
"Regularly taking elixirs would help."
Thanks to my parents, who never let go of hope, I managed to survive for ten years.
Three times a week, I received a cleric's aid, and I took quality elixirs without fail.
All of this was only possible because my father was the lord of the northern territory in the Kingdom of Rosteljier.
But after roughly ten years, even that became unsustainable.
The North was already a barren land where farming was impossible, and support from the kingdom dwindled with each passing day.
On top of that, my father, the lord, had gone into debt trying to keep me alive.
Despite my parents' efforts, ten years of unrelenting pain had warped my personality.
"Why does this food look like garbage?"
I threw tantrums at every turn.
I think, knowing I wouldn't live long, I believed I had to squeeze every bit of pleasure from whatever time I had left.
"I'm so sick of this...... I'd rather just be dead."
SLAP!
Having driven a dagger into my parents' hearts, I was slapped across the face by my father for the first time.
"How could you say something like that in front of your mother."
I knew.
How hard my parents had worked for me. All the problems existed because of me.
"You should've just given up from the start. How much longer is any of this going to buy me?"
Resentment toward the parents who brought me into the world like this, and guilt toward the people suffering because of me.
Perhaps the North's downfall was destined from the moment I was born.
"Lord Lumio, you must flee."
That night.
Julian came to my bedchamber and shook me awake in a panic.
Julian was my personal guard—a boy my age whom my parents had taken in to be a companion, since life outdoors was difficult for me.
"What's going on?"
"Monsters have breached the territory. You need to evacuate immediately."
"......What?"
"Ask questions on the way. We need to move—now."
When I threw on some clothes and stepped outside, the territory was already a sea of flames.
CRASH—!
A building collapsed right before my eyes. My body trembled.
Julian seized my hand as I stood frozen, staring at the scene.
"Don't let go of my hand."
Pulled along by Julian's strength, I ran as hard as I could. My breathing quickened.
The faster I breathed, the more Mana Reflux tore at my heart.
I stopped briefly to steady my breath. A pack of feral, dog-like monsters seized that opening and lunged at us.
Julian's sword cleaved them in half.
SLASH—!
"I'm sorry, but there's no time to rest."
His words made me realize something was wrong.
This was the southernmost edge of the territory. If monsters had pushed this far in.......
"What about the others?"
"......"
"My parents?"
Julian, who had been pressing his lips tightly shut, forced the words out.
"The Lord is fighting alongside the Knight Commander to defend the territory."
"Then you should go help them too! Why are you wasting your time on someone like me......!"
"It is the Lord's order. To ensure that Lord Lumio escapes the territory safely."
Julian steadied his breathing and raised his sword toward the forest.
Dozens of red eyes stared back at us from between the dark trees.
"When I give the signal, run. Follow the road, and you'll find the territory's people who fled ahead. Seek their help."
"You— what about you......"
"I'll be right behind you."
I knew. I had to run. I'd be nothing but dead weight if I stayed.
But Julian was the only friend I'd ever had.
My feet wouldn't move.
Julian cracked a grin, as though he'd expected this.
"We're friends, right? Let me drop the formalities, just this once."
Sword aura gathered along his blade.
"Go, Lumio—!"
I couldn't let his resolve go to waste. I ran. I ran like a madman, thrashing forward, the agony of Mana Reflux forgotten.
Even so, the feral monsters clung to my heels, and just as I thought I wouldn't survive—
THWACK.
"Over here, Lord Lumio."
"Leave this to us and get to safety."
The territory's people gathered there stepped forward and began fighting the pursuing monsters.
Someone held up a torch and pointed the way to escape.
All I could remember was treating them cruelly, using my illness as an excuse.
"Why...... All I've ever done is cause you trouble."
"The Lord spending territory funds for you was something we all agreed to. So don't feel guilty. Please—survive, and someday, rebuild the North for us."
......The only one who had given up on me was myself.
That day, the North fell.
Only about twenty people survived.
***
Their efforts were not in vain.
I survived another ten years, all the way to twenty-seven.
While Mana Reflux condemned me to a death sentence and excruciating pain, it also allowed me to absorb an enormous amount of mana.
The catch was that impurities caused the mana to endlessly flow backward—a cursed cycle.
In short, as long as I could endure the pain, I could wield far more mana than anyone else.
Furthermore, thanks to the many elixirs my parents had given me over the years, a single ring already existed around my heart.
First Circle—meaning I could use magic.
Using that power, I became a wanderer, taking commissions, buying elixirs with the money I earned, and clinging to life with everything I had.
All the while, I drifted slowly southward. I think some instinct in me wanted to get as far from the North as possible.
"That's coming to an end, too."
Ten years of driving my body to the breaking point had brought me to the Fourth Circle, but my condition had deteriorated beyond what elixirs could sustain.
The end of the road was coming into view.
"I wish the North had been like this."
Green grass and warm sunlight. Birdsong and a gentle breeze.
Even in the South, I kept walking toward the places no one else went.
That was when I found a spot where a square stone tablet was embedded in the ground.
At first, I approached it thinking it was a grave.
But its appearance was slightly different.
"Not a grave. Come to think of it, I feel like I saw a tablet like this when I was young......"
I sat down beside it and ran my hand over the stone. A massive amount of mana pulsed from within.
At the same time, a message appeared in the air.
【Activate the Mage Tower?】
The question of "how?" didn't need to be asked.
Because of Mana Reflux, mana constantly overflowed from my body, and it had naturally synchronized with the tablet.
The ground trembled, and a massive vortex formed around me.
"What the—"
Then something unbelievable happened.
The ground warped, and enormous walls rose up on all sides.
Mana drained out of me at a terrifying rate. Just as I thought I was going to die—
- You have become the Mage Tower Master.
A message appeared again, and pure mana filled my body. The pain that had crushed my heart for twenty years vanished.
"Ah......"
With a brief gasp of wonder, I looked around. The interior spanned roughly a hundred and thirty square meters, with floors and walls as smooth as polished marble.
A single book sat on the table in the center of the room, and at the far end, a hearth blazed with blue flames.
【Mage Tower Lv 2 Upgrade】
- Low-Grade Mana Ore: 10 kg
- Iron: 10 kg
- Gold: 10 kg
- Low-Grade Monster Core x3
- Mage Tower Lv 2: Magic Research Lab unlocked
The Mage Tower operated on a system where meeting certain conditions raised its level and unlocked sealed floors.
And unlike the outside, the interior was saturated with pure mana, so the pain that had clung to me like shackles was gone.
I spent decades more inside that tower.
I only ventured outside briefly to gather the materials the tower required.
The kingdom appeared to be consumed by war against foreign invaders who had pushed in from the North.
Before I knew it, I had surpassed the Eighth Circle—strong enough that even the Archmage regarded as the capital's greatest force would not have gained an inch against me.
Of course, I could have gone to the capital to help...... but I had nothing left to protect, so I didn't.
"And if an Eighth Circle mage had the power to end the war, it would've ended long ago."
But reaching the Ninth Circle would change everything.
In the tower's library, I read books on the history of the Kingdom of Rosteljier.
The one who built this Mage Tower was a Ninth Circle Archmage.
He had used his immense power to bring about peace and erected the tower upon his knowledge and the secrets of the world.
For reasons unknown the tower had since been abandoned—but if I could reach the Ninth Circle, I could put an end to the war and eradicate those abominable monsters.
"I wish this damn war would just end already. It's too terrifying to even live."
"Thank God they haven't pushed south, for whatever reason."
I overheard people chattering at the market.
That was entirely thanks to the defensive barrier deployed from the Mage Tower.
Naturally, they had no idea.
The tower was equipped with a function to conceal its exterior, so it remained invisible to the naked eye.
Carrying my provisions, I climbed to the thirtieth floor of the tower and sat in the center of the magic circle drawn on the floor.
This chamber, walled entirely in mirrors, was the nexus that concentrated all of the tower's mana to aid in reaching the Ninth Circle.
"If I fail, I die."
I steadied my breathing and steeled my resolve.
Death didn't frighten me. I was already as good as dead since the North fell.
When I closed my eyes, memories of the past surfaced.
The days spent isolated from the world after finding the tower, the hand-to-mouth existence as a wanderer taking commissions, and the agonizing life in the North.
Funny enough, the most terrible of those—life in the North—was what I missed the most.
"I'm sorry. And thank you."
Uttering the final words I'd never gotten to say to them, I activated the magic circle.
Countless streams of the tower's mana bored into my body.
My cells screamed. My heart pounded like it would burst. My entire body convulsed as though electrified, and mana erupted from every orifice.
"Gkh......"
I knew it instinctively. Failure. Was it because of all the dubious elixirs I'd scavenged during my wanderer days?
The internal damage accumulated since childhood had grown worse with age, becoming an insurmountable wall on the path to the Ninth Circle.
'I can't give up.'
My life was given to me by my parents, Julian, and the people of the North.
Even if I'd resigned myself to death, I'd fight as long as there was breath in me. I poured everything I had into controlling the tower's mana.
The mana bleeding from my body turned to blood, and through my blurring vision, I saw space itself begin to twist.
The rampaging mana collided with the tower's perpetual engine, creating a phenomenon so bizarre that even I couldn't have imagined it.
Then a strange comfort enveloped me, like sinking into the depths of the sea.
......This is death.
And a moment later.
"Today's treatment is finished."
When I opened my eyes at the sound of that voice, the scenery I had longed for so desperately came into view.
The cleric I'd seen so often as a child.
"Thank you so much for coming every week."
"Not at all. I'm paid to do this."
"Even so, you go through a great deal of trouble to come all the way to the North."
My parents, bowing their heads to him.
"......Ah."
"Are you alright? We heard you were in pain while you slept, so we called for the cleric right away."
At that warm voice, tears rolled down my cheeks.
"Does it still hurt?"
I pulled my approaching mother into a tight embrace and answered, "No."
Somehow, I hadn't died—I had returned to the past.
Seventeen years old.
The year the North would fall.