"Excuse me, coming through."
Adam gave the escort captain a light nod.
Every time he brushed past, the acrid smell of burning drifted over on the wind.
"Big Bro, is it all right for him to meet the employer like that?"
"That's for the employer to decide."
The smell of smoke that wouldn't wash off.
It didn't seem like he'd come from tending a fire.
It was a scent that often came off the hands of mages who handled the fire element.
The escort captain thought it on instinct.
This man is the crazy mage from the rumors.
"I'll hire him."
Anya's voice came from inside the carriage. The escort captain nodded.
Didn't they say that woman had mana too?
She'd probably seen the crazy mage's mana.
"Then could you get into the carriage for a moment?"
As soon as Adam took his seat, the carriage set off vigorously.
***
Inside the cramped carriage, the golden-eyed girl Anya and the old butler stared at Adam, tense all over.
Clatter.
Only the whinnying of the horses and the sound of the wheels filled the silence.
"Are you the employer?"
"Yes."
When he got into the carriage, he gave off the scent of a half-burnt campfire, or the sparks of a smithy.
"Pleased to meet you, Employer."
Adam placed a hand on his chest as he greeted her.
"How are you finding your direction?"
"...We used a magic tool compass."
"A magic tool... I've never seen one, but from here on the rocks give off a magnetic field, so put the compass away. And tell the coachman to find the way by the position of the sun or the direction the birds fly instead of by compass."
"Y-yes......."
He was supposedly a bandit leader, but his manner was as courteous as a noble's and his knowledge seasoned.
Adam turned his gaze to the huge bundle of luggage sitting beside Anya.
"What's this luggage?"
Adam checked the luggage in the seat next to the girl.
The old man answered coldly at the question.
"Why do you ask?"
"Ah, I was just wondering if it was important enough to cross the Great Forest for."
"It's not something a bandit would know about."
The girl answered in the butler's place.
"They're manuscripts."
"My lady!"
"You mean books?"
No wonder. I was wondering why the carriage train was so small. It was all books.
"That's amazing. With this many, they must be worth quite a bit."
"......!?"
At that answer, the old man's and the girl's eyes went wide.
Even the escort detail right outside thought little of this job, and yet a bandit had been impressed by the girl's work.
"Thank you. For recognizing it."
"Eh, no need to thank me. With this much, you must know a bit about magic theory books too?"
"Yes, well. I attended the Academy, so I know a little."
"The Academy!"
It had been a successful gamble.
He'd joined without expecting much, and his employer turned out to be an Academy-trained expert, of all things.
When Adam grinned, Anya felt an inexplicable chill.
"Employer, may I ask your name?"
"I am Anya of House Grave."
"I'm Adam Sanchez."
"Sanchez......."
Adam and Anya shook hands to celebrate the contract.
Anya's hand was smaller and more delicate than he'd expected.
***
It's human nature: when someone you like says something, you want to give them one more word in return.
Adam poured in all the lip service he'd picked up at Aicolman's mansion without holding back.
Before the praise and the polite attitude, Anya's wariness crumbled like a sandcastle.
Once he praised her book-transporting work, it was pretty much over.
The way she tried to hold back even as the corners of her mouth twitched was rather cute.
She's really not honest with herself.
With Anya won over, the rest was easy.
When Adam offered advice on avoiding danger zones by looking at animal tracks and orienting themselves by the birds' flight paths, the butler began treating him like a sage of the forest.
"Remarkable. You seem young still, yet you know the way this well."
"It's nothing."
In truth, what would Adam know?
He was a drifter who'd only been here 3 months.
All this information was gossip the bandits chattered about over meals.
The forest was a land of peril only to traveling merchants; to the natives, it was no different from a room in their own house.
"You said a moment ago that you had a curse?"
Anya asked amid the much softened atmosphere.
Adam deliberated for a moment.
Isn't it a little much to show a stranger what's causing my curse?
But if he didn't say anything, he couldn't get any information either.
"The curse... I've been calling it a curse for convenience, but I'm not sure that's right. The person who taught me talked about it like it was inevitable."
Anya looked at the magic circle on the back of his hand and spoke calmly.
"It's a magic circle. Are you an Arcanist?"
"An Arcanist?"
When he reacted as if hearing it for the first time, Anya added an explanation.
"Normally, mages use magic through incantations and hand seals. But people like you, who carve magic circles to reconstruct magic without incantation, are called Arcanists."
Aicolman hadn't taught him even something this basic. Because he wasn't his teacher.
"Arcanists can reconstruct magic by combining all kinds of formulas, not just the Four Great Elements. They can add commands, too."
Adam took notes on what Anya said. In other words, what was carved on the back of Adam's hand was a kind of automatic programming.
-Generate a sphere.
-Convert mana into a substance containing explosive energy.
-Compress and store the energy in the sphere.
So the magic circle was basically going 'ptooey' and spitting out the resulting bomb.
"Well, this is very basic stuff, so that's about the limit of my knowledge."
"......."
"Excuse me?"
Adam kept his eyes lowered and didn't answer.
But how is this person teaching me all this?
Is she an angel?
For some reason, he felt his eyes getting misty.
"Sniff."
"Wh-what's wrong?"
"To think you'd tell me so much for free. Out on the frontier, they make you pay even to use the toilet. And you're teaching me so, so much for free, Miss Anya."
"T-teaching you? I was only going over what anyone knows. I-if you're an Arcanist, isn't this obviously something you'd know?"
"I don't, though?"
"No, what do you mean—"
"Today was my first lecture on magic ever. The only person teaching me would only teach me mana control for survival, on principle."
Anya wanted to ask if he was making fun of her, but judging by his eyes, they were truly the eyes of a child full of curiosity.
Is this how it feels to watch a child double over at the 'fire stone' part when you're explaining, 'Now, pour water into the pot, and put a fire stone underneath,' in the first class of a cooking course?
How did he become an Arcanist with knowledge as blank as a fresh sheet of drawing paper?
"Mr. Adam, do you by any chance know that you can add extra circles to a magic circle?"
"What's that?"
Just in case, she taught him that there was such a thing as a 'Time Extension Circle,' and this time he reacted like a caveman discovering fire for the first time.
"Good heavens, how can this be!"
What is with this guy?
"Magic circles can do this too?"
"No, how can you not know this much? You're an Arcanist who even got a formula on the back of his hand. This is the most basic of basics!"
"Ahh, well, that's because I'm not the one who carved it."
"Sorry? What do you mean......."
Adam stroked the hateful magic circle on the back of his hand.
"A grimoire just carved this magic circle on the back of my hand on its own and ran off. So it spits out bombs regardless of my will, and I felt like I'd burn to death from my own magic at this rate, so I asked for help."
On the back of Adam's hand, bloody red marks stood out vividly.
They were wounds from scratching it every time he got angry.
"A grimoire... So that really does happen."
Judging by Anya's reaction, it didn't seem to be a common occurrence.
Of course it wasn't.
Aside from Aicolman, he'd hardly gotten any information about grimoires.
On top of that, Aicolman even considered insomnia plus periodic bomb threats to be a trial.
It seemed mages were perverts who took hardship for granted.
No, did she say Arcanists?
"You've really been through a lot."
"Can't be helped. I don't want to die just because I can't get a little sleep."
"If it were me, I might have lost my mind."
For now, he briefly wrote down only the things he could use right away.
Time Extension Circle.
Compression Circle.
Once he'd written them down, his heart was pounding.
When's the next magic beast going to show up?
I want to test these.
It was just as he was waiting for the next magic beast.
"Neigh!"
With a horse's whinny, the carriage came to a sudden stop.
Looking out the window, the escort captain had drawn his sword and was in a standoff.
"Is something wrong?"
"Thanks for showing us the way, but this time you'll have to work too."
Diamond Bears.
8 bears with hard back shells were baring their teeth.
"Adam, you can fight too, right?"
"Escort captain."
Adam called the captain in a low voice.
The look in his eyes, which had been moved to tears by an angel a moment ago, was nowhere to be found.
"Don't face them."
"What?"
"Don't fight. Run, now."
"What are you talking about?! They're only Diamond Bears!"
When he raised his voice, the Diamond Bears grew even more suspicious of them.
"The Diamond Bears that live in the Great Forest are pretty dangerous around here."
"Hey, you punk. Who the hell does that kid think he is—!"
"I said don't engage them."
Adam grabbed the escort captain by the collar and spoke quietly and roughly.
"Y-you, you, what's wrong with you?"
Flap.
Flap.
The forest birds beat their wings frantically and soared into the sky.
Inside the carriage, Anya looked at Adam with a frightened expression.
"Adam?"
"What are you spacing out for? You're the employer. Give the order. Tell them to get the hell out, now."
"Wh-what are you talking about? Diamond Bears are low-tier magic beasts that even C+ adventurers can handle."
"Because they're cubs, sure."
"Cubs? They're already that big!"
"In other regions those might be adults, but not here."
Adam's eyes went cold.
"Cubs especially must never be touched. If the mother comes, never mind the books, we're all just dead."
The escort captain, who'd been listening to the two of them, stared at the Diamond Bears.
Even at a glance, the Diamond Bear cubs were bigger than the average magic beast.
But those are cubs?
Then how big are the adults?
While the escort captain was flustered, Adam grabbed him by the collar and gave the order.
"Ditch the carriage and run. As inconspicuously as you can."
The captain shouted in perfect order.
First, the merchants fled in perfect order.
The escort detail also held the front line as they pulled back.
It was the moment the trust built by showing them the way shone.
But fate wouldn't leave them alone.
"There's another one over there!"
"Grrrrr!"
A Diamond Bear that had been hiding in the bushes ambushed one of the guards.
"Aaaaargh!"
If they abandoned one guard, everyone could live.
"Gyaaaah! Help me!"
But the world apparently wasn't rotten enough to just abandon someone after seeing something like that.
It'd be fine if it were a little rotten, though.......
"You bastard!"
The escort captain finally couldn't hold back and kicked the Diamond Bear.
Unfortunately, it seemed Diamond Bears were big crybabies.
The cub, sent rolling over and over by a single kick, raised its voice to the sky.
"Grrroooaaar!"
A spine-chilling howl shook the forest.