'Today, let's finish it.'
What Delam had been absorbed in lately was mana formulas.
Precisely, the combination and re-creation of mana formulas.
The Vistache secret formula he'd obtained a while back was the object.
'My Flurex Arts, and the mana formulas of other great houses... and the Vistache secret formula Rubian taught me.'
The materials were sufficient.
The one he examined most intensively was the Vistache secret formula.
A mana formula was normally supplemented and supplemented again across dozens of generations, so it could not help taking on a tremendously complex structure.
But in the end the origin was one.
The work Delam had been doing all through the past two months.
Was precisely the process of tracing his way back to that beginning.
Delam kept moving the tweezers in his head.
He dismantled the abstruse mana formula in fine detail.
He stripped away the superfluities later generations had attached, and separated out the residue of other mana formulas plastered on in the name of strengthening it.
What remained at last was the [true body].
The intent of a founder who had valued nothing but strength.
'Finally done. Now let's get my hands on it.'
Delam began to work on that true body again.
Materials heaped in a corner of his mental world, broken apart.
He gathered them up and reassembled them.
Not exactly identically, of course.
If it were to be that, there was no reason to have dismantled it at such trouble.
Keeping the basic frame as it was, he simplified the inefficient parts and boldly cut away the parts that were tangled or clotted.
They were probably parts lost through some incident, or the traces of some talentless head of house forcing an alteration.
Snip, snip.
Delam cut every such part away.
In the affairs of the world, people and mana formulas were the same.
When you take a blade to it, you have to take it decisively for the thing to live.
'Hmm... what would be good?'
Delam considered while looking at the emptied places he'd cut.
Several mana formulas dismantled and vanished inside his head.
And as a result the most effective adhesive was selected.
Namely Flurex Arts.
Flurex Arts.
Flurex was not so grand as to be called a great sea.
It was neither that wide, nor able to embrace everything.
But it did amount to a great river.
Never drying however severe the drought.
A main current that traverses the land toward the sea without ever being cut.
It makes everything flow.
It lets nothing dry up.
And therefore it would splendidly fill in the empty parts of the Vistache secret formula, damaged and severed here and there.
'And with this... complete!'
The Vistache mana formula, made whole at last.
No. The Vistache-Delam mana formula.
He'd gone out of his way to attach his own name and take some credit.
He did it because the completed formula was far finer than Delam had expected.
Enough that even Delam, who knew a great many mana formulas, admired it.
'This is seriously good, isn't it?'
The Vistache mana formula had changed.
A thing called [focus], which hadn't existed at all before, had appeared.
Concentration to a single point, which had been scattered without anyone noticing across the course of its improvements.
And with a reference point established, its power rose by another 50 percent.
'But this isn't the Vistache secret formula being impressive... isn't it the Flurex that went into it that's ridiculous?'
Flurex Arts looked remarkable to him afresh.
And he could dimly see the road he ought to advance along, too.
Delam's reason for remodeling the Vistache secret formula?
To repay the kindhearted Rubian, of course.
Precisely, to raise Rubian into a hero who would kill demons.
But the largest purpose was Delam's own strengthening.
Precisely, it was work aimed at evolving Flurex further.
[Flurex Arts, of stability]
[The Vistache secret formula, of destructive power]
The two formulas' attributes were exact opposites.
Which meant there was much for each to learn from the other.
So then, Flurex's weakness.
Meaning, should he supplement its destructive power with Vistache?
Ordinarily that would have been it.
But Delam made the exact opposite decision.
Dismantling the Vistache secret formula, he understood.
Which expression to touch and how, in order to draw a formula's destructive power up to its maximum — that structure.
Astonishingly, Flurex had a destructive aspect too.
That was the part overlapping with Vistache.
An exceedingly small part, granted.
Delam removed that part completely.
From a Flurex whose power was weak to begin with, he deleted outright the destructive portion that had remained like a vestigial organ.
'The road beyond senior!'
Before regressing, Delam's final attainment had been senior.
Above that had been impossible however hard he strove.
And now, however dimly, he understood.
The reason his attainment had stagnated.
Ironically, it was because of knowledge.
Because he knew too many mana formulas — and every one of them a high-grade formula, so he couldn't boldly discard any.
[Selection and concentration]
Take what is to be taken, discard what is to be discarded.
Delam had realized it only after dying once.
That was why he remodeled Flurex.
To make a mana formula that had reached the extremity of softness.
To see the end of a single field.
"Obtaining Vistache was good fortune."
Delam murmured it while feeling the mana around him.
Mana came to him a degree more intimately.
And along with it, Flurex's stability had advanced a step.
Now mana accumulated even when he drew breath.
Nor was that all.
When he exhaled, the turbid energy inside his body was expelled with it.
[Circulation]
The circulation of water, the circulation of a human being, the circulation of mana.
Delam had at last come to understand that principle.
At any rate, Delam had gained much as well.
So he decided to simply pass on the Vistache-Delam mana formula he'd spent two months laboring over, without being greedy about it.
Delam inspected the remodeled formula one last time.
Because if there were any tangled part, Rubian would be in danger.
There was no such part, however he looked, of course.
But he did find a dangerous element.
'I'd better stop messing with Rubian from now on.'
The remodeled Vistache formula, defined in a word, was [monstrous strength].
Naturally, since it converted mana entirely into force.
And now that had gotten stronger......
Get hit by a Rubian who had properly mastered it?
Straight to the next world.
Sweep, sweep.
Having thought that far, Delam's hand moved of its own accord.
Clearing away the snack crumbs fallen on the tent floor.
Because this was Rubian's tent.
The truth was that it was a strange thing.
A man in a knight's — and a woman knight's, at that — private tent?
It was proof of how much Rubian trusted Delam.
Since it meant she would endure it even if strange rumors spread.
'She isn't going to suddenly declare she's taking me as a live-in son-in-law and drag me off to House Vistache by the hair, is she?'
They say she really did beat her cheating ex-fiancé half to death.
By rumor he's still bedridden.
"To keep that from happening, I'd better start climbing soon myself."
Delam murmured it and concentrated his mind.
Some six months since regressing.
The mana he had steadily built up since his days as a potato farmer in a country village filled his heart to the brim.
It was exactly like a cup right on the verge of overflowing.
The two ventricles and the two atria.
The mana packed densely into them growled as if, given only a trigger, it would break into a run for the aorta and the vena cava.
So where was Delam saying he would climb to?
The answer was simple.
'To the attainment of a low-grade knight!'
***
The last drop of mana was absorbed into his heart.
At the same moment a fierce beat rang through the tent.
Ba-doom— ba-doom—
It wasn't his imagination.
It was loud enough that a person beside him could have heard it.
Evolution from mana user to low-grade knight.
Simply put, it was the work of dispersing the mana gathered in the heart all at once, expanding the space mana occupied.
But it was by no means easy.
Because it was the first time doing it, so it was hard to know how much mana, and how far, it was appropriate to expand.
Which was why the existence of a master mattered.
The expansion range differed from person to person, so he couldn't tell you precisely, but even a tip alone was a great help.
And there was the aspect of protection as well.
One was vulnerable to danger even while gathering mana, so as for how weak one became in the process of leaping a stage, saying it would only tire the mouth.
'I don't, well... need any of that.'
Delam was different, of course.
He had been a senior knight with a byname of his own, after all.
An attainment like low-grade he could climb to with his eyes shut.
And Flurex Arts was the limit of stability.
And he'd just strengthened it on top of that.
At this level it seemed that if someone stabbed him with a knife beside him he'd die of blood loss, not of mana running wild.
'Then let's begin.'
Fwoosh!
Delam released the mana in his heart.
Presently the mana spreading outward stopped as though striking a wall, and formed a circle centered on the heart.
That, precisely, was the knight's mark—
'A knight circle... it's been a while.'
The circle was the size of two hearts.
From low-grade to intermediate, and the higher the attainment climbed.
The size of this circle would grow exponentially.
What's good about it getting bigger?
The circle was precisely mana's domain, so naturally mana volume increased.
Responsiveness likewise.
The time it took for mana to break into a run toward the limbs was shortened, so the quantity, quality and even speed of aura all rose.
'They say once you become a Sword Master the circle expands beyond the body.'
From that point, assassination becomes impossible.
Because whatever occurs within that range.
It becomes impossible to escape a Sword Master's notice.
An absolute barrier, in effect.
"Boy, boy!"
Just then hurried footsteps came from outside.
And presently, sweeping the tent flap aside and entering, was Rubian.
"Are you all right!"
"Ah, ma'am."
"Whew! Thank goodness. I was returning to the tent and suddenly felt a pulse of mana, so I came running in shock."
Rubian saw a perfectly fine Delam and let out a sigh.
Delam spoke as though it were nothing.
"Ah, that's nothing much."
"Nothing much, you say?"
"I was training the mana formula as you taught me, and the mana in my heart suddenly began to churn. I watched to see what was happening, and the domain of the mana suddenly grew about twice as large."
"......?"
Instead of answering, Delam picked up a nearby knife.
Then, when he concentrated—
Vmmmm.
The knife vibrated faintly.
And blooming above it, faint though it was, a bright light.
Rubian, as a knight, could be more certain of it than anyone.
That it was the knight's mark... aura!
"I-impossible. Aura......?"
"Ahh, so this is aura."
"But it is only two months since you mastered the formula... and on a dining knife, not even a sword......"
"It just seemed like it would work."
Delam answered dutifully, but it was no use.
Rubian, unable to hear him any longer, only muttered something.
Judging by her pale complexion she'd taken a proper shock.
Becoming a knight was easier than becoming a mage.
But that was a relative statement at best.
However fine a high-grade mana formula one had.
Without a decent measure of talent to go with it, mana user was the ceiling.
To bloom aura — the condition on which the kingdom recognized a [true knight] — even a genius had to grind for two or three years.
And Delam?
A mere two months!
But Delam scratched his head.
Because he hadn't even mentioned the genuinely astonishing part yet.
"Actually, at first it didn't go well. I was wondering why, and I discovered there was a problem with the mana formula."
"There was a problem?"
"An awkward point was visible. So I fixed that part in my own way, and this is what happened."
"Aaagh!"
At those words Rubian went so far as to scream.
Her face was no longer pale but had gone blue.
A mana formula wasn't simply a methodology.
It was a precisely made blueprint!
Not one line, not one process, was made carelessly.
However trifling it looked, all of it was a masterpiece built on profound theory at the end of countless experiments.
And he'd torn it up and rebuilt it as he pleased?
A novice who'd learned it for a mere two months?
A scene soon to come drew itself in Rubian's head.
The sight of Delam dying with blood spraying from his whole body......
"No—!"
Rubian lunged desperately toward Delam.
And seized him by the wrist.