A Talentless Mage Devours a Disaster-Class Future - Chapter 19

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 19

Creak—

Aion opened the door to the counseling office and stepped inside.

“Pardon the intrusion.”
“Not at all. From your position as a student, it’s certainly a matter worth careful consideration.”
“…Then, I’ve decided.”

He traced his finger across the map, passing over the elaborately marked dormitories before moving it further outward.

The outer boundary of the academy grounds, marked with mist symbols—a sparsely populated, densely wooded area.

“Inside Mistyveil Forest…. There are mountain lodges there that aren’t maintained, aren’t there?”
“…I’m sorry?”

The staff member’s eyes widened at the unexpected question.

“How would a new student know about that? First-year students shouldn’t have gone anywhere near there yet?”

Aion responded smoothly.

“Ah… I heard about it from a senior I know.”

【Flame: Kekeke… that’s not a lie, technically. We are your seniors, after all. Just extraordinarily distant ones.】
【Earth: Your lies are improving faster than your magic. Who knew.】

Those seniors chuckled in his mind.

“Well… hmm….”

The staff member could not hide her confusion.

“It’s true there used to be a caretaker’s lodge that hunters used…. But why are you looking for that? When there are dormitories like Lumenia and Sirwen with excellent facilities and locations, why would you want that old place?”
“Do you know that I’m from the North?”
“Of course. It would be impossible not to know that the Iscar Family has protected the northern reaches of the Empire for ages.”

Aion caught that detail and deliberately adopted a grave expression.

“That’s precisely the reason.”
“…I beg your pardon?”

While the staff member tilted her head, Aion continued slowly.

“In accordance with my family’s wishes, I underwent severe training from childhood. I grew up on the path of a warrior, not a mage. Cold floors and biting winds were the only life I knew.”

Aion’s eyes grew distant. The staff member’s expression began to harden.

“Because of this, I cannot sleep in comfortable places. Soft beds and warm air only make me anxious instead.”
“Ah…… such a thing…. But in principle….”

The staff member sighed. What harsh life must a child have endured to refuse a good dormitory and seek out an abandoned house.

Aion did not miss the wavering in her eyes. He paused deliberately, then continued in an even lower voice.

“Even now, when I lie on a soft bed, I hear the voices of fallen comrades whispering in my ears. Why am I lying in such comfort, they ask. Why have I abandoned them, they ask…. Why….”
“That’s… that’s enough, please. I understand.”

The staff member’s eyes brimmed with sympathy as she regarded Aion.

“What exactly are you looking for?”

At last.
The conversation had shifted into workable territory.

“To be direct: I’d like to use that abandoned mountain lodge.”
“Y-you mean here? The place hasn’t been maintained in decades… there must be any number of inconveniences?”
“I don’t mind. In fact, that suits me better.”
“Hmm…”

The staff member rubbed her chin, clearly troubled.

But the priority was Aion’s to claim, and since he actively preferred the austere conditions, she had no grounds to object.
She’d warned him thoroughly, and he’d accepted it.
That left only one hurdle to clear.

“Give me a moment. Let me confirm something.”

She used a Crystal Orb to contact someone, exchanging a few words before looking up from the documents she’d been sorting through.

“It’s possible. It is, but…”
“Is there a problem?”
“It’s a matter of jurisdiction. That lodge is so far out it won’t fall under Lumenia’s territory—Lumenia’s classified as closer to the main campus, you see.”
“Then?”

She pointed to a region on the map—a dark, dreamy-hued area bordering Mistyveil Forest.

“It’ll be classified under Noctorna’s jurisdiction because it’s near their grounds. As you know, Noctorna has… quite an unusual student population.”

Noctorna.

The place where the most radical of mages typically gravitated.

Most of the academy’s troublesome incidents had their roots here.

Aion closed his eyes as if mulling it over.

‘What do you think, spirits?’

【Water Flow: Noctorna’s jurisdiction… wasn’t that already part of your plan?】
【Flame: Nothing to worry about. Just a change of jurisdiction.】
【Earth: No issue at all.】

Unanimous.

Aion opened his eyes and nodded.

“No objection. Please arrange it that way.”
“Are you absolutely certain? I think you’ll come to regret this…”

The staff member’s worried gaze settled on him.

“I don’t think that will happen.”

***

Crunch, crunch.

Mistyveil Forest.

Aion walked in silence along the forest path, where thick mist hung like a curtain, true to the place’s name.

With a large pack laden with supplies and bedding strapped to his back and cleaning tools and various implements clutched in both hands, Aion looked every inch a refugee.

The only mercy was that Aion had grown accustomed to such weight.

“Phew….”

Yet still his breath came hard and shallow.
The burden was no small thing, but the damp that saturated the entire forest seemed to gnaw at his stamina with each step.

【Flame: A northerner born and raised, and you’re gasping after that short a walk? How pathetic.】
【Earth: Tsk, tsk… but the soil here isn’t bad at all. One could plant crops successfully.】

Ignoring the jesting remarks of his Spirit Companions, Aion fixed his gaze on the landscape ahead.

“……I’ve arrived.”

A clearing where the mist had parted.
There stood a dilapidated log cabin.

It wasn’t just one.
Five or six mountain lodges, perhaps once home to hunters who gathered there, scattered the clearing, though most had collapsed roofs or crumbling walls.

The forlorn atmosphere was so oppressive that even in broad daylight, one might expect a ghost to emerge from the shadows.

“What on earth could be in these ruins that made this place absolutely necessary?”

Aion voiced the question to Wind in his mind, but his Spirit Companion offered only silence in return.

The reason Aion had forsaken comfortable modern dormitories and come all the way to this isolated ruin was something Wind had told him then.

— To Mistyveil’s… b… u… r… i… e… d lodge… there….

Wind’s voice, silent until now, was peculiar. One could almost mistake it for the whisper of wind rather than human speech.

“Well… regardless, I should unpack my things first.”

Aion selected a two-story lodge positioned at the center of the settlement—one whose frame at least appeared relatively intact.

Creak-eeeee—

Thud-crash—!

The moment the door swung open, a maelstrom of dust billowed forth.

“Cough… this is worse than I expected. It really does seem like decades have passed without any maintenance.”

【Flame: I didn’t know it would be this bad…】
【Water Flow: It’s more severe than anticipated. I wonder if we’ll even be able to sleep tonight.】
【Earth: What good does complaining do? We’re not moving. So what do we do?】

Ding-!

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[!] A new Quest has been assigned.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
『Quest: A New Haven』

― 『Quest Overview: You have chosen a mountain lodge in a remote location over the comfort of the academy dormitory. At least for today, you must make this place habitable for sleep.』
― 『Objective: Clean and repair portions of the lodge.』
― 『Conditions: Secure firewood, improve cleanliness by 10%, close all doors and windows』
― 『Designated Reward: Stamina + 2』
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“So even cleaning is a quest now?”

【Earth: How fitting. You need objectives to actually move, don’t you? Do you think we don’t know you? One look at your habits and it’s clear you’d just beat the dust out of a blanket and call it a day.】

Aion made no attempt to argue. It was hard to deny.

“Seeing right through me like that…”

Thud.

Aion set down his pack and rolled up his sleeves.

Creak.

He tore away the rotted shutters first, then swept the accumulated dust from the floorboards with a broom.

“This is sweltering.”

Aion stripped off his coat and set to work in earnest.

Within moments, his shirt was damp with sweat, clinging to his frame.

What lay bare was a physique far too lean and muscular for an aspiring mage student.

Forearms and shoulders corded with taut muscle. Scars—large and small—carved across his body in silent testimony.

They spoke without words of the path he had walked.

‘Still not fully recovered, I think. My movements feel sluggish.’

He gathered a fallen log from the forest and began splitting it with an axe.

Crack!
Crack-split!

The sound of splitting wood echoed through the quiet forest.

Though late spring had arrived, temperatures would plummet once night fell.
Whether the fireplace would function properly remained uncertain, but firewood was essential if he meant to avoid freezing to death.

“The windows… no glass left, so I’ll have to board them up with wood.”

He pressed timber against the broken frame and drove nails through it.
Wind would still seep through the gaps, but for now, this was the best he could manage.

Hours passed in ceaseless work.

Before long, the window outside had flushed crimson with the setting sun.

“Phew… no matter how much I clean, there’s always more. That’ll have to do for today.”

Ding!

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[!] Quest completed.
[!] Reward granted: Stamina +2
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Aion wiped the sweat from his brow and studied the finished work.

“Managed to get it done before nightfall, at least.”

At this rate, even if he spent the night here, there was little risk of contracting whatever pestilence haunted the place.

Aion checked his stat increases from the quest completion.

‘…Everything went up.’

All his attributes remained at F-grade, but the plus sign beside each one brought a quiet satisfaction.

Slow as it was, he was undeniably growing.

‘Starting from nothing—I’m used to that by now.’

That was when it happened.

While scrubbing the walls of what looked like a study, something caught his eye.

“…Huh?”

He knocked with his knuckles—not the dull thud of solid wood, but a hollow ring echoing back.

Without hesitation, Aion grabbed a tool.
He wedged an iron pry bar into the gap and applied pressure. The decayed wooden panel splintered with a sharp crack, coming free.

“This is…”

What lay beneath was a descending staircase, and beyond it, an iron door sealed tight with rusted chains.

“A basement…?”

It could have been a storage room, but what struck him as odd was that in this otherwise wooden structure, this door alone was solid iron.

Aion paused to consider.

“No real need to check this far today…”

Clang!

His words belied his actions. The iron pry bar in his grip came down mercilessly on the lock.

The corroded mechanism shattered without resistance, falling to the ground in pieces.

Creak…

The iron door swung open with a shriek from its rusted hinges.

Cool subterranean air rushed out, carrying the reek of old mildew.

Aion held the Mage Light he’d brought and descended the stairs with careful steps.

“……”

This was no mere basement. Shelves lined every wall, workbenches cluttered the space, and the floor bore the intricate traces of Magic Circles drawn long ago.

“…This is definitely where a mage lived.”

【Flame : Wind, I’m not sure what he’s plotting… but it seems about right.】
【Earth : Look at this. The previous owner set things up rather impressively.】
【Water Flow : It’s a workshop. Someone’s atelier.】

A Magic Workshop.

“There’s barely anything worth keeping.”

Most of the materials on the shelves had rotted into formless decay.
Desiccated herbs twisted into brittle shapes, fractured flasks, books layered in dust.

Yet among the ruin were some intact bottles sealed with wax, and scattered stones that still faintly hummed with residual magic.

“……Blood?”

Bloodstains caught his eye.

【Flame : Signs of a hasty escape are all over this place.】
【Earth : Well, what of it? Fix it up a bit and it’ll do just fine.】

“A workshop… I never imagined there’d be one in a place like this.”

【Flame : That sneaky Wind must have known. That’s why he led you here, no doubt.】

“…Possibly.”

He wanted to search deeper, but night had fallen long ago.
Outside was now utterly dark.

“…I’ll leave it for today.”

Aion climbed back to the first floor, reluctance weighing on him.

He went straight to the bedroom and lay down on the bed, hastily brushing away only the worst of the dust.

“Hah…”

Gazing at the ceiling, he could see the night sky’s stars through holes in the rotted roof.
He’d lacked time to patch them during the day and left them as they were.

Starlight pouring through the gaps.
A familiar feeling.

‘How long has it been since I lay watching the stars?’

Strangely, it eased his mind more than a sealed ceiling ever could.

The first night in a dilapidated mansion—one that even ghosts might fear.

The weariness of manual labor crept over him, and his eyelids grew heavy as lead.

Hiss….

Aion’s consciousness was slipping into deep sleep when it happened.

Whoosh—

His eyes snapped open.

Click.

Aion’s hand immediately went to the sheath of the Short Sword he’d left beside him.

A chill raced down his spine, and a clear voice rang in his ears.

【Who… are you?】

Aion’s hand stiffened over the sheath. It wasn’t the voice of his Spirit Companions.
This sound came from outside his mind—unmistakably, from the world beyond.

Silence.

Aion held his breath and stared into the darkness. He could see nothing.
Yet the voice was undeniably real.

Then came another voice—the one he’d been waiting for all along.

【Wind: ……It’s here.】

The Talentless Mage Swallows a Catastrophic Future — Chapter 19

Author
Wang Mozhi
Publisher
Daon Creative
Planning / Editing / Production
Yeon
Cover
Dali

UCI
G720:N+A036-20260706063.0019

ⓒ2026, Wang Mozhi

※ This electronic book is protected under the copyright law of the Republic of Korea.
No part of this work may be reproduced or modified in any form without the permission of the author and publisher.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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