The Archmage’s Swordsmanship Is Too Strong - Chapter 103

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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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103
Episode 103. Seire
***
“How could you possibly know that.”
Go Gwang-sik’s voice carried the damp, corroded timbre of wet metal. I caught the fine tremor at the edge of his words.
Ashen fluorescent lights flickered, casting their pallid glow across the heavy air of the workshop. Two broad-shouldered blacksmiths and a young man in his twenties barely beginning his apprenticeship.
Three pairs of eyes hung suspended from my lips as though they’d arranged it beforehand.
Collapse Stone.
The name alone conjured the illusion that the temperature in the workshop had dropped several degrees.
It was a fragment of the Other World, shed in a fleeting instant when a dimension’s core exceeded its threshold and collapsed.
A substance that regenerated infinitely while simultaneously attempting to shatter every law of physics in its vicinity.
The acquisition difficulty of this bizarre, destructive World Item transcended human reason without effort.
A vision from the depths of memory flickered past—a future turned to ash and ruin.
In the world that was, the exact nature and location of the Collapse Stone weren’t confirmed until just three months before Zephyros brought humanity’s civilization to its end.
When the information was released, the surviving major guilds threw themselves at it with burning eyes, even standing at the threshold of annihilation. But the result was catastrophic.
The craftsmen capable of processing and controlling that overwhelming material in full were already dead or had lost their hands, and at a point when the signs of ruin rose to their throats, any attempt to weaponize the Collapse Stone was nothing but a hollow struggle.
The present moment. Now, with ten years of grace still remaining—what of it?
It exists only in the deepest closed networks of the Hunter database, its name registered in lonely isolation, gathering dust.
Which abyss buries it, what warped mechanism binds it within a monster—only I on this earth knew.
“I cannot provide details.”
I slowly unclenched my interlaced fingers from the table. My knuckles cracked in sharp, dry succession.
“But it can be obtained. I assure you of that. However, the physical preparation and exploration will require considerable time. Can you endure that span?”
My voice carried no emotional residue. No bravado, no bluffing—only colorless, odorless certainty.
Ji Ung, standing before me, had his lips pressed firmly shut while his face flushed red, fighting to contain a breath threatening to burst free.
Go Gwang-sik too had struggled to maintain composure, but he couldn’t hide how his scarred fingers, pressed against the table, trembled in fine convulsions.
They had just glimpsed a mirage of hope at the edge of despair.
“Since it comes from you, you wouldn’t be joking.”
Go Gwang-sik swallowed hard. His Adam’s apple bobbed visibly.
His gaze swept my face persistently before shifting to his colleague Do Seok-gwang standing beside him.
“I been thinkin’ like this. If we come this far, we gotta do it. If the master says we can, then we can.”
Do Seok-gwang thrust his severed hand stumps violently through the air and roared like thunder. Dust inside the workshop scattered in the wake of his cry.
“…I know.”
Go Gwang-sik dragged his thick palms roughly across his face. Where his hands had swept away, his eyes remained.
They were no longer the eyes of an old blacksmith crushed by the world’s trials, stripped of all hope when I’d first seen him in the workshop.
The gleam of an old beast who’d caught the scent of prey burned there instead.
“We will. This is our last chance to restore our name. No—this is the last chance to revive the soul of Gwi Geom Cheol Bang itself.”
Go Gwang-sik sprang to his feet and tightened the cord of his worn, grease-stained apron. The pressure emanating from his massive frame crushed the air itself.
“Let’s light the fire. The Furnace that’s been dying out.”
I quietly pushed my chair back and rose, leaving behind the three craftsmen’s bloodshot resolve. The contract I had sought was sealed perfectly.
There was no reason to linger in this overheated emotional crucible and waste time. Emotional excess only clouds rational judgment.
Pushing open the factory’s heavy iron door and stepping outside, cool night air carved deep into my lungs.
Dusk had already settled thick, warping the silhouettes of the factory zone into grotesque shapes.
I was reaching for my car key in my pocket as I moved toward the parked vehicle when—
“Hunter, wait a moment!”
Urgent footsteps scraped roughly against the dirt behind me and closed in.
It was Ji Ung, the youth who’d assisted with the refining. He came rushing up to me, shoulders heaving with ragged breath, and stopped before me.
In one hand he cradled something as though it were a precious treasure.
“What is this.”
My gaze fixed on what lay in his hands.
A rectangular object, roughly the length of a forearm, wrapped tightly in fine blue silk.
“I wanted to give this to you, Hunter. Actually, I have to give it to you.”
I took the wrapped bundle. Its considerable weight transferred through my wrist. This was no mere lump of metal.
It was the distinctive density of condensed Mana taking physical form.
I untied the knot with one hand and drew back the cloth to reveal a blade sheathed in black leather as dark as pitch.
Its proportions were unusual for what could be called a sword.
Clearly longer than a short blade or dagger fit for hiding in one’s garments, yet distinctly shorter by over a handspan than a standard curved sword or longsword wielded in direct combat.
It took a form close to a short tachi—maximizing the blade’s keenness while specializing in deceptive thrusts and evasion in close-quarters combat.
Shing—
I drew the blade halfway from its sheath.
“……….”
The moment the blade was exposed to the night air, a cool vibration coursed through my palm gripping the hilt, traveling down my spine in a prickling wave of sensation.
Though its weight was featherlight compared to the crude lump of Black Iron hanging across my back, the purity of Mana the blade contained and the depth of its presence far exceeded it.
The surface gleamed with a silver brightness that hurt to look at, and along the edge of the blade, barely perceptible to the naked eye, fine undulations of magical energy shimmered like heat haze.
It created the illusion that some living creature was breathing.
It created the illusion that some living creature was breathing.
“What is this.”
I slid the blade back into its sheath and asked. The metallic contact sang with unusual clarity.
“It is a sword that failed to become Ilhui.”
Ji Ung kept his hands folded neatly above his abdomen and lowered his voice as if conducting a sacred ceremony.
“It was my father’s legacy, and the work of his entire life.”
I gazed quietly down at the sheath of the sword I held.
There was no guard. Only the hilt and blade—the very epitome of minimalist design.
It was a mad configuration that abandoned all defense entirely, pouring everything into the trajectory aimed solely at the enemy’s throat.
The obsession of its maker seemed to linger at the very edge of the blade.
“It’s a fine sword.”
It wasn’t empty flattery.
By my sense for reading the grain of Mana, this blade already far surpassed the Epic Grade specifications that only the masters of major guilds typically wielded.
More than that—something greater lay dormant within it.
“You may think of it as incomplete······.”
Ji Ung bit his lower lip and continued.
“But it will certainly be necessary for you, Hunter. I saw it. Your movements are different from swordcraft bound by convention. This is my personal token of gratitude for your kindness in piercing the blueprint of Dusk. Please, do not refuse.”
There was no reason to refuse.
A good weapon chooses its master, but I was worthy enough to be that master. I wordlessly rewrapped the silk cloth neatly and secured the blade.
I tossed the sword Ji Ung had given me onto the passenger seat and drove out of the factory district’s rough, unpaved roads.
Just before departure, I ran the smartphone banking app and transferred an additional one billion to Go Gwang-sik’s account.
In the process of forging Dusk, the prototype of Ilhui, untold quantities of rare ore and astronomically priced catalysts would likely be needed.
I wouldn’t let financial concerns silence the craftsmen’s hammers.
[If additional funds are needed, tell me anytime. The amount is irrelevant.]
I left a brief message and pressed the accelerator.
In completing the absolute weapon needed to pierce Zephyros’s hardened scales, I had no intention of being stingy with mere cash, worthless as scraps of paper.
***
On the highway entering the urban area.
Yellow streetlights scattered sparsely outside the window passed periodically over the sheath on the passenger seat. Inside the car, only the sound of tires scraping against the road filled the silence.
“Airi. Scan that sword from earlier.”
I gave the order curtly to the empty air, my hands still on the wheel.
[Yes, Successor. Outputting near-field scan data.]
Whish—
A semi-transparent blue system window materialized above the passenger dashboard. The holographic light pushed back the darkness inside the car.
[Grade: Undetermined (Currently unmeasurable by system standards)]
[Name: Seire]
[Maker: Chae Jin-hyuk (Affiliation: Gwi Geom Cheol Bang)]
[Base Attack Power: ???]
[Durability: ???]
[Special Option: Locked—Unlock conditions not met]
“That’s all?”
I narrowed my brow slightly. The information was disappointingly sparse.
[Yes. It is an unidentified specification weapon that has never once been registered in the existing system’s database.]
[Clear numerical values cannot be calculated until combat data is accumulated through physical impact or Mana infusion.]
Ji Ung’s words had proven true.
A dead craftsman’s legacy that had never once seen light in this world—a failed work where hatred and longing for the world had intertwined.
‘Seire.’
The name was odd regardless. It had a different character than most weapons, which bore names symbolizing “destruction” or “severance.”
[Apparently, within Gwi Geom Cheol Bang there had been serious ideological conflict regarding the refining direction of the Ilhui series.]
Before I even asked, Airi began briefing me on fragmentary information she had collected from Ji Ung’s associates and historical records.
It seemed the artificial intelligence too had grown intrigued by this peculiar weapon.
[The first master, Ji Ung’s grandfather, and his father, Chae Jin-hyuk.]
[The two pursued different extremes of the sword.]
[When that conflict reached its peak, Chae Jin-hyuk lost his life in an accident where the Furnace’s Mana spiraled out of control.]
Airi’s mechanical voice struck against the car window.
[The old man, having lost his son, was consumed thereafter by guilt that his own convictions had killed his child, and lived as a recluse, as if dead himself.]
“And then that fool Charles smashed ‘Ilhui’ at the showcase—a mercy kill, it would seem.”
[Indeed. After that, Grandfather set down his hammer for good. He passed away shortly after, worn down by deteriorating age.]
Three generations of tragedy and ruin.
In this profession, I’ve never met a single person deeply entangled with the matter of the Other World—the fragments of Gates—who ended well.
In my first life, I endured that hell to my bones; now I’m spinning through the wheel a second time.
Whether kinship or pity, a strange feeling brushed across one corner of my chest.
“What exactly does Seire mean?”
[It means twenty-one days, sir.]
[When a newborn is born, a sacred rope is placed at the gate to ward off impurity, and it signifies the twenty-one sacred days during which all contact with the outside world is strictly avoided.]
“Right. The sacred rope.”
I turned the wheel and murmured low.
Seire.
Was it the master craftsman’s desperate prayer that his blade would never be tainted by the world’s profane malice?
Or was it a sacred rope he had drawn around himself, foreseeing that the very act of forging would lead him to ruin?
A cursed blade that never saw completion, left incomplete. But now that it’s in my hands, I have no intention of treating this hunk of steel carelessly.
I’ll walk with it to the end, leaving the cleanest and sharpest trajectory I can—a hidden blade as worthy of the master’s fervent wish. Even if I’m to draw that blood-stained sacred rope.
***
G City Hall, Ability Management Team Office.
The beep of the door lock’s keypad shattered the silence. The moment I stepped inside, acrid dust and paper dust rushed at me.
Though I’d only been away for two days, my desk was mocked by towering stacks of documents waiting for approval—a mountain that seemed to multiply.
“Enough to drive a man mad.”
I tossed my hat onto the sofa and let out a small sigh.
Kim Dae-han, the team leader, was busier than I was.
He was still at the site, covered in dust and grime, mopping up the aftermath of the Hong Hyeol Maeng’s fake Gate incident in the Outskirts of Paju and the booster distribution network cleanup.
If someone runs the fieldwork, someone else must turn the administrative gears.
I skimmed through documents, clicked my mouse, and mechanically stamped and moved through them.
After more than an hour wrestling with paperwork, I finally extinguished the urgent fires and stood from my desk. The back of my neck was stiff and sore.
I cracked my dull neck side to side, hearing it pop. With my toes, I turned on the robot vacuum gathering dust in the corner of the office.
The whirring machine sound began spreading low across the floor.
I moved toward the window. Through gaps in the blinds, I could see thick dust accumulated in the darkness. With the tip of my finger, I drew up the faintest thread of Mana.
As I focused my consciousness, the air at my fingertips began to vibrate.
The incantation was brief, and the effect immediate. An intricate air current generated at my fingertip swept through the window frame like a broom.
The old dust was swept cleanly into the open air outside without a sound.
For a 2-Circle mage, this level of Precision Mana Control was as natural as breathing.
After opening the window wide for ventilation, I headed into the private shower booth located inside.
Whoooosh—
Hot water cascaded over my head. Thick steam filled the narrow booth.
The acrid oil smell of the Abandoned Factory caked into my muscles, along with the remnants collected from rolling through the battlefield, all washed down the drain in white foam.
After turning off the shower and roughly toweling my wet hair, I stood before the mirror above the fogged sink.
As I wiped the mirror with my palm, my reflection emerged.
“This won’t heal, I suppose.”
My bare upper body reflected in the glass.
When I first inherited the Succession, this body had been unmarked—smooth and unblemished.
But after the recent string of slaughters and extreme training, a lattice of large and small scars was etched across my tightly woven muscle fibers.
With Healing magic, I’d sutured ruptured blood vessels and reattached torn flesh.
But where lethal Aura collisions and Mana backflows had scoured through, faint crimson marks—beyond the limits of cellular regeneration—remained like branded stigmata.
I remembered looking at Kang Tae-yoon in the past, his body adorned with scars like medals, and sneering disdainfully that he fought like a brute.
Now those coarse, savage marks were being redrawn intact across my own flesh.
“It seems worse, actually.”
They were proof that I’d survived—and a preview of the hell yet to come.
I draped a towel over my shoulders and left the shower. Cold winter wind blowing through the window quickly chilled the heat rising from my wet body.
The chill touching my skin sharpened my mind.
I sat cross-legged in the empty space at the center of the office. The coldness of the floor seeped through my hips, but I didn’t mind.
I closed my eyes and drove cold air deep into my lungs.
Though the Altar of the Successor existed as a perfect mental space, breaking through the physical limits of reality required the essential process of directly colliding and refining ambient Mana against the actual body.
The process of expanding my Core to 2-Circle was already complete.
But I needed to verify and fortify the durability of the ‘vessel of flesh’ that could contain this violently swollen Mana wave without rupture.
Breathe in, breathe out—
Minute Mana particles drifting in the atmosphere cascaded into my lungs along the trajectory of my breath. Blood vessels expanded as a sharp, burning sensation swept through my entire body.
My Core near my heart rotated, drawing in Mana. Just as I was narrowing my consciousness to the extreme, weaving scattered Mana into a single thread—
Beep.
Beyond the maintenance room door—which should have been locked—came a sound he recognized all too well: the authentication chime.
The flow of Mana cut off.
I opened my eyes slowly.
Between the mechanical grinding of the dual-lock disengaging, an unfamiliar cologne drifted into the air thick with the smell of machine oil and metal shavings.
The voice that followed was audacious to the point of insolence, and anything but welcome.

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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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