The Archmage’s Swordsmanship Is Too Strong - Chapter 4

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

4
Chapter 4. The Optimal Answer
***
“Airi?”
An alien name.
Before the regression, nowhere in the countless iterations of Fifth Generation System code I’d debugged had there been any add-on like this.
I’d never seen it in the deep servers of the Association, nor in the black-market listings of illegal programs.
Which meant there was only one answer.
“Are you a byproduct of Succession?”
[Affirmative, Successor.]
A dry confirmation.
I gripped my still-aching arm and stared at the chatbot icon hovering in empty air.
My brother hadn’t left behind mere power. He’d even attached a secretary to manage my data.
“What are your functions?”
[I perform Successor Skill Synchronization, data backup, combat analysis, and tactical support.]
“Good. Analyze the last fight.”
An order given without hesitation.
It was a performance test of sorts—I needed to see in objective numbers the pathetic results of a mage who’d picked up a sword.
Airi seemed to have been waiting for this, unfurling a red holographic graph in the air.
[Combat Efficiency: 12%.]
[Detailed Analysis: Aura absent. Physical capability insufficient.]
[Overall output in overclock state.]
[Conclusion: The height of inefficiency. A path to self-destruction.]
“……Accurate.”
A barrage of undeniable facts.
I pressed a cold can of coffee against my forehead.
As the heat faded, my overheated mind grew cold and sharp.
To put it in terms I understood: it was like forcing an F1 racing engine into a gasoline compact car.
The chassis screams under the engine’s vibrations, and worse still, the fuel being poured in is diesel—so of course the engine explodes the moment you turn the key.
‘Mages use Mana, swordsmen use Aura.’
Common knowledge.
Different fuel, different circuitry.
These two realms cannot be mixed like oil and water.
A mage who tries to use Aura bleeds out and dies; a swordsman who forces Mana burns out their brain.
That’s the law of this world.
[A mage class cannot extract 100% skill efficiency from sword mastery.]
An endless matrix of zeros stretching past the decimal point.
That was my current position.
“So you’re saying I should give up Mana and take up the sword?”
Airi didn’t answer.
The silence meant yes.
My fingertips trembled slightly.
Nine Circles of magic knowledge. And the broken trait, Tree of Sephiroth.
Give all that up and learn the sword from the beginning?
That’s insane.
No—it’s impossible for me.
To tear down the summit of magic I’d spent ten years building with my own hands.
The Calamity Drake consumed both the Archmage’s forbidden spells and the Sword Saint’s perfect cuts without flinching.
Neither alone would ever pierce even its scales.
I’d already proven that in the future.
The answer was already decided. I needed both.
No—I had to combine them.
Mix oil and water, if I had to, and create a new fuel.
“What’s the optimal answer in the current situation?”
Static flickered across the screen for a moment.
Airi’s voice dropped lower, as if it were the conclusion of mechanical calculation.
[Rational Proposal: Transfer Succession to another Awakened One with high Aura affinity.]
“Don’t bullshit me.”
A hollow laugh spilled out. Too rational, too machine-like—a proposal that made me sick.
I shook my head firmly.
“That will never happen.”
[I do not comprehend. You are specialized in magic. Considering efficiency···.]
“Efficiency?”
His fist clenched until his knuckles whitened.
This wasn’t some mere skill data.
It was his brother’s life.
A legacy left behind even as his brother erased his own existence to save him.
Hand it over to someone else? For the sake of efficiency?
“Even if my body breaks apart, I’ll bear it. That’s the price.”
[······Your resolve as the Successor has been confirmed.]
[I propose an alternative. Entry to the Successor’s Altar is recommended.]
“You should’ve brought it up sooner.”
***
The moment his eyes opened, a chill wrapped around his ankles.
He was no longer in the café of reality.
Gone was the coffee aroma that had filled his nostrils moments before; now the metallic reek of iron and dust pricked at his senses.
A vast circular colosseum.
The spectator seats stood empty, silence reigning supreme.
The cold touch of the flagstone beneath his feet transmitted up his spine.
For a virtual space, the sense of reality was far too vivid.
Even the texture of the wind against his skin felt tangible.
‘The Successor’s Altar.’
In the center, altars carved with strange inscriptions rose before him.
When the wind blew, his garments fluttered; with each breath, cold air filled his lungs.
[This is a deep space of consciousness.]
[One minute in reality equals one hour here.]
[The physical laws of the external world do not apply.]
In short, it was a room of time.
So this was the secret behind Sword Saint Kang Tae-yoon vanishing for days at a stretch, only to return a monster.
While others trained for a year, his brother endured decades of solitude within this place.
[Warning: Death in this space means the annihilation of your consciousness.]
[In reality, you will enter a state of brain death.]
[Do you wish to proceed?]
He clenched his fist hard.
The sharp sting of fingernails biting into flesh honed his senses to a razor’s edge.
Brain death? After witnessing the world’s ruin ten years hence, what did that matter?
‘Die here or die later…’
Without hesitation, he nodded.
Blue flames erupted around the altars.
A virtual Gate opened, and a familiar, terrible presence flooded out.
Skeleton Soldiers.
The same creatures he’d faced at Donggureung moments before.
But they radiated a far more vicious aura than those in reality.
“All right. Before that.”
He closed his eyes and steadied his breathing.
Time to attempt something that existed only in theory—something insane.
“Skill activation. [Synchronization].”
A deep thrumming resonated through him.
His heart lurched erratically.
The pure Mana flowing through his veins twisted by force.
As if shards of glass were rushing through his blood vessels—a searing agony.
The sensation of his organs wrenching sent bile rising to his throat.
[Warning! Mana circuit backflow detected.]
[Aura generation within body. Unstable!]
Airi’s alarm shrieked in his ears.
He ignored it.
The skill Synchronization—
A passive skill where a mage forcibly generates an Aura.
It burns Mana to amplify life energy, making its efficiency atrocious, and if missteps occur, it leads to Mana runaway.
A suicide skill no sane mage would ever learn.
It’s a method flagged as “strictly forbidden” even in the guide.
But right now, it’s all I have.
Using a Sword Saint’s skill requires Aura.
I have to turn two hearts at once—Mana and Aura.
“Ugh···”
Heat poured from every inch of my body.
Cold sweat streamed down like rain.
Like sprinting at full speed while holding a paper cup of water.
Spill it, and you die.
[Analysis complete. Cutting it rather close, aren’t we?]
[Current maximum Aura output efficiency: 10%.]
“It’s enough···.”
Nothing compared to what the Sword Saint Kang Tae-yoon could channel.
And here I was, burning through my veins just to scrape together this much power.
But it would have to be enough.
“I don’t need support. We do this my way.”
Thud, thud.
Thirty Skeleton Soldiers tightened their encirclement.
Rusted blades scraped against one another, a sound that made the skin crawl.
A killing intent sharp enough to cut flesh.
Yet my mind went cold.
Control it, and I live. Lose it, and I die.
I adjusted my grip on the Wooden Sword conjured in the virtual space.
“Come on then. I’ll grind you to dust.”
***
It was hell.
With only 10% Aura, I couldn’t shatter a Skeleton Soldier’s bones in one blow.
Cut down one, and two more rushed in.
When the Wooden Sword broke, I used my fists. When my fists shattered, I bit with my teeth.
Mana backlash painted my vision crimson, strobing.
My heart felt like it would burst, but I couldn’t stop.
If I stopped here, I’d have no face to show him.
“Haaaah!”
The final strike.
Wrung-out Aura erupted from the tip of the Wooden Sword.
Crack-boom!
The blade, now wreathed in flame and lightning, shrieked through the air and pulverized the last Skeleton Soldier’s skull.
“Hah··· hah···.”
My legs gave out and I collapsed.
Bone fragments scattered everywhere.
[Your trial at the Successor’s Altar is complete.]
Airi’s voice sounded distant.
The floor of the altar began to crumble away.
The sensation of falling.
I was sucked down into endless darkness.
“Gasp…!”
I gasped for air and opened my eyes.
My heart was pounding wildly.
The metallic taste of blood filled my mouth.
“······.”
The surroundings were bustling.
The white noise of a café. Murmuring people, the hum of a coffee machine.
A peaceful reality—so different from the altar where I’d just wagered my life with a blade.
“Hah··· haha···.”
I wiped away the cold sweat beading on my forehead.
My hands trembled faintly. I didn’t even have the grip strength left to hold a cup.
I checked the time on my phone.
‘Thirty hours. I was in there for thirty hours.’
My physical body in the real world was unharmed, but my mental fatigue had exceeded its limit.
Every muscle in my body screamed with phantom pain.
Yet an odd exhilaration hung in the air.
I’d done it.
The sensation of converting Mana into Aura. That precarious tightrope walk—I’d etched it into my body.
Though it had been brutish, almost primitive, a mage wreathed in Aura had survived close combat.
I rose from the chair.
My legs trembled, but I forced strength into them and held firm.
I gripped the table and drew a deep breath.
I had to return to Donggureung.
No level-up had come, but my hands remembered. The body remembers.
Before this sensation faded, I had to test it in live combat.
But before that, I needed equipment.
My brother’s legacy—the Wooden Sword—had been shattered inside the Altar.
I needed a real weapon.
I couldn’t endure much longer with a toy like that Wooden Sword.
‘Hunter’s Depot.’
Two blocks from Donggureung, a specialist shop for Hunter gear.
A neon sign above the weathered storefront flickered with a faint buzz.
The exterior was shabby, but anyone in the know recognized it as a treasure trove.
The kind of place that dealt in merchandise hovering on the line between legal and illegal.
The moment I opened the door, a distinctive smell hit my nose.
Cheap rust-preventative oil, leather, and the clean scent of metal mingled in the air.
This was far more comforting than the perfume of a department store.
It carried the smell of the battlefield.
“Welcome.”
A flat voice drifted from behind the counter.
A man in a grease-stained work uniform.
His eyes looked hollow, but the way his hands moved as he wiped the blade was far from ordinary.
Fine scars dotted the back of his hands. Calloused knuckles.
Below the sleeveless shirt, a tattoo peeked out from beneath his skin.
‘Prison background, maybe.’
The shop was in disarray.
Machetes hung densely across the walls, entrenching tools, and crude blunt weapons modified for Hunters.
An age when Gates had become everyday.
Now people bought self-defense weapons here the way they’d grab a triangle kimbap at a convenience store.
I approached the display.
Longswords, rapiers, greatswords.
All mass-produced and crude.
Polished on the surface, but durability was abysmal. Factory-made junk.
I picked up one blade.
It was heavy. But the balance was completely off.
The weight lurched forward.
Swinging something like this would snap your wrist tendons first.
In actual combat, it’d be nothing but a burden—an iron club.
“Hmm.”
I picked up another. This time, I let the faintest trickle of Mana flow through.
The thin Aura coating my fingertips became a jeweler’s lens for inspection.
A tingle.
A faint resistance registered against my touch.
This one had abysmal Mana conductivity.
The moment Mana flowed through, the blade’s interior choked—the current stuttering and breaking apart.
Use something like this in a skill activation, and the blade would shatter before the enemy did.
I’d been handling the displayed blades for ten minutes now.
Flowing Mana, checking the center of gravity, setting it down.
The same motion, over and over.
“You’re pretty particular, huh.”
The shop owner had drifted closer, standing off to the side, studying me.
The cigarette in his mouth was unlit.
His gaze had sharpened.
He’d picked up that I wasn’t some tepid customer looking for casual self-defense gear.
“But you’re no newbie, either.”
His gaze lingered on my fingertips.
He’d likely sensed the faint ripple of Mana I’d released.
As I thought—no mere merchant, this one.
“You wouldn’t happen to have something light and sturdy? Ideally something that conducts Mana well.”
“Greedy, aren’t you? You expect to find that here?”
The middle-aged man snorted despite himself, rummaging through a cramped box beneath the counter.
From the dusty cardboard box, he extracted something wrapped tightly in newspaper.
Thud.
He tossed it toward me.
“Catch.”
I snatched it from the air.
The moment it touched my palm, I felt it.
A grip that fit perfectly—responsive, alive in the hand.
I stripped away the scabbard to reveal a Short Sword with a sturdy black handle.
The blade ran roughly fifty centimeters.
No ornamental flourish—a pure combat weapon, forged solely for cutting and thrusting.
Oil gleamed along the razor-sharp edge.
‘Ah.’
The moment I gripped the handle, a sharp tingle shot through my palm.
I let Mana flow into it, and it drank deeply—no resistance, like a sponge.
The alloy composition was exquisite.
Either a trace of Mithril or a Mana-affine ore had been worked into it—that much was certain.
With conductivity this good, it could handle both my Mana and Aura simultaneously.
Whoosh—
I drew it lightly through the air.
Perfect balance, no strain on the wrist.
Light enough for a mage’s meager strength to wield with ease.
And the length wouldn’t snag in the cramped confines of a dungeon.
I’d gotten lucky.

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