The Dragon Slayer Who Regressed After 1,000 Years - Chapter 32

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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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Dragon Slayer, Returned After a Thousand Years — Episode 032
Two days later, Valencius brought the materials Cain had specified.
“Here they are.”
“You’ve gathered everything correctly. Was it difficult to find?”
“Easier than I expected. The supplies happened to be in stock.”
Highly Concentrated Mana Grass, Century-Old Ash Tree Bark, Geumwang Mountain Cliff Honey, Black Iron Earthworm Body Fluid, Dragon Scale Powder Pickled in Volcanic Ash.
Under normal circumstances, these were things that took years of searching to procure.
‘The issue would be the price, normally. But…….’
Money was hardly a concern for the eldest son of the Empire’s second-ranked family.
When you had enough wealth to offer tribute to dragons, money was merely something rotting away.
“But…… can you really cure my condition with these?”
“Yes. I’ll need to brew the medicine, so will you wait a moment?”
Leaving Valencius to his nod, Cain stepped out of the room.
He prepared each ingredient one by one, then began brewing them in the prescribed order.
The preparation didn’t take long.
Still, the mixture was crucial, and with ingredients so rare, an ordinary person could never hope to replicate it.
With the finished medicine in hand, he returned to the room.
“Please, drink this.”
As he offered the bowl, Valencius stared at both Cain and the medicine in turn with the look of someone facing a deadly poison.
“It’s safe to drink. Don’t worry.”
“What exactly is this……?”
“A Mana Circuit Loosening Potion. There’s no poison in it, so please, drink it now.”
Part of him wanted to slip poison into it, but having decided to cultivate Valencius, he had to cure his condition.
That way, he could later use him as a stepping stone to penetrate the Empire itself.
‘Especially if I can keep the eldest son of the Drake Family under my wing…….’
There couldn’t be a more suitable pawn.
Though Valencius’s pupils trembled dozens of times as he took the mysterious medicine, he seemed to steel his resolve and brought the bowl to his lips.
As he swallowed, his brow creased.
“Good medicine tastes bitter on the tongue, as they say.”
Emboldened by Cain’s words, he gritted his teeth and drained the bowl until the bottom was visible.
The medicine’s effects didn’t take long to manifest.
“Ugh…….”
Valencius writhed on the bed, his stomach in distress.
“The medicine is taking effect. Don’t worry. This is a normal reaction.”
Cain spoke calmly as he grasped Valencius’s wrist.
“Now I’ll channel my Mana into you to repair your damaged Circuit. It will be painful, but endure it for five hours.”
“F-five hours?”
“Then we begin.”
With a solemn expression, Cain sent Mana flowing through the wrist he held.
He pictured in his mind where and how to repair, then began carefully manipulating the Circuit.
“Argh!”
Valencius jolted as if burned, convulsing upright from the mere touch.
“Don’t move. Can’t you endure even this much pain?”
He thought Valencius’s pride would be shattered, but it seemed it wasn’t.
The way he bit his lip and bore through the suffering spoke otherwise.
“I’m beginning again.”
Cain poured more Mana in and began manipulating the Circuit.
With the care of untangling a knotted thread, of coaxing a candle flame with breath, he worked with precision.
Valencius clenched his teeth and held firm until the end.
Because of this, Cain could focus entirely on the treatment.
‘The potion is certainly effective.’
Normally, manipulating the Circuit with raw Mana alone would snap it completely.
But thanks to the medicine that had hardened the Circuit, he could work without impediment.
Still.
‘It’s tangled quite severely.’
Looking at the Circuit, there was a mountain of work ahead.
Five hours would be cutting it close.
‘I have no choice. I’ll have to work as fast as possible.’
He had to unravel it with both precision and speed.
His cursed memory proved useful at a time like this.
Since he remembered the exact location of each circuit, it came naturally to him how and where to untangle them.
“Ugh, ah-ah…….”
Valencius lay on the bed, trembling violently as he endured the pain.
Cold sweat poured from him like rain—and he was not alone in this.
Cain’s forehead too was beaded with perspiration.
The concentration required to untangle the circuits was no trivial matter.
“It’s done.”
Exactly five hours later, Cain withdrew his hand from Valencius’s wrist.
“You’ve worked hard.”
“You’ve…… worked…….”
Valencius had barely the strength left to speak.
After five hours of what amounted to torture, it was hardly surprising.
“All the tangled circuits have been returned to their proper places. Your body is now the same as any normal person’s, so you should have no difficulty accumulating Mana from this point forward. My congratulations.”
It was a dry congratulation, but there came no reply.
Valencius had already fallen into unconsciousness.
‘Rest well. Starting tomorrow, there won’t be time for sleep.’

* * *
When the sun had climbed to its zenith, Valencius’s eyes opened.
‘Where am I…….’
His own chamber.
Someone had moved him here while he slept.
Valencius rose slowly to his feet.
The thought of that terrible pain he’d endured before sleep made him reluctant to move at all, yet strangely his body felt completely sound, even refreshed.
‘……Must be from sleeping so deeply?’
Sensing some change in himself, he made his way to the Training Grounds out of habit.
Several knights paused their drills and glanced at Valencius, but he paid them no mind and drew his sword.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
As he swung the blade and breathed as he always did, the sensation was strikingly different from before.
‘What is this? My body feels light.’
He knew well enough, having swung a sword hundreds of thousands of times.
He knew that feeling of resistance, of moving against an invisible wall, when the body wouldn’t obey his will.
But today there was none of that.
Instead, everything came easier, and power flowed abundantly.
With his body responding as he wished, his movements became cleaner, stripped of excess.
It was an almost unbelievable transformation.
‘This is…… exhilarating!’
He had refused to give up even knowing he lacked talent, because he loved the sword.
Yet even that love had begun to falter.
After years of one-sided devotion, he had grown weary at last.
But now, those same movements he’d practiced so tediously for years felt new, felt alive with possibility.
It was as though he had returned to the moment he first took up the blade.
‘I can’t believe it. My body has changed this much.’
Suddenly Valencius’s gaze fell upon the movements of the other knights.
‘Can I do that too?’
He watched the other knights carefully and began to imitate their techniques.
At first it felt awkward, but after swinging through the motions a few times, they stabilized.
That he could execute them without strain surprised even Valencius himself.
‘Can it really be this easy……?’
Unable to contain his excitement, Valencius devoted himself to learning new techniques.

* * *
Late in the evening, after all the trainees had gone.
Valencius remained alone in the Training Grounds, sword in hand.
So absorbed in his practice that he didn’t notice Cain’s approach.
“Still training, I see.”
“Ah, Master Cain.”
Valencius, who had been practicing the techniques of the other trainees, stopped his movements.
Sweat pooled thickly at his feet.
“Quite absorbed in your work—so much so you’ve forgotten to offer thanks.”
“Ah…… I apologize. I should have greeted you the moment I woke, but I forgot entirely and before I knew it…….”
Valencius scratched the back of his head sheepishly, as if only now realizing night had fallen.
Cain smiled gently in understanding.
“How do you feel? How’s your condition?”
“Excellent. I never knew what it felt like to have my body obey my will, but now I understand.”
Valencius bowed deeply as he spoke.
“Thank you, Cain. I owe everything to you. Truly, I cannot thank you enough.”
“I’m glad it helped.”
Cain spoke plainly and said no more.
As if to say he expected nothing further in return.
Watching Cain’s quiet smile, something flickered in Valencius’s eyes.
Usually, those who approached him fell into two categories.
Those seeking connections with the family.
Or those after his money.
Most came with some purpose or other.
But Cain demanded nothing.
Which made Valencius suspicious all the more.
“Why do you look at me that way?”
“Well…… Cain. I would appreciate your honesty. Why have you treated me like this?”
It was Cain who noticed the flaw in his Mana Circuit, and Cain who declared it could be fixed.
Valencius was grateful for the aid, but he still hadn’t heard what purpose lay behind it.
“If there is anything you wish, please tell me. You are my benefactor for life. I will grant you anything.”
But.
“Anything I wish…… that is not why I did this.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Cain did not answer frankly.
“If I must name something, there is one thing. I hope for the day your treatment succeeds and Drake awakens his Aura. That is all I ask for.”
“…….”
He demanded no price and concealed no dark intention.
It was precisely this that shook Valencius’s convictions.
‘I cannot simply tell him that I mean to extract information about the Drake Family through him, and topple the dragon-worshipping faction.’
But pure goodwill is easily doubted.
For Valencius, who still could not believe, Cain found himself compelled to offer a suitable deflection.
“I understand what it feels like to hit a wall.”
“…….”
“I grew faster than anyone, yet before the wall of the Sword Master, I could not advance a single step. It was my first true barrier.”
Valencius’s pupils wavered again.
Cain’s words had touched something within him.
“Perhaps that is where it began. The decision to help you.”
“…….”
“So I ask for nothing more. I am content with knowing it has been resolved.”
Cain smiled and turned slightly to leave.
“Now you should be able to accumulate Mana normally. If you regulate your breathing as I instructed, you will awaken your Aura far more rapidly. Rest well.”
Cain nodded and departed without hesitation.
As his retreating figure grew distant, Valencius felt a pang of loss.
He did not want to lose his benefactor like this.
He wanted to continue their connection.
He wanted to hear more counsel from him.
He could trust this man.
These feelings surged forward like a tidal wave, and his body moved of its own accord.
“Cain!”
Valencius closed the distance and suddenly fell to one knee before him.
“Take me as your disciple!”

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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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