The Imperial Supreme Commander Has Returned - Chapter 55

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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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The Empire’s Supreme Commander Returns — Episode 55

Splash!

Cold water cascaded over Delram’s torso.
As the heat drained away, steam rose in thick billows.
Despite the depths of summer, vapors curled upward in ghostly wisps.
It was the immediate aftermath of an intense sparring match with the Family Head.

‘The training effect is incredible.’

Delram shivered in the cold water and reflected.
The moment he thought it, his Mana responded.
Phlurex’s gentle Mana flowed along the Mana Road in circulation.
The volume had increased by roughly 1.3 times compared to before the sparring began.

But what mattered more was the speed.
The velocity spreading through his limbs was like the flash of a blade.
It meant his Mana control had advanced another tier.

‘And my body as well.’
Drip-drip—

Water droplets traced paths down Delram’s muscles.
His physique was sculpted to near-perfect form.
The word “sculptural” fit him precisely.
Yet there was nothing of vanity about it.

It was the culmination of training and the sum total of practical experience.
Any other knight who saw him would have gasped in admiration.

“Wow……!”
“Ahem.”

Indeed, gasps came from the corner of the Well Side.
Not from knights, but from Rubian and the boy Tas.
Tas was captivated by Delram’s tough, elastic musculature, while Rubian, for reasons unclear, could hardly bring himself to look.

Delram chuckled softly and began drying himself.
He could ask Owl for a gust of wind and dry off in moments, but he had no desire to reveal the spirit’s existence.
Not even to Rubian.

“You came, Tas. Why have you come, Rubian?”
“Hmm, I heard you were teaching Tas the Whip Technique.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Could I possibly learn as well?”
“You, sir? It might be difficult…….”
“What are you saying! I was called a genius once.”
“Well, then, try it. There might be something useful in it.”

Delram nodded in assent.
Teaching one student or two made little difference.

They moved to the Training Ground.
It was a small space, but it was enclosed by a fence.
He didn’t mind exposing the whip work, but attention was the problem.
Since the sparring with the Family Head, the eyes following Delram had become not merely sharp but painful, and Tas certainly wouldn’t be able to concentrate.

On one side of the Training Ground stood a weapons display rack.
Weapons arranged by size, from Short Sword to halberd.
But among them, there was no Whip.

‘It had to be such a unique weapon, after all.’

Knights who wielded Whips were few and far between.
Or rather, virtually nonexistent.
Before the Regression, he’d barely encountered ten in his entire life.
And most of those had belonged to specific families.

“Tas, why do you think that is?”
“I suppose it’s because so few people know how to use it, sir. If few know it, then few can teach it, and so even fewer learn it……”
“A vicious cycle?”
“Yes, and… it’s not very gallant, is it?”
“Exactly right.”

Delram nodded at Tas’s hesitant words.
Surprisingly, the lack of gallantry was the biggest reason.
Put another way, it wasn’t befitting of a knight.

The second reason was difficulty.
Mastering the Whip to any real degree required a special talent.
The Spatial Perception Ability that Delram had observed in Tas was precisely that.

A Whip wasn’t something you could simply swing.
Even a five-year-old could do that much.
What mattered was what result came from the swing.
Only by understanding that cause and effect could it become a true weapon.

‘In other words, you have to be able to predict its trajectory.’

A Whip was a mid-range weapon.
Which meant that even the slightest twist of the wrist would translate to an enormously amplified movement by the time it reached the tip.
Move the handle just three centimeters?
At the end, it became one and a half meters of sweeping force.

That’s why Spatial Perception was necessary.
Not two-dimensional flat motion, but three-dimensional curved motion.
You had to be able to map out the entire trajectory of the Whip.

“Only then can you kill someone.”
“That… sounds quite difficult.”
“Don’t worry about it. Everything I just described? You’ve already done all of it effortlessly in the Underground Waterway.”
“Me?”
“Absolutely. Which is why it’s the perfect weapon for you.”

The Whip, once learned with such difficulty, was truly formidable.
As mentioned, its users were so rare.
Because few wielded it, there were few opportunities to fight against it, and so opponents had almost no experience—when faced with one, they could be utterly overwhelmed.

‘And if he awakens his Bloodline Ability on top of that?’

Delram didn’t know what Tas’s inherited ability was.
But typically, an awakening ran deep with one’s natural talent.
So perhaps it would be something in the spatial domain.
His Spatial Perception Ability was already so exceptional.

‘If that happened… I might actually be looking at a monster.’

But for now, at ten years old, such thoughts were still distant for Tas.
Delram shook off his thoughts and drew the Whip from his Subspace.
It was a Whip twisted from Monster Hide.
Four meters in length, with a metal tip fastened to its end.

“Well then, let me show you the basics first.”

Crack!

Delram flicked his wrist lightly.
At the same moment, the slack Whip shuddered to life.

Then he snapped it again.
The Whip coiled through the air, its tip breaking the sound barrier.
And with the sharp crack of splitting air—

Snap.
Thud-thud-thud.

The Scarecrow’s head simply vanished.
Its arms followed an instant later, cleanly severed at the joints.

Gulp.

Beside him, Rubian’s gulp echoed audibly.
The display was that startling.

Cutting a Scarecrow apart was simple enough, of course.
The problem was that he hadn’t seen it coming.

Not entirely—he’d caught the last two of five strikes.
But every target he’d anticipated was wrong.

Could he even defend himself if that were aimed at him?
He couldn’t see where it was coming from, couldn’t predict its path.

‘If he infused Mana into that…’

Rubian stopped thinking.
Instead, a hunger blazed through him.
He would learn this technique himself, no matter what it took.

“Wow!”
Clap-clap-clap!

Tas applauded in wonder.
Truth be told, his lips had been pouting at first.
No matter how mature a child became, a child remained a child.
And what boy’s greatest dream was anything but the sword?
So when they said they’d teach him the Whip, he’d been disappointed in secret.

But that expression had vanished entirely now.
He’d fallen in love with the Whip’s devastating power and its clean, satisfying grace.

‘Given that level of Spatial Perception Ability, of course.’

He’d understood the moment he saw the demonstration.
This weapon was made for him.

“Then I’ll teach you from the beginning.”
“Yes!”
“Me too, me!”

Rubian and Tas’s eyes lit up.
Five days passed that way.

* * *

Whirrrr— Crack!
“…….”

Contradictory sounds echoed through the Training Ground.
One was the whip lashing freely through empty air.
The other was Rubian’s silence.

Rubian snapped his wrist again.
The long whip shot toward its target—an apple—
and circled back to strike Rubian across the back.

“…Ugh!”
Slash!

Rubian had taken to wrapping himself up completely these days.
During training, he wore long sleeves and long pants instead of short sleeves and shorts.
It was because of the whip marks covering his entire body.
Otherwise he’d be mistaken for someone with peculiar tastes.
Marriage prospects were difficult enough as it was…….

“No, that’s not how you do it.”
“…….”
“You can’t just use your wrist. You have to think of the elbow and shoulder—the entire arm’s joints—as extensions of the whip itself.”

Slash!
“No, why can’t you do this? The fundamentals of Swordsmanship are treating the blade like your own hand, right? You should just do the same thing with the whip.”

Slash!
“No, don’t just brute-force it. You need to preserve the balance and rhythm. The power only needs to be enough to reach the whip’s tip.”

Slash!
“No, could it be that you—”
“…….”

Delram, who had been chattering away enthusiastically, closed his mouth.
It was because Rubian’s eyes, which had been growing more irritated by the moment, were turning red.

Delram was suddenly flustered.
A woman who could bisect soldiers on the battlefield, now shedding tears?
Then again, when had a Swordsmanship prodigy ever endured such humiliation?

‘Was fifteen days of relentless drilling too harsh?’

Now that he thought about it, that seemed likely.
Even if the Empress herself came, she probably wouldn’t have shed a single tear.
Unless Rubian had her by the throat instead.

“Sigh.”

A sigh drifted from beside him.
It was Tas, who had by now learned to wield the whip as naturally as his own limbs.
Even through a ten-year-old’s eyes, Delram looked pitiful.

Delram instinctively realized he’d stepped in it.
If he didn’t handle this properly, it would dog him for the rest of his life.

But when had he ever been good at soothing people’s ruffled feathers?
If he’d been capable of it, he wouldn’t have lived the way he did before the Regression.
He’d probably have married young and had nine children by now.

“Delram, my boy!”
“Eh? Oh, Rocard!”

Delram spun around with more genuine delight than he’d shown in some time.
Even if his long-dead mother had risen from the grave to explain the wooden bow and Ymir’s true nature, he doubted he’d have looked this relieved.

Sure enough, Rocard—Rubian’s older brother—stood at the entrance to the Training Ground.
Though he wasn’t alone.

“It’s been a while.”
“What? What brings you here?”

Nuak was with him.

* * *

The tea poured smoothly.

“Thank you.”
“Well, it’s from the Vistech Family stores—thank them instead.”
“Hopeless with people, as always.”

Nuak clicked his tongue and lifted the teacup to his lips.
Delram, who’d poured it, found himself puzzled by Nuak’s presence.

He’d already heard the story—all the demon spawn had been exterminated.
He’d thought there was no reason for Nuak to seek him out.

‘Didn’t he say we should avoid meeting as much as possible?’

Delram had only just become a Viscount.
Moreover, his origins were common birth.
Breaking into noble circles was proving difficult.
Despite the existence of numerous gatherings among the nobility—smoking lounges, wine-tasting societies, and the like—he hadn’t received a single invitation to any of them.

Of course, his current residence played a part in that too.
Living under the Vistech Family roof meant no one felt comfortable probing.
Once he moved out and established himself independently, a few invitations would likely trickle in.

Either way, this was a delicate and crucial period.
If Delram were to flaunt his connection to the Luminous Church?
Nobles who opposed the Church would almost certainly take a dislike to him.

That was why Nuak had proposed it first.
Until Delram was firmly established, they should minimize all contact.

“Hmm… I didn’t expect you to come first, though.”
“Don’t call me that. I’m still in my prime.”
“Then should I call you Archbishop instead?”
“As Archbishop, you ought to do exactly that.”

Delram nodded and accepted this with good grace.
Nuak had made it clear he didn’t care for the old man’s epithet.
Then you’ll have to keep calling me that from now on.

“Anyway, what brings you here all of a sudden?”
“You’re going to take the Crusader test.”

Nuak threw the words out carelessly.
But the content was something Delram could never have imagined.
So he tossed back an answer just as casually.

“Crusader? You mean a servant of the Luminous Deity?”
“What!”

Nuak bounced up like a frog.

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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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