The Imperial Supreme Commander Has Returned - Chapter 65

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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 Imperial Commander Returns — Episode 65

[Mana Arts]

Spreading Mana Arts was taboo among taboos.
It was the history of a house, the soul of it, its very dignity.
More than anything, it was the foundation of a noble’s station—what made nobility possible at all.
That was what Mana Arts were.

Delram was a commoner, born in some backwater corner of the kingdom at that.
Yet however you counted it, he had lived as a noble for twenty years.
Add in his service as a quasi-noble officer, and wasn’t that thirty years total?

So Delram had never quite considered it.
The thought of laying Mana Arts bare for all to see.
It was the prejudice of privilege, hardened by decades.

‘How did I never think of this?’

Of course, such attempts weren’t unheard of.
They’d been seriously discussed since the demons came.
But the world was full of fools who’d sooner see mankind perish tomorrow than let go of the privilege they clutched in their hands today.

Most damning of all was Mana Arts’ fatal weakness.
The factor of time had buried the whole idea.

Understanding and beginning Mana Arts was brutally difficult.
First, you had to be literate.
What use was giving someone Mana Arts to study if they couldn’t read it in the first place?

But this was an age when most commoners were utterly ignorant.
You could set the food before them and they’d never get a bite.

Then came the next hurdle: sensing Mana.
It took an average of a month just to feel Mana for the first time.
And that assumed you’d started young.
Delram, learning as an adult, had needed a full two years.

But reach this point and initiation was complete.
Did things get easier from here?
Of course not.

Gathering Mana alone wasn’t enough.
You needed a powerful foundation to hold it in place.
For Knights, that was training; for Mages, knowledge.
You had to push body and mind without rest.

Then there were the dangers that came with each breakthrough.
Without a master, you had to navigate every hazard alone.
It was a path paved with suffering.

‘Just hearing about it is suffocating.’

Which was why opening up Mana Arts wouldn’t yield much benefit anyway.
Or rather—it would simply take too long.
It would take at least five years before the first common Knight emerged.
And by then, the demons would already have half-destroyed everything.

‘There was no reason to open it at all.’

But that was not the case now.
Forty years remained before the demons invaded!
An era long enough for the land to transform not once, but four times over.
And if he began spreading Mana Arts from this moment forward?

By then, perhaps the demons would face something entirely different.
Hundreds of thousands of Knights…….

Of course, lower-rank Knights would not prove especially useful.
But mankind was the beast of possibility.
Some who absorbed the Mana Arts Delram spread might well awaken the seeds of heroism within themselves and become Sword Masters.

‘Life is all luck anyway, isn’t it?’

Naturally, the side effects would be considerable.
The continental hierarchy could crumble entirely.
Another war might erupt, bringing torrents of blood across the land.

Especially among commoners—many never received even Basic Education.
To place such a dangerous blade as Mana into their hands?
It could very well descend into chaos.

‘But still, it’s better than everyone dying. War risk? Well… no matter how severe, it can’t exceed a continental conquest war, can it?’

The collapse of the nobility—that presented no obstacle.
They could sort themselves out.

His resolve hardened.
He would release Mana Arts into the world.
It was a thought that had struck him in a single moment upon seeing the children.

So that day, playing with the children had to be postponed.
If he was going to teach them, he decided, he would do it properly.

Delram shut himself away in the Temple Back Room.
What he undertook there was a complete restructuring of the Mana Arts.

Delram knew many Mana Arts, but truthfully they were somewhat skewed in distribution.
Either the highest tier, or the lowest.
So he disassembled everything and recreated it from scratch.

‘Overall level—intermediate. Entry difficulty should be easy, and as safe as possible… but if the ceiling is too low, it won’t serve them well. So I’ll incorporate plenty of Secret Grade Mana Arts in the latter stages.’

If discovered, there would certainly be an uproar.
But that simply meant he must not be discovered, did it?
Besides, he had scattered the pieces far and wide—no one would understand the full picture.

In truth, even discovery did not concern him much.
So long as it was not revealed that Delram had created it.

A month later.
Five intermediate-level Mana Arts had been completed.
The exact same number he had divided among the children.
Most people’s aptitudes would not extend beyond these five.

‘As for the names…….’

He would make them up carelessly.
Then he reconsidered, and gave them proper names instead.
Those were the names of people Delram knew.
Subordinates who had stood by his side to the end, or hadn’t been able to.
He’d received so much help from them, and when he thought about it, he’d given them nothing in return.
They were the sort who would be satisfied just to have their names recorded in history, however briefly.

‘Nothing remarkably unusual about any of them, so they shouldn’t run into any trouble.’

Most of them hadn’t even been born yet, in truth.
Even so, they were no older than ten now.
He trusted that no one was mad enough to believe that a bunch of snot-nosed children could have invented the Mana Arts.

From that day forward, Delram’s routine changed somewhat.
Mornings he spent detecting Mana traces, and afternoons he taught the children.

“Ugh, I don’t want to study!”
“Don’t you want to create such a beautiful Aura?”
“…Well, maybe I’ll try a bit more.”

“I want to learn magic, though…….”
“Once you master this, becoming a Mage later will be far easier.”
“In that case, just a little…….”

“But can women become Knights too?”
“Women are better at it. When you replace strength with Mana, the only advantage left is flexibility—that sort of thing. My friend is a Female Knight, and I’m always the one getting hit.”
“Wow!”

Teaching the children, Delram learned much himself.
Unfortunately, none of it involved reaching any higher level of cultivation.

That children could concentrate for at most fifteen minutes.
That they wouldn’t listen to a word you said.
That they lied far more than expected and were cunningly shrewd.
That the boys were so irritating he sometimes wanted to give them a thrashing.

Actual instruction in the Mana Arts took little time.
Far longer was spent soothing and cajoling them into cooperation.
Utterly exhausted, Delram found himself speaking without thinking.

“…I have great respect for you, Priest.”
“Ha ha, you’re far more admirable than I, brother. I cannot express how grateful I am that you share such precious teaching with the children.”

Still, the time wasn’t entirely without value.
He’d confirmed there was no trace of Mana corruption anywhere in Gullest’s territory.
And through teaching the Mana Arts to the children, he’d gone through a process of refining and improving them.

The newly created Mana Arts had no significant flaws.
The issue lay rather in the properties of the Mana Arts themselves.
It was a matter of which of the five types of Mana Arts each person would master.

For the children, Delram had simply found the right Mana Arts for each of them.
But what of those encountering the Mana Arts for the first time?
One couldn’t leave it to chance—there had to be a method for them as well.
After much deliberation, he created one.

[Mana Arts Aptitude Test]
– I find it difficult to wake in the morning ○ or ×
– I prefer summer to winter ○ or ×
– Using my body feels more natural than using my mind ○ or ×
…….

Around five hundred questions in that format.
They all seemed absurd, but they were carefully crafted nonetheless.
Each one reflected a person’s character, attributes, actions, and philosophy of life.
Approached earnestly, they would reveal one’s true affinity for the Mana Arts.

The accuracy rate was roughly seventy percent.
The remaining thirty percent—well, one simply had to live with bad luck.
Though truth be told, even that much would have been unimaginable before.

And so forty days had passed without notice.
Far longer than the ten days Delram had originally planned to stay.
Now it was time to leave.

* * *

“I’m grateful for everything. I’ll be going now.”
“Go safely, brother. It’s not much, but…….”

Early morning.
The Priest handed Delram a bundle as he left the Temple.
It was a lunch box made after barely any sleep.
The bread had been freshly baked, and warmth radiated from the wooden container.

“You shouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.”
“Compared to the grace you’ve shown by teaching the children about the Mana Arts, this is nothing. I’ll make sure the children are careful about it.”
“Careful about what?”
“Well, so it doesn’t spread―”
“No need. If anyone wants to learn, tell them everything. Since I created it myself, there’s no one to object. It’ll be helpful for the next children who come here too.”

The Priest’s eyes widened.
Delram had taught the Mana Arts to orphans.
Children without parents in Gullest, whom the Priest had taken in and raised.

But they couldn’t stay in the Temple forever.
Once they came of age, fate would drive them into the harsh streets.
There was no shortage of orphans, but the Temple’s capacity was always limited.

Of course, the future would not be easy.
If they were fortunate, they might learn a trade and barely scrape by.
If luck abandoned them, whether man or woman, they would have to sell their bodies to survive.
Then came the slums, and the shadow of their parents’ fate―
The Priest carried this guilt with him always, heavy and unbearable.

But with the Mana Arts, it didn’t have to be that way.
The children’s choices would expand far beyond measure.
They could work as mercenaries, become guards with greater ease.
Perhaps one of them might even become a Knight.

That wasn’t all.
With Mana awakened, physical endurance naturally increased, and strength grew.
Even work as a carpenter or farmer would be greatly improved.

Still, the Priest worried.
Would the children speak carelessly, spreading word without thought?
If the Mana Arts leaked out, might Delram not be angry with him?

But the answer that came was entirely unexpected.
The Priest stammered, asking again in disbelief.

“Do you truly mean that?”
“In the first place, they weren’t even adults — just children, and more than twenty of them at that. How could it not spread?”
“Brother…….”
“When we reach the next city, I’ll compile it all into a book and send it to you. So when you teach others, use that instead.”
“Ah……!”

The Priest fell silent, visibly moved.
His eyes turned toward Delram with a gaze bordering on reverence.

For Delram, it was an unbearable moment.
Here stood a saint who had devoted his entire life to God and to orphans, serving them without falter.
And yet this man looked upon him — a mere butcher, a human of blood and trade — with such veneration.
So Delram hastily traced a clumsy sign of blessing and left in haste.

The world lay hushed in the enigmatic silence of dawn.
A faint shaft of light began in the east, illuminating Delram.
As if he alone existed in all creation.
The Priest lifted his voice in prayer.

“O God of Light, watch over your servant. Grant him victory over all evil, and in the end, grant him only peace…….”

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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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