The True Meaning of Resonance

The hint that evolved the skill was, of all things, simple.

Paaang.

The instant I swung, the vibrating spear tip split the air. That much was the Resonance Spear, doing precisely what it had always done. But while I drove the spear on without end, every thought scoured clean out of me, a question came out of nowhere.

Why Resonance Spear?

Why not Vibration Spear?

Resonance — the phenomenon in which an object's own frequency meets a vibration from outside, and the oscillation amplifies.

...That's what it means, isn't it?

The moment that thin scrap of science floated up, I began to doubt the name the System had hung on the skill, and the mana streaming toward the spear tip changed with it. Without ever deciding to, I was trying to copy, in mana, the tremble of the air against the point.

It wasn't especially hard. All I had to do was let the mana out in finer threads, timed to the motion that set the spear vibrating, and shake that mana along with whatever stimulus met it from beyond the steel.

A few misses. Then, all at once —

Fwoooom.

The boom tearing off the spear tip had changed in its very quality.

Oh!?

In that instant I wanted to try it on more than air. A heavy thud, then a long splintering crack — and from then on the floor and walls of the training hall were my test pieces. Somewhere in the middle of it, I grew certain.

I can't force resonance onto something I've never struck. But hit it a few times, and I can.

The ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠moment I thought that this, at last, might be spearwork worthy of the word resonance in its truest sense —

"Done!"

How was I supposed to describe the pleasure of that moment? I was still shouting with it when —

"What in the world is all this!?"

Instructor Jerik bellowed at the smashed floor and walls of the training hall, and before anyone could congratulate me I was paying the repair bill and sitting through a lecture that refused to end.

The footwork's evolution was simpler still. From the start I had taken the basic footwork learned at the Volante viscount house, corrected its flaws through my trait, and turned it into the original Volante Footwork, Stage 1. Ever since, I had drilled that first stage without end, hunting down every shortcoming I could find. The boast I had made to Jerik — that I could evolve a skill — had been about the footwork all along.

Then the spearmanship evolved when I hadn't even been aiming for it, and my mind eased a little.

I was rushing.

With that plain realization, my footwork began to correct itself by the smallest of angles.

The result.

The very day after I mastered Shatter Spear, I succeeded in evolving the footwork.

"You brat! What, did you turn into a genius overnight!?"

"You're the one who said I had talent!"

"...Not a genius. I didn't say that."

"Unbelievable."

I was glad, of course. But a strange weight settled on me along with it. Even with my trait pointing the way as plainly as a signpost, it had taken more than three months of training to work the thing into my body.

At this rate, evolving anything from Rare on up by training alone is going to be rough.

Use the trait and put in the time, and a Rare evolution might still be possible.

Three months to reach Highest. Would Rare take half a year?

The trouble was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that it would never work out by arithmetic that neat.

I have to allow for it taking far longer than that.

And I wasn't sure I had the patience to go that far. So I took it to Jerik.

"Well. That's why so many Summoners stall out on a floor lower than anyone expected of them."

"Sorry?"

"You thought about this?"

"About what?"

"A talented Summoner gets one point a level. Dump every last one of them into a single skill, all the way to level 100, and I hear you can push that one skill all the way to Divine."

"Ah..."

I had never really pictured it in any concrete way.

"I've never seen a Summoner with a Divine-grade skill. Never heard of one, either. Could be they just don't have the mana to match a skill like that. I'll grant you that."

"Is that... so?"

"Yeah. Think about it and it's simple. Evolve a skill and your combat power itself changes. But a fight, in the end, is offense and defense. You need an attack. A defense. Evasion. Stamina, too. Leave any one of those weak and you can die stupid in some place that never should have killed you. You wouldn't know that yet."

It wasn't quite the same thing, but what he meant was that a character who dumps every point into a single stat, the way you do in a game, cannot exist out in the real world.

"So I can't pour everything into just one skill."

"Right. Which is why you save your level-up points. If you actually mean to climb past the hundredth floor of the Labyrinth and get out of this world, the way you keep saying you will."

"Right..."

It felt like hearing, in my bones, a thing I had already been told more times than I could count.

"Even cut down to the bone, three things. A cultivation method to be your foundation. An evasion art. An attack art."

"That's what you told me at the start."

"Yeah. But you've been through enough by now to know it isn't as easy as saying it."

"...Of course."

"Next evolution feel hopeless? It isn't impossible. If it's only daunting, then try to smash through it. Otherwise, one day you'll stall on some floor like every other Summoner. You especially..."

"Because I've only got the one Ability Slot."

"...Yeah."

I had finished the sentence he found hard to say himself, and the weight in me only grew.

"...So it comes down to effort. Effort."

"Yeah. But there's no need to look that grim about it yet. You're already doing better than I ever expected. By a long way."

"Yeah. That much I know."

"Wasn't telling you to get cocky. But you've shown me something, so I can't very well complain. Have some confidence. How many freaks do you figure master two Highest-grade skills or more while they're still a Novice?"

"A freak...?"

"Yeah. And you. That linked skill of yours ranked up again, didn't it?"

"Ah!"

In that moment I remembered the skill I had forgotten.

"Oh!?"

It had become a Rare skill, no less. I was still marveling when something about it struck me as faintly wrong.

"What?"

"The System's lettering. It feels a little... faded?"

"The linked skill?"

"Yes."

"Tsk. Quit wasting time and plant your feet. Train. Footwork and spearmanship both just evolved, so the link's come loose."

"Ah!"

"Drill it back into place. Don't forget — the same grain."

"Thank you, as always, Instructor!"

"Don't mention it. Labyrinth auction's in three days. Don't forget that."

"Yes. Of course!"

Talking it through left me feeling as if I had circled all the way back to where I started, and yet I was lighter for it. Light enough, at least, to feel the whole of what I had done.

Right. I'm doing well.

Well enough to take, undiluted, the satisfaction of having evolved two skills.

"Whoa! So this is the Labyrinth auction!"

"There are so many people."

"Over there — over there, let's go look!"

The noise rolled over everything.

The moment the Labyrinth auction opened, people from all over Bartus poured in to see it, and Jerik and I were among them.

"...There are more people than I expected?"

"Precious goods from other kingdoms are up for sale too. Not just ours."

"Holding the auction outside the castle is a surprise as well."

I had pictured some glittering festival at the royal palace. What I got was an affair that began with enormous tents pitched beyond the walls. There were the three great tents, and around them stalls of trifles, little events, even a circus troupe putting on a show. The whole of it was nearly the size of a small city.

"They're stingy. That's why."

"Stingy?"

"Yeah. They don't want the best of every nation walking deep into the royal castle, so they throw the event outside the walls."

"Ah..."

"The other races go further, mind you. You'd be shocked if you went."

"How far?"

"Step outside the auction grounds and get anywhere near the city, and they kill you."

"Damn..."

While we talked, other races stood out here and there along the auction street — people you rarely saw in ordinary Bartus. Elves, every one of them so slender and lovely you couldn't have said which were men and which were women. Dwarves who wouldn't have reached an ordinary person's waist, and yet were broad to every side, built thick through the whole body. And orcs besides: the intelligent(?) race that stood for the monsters. The greenskins.

It really does feel like I've walked into a world out of a fantasy tale.

Of course, the moment I remembered the hard fact that I had taken wounds on every inch of my body in under two years, that thought wiped itself out. Treat it as reality, though, and the reasoning turned down another road.

What if the stories came from someone of Earth, who saw this place and went back to tell them?

Clear the hundredth floor of the Labyrinth, and you can pass into another world. Here, people usually call it ascension — rising into the heavens, the way those who became gods had done before the Labyrinth ever appeared. And yet, in all the centuries since the Labyrinth actually showed itself, not one of the people said to have cleared the hundredth floor had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ever taken a god's name. I could only infer from what was in front of me.

There's a good chance someone went back. The author themselves, or someone close to them.

Which would mean it might be possible to reach Earth.

Seeing the other races, I felt that thought grow sharp all over again.

And in the meantime —

"Here. The mid-tier auction house."

Jerik and I stopped before the second largest of the three tents. They called it the middle one, but the thing alone was on the scale of an Olympic stadium I had walked into once, in the life before this.

"Whoa..."

The size of it pulled the sound out of me on its own. Then an unfamiliar voice came from beside me.

"The auction runs over a week, but you'd do well to check the list of goods every day. Ah — and if you have something of your own to put up, just speak to the clerk over that way."

"Who...?"

"Ah, forgive the late introduction. Hailon. I manage the mid-tier auction house for this Labyrinth auction."

A potbellied, brown-haired man of middle years answered my confusion with an amiable smile.

"Ah. I see."

I was only nodding out of courtesy when he offered me his hand.

"You're Charr, aren't you? I've heard a great deal about you from young Ruda."

Hm?

While I was still wrong-footed, Jerik stepped out in front of me.

"In charge of the mid-tier house. Merchant Guild, then?"

"Yes, that's right. And you would be Jerik? In the old days, the Gale —"

"Enough. What's a manager too lazy to lift his backside doing out here? Don't you usually just pat that belly until the auction's over?"

"...Ah. 'Manager' sounds grand, but it's work they dumped on me from above, and there's nothing much for me to do. I stepped out to pay my respects to you, Jerik — and to Charr, the rookie worth watching."

Jerik, I could grant.

Me?

I was tilting my head when Jerik snorted.

"Hmm. Respects, is it. Then how about doing us a favor?"

"Yes. Of course. So long as it doesn't cross the rules."

"Everything listed so far. Spears, preferably, and the expected winning bids if you've got them. Well?"

"...Ah, that's no trouble at all. Will that be enough?"

"Reserved seats, too?"

"Those, if you simply pay the fee —"

"They're expensive. You said a favor."

At Jerik's strong-arming, a fine sweat started on Hailon's smiling face. He stole a glance at me, and then the smile came back, bright and easy.

"...Ah. Yes. Well, I suppose I could offer that much as a courtesy. If it means I get to know the two of you."

He was all but openly watching me. Still, if the attention was rooted in goodwill, I had no particular mind to refuse it.

"Ah. Then you can shave the commission, too?"

"..."

Jerik's demands, stacking one on the next, were a little past absurd.