The Path of Mana
I stared hard at my notebook. In the field, a veteran’s tip could be ten times more useful than a hundred textbooks. If Nefertiti was right, then the stiff, resistant feeling I got when moving my mana might simply be because my body wasn’t yet accustomed to Gerður’s techniques. Did that mean if I endured this miserable constipation-like sensation long enough, I’d eventually achieve the refreshing release of perfect spearmanship?
‘That doesn’t feel quite right.’
To me, it felt more like mana and the technique simply weren’t compatible. Like trying to jam an American two-prong plug into a Korean outlet. My elite brain greedily devoured the analogy and raised my wisdom stat by a point. I flipped the page.
─Who taught you doesn’t matter.
─Even if you start from the same martial school, the destination will differ.
─When you fight, you naturally create techniques that suit your own personality and body.
Constitution. It was constitution again. In this fucking bloodline-obsessed isekai world, if something didn’t match your body, even a wizard who dreamed of breaking the law would end up freezing to death. ‘So the technique doesn’t suit my constitution?’
No, I shouldn’t jump to conclusions. The ancient sages said: keep your dick hot and your balls cold. I had to suppress my irritation and think calmly.
‘There are many types of mana.’
The dark, yin mana used by black mages riddled with wormholes. The abundant mana favored by priests of fertility. The ordinary, consumable mana that regular people naturally acquire. There were so many damn variations it felt like the instant ramen aisle back in 21st-century South Korea.
‘Gerður’s techniques don’t accept the ordinary mana I possess.’
I’ve said this dozens of times already, but modern magic in this isekai world is created and distributed by the Mage Guild based on rune characters. As such, the spells are optimized for the mana people obtain through training and meditation. In the old days, people measured a car’s speed in horsepower because that was the most universal standard. Magic here is the same. That’s why I was able to casually learn and use spells like Burning Hand.
The magic designed for us humans—from the human race to elves and dwarves—is what modern isekai magic is all about.
‘But the era when this spearmanship was created was different.’
I’d been told that the name Gerður was given by Odin himself. In other words, the time when Spear Girl was doing her spear thing was probably some prehistoric era before the Common Era, when people bowed and scraped whenever the guy holding Gungnir told them to. So then—what kind of mana was considered the absolute best by humans back in those days, before the curse?
‘Obviously rune mana.’
The power of letters personally bestowed by the Sky God! No devout believer could resist that. Maybe the mana Spear Girl used for her spearmanship was rune mana?
‘—This is it.’
I held the spear like a laundry pole and drew up my mana.
—Whiririric!
As I raised rune mana and took the first attack stance of Gerður, the rune mana flowed smoothly through the mana-catheter inside my body!
‘Did it work?’
—Ptooey!
The rune mana moved for a brief moment before being violently repelled.
“Goddamn it, of course not.”
Well, I couldn’t expect to get the right answer every single time. I wasn’t some real genius like the people around me mistakenly believed. Even I had days when I got things wrong. Besides, rune mana was fundamentally different from ordinary mana. If consumable mana was electricity, rune mana was a USB charging cable. With that analogy, maybe people could understand why I got so pissed when that ogre bastard stole my genuine charger.
Anyway, rune mana wasn’t something that got consumed, so using it for a technique felt inherently strange.
‘Still, the approach itself wasn’t bad.’
The idea that the mana used in Gerður was some incredibly ancient mana that had existed since the age of myths seemed reasonable. I rubbed my temple with my fist, then picked up a rune stone from the floor. It was a red rune stone engraved with ᛏ (Teiwaz), the rune meaning Tyr.
‘The fact that I can watch the video means I’ve fulfilled the qualification.’
Spear Girl, who hadn’t even revealed her own name, had created this rune stone so that Gerður would be passed down to future generations. That meant that since I had met the conditions to unlock the video, I possessed the foundation to learn Gerður.
‘For now, I should just memorize the stance.’
With that thought, I decided to check the rune stone again in case I had misremembered the posture. But before I could pour mana into it, someone arrived in the garden. There was no need to guess who.
A cute height and adorable face could only belong to our Franc.
“Franc? What’s up?”
“Ah, sorry. I thought you were finished and came over… Did I interrupt?”
“Not at all. Wait, were you watching me practice?”
—Nod.
Franc bobbed her head up and down. Holy shit. I hadn’t noticed her at all.
“Franc, have you gotten even better at hiding your presence?”
“Hehe. I was pretty far away. Still, it makes me happy to be praised by Nord.”
She only laughed as if my words were mere flattery, but I was dead serious—I really hadn’t sensed her until a few seconds ago. If Franc had thrown a knife at me, I would’ve become a Nord kebab. I definitely hadn’t worked with her for about a month, yet she had improved this much in that time?
“How did you do it? You weren’t even wearing the mask, right?”
“It’s thanks to the ring Nord gave me. When I use the magic engraved on it, even the sound I make gets amplified. So while thinking of ways to reduce noise while moving, I ended up like this.”
“……That’s amazing.”
I genuinely admired her. The reverse Kenaz impression camouflage was completely useless in combat. But Franc’s stealth was pure physical ability! If I lost sight of her or blinked during a fight, I’d probably get a knife thrown at me while gathering energy and die screaming.
“Hehe. If I’d been a little better, I wouldn’t have had to stop your training. You’re sweating a lot. Let me wipe it for you.”
Franc took out a handkerchief and dabbed at my forehead. I politely bent at the waist and knees to receive my wife’s devoted care. While wiping my sweat, she asked,
“That’s the rune stone you mentioned yesterday, right? The one Veronica gave you. Is practice going well?”
“Larilura was studying alone, so I came out to practice too, but I’m a bit stuck.”
“Really? That’s a shame when you’re working so hard.”
Franc smiled as she unfolded the sweat-soaked handkerchief. She used to carry plain black ones, but now it seemed she carried cute ones. Somehow I felt a little guilty for dirtying it with my sweat.
“I just need to work harder. Seeing your face gives me energy. Are you done studying, Franc?”
“Yes. I was studying enchantment magic and came out for some fresh air, and then I saw Nord.”
“………………Enchantment magic?”
I had assumed she was going to ask Veronica about something related to Seidr, but enchantment magic? A thunderbolt struck inside my skull.
Was I surprised? No. It wasn’t strange for Veronica to use enchantment magic. Normal rune magic, when activated by engraving, became similar to enchantment. For a rune master like Veronica, it was entirely possible. The problem was that a very long time ago—
Franc had once asked me to teach her enchantment magic.
No, let’s not lie. It wasn’t a very long time ago. It hadn’t even been two months. It was before we joined the golem subjugation force. And yet I had completely forgotten about it until this very moment!!
‘Fuck?’
A massive wave of guilt crashed over me. That kind Franc! Our Franc, who almost never asked me for anything! The one and only request she had ever made in her life, and I had forgotten it completely!
When she saw my face turning deathly pale, Franc raised her palm.
“Ah, I forbid you from saying sorry or anything like that. You already know what I’ll say, don’t you?”
“Ughhh……”
—Tsk!
Franc mom-mode activated as she scolded me with a raised finger. But forbidding me from apologizing was truly evil, because the words I wanted to say got stuck in my throat and my guilt went into overdrive with nowhere to go. Back when my father forgot their wedding anniversary and ended up sleeping in a separate room, he drank soju with peanuts until three in the morning. Now I finally understood exactly how he felt. I wanted to die. Did someone like me even deserve to be Franc’s husband?
I had forgotten it just because I didn’t write it down in my notebook! Sure, after that I was busy dueling black mages and preparing to confess to Franc, so my mind had been completely occupied, but still!
“I learned enchantment magic from Larilura instead. So I asked Veronica to teach me about different magic. I couldn’t really get into rune magic. Even if I start learning now, I’ll never catch up to Nord or Veronica anyway.”
Franc spoke gently. I listened to her words with all my attention so I wouldn’t make the same mistake again, but the shock was so great that it felt like her words went in one ear and out the other.
‘Damn it, Nord. If you mess up again after this, are you really going to bite your tongue and die?’
That was out of the question. The isekai male chauvinist pig Nord didn’t even deserve to die while his wives were still alive and watching. Franc gave a bitter smile as if she could read every thought on my face.
“I’m not upset with Nord at all. I was much happier receiving Nord’s confession than learning enchantment magic, you know?”
“No, even so, that and this are completely different……”
Of course, if it hadn’t been that time, I wouldn’t have been able to match the timing for the confession and the ring. But if I had only remembered, there would have been plenty of time to teach Franc magic. And yet after the confession I had been completely out of contact for over a month!
When it seemed like I had forgotten, Franc simply went and learned from Larilura. And I was the one who had lent Larilura the enchantment magic book in the first place! This wasn’t at the level of being upset—she would have every right to hate me. Technically Franc had also let it slide when I forgot, so it wasn’t entirely my fault, but when had love ever worked purely on logic?
This was one hundred percent my fault for forgetting Franc’s words. When I stood there at a complete loss, Franc giggled as if she couldn’t stand it anymore.
“That’s so like Nord. Are you really that sorry just because you forgot once?”
“Yes.”
I erased the default playful attitude of Nord and answered seriously. Seeing my earnest expression, Franc happily rubbed her cheek against me.
“Okay, I understand. Nord? Can you wait here for five minutes?”
“Huh? Ah, yeah, sure.”
I didn’t ask any questions. If Franc told me to wait, I would wait even if it meant crawling home tomorrow morning. Of course Franc didn’t do that. Exactly five minutes later she returned.
“Ta-da?”
With both arms full of wooden weapons.
“If you’re sorry for forgetting my request, then you can just grant me a new one, right?”
—Clatter!
Franc dumped the weapons on the ground. There was a long pole like a mop handle and four wooden knives. The knives were almost identical to the Puppetry knives Franc used. She must have carved them herself. Franc held out the wooden pole to me and made a serious request.
“Spar with me, Nord.”
“……Ta-da?”
Our first married couple fight had begun.
“Franc. If you’re angry, I’ll just stand still and let you hit me all day today.”
When I said that, Franc looked hurt and became depressed. It seemed she was saddened because I didn’t believe her when she said it was okay.
“I’m sorry!! Let’s do it!! Sparring or whatever, I’ll do anything our Franc wants!!”
My mentality shattered at Franc’s sad face, so I threw everything else aside and agreed. For some reason she didn’t seem to want to beat me like a sandbag—her aura wasn’t that of someone angry—so she asked me to activate Beast Regression. It was true that Beast Regression, which raised my defense, was necessary so she wouldn’t hurt me. I was simply curious why she had suddenly asked for a spar.
“Let’s begin.”
—Shk.
Franc said, holding two wooden knives in reverse grip with both hands. Her sharply focused eyes were the serious expression she showed when working as an adventurer. However, I froze while holding a wooden pole that was almost the same length as my mithril spear. It was only natural. This was a problem that came before winning or losing.
‘You want me to hit Franc?’
If anyone other than Franc had suggested it, I would have told them to stop talking nonsense. Even if Dana had said it, I would have reacted the same. The only place I was allowed to hit my wives was in bed. And even though we had some experience with outdoor play, the middle of the garden was definitely not a bed. Above all, my main weapons—my dick and golden fingers—were currently sealed by clothes and a spear.
“Nord. Please take this seriously.”
Franc noticed my hesitation and spoke.
“No, even if you tell me to take it seriously……”
Recently I had been spending time on spearmanship textbooks and primitive ancient video lectures, but I was a man who had barely learned any proper combat techniques. The only swordsmanship I knew came from university physical training. In real battles, I had only learned to go straight for the neck or kill the enemy. I had almost never practiced restraint.
‘Every technique in Gerður is a killing move.’
It was a martial art from a barbaric era, so saying anything more would just make my mouth hurt. And this person was supposed to spar? If someone told me to beat up the uncle next door like a dog, I would hesitate. Standing in the garden holding weapons with my wife felt incredibly strange.
But this was a request Franc had brought up first. She wasn’t the type to suggest something like this without explanation or reason. Thinking that, I answered.
“……Alright. I’ll fight you properly.”
“Thank you. Then I’ll attack first.”
Franc smiled happily, just like she did for me every day.
—Tap tap!
She brought the knives to her waist and charged toward me.