Our Young Master Lacks the Intellect to Wield a Sword (1)

Students admitted to Cheonryong Academy received a privilege of their own. Pass the first exam properly, and you were entitled to a weapon forged by the blacksmiths of the Cheonryong Sword Family. The Academy's patron house was the Cheonryong Sword Family itself, so the privilege was only natural.

Someone who could use aura might well ask what a weapon even mattered. It mattered precisely because of the aura. Arms made with modern techniques were built from special materials and structures meant to take aura easily, and so they drew it up more readily than any ordinary object or weapon, held its shape more firmly, and struck with greater force.

People liked to say a true craftsman never fussed over his tools, or however that line went. Hand that same craftsman a better tool, though, and you had put wings on a tiger. A superb weapon was, in the end, little different from a mark of the strong.

"Whoa! A sword from the Cheonryong Sword Family!"

Duna was bouncing in place, thrilled out of her mind, and she wasn't even the one receiving a sword.

"Young Master! It's a Cheonryong Sword Family sword!"

"Yeah, yeah. I know."

"Must be nice! I'm jealous! I want one too!"

"Knock it off."

Only a smack across the back of the head from Hana finally shut her mouth, and even then she stood there with her lips shoved out, sulking for all she was worth.

"So how do you actually get one?"

In the original course of things, Seo Hoon had never received a sword from the Cheonryong Sword Family at all. From his first year through his third he had never once properly passed an exam, and so the family's privilege had never come his way. Cheon So-hyeong had missed the normal route as well. With Cheon Dae-seong working against him, he was certain that a sword taken from the family forge would be tampered with. When the others returned to the estate and walked straight into the forge, So-hyeong received his mother's will in the inner halls and entrusted the work to a retired craftsman who had been waiting for him.

I had no need to go that far. Leaving it with the Cheonryong blacksmiths would be enough.

"They take the design you want in advance, then confirm the user's height, arm length, and hand size before they forge it. After that you meet the craftsmen at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Cheonryong forge, and the weapon is finished only once that meeting is done."

All I wanted was an ordinary sword with a grip fitted to my hand. Hana, as if she had already thought the matter through, drew out a set of design drafts she had prepared ahead of time.

"These are ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the designs for your use, Young Master."

There were several candidates. Every last one of them had something in common.

"These aren't swords."

"Correct."

One was a club shaped like a baseball bat. Another was a one-handed axe made for nothing but mindless swinging. The last was an iron flail with a heavy weight fixed to its head.

"Why?"

At an insult I had never seen coming, Sena and I—who had been listening without a word—could only stare, mouths hanging open.

"Sis! What are you saying!"

"I'm only stating the facts."

It was Duna who flared, her voice jumping, while Hana's face didn't so much as shift. She drew out several more drafts. Still nothing but weapons you picked up and swung, clubs and the like, and among them a set of spiked knuckles.

"Young Master. As I understand it, you have been learning a few sword arts from Duna?"

At that I answered without thinking, cutting the air with my right hand—once across, once down.

"Yes. Two kinds of swing. That is what you learned. You cannot thrust, so a sword is entirely useless."

The moment the words landed, the fight with the Dark Fire Bird Corps came back to me. I had gone for a straight punch. My arm stopped dead with a heavy jolt, the angle slewed, and I finished by driving my fist across in a horizontal smash.

"Then he can just take a Cheonryong sword and swing it!"

"If all he's going to do is swing, a club is more useful."

"You're looking down on our Young Master way too much! Young Master, don't listen to mean talk like that!"

Duna clapped her hands over my ears in a fury. As if that would keep me from hearing.

"From now on, the Young Master has to enter the dungeons. The instructors of Cheonryong Academy will not stand by and let a student die, but if a bone breaks, or you come out crippled, they will not help you."

"That's..."

"Which means the Young Master must have, at the very least, a way to defend himself. Duna, do you have a better idea?"

To sit the exams I had no choice but to enter the dungeon alone, so Duna staying at my side the whole time was impossible. And what truly left me speechless was this: if I thought about my own body, Hana wasn't even wrong.

Yeah. Even if I picked up a sword, I don't think I could thrust with it.

Call up a Daily Quest and grind at it until I dropped, and I could probably learn. A million and a half thrusts, say, and it ought to take—provided the Daily Quest actually bothered to show up in a useful form about a hundred and fifty times.

Even so, I wasn't about to go swinging a steel bat with the Cheonryong name on it, and an axe was no better. The heads were too heavy to haul around in the first place. My aura formed itself into a long, narrow sword, though, and everything I knew how to do was a swing. Thinking it over, some other weapon would suit me better.

"What about a long saber?"

If I was giving up on the thrust anyway, a long, slender saber could be handled almost like a sword, only specialized for cutting and sweeping.

"Young Master. Defeating monsters with an edged blade will take a great deal of hard practice. For your safety from here on, wouldn't these be better?"

"I'll teach you properly! And I've been drilling you in swordwork every time, so you'll actually be better with a sword or a blade!"

With Duna taking my side as well, Hana could push no further. In the end she had only chosen those designs after agonizing over them for my sake, so I would come through a fight with monsters as unhurt as possible.

"...It can't be helped. We'll need to send the design draft to the Cheonryong Sword Family ahead of time, so I'll prepare it now."

That reminded me—I had been wondering who drew these drafts. Hana produced drafting paper, a straightedge, and a pen, and at once set to sketching a long saber in quick, clean strokes. Between lines she measured my palm outright, or ran a tape around my hand, and before long she had spread a life-sized long saber across the sheet.

It stayed as close to a sword as it could, with only the very tip curving in, the better to favor the cut. The blade alone ran past three feet, but on a body like Seo Hoon's—tall, with long arms—it would sit exactly right.

"Young Master. A letter has arrived from the Cheonryong Sword Family."

Hana set it respectfully on a tray and brought it over, a letter marked with the family's crest: a dragon with a sword clenched in its jaws. Word was that the other students had already received letters naming which craftsman had taken their commission and when the weapon would be sent. Mine was late, and I had been waiting on a low, restless simmer. Before long I would have to go to the Cheonryong Sword Family, meet the craftsmen, and place the order, and I still hadn't even decided whom to seek out. Of course I was on edge.

I took the letter and tore the envelope open. Hana held out her hand. Right. Seo Hoon couldn't read. I was in no position to announce that I had learned my letters in under a month, so I set it back in her palm, and she read it as it stood.

What was that supposed to mean? For a second I wondered if Hana was making it up, so I checked the writing showing through the page in her hands. It was exactly what she had read. In the end, the message came down to this.

Well. They are the Cheonryong Sword Family...

It wasn't the Cheonryong Saber House, or the Cheonryong Mace House. If they made nothing but swords, I didn't have much of a leg to stand on.

"I'll send a letter of protest."

Hana had been the one uneasy about a long saber at the start. Now the family's nerve—refusing to forge the weapon a student had asked for, after promising they would, and brazen about it besides—had plainly lit a fuse.

"No, forget it. Force them to make it and they'll just slap something together."

That ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠left me no choice.

"When we go to the Cheonryong Sword Family tomorrow, I'll have to find a craftsman willing to make it."

"If they have gone so far as to send a letter of refusal, I expect they will turn you down out of pride alone."

"There's a way around that."

No helping it. Once again, I was going to have to borrow something that belonged to the protagonist, Cheon So-hyeong.

This one doesn't get used up either. Yup!

We arrived at the Cheonryong Sword Family. Not the inner residence itself, strictly speaking. The family held an entire district of its own, and the forge stood inside it.

Cheon Dae-seong, who had already inherited his sword, was puffing himself up in front of his friends.

"This is my house."

Cheon Yu-rin, to my surprise, had not received a proper heir's sword, and she was deep in discussion with the head swordsmith of the Cheonryong Sword Family about having one made this time. Apprentice smiths working on the grounds were guiding the new students of Cheonryong Academy themselves and showing them through the forge.

A short way in from the entrance, the exhibition hall bristled with famous blades, enough to cow anyone who stood before them. A few ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of the swords were broken, but the plaques recorded how many monsters each had felled before it snapped, and which boss it had brought down at the end of its life.

Twenty swordsmiths worked here, with eighty more assisting them. They belonged to one of the foremost sword houses in Korea, and within it they forged weapons that were theirs alone. Now they were dividing the seventy-eight students who had passed the exam and taking their commissions for new arms.

The work began with the design and the concept a student wanted. Then the smith sat down with that student and worked out the finer adjustments. They might bring out a blade already half-forged, or scrap the concept and begin again, studying the student's aura cultivation and the habits of the sword in that student's hand until they produced a weapon that fit.

"Whoa, that one's a real masterpiece... and they just leave something like that out on display!"

Our house had money enough that I could have bought Duna a fine sword of her own. A blade a great house drew from its secret arts, though, could never sit at the same level as a masterwork sold to ordinary people, and Duna's eyes shone as she took them in. I led her, still buzzing and looking everywhere at once, toward the edge of the Cheonryong forge.

"Careful with the case."

"I've got it. I'm holding on tight."

She was gripping it with aura, which only worried me more. At this rate that case was going to burst.

Was it around here?

The bench I wanted belonged to a blacksmith who hadn't even lit his fire. He was turning out odds and ends—metal traps, the clasps that fastened armor, scrap work of that sort. Once he had been the most promising smith of all, a man with a brilliant future. Then he took the side of Cheon Jin-myeong's third wife, drew the fury of the second wife—a daughter of a great house, and Cheon Dae-seong's mother—and fell from grace.

Two years on, in the future I knew, Cheon So-hyeong would commission him, and he would forge the boy's sword, the Ink-Iron Dragon Scale Sword. The man standing there was that craftsman. Bak Cheol-son.

"Excuse me."

"Kid. This isn't a place for sightseeing."

"That's not why I'm here. I've come to commission a weapon."

"From the look of the clothes, you're one of those Cheonryong Academy brats. Go ask somebody else."

Just as I'd expected. Cheon So-hyeong was another matter. He was the son of the third wife Bak Cheol-son had secretly yearned for, and the smith carried a private guilt besides—his feelings had been found out, Cheon Jin-myeong had grown suspicious, and that suspicion had gotten him cast aside. Guilt was why he would help So-hyeong. I had no such bond with him. A man who had lost every scrap of will was never going to help me.

"Duna."

Click.

Duna opened the trunk case she had carried in.

"Wh... what is this."

I pulled out the bundled stacks of fifty-thousand-won bills inside and tossed them to Bak Cheol-son.

"A bit large to refuse, wouldn't you say?"