The Magicians of This World
I'd felt a presence ever since I started playing the Legend of Dalmyo, but whoever it was had remained perfectly still in that spot, listening to my performance.
Only after the rest of my pieces had ended and Blanc began to throw her tantrum did the presence draw closer—close enough that I decided I needed to see who it was.
This was the deep heart of the mountains. If it was a person, it could just as easily be a bandit or a highwayman.
"Aren't you going to come out?"
"I'll come out, then."
An elderly man's voice. The presence that had been radiating that presence slowly revealed itself.
Tall and solidly built, with long white hair, blue eyes, a beard that stretched far down his chest, sharp focus in his gaze, and deep-set wrinkles…
He was advanced in years, yet his body called to mind a slab of hard stone.
His attire consisted of leather armor, a robe, and a sword more than a meter long strapped across his back.
And last of all—his mana.
The mana flowing from the old man before me was as warm as groundwater near a volcano.
I had just met a Gandalf who was more Gandalf than Gandalf.
The Gandalf slowly walked toward me.
"Sorry about that. I wasn't deliberately trying to spy on you."
The old man apologized, tossed his pack down in front of me, and then drew his sword and drove it into the ground—as if to show he had no intention of fighting.
"Is that enough for you to trust me?"
Even if the other party was a mage, discarding both his luggage and his weapon to declare his intent left only one response for anyone who still refused to trust him: total idiot.
"Yes. Thank you."
"Hahaha! Sorry! At my age, peeping like that… what a ridiculous thing to do."
"What brings you all the way out here, Elder?"
This place was a mountain range so deep it might as well have been a million years removed from civilization.
He's not young… so why come here?
"I came because I had business at this lake."
"Here, of all places?"
"You already know, don't you? Being a mage yourself."
Just as I had sensed the mana in the old man, he must have sensed the mana in me as well.
"Hmm?! …Hah… Unbelievable… Young man, you have lived far too hard a life."
"Pardon?"
"Are you all right, young man…"
The old man suddenly stopped mid-sentence, stepped closer, and patted my shoulder in encouragement. He looked at me with the overwhelming pity of someone gazing at a war orphan.
"Those damned demon worshippers!"
"Elder, what on earth…"
"You… were raised as a weapon."
"Excuse me??"
"How else could someone of your age possess that body and that mana…"
He read my physical abilities and the size of my mana circuits?!
"Truly… truly remarkable… To be raised by people like that and still find companions such as these, and to play such beautiful music… You've suffered so much, young man…"
An old man offering warm comfort by the lakeside, and a young man collecting an endless number of misunderstanding flags.
A short while later, I still had not managed to clear up the old man's misunderstanding.
"Elder, I was not raised by demon worshippers!"
"Hah… It's only natural you'd want to hide it. I already know everything, so there's no need to say more."
On top of that, this grandfather was so stubborn he simply refused to listen to a word I said—and he was generous with his tears.
"Khuh…! Those bastards were the ones in the wrong. There's nothing wrong with you…"
Watching a grandfather who was only trying to encourage me out of genuine concern start crying made the pressure almost unbearable. I decided to just play along.
"Th-thank you…"
"There, there. If there's anything you're curious about, think of me as your real grandfather and ask. I'll tell you—I, Deprim."
The Gandalf grandfather who introduced himself as Deprim seemed to regard me as something like a grandson. He chuckled warmly and made it clear he wanted to talk.
"Then… may I call you Grandpa Deprim?"
"Of course you may! Come to think of it, what's your name, young man?"
"I'm Haren."
"A fine name… To think such a fine young man was, from childhood— khuh!!"
"No! Grandpa Deprim! Right now! I'm completely! Happy!"
"Yes, yes… I understand. Getting old makes a man tear up easily. Forgive me."
But why didn't Hati and Hugin notice this grandfather?
Blanc's eyes were rolled back so she can be excused, but those two are more sensitive to presence than I am…
"K… woof woof?" "Screech…?"
Even Hati and Hugin, who had been nearby, were sending me worried thoughts asking if I was all right.
"Ah! Right—before your companions start thinking even stranger things of you, I'd better resolve this first."
Clap!!!
"Screech!!!???!" "Woof woof?!?!?!?"
Grandpa Deprim suddenly clapped his hands, and Hati and Hugin leaped into the air in utter shock.
"Hahaha. Haren, to your companions it must have felt as though I simply appeared out of nowhere."
"Ah, so that's why they were worried about me?"
"Hm? It's a recognition-blocking spell that only works on animals, you see."
If you saw someone talking into empty air, flustered and panicking, of course you'd get worried.
Recognition-blocking, though? That's an incredible spell, isn't it?
"That spell…"
"Hm? You don't know even this…? C-could it be?! They never even taught you a basic spell like this?! Those! Rotten! Bastards!"
"Calm down! Please calm down, Grandpa!!"
After Grandpa finally settled, some time later…
"Haa… If they never even taught you the basics, Haren—does that mean you don't know the history of mages either?"
"I only heard that the Demon of Interest taught the mages."
"I thought as much… Come sit here and listen."
"Do I really have to hear it?"
"As long as you are a mage, you will eventually learn the truth of what mana—the root of magic—actually is. Better to hear it now."
The truth of mana, huh…
I sat down with Grandpa Deprim and listened to his story.
"Magic is something the Messenger created for our sake."
"The Messenger?"
"Yes… Our progenitor."
It matched the stories about demons I had once heard in a village church.
So the one who taught the mages had been the Messenger—a demon.
The tale went like this.
The Messenger, who had been the Demon of Interest, grew so fond of this world that he forced his way through the power of the gods and began traveling across it.
"During those travels, our progenitor… found our ancestors amid the ruins left by a great war. He felt pity for them and raised them."
"That must have been a truly tragic age."
"If we go a little further, our progenitor came to notice a problem with our ancestors."
"What was it?"
"That it was too hard for them to survive in that era."
"Pardon?"
"It was an age overflowing with swords and arrows and people who had lost their humanity. And yet… our ancestors' life force was far too weak."
In an age where people slaughtered one another freely, commoners whose life force was practically nonexistent would have found survival almost impossible without heaven's protection.
And the Messenger, whose essence was that of a demon, would one day have to leave this world.
"So our progenitor thought: he would use his own power to grant strength to our ancestors."
The very ability that matched his title—Transmission.
"Our progenitor refined his own mana to an extreme degree so that it would suit humans, and continually exposed them to it."
Grandpa Deprim stroked his beard for a moment, catching his breath, then continued.
"Once our ancestors' bodies had adapted to a certain extent, he fed them the pure essence of that purified mana so they could handle mana themselves. That was the beginning of the mages."
"I see…"
The reason a mage's mana felt warm was because its origin had begun with a parent's love.
He shared his mana for the sake of children whose life force had been so faint…
But if that's the case, does that mean free citizens—who already possess life force—can't handle mana?
"Free citizens cannot enter the path of magic. Only today's commoners can become mages."
"I see…"
"In the end, after our progenitor left this world, our ancestors used mana to replace life force."
Grandpa Deprim picked up a smooth stone from the lakeshore and crushed it in one hand.
"Mana is a power of mystery. Our ancestors realized it too—that even after replacing life force, it could create other phenomena."
Originally mana had been created to replace life force, but as they used it they discovered a force that could twist reality itself—in other words, magic. And yet…
"Our ancestors never used magic that harmed anything."
Grandpa Deprim spread his mana, exhaling fire and causing the surrounding grass to grow.
"Instead, they could protect themselves, manipulate reality, and even hide their bodies from the world."
"Then why don't they use magic when they attack?"
"As I said earlier, it is a power that began with love."
Grandpa Deprim patted my shoulder as he spoke.
"Except when using that power to protect yourself or those you cherish, deliberately harming anything with it is to desecrate that love."
"So that's why magic developed in the direction of concealing oneself or replacing life force?"
"Hahaha. 'Developed,' you say. What an amusing way to put it."
"Pardon? What do you mean?"
"Haren. Do you think magic has been systematized?"
"Judging by the existence of basic spells… isn't it?"
"It is not."
Grandpa Deprim lit and extinguished a flame in his hand several times, then posed a question.
"What do you think?"
"Some are strong and some are weak."
"Exactly. Even with the same power, even with a simple spell, the results differ."
"And…?"
"Haren, do you believe mana is a power with a true foundation?"
"Pardon?"
"It is a force external to this world to begin with. There is no foundation of any kind."
Grandpa Deprim stood, raised a hand to the sky, and brought it down toward the earth—
KRA-KOOM!!
A bolt of lightning the size of an apartment building slammed into the lake… wait?
"Wh… what?"
"Haren. Look at the lake. Did any of the fish die?"
They hadn't. And even though a bolt that thick had struck, only ripples spread across the water's surface…
"Haren, isn't it strange? A phenomenon occurred, yet there is no result."
"Why did it turn out like that?"
"Because I did not wish for any living creature to die."
"What?!"
"Mana is a brush. And the painting called magic… the one who paints it is, of course, the one who wields that mana."
Grandpa Deprim tapped his own temple with a finger as he spoke.
"What matters is will. In other words, expressing your imagination through mana—that is magic."
"So that means…"
"What we call basic spells are simply magic that lets us mages live more conveniently. We only tell you, 'This sort of thing exists.' Learning it and making use of it is up to each individual."
The mages of this world… are completely broken, aren't they?
When Grandpa Deprim saw the utterly dumbfounded look on my face, he laughed and continued.
"Hahaha. Even so, there are limits to how far one can twist reality, and it differs from person to person. In my case I can manage about this much, but others cannot."
"Then… can you also regulate the strength of your own body?"
"Of course. But you cannot step outside the bounds of a living being. Mana is not omnipotent."
At that level it might as well be omnipotent…
"Then… you don't use physical enhancement?"
"When mages strengthen their bodies, it is an act of replacing life force, so we can strengthen ourselves as much as we like without anyone minding. We have to make a living too, after all."
The mages of this world were grand mages who surpassed anything from a game—
and yet, leaving their completely broken magic unused, they were the sort of power-mage bunny princesses who insisted on cutting things down with a sword instead.