Chapter 72
Chapter 72
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 72
Chapter Title: Next Mage Tower Lord, Resti (Part 2)
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I've met her before.
Many times.
That answer was somewhat expected. Resti knew quite a bit about Professor Lania.
The records were even posted in the Ashen Mage Tower.
"Studied under Professor Rosel for ten years."
Though overshadowed by Raniel's name, she was one of Rosel's long-time disciples. She had only been officially recognized as a disciple after the Ashen Mage had vanished.
It wasn't all that unusual.
Magic families often had a strong one-heir succession vibe, but they frequently took on one extra disciple just in case.
Resti thought.
Ten years ago—that was right around when the Ashen Mage had started appearing at the Ashen Mage Tower.
"And she must have crossed paths with Professor Lania."
After all, she'd spent ten years living in that mage's shadow.
Professor Lania had only recently been recognized as Elder Rosel's adopted daughter and disciple.
For over a decade.
She must have lived hidden in the Ashen Mage's shadow for a time that wasn't easy to imagine.
Asking someone like that about it might be incredibly rude. It could even touch on trauma.
Even so, Resti opened her mouth.
She asked the question she'd held back until now.
"...What kind of person was Lady Raniel?"
"What kind of person?"
"I've seen her a few times at the Mage Tower. But I just can't get a read on what she's like..."
She kept getting compared to her.
But Resti herself knew next to nothing about the Ashen Mage. She'd only ever encountered him through his achievements.
The Ashen Mage.
Raniel van Trias.
Resti didn't know Raniel as a person, only as achievements. And it probably wasn't just her. The mages of the Ashen Mage Tower were the same.
They knew the symbolism of the person called Raniel.
They knew the feats and accomplishments he'd piled up.
But they didn't know the person called Raniel.
"What kind of person he was."
Resti wondered.
"How he lived his life as the Next Mage Tower Lord."
That was what she wanted to know.
"That's what I wanted to ask."
With those words on her lips, Resti gauged Professor Lania's reaction. Surprisingly, she didn't seem offended.
"Hmm..."
Instead, she looked puzzled.
"...Well."
Finally, she spoke with some difficulty.
"You two seem pretty similar?"
"...Pardon?"
An utterly unexpected answer.
Resti blinked at it. Professor Lania tilted her coffee cup and continued.
"Do you know what the Mage Tower was like when the Ashen Mage first rose as Next Mage Tower Lord?"
"...No, I wasn't at the tower then."
"When did you join the Ashen Mage Tower?"
"About six years ago. I was selected as Next Mage Tower Lord... about three years ago."
"Six years ago... that was right before the Ashen Mage left the tower. Makes sense you wouldn't know."
She gave a wry smile.
"That guy wasn't so different from you."
"...Not different?"
"He got ignored, just like you. Bullied by the elders, shunned by fellow mages... the Ashen Mage Tower must've been pretty brutal."
"...Pardon?"
The Ashen Mage had been disrespected?
"Similar to me?"
Resti tilted her head.
The Ashen Mage she'd occasionally run into at the tower... was always so confident. He never hunched his shoulders.
Whenever he passed by, mages straightened up. They'd scramble to show him their research results, eager for even a glance from him.
That was the Ashen Mage, Raniel. A person who shone just by existing.
"...That kind of mage got ignored?"
She couldn't easily picture it.
As Resti tilted her head, Professor Lania continued.
"You don't get flak for your background, right?"
Resti nodded.
Indeed, she'd never been picked on for her origins.
"Lucky you."
Professor Lania swirled her coffee cup and went on.
"The Ashen Mage got trashed exactly for that—his background. 'What does a pathetic refugee mage from a lost homeland know?' That kind of thing."
"...Just for his background?"
"Yeah, just that. He was adopted into the Trias family, sure... but still a refugee. Hilariously, they wouldn't even look at his papers because they were 'dirty' or whatever."
It was absurd just hearing about it.
Seeing Resti's expression, Professor Lania let out a chuckle.
"Ridiculous, right?"
"Yeah... it is."
"Your background... um, sorry if this sounds bad, but you were adopted too, right?"
"Yes, from an orphanage."
"Right. But the elders don't rag on you for it because... if they did, they'd have to rag on the Ashen Mage too."
"...Didn't you say the elders disrespected the Ashen Mage?"
"Ancient history."
She shrugged.
"No one in the current Ashen Mage Tower could trash the Ashen Mage anymore. Right?"
"......"
Resti nodded.
She knew that better than anyone. She'd been constantly compared to him, after all.
"Why do you think that is?"
Professor Lania pressed down hard on the coffee lid with her index finger.
"He crushed them."
The lid dented inward.
"He proved it with achievements. With results no one could ignore, he crushed the elders."
She turned to Resti.
"And that didn't happen overnight."
"......"
"It took forever. For years... he kept clashing with the elders."
Resti blinked at that.
"I saw it up close. He struggled a ton at first. He'd grind his teeth, vowing to beat the crap out of the mages multiple times a day."
Resti stared at Professor Lania.
Her eyes seemed to gaze into the distance.
"He'd say he'd grind the elders into dust, cut sleep to write reports. Being ignored at the tower was daily life, and when he got home, he'd drown in booze like it was nothing. He'd whine to Master too."
That mage had such human sides?
Resti blinked and asked again.
"...Really?"
"Yeah, I saw it up close."
Professor Lania sipped her coffee, her eyes nostalgic as she looked afar.
"Everyone's got it wrong. They idolize him as a genius, an unprecedented mage... but peel back one layer."
She smiled.
"He's not that different from you."
"......"
"He just endured. Worked hard, gritted his teeth."
Resti shut her mouth.
She mulled over everything she'd heard so far. Professor Lania kept going.
"That's what being Next Mage Tower Lord of the Ashen Tower is like. You think sitting in the seat fixes everything... but nope."
Thud.
"They bully you, tear you down until you step aside. Relentlessly, endlessly. Because you're a thorn in their side. The tower runs fine without a Next Mage Tower Lord."
Thud.
"That's why so many past Next Mage Tower Lords—excluding the Ashen Mage—ended up as puppets. Too annoying to deal with. They just dumped it on someone else."
She raised the finger that had been tapping the coffee cup.
"But."
That finger pointed at Resti.
"You don't seem like that."
"......"
"You've got aspirations, right?"
"...Yes."
"You don't care much about the Next Mage Tower Lord seat. There's another goal? And it's probably not even that grand."
Inner thoughts she'd never shared with anyone.
Yet Resti nodded without thinking.
"...Yes, there is."
"You want recognition."
Thud, Professor Lania said bluntly.
"Just one person is fine. You'd love for that person to be proud of you. To prove that picking you up was the right choice."
Resti swallowed.
"How did you...?"
"The Ashen Mage was like that."
She smiled.
"I was like that, and so was the Ashen Mage."
Professor Lania smiled softly, gazing into the distance.
"Truth is, I don't care what anyone says about me. They can ignore me, whatever... it's all fine."
She said.
"But I hate it when they disrespect the one who took me in. So that's why I cling to that seat, holding on for dear life."
That was it.
Resti nodded unconsciously.
"...Because I hated seeing the elder disrespected."
There were voices tearing her down. Plenty of them.
They didn't just target her alone.
Denying her was the same as denying the elder who took her in.
That.
More than anything, Resti couldn't bear that.
"Without something like that, I never could've lasted three years as Next Mage Tower Lord."
Resti looked at her.
Met her blue eyes.
"...Professor Lania."
And she brought up the question she hadn't asked earlier.
"Have you never felt that the seat succeeding the Ashen Mage comes with too much expectation?"
Thinking about it, it made sense.
This professor in front of her had lived ten years in the Ashen Mage's shadow. Lived being compared.
Ten years of waiting.
Waiting ten years without showing herself to the world.
And when she finally stepped out.
When Elder Rosel recognized her as a disciple and she took the Trias name, showing herself to the world.
"From the very start."
This person was confident.
Unafraid of others' gazes. Resti found that purely amazing.
If it were her.
She wouldn't have withstood the pouring stares.
"...Didn't you ever want to quit?"
At the question, Professor Lania blinked.
Her eyes narrowed as she opened them.
It was a misunderstanding.
Professor Lania roughly grasped what she was asking. She understood it was a misunderstanding.
However.
Resti wouldn't know, but that misunderstanding wasn't entirely wrong.
The weight of the seat.
The expectations pinned on it.
Those were things the Ashen Mage felt every single day.
"Well."
Raniel, playing Lania, smiled.
That was a misunderstanding. But she didn't have to lie just because the other person misunderstood.
She.
Answering as Raniel, not Lania.
"It was heavy."
The Next Mage Tower Lord seat was heavy.
The Hero Party sage seat was even heavier.
"My mistakes don't just end with me."
They tarnished Master's reputation.
A mistake on the battlefield led to someone's death.
"Symbolic seats are all like that. Heavy... and yeah, I thought about quitting every day."
Expectations were high.
"Had to be perfect all the time."
It was manageable as the Ashen Mage Tower's lord. But on the battlefield, it was different.
Sage Raniel van Trias.
Hero Party member, Ashen Mage.
The meaning of that name was immense. Everyone expected things of her. Whenever she appeared on the battlefield, she had to be a symbol of hope.
She had to bring hope even in hopeless situations.
The front lines collapsed under the black dragon, and she had to rally the knight orders that had lost their commanders and fallen apart.
She had to detect the countless traps laid by an ancient lich who'd lived centuries and devise countermeasures.
"And that's not all."
Even against the traitor Gletus.
Even facing the blade of death, Ganikalt.
In situations with no answers, the knights, hero, saintess, divine archer—all looked to Raniel.
"With eyes full of expectation that I'd find the answer."
It was always like that.
-Star.
Even when facing the Demon King.
-I'll offer half my lifespan.
Raniel had to find some way. That was the role expected of the sage.
That role was heavy.
Heavy enough to make her want to quit right then and there.
"But, you know."
Every time, Raniel thought.
-Raniel.
Words from her master.
-Don't hesitate to challenge out of fear of loss. A mage is a challenger before being a calculator.
She recalled those words.
-You'll live a life you're satisfied with.
"I figured I'd regret quitting."
Raniel, as Lania, as professor, perhaps as master, looked at Resti.
"Heavy, tough, annoyingly so... but quitting felt like it'd leave me unsatisfied."
"......"
"Isn't it the same for you?"
Lania took a sip of coffee.
Then blurted out.
"You're still holding onto that seat because you'd regret letting go, right?"
"......"
Slowly.
Very slowly, Resti nodded. Lania smiled at the sight. Smiling, she thought.
"I ended up making a choice I'd regret, though."
She considered holding on a bit longer.
But since it was all in the past, as a senior who'd walked a similar path, Lania offered advice.
"Mages are all like that."
She smiled.
"That's why mages don't die peacefully."
A smile from someone who'd lived longer.
Resti gazed at that smile for a while.
3.
Don't make choices you'll regret.
Make choices you'll be satisfied with.
"Such simple words..."
Yet they were hilariously just what she wanted to hear most.
"Because I hoped someone would say that."
Those words resembled something the elder in her memories had said. Resti pondered them.
"Choices I'll be satisfied with."
In the end, back to square one.
But now it felt like she was finally at the starting line.
"...You're right."
A smile slipped out unconsciously.
The chains she'd bound herself with were gone. Mindful of the starlight flickering in her vision, Resti made a vow.
Nothing changed right away.
Only things she had to change from now on.
The only difference from before was that her gaze on those things had shifted a little.
"From now on..."
The moment Resti was solidifying her resolve.
"Hm..."
Suddenly, Professor Lania stretched out her arm.
"I was agonizing over this a bit."
Then she spread her hand wide in front of Resti. Resti looked at what was in it.
"I think it's okay to help you with this much."
"...What's this?"
It was a key.
Mana flowed through it, so likely one that interacted with a magic tool.
"The Ashen Mage's research lab is still at the tower, right?"
"Ah, yes... I heard they kept it in case he returns."
"Hm... A3, was it? Third drawer in the A3 line."
"...Pardon?"
Professor Lania gave a wry smile.
"The Ashen Mage left it before he departed. In case... the elders act like jerks, throw what's in that drawer right in their faces."
"...Throw it... at them?"
"I don't know the details. Just that if you throw it and make your demands, they'll listen."
She nodded toward it.
"What are you waiting for? Take it."
"...This wasn't left for you, Professor Lania..."
"What am I gonna do going to the Ashen Mage Tower? I hate hassle."
When Resti didn't take it, Professor Lania forcibly spread her hand and shoved the key into her grip.
"...Is it okay for me to take something like this...?"
"Just take it."
She shrugged.
"Professors write recommendation letters for top students in each class, but I don't have one ready... so this'll do."
"...Top student?"
"Yeah, you're number one. Don't go blabbing about it."
She flashed a mischievous grin.
Resti tilted her head at the smile.
"...I didn't even solve them all."
"You got up to seven. After all that explanation, the other kids barely cracked six. You're undisputed first."
Really? Weird.
It felt like simple problems.
Seeing her grumble like that, Resti smiled faintly and replied.
"The problems were too hard."
"After all that explanation?"
"Listening doesn't mean you solve everything. Time was tight too."
Something felt off.
"...Is that so?"
"Your classes are tough, Professor."
"Really? It seemed doable..."
How long had it been since she'd chatted so casually?
Her throat tickled with a strange sensation.
"......"
Resti looked at the key in her hand.
A worn copper key.
Clutching it, Resti checked the clock.
Ding, doong.
Just then, the bell tolled.
Time for students to return to their dorms. After the terror incident, Aphria Academy had temporarily advanced curfew.
Even though the sun had just set, it was time to head back.
"Ah, already time to go?"
Professor Lania nodded.
Resti slowly stood. They walked along the garden path, exiting toward the plaza.
Upon entering the plaza, a fork appeared.
One way to the faculty offices, the other to the central academy building. On the sunset-lit path, Professor Lania paused briefly. Then she waved.
"Head in."
"Yes, Professor."
Resti walked ahead.
Lania stood still, watching her back. Then, as she was about to move again.
"Professor Lania."
A voice stopped her.
Turning toward it, Resti was looking back. Her purple hair swayed in the spring breeze.
With the sunset at her back, Resti smiled.
Not her usual faint smile, not a smirk, not a hollow laugh—a genuine one curved her lips.
"Thank you."
The sun set.
In the garden bathed in twilight, she smiled brightly.
...Aphria is a cradle of learning.
Countless talents gain knowledge here.
They gain enlightenment through learning.
This isn't limited to mere magic studies. Learning has a broader meaning.
And here is one mage.
She's young. She's studied magic since childhood, but hasn't wielded it freely much.
She always feared something.
Couldn't overcome the weight suppressing her.
"......"
Here is another mage.
She's experienced countless things. Achieved most feats possible for a mage. But at the end, only regrets remain.
That mage.
Sees a mage walking a similar path.
"Yeah."
The Ashen Mage smiled at the girl who resembled her.
"I'll cheer for you."
Author's Note (Afterword)
Resti Eleanor.
She's an incredibly important character with a lot on her plate, so I agonized endlessly over how to handle her story.
The result was 15,000 characters, basically three chapters' worth... Not sure if readers will buy into it.
Hope you enjoyed it! :D