Abigail's Sour Mood and an Unexpected Lesson
Abiigail was in a foul mood.
Abigail was in a foul mood.
Abigail was in an extremely foul mood right now.
The pampered, brainless girl who had grown up spoiled was too weak-willed to show up for training, and the dim-witted and airheaded boys had skipped training to chase after adventurer jobs.
Despite pouring every ounce of effort into building real strength, they were wasting their time on nonsense.
At first they had seemed like different people when she spent time with them, but they were still the same useless bastards.
Still, Abigail was glad to have Rai all to herself in the meantime.
Even if the three of them were gone, he wasn’t going to teach her any harder. Since there was no one to interrupt, her training efficiency would skyrocket.
While those brainless idiots were off doing whatever the hell they wanted, she would absorb every scrap of Rai’s knowledge and climb higher.
That was the plan.
Yesterday, when she had trained alone with Rai and felt satisfied, she had come to his house today expecting the same thing.
What she saw was Rai—half-mad and suffering from a brutal hangover, sprawled across the ground in the garden like a ragdoll.
Even though he was lying right there, the stench of alcohol poured off him so strongly that Abigail instantly knew today’s training session was finished.
Since she lived in the academy dorms, she had to come outside to train anyway, so she didn’t care.
The public training grounds were full of students; Rai’s private garden was far better for her to claim the space alone.
But it wasn’t just Rai.
A middle-aged man wearing an apron stepped out carrying a tray.
Wearing a shabby apron over an otherwise refined and expensive outfit, he had the air of a pervert—none of the usual leering.
The mustached pervert set a glass of juice in front of the unconscious Rai, then walked over and silently offered the same glass to Abigail.
“... ...”
Abigail stared at him in silence.
The pervert flicked his wrist as if urging her to take it.
Once she accepted the glass, he turned and walked away as if his job was done.
He then handed another glass to a long-haired middle-aged man who had just stepped out of the house.
“Uek— what the hell is this? The smell is disgusting.”
“It’s a juice mixed with a hangover remedy. Drink it.”
“If you mixed in something to fix hangovers, then it’s no longer juice. And I don’t get hangovers. Give me something sweet.”
“It’s good for your body, so just drink it.”
The long-haired middle-aged man grumbled like a child throwing a tantrum over vegetables.
The pervert answered without a hint of surprise and disappeared back inside the house.
Seeing the single remaining glass on the tray, Abigail figured someone else was still inside and watched Rai slowly sipping the toran juice while clumsily trying to hold the glass with only his mouth.
It looked like a worm trying to drink.
The long-haired middle-aged man took a sip, wrinkled his nose, and poured juice into Rai’s glass.
One was just sipping, the other was pouring—Abigail could only think how ridiculous these idiots were.
The long-haired middle-aged man, now fully composed, stood up and turned to look at her.
His gaze swept over her from head to toe, like someone evaluating a potential purchase.
“I trust you’ve been well, Miss Abigail.”
Abigail refused to answer, just staring back.
Her hair was messy, but her clothes were the same high-class style as the pervert’s—definitely someone with noble blood or a high position.
Humans like this always talk as if they’re the center of the universe.
Even though Abigail ignored him, the long-haired man smiled in a way that felt deliberately unpleasant.
“Your hair color is lovely. Your eyes are lovely too. It must be nice to have such beautiful luck.”
He praised her red hair and red eyes.
This man was a pervert too.
Abigail’s skin crawled at his words. She scowled and took a step back.
Even with her clear wariness, the long-haired pervert didn’t care. He set an empty glass on top of Rai’s head and walked back inside.
Rai was in some kind of trouble—Abigail wondered which idiots he had been drinking with. She poked his foot with the tip of her shoe.
When he didn’t wake up, she gave up and dragged his leg to the corner before throwing herself into training.
There was no time to waste. She had to get stronger, even if it took just one extra second.
Focus locked on becoming stronger, Abigail swung her sword for a long time until she noticed someone watching her.
A woman was sitting beside the fallen Rai, gently stroking his hair.
The woman looked to be in her early thirties and wore an equally lavish dress—more like a party gown than everyday attire.
The glittering necklace in her cleavage and the expensive rings were far too extravagant for a simple drinking party.
Abigail had already guessed the reason for Rai’s hangover was that woman, and she swallowed her rage while swinging her sword again.
“Put your foot a little further inward there. It’s good to step forward, but you have to keep thinking about the chance you’ll be hit from behind.”
Abigail stopped swinging and stared at the clueless woman in disbelief.
This woman gave off no aura at all.
That was exactly why unskilled apprentices were a problem. Especially arrogant nobles who loved to meddle in others’ business—these people were the worst.
Anyone who had actually trained would have at least a tiny trace of aura inside them.
No living being could exist without mana, and every living being possessed a faint aura. Training only made it stronger.
Some people had auras so powerful they felt oppressive just by standing still, while others had calm, deep auras like a still lake.
But this clueless woman had almost no aura at all, as if she had never been trained properly.
And the way she spoke—sounding like she was teaching—grated on Abigail’s nerves.
Especially that affectionate gaze. It felt suffocating.
“Stop minding everyone else’s business, lady.”
“... ...”
The clueless woman jumped at Abigail’s sharp words. The word “lady” seemed to hit her like a shock, and her eyes grew even wider.
The apron-wearing pervert, who had just stepped outside, froze mid-step before rushing back inside.
Abigail had laughed at the pervert’s cowardice for running away at the first bit of argument, but now she turned her glare back to the frozen woman.
“Ready to say it again?”
The woman smiled, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes.
“Why? Did you go deaf from old age? Stop minding everyone else’s business. You brainless bitch, if you open your mouth you think you’re something special.”
The woman glanced at Rai for a moment, checking if he was still asleep, then looked back at Abigail.
“It seems you need to learn some manners first.”
“Go fuck yourself…”
Abigail had just started speaking when she realized her vision was tilting.
Her legs gave out and she dropped to her knees.
She wasn’t sure if she had actually fallen, but all she felt was a dull ache from her jaw.
She only knew that her posture had dropped and that the clueless woman had clenched her fist.
The woman’s movement hadn’t even been visible, and the distance had been quite far.
While Abigail stood there in confusion, the woman smiled faintly.
“When you see me again, call me unnie. And take good care of your hair.”
The moment Abigail thought the woman’s fist had moved, her vision went black.
“Fuck, why do they all talk about hair…”
Abigail lost consciousness with nothing but a meaningless thought left in her mind.
* * *
“Hah—”
Just as Abigail woke from a strange dream, her face hurt so much she collapsed again.
“You took a hard hit, so lie down.”
Rai, who had been lying beside her, clicked his tongue.
Abigail scowled at him and lay back down comfortably.
She accepted the handkerchief Rai offered—something he had never done before—after he complained about his nosebleed.
She pressed it to her face, remembering Melanie from her last clear memory.
“It’s already dried up.”
The hardened blood flake crusted the handkerchief.
Abigail glared at Rai, who laughed and made a large water droplet appear in front of her.
Watching her rub her face roughly with the wet handkerchief, he laughed again.
“What the hell kind of guts did you have to face her?”
“Who the hell is that woman? Is she Marie? Or Marryene?”
Marie was the strongest person in the empire.
Abigail frowned, remembering that she hadn’t even seen the woman swing her fist.
“Maybe stronger than Marryene. I’ve fought her before and she’s gotten terrifyingly strong. Now I think I could even go up against Edelian.”
“... ... She’s not an empire person?”
Even if Marryene was the strongest in the empire, she was still no match for Edelian.
Even in the empire that worshipped strong warriors, Edelian was the knight they trusted most. One of the few who could have fought the Devil of All Nations one-on-one during the War of Strife, and his fame still echoed today.
Abigail’s eyes widened. She thought of famous foreign knights.
“No, she’s an empire citizen.”
“There’s no way…”
“Don’t you know Melanie? Yesterday while drinking he said she was famous. Was Joshua just bullshitting? The Iron-Blooded Empress? That was the name.”
“Iron-Blooded Empress… the real thing?”
Even though she only patrolled the borders, her popularity was high thanks to her loyalty to her former commander and her noble ideals.
Every academy student knew Melanie, and so did Abigail, who had come from outside.
Abigail, still looking stunned, watched Rai stand up and pick up his sword.
“There are three ways to wield magic.”
Abigail, staring blankly as Rai suddenly started teaching, sat up at once.
Whether she understood or not, she had to learn whatever she could.
“Spell formulas, magic circles, and rituals.”
Abigail realized the three methods were different from what she had learned at the academy and stared quietly at him.
Magic was created with spell formulas and magic circles.
One method involved calculating in the mental world and shaping it into a spell formula. The other involved perfecting the spell formula and realizing it as a magic circle.
What Rai had just mentioned—rituals—was used by the church to perform miracles and was not considered magic.
“The first two you already know. Let’s talk about rituals. Surprisingly, early magic was still close to rituals because theory hadn’t been established yet.”
Rai made a person-sized flame in the air and circled it while speaking.
“Think of ritual as borrowing power. Offering something—a sacrifice, a song, a prayer—anything. You borrow divine power from the god you worship. Early magic was performed by combining folk beliefs. You danced around a bonfire and muttered spells like that.”
Rai lightly mimicked dancing around the flame and then stopped, staring at Abigail.
The flickering light from the flame cast a serious shadow over his face, erasing the usual lightness.
“Who taught you the basics of magic?”
“... ...”
Abigail didn’t answer.
Her eyes shook as she met his gaze, hiding something she didn’t want to show.
When silence continued, Rai resumed circling the flame.
“Magic that combined with folk beliefs worked like rituals—offering something to perform magic. It was similar to divine power. That later evolved into the concepts of catalysts and exchange.”
—Thud.
Rai suddenly snapped his own finger and created a flickering black flame before launching it into the sky.
“I turned the concept of pain into energy. Ritual is, strictly speaking, exchange or conversion.”
Using healing magic on his finger, Rai met Abigail’s eyes.
“Doesn’t ring a bell? The magic of people persecuted as witches… I think we should call it shamanism rather than magic. Well, it’s all the same to me. Right?”
“... ...”
Abigail still didn’t answer.
“Building knowledge is important, but the beginning is more important. When you first learn mana, your direction is decided then.”
“... ...”
“So when I say the basics you learned from that witch don’t match the spell formulas you’re learning at the academy…”
Abigail flinched and reached for the sword at her waist.
She hadn’t done anything, yet she was tense and breathing roughly.
“Don’t worry. I don’t care whether you’re a witch or a demon king. I’m not interested.”
“... ...”
Even though he said she was safe, Abigail’s grip on the sword tightened, ready to swing at any opportunity.
“Is that witch you were taught by your revenge target? Or are you avenging the witches?”
Rai remembered her words about revenge and asked again.
Abigail didn’t answer, but her momentum eased slightly.
Her shaking red eyes no longer looked fierce—they looked sad somewhere deep inside.
“If you don’t want to talk, it’s fine. I don’t care either way.”
Rai chuckled and raised his sword high.
He pointed the tip of his sword at the night sky and began to move slowly.
His slow, leisurely movements around the bonfire like dancing with a sword looked free, as if the whole world belonged only to him.
Abigail watched, entranced, the beautiful sword dance.
“I’ll teach you one sword technique based on ritual.”
His voice was casual, but it carried a hypnotic quality that pulled Abigail in.
“The name of the sword technique is Joue en Lucette. In the common language, it means ‘a sword that hates gods.’”
Rai danced with his sword, swinging it toward the dark night sky.