Three Spellbooks
Riding a horse was harder than it looked.
Carriages were familiar enough, but Lawrence had never had the experience of riding alone.
Well, he had once sat in a saddle with Ulbaniero, but even then it had been Ulbaniero holding the reins, not Lawrence.
Still, it was fortunate that he had paid attention to Ulbaniero’s horsemanship.
Relying on old memories, Lawrence took the reins.
But all he could really do was mimic what he had seen over someone else’s shoulder.
Calling that riding a horse would have been generous.
He was more or less being dragged wherever the horse decided to go.
Even so, his body was exhausted in no time.
For the first few days of the journey, he could hardly straighten his back.
It wasn’t a short trip, either. Since he was heading from the Magic Tower to Mistra, he spent most of each day in the saddle.
His back wasn’t the only thing that hurt.
His feet kept slipping out of the stirrups, or else sinking too deeply into them.
His thighs burned so badly they felt as though they might bleed.
And his buttocks hurt beyond describing.
What kept him from sleeping soundly at night was the vicious muscle pain.
Fortunately, the horse Emily had prepared was docile.
If he tied it to a tree for a while, it would quietly graze on its own.
It was so gentle it even acted cute toward someone it had known for only a few days.
Lawrence took dinner from the saddlebag.
Hard tack and dried fruit. There was jerky, of course, and a generous supply of lentils that could be lightly cooked over a fire.
It was food that took up little space and made it easy to get enough nutrition.
When he had traveled with Lionel, they had often cooked potage or soup in a pot, but while traveling alone there was no way he could carry proper cookware with him.
“Fire.”
After he finished eating, Lawrence lit the campfire.
He washed the wounded area with Water and applied the medicine.
The saddlebag Emily had packed was full of things useful on the road.
For a moment, the medicine where it touched his wounds only made the pain sharper.
Then Lawrence felt the ache begin to fade, and he closed the ointment jar.
He forced strength into eyes that kept trying to close.
It was still too early to sleep.
Taking the spellbook from his bag, he began to decipher it.
Since he hadn’t been able to study it properly from horseback, he needed to make the most of this time.
It was fortunate that the Magic Tower’s roads were so safe.
Merely having fewer monsters left him with room to breathe on the road.
About a month after leaving the Magic Tower, Lawrence had become skilled enough at riding to open a spellbook in the saddle.
Once he had a little breathing room, the scenery around him finally began to catch his eye.
The slow-flowing landscape.
The wind brushing against his face.
It had a charm of its own, different from traveling by carriage.
Lawrence gently stroked the horse’s mane.
“I’ll be counting on you from here on out.”
* * *
Mistra, returned to after several months, was as it had always been.
An orderly city.
Countless carriages and visitors.
A long line had formed along the neat roadway.
“Please cooperate.”
“If each person lends a hand, the inspection will end that much faster.”
The guards who patrolled at regular intervals were Mistra’s city watch.
It would be a while before his turn came.
Standing at the very back of the line, Lawrence leisurely read his spellbook.
The three spellbooks Emily had given him.
Among them, the Warm spell had reached a level he could use with some confidence.
Cold naturally fell lower in priority, given the weather.
Cast time. Concentration. Mana.
None of them could be called efficient, exactly.
Still, the very fact that he could use magic at all was meaningful.
This was nothing like an attack spell that decided life or death in an instant.
This was one of the spells that made life more comfortable.
It was winter now, and real cold had settled in.
The Warm spell, which made his cold brigandine and robe pleasantly warm, was incredibly convenient.
Wherever he went, some measure of protection from the weather was always necessary.
Especially in a place like Ulbazar Swamp.
Not only was it hot there, but the humidity was so oppressive that simply standing still was irritating.
If he had been able to travel through Ulbazar Swamp with the Cold spell already mastered, how much easier would it have been?
He didn’t know for certain, but his irritation and fatigue would probably have been cut in half.
In that sense, Warm was important.
His next destination was the northern lands, where bitter cold raged without mercy.
Winterglen, said to lie close to Saint Wall.
The Warm spell, which would let him prepare properly against the cold, would become more valuable than gold.
Of course, it still had plenty of shortcomings.
Not only did it require concentration, but its cast time was not short.
And depending on the target, it burned through mana wastefully.
Even so, perhaps because he had used it so often on the road, he had come a long way from where he started.
Once he had a little room to breathe, he even cast Warm on the horse’s saddle.
Only horses couldn’t speak.
But cold was the same for people and animals alike.
Perhaps because its back had grown warm, the horse’s steps even seemed a little lighter.
What still weighed on his mind was the third spellbook.
Engrave.
It was a type of light magic, like the radiance attribute.
Thanks to Holy Shield, he had been able to grasp the basics relatively quickly.
Like the first two spells, it wasn’t an attack spell.
It seemed meant for engraving letters.
Or carving images.
It looked like little more than a magic to substitute for a signature.
He couldn’t see how it was useful in the same way Warm or Cold were.
Why, exactly, had they given him a spellbook like this?
Honestly, he had no idea what it was for.
On the surface, it was just a spell that wrote things.
No, that was too hasty a judgment.
He had only skimmed the surface so far.
If he wanted true understanding, he would need at least two or three months of research with the spellbook at hand.
There was no need to rush.
The answer to that question would have to be found starting now.
As for the last book, the one Wina had given him, it wasn’t a spellbook.
The untitled book opened with a passage about the Arme Empire.
“So long as the Arme Empire stands, mankind shall stand. On the day the Arme Empire falls, so too shall this world.”
It wasn’t the sort of book to read while on the road.
As the old man had said, he should read it when he had time.
Passing through the checkpoint was easy enough.
Lawrence, wearing his vestment and sacred stole, looked every inch the pious pilgrim.
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
It felt like a very long time since he had last spoken the Church’s greeting.
The gatekeeper, after confirming his identity, let Lawrence pass.
Mistra, the great city.
The bustling streets teemed with an uncountable number of people.
The faces of pedestrians passing through the roads were full of smiles.
There was a kind of ease here he had never seen in other cities.
The leisure to stop for a moment and look around.
Perhaps that was because the people who lived in Mistra were so prosperous.
The streets were beautiful in their own way.
Well-kept roads, and pedestrians who moved in orderly fashion.
From time to time, the watchful eyes of city guards met his own, and they listened to the voices of the residents.
“There’s been some kind of accident in the central square. I heard someone got hurt. You’d better hurry over.”
“Thank you for reporting it. We’ll handle it so it doesn’t grow into something worse.”
The atmosphere here was unlike anything he had encountered in any village so far.
He simply hadn’t felt it last time because he had been too busy.
These lively people still had the leisure to look after their neighbors.
It was a dignity that truly suited a great city.
With the reins in hand, Lawrence headed down the roadway.
He had a lot to do.
Lionel and Miriam were at the Mistra Merchant Company.
Since they had promised to meet again at the Magic Tower, he needed to see them without delay.
And if he thought about what came next, he would also need to stop by the Mercenary Guild.
The northern lands, where bitter cold raged.
Before heading to Winterglen, he needed to gather as much information as possible on what kinds of monsters were common there and what dangers to watch for.
What one knew was power.
There was no harm in being cautious.
The high ground at the city’s edge.
As the passersby had said, Anatacio Monastery stood on a hill overlooking Mistra.
A soft breeze tapped at the gate.
Beyond the iron bars that served in place of walls, he could see a garden.
Vines like parasitic plants climbed the monastery’s exterior walls.
Curiously, there was another building besides the monastery itself.
The two-story structure, with its faintly white exterior, was quite luxurious.
The city was large, and the number of believers who used the monastery was large as well.
Voices of conversation rang out constantly from all over the garden.
Servants in work clothes busied themselves cleaning the grounds.
He felt a strange sense of nostalgia.
After watching them for a moment, Lawrence left the horse in someone else’s care.
“Please take good care of it.”
“Leave it to me.”
The servant, delighted by the few copper coins he received, led the horse away with enthusiasm.
After confirming the location of the stable, Lawrence headed for the corridor.
In the clean hallway, he could see groups of sisters gathered here and there.
They wore not black and white, but pure white robes like lilies.
It was a color different from the sister’s habit Lawrence knew so well.
Thinking about it for a moment, he remembered something he had heard at an inn before.
“The sisters we know are called active sisters. They’re free to move around outside, and they aren’t bound by any special restrictions. By contrast, sisters like Margaret are called nuns. They’re ladies who stay in the monastery for their entire lives. Literally until the day they die.”
Sisters and nuns were different.
These women were probably nuns, not sisters.
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
When their eyes met, the nuns greeted him.
“Have you lost your way? The chapel is inside the corridor.”
“Wait. He’s not a believer, he’s... what was the name of that thing?”
“Wasn’t it the clothes priests wear? I’m sure it was a vestment or something.”
“A priest has come? I didn’t hear anything about that.”
With a person standing right in front of them, they tilted their heads in confusion.
Even if they hadn’t meant to, they seemed not to realize how rude it was.
“I’m Lawrence, a pilgrim in the service of the Goddess Belche.”
“A pilgrim? Oh! You startled me for nothing. I thought the chief priest had come for a minute.”
“You idiot. Where would you find such a cute chief priest?”
“Exactly. The people who come from the Holy See are all old anyway.”
“My, then we greeted you wrong from the start. May the Goddess’s blessing be with you. Wanderer seeking the road.”
Laughter rang out in shrill bursts.
Apparently finding one another amusing, the nuns slapped each other on the back.
Somehow, their atmosphere was quite different from that of ordinary sisters.
Their manner of speech was so loose it was enough to make him frown.
“But what brought you to the monastery?”
“I’m looking for a place to rest for a while. I’d like to see the chief priest, if that isn’t too much trouble. Could you guide me, if it’s not an imposition?”
“The chief priest isn’t here right now.”
“Priest Newman has gone to the Holy See.”
“The Holy See is busy preparing for the council. You’ll probably have to wait a few more months before he comes back.”
Mm-hmm, the nuns nodded.
“Then is the deacon here?”
“Deacon Davis is here. Shall I show you to him?”
“I’d appreciate that.”
They led Lawrence inside.
But soon he regretted having asked them for guidance.
“I heard Hans caused another scene in the chapel.”
“Again? Wasn’t he already chased out by a sister last time? Looks like he still hasn’t come to his senses.”
He didn’t know why they had so much to say.
The nuns never stopped talking for even a moment.
“Come to his senses? The fool goes crazy whenever he sees a pretty nun. If you ask me, he probably spends every single day thinking about one thing only: how to get a woman into bed.”
“Ugh, disgusting. He should be looking at his own face instead, if he has that much free time.”
Their footsteps rang loudly.
Even when they passed other believers, their voices never dropped.
And the nuns they met in the corridor were so delighted to see one another that they ran toward each other.
“......”
He had nothing to say.
Were nuns supposed to be like this?
They were nothing like the nuns Miriam had described.
For women who lived such ascetic, disciplined lives in the monastery...
Their lives devoted to the Goddess should have been respected.
At the very least, the nuns standing before him now behaved so badly that they were hard to regard as clergy at all.
“Who is making such a racket?”
A solemn voice echoed through the corridor.
Black and white robes. A sister Lawrence knew well.
“Eek.”
“It’s Sister Helen.”
“Be quiet, you idiot.”
The nuns straightened up at the sight of the middle-aged sister.
They pressed their hands together and bowed their heads quietly.
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
Perhaps because they had finally shut their mouths for once?
Now they looked a little more like nuns.
Helen stepped toward them, her face creased with displeasure.
“Haven’t I told you this many times? The monastery is a sacred place that serves the Goddess. As nuns, you are always to be mindful of your words and behavior.”
“We’re sorry, Sister Helen.”
“We’re sorry, Sister.”
“Anyone can say words like that. If you truly regret your conduct, then you should have no complaint about cleaning the chapel today.”
At her question, the nuns looked up.
“Clean the chapel?”
“That’s too much just because we were chatting!”
“So you still haven’t reflected on your behavior.” Helen’s tone sharpened. “The important thing is not the cleaning. It is preparing the place where the Goddess will come with a reverent heart. Surely you haven’t already forgotten what I told you.”
Helen went on, as if thoroughly displeased.
“Unless you’d rather clean the bathhouse as well, you’d better make sure the chapel is spotless.”
“No, this time we really couldn’t help it.”
“We were in a hurry because we were showing someone here around.”
As though they had rehearsed it, the nuns split to the left and right.
Before long, Lawrence was left standing face-to-face with Helen.
So that was how it was.
He swallowed the dry laugh that threatened to escape.
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you.”
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you. Wanderer seeking the road.”
As expected, she was different from the nuns.
At a glance, she had recognized Lawrence for a pilgrim.
---