Chapter 41
Chapter 41
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 41
Chapter Title: Compression's Tiny Triumph
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Among all the rune magics in Jeon's arsenal, the one that was by far the hardest to wield was the Compression rune magic.
The Guardian rune had become almost perfectly synchronized with Silvermont's will, moving as one with it ever since he inherited it. The Will and Storage runes he'd recently acquired were also highly versatile, allowing for a wide range of applications.
But the Compression rune was so finicky to handle that getting it to do exactly what he wanted was a major challenge.
So the method Jeon had chosen was to infuse the mana used for the Compression rune with his own will through the Will rune.
And the result? It wasn't perfect, but he could now control the Compression rune to a certain degree.
"Hmm, a bit extreme, maybe."
Jeon made a slightly apologetic face as he examined the result of using both the Compression and Will runes together.
And well he might.
Jack's "thing"—the target of the spell—had shrunk not just small, but down to the size of a pimple.
"Wha-wha, whaa? Whaaaah!? Wh-wh-whaaaah!?"
Jack watched in horror as his member dwindled away, then lost his mind completely upon seeing it reduced to pimple proportions, letting out a guttural scream.
"...Still better than having it ripped off."
Jeon offered what he thought was consolation, seeing how utterly pathetic the man looked.
But in truth, if Jeon hadn't used the Will rune and had just applied pure Compression, the thing would have surely torn free from Jack's body and shrunk to dust-sized on its own.
From Jeon's perspective, this was mercy.
"My... my dick, my, my, my little brother...!"
Jack saw things differently.
The man was a lunatic, sure, but he'd received proper knight training at some point.
So he had confidence in enduring torture or even threats to his life.
Tortured until an arm or leg—or even a vital part—was crushed or severed?
He could accept it as a knight's honorable wound.
Some might call it mental gymnastics, but the difference between being able to delude yourself and not was huge.
But what if everything still functioned, and it was just... smaller?
Impossible to brag about as an "honorable wound" anywhere.
And if he died like this?
Everyone who saw his corpse would leap to massive misunderstandings. He'd wander the afterlife in shame and injustice, unable to move on.
Plus.
A crushed or severed wound could heal.
Just bring a fortune to a high priest and request divine healing.
Top-tier holy power could restore lost limbs, so there was always hope of fixing a severed member if you got lucky.
But this case was different.
"It's small... so small... shrunken...!"
His dick hadn't been severed or detached.
No injury at all.
It had simply... shrunken.
Could holy power fix this?
Holy power healed wounds and regenerated missing body parts like a miracle.
But even that couldn't make something simply shrunken grow larger.
"No way... no way... how could my dick...?"
Staring at his pimple-sized privates, Jack wailed—then started muttering to himself like a madman, his grip on sanity slipping entirely.
He'd always been intensely libidinous, and took immense pride in his endowment.
For it to shrink like this?
The reality was too much; even his knight-trained mind crumbled.
"If you tell me who ordered it, I could restore it."
"...!"
Jeon's words hit the broken man like a lifeline.
Restore his shrunken member to normal?
"R-really?"
"I shrank it. Think I can't un-shrink it?"
Jeon answered calmly to Jack's desperate plea, but avoided direct eye contact.
'Truth is, I haven't tried undoing it yet.'
Jeon had only ever compressed things before; never reversed it.
But since this was no ordinary compression—it combined with the Will rune—maybe using the Will more aggressively could work... He had vague hopes.
'B-betray them, and it'll really go back to normal?'
Gulp.
Jack swallowed hard.
Restore his member, or rat out his backers.
A brief internal struggle.
"I'll talk!"
In the end, he chose his dick.
"Good. Explain in detail. If it's even a little lacking, you'll live with that size forever."
"O-of course."
Some strength returning, Jack staggered to his feet.
Then he shuffled to the bed Jeon had rummaged through earlier and started digging around.
'What the hell?'
He focused on the spot where Jeon had tossed the perverted junk he'd deemed trash.
Jeon hadn't even wanted to look at those filthy sex toys reflecting Jack's twisted tastes.
But Jack rummaged through them and soon pulled out a black orb about the size of his fist.
"Here it is."
"What's that?"
"A bead that lets me know when the person giving me orders gets close."
"...What?"
Jeon furrowed his brow at the baffling statement.
Jack panicked at the reaction and hurriedly continued.
"Th-the order-giver changes every time! I just receive one-way instructions from them!"
"...They go that far?"
"I don't know who's above them or exactly who's behind it. But no matter who comes, if this bead turns red, it means they're nearby."
Jeon took the black orb from the frantic man.
'Doesn't look special.'
He'd glanced at it before, but it was just a plain black sphere.
No mana even when holding it.
Curious, Jeon infused a bit of mana.
"Oh?"
The mana that should have flowed inside merely skimmed the surface before scattering into the air.
Some coating prevented mana detection or intrusion.
Definitely not ordinary.
Confirming it was real, Jeon turned back to Jack.
"So you started jobs without even knowing who's behind you?"
"I'm a mercenary. First time, I got paid, this bead, and a letter. The job was simple, so I knocked it out easy."
"And then?"
"Whenever the bead changed color, someone showed up with a letter or document outlining the job, then left. Rewards listed arrived the next day."
"And the jobs got bigger in scale, rewards too, I bet."
Jack nodded at Jeon's deduction.
'Definitely points to the Luin Church.'
A bit different from the fuzzy info in Silvermont's will.
But the method—manipulating pawns anonymously—matched the Luin Church perfectly.
'They probably tested him with minor jobs first before sending the bead.'
Once they knew he was useful.
Now, the question: Would the bead keep working without Jack?
'If it does, it could detect nearby Luin Church goons.'
But if its power vanished once out of Jack's hands, or if remotely controlled, it'd be useless junk.
'Still, worth trying a method I have in mind.'
Jeon already had a rough plan for using it, so he pocketed the orb in his bag.
"N-now you'll restore it, right?"
Jack asked in a voice brimming with hope.
"Yeah... sure."
No point squeezing more from him now that he had the orb.
Jeon cast another spell on Jack.
"Will."
He layered the Will rune onto the mana infused with his will from before.
Now, just reverse the spell.
"Oh, ooooh!"
The pimple swelled, growing to peanut size.
Jack exclaimed in hope.
"Ooooh! Oooh... oooh? Huh?"
And stopped there.
"Phew, all done."
Jeon wiped sweat from his brow, exhausted from the effort of going from pimple to peanut.
Jack asked in confusion.
"Wh-what? You said you'd restore it!"
"Wasn't that normal?"
"Y-you're joking, right? It was several—no, dozens of times bigger!"
Jack protested in a trembling voice, but Jeon truly couldn't do more.
'This is my limit for now.'
No experience reversing compression yet.
Pimple to peanut was his best shot.
Plus.
'He's scum anyway. Why bother fully restoring him?'
Man to man, he got the plight.
But it was karma.
Plenty of victims from his perversions, and Jeon might've ended up the same if weaker.
"That size should be fine for daily life."
He'd felt a twinge of pity thinking he couldn't even pee like that.
But peanut-sized? Manageable.
"Th-this is fraud! Fraud!"
Jack raged, but powerless.
The gray magic's effects lingered.
He could move a bit, but not at full strength.
"Shut up."
Whoosh!
Jeon used a basic wind spell to shove the charging man away.
A 1st Circle spell that'd merely stagger a normal person.
But Jack's weakened body couldn't withstand even that, tumbling backward.
"Gaaah!?"
Powerless but heavy, he rolled several times, smashing through the office door and out before stopping.
'Anyone'd think I summoned a storm.'
To fly that far from one 1st Circle spell.
His gray magic was impressive.
Refine the casting time and method, and it'd be devastating.
'Gonna need a proper name then.'
It was basically his first original spell.
A cool name when combat-ready sounded good.
Lost in thought, a familiar voice called from the broken door.
"Uh... Lord Jeon?"
"Oh? Lord Bolton?"
Bolton stood there, just arrived, with a neatly dressed middle-aged man and Pentagram Guild members who'd tried stopping them.
All eyes except Bolton's fixed on one spot.
"P-peanut?"
"That's a peanut, right? What else?"
"Why's a peanut attached to a guy?"
"Dude, does that size even make sense for a human?"
The wandering knight mercenary Jack met his social death.
The incident at the Pentagram Guild was wrapped up in no time.
Even in the city's chaos, targeting a guild master and Jack's kidnapping of boys for his perversions couldn't be ignored.
The case left the Haswell Family's hands, falling under direct Imperial investigation.
"Thanks to you, Lord Jeon, I can tie up one more loose end before handover."
"Oh, no need to mention it."
The quick resolution owed much to the middle-aged man now sitting before Jeon.
'Former city administrator, Conri Wolfdale.'
Before the Haswell Family received the fief, Conri had managed the city. Securing solid evidence, he stepped in as the Empire's proxy to lead the resolution.
"The Pentagram guild master luckily recovered, so the guild should normalize soon."
"Glad to hear it."
"And Jack, the ringleader, will face Imperial punishment. Targeting the guild master is bad enough, but over five boys fell to him."
Crimes against children were heinous here too.
Jack had targeted orphans and vagrants to avoid detection.
If undiscovered, fine—but caught, it meant nothing.
"What punishment?"
"Minimum... execution."
Jeon nodded at Conri's words.
Only natural for Jack's crimes.
"But why the private meeting?"
Separate from the case.
Jeon had been invited by Conri.
Hard to refuse gratitude invitation.
'...Kinda awkward.'
High Imperial official, and far older—even considering Jeon's past life.
Uncomfortable facing him.
"Ah, I invited you and just chatted idly."
Conri realized, getting to the point.
"Prince Lucian mentioned you, actually."
"Prince Lucian did?"
Didn't expect Lucian to put in a word.
Like with the Empire Guardian Medal, Lucian seemed to rate him highly.
"But separate from that, you impressed me personally."
"Uh... really?"
"Yes. Even with skill, acting directly at your age isn't easy."
True.
Jeon downplayed it, but subduing Jack and exposing his crimes wasn't ordinary.
He'd weighed it against Luin Church evidence and Bolton's investment.
Still impressive.
"So, I'd like to give you a gift."
"A gift?"
Jeon blinked at the sudden offer.
His actions helped the city, sure.
But a direct gift? Debatable.
"You uncovered and resolved the case with huge help, yet got no proper reward."
"I asked for that..."
"I admire humility. Your achievements and modesty deserve reward."
Right after catching Jack, Jeon had asked Conri to omit his name in reports.
Didn't want fame, and with Jack's Luin ties, better stay hidden.
Conri mistook it for humility.
'What now?'
As Jeon pondered, Conri revealed the gift.
"You're a mage, right?"
"Ah, yes. I am."
Job interview?
Conri knew already.
Just buildup.
"Then don't you need a staff—the mage's sword?"