Do You Want to Become a Troll?
The troll waved him off before Chris could ask again.
"You made a deal with the ogre?"
"Yes."
"You gave him mana stones. What did you get?"
"The Acrian Magic Book."
"You got fleeced."
"Me? I don't think so."
"And why don't you think so?"
"Because reading it raised me to Ring Binding. I learned the foundations of the Mind-Splitting Art as well."
"If you learned the Mind-Splitting Art too, then you weren't fleeced."
"Does that mean the Acrian isn't worth much?"
"Not that it isn't worth much. Only that an ogre has no use for it. He took something he desperately wanted and handed over something he didn't need. Kanta came out far ahead."
"He had no need of it, and I did, so it was a good trade for both of us. I'd like that same kind of deal with you. The latter half of Iron Body, perhaps—"
In that instant the troll lunged like lightning. Over the course of their talk Chris had judged him a rational being, but a sudden turn was always possible, and he had not lowered his guard. The moment the troll moved, he answered—falling back, raising a second barrier over the one he already held, and gathering mana into his fist.
The crash that followed was astonishing. Bare-bodied, the troll smashed through the barriers one after another. Chris drove a punch at his stomach. He had meant to crack the jaw, but the troll was far too tall and the jaw sat out of reach. Stretching his arm to its limit might just have touched it, only the posture would have collapsed and the force would never have landed cleanly. Given the difference in their frames, the gut was the best he could do.
The troll tried to stop the fist with his palm. The hand was so huge it looked as if he meant to bundle the punch up in a cloth.
Mistake.
Chris smiled with perfect confidence and poured still more strength into the blow. He was certain that palm could not bear what he had loaded into the fist.
Fist met palm with a dull thud. A hollow feeling washed through him, as if he had punched a wad of cotton, and he frowned. His punches were not getting through.
He was rattled, but he did not stop. He had fought the strong often enough not to freeze when a plan went sideways, and his other fist was already swinging.
The troll had two hands, just as Chris did. The other hand caught the second punch, until both of Chris's fists sat wrapped in both of the troll's palms. Locked together like that, they strained against each other.
I'm a Grandmaster!
Chris shouted it inwardly and drove his strength in, meaning to force the troll down by raw power. Astonishingly, the troll overpowered a Grandmaster. Chris's torso bent. His knees dropped.
"Hyah!"
He roared and dragged up every scrap of strength he had, down to what he had suckled as an infant. His knees kept folding until, at last, they touched the ground.
"You're strong," Chris said, grinning.
The troll grinned back—and suddenly kicked him in the gut.
Ordinarily you rolled with a blow like that, letting the enemy's force spill off as you tumbled backward and opening enough distance to set the damage right. But the troll had both fists locked tight, and Chris could not retreat.
The troll swung him about and slammed him into the floor. Pinned there, Chris made a sound like a frog.
"Gwehk."
The troll looked down at him where he lay.
"You really did learn Iron Body."
Chris coughed.
"You attacked me just to check?"
"Yes."
"If I hadn't learned it, that attack would have killed me."
"Ah. Sorry. I didn't think that far."
Chris got to his feet, coughed again, and swayed.
"As a trading partner, the ogre beats the troll."
Better to have your throat seized than to be kicked in the gut and slammed into the floor.
"I said I was sorry."
"If you truly mean it, then tell me what conspiracy the trolls are hatching with the ogres."
"I don't know about the ogres, and I'm not hatching anything. As I said, this is the human mages—"
The troll stopped mid-sentence. The subject seemed to sit badly with him.
"They say a bystander is worse than the criminal."
"Nobody says that. Don't make things up."
"So you are standing by."
"I am."
"Why?"
"Because I want the humans' plan to succeed."
The troll returned to his place and sat.
"Why in the world did a human learn Iron Body?"
"I had no choice."
"You did."
"What do you mean, I did?"
"There are many intelligent races in this world, and humans are among the more high-strung of them. Learning Iron Body means enduring tremendous pain. On top of that, your regeneration is the weakest of all, so you need at least a Ring Binding healing mage beside you, casting healing magic every time the body breaks. Anyone who can command that much investment is either very rich or very powerful. 'I had no choice' doesn't make sense to me."
"There was no healing mage."
"What?"
"There wasn't one."
"Have I ever seen such an ignorant fool? Even a thick-skulled ogre wouldn't do something that stupid."
"I told you. I had no choice."
"How did you endure that pain?"
"Spite. And grit."
The troll lowered his head.
"To endure that pain raw... impressive."
"If you find it impressive, then give me the latter half of Iron Body."
"Iron Body belongs to the trolls."
"And yet I learned it."
"The latter half doesn't train the body."
"Then what does it train?"
"The soul."
"The soul!"
"A human soul doesn't match a troll's."
"The body didn't match either, and I learned it anyway."
"Soul and body are different. I don't believe you can learn it. And even if you somehow succeeded, you'd run into an ugly problem."
"What problem?"
"Your human soul would turn into a troll's. Do you want to become a troll?"
He did not want to become a troll. Chris gave up on the latter half of Iron Body.
"Nothing to be done, then."
"How many mana stones do you have?"
"More than when I dealt with Kanta."
"That'll do."
The troll propped his chin on his hand and muttered.
"I don't have anything suitable to give you."
"What about teaching me the Mind-Splitting Art in detail?"
"Didn't you say you'd learned it?"
"Only the foundations."
"A troll's Mind-Splitting Art differs greatly from a human's. You'd learn it and gain little."
The troll leaned forward and went on.
"How many rings do you have?"
"One."
"How about the insights I gained while weaving rings?"
Chris was tempted. Still, settling the whole trade on that alone left him oddly shortchanged.
"Teach me how to wield Willpower as well."
"Fine."
"And the stage above Ring Binding."
"That's too much."
"Didn't you say you desperately need mana stones?"
"I'm being this generous because of the state I'm in. Under ordinary circumstances I wouldn't trade insights into Ring Binding for mana stones at all."
"I'm not asking you to teach the training method of the higher stage in detail. I mean common knowledge. What do you call the stage above Ultimate Mage?"
"Ring Absorption."
"Ring Absorption?"
"The Klpandi absorbs the nine rings, one by one."
"Why absorb something you went to such trouble to weave?"
"Because only then can you change the Klpandi."
"And why change it?"
"Any further than that is too much."
The troll held out his palm.
"Give me the mana stones."
"Payment up front is difficult. If the teaching satisfies me, I'll give you one highest-grade mana stone a day."
"You want to trade knowledge and mana stones on the spot?"
"Yes."
"Fine."
From then on, Chris began to learn how to grow and apply Willpower, and the insights the troll had gained while weaving rings.
For the first few days, no one noticed he was gone. Then one night, before sleep, Daryl grew briefly curious about what the bastard was up to and swept the area with Willpower. To her astonishment, she caught no one.
Did he find the Motaro and run?
If he had, he would have used the Silver Key she had given him and slipped out of the ruins.
"This bastard... don't tell me..."
He might still be hiding in the city. She put her weight on that possibility and, from that night on, tore the city apart looking for him. The Motaro was pushed aside. Finding him consumed her. For a month she searched not only the city but everything beyond its walls, and at the end of it she clenched her fists.
The little bastard found the Motaro.
And once he had found it, he had decided to swallow it himself.
"How do I catch him?"
To catch him she would have to go outside, and she was too reluctant for that.
I have to find the Motaro. Before that, weave the rings.
She had wasted far too much time hunting him. At this rate she might run into the ones coming after her, and they would try to take the Motaro from her. Five Ring Binders would be more than even she could handle.
She went out to the outskirts, dug her way into a cave, settled in, and ate the Motaro. Then she absorbed highest-grade mana stones and began to weave her rings. Mana ran thin in the ruins; without mana stones, weaving rings was difficult.
Another person's enlightenment does not become your own. Insight is terribly hard to pass on in words.
If words alone could transmit enlightenment, every disciple of a Ring Binder would become a Ring Binder. In truth, only a tiny few grow that splendidly.
When Chris tilted his head, the troll asked, "What? You don't understand?"
"It sounds like you're grasping at clouds."
The troll explained it again.
"Haa..."
Chris sighed.
"Can't you explain it simply?"
"Put it in ordinary words and it becomes a thing so obvious it isn't worth saying. If you still want that, I'll do it."
A long while later, having heard the explanation, Chris clicked his tongue.
"It's no different from saying that if you eat a lot, you get fat."
"I told you. Explain it simply and it turns into something that goes without saying."
"This is difficult."
"Don't give up anyway. Enlightenment often arrives in a single moment, from some trivial spark."
With that, the troll held out his palm. Chris set a highest-grade mana stone in the hand, and the troll absorbed the mana at once. Whether because of his bulk or the height of his realm, he swallowed every bit of it in almost no time.
When the absorption ended, Chris began to recite a passage from the Acrian Magic Book. The troll stopped him.
"Wait."
Chris halted.
"What?"
"That's the Acrian you're cultivating, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"Why are you reading it to me?"
"Your so-called insights are useless to me. So forget the enlightenment and interpret the passages of the Acrian I still don't understand."
"The Acrian is your magic."
"It is."
"And you're fine reciting the whole of it to someone else?"
"Why? Is that a problem?"
"It's your exclusive art. Are you happy to have magic that belongs only to you spread through the world?"
Chris folded his arms.
"Are you planning to go around advertising Acrian magic?"
"No."
"Then we're fine."
"I say no now. It could still leak later."
"I learned this from an ogre. If an ogre was carrying it around, it isn't some secret art. The ogre already knows it. What does it matter if a troll does too?"
"And if it spreads?"
"It isn't some one-person transmission handed down in secret. So what if it spreads a little? The system is different from tower magic anyway. Even if it spreads, there's no one who would learn it. Look at Iron Body. Succeed, and you gain a Grandmaster-level body—and not a single person learns it."
"If that's what you want, I'll do it that way."