Chapter 1
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 1
Turan first awakened his magical powers eight years ago, in the heart of his tenth winter.
While his mother was out tending the sheep, the simple thought of starting a fire caused flames to roar to life in the hearth. It didn't take long for Turan to realize he could accomplish a great many things just by thinking about them.
Lifting objects, igniting fires, summoning gusts of wind, and even conjuring invisible walls...
"Mom, look at this! The firewood is flying!"
That evening, Turan eagerly showed off his abilities to his mother, who had just returned home with the sheepdog. But his mother was neither amazed nor delighted by her son’s gift. With an expression caught between resignation and frustration, she reached out and snatched the firewood right out of the air.
"Turan, promise me. You will never use that power recklessly. Above all, never use it in front of other people."
"Why?"
Turan had always been a good boy who listened to his mother, but he couldn't help but grumble at the demand to suppress such a wondrous, exciting power.
His mother fed him a cup of warm sheep’s milk and, for the first time, told him stories of the world far below their mountain.
"Down below the hills, there are people called nobles."
According to his mother, nobles were the descendants of the Frea Divine Clan, who had descended upon the world in the distant past to save humanity. Born with powerful magic inherited from their ancestors, they reigned as the rulers and guardians of mankind.
Among them, those born from the mixing of noble blood with commoners over generations were called knights. They, too, were born with magical power, but because their gift was weak, they were employed as servants.
His mother told him that Turan had inherited a knight’s power from his father, and that if he ever went down the mountain, wicked nobles would capture him and work him to the bone.
"If we compare nobles to shepherds like us, then knights are like the dogs we keep. Sometimes they might be treated like family and doted upon... but if necessary, they can be sold off or sacrificed at any time."
Even though the nobles possessed everything, they fought constantly among themselves to gain even more, and those sacrificed in their games were almost always the knights under their command. It was just as a shepherd would send a sheepdog to fight a wolf instead of facing it himself, staying back to merely throw stones from a distance.
As she explained this, his mother’s face held a hollow emptiness that Turan had never seen before.
"Turan, you want to live a long, long time with Mom, right?"
"Yeah."
"Then you must hide that power. Otherwise, the bad nobles will come and take you away. You’ll never see Mom again."
"Okay, I’ll never use it in front of others!"
It had been eight years since he made that solemn promise. Even after his mother fell ill and passed away, Turan continued to live on a corner of Hisaril Hill, herding sheep—living quietly to avoid the nobles who might one day come looking for him, ensuring he never became one of their sheepdogs.
*
"Idiots."
Turan frowned as he closed the door to his shack.
Early that morning, before the sun had even risen, the village youths had swarmed his home to interrogate him about Labus’s death a few days prior. To anyone with eyes, the marks of a Leopard Magic Beast attack were obvious, yet they tried to pin a ridiculous frame on him, claiming he must have harmed the old man and thrown him to the beast as bait.
It wasn't hard to guess their motive. An elderly man had left the village and perished while the young men stayed behind. Before they could be blamed for the old man's death due to their own laziness and cowardice, they intended to use Turan as a scapegoat to deflect responsibility.
Of course, Turan had given the village youths a thorough thrashing and chased them away. The next time he went down to the village to barter, they would likely use this incident as an excuse to lowball his prices or try to cheat him. Then, Turan would simply have to beat some sense into them again until they agreed to a fair trade.
It was a tedious cycle that had happened several times before and would likely happen again.
As he was lost in thought, someone suddenly pounded on the door. Turan let out a deep sigh and growled as he swung it open.
"Which one of you bastards is it now? Do you really want to die?"
Had they become so stupid that they forgot the lesson he gave them just moments ago?
However, the person beyond the door was not one of the village youths. A man who looked to be in his late forties, wearing a dust-covered cloak, spoke with an awkward expression.
"Ah... excuse me, young friend. I was hoping to rest for a bit during my travels, but it seems I've come at a bad time."
A traveler. Turan’s mind momentarily blanked at the sight of someone he hadn't encountered in his eighteen years of life. To think there was someone idle enough to travel to a rural backwater with absolutely nothing to see.
After standing stiffly for a moment, Turan immediately stepped aside to let him in.
"No, not at all. Please, come in. Some unpleasant people were just here."
The polite way of speaking to an elder, which he had learned from his mother, felt incredibly foreign on his tongue. When was the last time he had spoken like this? It had been a very long time—certainly before he realized that the village elders, including Labus, were all bastards.
"Then, if you'll excuse me."
In truth, if he wanted to keep his identity hidden, the right move would be to chase away a mysterious guest immediately, but Turan decided to welcome him. He simply wanted to have a conversation without hostility for once, no matter who it was with. Besides, he was confident enough to handle the man if he turned out to be a villain.
"Have you had breakfast yet?"
"Not yet."
"I haven't eaten either, so let's eat together."
Turan sat the traveler at the table and served sheep’s milk from yesterday, cheese, porridge made from dried grains, a lump of crushed rock salt, and mutton jerky. Unless one was on the verge of starvation, a guest should be treated with the utmost hospitality; that way, the guest wouldn't dare harm the host. This, too, was etiquette learned from his mother.
"This is a poor place, so I don't have much to offer."
"Nonsense! This is a feast. I shall eat well, thank you."
As if it weren't mere flattery, the man devoured the food as if he hadn't eaten in days. Even so, unlike the villagers, he displayed refined table manners. He didn't speak while chewing, and he turned his head slightly when drinking.
The traveler seemed to have a similar impression, as he set down a cup of sheep’s milk and offered Turan a compliment.
"You're a young man who knows his manners. It seems you were raised well by your parents."
"I learned from my mother."
Sensing something in the fact that Turan didn't mention his father, the traveler hesitated for a moment before continuing.
"Is she in the village? Looking at the house, it doesn't seem like you live together."
He had already noticed there was only one bed in the shack.
Turan nodded and said in a flat tone, "She passed away from illness a few years ago."
The traveler looked dismayed for a moment, then crossed himself with one hand and bowed his head. It was a gesture Turan had never seen before.
"My condolences. Since she raised such a fine young man as yourself, she is undoubtedly staying in the Celestial Palace with the gods."
"I hope so as well."
Back when he first lost his mother, just thinking about her would ruin his appetite and bring him to tears all day. Was the fact that he could now mention her with a faint smile a sign that he had become an adult, or had her presence in his heart simply faded with time?
Turan forced a change of subject to shake off the sudden gloom.
"More importantly, what brings an elder like you to such a remote place?"
"I happened to be passing through a nearby city when an old man was looking for a mage to defeat a Leopard Magic Beast that appeared in his village. I came to slay it after hearing the story. I'm quite confident in my fighting skills."
"By yourself?"
Even a young man in his prime would struggle, yet this middle-aged man, whose back looked like it might soon stoop, was planning to charge in without even a visible weapon.
At Turan’s surprised expression, the traveler gave an awkward smile.
"I am a knight. I served the Arabion Family for sixty years. I can handle a common magic beast well enough."
The moment he heard the word "knight," Turan’s eyes widened, and every muscle in his body tensed. The existence he had only heard about from his mother—a servant of the nobles.
His tension lasted only a moment, as he realized there was no hostility in the man's eyes, and he slowly relaxed.
"What is it?"
"It's just that it's my first time seeing a mage... and you don't look like someone who has worked for sixty years."
"Mages age slower than ordinary people and live longer. I am seventy-five this year. I'm only like this because I'm a knight; I hear powerful nobles easily live past two or even three hundred."
Turan marveled at this new information and observed the man—one of his own kind—closely. On the surface, it was hard to find any difference from an ordinary person. If he had to compare, the man had a sturdy build and a healthy complexion...
In other words, being a mage didn't mean someone could recognize you as one just by looking.
This was incredibly important information. It meant that even if Turan stood in the middle of a crowded city, no one would know his true identity as long as he didn't use conspicuous magic. Just knowing that fact made him feel as though one layer of the chains tightening around his chest had finally been released.
"That's truly amazing, being a mage."
"Amazing? Not at all! I think people like you are more amazing. You live in a harsh place like this where magic beasts appear, without even borrowing the power of magic. I wouldn't even dream of it."
Contrary to his thoughts, this was the first time a magic beast dangerous to humans had appeared in this area—at least since Turan had been born. If it hadn't been so, no matter how remarkable his mother was, she wouldn't have been able to work as a shepherd here alone. In fact, a woman who raised a child alone on this desolate hill without even the power of magic was truly worthy of praise.
"Come to think of it, we haven't even introduced ourselves. My name is Keorn. Keorn of Arabion—no, I shouldn't call myself that anymore. I am Keorn the wanderer. And you?"
"I'm Turan. The only shepherd on Hisaril Hill."
"A fine name."
"But you said earlier that you 'served' the family. Does that mean you don't anymore?"
"I officially ended my vassal contract a month ago. The family said they would look after me until I died if I wanted... but I wanted to travel in my later years. I've been tied to one family ever since I was hired at fifteen."
"Don't other families try to recruit you?"
"Why would they? I'm not a highly capable knight who achieved great feats, nor am I a talented youth. Keeping an old dog like me would only waste their food."
Though he spoke self-deprecatingly of being an "old dog," his face held an undeniable pride and ease. Turan had heard that nobles were arrogant predators and that knights were emotionless hunting dogs. Yet, Keorn seemed more relaxed and pleasant than any adult he had ever met.
After finishing their meal, Keorn stood up and placed a small silver coin on the table. The face of a handsome man Turan didn't recognize was engraved on the front.
"It's an Arabion silver coin. It has the highest purity among silver coins. If you trade it in the village, it should be more than enough for the meal. Though, the prices in this neighborhood seem a bit steep."
Keorn grumbled about how the village tried to rip off even the person who came to help them, which wasn't surprising given the character of the villagers Turan knew.
Turan took the silver coin and gave a polite bow.
"I hope your hunt is successful."
"Don't act like we'll never see each other again. I might come back to get another meal on my way out!"