Lord: Starting from a Goblin Nest

”This set of engraving knives requires the user to disregard all moral leanings and avoid favoring any particular group. Only then is the difficulty of using them at its lowest. The stronger the user’s bias, the harder they are to use—there’s even a risk of being cut.”

”Are you saying you gave us a cursed set of items as payment?” Silvia frowned. ”That’s not exactly a stand-up thing to do, is it?”

”Well...” Old Feibo explained, a bit embarrassed, ”but this set of engraving knives is quite valuable, isn’t it? If you all prefer to be paid in Gold Coins, that’s fine too, but it certainly won’t be nearly as valuable.”

”Let me try,” Aive said, drawing an engraving knife. She picked up a shard of a vase from the floor and tried to carve it, but was met with only a crisp CLANG. ”It won’t even pierce it?”

”It seems your connection to Magic isn’t that close,” Old Feibo said tactfully.

Sera also gave it a try, but just like Aive, the engraving knives were nothing more than ordinary knives in their hands.

Delaford and Silvia, on the other hand, could use them, but both of them immediately got their palms cut by the blades.

”These are way too hard to use. It’s completely different from when you were using them,” Silvia complained, sucking on the cut on her hand.

Victoria took an engraving knife. In her hands, it finally demonstrated the same ease of use Old Feibo had shown, cutting into the shard as if slicing through water. But after the Priest glanced at the mountain of books on the table, she immediately handed the knife to Ron.

The engraving knife, having been passed through a number of hands, felt warm to the touch. Ron switched to the pen-like grip used for holding a scalpel, and a strange sense of familiarity washed over him.

Old Feibo’s gaze sharpened. He watched in disbelief as the engraving knife settled into Ron’s hand and the eyes of the eagle head on the pommel flashed with a silver glint.

’Was I seeing things?’ Old Feibo was puzzled. A reaction from the eagle head usually meant the user and the knife were highly compatible; he had seen this with his grandfather. ’But logically, that silver glint should have stayed lit. What’s with it flashing and then disappearing?’

’Compatible, but not completely?’

”Heh, interesting.” As a ”Ghostwriter,” Ron’s perception was naturally far stronger than Old Feibo’s. The engraving knife felt incredibly natural in his hand. When he cut into the vase shard, it felt even easier than it had for Old Feibo and Victoria.

Ron didn’t work in a clinical setting, so he didn’t have many opportunities to use a scalpel. Logically, he shouldn’t have been this proficient.

”It seems the engraving knives have chosen you as their user,” Old Feibo nodded slightly. ”I haven’t seen that level of fluency in many, many years.”

”Why don’t you get your hand cut?” Delaford looked at Ron, completely bewildered. ”This is illogical! I don’t understand!”

”What’s there not to understand?” Silvia snorted. ”I haven’t even said anything yet!”

’We’re all Mages who rely on memory for Casting. Even if Ron is my benefactor, this is just cheating, isn’t it?’

But the facts were the facts. Since everyone else was either unable or unwilling to use them properly, the set of engraving knives naturally fell to Ron. After they returned to the Night Wind Tavern, Ron dove headfirst into a sea of books, even combining all three of his meals into one.

”Has the boy lost his mind?” Liya stared worriedly at Ron’s locked door. ”That’s such a thick pile of books. Even at the pace he’s going, he can’t possibly finish them all!”

”Just leave him be,” Aive said, pushing her mother away. ”Ron—or rather, all Mages—are like this. He’ll come out when he feels he can’t take it anymore.”

”Your uncles weren’t like that!” Liya was utterly baffled. ”I thought they were always very relaxed and casual about learning Magic...”

”Not everyone has the seven-century-plus lifespan of an Elf!”

「In the days that followed」, Ron seemed to disappear from everyone’s sight. Aside from one meal a day, nothing in the outside world had anything to do with him. Even when Aive told him through the door about Hendrix’s accusations against Fernando’s family, all she got was a perfunctory ”uh-huh.” This continued for a week, until a disheveled and bearded Ron, who clearly hadn’t groomed himself in a long time, finally opened his door and appeared before everyone.

”You... don’t tell me you actually finished them all?” Without another word, Aive dragged Ron straight to the washroom. ”Look how filthy you are.”

”No way it’d be that fast. I’ve only figured out less than a fifth of it—hey, cold, cold, cold!” At first, Ron’s words were like sleep-talking, but then Aive shoved his head directly into the water, and he shot up as if suddenly shocked awake.

”Can’t I do it myself? Don’t, don’t pull my hair!”

Poor Ron, a mere Mage, was no match for a Half-Elf who could move swiftly while wearing Full Body Armor and carrying a tower shield. In her hands, Ron was like a rag doll; Aive might as well have wrung him out and hung him on a clothesline to dry.

”Now that’s more like it!” Aive looked at her masterpiece with satisfaction, then used a comb to fix Ron’s hair. ”You’re our leader, you know. What kind of example are you setting, looking so sloppy?”

”I just didn’t have the time...” Ron, who felt like he’d lost half his life from the ordeal, sat on a small stool in the washroom. ”Let me tell you, I’ve finally, barely gotten my foot in the door with this Enchantment stuff!”

”Oh? How much of a foot?” Aive wasn’t very enthusiastic about Ron’s progress. ”I asked my mom about it these past few days. She said making Magic Items isn’t supposed to be this complicated, and you don’t need to specifically study the Enchantment School’s knowledge.”

The Enchantment School is a branch of Mages, also known as the Enchantment School, and it has absolutely nothing to do with enchanting items. But both Aive and her mother, Liya, were laymen in this regard and just assumed the Enchantment School was specifically for learning how to create Magic Items.

”’The skill of Enchantment and the Enchantment School are two different things,’” Ron corrected. ”’Enchantment is a craft for turning non-magical items into magical ones, and the change is usually permanent.’”

”The single-use versions, like the one Old Feibo made, are a degraded version of a degraded version.”

”So, you’re already better than him?”

Ron pointed at the robe he had just taken off. ”At least better than what he demonstrated that day. Look at this robe of mine. Notice anything different about it?”

”Isn’t this the same one you bought before? What’s different about it?” Aive picked up the black robe, perplexed. ”At most, it’s just not too dirty since you haven’t been out in the wilds these past few days.”