The Fleeing Nomad

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To become a Mana Beginner, accumulating magical power was sufficient.

By consistently completing tasks achievable by ordinary people and faithfully keeping promises, anyone could amass enough magical power to become a Mana Beginner.

But Mana Users were different.

Not only did they require much more magical power, but even gathering all that power didn’t immediately qualify someone to become a Mana User.

To become a Mana User, one needed to awaken the Gift within.

‘Gift,’ or primitive magic. It was magic performed through instinct and a mysterious phenomenon that even the greatest mages hadn’t fully explained.

Because of this, there was no royal road to awakening a Gift.

Some said, ‘Something tickled inside me and then burst out like a sneeze.’

Others claimed, ‘I had a very strange dream, and when I woke up, I just knew how to do it.’

And still others reported, ‘I practiced every day like rehabilitation training, and gradually it started working.’

Everyone’s explanation was different.

Some realized it quickly, others gradually, and some never at all.

That’s why awakening as a Mana User was a threshold no one could help you cross—one you had to overcome entirely by yourself—and precisely because of this, awakening as a Mana User became the most accurate measure of whether someone had the aptitude to become a mage.

-The Awakening of a Mana User

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+ – + – +

Beyond the wilderness, stars hang in the daytime sky. They’re close enough to be visible even during daylight. The walls of Erasmus reflect the sunset in golden light, and if you look closely, you can see the spires jutting upward.

Beneath the stars, riding alongside the sunset, I felt strange the entire time.

I felt feverish and hazy, as if someone was constantly watching me.

At first, I tried to dismiss it as just my imagination, but the gazes became increasingly distinct, forcing me to look around repeatedly.

Yet I couldn’t see anything. Only the various colored magical energies filled the world, wavering like heat shimmer.

“Are you okay?” 

Yuria asked with concern.

“Yeah, it’s just… I keep feeling like someone’s watching me.”

“Oh, you poor thing…”

Yuria rode up beside me and patted my back before moving ahead. Her horsemanship was impossibly clean, even while galloping at full speed.

Riding ahead, she said, 

“Is this your first time? Fighting a calamity. Seeing someone die like that in front of you.”

“Yeah.”

It was shocking. Miri… She was small but proud and spirited… The way the orc rolled her orange head like candy and then spat it out with a plop—the more I thought about it, the more dumbfounded I felt.

“Dumbfounded” is hardly enough to express how I felt, but truly, my entire body felt constricted as if all my energy had been blocked.

And Miri wasn’t the only one who died. Gi Seung-hu and Ziglo were beaten to a bloody pulp by the club, and Mika suffered a severe spinal injury. It was utterly horrific.

“It’s because it’s your first time. I was the same way. For days, I kept feeling like someone was following me, watching me from the darkness.”

“Ah…”

Come to think of it, Yuria was the only student in our School Nomad without any guardians.

Her previous School Nomad had been annihilated by a calamity… She had collected several protective talismans from the dead and offered them as payment to re-enroll in the Sena School Nomad.

That’s why she was studying with us despite being older and more skilled than the other students.

So… she had already experienced having her family and acquaintances all killed by a calamity.

I could see her shoulders trembling slightly as she rode ahead. Her voice was tinged with moisture.

“But we won, right? That’s really something. Let’s think positively. You’ll be fine soon.”

I couldn’t tell if she was comforting me or herself…

Hearing her moist voice, I felt a warmth and dull ache in a corner of my heart.

Is this… what they call fellowship in suffering?

“Thank you.”

She seemed to smile faintly at my expression of gratitude but offered no further response.

It felt nice anyway.

Yuria thought I was experiencing PTSD and was trying to comfort me.

Though she’d misunderstood.

The gazes I felt weren’t some kind of “post-traumatic stress disorder.” The eyes watching me were now utterly blatant.

<What is he?>

<Could that one do it?>

<Probably garbage.>

<…>

<Let’s see for now.>

Curiosity. Dismissal. Contempt. Malice. All kinds of gazes followed me. These didn’t feel like the orc.

Not something so violently ferocious… but rather gazes searching for flaws.

I was beginning to guess the identity of these faceless spectators surrounding me.

It must be magical energy. The various colored energies kept hovering around me, and with each movement, I felt more and more gazes upon me.

I’ve always been sensitive to magical energy, but this was the first time I could so distinctly sense the emotions behind these gazes.

Previously, these were gazes whose thoughts I couldn’t comprehend at all…

But now they seemed to be looking at me with something like expectation, yet also without expectation… that’s how they watched me.

‘What is this, exactly?’

As I rode lost in thought, Monggu, who was following behind, called out.

“Hey… do you think Teacher Sena will kill him?”

Yuria, who was riding ahead, answered his somewhat tense question.

“He deserves to die. Someone like that.”

Her response was casual to the point of indifference.

+ – + – +

Do Gyeong-su was discovered not far away.

When he spotted us, he seemed to sense something and fled for his life, but Yuria’s arrow pierced his right calf, sending him tumbling to the ground.

As always, I’m impressed by Yuria’s archery skills.

Yuria skillfully covered his head with a cloth to block his vision, tied his hands, and loaded him onto a horse.

“Just because there are so many stars in the sky… doesn’t mean you have anywhere to run, you idiot.”

After handling Do Gyeong-su with cold detachment, Yuria suddenly looked up at the sky with that contemplative remark.

It’s true.

Though the horizon stretches endlessly across the land, and the stars in the sky that can be visited through the Tower of Covenant are countless… we actually have nowhere to run.

We can only survive by moving along predetermined paths with predetermined groups, avoiding calamities.

At least until we become mages.

“Huk… huk… sob… I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Teacher. I was just… just so scared… Miri. I’m sorry… Everyone, I’m sorry… I was wrong. Huk-huk…”

Do Gyeong-su was clinging to Yuria’s foot, continuously sobbing and wailing…

By the time his face covering was removed in front of Teacher Sena, he was practically melting like salt, his face streaming with fluids as he begged desperately.

The children swallowed hard as they watched Teacher Sena.

Since Teacher Sena had always been kind to her students… some thought she might show mercy.

But without batting an eye, she said,

“You’re sorry? That’s fine. You just need to take responsibility.”

She had been sitting on a rock resting, but now stood up.

Her right arm and head were secured with bandages, and she briefly grimaced in discomfort before walking straight to where Do Gyeong-su knelt.

Do Gyeong-su knelt and clung to her legs.

“Teacher! Teacher! Thank you! I’m truly, truly sorry. I won’t ever do it again!”

Was he that desperate? Do Gyeong-su seemed to have interpreted her words about “taking responsibility” as forgiveness.

That’s when Teacher Sena, with an expression of annoyance, said:

“Do Gyeong-su. Look up.”

“Yes! Yes!”

The moment he raised his head—

Thwack!

Her foot extended and kicked Do Gyeong-su square in the face.

Crack!

Under the Mana User’s kick, Do Gyeong-su’s teeth scattered through the air.

“Augh… aaaugh…”

As he writhed in pain on the ground, Teacher Sena slowly approached.

“If your only mistake had been desertion, I might have let you off with just a beating.”

She grabbed Do Gyeong-su’s hair with her left hand and yanked him up.

“But you threw Miri to the orc to save yourself.”

Crunch!

“Aaaargh!”

Teacher Sena’s foot came down on Do Gyeong-su’s left instep.

The sound of his foot breaking filled the air as Do Gyeong-su rolled on the ground. Or rather, he tried to roll, but Teacher Sena’s foot held him firmly in place like a spike.

He could only tremble as he clutched Teacher Sena’s shin, looking up at her.

Teacher Sena swung her hand dismissively.

Slap!

Do Gyeong-su’s cheek twisted to one side.

When he collapsed and couldn’t get up, Teacher Sena sat right on top of him and began to slap his face repeatedly.

Unable to use her right arm, she struck with only her left hand, but her movements were so uncannily precise that no matter how Do Gyeong-su twisted his body or raised his arms, her strikes never missed.

“Uuhhh… teee-cher…”

With his teeth shattered and his mouth bleeding inside, Do Gyeong-su’s words became increasingly slurred.

Slap! Slap! Smack!

But Teacher Sena’s hand did not stop.

“What you committed was betrayal.”

Smack! Smack!

Thwack!

Somehow she hit him in a way that caused not blood but clear fluid to spray from Do Gyeong-su’s face.

“The price for betrayal is death. Your parents will have their property confiscated as compensation and be expelled from the nomad.”

Crack! Thwack! Crack!

The slapping sounds ceased.

Only the sounds of tissues being crushed and torn remained, and Do Gyeong-su’s face was so brutally mangled that it was barely recognizable as human.

Whether dead or alive, his body just trembled.

After beating him for a long while, Teacher Sena stood up with a troubled look.

She stared at Do Gyeong-su, who was twitching like a piece of meat, then poured oil over him and snapped her fingers.

Pop!

A small explosion ignited, burning Do Gyeong-su’s wretched remains.

“Normally, I would drag him in that state behind a horse to the crossroad for public execution… but out of our past connection, I’ll end it here.”

After saying this… she bowed her head briefly, as if collecting her emotions.

Only after some time passed did she raise her head and look at the students.

They were frightened faces. Especially Kallin and Mukuru, who had been close to Do Gyeong-su, trembled with ashen faces.

Teacher Sena addressed the students in a weary voice.

“There’s no need to be afraid or sad. The moment he betrayed us and ran, the Do Gyeong-su we knew was already dead. Today, the orc killed Miri, Gi Seung-hu, Ziglo, and Do Gyeong-su. You survived. And… forget the dead. That’s how we live.”

Then she smiled faintly.

It was exactly the kind of smile that matched the wilderness maxim: ‘The tougher things get, the more you need to smile.’

“Alright, let’s depart immediately. We’ve erased our traces, but… after all this commotion, calamities will gather. Let’s quickly return to the nomad and flee! Everyone mount up!”

“Mount up!”

“Tonight we march through the night!”

Thud-thud-thud-thud!

As the evening grew darker, breathtakingly beautiful stars filled the sky, and we began our march of flight to escape the calamities.