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HELHEIM SCANS
[Translator - Kiteretsu]
[Proofreader - Kyros]
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Chapter 2
"This doesn’t seem to be a dream."
Ernstine barely managed to lift his massive body.
Cold sweat ran down his entire body.
It felt far too real to be a dream.
Now, he had to assume this was reality and act accordingly.
"I need to assess the situation."
Regulating his breathing, he tried to recall the name of this body.
As he dug through his memories, fragmented recollections started surfacing.
[Kaylen Starn.]
[19 years old.]
[Second-year student in the Royal Academy’s Magic Class.]
[Second Circle.]
"A mage, huh."
Typical bookworms.
No wonder his body was in such poor condition.
Another memory surfaced.
[Breakfast is way too meager. It’s probably because the dorms are full of commoners.]
[The noble kids all commute from their estates in the capital.]
[Ah, I envy them. They probably have proper meals every morning.]
[If only I hadn’t been born into this family… If only my ancestors weren’t from the demon clan ‘Meier.’]
"…What?"
At first, Ernstine had been sighing in disappointment, thinking this guy was obsessing over food again.
But that last memory made him snap to full attention.
"The Meier family… is a demon clan?"
Meier.
The bloodline of the hero who once defeated the Demon King… was actually demonic?
At first, he thought it had to be a mistake, but the memories continued.
[Damn family. They used to be the imperial house, didn’t they?]
[Then why the hell did they side with the Demon Realm? Idiots. They could’ve just lived comfortably as emperors.]
[The first emperor was a Grand Swordmaster, but then he suddenly disappeared…]
For a moment, he wondered if it was a different family with the same name.
But as he sifted through the memories of this body, it became clear—it wasn’t.
"The first emperor… the Grand Master… They’re talking about me. But… disappeared?"
He needed more information.
As Ernstine scanned the room, his gaze landed on something.
A cluttered desk, littered with books and cookie crumbs.
There, a crumpled piece of paper lay discarded.
He smoothed it out and scanned its contents.
The words written on it were shocking.
[If you fail to reach the Third Circle, you will be unable to advance to the next year.]
[Sacred Calendar, Year 2787, August 14th.]
[Bormian Royal Academy, Magic Administration Office.]
"…2787?"
The year he abdicated to his son was 1787.
A full 1,000 years had passed.
"And Bormian? Royal?"
A name he knew all too well.
During the war-torn era, Ernstine had personally discovered a knight of common birth.
His talent was extraordinary—he rose to become a Spear Master and became one of the Seven Knights of the Meier Empire, his name renowned across the land.
"…I need to confirm it."
Kaylen recalled the list of dining halls in his memory.
One of them was the library cafeteria, and the route there was ingrained in his mind.
He distinctly remembered: "Thursdays are for the library cafeteria~."
"If it’s there, there should be history books as well."
Ernstine resolved to see the past with his own eyes.
A day later.
Kaylen, who had been lying in bed, suddenly sat up.
As he looked around, he blinked several times.
"…It really isn’t a dream."
It would have been better if it were.
Fully opening his eyes, Kaylen muttered in a calm voice.
"The empire has vanished without a trace, and Meier’s descendants aren’t even allowed to bear their own name."
The academy’s library.
The past he saw there was something he could hardly accept.
A thousand years ago.
The founding emperor of the Meier Empire, Ernstine, had suddenly disappeared.
His successor, the second emperor, Caius, lost his greatest supporter.
The emperor’s younger brothers did not miss this opportunity.
"…A civil war."
For the sake of swiftly consolidating the unified empire, Ernstine had engaged in political marriages with the princesses of the old royal families.
That decision proved fatal.
He had more than ten wives and over forty children.
Compared to Ernstine’s children, who were backed by the old royal houses, Caius, the eldest son, lacked a strong foundation.
His mother, the emperor’s first wife, came from an insignificant viscount family.
Had Ernstine still been alive, they would never have dared to act rashly.
A Grand Swordmaster who single-handedly conquered nations and even subdued the Demon King.
No matter how much power they gathered, they could never surpass him alone.
But with the Grand Swordmaster gone and the authority of the new emperor still unestablished, the ambitious younger brothers saw a golden opportunity.
Rebellions erupted across the land, and the continent, once unified in peace, was once again thrown into an era of war.
Amid the endless slaughter between blood relatives, the Holy Order made a shocking announcement.
—Emperor Caius has fallen into black magic and allied with the demons.
With that declaration, Emperor Caius was excommunicated.
The aftermath did not end there.
The people of the Iberia Continent, who had suffered greatly at the hands of the Demon King, were enraged by this revelation.
Even Caius’s most loyal retainers turned their backs on him.
Among them was the Spear Master—Bormian.
With this, the tides of war swiftly turned against the Meier Empire.
And in the end…
"The Meier Empire… Forget a thousand-year reign, it didn’t even last beyond the second generation."
The Meier Empire was destroyed.
Branded as traitors who had conspired with demons, Meier’s bloodline was stripped of their family name.
Ernstine’s children, who led the rebellion, all took their mother’s surnames.
They restored the old royal houses and became kings, while all of Caius’s children were executed.
However, rumors spread that Caius’s youngest son had escaped with the help of a loyal retainer.
His name was...
"Starn."
Starn.
He was the ancestor of Kaylen Starn.
Several unresolved questions arose.
‘With Caius’s nature, he would never have allied with black magicians.’
‘But the Holy Order wouldn’t have made such a claim lightly either.’
‘I was merely asleep, so what exactly happened?’
‘And why did I end up in the body of my own descendant?’
But it was an event from a thousand years ago.
No matter how much he pondered, he wouldn’t find answers or be able to resolve anything right now.
For now, Ernstine decided to focus on the present.
"From now on, I am Kaylen."
He buried his former name deep within his heart.
A world a thousand years into the future.
Here, he reaffirmed his new identity—Kaylen.
"Of course, I must reclaim the name of Meier as well…"
He lowered his head.
Jiggle. Jiggle.
Even the slightest movement made his flesh wobble.
"The immediate problem… is definitely this body."
Kaylen closed his eyes and began to observe his body from within.
When he first moved after possessing this body, he hadn’t felt any mana.
But now, he expected to find something if he examined himself closely.
However, as time passed, an expression of bewilderment spread across his face.
‘…How am I even alive?’
Except for his heart, where the Mana Heart was located, his entire body was disturbingly devoid of mana.
Mana was the essence of nature.
Without it, living beings could not survive.
Even an ordinary person should have at least a small amount of mana.
Yet, Kaylen’s mana levels weren’t just low; they were comparable to those of a dying old man.
‘…Knights accumulate mana, and mages disperse it, but still…’
A knight steadily builds up mana within their body.
A mage, to communicate with external forces, disperses their mana outward as much as possible.
Though their approaches were entirely opposite, both required a fundamental level of mana to sustain life.
‘No matter how much of a mage he was, this is excessive.’
If left as is, this body wouldn’t last much longer.
What had happened for it to be in such a wretched state?
‘…I have a suspicion.’
Kaylen’s abnormal appetite.
From the moment he realized he had possessed his own descendant, something had felt off.
‘I should examine the stomach.’
Though his entire body was nearly devoid of mana except for his heart, the stomach had the second-highest concentration.
Kaylen focused on analyzing the mana within his stomach.
He observed the small clusters of mana gathered along the stomach lining with greater precision.
As the night passed and dawn broke, the sky began to brighten.
'As expected.'
After prolonged concentration, Kaylen finally found it.
A special type of mana passed down only within the bloodline of the Meier family.
Golden, star-shaped mana particles.
Infinity.
'Kaylen. You are undoubtedly my descendant.'
The Meier lineage.
They called themselves the descendants of dragons.
This was not merely a claim to establish legitimacy after ascending to the throne.
'Every bearer of Meier blood carries Infinity within them.'
Infinity.
A unique mana core inherited by only a select few within the Meier bloodline.
Its defining trait was simple.
Limitless.
It had no boundaries.
The mana within Infinity could be drawn upon infinitely.
Since its properties closely resembled the Dragon Heart, the legendary core mana organ of dragons, the Meier family came to call themselves the descendants of dragons.
'Of course, it’s not without its drawbacks.'
Infinity devours the body's mana.
For a knight, it meant that the mana they painstakingly cultivated through training would be consumed.
If one accumulated 100 units of mana, Infinity would absorb the majority, leaving less than 20 usable.
For knights, who needed to store mana within their bodies, this was a fatal flaw.
Because of this, the Meier family had long been known for their perseverance rather than their natural talent.
Although Infinity allowed continuous access to mana, storing large reserves of it was difficult.
Of course, that belief only held true before Ernstine was born.
Ernstine had mastered the use of Infinity, becoming the strongest warrior on the continent.
'…But to do the same, I need to extract it from my stomach first.'
The defining trait of Infinity—limitlessness—seemed to apply to the stomach as well.
Kaylen was constantly tormented by hunger, to the point of near madness.
With Infinity embedded in his stomach like this, he couldn't accomplish anything.
'Now I understand why it's here.'
The Infinity inside him was far too small.
At its current size, it couldn't grow simply by absorbing mana from the atmosphere.
A more fundamental method was needed.
Consumption.
By absorbing the nutrients and mana contained within food.
For Infinity, which was as small and fragile as a speck of dust, this was the only viable method.
And what was best for Infinity was the worst for Kaylen.
'It’s killing its host just to absorb the minuscule mana left in food.'
There was barely any mana in ordinary food to begin with.
Yet Infinity was driving him into relentless hunger, just to extract those microscopic traces.
Grrrrrr—
His stomach growled.
His stomach continued to growl with hunger.
If it had been an ordinary person instead of Kaylen, they would have already succumbed to their body's cries and eaten something.
To survive, he had to transfer Infinity to his Mana Heart and allow it to grow to a proper size.
"Hmm..."
But Infinity refused to move easily.
No, it wasn’t just Infinity—his body's mana itself felt completely blocked, refusing to flow.
'Is it because I'm a mage?'
Unlike knights, who were accustomed to moving the mana within their bodies, mages were more adept at manipulating external mana.
Kaylen had never trained in controlling his internal mana, so it was natural that he struggled at first.
But who was he?
The first Grand Swordmaster in human history.
No matter how much of a mage’s body he had now, as long as he was human, manipulating mana should be simple.
'I’ve personally trained dozens of Master-class warriors.'
Even his eldest son, who had once lamented his own lack of talent, had reached the peak of Sword Expert in his thirties.
Kaylen had absolute confidence.
Yes.
At least, he did—until that day.
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HELHEIM SCANS
[Translator - Kiteretsu]
[Proofreader - Kyros]
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