Chapter 140 (1): If You Feel Like You’re under a Heavy Burden, Someone Must Be Riding on Your Back
September twenty-eighth.
Lando Estate.
There were many studies in the Lando Estate. Outside of the main house, Veronica’s building alone had three. The mansion still being built for Young Master Wayne also had three.
A noble family had many rules. Combined, the rulebook would be as thick as a sacred tome. Take studies as an example; there was a reason for having multiple. It wasn’t just to show off wealth, nor was it to make use of the many rooms to avoid having empty spaces left unused.
Studies served a similar purpose to reception rooms. The studies of different sizes and designs corresponded to guests of varying levels of importance: strangers, acquaintances, partners, friends, close friends, and honorable guests. The butler would lead each guest to the appropriate study according to their importance.
The master and mistress of the family owned the standalone study outside the reception room. No guests could enter, and the study was usually used for important family meetings.
Today, Megan was standing outside the mistress’s study, eavesdropping on the conversations taking place inside. She had always been good at that.
Inside, Silvia created a soundproof barrier, even drawing the curtains. Wayne rolled his eyes. The old man’s spy was right outside. With his master acting like this, a misunderstanding would be created out of nothing.
Just part the curtains. We’ve got nothing we can’t show the world.
“I have a treasure that can’t be shown to the world. I prepared it for you.” Silvia raised her eyebrow. She was going to give her student a surprise. With her mana as key, she took a wooden box out of a hidden compartment in the study. It was the size of a makeup kit with fine carvings and an embedded emerald.
Wayne looked over. Loot incoming.
Since it was his master, he was pretty sure that the treasure inside the box wouldn’t be the one he had lost years ago. It wouldn’t be going back to its original owner.
Silvia opened the wooden box. Green light radiated and cast Wayne’s face in green. It was like the classic scene of a dish being served in anime. With the white phosphorus that the chef added running out, the green light faded gradually, enough for him to see the treasure in the wooden chest. It was a framed card the size of a palm, drawn with a large tree with dense canopy and thriving roots.
What kind of treasure is that? It’s just a card.
Wayne looked at Silvia in confusion. She smiled, saying proudly, “This is a treasure Sister brought from Palis. I worked hard to acquire it.”
Noting his still confused expression, she stopped being cryptic and revealed, “The card belongs to a set that’s said to be personally created by the goddess, once stored safely in the headquarters of the Church of Nature. Later, the cards were unfortunately lost. The church has been seeking them for centuries and still hasn’t collected them all.”
Huh? The Goddess of Nature plays cards? Perhaps she has colorful and pointy hair that makes her look like a master card player[1]?
Wayne didn’t voice his comments. He asked quietly, “Master, this is a sacred item of the church. Is it really alright to hide it?”
“Why would it matter? No one knows about it, so it doesn’t count as hiding it.”
Silvia didn’t feel guilty at all. To acquire the card, she had killed countless enemies. If she handed the card to the church, those people would’ve died for nothing, wouldn’t they?
Wayne decided to trust her this once for her convincing looks, and since she was his master, he decided to follow her example. In the future, he would never hand in any treasure he found.
Silvia didn’t have a guilty conscience at all. During the years after she pulled out of the competition for becoming the holy maiden, she had been marginalized and ignored, a nobody no matter where she went. Whatever status she retained was thanks to her bastard husband.
Ever a prideful one, she swore to take back everything she had lost, throwing herself into the work of the surgical strike unit and fighting on the most dangerous frontlines. That was why she didn’t hand in the card.
The church had treated her unfairly first, which justified her action. It was all the church’s fault. She didn’t go against her faith, nor was it an act of revenge against the church. Least of all was it out of pettiness. She was merely making things right for herself.
Wayne accepted the explanation with a serious nod. His master was right. It had nothing to do with pettiness. Anyone would’ve done the same in her position. In fact, if he were in her shoes, he would do more than hide a sacred artifact. He would go as far as pretending to be a demon to empty the church’s storage.
“Your life essence has merged. Now, you need to dissect void and self to combine into god. Just like combining your life essence, the whole process takes a long time. Outside help is necessary.”
Silvia reaffirmed the importance of god. God was the faith component and served as a guide, closely intertwined with void, self, and a mage’s thoughts and acquired knowledge. A regular mage would only need the guidance of a senior mage while they dissect void and self to combine into god, but Wayne’s bloodline was so powerful that, despite her confidence in herself, Silvia couldn’t guarantee that nothing would go wrong.
If the child went astray and became stuck at Silver rank, who would Veronica make the complaints to?
Well, Veronica would laugh at Wayne’s misfortune.
“Your life essence is too powerful. Regular outside forces cannot dissect your hexagram. You need the help of a sacred artifact.”
“I’ll guide you,” she continued seriously. “Through the divine power the artifact contains, you’ll recombine your void and self. During the process, you won’t be a mere bystander. Calm yourself and focus on your mind. The process of breaking through the hexagram stage to the Silver rank is crucial. It may grant you faith magic that’s unique to you.”
Wayne nodded seriously, sitting down on the sofa with his legs crossed.
The first time she saw that posture, she had found it strange, but now, it’d become a familiar sight. She placed the wooden chest in his hand and said, “Hold the card and follow the cultivation formula I taught you, stimulating your void and self with your mana. I’ll guide the divine power into your body. Given your talent, if you’re lucky...”
Silvia trailed off. She had already been proven wrong many times; she wasn’t eager for a repeat.
Master, I can draw the divine power without your guidance. You may not believe it, but I’m a pro in that.
Wayne met the gaze of the Book of Greed, which was already rubbing its tentacles together in anticipation. He took a deep breath with the card in his hand. Countless tentacles shot out to plunder the greenness in the card.
A breeze seemed to sweep and awaken the slumbering behemoth tree. The leaves danced like green butterflies in the wind, shimmering like emeralds. The ever-changing sight was breathtakingly beautiful. Faintly, a rustle could be heard.
Silvia blinked in surprise. The moment Wayne held the card, the card reacted. As much as elements were drawn to him, divine power responded to him just as eagerly.
Goddess, this child isn’t your illegitimate son, is he?
She hurriedly shook her head to disperse the disrespectful, sacrilegious thoughts. She went up to him from behind and squeezed his shoulders, helping him sense the divine power.
She was slowing him down!
The Book of Greed was happily feasting when the dishes were suddenly being served more slowly. Annoyed, it urged Wayne to kick the unwanted troublemaker out.
Troublemaker? She paid for the food. Without her, this table wouldn’t even be set!
While Silvia’s help wasn’t very helpful and had limited the flow of the divine power, Wayne would not stand a chance today without her intervention.
The Book of Greed didn’t eat everything. It forewent what it had tasted before and ignored the side dishes and dippings, going for only the new dishes and the best bites. It never even spared a glance for the useless additives.
“Wayne, don’t space out. Follow the formula for cultivation,” Silvia instructed, guiding Wayne’s mana to clash with the hexagram. The life essence had merged and become unshakeable, so the great amount of mana only impacted the remaining two corners of the hexagram—void and self.
Perhaps it was due to the hexagon bordering the hexagram being too stable and making the process difficult, Wayne failed the first attempt after putting in a lot of effort. He lowered the card and told the Book of Greed to stop eating. The book had finished all the meat in the soup. He wasn’t a beggar who would be satisfied with broth without proteins!
The Book of Greed stopped. In that short timeframe, it had already eaten most of what the card contained. It didn’t care about the scraps.
“Your life essence is stable with a firm foundation, so it’s normal for your first attempt to fail. Once you learn the Silver-rank skill to unleash explosive mana, you’ll succeed.”
Silvia encouraged her student, telling him to hold the card and try again.
It didn’t work.
Most of the goodies in the card had been stolen by the Book of Greed. On the surface, the divine power was still the same, not at all weakened and far from unusable, but to the void and self of Wayne’s hexagram, the scraps were nothing, unable to attract his attention at all.
His second attempt also failed.
“It’s working. You’ve made another step toward success!” Silvia patted him on the shoulder encouragingly. “You learn quickly. Your second attempt shook your void and self. After a few more tries, you’ll complete the god component.”
No, it won’t work.
Wayne wasn’t optimistic. He simply knew too well that the Book of Greed had stolen the good bits, leaving only divine power that was beneath his void and self. Given the circumstances, his chance of success was highest when the divine power in the artifact had been most pure and dense, meaning the moment he had held the card for the first time.
He could imagine the Book of Greed belching in satisfaction.
(눈‸눈)
As they say, if you feel like you’re under a heavy burden, someone must be riding on your back. Coach, can I have a different cheat[2]?
1. A reference to Yu-Gi-Oh, a manga/anime where the more colorful and pointier one’s hair is, the better they are at battling with cards. ☜
2. This is a combination of two memes. The first part has been used before. It's a variation of the common Mandarin saying, "If you feel like you have it easy, it must be because someone's carrying you on their back." This is the reverse version. The second part is a Slam Dunk reference. The original quote is, "Coach, I'd like to play basketball." It's evolved into various versions of "Coach, I'd like xxxxx" ☜