Magic Is Learned For Nothing [EN]: Chapter 450

Storm’s Eve 2

The Far North.

Vampire Kingdom.

Queen Sharons received a summons from Tibone, the White Dragon who reigned as the ruler of the Far North.

Originally, the one who had settled in the Far North was the Wyrm-class dragon, Gloomy Eyes.

But one day, she vanished without a trace.

No unusual signs were detected in her lair. Therefore, some of her close friends thought Gloomy Eyes had gone on a journey. (Gloomy Eyes was killed by Duke Trebia and reborn as a Bone Dragon. That Bone Dragon is now Mammon’s summon.)

They assumed she would return someday.

However, Gloomy Eyes had yet to reappear.

So, another young dragon settled next to Gloomy Eyes’ lair.

Gloomy Eyes was said to have a gentle personality. She never extorted younger dragons.

Knowing this, Tibone cautiously settled next to Gloomy Eyes’ lair.

He planned to pay key money [a large, non-refundable sum paid to a landlord at the start of a lease] if she ever returned.

He had already checked with the Dragon-only Bank to see if he was eligible for a loan.

Fortunately, he was.

Quite a few dragons squandered their fortunes.

Some dragons lost unimaginable sums at casinos. They ended up living as vagrants near the casinos, taking on odd jobs to gamble again.

It was a vicious cycle of gambling that they could never break free from until they lost everything.

The Dragon Lord considered it a serious problem for dragon society.

There were frequent calls to shut down the Dragon-only Casinos.

However, this was thwarted by the fierce opposition of Donemecher, an Ancient-class dragon who operated the casinos.

The uncomfortable truth was that hundreds of dragons were still wandering the streets due to gambling addiction.

Gambling was not the only problem.

Dragons burdened with debt due to business failures were also common.

They, too, were ineligible for bank loans.

And then there were the young dragons.

For them, society was a battlefield.

Originally, dragons were supposed to become independent after their coming-of-age ceremony.

However, many dragons were still living with their parents.

The reason was simple.

They couldn’t afford a lair.

Recently, the price of lairs had skyrocketed beyond imagination. They were so expensive that dragons couldn’t afford them even if they worked for 1,000 years.

It would take a solid 2,000 years of work to barely afford a small lair.

Therefore, young dragons found it difficult to become independent without their parents’ help.

Quite a few young dragons chose to give some of their earnings to their parents and stay in the lair.

But Tibone chose independence.

And he settled in the lair that Gloomy Eyes had created when she was young.

That’s why he looked into key money loans.

If Gloomy Eyes didn’t want to lease the lair, he was willing to consider a semi-key money arrangement.

However, Gloomy Eyes had yet to appear.

Naturally, Tibone became the dragon who had the greatest influence on the nearby Vampire Kingdom.

“Why did that crazy dragon summon us?” Vampire Priest Scratch asked, puzzled.

“He probably wants more booze.”

“Really? How can a dragon love alcohol so much?”

“I heard he got diagnosed recently.”

“Diagnosed with what?”

“Tibone drinks a lot, you know. His lair is always littered with empty bottles.”

“That’s right. I was starting to wonder if other dragons were like that too.”

“He must have been worried himself. He went to see a psychiatrist.”

“What? Dragons have that kind of profession too?”

“Of course. Aren’t they living beings? They have doctors and judges too. Gold Dragons, who love money, are generally good at commerce, and Green Dragons, who are smart, are good at professions that end with ‘-ist’. Fighting is…”

“Red Dragons?”

“You got it.”

“The image comes to mind. Anyway, what happened?”

“He was diagnosed with hereditary alcohol dependence.”

“What’s that?”

“If you’re genetically predisposed to liking alcohol, you can get that. Once you start drinking, you can’t stop until your body refuses the alcohol.”

“That’s a strange disease.”

“What’s scary about that disease is that most people don’t know they’re alcoholics. Why? Because they don’t drink often. They just drink like crazy once a month or so. So, by the time they go to the doctor, it’s already too late. Dragons with alcohol dependence mostly die of cirrhosis [liver damage].”

“Alcohol addiction that kills even dragons… That’s scary.”

“There’s nothing scarier than disease in this world. Whether you’re a dragon, a god, or a demon lord from the Demon Realm, you have a high chance of dying if you get cancer. So, you have to live healthily. Got it?”

“Can’t even the priests cure it?”

“I haven’t seen a priest with enough divine power to cure cancer yet. So, Tibone must be abstaining from alcohol now.”

“So, it’s not about supplying him with alcohol.”

“Yeah.”

“Then why did he call us?”

“I don’t know.”

Sharons and Vampire Priest Scratch tilted their heads. The True Vampire Knights guarding them listened intently to the fascinating story they were hearing for the first time.

To them, dragons were godlike beings.

That such dragons could suffer from alcohol addiction or squander their fortunes due to gambling addiction…

They felt that humans, vampires, and dragons all lived the same way.

“But what’s this? It wasn’t here when we came last time.”

Sharons stopped walking.

Next to her, quite a few humans were frozen solid. Judging by their clothes, they seemed to be nobles. There was also a human holding a staff.

“They were hit by a blizzard.”

Even in the Far North, the area where Gloomy Eyes and Tibone resided was extremely dangerous.

The Legion seemed to limit the kingdom’s three most dangerous areas to the Dusselrup Mountains, the Devil’s Swamp, and the Blood Desert, but Sharons thought this place was much more dangerous.

Extremely cold blizzards struck four times a year.

Once a blizzard started, it wouldn’t stop for 14 days. No living creature could survive in a place hit by a blizzard.

Fortunately, the blizzards only lasted for a certain period.

All creatures living in the Far North instinctively knew when the blizzards would strike.

The vampires were the same.

However, if those who didn’t know entered this place during the blizzard season, no one would survive.

Even Grand Masters were no exception.

A world of extreme cold below -100 degrees Celsius.

Visibility was completely limited.

The visible range was only about 10 meters. Finding a path there was impossible.

Moreover, the Far North was more than thirty times larger than the Baroque Kingdom. It was an incredibly vast land, but it was also abandoned due to the extremely low temperatures.

If you got lost in such a place, no one could guarantee your survival.

“Hmm, merchants?”

“From the Baroque Kingdom?”

“No. There’s a mark of the Neck House Kingdom.”

“We have no relationship with the Neck House Kingdom, do we?”

“No. We have an exclusive contract with Duke Legion. They probably don’t even know we’re here.”

“Then why did they come here?”

“I don’t know. They’re all frozen to death, so I can’t get an answer.”

Sharons and the vampires tilted their heads and headed towards the lair of the White Dragon, Tibone.

The mysterious people frozen by the blizzard.

They were knights from the Neck House Kingdom’s elite Cobra Unit, who had come all the way here chasing the ultra-special Janus.

Among them were Smith and Reeves, who could be said to be Duke Trebia’s closest aides.

Then where was Duke Trebia, who was always with them?

* * *

Legion returned to his territory after a long time.

For now, there was nothing for him to do as he remained in the Holy City of Poman. In fact, it would be more accurate to say that all the nobles were in a state of panic and had no time to pay attention to Legion.

They had no idea where to start.

The panic was especially severe among Duke Sizinpi’s faction.

They thought that handing over Baserabap and Duke Legion to the Empire and offering a considerable amount of wealth might appease the Emperor’s anger to some extent.

However, when it was revealed that this was a deliberate assassination attempt, they had no idea where or how to start.

Legion had some understanding of the Stone Head Church.

It would be stranger if he didn’t, having clashed with them several times.

He expected to clash with them someday.

But not the nobles of the kingdom.

They were too ignorant about the Stone Head Church.

On the day Countess Annabelle’s identity was revealed, many nobles were hearing about the Stone Head Church for the first time.

Some nobles still didn’t take the Stone Head Church seriously, saying that mere heretics couldn’t possibly covet the kingdom.

However, those who were quick to notice would realize they were already deeply embedded in the kingdom, hiding not only in our kingdom but also in various parts of the continent.

For the time being, Duke Sizinpi and Baserabap agreed not to engage in political conflict.

They existed because the kingdom existed.

They knew that if the kingdom fell, their existence would also be lost.

The first thing they had to do was to understand the Stone Head Church.

Duke Sizinpi mobilized all his intelligence agencies to track down the Stone Head Church.

Baserabap did the same.

The Magic Tower was an independent entity. They rarely interfered with each other.

Very occasionally, they joined forces. That was when the kingdom’s safety was uncertain.

That was now.

Baserabap informed the wizards of the Magic Tower of the reality.

A thousand wizards began to track down the Stone Head Church all at once.

Baserabap said to Legion.

“The kingdom’s trump card is you.”

Baserabap, John Wick, and the surviving knights had witnessed Legion’s power with their own eyes.

It was a scene that was hard to believe even when they imagined it again.

That power that defied common sense!

In particular, John Wick and the knights’ common sense about power had completely collapsed.

He remembered when he became a knight and worked hard to create a mana blade.

When he created an aura blade, he was so happy that he drank all night.

His parents were so proud of their child who had created an aura blade that they shed tears.

A knight who could create an aura blade.

The pride of the village! The glory of the family!

But watching Legion’s power, all their efforts felt useless.

It couldn’t be expressed with the word “overwhelming.”

Even the saying “the difference between heaven and earth” didn’t cover it.

Would it be similar to expressing it as an exception, outside of common sense?

They thought, “We are watching a legend being made. This is an honor. It’s a proud thing.”

A human sent tens of thousands of monsters and demon lords back to the Demon Realm in one fell swoop. It was an impossible thing, something they had never even thought of.

In a single blow, they acknowledged it.

The strongest in the kingdom is Duke Legion.

He is not some great traitor.

Since then, they had become staunch Legion supporters.

He was the only man who had seen the ultimate in martial arts. The fantastic power unfolding before their eyes was deeply engraved in everyone’s minds.

The knights who saw such power also realized how they should train.

They were knights who would have remained mere veterans, but they had completely changed through this battle.

They became stronger at an astonishing rate.

It was a taste they had experienced once. They had to make it their own before they forgot that taste. The only way to make it their own was through painstaking effort.

Duke Legion’s power beyond common sense!

No one would believe it.

No matter how many times you told them to believe it, it would be useless.

It’s okay.

Because we saw it.

Because we witnessed the power of the one who would become a legend.

Baserabap felt the same emotions as the knights. When they first met, it wasn’t to this extent…

He was just amazed that he could grow this much without his help.

And…

Legion is the kingdom’s blessing.

“A trump card? You’re flattering me too much.”

Legion replied, seemingly embarrassed.

“No. I’m saying it sincerely. A trump card should not be revealed. From now on, I will hide you as much as possible.”

“You must be having a headache with the Stone Head Church and the Empire. Wouldn’t it be better for me to help?”

“If you’re there, it’s like having a thousand troops. But not now. We are in a very dangerous situation. We must be calm in times like these. We can never prematurely exhaust your abilities.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. That’s right. So, you should return to your territory and recharge as much as possible, so that you can be deployed anytime, anywhere.”

“Yes, I will.”

Legion nodded.

That’s how he returned to his hometown after a long time.

Everyone should welcome him when he returns to his hometown.

Shouldn’t maids with bouquets come out to greet the lord?

Why is no one coming out to greet me!

I’m the lord!

“This is too much.”

Legion grumbled and set foot in his territory. From the castle gate, countless people were lined up to enter.

Rumors had spread throughout the surrounding territories that the Legion territory had good welfare benefits, treated its residents well, and that no one starved to death.

Thanks to this, tenant farmers who wanted to be incorporated into the Legion territory were constantly coming.

Legion cut through them and approached the soldier guarding the castle gate.

“Open the gate.”

“What? Who are you?”

“I’m the lord here. I’m really tired. I want to go take a bath and rest. So, open the gate.”

The soldier looked at Legion with an absurd expression. In his eyes, Legion looked like a bar host. A recently popular host. A piece of human trash who only caters to the whims of noble women and gets money from them.

Such a piece of human trash was impersonating the lord.

The soldier respected the lord very much. He had never seen him, but he had heard over 100 anecdotes about him.

In short, he was a Legion fanboy.

So, he couldn’t stand the host impersonating the lord in front of him.

“You bastard, do you want to be arrested for impersonating a noble?”

“What? What impersonating a noble? What did I do? I’m really the lord.”

“Enough. Show me your ID.”

Legion rummaged through his back pocket. He realized he had lost his ID in the desert and hadn’t gotten a new one yet.

“Hey, soldier, tell that bastard to go to the back. Do you think we’re standing here because we want to cut in line!”

“Hey, you bastard, go to the back! To the back! All those who cut in line should be killed!”

The tenant farmers’ tone became increasingly harsh.

The eyes looking at Legion were very fierce.

Legion was dumbfounded.

What did I even do!

This is my territory!

Why do I have to suffer this in my territory as soon as I return!

Legion was really dumbfounded.