How to Live as a Martial Arts Writer in a Fantasy World

45 – 45. Newspaper Serial

45.

“Ah, my cheek hurts.”

Allan grumbled, his rouged cheek in his hand.

He was on his way back from meeting his sister, Alice Scarlet von Müller, being dragged by Meia’s hand. Because Meia spilled every single thing, he was scolded by Alice.

Allan glared at Meia, who was following him in silence, with a slightly resentful look.

“I didn’t know you would divulge everything, Meia.”

“Your inappropriate language could tarnish the dignity of the ducal house, Master.”

“…I have nothing to say.”

The argument was too reasonable that he couldn’t come up with a rebuttal.

Allan rubbed his cheek.

Meeting Alice after a long time, she hadn’t really changed. At least outwardly. But it felt like her aura itself was different.

If his cousin Albert had the elegance of a finely honed sword, from Alice, he could feel a powerful wilderness.

‘Should I refer it to as Gamsungdo (the way of sensation)? If I express it in martial arts terms.’

By definition, it refers to the martial art of brandishing weapons relying on sensation without any fixed form, categorizing it as Gamsungdo.

Moocho (no sign), Moosik (no form).

The biggest characteristic of martial arts belonging to the Gamsungdo.

Because it’s not confined to any pattern, there’s no way to predict the manner of brandishing the weapon.

Facing the martial arts without any specific styles or forms can only be confronted by the same Gamsungdo. At least, that was common sense in the martial arts novel Allan knew.

“Meia. Doesn’t my sister’s atmosphere seem to have changed rather a lot?”

“It seemed as though you had some sort of realization. I guess it felt like an untamed instinct.”

“Well, if sister had some sort of realization, then that’s good enough.”

Alan shrugged his shoulders.

“Starting from tomorrow, it’s going to get a lot noisy, huh?”

***

-Schellen Chronicles, Volume 5 on hold!!

-The reason is due to a thief hiding in the dormitory of Alan Ed, author of the Schellen Chronicles.

-Alan Ed stated that he would suspend writing the fifth volume until he found out who the culprit was in his dormitory.

Successive broadcasting stations announced the suspension of the Schellen Chronicles Volume 5 serial publication.

The academy’s school newspaper also naturally informed students about the situation, and it not only upset the broadcasting stations, but also the academy itself.

People came directly to Alan to ask if it was true that he was suspending the serial publication.

“I really can’t believe it…”

“It’s shocking.”

By Alan’s side, Leilla added briefly.

“Is it that shocking?”

“Yes.”

Leilla’s words were short.

She doesn’t talk much even when telling a story. And she responds consistently or talks a bit longer only to Alan.

If she has a conversation with other students, she just nods or agrees, that’s all.

It seems understandable why her circle of friends is so small.

‘That’s not really my business.’

Alan laughed quietly.

“…Why are you laughing?”

“No, it’s just that we’re similar in terms of not really getting along with people.”

Of course, Alan lacked interest in his surroundings because he was absorbed in the small world of the novel, and for Leilla, the reason was different.

Nevertheless, if one did not know of such circumstances, the two seemed to be quite alike.

They don’t enjoy interacting with other people.

Both Alan and Leilla, rather not have other people pay attention to them, but they can’t escape that attention.

“I see.”

Leilla moved her pen.

Her pen sketches countless trails on the white sheet. For every flick of Layla’s wrist, an illustration of a man is completed.

In a ponytail, her pitch-black hair is tied up.

With the sunlight striking it from behind, her long hair spread out like a black dragon’s tail, hiding her face. Shuren could be seen, peeping over her shoulder to glance back.

Viewing the full-body illustration of Shuren, completed in an instant, Ellen offered her impromptu critique.

“Such a captivating drawing as always. I wonder how it would look with colour.”

“Colour?”

“But again, it might be a bit tricky.”

As far as Ellen knows, colored pencils are still not available in the empire.

She has heard that to add color to such a sketched drawing on paper, pigments are sprinkled and then rubbed in; there are no tools to color with ease, like colored pencils.

‘I should visit the workshop.’

While a monochrome figure is nice in a comic, a coloured version is even better.

Of course, it might be a bit hard to expect flourishing coloured art like what Ellen was used to viewing in the modern world.

“Is this really how the newspaper publishes stuff, sir? Drawing each line by line?”

This was someone addressing her as ‘sir.’ It was Layla.

At the call of the art club member, Layla, who had been engrossed, raised her head slightly in acknowledgment.

“Ellen told me she’s going to submit them to the newspaper.”

“Really?”

“Yep. Even though the writing for the 5th volume of the Shuren chronicles is on hold, that doesn’t mean we’ve completely paused the project.”

“Oh… I want to read the fifth volume…”

The art club member clicked her tongue sadly.

Layla spoke out.

“Ellen. Are we really going to submit this to the newspaper?”

“Yeah. I’m curious to see how people would react. Given that we have a printing press, it shouldn’t be hard to publish, as long as we have an original manuscript copy.”

“Do you reckon any newspaper would accept it…”

Ellen grinned.

“I think it could work, just push it through under the name of the Duke of Muller.”

“That’s abuse of power.”

“That’s what power is for. Of course, some negotiation needs to happen. By the way, you are actually an incredible artist. It’s like you’re translating text into illustrations.”

Layla flinched a bit at his remark, but she didn’t show her disturbance outwardly.

Her ability is quite literally the ability to translate written words into images.

When she sees the written word naturally images come to her mind, which she then turns into drawings. Beyond that, she does not possess any other extraordinary abilities.

Of course, when she spends a long time converting books into illustrations, her brain does get overloaded.

She can only endure this for up to four hours a day; any longer and the abundance of information transforming from written word to visual form gives her a severe headache.

The reason her abilities aren’t exploited further is the considerable mental fatigue that comes with them.

“Just make sure you do your best when you draw. I will definitely compensate you appropriately.”

“…Thank you for hiring me.”

As Leila thanks him, a chuckling Allen rises from his seat.

“In any case, you’ll do great. I need to get going.”

“Alright. See you again.”

“Sure.”

Allen departs from the Art Club room.

Watching his retreating figure, Leila takes up her pen again.

Another club member giggles mischievously and comments.

“President, you talk more than I thought when he’s around, huh?”

“Be quiet.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Feeling awkward at Leila’s icy response, the club member resumes his drawing.

The sound of pencils scratching away fills the art club room.

***

“Damn those Imperial Intelligence bastards, they’re relentless!”

“What the hell is in that novel that caused all this ruckus?”

The dark magicians of the Graphite Guild gnash their teeth in frustration.

Some of them are seriously injured, on the brink of death. This is due to the joint operation of the Imperial Intelligence and the Imperial Knights.

As a dark mage presses a cloth against his bleeding arm, he curses out loud.

“Didn’t they say Redios won’t make a move?!”

“It’s an unforeseen factor. We didn’t consider Redios Earl making a move.”

“We should have included that in the calculations from the start!”

Nervous voices exchange heated words.

A palpable fear of Earl Redios lingers amidst their conversation.

To the dark sorcerers who command the powers of darkness, there was no greater enemy than the holy knights who harness the power of light, and they had never expected that Duke Ledios would personally lead the Crusader Order, one of the three knightly orders of the empire, composed entirely of holy knights.

A black wizard asked,

“What about the Dao?”

“It hasn’t been taken. The problem is where the information has come from. How did those fanatics find out?”

“They must’ve gotten snagged in the surveillance network of the Rou sect idiots! Damn it, didn’t we focus as much as possible on security?!”

From Noble mtl dot com

“No matter where we go, there’s no escaping the gaze of Rou if we’re somewhere the light can reach.”

With a mighty voice, the building where the black wizards were hiding collapsed.

The man who burst through the building wall was a middle-aged man with a rather aggressive demeanor, clad in sparkling white armor.

A middle-aged knight in white armor with an impressive scar slashing diagonally across his right eye.

Upon seeing him, the dark magicians screamed in horror.

“Ledios?!”

“Dammit, how?!”

Duke Ledios mercilessly cut off the wrists of the black magicians who were desperate to cast their spells.

The white aura symbolic of the holy knights surrounded the blade as it sliced through their wrists, blood spurting.

“Arrrgh…!!”

“It seems you weren’t aware that the intelligence department has been keeping an eye on the remnants of the black magicians since they were spotted.”

The Duke of Ledios looked down coldly at the black magicians from the graphite sect, writhing in pain, gripping their wrists.

The descendants who had lain low since the war between the black wizards had begun revealing themselves once more.

And as a holy knight serving the sun god, Rou, he did not approve of this. Their reappearance signified the possible arrival of chaos yet again in the empire, which had been enjoying a rare period of peace.

Duke Ledios swung his sword several more times, taking out all the black magicians.

His gaze was icy as he looked down at the fallen black magicians.

“Your Grace, we’ve taken care of them all.”

“Any survivors?”

“None.”

“I hope there were no innocent victims.”

Just like during the war of the black wizards, they were known to hide amongst innocent populace, deceiving countless nations.

Thus, the best way to deal with black magicians is to kill them before they can utter a word.

It’s crucial not to give them time to showcase their bizarre abilities.

The policy of ruthless treatment, even if there were innocent victims, was established after the war against the black magicians.

After all, those followers of the devil, twisted from black magic, possessed peculiar abilities.

Duke Radios wiped the blood off his sword.

A subordinate knight extended a book towards him.

“We found this.”

“Hmm? This is…”

“It seems to be related to a popular novel these days.”

The duke glanced curiously where the knight pointed in the book.

“The motions of swordsmanship from ‘The Chronicles of Shule’?…”