Demon King of the Royal Class-Chapter 492

My back had given out. As a result, I found myself being carried by Arta all the way to Rijaiera.

“Ugh...” I groaned.

“Is there another fool like this in the world?” Luna sighed deeply as she placed a hot towel on my back. She must have heard Arta’s account of how I had tried to uproot a tree with my bare hands and ended up injuring my back.

“Mother... if I use Tiamata... I can heal myself...” I suggested. Although it required anger to activate, I had grown quite accustomed to using Tiamata. Perhaps I could channel its divine power by directing my own anger over my own foolishness.

Woong...

Smack!

“Ouch!” I yelped as Luna slapped my hand when I attempted to summon Tiamata while lying prone.

“Have you forgotten that I told you not to use the holy relics?” she scolded me.

“But... this is an injury...” I protested, turning my head slightly.

It wasn’t like I was using it to do my task; I had suffered an unavoidable injury. Shouldn’t I be allowed to use it?

Luna shook her head sternly. “No. Rest for a few days and reflect on your foolishness. What if you had completely broken your back?”

“But... I heal quickly even if I get hurt, so it’s not a big deal...” I argued, though the pain in my back was so intense that it screamed every time I moved.

Luna pressed the hot towel firmly against my back.

“Ow, ow, ow! Stop! Stop! Stop!” I pleaded.

“The belief that you can heal easily leads to the belief you can easily let yourself be hurt. Isn’t that why you’re in this state?” she said, finally lifting her hand from my back and looking at me.

“No matter how easily you can heal, no one should let themselves get hurt easily,” she continued.

“...” I was silent.

“Don’t take getting hurt for granted in the pursuit of your goal. That’s your flaw,” she added.

Somehow, her words seemed to be more about my heart than my body.

Was she worried about my tendency to be so readily willing to endure pain, or did I just seem pathetic to her? In the end, I followed Luna’s instructions and refrained from using Tiamata. Instead, I lay down and rested for a few days.

I pondered what it meant to take pain for granted just because I could escape it easily.

Somehow, the memory of the day Ellen had stabbed me in the heart kept resurfacing.

***

I spent about three days lying down. It was an unexpected break, even though it was due to an injury sustained after finishing the logging work.

Although I could have healed myself quickly using Tiamata, Luna’s words about not using the ability to easily recover as an excuse to get hurt easily lingered in my mind during those three days.

Luna, along with Ronan, also checked on the condition of my back. They performed some sort of physical therapy, which felt like compressing a week’s worth of pain into a short period to speed up the healing. Honestly, it was a bit overwhelming.

Thanks to Ronan’s treatment and my basic physical resilience, my injury was completely healed in three days.

“Honey, please accompany Reinhart,” Luna instructed.

“Ah, I should,” Ronan agreed.

It seemed Luna was afraid I might injure my back again if left alone.

From being a useless guy who did not even know how to cut down a tree, I had now become a reckless fool who hurt his back trying to uproot trees with his bare hands. Somehow, I didn’t entirely dislike being seen that way.

***

When we arrived at the newly-cleared forest, Ronan stood beside the tree stump that had caused my back injury.

“It’s not about uprooting the entire tree,” Ronan said as he started to dig into the ground around the tree stump with a shovel, clearing away the soil around the roots.

As he dug deeper, the roots which were buried deep in the ground began to reveal themselves. With a pickaxe, he pried at the roots while he dug, showing me the full extent of the root network, which was far more extensive than what was visible on the surface.

“Do you see now how absurd your attempt was?” Ronan asked.

“Yes, I see,” I admitted. I hadn’t imagined that such a large tree stump would have such deep and extensive roots.

Next, Ronan used an axe to sever the deeply-embedded roots, making it easier to remove the stump. After some time, he managed to pry the stump loose with a pickaxe and pulled it out of the ground.

The stump itself was heavy enough that no ordinary person would be able to lift it.

“That’s how it’s done,” Ronan said.

“Well... I’m not sure if I can do it properly, but I’ll try,” I replied. Logging already required some skill, and this seemed even more technical.

After completing his demonstration, Ronan tossed the uprooted stump aside and dusted off his hands, indicating there was nothing more to teach.

I had a question.

“Um... Father?”

“Do you want me to show you again?” Ronan asked.

“No, it’s not that. There’s something I’m curious about. Can you show me how to do it with sheer strength instead of this method?” I said, pointing to a stump of a similar size.

“...” Ronan tilted his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

I was genuinely curious. I wasn’t sure what would happen if I exerted my full strength, but I thought Ronan might be able to do it. He was undoubtedly more skilled than I was.

“Hmm... even if I do it that way, I’m not sure if you can replicate it,” Ronan said.

“Haven’t you tried it before?” I asked.

“...” Ronan looked at me, pondering my question.

‘Was that something I shouldn’t have asked?’

Whatever he was thinking, Ronan suddenly rolled up his sleeves.

Perhaps Ronan Artorius was much simpler to handle than I thought.

Thus far, he hadn’t shown any use of Mana Reinforcement or any extraordinary strength. However, it would be impossible to uproot that tree stump from the ground with ordinary human strength.

He went about it almost the same way I had attempted to a few days ago. He dug up some soil around the tree stump with a shovel and grabbed the roots.

Just like Arta—and like myself, who had recently learned the technique—there was no blue aura around Ronan. However, it was clear that Ronan Artorius was about to exert tremendous strength.

Even just watching him made my skin tingle.

“Hup!” he grunted.

Crack!

While my back had given out, it was different with Ronan. It was as if the entire earth was being lifted up. Ronan’s feet sank into the ground, and a succession of cracks and snapping sounds filled the air.

Swoosh!

In one swift motion, he tore the massive tree from the ground with his bare hands, as if ripping it apart.

I could only stare in awe at the enormous roots, all broken and torn, dangling from the uprooted tree stump.

Thud!

Ronan tossed the uprooted stump aside and looked at me. “Can you do that?”

“No, not at all,” I admitted.

The human excavator was right in front of me.

***

After those two demonstrations, Ronan left, and I was left alone. I wondered if I could do something similar, so I tried.

To sum it up, I could do something similar to Ronan. By channeling all the mana I could muster, I could exert my maximum strength.

Thud!

“Whew,” I sighed, tossing aside the uprooted stump and releasing my Mana Reinforcement.

I could uproot a tree with my strength, proving that my power was on par with Ronan’s.

However, I could not be content with this level of strength. If I could achieve maximum output while in a state of extremely stable Mana Reinforcement, what would happen?

I would possess power on a completely different level. Therefore, for the moment, I focused on uprooting the stumps. Since the logging had been completed, it was time to uproot the stumps. Then, perhaps, till the land.

A significant amount of time had already passed, but once again, I had to invest more time to take the next step.

Focusing my mind, and maintaining a stable state for Mana Reinforcement. It had to be more stable, more precise, for even more complete power.

Thud!

I drove the shovel into the ground.

***

Uprooting tree roots required even more time than logging. Unlike felling and chopping trees, uprooting required digging deep into the ground, as the roots were deeply entrenched. And since I wasn’t accustomed to this work, I had to go through a process of trial and error.

Clearly, though, manual labor required time investment in order to show results. As I spent more time, my concentration naturally increased.

At some point, I found myself able to maintain a refined state of Mana Reinforcement while I worked, from start to finish.

“Better not disturb him, right?” Lena asked Arta as they watched me digging from a distance away.

“I’m not sure we could even if we tried,” Arta replied.

Lena and Arta had come to chat, but found themselves watching me instead, entranced by my focus on digging out and chopping up the roots.

“When he first arrived, I wondered what kind of guy he was, but the more I see of him, the more relentless he seems,” Arta said, shivering as if in exasperation.

It was as if I had put myself under a powerful form of self-hypnosis, focusing on the task with such intensity that I was deaf and blind to everything else. I couldn’t hear anyone calling me, nor did I notice anything happening around me.

Such intense focus and immersion... Even Arta couldn’t keep up with my level of concentration anymore.

Lena looked around the area where I was working. “What on earth drives him to be like that?”

Though I had succeeded in focusing my mind, there was an undeniable desperation beneath all my actions, and both Lena and Arta were aware of it.

Though I was just digging up roots and uprooting tree stumps, my sheer level of focus in pursuit of the next step revealed a desperation bordering on madness.

What kind of story lay behind it? What was I preparing for that made me so desperate?

“I don’t know,” Arta said quietly. “It’s probably better if we don’t know. Definitely.”

Lena remained silent.

Arta believed that my desperate madness was related to matters of the outside world, and if so, it was better for them not to know.

As Arta returned to Rijaiera, he shivered. “It’s getting chilly.”

“Indeed,” Lena agreed.

Autumn was arriving.