One summer day. Sebestian Ebenholtz, the head of the Ebenholtz family, asked while signing documents. “Where is Max?” The knight standing before him, Edmon, answered. “He should be with the cadets from the Military Academy.” “Really?” “Yes.” “So, he’s playing around.” Sebestian rose from his seat and pulled back the curtain. Sunlight poured in. His thick jaw clenched in displeasure. It was clear he wasn’t satisfied with any of his son’s actions. Edmon spoke. “Still, he was admitted into the best knight order. There was no recommendation involved in the process.” "At least he'll be useful for propaganda." Maximilian Ebenholtz. Blond hair, golden eyes, fair skin, delicate facial features, long arms and legs with perfect proportions, he was like a textbook example of a “Pureblood Noble” as defined by ethnology. In appearance alone, he was the ideal image of an Imperial citizen, but to Sebestian, that was all he amounted to. “On the inside, he’s nothing like an Imperial. Far too weak.” “.......” Edmon quietly bowed his head. If Max had been born into an average noble family, he would have been considered above average, but Sebestian and the Ebenholtz family were far from ordinary. The title “Bulwark of the Empire” is not granted to just anyone. “That’s enough. Go.” Sebestian scribbled his signature on the documents. “Yes, Commander.” Edmon turned and left with the signed paperwork in his arms. He boarded the vehicle waiting outside the residence. “Let’s go.” “Yes, Major.” The adjutant in the driver’s seat adjusted the rearview mirror. “Oh right. I heard the young master was accepted into the Sentinel Knight Order?” Edmon held up the document he had just gotten signed. “This is the approval matter. In other words, the consent form.” “Ah. But… do you think he’ll do well? No matter what, the Sentinels… They won’t go easy on him just because he’s the Ebenholtz heir.” The adjutant glanced at Edmon’s expression. Edmon was more qualified than anyone to be in the Sentinels, but he couldn’t join. It was because he was of mixed blood. He was disqualified due to the Sentinels’ pureblood policy and instead chose to enter the Imperial military. “His father is the mountain king. No need to worry.” Sebestian wasn’t just any tiger, he was the monarch of the mountain. In fact, the Ebenholtz estate was surrounded by rugged mountain ranges, fitting the reputation perfectly. “Let’s stop by one place on the way.” “Yes. Where shall we go?” “......Library.” With that, he quietly picked up a book. Blocked by the wall of bloodlines, Edmon naturally came to dream a different dream. It was the grand dream of revolution. *** Under the blazing sun, I finished the morning jog. My whole body was soaked in sweat. The cadets quickly approached and handed me a dry towel. “......Oh, thanks.” “You’re welcome!” Just one word of thanks lit up their faces. Three boys, one girl. All of them were trainees from 'Empire Point', the pinnacle of the Military Academy. It meant they were elite students gathered from all over the Empire. “When does your apprenticeship end?” Their assignment was to shadow me, a newly inducted member of the Sentinel Knight Order, for one week and learn from me. And I had to accept it. It was also a duty of a fully-fledged knight. “Until this Friday!” “I see.” I wiped the sweat roughly with the towel and handed it to the buzz-cut boy cadet. He received it with both hands, as if deeply honored. At that moment. ───Crunch! A sharp pain suddenly stabbed near my left collarbone. Instinctively, I pressed a hand to my chest. “Oh- Knight, are you alright?” The buzz-cut boy flinched and checked my complexion. “......Ah, it’s nothing. Just felt a bit queasy. I’ll go to the bathroom real quick.” Pretending it was nothing, I hurried away. Ebenholtz Castle is big. Disgustingly big. Even just getting to the nearest bathroom from the training ground takes five minutes. Clunk. I entered the bathroom, locked the door, and threw off my upper clothes. Standing in front of the mirror, my sweat-drenched upper body was revealed. On the left side of my chest, near my heart, a black object was wriggling. It wasn’t a mere stain or mole. Like a living shadow, it pulsed faintly, squirming beneath the skin. “Haa.......” It looked like a cancer cell or a parasite. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was, but I was certain of its origin. A part of the “Dimensional devourer” that had tried to consume me in the ruined world just before I regressed. A fragment of that alien being was now alive and moving inside me. “......Stay still.” It was something I cherished in its own way. It was also the clearest proof that I had regressed. I had returned to the past, to when I was twenty years old. The Empire fell when I was thirty-three, so that was thirteen years ago. Then twenty more years passed, and the world was destroyed, meaning I had returned thirty-three years into the past in total. Thirty-three years. An overwhelming span of time. Until the moment I died, I was still an immature noble brat, but no matter how hard I tried to recall, my time spent imprisoned in the Underground prison felt like only one or two years at most. It was an enormous discrepancy compared to the twenty years Edmon had mentioned. Suddenly, Edmon’s voice echoed in my mind, the same Edmon whose hair had all fallen out. ‘It seems you were born with some kind of talent even you don’t know about. That’s the only explanation for this unrealistic situation.’ I took a deep breath and stepped out of the bathroom. Outside, Enzi, the family butler, was waiting. A middle-aged man in his fifties with eyes as thin as thread. His familiar face smiled at me gently. “Oh, Enzi. What is it?” “It’s almost time for your class, young master. Though I suppose you’re a knight now. The mana studies professor is waiting for you.” Right now, I was twenty years old. I had been accepted into the Empire’s top knight order, the Sentinel Knight Order. And yet, my private tutoring schedule was more packed than most cadets. It was all forced by the family. My father wanted me to shine not just in appearance but also in ability under the name of Ebenholtz, and he had brought in all sorts of private professors in various fields. It had all been useless. “Really? Then have those kids come with me too.” I pointed to the trainees gathered at one side of the training ground. “Are you sure it’s alright?” “Of course. I’m not that petty.” Thanks to that, the trainees scored big today. They’d get to attend a top-tier mana studies class, worth $30,000 per session, for free. “Yes, understood. I’ll inform them. Please go on ahead.” “Sure.” I walked through the long corridor of the main house. In this lavish space that would collapse thirteen years from now, I thought about the Empire. ‘If only, if only the Empire had lasted a little longer, if only we hadn’t brought it down, if that had happened... maybe humanity could have... lasted a little longer.’ That’s what Edmon, who had been consumed by despair, had said. But the Empire was undoubtedly the worst as well. The Emperor and the sycophants around him were all utterly rotten, and most of the noble houses supporting the Empire were garbage too. Because I had been weak and incompetent, I was able to escape their fanatical brainwashing relatively quickly. I came to clearly understand their filthy corruption. Imperialism was a illusion, and there was no such thing as superiority between races as they claimed. But I couldn’t even think of resisting them. That too was because I was weak and incompetent. The problem was, just as a broken clock is right twice a day, their blind hatred and discrimination were correct for exactly one race. ‘The Ezenheim race... they were the catastrophe. They weren’t human. Those damn bastards destroyed the world.’ I looked down at my body. All of it felt like a midsummer illusion. Like a nightmare I had been trapped in for far too long, feverish and endless. “Ah... my head seriously hurts.” I placed my hand over my left collarbone. The only thing that now proved my existence was this strange black object writhing inside my body. *** “What is a mana circuit? It is a type of biological organ and tool that allows humans to sense the mana within their bodies and handle it quantitatively.” The mana studies professor, dressed in a neat uniform, projected a human body diagram into the air. The complex veins and organs disappeared, replaced by simplified blue lines. It was a diagram of the system extending from the head down to the ends of the hands and feet. “The mana circuit is a pathway that allows mana to move safely and efficiently within the body. By circulating mana through this circuit and concentrating it in specific areas, humans can exert superhuman strength or control natural phenomena through magic.” Blue mana particles flowed smoothly along the circuits. The single large circuit that ran throughout the entire body was called the 'mana circuit', and the smaller branches that extended from it were called “auxiliary circuits”. “The wider the diameter of the circuit, the greater the total amount of mana that can move at once and the faster it can circulate. On the other hand, the more auxiliary circuits there are, the more precise the mana control becomes.” In the end, the important thing is the mana circuit. Every element, its shape, length, and rigidity, matters. Whether knight or wizard, one must be born with a good mana circuit. “In the past, there were also studies that focused on concentrating mana in one place by designating an imaginary central point called the ‘mana core’, but the side effects were severe and the efficiency was low, so that approach has almost entirely been abandoned. Now, we will begin covering the actual theories.......” Formulas. All sorts of complicated symbols and numbers appeared densely. It was the self-enhancement type of magic used by knights. Self-enhancement magic was all about memorization. It could only be used if memorized. I had been lazy, so I hadn’t mastered many. The mana studies professor gave a very passionate lecture for 40 minutes, and I, at the very least, did not fall asleep. “......Let’s take a short break, and then I’ll explain practical mana usage.” The first period ended. I stood up from my seat and stretched. The four trainees approached me all at once and bowed deeply. “Thank you! Thanks to you, we were able to attend a truly valuable class!” “Thank you!” “Thank you!” ──Crack! Once again, my left collarbone twitched. This time, it wasn’t just pain, it was a violent sensation of something thrashing inside. I pressed it down with my hand, pretending to be calm. “Oh. No need to thank me. Just keep working hard.” “Uh, Knight! May I go to the restroom?” The buzz-cut cadet asked with a nervous face. “You don’t need permission for that kind of thing. Go ahead, feel free.” “Yes! Thank you!” The four cadets rushed to the restroom. I stared quietly at the seats they left behind. Nothing special. Rather, endearing for that age. They weren’t anything special. Rather, they were charmingly appropriate for their age. And yet, suddenly, I felt nauseous. Something inside me kept bubbling up with a burning, unpleasant sensation. “.......” The buzz-cut one, his name was Jacob, I think. I looked at his seat. I picked up the bag hanging on the chair and dumped out its contents. Thud, thud, thud. Writing tools, a sketchbook, a novel. Among them, the novel caught my eye. I didn’t know why. I just picked it up and flipped through the pages. On a particular page, faint mana markings highlighted specific words. [Soon, retu, rn, poss, ib, le, tha, t, ti, me, me, et, you] [This, way, com, mu, ni, ca, tion, pos, si, ble, to, com, rades, trans, mit......] It pretended to be a simple cipher sentence, but it was a double-layered trick. Beneath that layer of mana, I could see a hidden, ominous “residue”. A remnant of cold, alien energy entirely different from ordinary mana. I placed my hand on that section. A chilling voice flowed into my mind. At the same time, the black fragment inside me squirmed violently. The alien language translated itself automatically. ━Hungry. Need to eat a fresh heart to replenish mana. The younger and purer the child, the better. Their life force is necessary.━ ━You will be selected as a knight of the Empire, so we will assist you in securing food whenever needed. Lexi will soon come to you. Follow her instructions.━ “......Kh!” I quickly pulled my hand away from the book. A splitting headache and overwhelming nausea surged up. Ezenheim. That race was hiding here.