The Liberomancer [Isekai Progression LitRPG]

In most video games I played, in addition to learning spells, there would be magical items or artifacts that you could use to either get stronger or to cast magic that you didn't have to learn a spell for.

There was nothing that useful in this world, despite how similar to a video game it seemed in some aspects. There were no spiritual rings or wands that would help me in any way - there were only the thirty slots for every Rank and whatever grimoires you could stuff into them. The only thing close to magic items I had seen in this world were translation devices, but even they required your own mana to work and did not do anything on their own. Not to mention they couldn't translate normal text.

Granny Qi continued to give me pointers on things I could improve on while I decided to ultimately work on the new idea I had for a Rank Three grimoire. It would take time to write, by which point I would probably know what the guild thought of the grimoire I had created, and I could memorize it making replicating Charlotte's Web far easier than it would be now.

I was in for a bit of a pleasant surprise though when two weeks later a messenger from the guild came by our house to let me know they had already come to a decision.

I was a bit nervous as I thought that an early decision meant that they had found another grimoire identical to my own and the ax would now be falling on my head, and so I found myself tapping my foot anxiously while the receptionist went to go get the manager when I reached the guild's headquarters.

"Ah, good to see you sir," the manager greeted me with a warm smile. Okay - so that meant that things had likely not gone south.

"Any issues with verifying what I had made?" I asked.

"No, none at all, actually… I wanted to speak to you about that," he said. Although he clearly had experience with talking to Liberomancers, he seemed to be a bit off-balance right now. "The reason we were able to so quickly verify this was because… no matter where we looked we couldn't find any grimoire that used this same language. Not even a single Rank One grimoire - aside from the ones that you made, of course."

I had relaxed a bit, but now tensed up again. It looked like I was in trouble for an entirely different reason.

"We don't have any problem signing off on this, of course," he said. "I was just curious - which country do you hail from again? And… this language…"

"I come from a country far away from here," I said. "Called uh, Lib-no, you might know it under another name, America." I decided to give them an actual name. 'America' did not exist in this world, as far as I knew, but maybe they could find some mention of it somewhere? It would make my life easier if they could find a name like that. As it was, giving one fake name over a name that would be indistinguishable from a fake name made little sense.

"I apologize as I have never heard of that name before," he said. "And this language… as ridiculous as it may seem, it appears that you're the first Liberomancer to have ever made grimoires in this language."

That was probably true, actually. I wasn't sure how to explain it though.

The manager continued. "Is this an original language that you invented?"

"No… I just think the people that know this language don't really trade much," I said to him. "We lived in a rather isolated community after all."

"I see, I see," he said, not appearing convinced at all but not willing to call me out to my face either. "Well, there are no issues here, we have already prepared a sash for you." He pulled one out and placed it on the counter.

"I - I'm not a Rank Three Liberomancer yet, at least, not really," I said. There were two requirements to be considered a Master Liberomancer - you had to reach Rank Three and also have created a new Rank Three grimoire. I had accomplished the latter, but because I had submitted the grimoire I had made I technically hadn't reached Rank Three yet. I was in the awkward limbo after you had filled out all thirty of your slots and needed a higher ranked grimoire to advance. This kind of situation was probably unheard of in all of history because most people would naturally fulfill the first condition before they could reach the second. It wasn't easy to make an entirely new Rank Three grimoire, after all. "I have to read that grimoire first."

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

"Oh, I see, that is not a problem, it's a mere formality anyway and we know that you will be a true Rank Three soon enough," the manager said, waving his hand and dismissing what I had said as nothing to be seriously concerned about. "On that note, three people have offered to buy this grimoire, though I take it that you will be wanting to read a copy first? Yes, right, well, just to let you know, you do have several generous offers in case you were to ever make a few more copies." He handed me the iconic purple sash before continuing, "Apologies, but I have a meeting with the governor later and I must attend to such." He turned to the receptionist. "Make sure that Master Dawson has any and all questions he has answered, and that he receives the full details of the benefits he is entitled to."

"Thank you," I said, accepting the sash.

"No worries, no worries, if any problems happen, feel free to drop by at any time later on - I would be happy to continue assisting you in person but you must understand, this is the city's governor so-"

"Yeah, I get it."

He left, leaving me with the receptionist. This was the same girl who had looked rather smug after I had walked away dejected and declined to buy a license to make grimoires that one time, but there was not even a hint of any of that anymore.

She went into the various benefits of being a Rank Three Liberomancer, and a Master Liberomancer as well on top of that.

And boy, were there a bunch of benefits!

My suspicions earlier were proven to be correct - the guild basically suppressed Rank One and Rank Two Liberomancers in order to support Rank Three Liberomancers. This was in many ways like asking for licensing fees and making it harder for them to sell grimoires on their own so they'd have to work in an official bookstore, which only Rank Three Liberomancers were allowed to operate. A 'bookstore' being a group that sells grimoires, one could technically sell them as an individual, although it would be hard as I had found out earlier.

It seemed kind of counter intuitive to me at first - why would you put an extra burden on those who were weaker rather than stronger? It was like taxing the poor to benefit the rich.

I thought of things back on Earth and it kind of became a bit clearer. Seniority nearly always meant having a cushier gig, and new people in any occupation were expected to 'pay their dues' initially. The most experienced teachers would get the easiest classes to teach, salesmen higher up on the corporate ladder would get better clients, etc.

I guess this was a way that Rank One and Rank Two Liberomancers were expected to shoulder certain burdens, being newcomers.

I no longer had to worry about those fees though - membership fees, licensing fees, or taxes on sales; all of them were waived for Rank Three Liberomancers. There would still be a small processing fee for buying and selling Rank Three grimoires, but only for Rank Three ones.

Rank Three Liberomancers were exempt from a lot of tolls and taxes in other aspects of life as well.

I knew about this already as Granny Qi had told me she didn't need to pay property tax on her house, even though she wasn't a Rank Three Liberomancer herself she was the widow of one. Since she had no other heirs or anyone else supporting her, the city exempted her from having to pay property taxes.

They also offered to give me a steady supply of paper (low grade mind you) as well as ink - as if they were practically begging 'please continue writing Rank Three grimoires!' I showed the receptionist what I used to write - she said that they normally only gave out ink brushes and she would have to see if they could arrange something for me that would be similar to a pen, but I didn't care about that that very much.

The Liberomancer's Guild also had some buildings they rented out for very low costs to Rank Three Liberomancers, though very few of them took up this offer, and I did not intend to either for now.

It did make me think about how I had been homeless when I first came to this world, and now I was being offered a roof to live under for basically no cost.

I left once the explanation was done, Rank Three grimoire under my arm. It turns out that I had been a bit too paranoid when I had been afraid of them stealing it. Of course they wouldn't now that I thought about it some more. I thought many of the rules were unfair, but they followed most of their own rules. And they would gain far more from me making more copies of this than they would from taking a single copy. Stealing it would be like killing a goose that laid golden eggs - why steal a single egg out of greed rather than ensuring the goose continued to lay them? As for an employee stealing it; well, they wouldn't have lasted for so long as an organization if something like that could so easily occur.

I now became worried about something else though; that someone on the street might try to steal it - that was why I had wanted the receipt when I had deposited it with the guild after all, but then quickly relaxed. What kind of person would be carrying a Rank Three grimoire? Of course, it would be a Rank Three Liberomancer. And no one would stoop to trying something like that given the inherent risk of messing with a Rank Three Liberomancer.