The Liberomancer [Isekai Progression LitRPG]

The root problem with Rank Three grimoires was a supply and demand issue at its core, and one the guild had tried its hardest to remedy, or at least smooth out to some degree. Most Liberomancers didn't spend all their time managing their businesses and tried to at least take out some time every day to write, but the fact remained that demand still far exceeded supply. For example, Lauren, who owned a bookstore, left most of the management to Mark, and wrote her own Rank Three grimoires when she wasn't dealing with administrative tasks. This ameliorated the situation to a mild extent, but still wasn't the fix that the guild would have liked.

Personally, I felt that the fix was that there should be a rule passed stating that Rank Three Liberomancers would lose their privileges like their preferred taxation status if they didn't make at least two Rank Three grimoires every year.

Then again, that was just my opinion based on my limited understanding of this world. I didn't understand most of the intricacies of politics or what not - it was possible that someone had already suggested my idea at some point and the legislation was shot down due to some reason that hadn't occurred to me. Many ideas sounded good on paper but failed horribly when it came to implementation, especially when it came to the economy.

The underlying issue was that no matter how much money I made, I wanted to eventually go back to Earth and I probably couldn't take it with me; and even if I could I would have a hard time explaining how I got it. The coinage was made of silver so it would have some value back on Earth, but again, where would I say it came from if I turned up along with a mountain of silver with me?

There was the prestige of being an earl, though once again that didn't matter to me. Perhaps I would have access to some resources other people couldn't get their hands on, but at the same time it would make travel, especially to different countries, much harder to arrange for.

I guess if one wanted to have a harem, it would be easier with that rank to have a few mistresses, though I had no interest in romance given the fact I'd likely have to abandon anyone I shacked up with when I found a way back to Earth.

No, the earldom didn't have any appeal to me.

I'd stopped working on making new Rank Three grimoires for some time as I needed to build further funds for when I'd join the merchant caravan, and it would be a good idea to show them that I had at least a single Rank Three grimoire to sell. So I instead turned my attention to making copies of the two I had memorized as it guaranteed a steady stream of income.

The reason I didn't delve into starting or investing in a business despite the greater long-term benefits was that I didn't intend to stay in Arconia for much longer than a few months.

Winter had already turned towards spring, and I was pretty much ready at this point to head out whenever the Book Fair came around again.

"Do you have some spare time?" Granny Qi asked me one day.

"Sure," I said. I was spending most of my days writing copies of Rank Three grimoires, but I could use a break as it was, and it wasn't like a few hours lost would affect me too much.

"Spring has finally come around," she said with a faint smile on her face. "There is somewhere I wanted to go to, but I would need assistance for that."

"Sure thing," I said. "Is this the favor you were asking about earlier?"

She nodded. "Let me just get some things ready - we can head out the day after tomorrow."

There was a location that she wanted to visit that was technically much closer to the city than her village, but was off the trail and so harder to get to. Not to mention it was also more dangerous being off the usual route people went along, which was why she wanted me tagging along.

Truth be told, she could probably have handled it herself, but again, as she had once told me - misfortune could cripple even a highly skilled Liberomancer. She was also getting along in years, meaning her reaction time was not as good as it used to be. Traveling with a companion was without a doubt, much safer than going alone.

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I went up to the guards before leaving so we wouldn't have an incident while coming back because of the demonic grimoire like usual whenever I left the city, but by now it looked like everyone in Arconia knew what the story about me was after I had become a Master Liberomancer and we were waved on through without much fanfare.

We didn't even have to use the main gate - one of the perks of being a Rank Three Liberomancer was that there was a side gate usually reserved for officials that we could now use and skip the usual queue.

We were traveling light with only food and water for the trip, so we hadn't bothered bringing a cart or any horses. They'd likely not be very useful anyway given we were traveling off the trail.

Instead, I used [Summon Elephant Frog] and the two of us rode on its back while it crawled towards our destination.

This wouldn't have been possible if it was just a domesticated animal, as we would have no doubt been thrown off at some point, but because it was a summon I could control it so that we barely felt anything as we trudged on.

"Any difficulty holding on?" I asked Granny Qi.

She shook her head. "Are you sure it is a good idea to use your summon like this now?" Once the Elephant Frog vanished, I wouldn't be able to call upon it again for another eighteen hours.

"I have new offensive options I didn't have earlier," I explained to her. "Including a Rank Three summon so worse comes to worse we won't be defenseless… but ah, I don't think that other summon would be a very good mount, and we should probably walk back." I would not be surprised if, once she saw the Tyrant Arachnea, she fainted. There was a reason that I hadn't actually tried summoning it yet as I didn't have the right opportunity - as in, a place that was quiet and secluded. As for using the Tyrant Arachnea like a horse - even I shuddered at the thought. It would just feel so weird and creepy, and I would prefer to avoid it unless it absolutely couldn't be helped.

She nodded. "Not a problem, we're not far from where we need to be. And it's better we get help going there rather than coming back given we'll be traveling lighter."

"So where are we going exactly?" I asked her as she pointed us in the direction we were supposed to go. "And what's there that's so special?"

"Consider it a surprise for when we get there," was all that she told me.

The trip was uneventful and didn't take too long - within an hour she said, "Ah, I can hear it! We're close!"

The sound of running water was apparent, and when we got closer I rubbed my eyes, wondering if I was hallucinating. "Wait - is that… flowing backwards?"

There was a small stream beneath a small waterfall - nothing extraordinary about it, except for the fact that the water was moving from the stream up the waterfall against gravity. I thought it was a trick of the light at first, but no, I really was seeing the water move backwards.

"Fascinating, isn't it?" she asked as we got off the Elephant Frog.

"How does it work?" I asked as we got closer to the weird waterfall. I put my hand in the water and noticed nothing wrong with it. I remembered a thermodynamics lesson that stated that it was possible, based on simple energy conservation, for water to spontaneously cool itself and flow backwards like this. However, this is never seen in real life - and it was due to phenomena and observations like this which is what led to the concept of entropy and the derivation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

The water, however, did not appear to get any colder as it flowed upstream.

So where did the energy to propel the water upstream come from?

"Natural magic," she said. "The kind that exists without any source."

I had heard of such things before - like the double inverted rainbows you could see in the western desert even though it basically never rained there. Such magic did not have an identifiable source and simply was without any further explanation. The biggest example of natural magic though, was the way that the world translated speech for everyone. Most people lived close to where they had been born for a large portion of their lives, so they never even noticed this kind of magic, but it was timeless as recorded history itself, and probably went back even further.

In a faraway land, there was a king who wondered to himself - if languages were automatically translated, was there a 'default' or 'true' language in this world? He had ordered a young boy and a girl to be kept in cages separated from one another but in close proximity to each other, and the guards were to feed them and give them water but never talk to them. If there truly was a 'default' language, the two of them would begin speaking to each other in that tongue.

The experiment however, was a complete failure as neither the boy nor the girl grew up knowing how to speak in any recognizable language and could only communicate with basic grunts and sounds.

"And where does the water go?"

"It joins with another branch of the Arconia, and ultimately goes into the sea, just like any other river," Granny Qi said.

It was mildly fascinating, but at the same time I couldn't figure out why she had wanted to come out of the city just to visit this place. Granny Qi seemed to catch the inquisitive expression I had, deduced what I was thinking and beckoned me to follow her.