kscans

Chapter 273 - The Enchanter Speaks 3. What is Enchanting? (Part 1)

"Hmph... Enchanting, you say..."

Yuri watched Omo, who had fallen silent with a difficult expression, with bated breath. In the light novels of his past life in Japan, enchanting often made an appearance... but he had never quite understood what it was. No... to be precise, he understood what an "enchantment" was, but he didn't understand how it was different from "magic tools" or "magic circles." After various twists and turns involving reincarnation and other things, the day had finally come when that mystery would be revealed, so Yuri was filled with curiosity.

Feeling a bit awkward under Yuri’s intense gaze, the enchanter Omo continued his words. He spoke, pausing between phrases as if organizing his thoughts as he went.

"...There are many misunderstandings... but enchanting in its original sense is, so to speak, ‘the art of engraving a formula into an arbitrary object so that the effect of a specified magic can be reproduced.’ ...It allows someone who originally cannot use that magic due to problems with their magic power, attribute, and so on, to wield that specified magic... It is that kind of ‘magic.’ ...In that sense, the original ‘enchanting’ can be said to be only a single type of magic."

"A single type...?"

Yuri couldn't help but tilt his head. There should be more than one type of enchantment, shouldn't there? He remembered various ones appearing in the light novels of his past life, such as "Durability Increase," "Striking Power Enhancement," "Hardening," "Force Field Barrier," and "Automatic Size Adjustment"... Was it different in this world? He himself had just recently, albeit unintentionally, succeeded in creating an enchantment called [Disintegrate Acceleration]... Was he really going to say that was the one and only enchantment in this world?

"...You’re probably misunderstanding, but what you lads think of as ‘types of enchantment’ are actually ‘types of enchanted effects.’"

Once he said that, Yuri could guess what he meant.

"Ah... for example, there are countless prints... but the technology to make them is one... is it something like that?"

"Exactly... That’s a good analogy."

He had almost blurted out something about letterpress printing, but he managed to avoid it at the last second and used the innocuous example of printmaking. ...Drypoint? Etching? Silkscreen? Lithograph? Woodblock? ...It's fine, they're all within the scope of the ‘single’ technology of "printmaking."

Well, that aside... if what Omo said was correct, the definition of enchanting was extremely simple. However...

"...Huh? If that’s the case, what’s the difference between an enchanter and a magic tool craftsman? And weren’t there other things like magic circles and magic talismans?"

This was his chance to solve the mystery of the incongruity he had felt in his past life. With that thought, Yuri pressed Omo. Judging by the way Omo nodded when asked, it seemed Yuri's doubts were not unfounded.

"A fair question... but the answer to that is a bit complicated. This might take a while."

"Is that all right?" Omo asked. Yuri, after exchanging glances with his guardians behind him, gave a nod in return.