Hero From The Toilet

4. Kinetic Energy Is My New Spell

Everyone turned to look.

A small, perfectly clean hole had appeared in the thick stone wall. Not a crack,n ot shattered stone.

A hole. A marble-sized hole that had gone straight through.

The young mage opened his mouth.

"...That..."

The guard captain walked over, touched the hole with one finger, then moved to check the other side of the wall.

It had gone completely through then he turned to look at Rangga.

"This castle wall is one and a half meters thick."

Silence followed for several seconds and the elderly mage finally spoke quietly.

"...He didn't use a spell."

His eyes remained fixed on Rangga, as though he were looking at something that shouldn't exist.

"No runes. No chant."

He paused.

"He simply... imagined it."

Whispers immediately spread among the mages.

"Is he truly a Hero? Or something else?"

Meanwhile, Rangga's palm still felt warm and now, he realized something.

He hadn't even felt like he'd used any energy. It was almost as if the world itself had simply obeyed his imagination.

The elderly mage was still staring at the hole in the wall when Rangga turned toward him.

A smile slowly appeared on Rangga's face but not an ordinary smile. It was the kind of smile that made several knights behind him tense instinctively.

"Hohoho..."

He pointed toward the hole.

"So?"

The elderly mage stared at him.

"...What?"

Rangga shrugged.

"Kinetic energy still works here."

Several mages immediately exchanged glances.

"...Kinetic what?"

But Rangga was already continuing.

"And that was just a tiny bit of water, right?"

He spread both hands wide.

"Now imagine if I made it as thin as a blade..."

His arms spread even wider.

"...and this big."

The reaction was immediate. The guard captain half-drew his sword and several knights stepped forward.

The young mage instantly went pale.

"DON'T—"

Even the servants watching from a distance backed away.

Rangga saw their reactions, chuckled, and casually raised both hands.

"Relax."

He waved one hand dismissively.

"I'm kidding."

For several seconds, no one moved. The guard captain stared at him for a long moment before finally sheathing his sword.

"...You have a terrible sense of humor."

Several knights remained tense but the young mage stared at the hole in the wall.

"...He actually pierced the castle wall..."

Meanwhile, the elderly mage was now looking at Rangga differently.

No longer confused but interested then he stepped closer.

"Rangga."

His tone became more serious.

"Earlier... you mentioned something."

He tried to remember.

"Ki... netic?"

He narrowed his eyes.

"And before that... water vapor."

The elderly mage stared at him thoughtfully.

"You did not manipulate the water itself."

He paused.

"You manipulated... Something."

Several other mages began moving closer, like scientists who had just discovered an entirely new phenomenon.

The guard captain looked at Rangga.

"I don't know what you just did."

He pointed toward the wall.

"But if ordinary humans could do that... this world would be very different."

From the edge of the training ground, the King finally spoke.

"Interesting."

He walked closer, and everyone automatically stepped aside to make way. The King stopped several meters away from Rangga.

"You said something important."

His gaze sharpened.

"You did not use a spell. You did not use the techniques practiced by our mages."

He paused.

"And yet, the laws of this world still obeyed you."

The King narrowed his eyes.

"You understand this world... differently."

The afternoon breeze swept gently across the training ground. Everyone now looked at Rangga in a new way.

Not merely as a Hero but as something potentially dangerous.

Rangga turned toward the King with a wide grin.

"Ohhh."

He looked at him casually.

"I'm not really used to talking to kings."

Several mages immediately became uneasy then Rangga casually added,

"Can I just call you Uncle?"

Silence. A long, painful silence.

Several knights looked like they were about to faint. The young mage nearly choked on his own breath. The guard captain rubbed his temples.

"...Gods above."

Everyone waited.

The King stared at Rangga for several seconds then laughed loudly.

"It has been a long time since anyone spoke to me with such honesty."

He slowly shook his head.

"If you said that in the royal court... half the nobles would probably faint."

Several knights chuckled and the King shrugged.

"For now... I will tolerate it."

The guard captain let out a long sigh but Rangga pointed back toward the wall.

"Anyway, about what happened earlier... just think of it as something that's a little different, but also kinda the same."

Several mages were still fixated on the tiny hole.

"It's hard to explain," Rangga continued. "I'd have to get into thermodynamics, vectors, forces... and a bunch of other stuff."

The young mage froze.

"...Thermo...?"

The elderly mage narrowed his eyes.

"...Vectors?"

One mage whispered,

"Are those names of spells?"

The elderly mage shook his head.

"...No."

His eyes gleamed as he stared at Rangga.

"It sounds more like... a system for understanding the world."

The King crossed his arms.

"So you understand the world through these laws?"

Several mages had now gathered around like eager students.

"If that is true," the elderly mage said quietly, "then you have brought more than mere power."

He pointed toward Rangga's head.

"You have brought an entirely new way of understanding the world."

The guard captain shook his head.

"...This is going to give a lot of mages headaches."

The King smiled faintly.

"And perhaps..."

He looked at Rangga.

"...change our world."

Everyone waited for his answer but Rangga merely shrugged.

"Yeah... but that'll take time."

The elderly mage immediately nodded. Suddenly—

CLAP!

Rangga slapped his hands together, making several people flinch.

"Oooohhh."

He smiled.

"Maybe I can turn this into secret knowledge."

Several mages exchanged glances.

"Secret?"

Rangga chuckled.

"Something like that."

The guard captain narrowed his eyes.

"...This is going to be troublesome."

Rangga looked down, picked up a small stone from the ground, and stared at it for a moment before closing his eyes.

No spell. No runes. Only a concept about pressure. 

Equal force pressing inward from every direction. The stone began to tremble.

The elderly mage immediately stiffened.

"...The mana is moving again."

The surface of the stone slowly began to change. Cracks appeared not because it was breaking apart. But because it was being compressed.

As though invisible pressure were crushing it evenly from every direction.

Crk...

Crk...

Tiny fragments fell away and the stone's surface became smoother, rounder and denser.

Several seconds later, what remained in Rangga's palm was an almost perfectly spherical ball of stone.

Dense. Smooth. And somehow looks unnatural.

The young mage's eyes widened.

"...He compressed the stone?"

The elderly mage whispered,

"...Uniform pressure."

Rangga opened his eyes.

"Not bad."

He casually walked toward the King and several knights immediately tensed.

"Let him," the guard captain said.

Rangga stopped in front of the King and held out the stone sphere.

The King accepted it and slowly turned it over in his hand and his eyebrows rose slightly.

"Smooth..."

He examined it more closely.

"Extremely smooth."

He pressed his thumb against its surface.

"And hard."

The King looked at Rangga and the elderly mage spoke quietly.

"Its structure has changed."

He stared at the sphere.

"It is denser."

The guard captain looked at the stone ball.

"If he can do that to stone..."

His eyes drifted toward the castle wall.

"...I don't want to imagine what he could do to armor."

The King smiled faintly.

"Secret knowledge, you say."

He turned the sphere in his hand.

"Interesting."

The afternoon breeze swept across the training ground. By now, the mages looked as though they had just discovered a gold mine.

"Rangga," the elderly mage said quietly, "you may not realize this... but if this can be taught..."

He looked toward the other mages.

"...it could change the very foundations of magic in this world."

The guard captain sighed.

"...Which means enormous trouble."

The King was still holding the stone sphere.

"So," he said calmly, "Rangga... what do you wish to do now?"

Several mages were still staring at the stone sphere when Rangga casually answered,

"Ohhh... about teaching people..."

He shrugged.

"I like teaching."

The young mage immediately brightened but then Rangga grinned widely.

"But I have one condition."

He turned toward the elderly mage.

"They've gotta be at least a little crazy like me."

Several knights chuckled and the young mage immediately looked offended.

"I'm not crazy!"

The elderly mage, on the other hand, merely let out a long sigh.

"...I have lived long enough to know that every great discovery is born from a little madness."

The guard captain shook his head.

"Mages really are strange."

Rangga casually continued,

"Here's the thing. I'm kinda bad at remembering names—especially unfamiliar ones."

Several people began to look confused about where this conversation was going.