Chapter 3 (Cleaned) – Depressing Sigh

Ex Strongest Swordsman Chapter 3 is out!    

TLN:

Greetings everyone.

This chapter has been edited by Dogboy90, thank you very much!

Thanks for the Patreon members who are willing to support this translation. A huge appreciation to:

Brooplin;

Toan N.;

Daryl;; MadHatter; Jared R.; Rigo G.; Carlo C.; Andy T; Igor B.; tlinga; Beligerante; Mervin. L; Shawn M.; AO B;

Zaq Q;

Travis V;

Kazuo M.; Vasosulf; Babar Not the Elephant; Vincent G.; Samuel K.; Alexander P.; Chris B.; Simon v. E.; Shyll;

PS: The writing styles of the author is a bit difficult for me to translate. IMO, the author is writing like when s/he is talking with someone else. So, the sentences are like jumping here and there. Well, that’s how I feel. Which is why I had to add extra wordings to complete the sentences. Not sure how this work, but if there is any comment on the way I translate this novel, please do so. I really appreciate it. ?

PS2: Changing the name to Ex Strongest from Former Strongest.

Do enjoy!

As for Sofia Neumont, the existence of her son — Soma Neumont was to be called the symbol of a genius. (TLN: The name in raw is ソフィア・ノイモント)

With that status, Sofia had the opportunity to meet various people.

There were bad people amongst them, but there were also good ones; so if there was a genius, there were ordinary people.

Starting as the unmarried daughter of a Duke, going through magic academy, running through battlefields… eventually, she was known as the world’s strongest magician.

But, rather than any person she met in the process, her son was full of talent.

That son of hers had never been the least favorite.

Rather, since she had seen her son from the time he was born, she was able to notice his extraordinary talent.

The first time she noticed that was probably because he never cried at all in the night.

And when she thought about it, Soma had never cried, except just after birth.

The abnormality was obvious when Sofia raised her daughter, Rina, who was also Soma’s younger sister.

Rina was different from Soma. She was crying during the day and the night, but… the sight of a 1-year-old child comforting his crying sister was something impossible, no matter how she thought about it.

Moreover, it didn’t happen once or twice. It frequently happened when Sofia was in the middle of something… And, since she was used to it, she asked Soma to take care of her when she was busy, but when she thought about it afterwards, she was greatly perplexed.

Well, even though there were such things, when she thought about it later, she assumed that they were cute.

Later, when she was considering the matter of education…

Basically, education was usually simple, even before getting a skill appraisal.

Depending on the results, it might prove to be pointless, which was natural.

Furthermore, in the first place, even if education was a common thing, receiving an education was pretty restrictive after getting a skill appraisal. (Recheck)

There was an academy in this world, but that would be after reaching nine years old. Furthermore, it wasn’t necessary to go there and the fee wasn’t cheap at all.

Depending on the skill, there might be no need for the education, and not receiving an education was also not unusual.

That was why, for Sofia to say such things like a normal person means she was an ordinary noble to the bitter end… rather than coming from the household of a Duke.

On the contrary, when considering being a Duke, it was impossible not to receive an education.

It was normal to hire a tutor to study.

Just by doing so, as mentioned above, the possibility of becoming useless was the least possible.

It was fundamental to safely learn knowledge, no matter how broad or shallow it was.

Even so, parents who noticed a glimpse of talent as early as five years old would normally consider them as the favorable one.

But, for Soma, his education started ever since he was four years old.

That was too early, no matter how much she thought about it, and those who heard the matter would probably be seeing him in a favorable light.

Nevertheless, even if Sofia thought so, she probably wouldn’t do it until that point.

And she wasn’t the only one who thought so.

Kraus Neumont. (TLN: The name in raw is クラウス・ノイモント。)

He was Sofia’s husband, and Soma’s father. He was also thinking the same thing.

It didn’t change the fact that they were Soma’s parents, but to see someone in a favorable light was not a characteristic of Kraus Neumont.

He was rigorous and fair.

For those who knew Kraus, they understood that it was impossible to put personal feelings in his evaluation.

That Kraus… was a person known as the world’s strongest swordsman, and he also confirmed that talent.

If that was the case, it was natural to think that Soma was a genius after all.

In fact, Soma had responded to the expectations from Sofia and Kraus.

It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that he responded too much.

In any case, he completed the elementary portion of the academy — all basic courses that were to be learned over three years, in less than half a year.

That was after doing, more or less, an examination on martial arts and magic, even if the practical skills were excluded.

It was already ridiculous to talk about such talents.

However, the reason why she didn’t hurry with the skill appraisal was the opposite. She was worried about narrowing Soma’s possibilities.

It was true that one could take early action if they received the appraisal early, but skill appraisal was still not understood in many cases.

Because of that, if Sofia and Kraus closed the path that he could progress ahead on, they couldn’t feel sorry if they wanted to.

That was why, while suppressing the flourish feelings, they were waiting for Soma to be six years old.

— And…

“…Is this the result? Goodness… Really, dear me, there is such a thing, huh?” (??)

Her son went out of the room with a stunning face — No, while thinking back about Soma not allowing her to call back, Sofia breathed a sigh.

She looked at a sheet of paper in her hand.

Although it was expensive stuff, it was impossible to miss what it said about the future of her son.

Because with a sheet of this, it was comparable to the price of a magic book.

However, even though such a thing was prepared in this way, there was only one short sentence written down there.

— Capacity of the God’s Sanctuary: The proof was completed, and concluded. This soul will never grow anymore.

That was said to be Soma’s skill.

Both present and future, altogether.

There was no swordsmanship, spearmanship, archery, martial arts, and not even magic. There was only one meaning for this ambiguous skill, and that was all about Soma’s talent.

Although he had a great name, there was no meaning in that.

She knew such skills existed, but Soma didn’t have it… and that was it.

She wanted to say that it was a mistake.

She also wanted to say that it was a lie.

However, Soma’s Skill Appraiser was an exclusive Skill Appraiser to the Neumont household.

She was also Sofia’s friend and Sofia didn’t suspect her to do such a thing… In other words, it was the truth.

No, she knew that.

Because she knew it, she didn’t want to tell Soma.

Rather than knowing that it had only one meaningless thing, it was better not knowing it, but that probably wouldn’t be enough.

But, even so… yeah, even so.

It didn’t matter who said it, she wanted somebody to say that it was a mistake.

She didn’t even care if Soma was not a genius.

Because it was merely a knothole in front of Sofia’s and Kraus’ eyes.

But this couldn’t be settled just like that.

Conversely, if the Neumont household was an ordinary household, they might be able to do something.

In particular, it wasn’t necessary to have skills to live. Even without skills, there were a lot of jobs they could do.

In the first place, not all talent would become skills, and there were cases of those talentless having skills.

It was possible to wield a sword even without the swordsmanship skill, and there was also one with good memory without an instantaneous memorization skill.

Supposedly, Soma’s talent would be like that. Hence, it might be possible to convince him.

But the Neumont’s household was the household of a Duke.

Moreover, it was the head of the four Duke households.

To put it even more, or even more than that, he had the blood of Sofia and Kraus.

For the eldest son to have no talent — he would not be able to learn even the basic skills, and that matter couldn’t be allowed.

The conversation with the past Soma was suddenly revived in Sofia’s mind.

That was when she heard about what Soma would like to do in the future.

Of course, he was saying that he wasn’t sure whether he could the learn skills he wanted, but—

— I want to use magic.

— Aah, if that’s the case, it’s alright… I will diligently teach you that.

The day of having a laugh after saying so would never come back.

The future they imagined won’t come.

No, on the other hand—

“…Haaa. If there was to be such a thing, I wouldn’t really want to have such blood or titles…” (Sofia)

Instead of lamenting, everything was already too late.

Thinking about the future, Sofia let out a heavy sigh again.