Mage vs. Great Mage (1)

-This child will surely become a Great Mage who surpasses me.

That was what Count Ionel casually tossed out as he looked down at Edwin Belka on the boy's fifth birthday.

Those words remained in Edwin's mind even now, as he approached his seventeenth birthday.

They were especially precious because they were the first and last words of praise he had ever heard from his father, a man obsessed with magic and devoid of familial affection.

Of course, Edwin was well aware that he had been born with extraordinary talent.

There was a reason people said that bloodline and talent were everything in magic.

But the path to pursuing truth was never an easy one.

As one studied magic, one would occasionally run into an enormous wall blocking the way, and at such times, it was only natural to doubt one's own talent.

Whenever that happened, recalling the words his father had left him filled him with a strange confidence.

Obstacles of this caliber hardly felt like obstacles at all...