Beryl Gardinant is living out a quiet retirement as a sword instructor in a rural backwater, sure his glory days are behind him, when a former pupil turns up with an offer that reshapes his life: special instructor to the Liberion Order of Knights. The move to the capital reunites him with old students who now command that order, serve as a court mage, and rank among the highest adventurers alive, none of them willing to let their teacher fade into obscurity. This is the source novel behind the manga and the anime.