Volume 2 - CH 170

The Adventurer’s Guild rents the training ground ……, or examination hall, which is to start a mock battle between me and Yurie.

In order to avoid being seen playing our hands, we had all the observers come out to watch us.

Although, Jigul and Rose are observing from the spectator’s seats.

Yurie’s weapon is a huge battle axe.

As for me on the other hand, I use a Hakuryuzen as my primary and a KageOrochi as side arm.

I can’t do anything about my automatic skills, despite the fact that I must not use any skill, and so I asked the audience to tolerate that.

I was told that Yurie also had the automatic skill, so it was mutually agreed upon.

I pulled out my Hakuryuzen and Yurie stood with her battle-axe on the ground.

“I thought you’d say no, but …… I’m surprised you decided to take the offer.”

“Tch! I’m not going to let you beat me!”

“I see, so we’ll just call it that then.”

I still think Yurie is not being honest.

What do you call a person like this …… hmmm …… tsu…… tsun?

Nevermind.

But …… it’s not good to take that huge battle axe head on.

Basically, it would be better to avoid it or just parry it.

If you take it head on, the sword might be damaged.

“Alright, are you both ready?”

“Yea”

“I’m ready.”

The judge is left to Rose.

The conditions for concluding the battle were that the opponent must either be knocked unconscious or surrender.

When Yurie and I saw Rose raise her hand, we readjusted our weapons and held them.

“Battle Start!”

I had decided to wait and see what would happen, but Yurie seemed to be in the same boat, and neither of us made a move.

I am not very good at aggression, but this time I thought it would be a good idea to try something I am not used to.

At any rate, it didn’t matter whether I lost or won the match this time.

Lowering my sword to my side, I approached Yurie with my light footsteps.

Yurie is still not moving, so she is probably waiting for my attack.

If that is the case, then I will do a little trick.

I raised the tip of the sword, which had been lowered to the side for a moment, and informed Yurie that I was going to cut in from this direction.

If I use my eyes and the tip of my sword, the other party will somehow sense it.

However, the problem is not to make it too big, and just a momentary flick of the sword is all it takes.

Yurie seemed to sense it and moved her battle-axe a little.

But that’s what I had been waiting for.

I immediately turned my body halfway around, turned my wrist, and changed my attack to one from the opposite direction.

By twisting my body and using it to lash the sword to the side, a great centrifugal force is formed and a powerful attack can be unleashed.

Yurie saw this immediately and avoided it by leaping backwards widely.

Only the sound of the wind cutting hard passed through.

Since she was waiting for me, I might have been able to hold her down a little longer until the other side made a move.

“That sword of yours …… is quite a piece of work.”

“You can tell? It has a name engraved on it. The name is Hakuryuzen, but I’ve only cut Red Boar with it …… I haven’t had a chance to test its sharpness.”

“I should have brought a more decent weapon with me. ……”

Yurie looked at her battleaxe and poked it with a thump.

Then she slung her battle-axe over her shoulder and took a broad stance.

“You don’t use those head splitter skills this time, do you?”

“Of course not.”

“Well then, don’t get hurt with this!”

Yurie lunges at me in the same stance as it is.

It would be safe to evade that attack, but I’m a little tempted to test this sword a little to see how far it can go.

So I think I will try to surpass Yurie’s attack in a simple way.

Yurie’s battle axe, held in the upper stance, swung down at me with tremendous force from above my head.

I might be able to avoid the attack if I tried, but even Yurie would not be that naive.

She might be aiming for a follow-up attack when I evade her, or she might be aiming for this attack in the first place.

If that is the case, let’s take her by surprise.

But it is difficult to outwit a swinging down attack with a swing up from the lower level.

Besides, my weapon is a three-foot sword,……, and I can’t swing it like a golf club because the ground is in the way.

And thus.

“KageOrochi, It’s showtime.”

Holding the Hakuryuzen with reversed left hand, drop it into the left side grip.

With the open right hand, hold the hilt of the KageOrochi, and at the right moment, grasp it in the right hand, and strike the hilt against the side of the battle axe to deflect its trajectory just a little bit.

That was my intention. ……

Gachiiin!

“!!?”

The battle axe fled from Yurie’s hand and flew away.

I was surprised at the unexpected situation, but I felt sorry for my opponent to stay here.

So, without any restraint, I thrust the hilt of the Hakuryuzen in my left hand toward Yurie with all my might.

It hit her in the abdomen.

Yurie, who was attacked by the momentum of the blow, fell to the ground with a frown on her face.

“Guhaaaa…”

“I’m sorry… I went a little too far.”

It’s weird …… I was going to shift the trajectory a bit and stick it in the ground, but …… why did it blow away?

“I-, it’s over …… I think Ouren-san wins this one …….”

“Nii-san is awesome ……. But why did he do the spinning technique …… he told me not to do that. ……”

In the meantime, …… yes, let’s just ignore what Jigul said and make her some recovery water and let her drink it.

There may be some damage to her internal organs,…….

While I was doing this, Rose and Jigul came running up to me and started worrying about Urie.

“Yurie, are you okay?”

“Why …… is my weapon getting blown away? …… Its weight is over 70 kilograms you know….?” (154 lbs)

“Why the hell are you carrying around that thing!”

She was swinging something like that at me, huh……

Imagining that is crazy scary, but I’m seriously glad I wasn’t injured …….

If I hadn’t been able to blow that thing off, I would have been seriously injured. ……

Anyway, that aside.

A promise is a promise, so I ask her to take Jigul as an apprentice.

When I told her that, Yurie nodded, not with a displeased look on her face, but for some reason with a happy look on her face.

“Ew, wtf, that’s creepy.”

“HHA!? I’m really going to slap you, you bastard. ……”

“Come on, Yurie, easy, okay?”

Mm, as I thought, Yurie looks better this way.

Well, that’s aside, I have a few questions.

“Hey, why were you hesitant to take Jiggle as your apprentice earlier?”

“Oh, ……, Yurie is.”

“Wait, you’re going to tell him that?”

“I’m not sure how to explain it. I think we can trust Ouren-san.”

Yurie was very reluctant to talk about it, but Rose did not stop.

She said that Yurie had taken on one apprentice when she had just become an A-rank adventurer.

It was a boy exactly the same age as Jigul.

Since they were both battle-axe wielders, it was easy to teach him, and the boy quickly rose to the rank of C adventurer.

Rose also knew the boy and had gone with him on some of his requests.

However, the boy had passed away.

The bandit had attacked Yurie, who had been distracted by the fact that it was a C-rank request.

The boy apparently defended Yurie, and Yurie defeated the bandit, but the boy did not have recovery skills, and he died as the result.

Yuriye who had lost her beloved apprentice due to her own carelessness continued to weep loudly out of character.

Since then, Yurie has never taken an apprentice, and until now, she and Rose have been working together.

After that, for a while, Yurie became unable to trust men.

She appears to be cured now, but when she recalls the memory of that time, the word ” rejection” comes to her mind.

“That’s why Yury stopped taking apprentices to prevent that from happening again.”

“Then why are you fine with my offer now?”

“You know, I’ve had a lot of things happen to blow my mind. High-ranked adventurers have to train low-ranked adventurers. Most of us do some sort of joint training.”

“…… that’s not the only reason, is it?”

When Rose said this to Yurie, she looked down and began to talk in a hushed tone.

“…… I heard the kid say it was the last thing he ever said to me. I was crying and didn’t hear it, but Rose remembered it well. [Please raise up adventurers who can protect everyone. You can do it.] That’s what he said.”

Yurie sounded like she was about to cry as she got to the end, but she finished her words clearly.

I thought she was a clumsy person, but she was a good instructor.

If this is the case, it seems there is nothing more for me to worry about.

“Then you have to live up to it, don’t you?”

“…… yeah.”

“You know, if you’d been a little more honest, you wouldn’t have taken that blow from me.”

“Shut up …….”

If she can talk to me again without diminishing me, then I guess I’m good to go.

However…… perhaps it was a long time ago that she heard about the boy’s will…………. why didn’t she take an apprentice until now?

If the decision had already been made, it should have been possible to have an apprentice before Jigul. ……

Let’s ask them anyway.

“Rose. When did you tell Yurie about the boy’s will?”

“When we reached the S rank,  …… roughly two years ago.”

“Did anyone want to be her apprentice up until then?”

“Ah,…… that’s the thing,……. Most of them were eyeing Yurie or for the benefits of S rank, and their motives were in shambles,……. I’ve been waiting for a boy Jigul.”

“I’m not sure if there are any adventurers here that are nothing but scum.”

I didn’t want to hear the last information.

“I mean, did it go on and on and you began pointing your blades at men?”

“No! That was! My bad……”

“You shouldn’t have raised an axe in the first place…….”

“Because you smell like a monster.”

Gulp.

That”s not far off the mark ……, no, it’s actually on point……

If that’s the reason why she came at me, well, that’s understandable.

Well, that’s why you can’t get an apprentice for two years. …… Perhaps there was a problem with Yurie’s personality as well.

I understand that Yurie has a stubborn personality, but from a child’s point of view, she is a scary adult.

It would take a lot of courage to approach such a scary adult and ask her to be her disciple, even if there was someone who had ambitions.

Well, I guess that’s something we’ll have to talk about later.

“Come on, don’t cry for too long. Say hello to your new apprentice. And Jigul, too.”

“I’m not crying!”

“Uh, um…….”

Jigul stepped forward as if he had made up his mind and made eye contact with Yurie, who was sitting down.

“I am Jigul, an E rank adventurer. I don’t remember my last name. I’m not very good at everything, but please teach me a lot of things from now on. My best regards.”

Jigul bowed deeply.

I was a little surprised that he could speak so neatly, but perhaps this was thanks to Irza.

Yurie wiped her face with her sleeve and then looked at Jigul’s face and finally introduced herself.

“I’m Yurie Sertol, S-rank adventurer, From Thunder Bow. And this is …….”

“I’m Rose Maquarine, also an S-rank adventurer, from the Thunder Bow. Nice to meet you, Jigul-boy.”

“Nice to meet you!”

(I can feel the ARA ARA energy from Rose!)

I think this is the first time I’ve heard their last names somehow.

And while I was thinking that, Yurie glared at me with a fierce scowl.

“There must be a good reason for Jigul to forget his last name……”

“I have to tell you something about these things about me, too. It’s going to be a bit long.”

Then I decided to explain what had happened in the Zenki-village and the Kingdom of Garott.

If I was going to talk about the fact that Jigul was a slave, I would have to explain the origin of the incident.

The three of them were taken aback by my close relationship with the royal family, but they seemed to understand why I had come to this place.

Of course, they didn’t seem to think it was to avert a war.

I explained to them in detail about Jigul, of course.

I had to let them know about it because Jiguru was a victim of the war.

“You …… are definitely not normal.”

“You’d have to be pretty amazing …… to survive a fight with that guy.”

“It’s thanks to Reizen.”

“The fact that he survived that attack is so annoying!”

“That’s all I’m going to say. Well, it’s late in the evening, let’s go out for dinner somewhere, shall we?”

“Haneyasume!”

“Ara, Jigul, you know that place. Shall we go there then?”

“All right, I’ll bring my friend with me. They should be back by now.”

And so we decided to leave the Adventurers’ Guild.

However, we could not find Reizen or Uchikage anywhere, so we decided to have dinner alone this time.

I hope those guys aren’t involved in anything weird….. With this in mind, the day ended.