Chapter 27 - Monster Hunting Event 1

The next day, Cecil woke up with Lucia clinging on to him.

He wasn't surprised since this was a common occurrence back when he was still living with Lucia's family.

They shared the same bedroom and just like this inn, they had different beds. But every single morning Cecil would always wake up and find Lucia clinging on to him.

He was surprised at first, but then thought nothing of it. His little sister, Angelia, also did the same back on earth.

Looking out the window, Cecil sees that it's still a bit dark outside. He turns towards the girl clinging onto him and shakes her gently awake.

"Hey, Lulu... wake up, it's time for morning practice."

"Hrmm... uhnm, five more minutes Cel~..."

'Hah, typical Lulu.'

Seeing that the girl had no plans of getting up anytime soon, Cecil stops shaking her and moves his hand down slowly towards the girl's waist.

Sensing something ominous about to happen to her, Lucia's eyes immediately snap open and she stares back at Cecil. Her golden colored pupils glinted brightly in the dark.

Seeing her stare at him, Cecil stops his hand and stares back at her and asks,

"What is it?"

"...What were you planning on doing just now?"

With his intentions seen through, Cecil decides to play dumb.

"Milady, whatever is it that you are talking about?"

"Gah! I knew it! Whenever, you talk like that, it's only when you try to do something bad to me!"

'Wow, her reaction is almost just like Angelia's'

"Haha, so... are you getting up or not?"

Since Lucia already knew what he was going to do, Cecil brazenly puts his hand on her waist while smiling.

"F-fine, just don't tickle me."

"Hehe, good. We should never neglect our morning training no matter how tired we are."

"...Meanie..."

"Heh, if you just stayed on your bed then you wouldn't need me to wake you up so early~"

"NO!"

With Lucia getting off of him, Cecil puts on his boots and walks over to the basin on a table near the corner of the room.

"Lucia, help please?"

"... Wait a bit."

After combing her hair, Lucia walks up to Cecil, she extends a hand and concentrates. After about 2 seconds, she opens her eyes and say,

"Aqua~"

A small magic circle appeared above the basin. From Cecil's partial mana-eyes, he could see that the mana in the air was flowing into the magic circle after which the mana started transforming.

After the mana was swiftly transformed, water started to gush out slowly from the mana circle. Quickly the basin was filled with water.

"You've gotten better using water now."

"Yup~"

Lucia smiles brightly after receiving his compliment.

"Okay, so le–"

Before Cecil could say anymore he was quickly interrupted by the smiling Lucia.

"Haha, idiot Cel, are you seriously going to make a lady wait for you?"

"...Lady's first."

"Glad you understand."

Lucia washes her face first. After doing a quick wash, she empties the water into the sink next to the table and fills it up once more with water.

"I'll wait for you outside."

"Okay."

An hour later, after finishing up their morning training, the duo goes and takes a proper bath in the inn's public bath area.

Then they quickly have breakfast and hurry out the city gates.

They head towards the ranch on the outskirts of town and feed Silver the food they ordered back at the inn.

"Silv, we're going to go back and meet up with our temp party. We'll come back to pick you up when we go out for the hunting event."

"Cel, you wait here with Silv. I'll go and meet up with Milly and the rest and pick you both up later~"

"Eh... okay? You sure, Lulu?"

"Hehe, don't worry so much~. Silv's probably real lonely here by himself."

"... Alright."

"The event starts at noon, so I'll come pick you up around that time~"

'What's with her all of a sudden?'

Lucia was already walking back to the town while Cecil was thinking. Normally the two would be inseparable so Cecil found it weird that she left him like that.

'It's probably a girl thing.'

"Hey pal, let's go kill some time in the forest after you eat okay?"

"Rawr!"

Silver responds with a positive bark.

After eating, the two head towards the forest close to the ranch. Cecil heard from the ranch master that although that part of the forest is closer to the town, it didn't mean that it wasn't dangerous.

Actually, the reason why the administrators of the town built the ranch so close to the forest was to also act as a barrier and defense in case any stray monster came out of the forest.

'Well, at least we'll get some exercise after our meal.'

*************

THWACK CRACK

In the forest, a boy was currently in combat with an ape-like monster.

The ape monster had barbed spikes that were spread all over the back of its body. It had sharply curled claws that were slashing towards the boy, threatening to disembowel him.

Seeing the claws incoming, the boy quickly stepped forward and closed the distance between the ape and his body. With his body close to the ape, he extended a hand and smashed at the wrist of the ape.

Seeing how the boy was doing something so foolish as to come closer to it. The ape was excited and didn't pay any mind to the boy's fist that accelerated towards its wrist.

The ape instead tried to slash at the boy with his other hand, but before it could do so, the ape's body suddenly went rigid and it quickly raised a pain-filled howl.

The ape looked down at its wrist and saw that it was bent back in a way that it wasn't supposed to be. The small boy had snapped the wrist of the ape with a seemingly light punch. The ape first felt pain and confusion. Then it morphed into rage.

It quickly looked down at the boy and froze a little bit in fear.

What it saw, were apathetic, gold eyes that gazed back. Right then and there, the ape felt a looming sense of death just by staring at the small creature's gold eyes.

After striking at the ape's wrist, the boy leaned in with his shoulder and knocked the ape back.

After a small knock-back he pulls back his fist and directs a punch at the ape's abdomen.

BAM

Like a kite with its string cut, the ape flew back and smashed into a tree. It was fully embedded into the tree with all its limbs broken and blood seeping out of its orifices.

'Nice. It worked!'

This boy was of course, Cecil.

After the two had gone into the forest, they went deeper and started fighting a pack of Barbed Apes.

Finishing his fight with the monster, Cecil takes a look around and sees Silver walking up to him.

"Good work Silver."

"Rawr!"

Taking a glance behind Silver, Cecil sees over a dozen corpses of Barbed Apes on the ground. Some were disemboweled and others were split in twain.

He looks back and sees his handiwork, there were only half a dozen spread around on the floor, up on the branches or embedded into the surrounding trees.

What they all had in common was that at least 2 or more of their limbs were broken and they had blood leaking from their orifices.

"Being able to incorporate a little bit of mana into my attacks really works wonders! There's no way I could have done this back on Earth, haha!"

It was such a scary scene surrounding the pair, but all that it earned was a light laughter from the boy.

Looking up at the rising sun, Cecil estimates that it's been at least an hour since they've gone into the forest.

"Silv, let's head back. We've done enough exercise and experimenting. We won't need to be too worried hunting in the event. Besides, if Lucia doesn't see us at the ranch by the time she gets back there... she's probably gonna chew us up."

"Raaah!"

Giving a spirited bark, Silver leans down a bit to let Cecil jump onto his back. Confirming that Cecil was holding tightly onto him, Silver starts dashing straight for the exit of the forest heading back to the ranch.