Chapter 105: Training the prince (2)

"Graouh. (Just so you know, my Cranberry is set on taking over the world using the system.) Graough! (Your dream isn't even in the same realm!) Graough. (But you get a passing grade for trying.)"

The eternal servant laughed with his head up high.

"Graough. (Alright, the chat over, try to hit me again.) Graough...? (Maybe try thrusting...?)"

But almost instantly he stopped and pushed his hand forward to demonstrate the suggestion.

"Oh? Are we actually going to do some real training?"

Roan's eyes lighted up.

"Graough? (Huh? I'm not acquainted with any weapon other than the high-heels, though?)

Zombie only tilted his head in utter confusion.

The blue undead was lent to the prince as a training dummy, not a tutor. What was he supposed to teach the prince? How to get hit or how to use a strong kick to outspeed even the highest level charge and match blink? Or maybe cut monsters and people in two using just the high-hills?

That would require both overlevel skill and the leg power affinity, which the prince possessed neither, at least for now.

"Graough! (Just hit me!)"

"Alright!"

The annoyed Zombie hit his exposed stomach and Roan correctly read it as a signal and thrust the massive weapon at the eternal servant.

*clang*

The metal let out a pitiful sound when it met with the blue skin and instead of piecing through, or even scratching it, it bent and cracked.

"Gah!"

Not to mention that the prince put enough force into the thrust that he ended up pushing himself out of the carriage's roof and rolled on the road while his armor clanked pitifully.

*WHAM*

"..."

"Whoa! Hold up! The prince had fallen again!"

Zombie looked after him and shrugged his shoulders as if nothing happened, but the noise caused by the Roan's fall alarmed Shanks and Uresha who promptly stopped the carriage.

"What the actual fuck? Again?"

Lairs popped out of the carriage and approached the blond prince.

"Holy shit, he got knocked the fuck out! Must have fallen on his head in a pretty shitty way. How fucking unlucky..."

She reported after carefully checking up on the patient.

"Haa... can you heal him?"

Cranberry leaned out from the inside without actually getting out and asked in an annoyed voice.

"Yes, but also no... fuck...  the bruises and the bleeding are fucking easy, but he surely got a concussion. My healing spells' levels are too fucking low to be able to deal with that in an instant."

Lairs shrugged her shoulders while Uresha picked the unconscious prince up and carried him to the carriage.

"If I was a real fucking healer it would be no problem, but I've only recently picked up the white magic... fuck, why didn't we hire a healer, again?"

Lairs started explaining herself, even though no one had any problem with her skill levels and got angry all by herself in the middle of the said explanation.

"Lai-lai, relax. We'll just call it a day and try to find an inn. How does that sound to you, young lady?"

Rotte said to Lairs and pitched up the idea to Cranberry while helping Uresha lay down the prince on the seats.

"Fine by me, we are ahead of the schedule anyway."

Cranberry agreed casually.

"...! Well... fuck... sure, why not?"

For a second time it looked like Lairs was going to continue arguing, but then she frowned, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and ended up nodding.

It seemed that the Dandelions have found a new way to calm Lairs down.

Now, whenever Rotte called her Lai-lai, the elven mage's would mellow out and her mood would instantly improve by a few magnitudes making her way more agreeable.

"Zombie, get down here now."

Cranberry waved her hand through the door to get Zombie's attention.

"Hey! Young lady, with your puppet in here, it will get really fucking cramped in here. Maybe he should stay up there?"

Lairs sighed squeezing herself between the unconscious prince and the wall.

Instead of answering Cranberry stood up from her seat as when Zombie showed up, she pointed him at her old spot.

As soon as he sat down, she promptly sat in his lap and leaned back on his chest with a satisfied expression.

"Graough? (Do you need to cool down, master?)"

Zombie groaned tilting his head with a happy, puppy-like smile.

"Yeah... traveling in this heat is the worst..."

Cranberry answered him with a tired voice.

As she did, Zombie put his right arm on her stomach and his left hand on her forehead.

"...haa..."

Cranberry melted from satisfaction and closed her eyes.

Rotte and Lairs looked at each other but held back the comments.

Enough said that such familiarity with one's familiar was very uncommon...

"Lairs, say, we're around the Envys' territory, will you be okay?"

Cranberry asked lightheartedly without opening her eyes.

"...!"

But the effect her words had on the elf was rather unexpected.

Lairs flinched and became pale as a sheet.

She clenched her fists on her knees and straightened her back while staring at Cranberry with a mixture of fear and anger.

"Why the fuck...? What do you mean, young lady...?"

She asked doing her best not to sound shaken.

"Ha? Oh, because there's all those gossips and rumors about Envys' kidnapping elves to steal their good looks. Nothing was confirmed, and every elf straight up denied Envys' involvement when it came to family members going missing, so it's just a superstition, but I've heard that elves are very much against Envys' and vice-versa."

Cranberry shrugged her shoulders while observing Lairs from under the barely open eyelids.

"...fucking rumors...?"

Lairs's body shook from the barely contained anger.

For a second it seemed like she wanted to say something, but it seemed like her body gave up on her and just leaned back in her seat and put her legs up on Rotte's knees.

"Yeah, we elves just can't stand those fuckers, they are making life difficult for us whenever they can..."

Lairs sighed and complained.

Though honestly, that line sounded as if she was forced to say it and not like something honest.

"Any-fucking-way, it's not like we're going to meet any of those Envy fuckers in some random inn in the outskirts of their territory, right?"

She let out an awkward laugh, trying to lighten up.

"Of course not, Lai-lai, we would have to be as unlucky as this guy."

Rotte nodded, following up on the mediocre joke and pointing at the knocked-out prince.