CH 123

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-First day of the training. 

“Today, I will have you use this to train on Order.” (Souma)

Saying this, I hand Ringo the perfect item to do mappings or leave adventure notes: the beloved Notepad.

I tried using it in front of Ringo who was tilting her head in silence. 

I opened a random page from the notepad and Order the sentence. 

Letters appeared from the opened notepad page. 

[Today, try using this to practice Order.]

Ringo was taken aback by those letters that were written.

Aside from writing with a pen directly, you can also write in this notepad by using Order while holding it. 

Looks like she finally understood that this is used to train in using skills. 

I have already explained to her that Order is a required technique to use skills. 

I am the only one in this world using Order for skills, but I purposely hid that fact. 

There’s no need to give her unnecessary information that would just confuse her. 

Ringo received the notepad fearfully, poked it nervously for some reason, and I taught her how to use it. 

That said, you just have to Order the notepad, so there’s nothing grandiose about it though. 

The issue is that the ‘just have to Order’ part is what’s difficult. 

As explained before, Order is a command you give to the computer in a VR space, and refers to the operation of sending the image and letters in your head for the VR machine to read. 

This is a technique that anyone can learn, and more than half of modern Japanese people can use it without any issues. However, it is said that elderly people or people without any connection to VR find it difficult to learn this. 

There’s even books at bookstores with titles like ‘Entering VR after your 50s’ or ‘VR command training you can do in 5 minutes’. 

I am one of the children that was raised while interacting with VR machines, which is basically called the New VR Era. Of course, Order is as natural as breathing for me, but…

“U-Uhm, there’s a trick to Order. Ah, right! You would first picture the letters in your head vividly, and then send that image to the VR machine—” (Souma)

“…Beearu?” (Ringo)

“Ah, sorry. Not VR machine, u-uhm…” (Souma)

It instead makes it difficult to explain to others how to Order. 

It is something that I could do since the moment I was aware, so I don’t have any experience about working hard to learn it. 

However, I continued explaining while trying to sustain it. 

“…And so, it is apparently better to use a short term that you are familiar with for your first try.” (Souma)

Anyways, I tried telling Ringo all the information I know. 

“…Okay, I will try.” (Ringo)

I was relieved by Ringo nodding obediently and…

“Then, I will go over there.” (Souma)

I said that and left the place. 

I do want to look after her the whole time, but I think Ringo won’t be able to concentrate if I am nearby, and I also have a lot of things I have to do. 

It is not only about mastering the 3x speed skills. 

Proficiency increase, level increase; I have to increase all of those even more in order to perform the Demon Lord weakening plan, so I can’t waste a second. 

But after a few hours, I ended up regretting that choice. 

(Uhm…is this really okay…?) (Souma)

I was wondering whether to speak to Ringo or not. 

To my surprise, Ringo has barely moved an inch since then. She has been holding the notepad and standing there. 

It is only at the times when the Butcher showed up that she would assist me as if nothing happened. She does blink, so it is certain that she is alive, but this is clearly not a normal situation. 

Just that, if this is her seriously training her Order, I feel like I shouldn’t get in the way. 

What’s problematic here is that I can’t tell the situation of Ringo at all just from what I can see. 

She looks as if she is really serious here, but it also looks as if she isn’t thinking about anything at all. It could even look as if she is sleeping while standing. She might even be standing there, expressionless. 

I was troubled about what to do, and after watching Ringo for close to a few minutes…

“…Ah.” (Ringo)

Ringo’s mouth moved without previous notice. 

“W-What’s the matter?!” (Souma)

I hurriedly run towards Ringo, and she thrusted the notepad at me. 

There was only one word written at the top left of the completely blank notepad. 

{Souma.}

—2nd day of the training.

Ringo repeated that countless times after that, and once she grasped the trick to it, she managed to properly do Order in various angles. 

It is just that Ringo is still not familiar with Order, so she takes a few seconds to just output the word Souma. 

If Order is required to activate skills, it would be best for it to be as fast as possible, and you must learn to use it at the timings you wish. 

No choice but to get better by repetition here. 

When I told her that, Ringo began to do put her all in her statue-like state as usual. 

The difference being that her progress is clearly being shown in the notepad. 

I checked her state several times, but it really is hard to tell what’s going on inside her head by looking at her. 

It seems like she is concentrating far more than it looks, and even when I got close to her, she wasn’t reacting at all. 

‘In that case, I will peek at her notepad’ -is what I thought with half of the intention being to tease her, but…

{Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma Souma So}

I silently stretched my hand and closed the notepad. 

“…Souma?” (Ringo)

Ringo finally noticed me when I did this, and I said this with a stiff smile.

“Y-You are really working hard there. But it wouldn’t be good training to just use a word that you are familiar with, so try mixing other words in too.” (Souma)

“…Okay, got it.” (Ringo)

I don’t know why, but when I see Ringo obediently nodding like that, I couldn’t help but sweat despite there being nothing to be afraid of. 

—3rd day of training. 

Ringo was again standing there with notepad in hand. 

Considering the last instance, she must be working hard despite how it looks, but I really can’t tell the progress of her training from her appearance. 

And so, I once again moved to the back of the concentrating Ringo and peeked at the notepad…and then got shocked by it. 

The first ones were really cute stuff like food or things associated with it, but…

{Apple Bright Red Tasty Fruit Banana Sweet Yellow Orange I want to eat Delicious Split Hair Like Black Strawberry Red One Bite Cookie Hard Chew Well Pudin Bouncy Trembling Demon Lord Marriage Enemy Butcher Cleaver Minced Meat Tasty Souma Tasty Souma One Bite I want to eat Trembling Souma Chew Well Minced Meat Bright Red Strawberry Fruits Orange Banana Apple Souma Like Marri—}

I am being eaten in the middle!! 

I move my gaze away from the notepad at the unexpected dial up of the bizarre. Even with that, I tried to read what was next and leaned forward but…

“Ah…” (Souma)

Ringo hid the notepad. 

“…You can’t.” (Ringo)

Looking closely, I could tell her face was a bit red. 

It seems like, in Ringo’s eyes, seeing that is not good. Most likely because she is simply spilling out her thoughts here. 

I will just have to pray that what she is trying to hide from me isn’t her desire to eat me. And so, I return to my own work.

—4th day of training. 

Maki contacted us that day, and we left the Deus Plains after a long while. 

I have met my other companions at times to guide them in how to clear the quests, but there’s some that I have to go directly or they can’t be cleared. 

I would like to not move too much until Ringo has finished her training, but there are important quests that won’t show the next quest unless you clear the preceding one, so we can’t leave them for later the whole time. 

I decided to clear them all in one go today. 

However, as I have said before, I have prohibited myself from using skills in order to master skill canceling at 3x speed. 

I still can’t properly use the 3x speed skills, so I have to solve the upcoming quests without skill canceling. 

I was expecting a hard fought battle, but that was unnecessary worry. 

My stats have increased with the seed and the level ups, so I am already at a level where I can overpower all dungeon monsters, and thanks to Ringo stepping forward to defeat the enemies, I didn’t have any troubles defeating monsters. 

We returned to the city faster than scheduled, and we used that extra time to train in the Deus Plains. 

—5th day of training. 

Ringo is standing there again today, but I already know that she is doing her best here. 

I watched over Ringo without any worries. 

When I put it like that, it sounds as if Ringo is the only one working hard, but I have been doing a variety of things in that time too. 

Hitting the Master Torch is a given, but I also defeat the Butcher that comes every now and then together with Ringo, and we are earning levels and Power Seeds with that. My other companions are also doing well while following my instructions. 

And the biggest factor to me becoming stronger, the Incarnation of Fury. 

I have been plainly shown how dangerous this skill is with the battle I had against the Butcher, and it made me feel uneasy, but I can’t avoid it the whole time, so I tried using it after confirming there’s no enemies around. 

3 times the speed really is close to the limit of the processing power of a human…or at least mine. 

Maybe because there was the lack of tension from not having any enemies around, I was flustered by such speed, but it only happened the second time I used it. 

Right now I don’t get flustered simply because I used Incarnation of Fury. 

I am getting slightly used to the 3x speed skills, and I first tried acclimating myself by practicing with the relatively easier Long Cancel of Midare Sakura. I now can succeed in canceling relatively low difficulty skills at a decent frequency. 

This day, confidence budded in me that training really did equate to growth. 

—6th day of training. 

Today I will finally be teaching Ringo skills. 

If we are going to be using Order, then the activation of the skill itself will be simple. 

Ringo easily utilized a skill to the point that it was baffling for a spectator. 

But that’s when the real deal begins. 

I lend Ringo the Master Torch, and instructed her to use Step as much as possible and hit Master Torch when she is free. 

It is the route of raising movement skills and weapon skills to increase the skills you can use. 

Ringo chose the Wakizashi as her main weapon, so she raised her Dagger and Ninja Sword proficiency. 

It is not like I didn’t think it overlapped a bit with Ina, but it would be best to train what is easier for her. 

She didn’t use the Look-Mari Dojo, so she couldn’t go all the way to learning Ground Compression, but Ringo learned Jump and High Step that day, and managed to obtain most of the Dagger and Ninja Sword skills. 

—7th day of training. 

I judged that she has obtained the necessary skills to a certain degree, so we enter the skill cancel training. 

I properly explained how to do the canceling, but Ringo had a hard time with this. 

It is understandably difficult to do consecutive Orders, moreover, while timing them. 

Because of stamina issues, it is not possible to train much in this consecutively. 

I decided to utilize that open time to have her train with elemental weapons to increase her proficiency in the 4 elements, so she can use magic too. 

In the end, Ringo barely succeeded in canceling that day, and the few times she did succeed were mostly by coincidence, but I didn’t worry about that. 

She has managed to reach the foundation that is activating things with Order. 

Everything else is just a matter of time. 

I am also increasing my success rate in the 3x speed skill canceling. 

The completion of the training is close at hand. 

—8th day of the training. 

Something shocking happened. 

To my surprise, Ringo showed me the cancel of Step to High Step which is a basic of canceling. 

“W-Wait a moment! Please do it once more! Once more!!” (Souma)

But I couldn’t believe what I saw before me. 

Ringo abided and showed herself succeeding in canceling Step to High Step again. 

However, I still couldn’t believe what I was witnessing here. 

Cause you know…skill canceling is an advanced technique in Nekomimi Neko. 

Even as someone who can use Order, it still took me quite a lot of time to learn it. 

And yet…and yet…

“…S-So disgusting.” (Souma)

It looks disgusting! Like really disgusting!! 

No, calling it disgusting isn’t accurate. 

It is not like it makes me want to puke or am disgusted by it on a physiological level. 

But it is like ‘Eh? The body doesn’t normally move like that’ or ‘That’s physically impossible!’. I couldn’t help but think that. 

NPCs don’t use skill canceling, and videos are in 1st person, so I have never seen the movements of skill canceling so clearly before, but this is unbelievable. 

It really is unbelievable. 

That’s when I noticed the change in Ringo.

“Ah…” (Souma)

I voiced out my thoughts without thinking just now, but is that really okay? 

There’s no questioning about it. Calling a girl disgusting must not be done…

“Ringo?!” (Souma)

After reaching that conclusion, Ringo’s body tilted forward. 

I hurriedly run towards her and catch her body gently. 

“A-Are you okay? Sorry about what I said just now…” (Souma)

It must have been really shocking. She is looking pale here. 

But Ringo squeezed out her remaining strength and told me this with a subdued voice.

“…Souma’s movements…are not even close to this…you know?” (Ringo)

Those were the last words of Ringo that day. 

Ringo lost all strength in my arms. 

Her eyes closed naturally.

“Ringo? Oi, Ringo.” (Souma)

I was flustered by this unnatural sign. 

I desperately shake her body. 

Even with that, Ringo didn’t react. 

“Don’t joke around like this.” (Souma)

No matter how much I pleaded, she didn’t answer. 

Seeing her like this, I understood what was going on. 

“Say something. Please…” (Souma)

The face of Ringo looks the same as usual. 

Even so, those lovely lips won’t be stringing any words, and her beautiful blue eyes won’t be shining anymore when looking at me. 

“Hey, please… I implore…” (Souma)

I couldn’t give up no matter what and continued calling her over and over, but they all ended up being fruitless.

“Ringo. Hey, Rin…go…” (Souma)

In the end, Ringo didn’t open her mouth again…

…Ringo was completely pissed and ignored me the whole day. 

—9th day of training. 

The destined morning came. 

“…Souma.” (Ringo)

I shook my head at Ringo who was looking at me in worry. 

“I want to do this on my own at the end. I won’t push myself like the first time, so please watch over me from afar.” (Souma)

“………Okay, got it.” (Ringo)

After a slightly long silence, I saw Ringo leaving, and I faced forward. 

What stood in front of me was the already familiar white giant. 

(Now that I think about it, you have been looking after me for a good time now.) (Souma)

How long has it been since the first time I encountered him because of the bug?

This King Butcher might actually be the monster I have fought the most since coming to this world. 

“But that ends today.” (Souma)

It is time to show the results of my training and the amalgamation of it all. 

I slowly take a battle stance with Shiranui in order to hold back my surging emotions. 

“…Now then, let’s have the graduation exam.” (Souma)

The King Butcher raised a loud roar as if answering my words.