CH 117

Episode 117 – A New Training Method

From the time that I started to learn how to brew potions from the grandma, about 3 months had passed. As for my progress on potion brewing, I was able to brew Recovery Potions on my own, and I even succeeded in brewing a Magic Potion the other day, although I still needed the grandma’s supervision.

Every day was a lot of fun, since I was able to see the grandma in good spirits and have engaging conversations with her, but I was also able to rest my body while I was learning how to make potions. It took a lot of brainpower to memorize the recipes and the procedures, but I had never had such a blissful time in my life before.

Also, it was rather unexpected to me that the grandma’s teaching style was actually very gentle, constantly giving positive reinforcement, which made me feel good. I totally thought her twisted personality would come out when it came to teaching, but instead she was always smiling kindly as she taught me.

I couldn’t help but imagine that if my place of employment had been Elf’s Tears instead of the Healer’s Guild, I could have been living a relaxed and enjoyable lifestyle where I would help the grandma run the store while brewing potions just like this… I felt a bit lonely when I realized that these days would be coming to an end soon. Based on what we had agreed on, we would stop the lessons for the time being after she finished teaching me how to this potion brewing method that was able to greatly weaken the bitterness of plants.

In regards to swordsmanship, thanks to Kirty continuing to teach me in the morning and the evening for the past three months, aside from the downward slash, I was able to properly learn the diagonal slash, the sweeping slash, the reverse slash, the uppercut, and the thrust. Now that the basics were drilled into me, I was able to wield my sword just as well as everyone else, which meant I could now devise and execute proper strategies during sword fights.

Because of this, the day before yesterday when we were on a plant gathering quest commission, I scored my first victory against Lyra during our mock battle tournaments, shocking everyone in [Iron Gear]. I thought it would be difficult to win because I wasn’t the only one working hard; everyone from [Iron Gear] was also growing quickly. But being able to pull off even one victory made me feel more confident about the fact that I was getting stronger.

Yesterday after coming back from the plant gathering quest commission, when I told Kirty about my victory, she had grinned at me and told me to come the next morning with my full gear instead of just the wooden sword.

She didn’t tell me the reason why, but I followed her instructions and woke up a bit earlier to equip my full loadout and make some preparations. After that, I waited for Kirty in front of the rundown inn. She showed up, although she was a bit later than usual.

Also… Kirty’s appearance was different. Instead of her usual helmet and armor, she was wearing ordinary civilian clothes. She was sporting a pair of straight black satin pants, which were complemented nicely with a stylish white sleeveless blouse, accentuating her originally beautiful looks. Moreover, instead of tying her hair up in a bun as usual, her pretty blackish-blue hair was let down as it cascaded down her back, making her look like a different person altogether.

Rather… since she was always wearing armor, I never knew what clothes she was wearing underneath it, so, well… I wasn’t sure where to put my eyes.

“Morning, Lewin.” (Kirty)

“G-Good morning. Hey… Kirty-san! What’s up with this? Your outfit!” (Lewin)

No, no, wait. Regardless of whether she looks good or not, why is she dressed like this?

“Er, no, I mean, why are you dressed like this? What happened to the armor from the Knights of the Royal Order that you always wear?” (Lewin)

“This is my first day off work in a long time, so I thought it might be nice to do a kind of special training. These clothes are meant for going out, you know?” (Kirty)

“Clothes for going out… and special training, you say?” (Lewin)

Feeling a little hopeful about what she said, I went along with her, but… the place she brought me to was a massive forest beyond the outskirts of Grezesta. If I remember correctly, this place was Nava Forest, the place where I tried to go for plant gathering one time.

I thought this was the forest where the members of [Iron Gear] said there were the B-class Brutal Kongs in the area, so I wondered if it was okay to be coming here for what felt like a picnic… Kirty had a rapier strapped at her waist, but, aside from that, she was totally not dressed for a battle. Which meant… was I supposed to be the one fighting then?

“Okay. Here is probably good for now. Now that we’ve come this far, you probably already guessed what I’m going to have you do, right?” (Kirty)

“Umm… fighting monsters…perhaps?” (Lewin)

“Fufufu, correct. Now that you’ve been with me for a few months, it looks like you’re already catching on to how I think.” (Kirty)

After I guessed correctly, Kirty looked pleased for some reason, while I felt the complete opposite. While I had fought several battles against Goblins and Kobolds and a few Angry Wolves, most of the battles I had fought were in places with good visibility against lone stragglers. As much as possible, I didn’t want to be fighting in this forest that was crawling with monsters and had poor visibility. Besides, since it was Kirty we were talking about here, she might make me try to do something crazy.

“Well, the only things you could do in a forest are gathering plants and herbs or hunting monsters after all.” (Lewin)

“Fufu, that’s true. Well, as for what we’re doing here, I wanted to have you acquire even more experience. Now that you’ve already mastered the basics, I was thinking that it was time for you to move on to the next step of fighting in real combat, where death is always a possibility.” (Kirty)

“So that’s why you said to fight monsters?” (Lewin)

“That’s right. In fact, although fighting against another human is the best way of gaining experience, it’s rare to run into a situation where you’ll kill another human. Since you’ve already fought some monsters, I was thinking it would be good for you to stack up even more experience against them.” (Kirty)

I see. In other words, she wanted to bring me along to fight monsters in order to help me reach the next stage of growth. If this was what Kirty decided was best for me, then I had no choice but to prepare myself for it.

With the absence of [Iron Gear]’s escort, which I had grown used to having during a fight, I would feel a bit lost for sure. But with Kirty here, there shouldn’t be any real danger, so all I had to do was focus on hunting monsters without having to think about too much.

To this day, I felt that nothing could go wrong as long as I just followed what Kirty said. Even though I had my concerns, I decided to wholeheartedly trust in her with this.