Ch.36Corpse Collecting (3)

*

Once again, I slowly opened my eyes to the clear morning of the forest that always lifted my spirits.

After letting out a long yawn and rubbing my stiff eyes, I finally noticed that Silvia wasn’t in the room.

Judging by the sounds coming from outside the room, it seemed she hadn’t left the cabin entirely.

With my mind still foggy, I slowly looked around Silvia’s room and noticed a small potted plant by the window.

“I didn’t know this was here.”

The plant in the pot had withered and died long ago.

It was a bit strange that Silvia, who tended a small garden in front of the cabin, would let a plant die, but growing ornamental plants and crops are different matters.

Perhaps she had started it to ease her loneliness, but when it failed to comfort her heart, she abandoned it.

I slowly got out of bed, opened the door, and stepped into the living room.

“Good morning.”

Hearing the door open, Silvia turned toward me and greeted me.

She was removing the feathers and innards from the goose she had left untouched yesterday.

“Heh… Did you sleep well?”

“Yes, and you?”

“Much better than last time.”

“Hehe, was it too stimulating for Ash last time?”

“…If you know that, don’t do it again.”

I was slightly annoyed, but not in a bad way.

No, I was actually in a good mood.

This morning, Silvia wasn’t putting on that strange family act that had been bothering me for days.

I felt relieved and found myself grinning without realizing it.

“Hehe,”

“…What? Why are you smiling?”

“I just prefer the usual Silvia much more.”

“…Ugh,”

Silvia turned her face away as she spoke.

“Shut up. I was embarrassed too, you know?”

“Then you should have stopped sooner.”

“Let’s just say I was out of my mind.”

She sighed and neatly wrapped the deboned goose in a cloth.

I didn’t bother to respond.

After all, I knew well.

Though she might seem normal on the outside, Silvia was a person who was slightly unhinged.

Considering what she had been through, it was rather remarkable that she maintained her sanity to this extent.

The meat wasn’t deboned particularly neatly.

Alongside the large chunk of meat were small torn pieces scattered here and there.

There was nothing to be embarrassed about.

Neither of us was a professional chef or butcher.

Butchering was also the part I found most difficult in the cooking process.

Not because skinning and removing innards was disgusting, but simply because it was technically challenging.

Of course, I knew many people found the process itself revolting.

That’s probably why butchering was considered a lowly profession.

Fortunately, neither Silvia nor I had much aversion to butchering animals.

I was the son of a chef and of common birth. And Silvia was a former hero who had camped countless times.

A typical noble would probably have been unable to hold back their nausea at the sight of an animal being skinned.

In that sense, both she and I had a slight advantage when it came to adapting to life in this remote area.

I picked up the meat she had prepared and asked:

“What should we have for breakfast?”

“Oh, Ash, don’t use that meat for this morning.”

“Pardon?”

“We’re not going hunting today.”

“Oh, really? Do you have something planned?”

I gently put the meat back down.

She nodded and asked:

“Do you still have the dagger I gave you?”

“Yes, of course.”

I patted my waist to show her.

Since that day when I was chased by the bear, I always wore this dagger at my waist whenever I got dressed.

The forest was unpredictable—danger could arise anywhere, anytime.

Of course, I hadn’t ventured into the forest alone even once since that day.

“Good. Today we’ll train with it.”

“Ah, training!”

Come to think of it, we hadn’t trained since the last test.

There had been some commotion, but I had successfully melted the ice chunks she threw and had become quite accustomed to casting magic quickly.

I could feel myself improving, and it wouldn’t be right to stop training now.

I nodded with an expectant face.

Training with a dagger—what kind of training would it be?

Would I learn a technique like infusing magic into the blade?

Silvia looked at my face, smirked, and said in a casual tone:

“From today, you’ll be sparring with me using that.”

“…What?”

What is she saying?

“Sparring… with you?”

“Yes.”

“…”

Sparring?

Me, who trembled in a tree when chased by a bear, with Silvia, who split that bear in half with a single slash?

“Why?”

“Um, well, I’m a mage… Aren’t we going to continue magic training…?”

That’s right, I’m a mage.

Of course, it was a misconception that all mages were weaklings like me.

Even though theoretical study was important for mages, adventurers typically had some level of physical training.

An adventurer was, as the name suggests, someone who adventured.

Unexplored territories, suspicious underground dungeons, monster lairs.

It was a profession where one risked their life to enter such remote places and made a living from the valuable treasures or materials found there.

And the most common activities for adventurers were ‘walking’ and ‘carrying loads.’

So even mages needed some physical training if they were adventurers.

But that was only for adventurers.

I was not an adventurer.

I was a magic theory specialist who had been cooped up at home, focused solely on research.

And naturally, I had never learned how to fight, let alone fought with my sisters.

“I don’t have anything more to teach you about magic.”

“Huh?”

“Well, I’m not a mage.”

“R-right.”

Silvia wiped her hands, covered in goose blood, with a towel as she spoke.

Until just a moment ago, it hadn’t bothered me, but suddenly the sight of her covered in animal blood seemed frightening.

“Ash, I wasn’t trying to teach you magic; I was trying to teach you how to protect yourself from danger. And to survive in this forest, you need to know how to use your body to some extent.”

Every word she said made perfect sense.

But I still didn’t feel comfortable with the idea.

No, to be honest, I was simply scared.

Even when she gently threw ice at me while I was wearing the bear skin, each hit felt like being struck with a massive club.

With a bit of exaggeration, I’d say the impact was similar to what I felt during the carriage accident when I was thrown around inside the rolling vehicle.

Her strength far surpassed that of an ordinary person.

Her broad shoulders and the lean muscles wrapped around her like armor weren’t just for show.

Seeing me standing there with a reluctant expression, she pulled up the corner of her mouth and said:

“Don’t worry.”

“…Ugh,”

“I won’t kill you.”

“…What?”

Having finished wiping her hands, she picked up the blunt knife she had been using to prepare the goose and cleaned it.

Though I knew Silvia would control her strength, I couldn’t help but be afraid.

I knew that if she wanted to, she could instantly cut me into pieces like the dismembered goose on the table.

Moreover, my weapon was just a dagger.

If it were a longsword, I might at least be able to keep some distance, but with this dagger, I wouldn’t be able to block her attacks.

“Um, Silvia.”

“Hmm?”

“Don’t you have a larger sword?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I was thinking that with just this dagger, it would be difficult to properly counter if animals attacked…”

Silvia looked at me and said:

“First of all, there’s nowhere to get a longsword.”

“…Ah,”

“And you probably couldn’t even swing a longsword properly.”

“Is it that heavy?”

Having never held a sword in my life, it might indeed be heavy for me.

But I remembered that the thin ceremonial swords I had seen before weren’t that heavy.

“A typical longsword weighs about 3 kilograms, and the sword I use is about 8 kilograms.”

“8…?”

I recalled the scene of her killing the bear.

Though I had closed my eyes at the crucial moment and didn’t see it properly, I knew she had split the charging bear in two with a single vertical slash.

Even if I had kept my eyes open, her swordplay would have been too fast to see clearly.

Silvia was swinging an 8kg piece of metal at such speed.

“That’s insane.”

“What?”

“Oh, nothing.”

It seems my thoughts accidentally slipped out.

Fortunately, Silvia was too busy scrubbing the blood off the knife to hear me.

After she finished cleaning the knife, I cautiously asked:

“When will we train?”

She held up the knife she had just cleaned and said:

“Now.”

I had a feeling I was going to end up like that goose.

*

After finishing training, when the sky was covered with a beautiful sunset, I entered the cemetery to tend to Laila’s grave.

Fortunately, apart from some muscle soreness and significant fatigue, I was fine.

I muttered as I rotated my stiff neck from side to side:

“I never thought I’d be so bad at swinging a knife.”

The reason I was unharmed was because I didn’t actually spar with Silvia.

Seeing me awkwardly holding the dagger with an uncertain stance, Silvia sighed and stopped the sparring, saying she might ‘accidentally’ kill me if we continued.

In the end, I spent several hours learning basic stances and how to move my body.

While there wasn’t a specific stance for using a dagger,

there were various theories about foot positioning that allowed for immediate evasion or attack while maintaining vigilance, and other ways to move the body.

Honestly, until now, I had thought that swordsmen and warriors overwhelmed their opponents through instinctive fighting spirit and trained physical strength, but after listening to her explanations and carefully observing her demonstrations, it was somewhat different from what I had imagined.

It was more calculating than it appeared, predicting the opponent’s next move to determine one’s own stance.

At the same time, one had to be mindful of maintaining the correct posture.

The mind was as busy as the body.

Perhaps a fight between two highly trained knights wasn’t simply about measuring which side was stronger, but more like chess, meticulously predicting the opponent’s next move or even several moves ahead.

Silvia confirmed that my thoughts were correct.

She explained that swordsmanship was originally a technique to subdue humans with a sword, so it often doesn’t apply well when hunting monsters or wild animals, but techniques for predicting movements or inducing attacks aren’t exclusive to humans.

In fact, she said that she had induced the bear that day to charge at her.

Despite my initial reluctance, the training turned out to be surprisingly interesting.

“Laila, I’m here… Huh?”

I looked at Laila’s grave marker.

There was a white bird dropping on Laila’s marker.

Having planted many flowers near the grave, bees and butterflies had gathered, and small birds had also flocked to catch these insects.

I sighed and wiped Laila’s marker with a handkerchief, muttering:

“…Well, nothing in this world goes as planned, does it?”

I had planted those flowers thinking Laila would like them, but who would have thought this would happen?

I couldn’t help but chuckle at the absurdity.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to me while cleaning Laila’s marker.

“Wait, come to think of it…”

I paused and looked around.

Among the numerous stone monuments, only Laila’s grave had a wooden marker.

At the time, I had hastily carved it from wood, thinking we would soon leave this forest, but now that I was destined to stay here forever, I could make a proper stone monument for Laila.

“…I should have done better while you were alive. Your brother is so inadequate, trying to make up for it now. Haha…”

I stroked Laila’s clean marker and said:

“I miss you, Laila.”

I resolved to make a proper monument for Laila.

No, not just a monument, but to properly decorate the grave, place a small altar in front, and put grave goods on it…

Wait, grave goods?

I fell into thought.

It was pathetic that I hadn’t thought of this until now.

Grave goods were objects buried with the deceased or placed in front of the grave.

Usually, items cherished by the deceased or mementos that family members wanted to give were chosen as grave goods.

Of course, I couldn’t find items that Laila had cherished now.

But I might be able to find things she had used until the end, or the last gifts she had received from our parents.

“That carriage…”

The carriage we had fled in.

In that carriage, which ultimately overturned and took Laila’s life, there were certainly some belongings.

Things like the ring our father had given us as emergency funds when we fled, or our mother’s necklace.

I didn’t need money now, but there could be no better items for Laila’s grave goods.

“I wonder… if it’s still lying there?”

.