episode_0044

“So Ayla is paying her own tuition?”

“What is that? To be exact, I have some money saved up, so I use that to pay, and sometimes I earn some pocket money when I have free time.”

“No..”

Mathias opened his mouth wide. That was understandable, because the academy tuition was quite expensive, and when you factor in the various living expenses, it was an amount that a normal ten-year-old kid couldn’t even dream of. That’s why Mathias had to go hungry.

“When I was young, I hated doing housework. Sitting still, picking weeds and drying them, and doing things like that didn’t suit my personality. I would constantly chase after the hunters in the neighborhood and ask them to teach me how to do things, and somehow I learned, and as I hunted around the mountains and caught things, I accumulated money.”

Ayla shrugged her shoulders as if it was nothing, but if you were to say when she was younger than now… maybe when she was around 8 or 9 years old? It’s hard to believe that she’d been hunting in the mountains with a sword in her hand since then.

“But as I was selling leather and meat while wielding a knife so ignorantly, I realized that although homework wasn’t fun, I made a lot more money than hunting. So I made a lot more money by looking for expensive herbs and tea leaves in between hunting. Later, I wasn’t a hunter, I was just a herbalist.”

Well, I guess so..

“So I know the names of most trees, flowers, and herbs. The flower on the right with sharp needle-like leaves is called Ginseng. If you crush the petals and squeeze the juice, it’s good for bug bites. And that tree with many swirls on its trunk, I don’t know the name, but bears really like the sap from that tree, so if you see a wound, you can tell it’s a bear’s area.”

Aila, who opened her mouth as if to explain everything she saw, seemed quite happy. Usually, when a girl explains flowers or trees, she should create a warm and cozy atmosphere, talking about the scent and the meaning of the flowers, but in reality, it was a lecture that was more nutritious than an academy class.

As I watched Mathias, who was so focused that he would have written it down right away if he had only had a pen in his hand, I followed Ayla’s finger and listened to her explanation, and then, unusually, I saw a flower that I knew.

“Aila, that light green flower’s name is Fides, right? I only know the name, though.”

“Huh? Oh, right. You know that, don’t you? It’s not a common flower.”

“Well, there’s someone I like around me.”

Without going too far, it was Yugram’s favorite flower. To be exact, it was a flower that he assumed he would like, and there was always that flower in the vase on Yugram’s desk. So he remembered asking its name one day and having it answer.

“Fides doesn’t really have any special use and is just for ornamental purposes. However, it is said to be very difficult to grow. It is said to be very difficult to transplant if it is not in the place where it first took root. They say that if you plant the seeds in a different place, they die right away. I only heard it, so I don’t know if it is true.”

“Hey..”

There are also many strange flowers. It is somewhat understandable if you think that they will die if you move the soil where they have taken root, but it is hard to imagine that it would be difficult to grow them if you sowed the seeds in a different place.

“By the way, I’ve told you several times, Golden Sand Princess, to call me by my stage name, not my name, right? Just call me Mae-nal-gae.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

Even if you say that, what can I do if it doesn’t stick even after several months?

“Hey you little shits, would you please be quiet?”

When I slowly turned around, I saw that he was an old man who looked like a mercenary. He had a messy, jagged beard, and his tough-looking leather armor had iron plates here and there. He had a sword, of course, but he also had a dagger and a hatchet hanging from his waist. Also, judging from his face, he seemed to be quite upset.

“I don’t know where you girls are from, but you didn’t come here to play?”

It was such a valid point that I couldn’t argue with it.

I glanced around and saw that the other members and knights in the expedition agreed, even though they didn’t show it. ..It seems I was talking too much.

“..I’m sorry. I’ll be careful.”

He nodded briefly and moved to the rear of the expedition with the Isla, telling them to keep small talk to a minimum from now on.

If you think about it, it was natural. We were the only ones laughing and chatting without any tension, while the other knights and mercenaries were literally risking their honor and lives while carrying out their missions.

.

.

.

“Gerard.”

“Yes! Vice-Chief. Did you call?”

As the expedition team finished their march and was clearing out their campsite for the night, Gerard heard a voice behind him, so he immediately stopped what he was doing, turned around, and answered. The man called the vice-captain was wearing armor that looked similar to Gerard’s, but a little better, as if to show the difference in rank.

“From what I heard earlier, it seems like the party recommended by the guild is causing a bit of a commotion. What’s going on?”

“Ah.. I guess they were young girls, so they were talking amongst themselves and a nearby mercenary caught their attention. So they apologized to those around them and moved to the back row.”

“You said they were 2nd year academy students. Aren’t they younger than my daughter? The guild recommended such little kids? Has the guild leader finally lost his mind?”

Gerard was conflicted for a moment about whether he should be honest or not.

“But the skills are real. To my shame, I lost to one of those girls without even being able to properly swing my sword.”

“Hmm… Really? Well, I guess I’ll have to do that much to get a guild recommendation.”

The vice-captain nodded without showing any sign of surprise. In fact, although Gerard was a member of the Knights of the Territory, he was the youngest and his skills were not that great. In fact, he was weak.

Even if they were the same order of knights, there could not be any skill differences between the members. This is because they were not all trained together from birth, but rather they were recruited by those with power or recommendations from each region. It is commendable that Gerard, who was ordinary in terms of talent and origin, worked hard to enter the order of knights, but there were too many geniuses on this continent who could easily surpass that effort.

“It’s not common for someone with that level of talent to come to this academy, so that’s strange. Anyway, don’t worry about it too much. You’ve seen a lot of idiots who took the entrance exams while claiming to be academy graduates. Those girls are just weird, so just focus on your training. ”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Well, I don’t think it’ll work out just because I told you not to worry about it.. Anyway, let’s stop talking here and call the person in charge of the mercenaries to the captain. It’s urgent.”

After a while, the mercenary leader called by Gerard, Norman, entered the tent where the captain and vice captain were. In the world of mercenaries, he was known as a veteran and strong, but he also had an incredible sense of where to live and where to die, so people naturally followed him.

“What’s going on?”

Considering the difference in status, it was a somewhat rude way of speaking, but no one really cared. The captain and vice captain both knew from experience that mercenaries rarely received proper training, so they would not use formal language properly. Rather, it was fair to say that they had put in quite a bit of effort.

“We don’t have much time, so let’s get straight to the point. Didn’t you notice anything strange, Norman?”

“Hmm.. I was wondering if I should say something or not, but I guess I was right since even the reporters felt it.”

“Looks like you’re thinking the same thing, aren’t there too few monsters? ”

The captain and Norman’s faces became serious. In some ways, it may be a good thing that they didn’t encounter any monsters during the march, but if you think about the reason why this expedition started, it wasn’t like that.

The reason this expedition was formed was to ‘exterminate ogres’ as ordered by the lord. In other words, although the exact location is unknown, there are ogres somewhere in the mountain range that the expedition is traveling through, and this fact poses a huge threat to wild animals and monsters in addition to humans.

In fact, there is no other monster in the mountains that can stand up to an ogre. An obvious top predator has appeared. It is common sense for monsters, whose sense of smell and sixth sense are much more sensitive than humans, to run away in a hurry to escape the ogre’s area of activity.

The reason for forming an expedition is also related to that. It is not simply to avoid annoying tasks, but because the secondary goal of this expedition is to completely clean up the low-level monsters that are running away from the ogres. That is why I brought as many people as possible, even if it was a bit rushed and forced, but there were too few battles.

“I also participated in the Ogre Expedition about 10 years ago, but I still remember fighting against so many monsters that I couldn’t even eat properly. I can never forget how scared I was back then, when I was still a kid and couldn’t even wield a sword properly.”

“Something is strange. This is definitely not normal. But there is no way to know what is strange..”

The thought of calling a wizard crossed the captain’s mind, but he quickly dismissed it as nonsense. There was no way those crazy guys would help, and even if they did, he couldn’t even imagine what they would ask for.

“Norman, for now, tell those you trust to keep watch and report anything suspicious, no matter how small. There’s no other way right now. Go ahead. ”

“Yes, I understand.”

As soon as Norman left, the captain took out his writing utensil and began to write a brief report to be sent to the lord. If he entrusted the fastest of the knights to be the messenger, the lord would be informed even if something happened to him.

I wish this was a needless worry, but the uneasiness in the captain’s heart did not easily go away.