Extra Story: The Bear Accompanies the Novice Adventurers’ Practice

Extra Story:
The Bear Accompanies the Novice Adventurers’ Practice

 

I’D MADE A PROMISE, so it was time to meet up again with Horn. I’d seen her the day before at the Bear’s Lounge and she’d asked me to take a look at her magic. Well, I was curious about whether she had been practicing and improving, so why not?

We promised to meet in the same spot as last time. There was nothing of note there, so it wouldn’t cause any trouble…but I was still in for a surprise.

There was a random dude. A, uh…oh, yeah, his name was…J…Jhin? And they were in the same party.

Horn waved. “See, Shin? She’s here!”

And by Jhin I obviously meant Shin, which was pretty much almost kind of the basically same thing, if you thought about it. Philosophically. But what was he doing here? Maybe he’d come because he was worried I was bullying Horn? I was apparently the bloody bear, if you asked around. I couldn’t blame anybody for being freaked if they thought there was truth to the rumor.

“Ms. Yuna,” she said, “thank you for coming.”

“It was a promise, wasn’t it? So, what’s he doing here? He’s part of your party, isn’t he, Horn?”

“C’mon, Shin.”

Horn pushed J—that is, pushed Shin’s back. “Um,” he said, “can I observe?”

“The magic?”

“Yeah, Horn’s gotten really good at magic, so I wanted to know how you were teaching her. If it’s a secret, I can head home.”

“I don’t mind. I’m not teaching anything significant.” My pedagogy was to go with the flow, man. I had no idea if I was doing it right. I was just teaching the way I’d learned it, and it was working out well enough.

 

I created a small, reinforced mound about a meter high a slight distance away using earth magic, giving Horn something to test herself on.

“Well, then,” I said, walking back up to her, “let’s check your progress. Try some magic on that dirt pile. Go wild.”

“Okay.”

Horn called up her earth magic. She created an earth clod about as big as a baseball in front of her. She made it spin at high speed and sent it flying at the dirt pile. The earth clod sunk straight into the pile of dirt. I could even see the tracks it left behind.

Yeah, she’d really built up the power on that baby. Good on her.

“Thanks to you,” she said happily, “I don’t hold everyone back now.” She looked like she was about to jump up and down, which would’ve—actually, I guess we were pretty much in the middle of nowhere, so I supposed that wouldn’t cause any kind of scene.

“In that case,” I said, “I’ll teach you something practical. If you can do this, I think you can beat some real monsters.”

“Do you really think so?”

“Sure. Not that it’ll be easy, mind you.” I created a thin pole from earth. It was pointed at the end. It wasn’t exactly an arrow so much as a thin, short spear. I made that short spear rotate really fast. Then, when I let it loose, it pierced the small dirt mountain and left a tiny hole.

Horn’s jaw dropped. “Whoa.”

“That’s amazing,” whispered Shin.

“She’s all yours,” I said.

“Um.” Horn stood in front of the dirt pile. “Okay.” Readied herself. “Make a thin pole. That’s first. Then I…yeah, I make the tip pointed like an arrow.”

Thin pole, check. Sharpened point, done.

“Then I make it spin,” she said. Took a breath. “And, um. Okay. Then…then I shoot it.”

Spin, spin, aaaaaand…whump-crack. It hit the dirt mound, but the earth spear shattered.

“Is it the spin?”

“Nah. It’s not strong enough. You need to make it as hard as the ball.”

“But it’s so thin. I can’t imagine it being so…I don’t know, so dense? When it’s a ball, I can see it all in my head, like the dirt is pressing into its center. I don’t know how to think of it, when it’s a pole.”

I shrugged. “Horn, I mean this in a nice way, but that is a you problem. And you can practice that, because I’ve seen you do just that. Get it dense, get it spinning, hit those monsters where it hurts, and I know you’ll up your power in battle.”

“Would I be able to stop an orc?”

“An orc?”

“We were doing some slaying around the Bear Tunnel earlier. When we did that, an orc attacked us, and we were nearly goners.”

Oh, um. Dealing with an orc myself was one thing, but…thinking about Horn and her friends was…yeah, that was different. “You’re okay, right? All of you are okay?”

In Japan, death felt really far away. But…“nearly goners”? I had my onesie to protect me now, and I’d had a cushy life back home. This was different. This kinda scared me.

“Yes, some adventurers named Rulina and Gil helped us when we were in trouble,” Horn said.

“Gil was so cool,” added Shin.

Whew. Okay. Exhale, Yuna: Rulina and Gil had saved them. It’s fine, and really not even a big deal. In fact, come to think of it, I think Rulina had mentioned participating in some monster slaying near the Bear Tunnel.

“You know Rulina, don’t you, Yuna?” asked Horn.

“Well, we are adventurers.” I’d suffered the big dumb attack from Deboranay, accepted a quest with Rulina, and eventually asked her to guard the shop that one time. We were less close and more occasional coworkers.

“If we could have just defeated that orc…” said Horn, almost to herself. “No, if we just could have stopped it back then, I think we could have run away.”

It was weird, thinking of an orc like that. I could whack an orc in one hit. However strong an orc was to anyone who qualified as baseline normal, I couldn’t internalize that differential. Even when I used the same magic as somebody else, our abilities were totally different. Our mana was different, too—the same magic could wildly differ depending on how much mana you had inside of you.

“You’re talking about defeating that orc, Horn, but…when I say that’s a you problem, I really do mean that. If you don’t practice, you’ll stay the Horn you are. That’s fine, if you want, but I don’t think you do want it. That Horn, that girl you are right now…maybe she could take one on, and maybe not. The only way you’ll ever know is to try. Otherwise, you’re just this Horn right here. And she’s all right. I like her. But I don’t know if that’s who you wanna be.”

There was no other way I could respond. She had to actually try to know for sure. That whole greeting card junk about anybody being able to do anything…if you say that to somebody and they can’t do a thing, what happens then? That’s pretty irresponsible, right? Nah, I wouldn’t say anything haphazardly.

But hey, it looked like it had worked pretty well: She seemed motivated!

Horn started to really apply herself to practicing. She cast her magic and fired it off at the dirt pile time after time.

“You don’t have to be in a hurry, though,” I said. “Think about the strength of it, how fast you’re spinning it, and how much mana you’re putting into it. Each thing, think about it.”

“Okay.” Horn took a deep breath and then slowly started to cast her magic.

While I was watching Horn practice from a short distance away, Shin spoke up. “Hey, why’re you just teaching her like this? There’s nothing we can give to thank you.”

“Hey, I don’t know. I don’t really want anything, you know?”

“Then why are you teaching her?”

“Because she’s Horn. You know, Horn? Over there? Your friend? If she ended up dead because I was greedy and didn’t wanna teach her, what kind of person would I be? I’d feel like a heel forever.”

“But you just met us.”

“Sure, I guess. If Horn had mocked me and been a mean kid, I think I wouldn’t have taught her. And I wouldn’t have been too broken up if she wound up on the wrong end of an orc sword or something. But Horn’s all right. Why wouldn’t I help her?”

We’d talked. I didn’t want her to die. Why was this so complicated?

“Um…” Shin shuffled his feet, oddly embarrassed. “Thanks for teaching her.”

“Long as you don’t hold her back, man.” She’d grown since I first met her. I had no idea how powerful she’d become, but who knew if guys like this were going to be footnotes in her story?

“I know that,” he said. “Gil taught me a whole bunch of stuff earlier, so I’m in the middle of intensive training.”

“You are?”

I was curious, so I asked what Gil had taught him: Put on some muscle, he’d said. Build up stamina, watch your opponent. Learn some techniques through experience. If you still can’t win after that, rely on your teammates. Stuff like that. He’d taught them the basics right.

“So I’ve been running and swinging my sword to gain some stamina and muscle.”

“Then…” I was getting a little bored. “…You want to have a quick match with me?” If Horn was gonna make it as an adventurer, the people around her needed to toughen up too. How strong was this Shin guy, really?

“A match with you? But aren’t you a mage?”

“I’m whatever I gotta be.” I pulled my tree branch from my bear storage, broke it off at a random point to make a one-meter-long branch. I made wind magic swirl around the two branches, whittling them down with a high whipping crack until I created two round, easy-to-grip practice swords. I threw one over to Shin. He took it, though he seemed surprised.

“I won’t use magic,” I said. “Come at me however you like.”

“Are you really sure? I’m not gonna hold back. Don’t come crying to me if you get hurt.”

Shin gripped the branch and brandished it at me.

I lightly caught the blow.

We had a cute little match.

 

Shin lay panting on the ground, an exhausted heap. The results were in: Turned out he was weak. What a surprise. Not that I really knew what strong was supposed to mean, but I sure knew the alternative.

“H-how were you able to move that fast, Yuna?”

I wasn’t even out of breath. “I have training methods that some might find…unusual.”

Which was a pretty nice way of saying “I’d never trained in my whole life.” Still, even though my physical strength was a sham, I’d learned my techniques through the game. That…was a kind of training, right? From a certain point of view?

“There was,” I added, “something I noticed. You wanna hear?”

“Damn it.” He kind of seemed upset.

“Well? Do you?”

“Pl-please give me your advice.” Shin dropped his head.

“Then here you go: Don’t waste all that effort swinging your sword so hard. When you’re easing off, you gotta really ease off.”

“But you’re supposed to swing your sword hard, right?”

“Not if you wanna maintain your grip. If you’re always gripping something hard, that grip’s gonna weaken. If you go at it too long, you won’t be able to hold your sword. If you keep waving your sword around when you don’t need to, you’ll get so tired you won’t be able to do much of anything. It’s the same with running—you’ll lose your stamina.”

“But that’s why I’m running and building up muscle! That’s what Gil said, at least.”

“And can you hold a heavy sword like Gil? Swing it like him?” If Gil was a hundred, Shin was a ten. They weren’t in the same ballpark—weren’t in the same city.

“But…if I work hard enough, then…”

“Maybe then, yeah, but getting stronger takes time. Even if you work hard, your body’s gonna be different in little ways. Everybody’s is.”

He slumped. “So what do I do?”

“Start thinking about technique.”

“Technique? Um, I never got taught, so I don’t know what you mean. I guess there is that thing Gil said about watching the enemy. Where am I supposed to look?”

“Where are you looking when you fight?”

Shin frowned thoughtfully. “I guess…their weapon?”

He wasn’t wrong, exactly, but… “You’re supposed to look at everything.”

“Everything?”

“The weapon’s a start, but what about the hand that holds it? What foot are they stepping forward with? Where are they looking, how are they breathing? And if they outclass you, you’ve got to really get in tune with your environment.”

“Do you do all that?”

“More or less. If they move their foot, I can predict their timing. If I look at the hand gripping a sword, I can tell how much effort they’re putting into it. If I track their gaze, I can tell what they’re targeting. Just one of these details doesn’t give you the whole picture; you’ve got to put it all together to figure out what they’re gonna do. You can’t predict everything, but it’s a start…and remember that as you watch an enemy, they’re watching you too.”

If you zeroed in on only one spot, you could get tunnel vision. If you looked only at someone’s weapon, they could get away with other tricks.

“Also,” I said, “you said you’re not as strong as Gil, right? So learn when to use your strength. When you see an opening, use all the power you got. Waiting itself can be a technique.” You didn’t need to put a lot of effort into a feint, after all—you just needed to find your moment.

“But that’s when you’re up against a person, right? What about monsters?”

“That’s not so different. Lots of goblins and orcs carry weapons. Wolves have legs, don’t they? Watch how they step. And yeah, monsters are often in groups, but when you learn to really see the parts of your opponent, you can turn multiple opponents into parts too.”

Which could help you see who was gonna attack, and when. Look at the big picture, and use that to figure out who to go after and which of your companions to protect.

Yeah, I was generally a loner, but I’d known how to run a party in the game.

“Look for someone who doesn’t seem like they’re doing anything at the adventurers’ guild and ask them to practice with you. I’m sure Gil told you the same thing, right? Experience is important. Gaining it in battle is dangerous, but you can learn a lot from practice without risking more than a bruise or two. Or maybe a few more.”

“All right. I’ll try,” said Shin, nodding slowly.

Since I was talking to Shin, I wasn’t watching Horn, but when I did look, she was still practicing her magic like she was supposed to. She was a diligent student.

I finished off that day taking on Horn and Shin. And sure, there were a few bruises, but no way was I going to let them end up dead.