Chapter 1: Training Began, or So It Was Told

“Hiya. The name’s Caryl Valliere. People call me the finest mage in Kukrika. I’m inclined to agree.”

The young woman had pale blond hair that was tied back. She was draped in a soft green robe, the fabric of which was unclear. It was decorated by an assortment of gold and silver jewelry that hung from all over her body, making for an ostentatious sight. The “robe” itself was also not what Renya would normally associate with the word. Unlike regular robes that covered the wearer from head to toe, this one had a collar that parted deep down the chest, and large slits ran so far up the side of the legs that they allowed her exposed thighs to be freely crossed over one another. It was a most confounding piece of clothing — not liberal enough to be called a dress, yet too flashy to be called a robe. As he gazed upon this dazzling display of green and gold and silver, Renya could not help but feel he had seen something like this before. He waded through the murky depths of his memories for a long while until the answer finally came to him.

“I got it!” he exclaimed with a strike of his fist. “She’s like a walking Christmas tree!”

“What’s that supposed to be?”

His revelation went unappreciated. Sitting beside him was a puzzled Shion, to whom he could not muster the will to explain. Instead, he shrugged. Apparently, out of all those Wanderers who’d wandered their way into this world, not a single one decided to bring Christmas with them. He wondered why. Was it because preaching the concept of Christmas was simply so far down the list of priorities that no sane Wanderer would ever get around to it, or did most of them simply hail from places where the holiday did not exist?

His statement also seemed to go over the head of the woman named Caryl, who sat across from them with an ebony table in between. One of her eyebrows was raised as her hands met each other over the table and their digits intertwined. Her fingers were lined with a truly bewildering array of gemmed rings. There were gems of all shapes and sizes, and even the rings themselves differed in material. White rays of light — the work of magecraft — reflected off the extensive display of ornamentation on her person, causing her to glitter brightly in the dim interiors of her store. It reminded him of sequins or gold yarn.

Their morning had begun with a discussion and ended with Shion dragging Renya by the arm, insisting that there was a place she had to take him. After making their way toward the center of the Commercial District, they ended up here. Upon entering they found that a single lamp, its white light produced by magecraft, was the sole source of illumination inside. It was not enough, and the store was still rather dark. Surrounding the ebony table in the middle of the room were all sorts of shelves and racks that held everything from books to trinkets. It gave the room a cluttered feeling.

Rona, as it happened, was absent. After announcing that she needed to report to the guild about Renya officially joining Shion’s party, she departed and left the two of them on their own. For his part, Renya believed that she was off hatching some nefarious plot again, but he had no way of confirming his suspicions.

“So, I get that you want me to teach you some magecraft, but are you seriously telling me that an aspiring adventurer of your age doesn’t even know a single basic spell?”

Renya shifted his attention back to the woman who spoke. For the record, she definitely fell under the “beautiful” category, but she was wearing way too much makeup. The combined effect of her thick makeup and her jangly mess of jewelry made her look gaudy. Age-wise, she was probably no more than two or three years their senior, but thanks to her cosmetics, she looked much older. It was a shame, really. Had she gone with a more natural style, she would have looked quite appealing. Of course, that was an opinion based entirely on his own personal tastes, so he held his tongue.

“Renya’s a Wanderer,” answered Shion in his place.

Caryl took another look at him, this time as though she were seeing some sort of rare animal. It was an unpleasant feeling, and Renya frowned.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“It’s fine. I don’t like it, but I don’t blame you.”

For people in this world, seeing a Wanderer probably felt the same as when people in his original world went to a particularly exotic zoo. With that said, understanding did not always translate to acceptance.

“I guess your world didn’t have magecraft, then?”

“Yeah, the closest thing we had were probably magicians. By which I mean performers who do tricks with their hands and such.”

Caryl gave a look of comprehension as she let out a breath.

“No wonder. Since Shion came to me about teaching somebody magecraft, I was totally expecting a kid to show up, you know? And then a piece of work like you walks in through the door and, well, you get what I mean?”

“I’ll reserve my opinions about being called a piece of work, but I see where you’re going. Still, is it really that rare? You said you were expecting a kid, but eighteen doesn’t seem that much older.”

“Aspiring adventurers tend to join the guild when they’re fourteen or fifteen. As soon as they earn some cash, they’re already knocking on my door to learn some basic magecraft. The ones who want to become mages probably apprentice themselves to a master even earlier,” explained Caryl. She leaned back in her chair, reached for a shelf behind her, and pulled out a bundle of paper scrolls.

Ever since setting foot in this world, there had been a number of things that surprised Renya. One of them was the existence of paper. He had been under the somewhat baseless impression that civilization here was about as advanced as the Middle Ages in his original world. That predated the technique of papermaking. Nevertheless, paper was extremely widespread in this world, and the people here were well aware of how to cook plants in water to draw out the fiber for pulp.

“Take a look. These are all the spells that I can teach you right now. The first list is five silver each, and the second is fifty.”

Renya was about to question the sudden jump in price, but the reason became clear as soon as he read through the contents. The first list included spells such as Ignite and Hydrate. They were mostly things that made daily living more convenient. The second list was populated by far more aggressive-sounding spells such as Firebolt and Iceshard.

“You can have a good talk with your coin purse about which to learn later, but first, let’s take a look at your aptitude.”

“Hm?”

“Your aptitude. You know, like what kind of magecraft you’re most suited to. We’d be here all day if I tried to explain, so I’ll spare you the details. Suffice it to say, it’ll give us a general idea about which element of magecraft you’ll learn more quickly and how much potential for improvement there is.”

Caryl twisted her upper body and reached for the same shelf again. This time, she took out a crystal ball that was about the size of one’s fist. She tossed the clear orb onto the table and rolled it toward Renya, who placed it on his palm and peered at it with a look of intense curiosity.

“It’s nothing special. If you’ve got the right materials, you can have one made for yourself for about a gold or so. It’ll suffice for our purposes, though.”

“How do you use it?” asked Renya as he rolled it back and forth on his palm.

Caryl leaned across the table and grabbed the ball from his palm. She held it in front of him at eye level.

“It’s simple. Focus on the ball and tell it to glow. That’s it. I mean, technically, the process involves a bunch of stuff about how the mana flows, but trying to explain that to a Wanderer would be an exercise in frustration.”

She gestured at him, then the ball. He nodded and took it from her. Under the watchful gazes of Caryl and Shion, he took a deep breath to calm himself and focused his attention on the crystal ball. It occurred to him that he was going to look like a total idiot if he just kept doing this and nothing happened. However, stray thoughts like those might very well make things worse, so he cleared his mind. Soon after, a tiny green light the size of his little fingertip flared up in the middle of the ball.

“Green, huh. That means his aptitude is wind, right?” asked Shion.

“Yeah.” Caryl nodded with a grimace. “But this is sort of…”

Before Renya had a chance to ask if something went wrong, Caryl snatched the crystal ball from his hand and tossed it carelessly over her shoulder. It landed somewhere in the back of the shelf with a heavy thud. He found himself more than a little concerned about the way she handled what was ostensibly a fragile object.

“Okay,” she continued, “first, we can say for sure that your aptitude is wind, and it’s one heck of a strong aptitude to boot.”

Renya recalled that he got a bunch of skills from the girl before he came to this world. One of them said something about wind aptitude, so it was probably thanks to that. He did not, however, expect what she said next.

“Thing is, your mana pool is tiny. Like, we’re talking less than half of what people normally have.”

“You can figure out that much from how the light looks?”

“The color of the light was impressive. It’s not every day you get to see such a pure shade of green. The size of the light was too small, though. Normally, however faint it is, it should at least light up the whole orb. For people with a gift for magecraft, it might get so bright you can’t look at it straight on. A hero might even cause it to explode in a blinding flash. That’s happened before, by the way.”

Armed with this new knowledge, Renya thought back to how the light looked for him. He had to admit that it did indeed seem very small. To his side, Shion was nodding as well.

“Yeah, I remember the whole thing glowing when I did it, too.”

“What color was it for you?” he asked out of curiosity.

“It was light green,” answered Shion, a hint of excitement in her voice. “The same as yours, Renya. We’re both wind.”

“Your mana pool does grow little by little as you use it, so there’s some room for improvement. With that said, you’ve got a whole lot of catching up to do. Personally, I’d reconsider any career aspirations involving magecraft if I were you,” said Caryl.

The news came as a bit of a shock to him, but he figured that he should have expected as much, considering he came from a world where the whole concept of magecraft did not even exist. If anything, it would have been much weirder to be told that he was carrying around a veritable ocean of mana. That would have raised the very pertinent question of what the heck happened to him in his previous life.

In addition, he was told that there was room for improvement. That was at the heart of the matter. He might not be flinging spells left and right, but maybe he could reach a point where it could at least be useful. With that slim hope in mind, he asked Caryl,

“Are there any efficient ways to train so I can make my mana pool bigger?”

Caryl said nothing. Instead, she put out her left palm. The gesture left him clueless until Shion stepped in.

“How much?”

“Seven silver.”

The short exchange was followed by Shion dropping seven silver coins in the open left palm of Caryl, who then beckoned Renya with her right hand. He did as he was told, leaning forward over the table. As his face neared Caryl, she quickly pulled out a slip of paper from her chest and slapped it on his forehead.

“Impart Illuminate.”

The paper melted into thin air. The effect resembled an ice cube being dropped into hot water.

《Notification: An external source has intervened to impart the non-elemental spell, Illuminate. Accepting will grant access to its usage. Would you like to accept?》

Without a second thought, Renya accepted the request.

“You cast it with the incantation, ‘By my power, I command thee. Rays of light, shine.’”

“Aha, so that’s how these work, huh. It’s a system where you impart the access privilege for its use. I’ve been told that they’re easy to use once you learn them, but it sure makes a lot more sense now.”

Caryl stared at him with a blank look of incomprehension, but lost in his own thoughts, he did not notice. It seemed to him that what just happened was the equivalent of someone who mastered a skill trying to teach someone who had not without going through all the theory and logic. It was focused on simply allowing the pupil to do the thing that was required. That explained why magecraft could only be learned from mages. A master could teach pupils, but pupils could not teach more pupils because they only knew how to use it; they did not understand why they could.

“…I’ve heard rumors before, but Wanderers really are something else, huh?”

There was some awe in Caryl’s voice as she came to realize what Renya had just figured out. Her reaction suggested that normal people did not know about the mechanism, and the truth of the matter was kept as a shared secret among mages, who likely valued the method as a source of income. After all, only a fool would divulge their trade secrets to outsiders. Meanwhile, Shion looked blankly at the two of them, completely lost as to what they were talking about.

“So, how exactly do I train with this?”

“I already told you. Just keep using it and you’ll get better. In other words, you train by casting a spell over and over again. It doesn’t matter what spell. As long as you keep using it, your mana pool will grow. For the purposes of training, we usually go with Illuminate.”

Other rudimentary spells involved creating things or moving things, all of which affected the surrounding environment. Illuminate, however, only created light. Using it in the daytime would not bother anyone, and it was fine to use at night, as well, because it simply replaced one’s normal light source.

“For the time being, just trust me and stick to this training method. Keep doing it for a while, and then come see me again.”

“Caryl… Um, what about other spells?” asked Shion timidly.

“Don’t even bother.” Caryl shook her head as she leaned back in her seat. “I can teach him, but he won’t be able to use any.”

“Hnngh, but…”

“Shion,” interrupted Renya, “it’s fine. At least I know how to train now. Once I get a little better at this, we can ask Caryl to teach me another spell. There’s no point learning any spells now if I’m not strong enough to use them.”

His efforts to appease her proved successful, albeit with some lingering disgruntlement.

“Fine. We’ll see you later, then, Caryl.”

“Sure. Just let me know when you’re ready. I’ll handle the rest.”

Seeing that matters were concluded, the two of them prepared to leave.

“By the way, Shion… what’s with the change of heart?” Caryl asked as Shion got up and turned to go. “It’s like you’re actually a normal adventurer, what with having a guy in your party and everything.”

“I am a normal adventurer!”

“You are? Wow. That’s news to me.”

Caryl’s dismissive tone seemed to irk Shion, and she replied somewhat resentfully.

“And it’s not like I didn’t ask you to join! But you turned me down!”

Figuring that their party needed a mage, Shion had gone to Rona. Under her friend’s advice, she then went to Caryl and asked her to join them, only to be immediately shot down. The reason she gave at the time was that she would much rather stay in town, sit back, and teach some Magecraft 101. It was less work for more pay.

“Who would have joined us, anyway? A party of three girls looks way too risky.”

“You… You’ve got a point, I guess. But that’s why I asked Renya to join us.”

“I see… Well, try your best. Once you’ve made some money, come see me again. I’ll be waiting.”

“Yeah, see you then.”

After seeing them off with a wave, Caryl crossed her hands behind her head and grinned, as though she just saw the most interesting thing. The teaching was done, but it remained to be seen how far his training would take him. That had to wait until next time.

“Took you long enough, huh, Rona? Nice to see that things are going your way.”

Softly, she whispered to herself, the face of her blond-haired friend vivid in her mind.

***

“We’re not going to accept any jobs for a while.”

Renya’s announcement surprised Shion and Rona, but neither of them opposed it. After learning some magecraft at Caryl’s store, the three of them met up at the inn. Shion immediately proposed that they should go find work, which led to this announcement. Rona then asked the very reasonable question of what in the world he was talking about, especially considering he was the one who’d declared that his goal of adventuring was to make money. He, in turn, offered a very reasonable answer.

“Because I haven’t yet grasped what I’m capable of.”

He was missing very crucial and very fundamental information about himself. He did not have a full understanding of what he could and could not do. Even for the things he could do, he was not aware of the degree to which he could perform them. Shion was puzzled by his statement, saying that it was strange that he did not know himself. He agreed, and then contemplated how much he should divulge.

“The fact of the matter is that most of my past memories disappeared when I came to this world. That’s why even I don’t know what I did in my original world.”

“You mean you have amnesia? You didn’t look very confused, though. When we first met, you also told us that you’re a Wanderer right away.”

He could not declare that he had met God with a capital G and was reincarnated in this world at her request. He did not have anything against telling the truth, but he doubted they would believe him. Being made fun of was one thing, but it would be problematic if they started assuming he had a few screws loose.

“I don’t know why either. It’s not like I’m a veteran world hopper or anything. As for saying I’m a Wanderer, I just vaguely recalled being given that information. I don’t remember who told me or anything.”

Fake it until you make it, or so the saying goes. As long as they could not verify his claims, whatever he said would become truth. After all, the only one who could testify was a young girl in a galaxy far, far away.

“I don’t really care too much about any of that. It is what it is. What I’m more concerned about is what I can do. It’d be a problem if we run into trouble and I have no idea what I’m capable of.”

“That’s true.”

Only an idiot would swing a sword around without knowing how well it cut. When he mentioned this, the metaphor seemed to strike a chord with Shion and she nodded firmly in agreement.

“So, I need some time to figure myself out. I can do some training along the way, too.”

“Okay, I understand. We’ve been paid for the last job, so we’ll be fine for a while, right, Ro?”

“Yes, but how long will you need?”

“Give me two days. I should have a decent grasp by then. I’ll keep up the training afterwards, of course. Now, here’s my question,” he said, taking a moment to ponder which of the two he should ask. The moment passed. He came up with nothing. In the end, he just decided to keep talking to Shion. “Is there some place near this city where I can swing stuff around without causing any trouble?”

He did not expect much. After all, he had asked Shion, who did not look like the type to know such things. In fact, she did not look like the type to know much of anything, but she responded surprisingly quickly.

“Then the plains past the north gate are your best bet.”

According to her, the city was surrounded by flatlands on all sides, but the one past the north gate was the least dangerous. Not only were the monsters in the region weak, a few hours on foot would lead him to a rocky mountain range that contained the Hermit’s Grave. In other words, there was a whole lot of nothing out there.

Exiting the city by any other gate led to areas that either saw plenty of monsters or were used as farmland, neither of which were suitable for swinging stuff around without causing trouble. The land to the north, meanwhile, was somewhat barren and not used for agriculture. It was frequented by swordsmen and mages who went there to “train,” but to date, there had been no complaints about their extensive efforts of geographic vandalism.

“I’ve been there a good number of times, too, and there really is nothing there. It’s honestly a great place to practice your swings. Even Caryl heads there once in a while. She calls it “de-stressing” and leaves a bunch of craters all over the place.”

“And she still hasn’t gotten in any trouble for it, huh. Sounds like the right place for me.”

The next morning, with his mind made up, he got up much earlier than the girls and prepared to leave. He picked up the food he’d asked the inn’s owner to pack for him the day before, took a few bites of breakfast, reaffirmed that it tasted miserable, and left the inn. All his luggage, including the food he just picked up, had been thrown into the inventory, so he was empty-handed. As he made his way toward the north gate, bright light leaked out from his curled fists.

He began his magecraft training last night. As soon as he returned to the inn, he gave it a try. Unsurprisingly, especially after expert testimony pertaining to the hopelessly small size of his mana pool, a single orb of light was all he managed before his head started spinning. It didn’t take long to go away, but he figured that the dizziness was a sign of his mana pool running dry. This being reality and not a game, he had no way of seeing a numerical depiction of his remaining mana. After a period of time during which he alternated between casting the spell and resting, he got the hang of how the Illuminate spell worked.

Firstly, he had no control over the brightness. “Say the words and a thing starts glowing” was the extent of his understanding of the spell. He had no idea how to adjust the brightness of the light, and despite his efforts to envision the blinding flash of burning magnesium as he chanted the words, he only produced dinky orbs that were about as bright as a flashlight. Distraught and out of ideas, he glanced off to the side, grumbling about how this would be a great time for that so-called Help Function to kick in.

It kicked in.

《Notification: Help Activated - Magecraft Spell Strength. The strength of a spell is determined by the first verse of the incantation. The order is as follows: By my power, I command thee -> By my power, I summon thee -> By my power, I empower thee -> By my power, I beseech thee. However, verses above the level of “I summon thee” are unavailable when used through imparted access. The strength of a spell also correlates with the amount of mana expended, but this method is likewise unavailable when used through imparted access.》

“Can I remove the access restriction?” asked Renya, noting that the function was indeed quite helpful.

《Notification: Help Activated — Removing the usage restriction of a spell requires committing the corresponding magecraft sign to memory. Currently, the usage restriction of Illuminate can be removed. Proceed?》

Slightly surprised that it was actually possible, he told the function to proceed. His forehead hurt a little as a pattern surfaced in his mind. It was pictorial and difficult to describe, resembling some sort of foreign character. Presumably, that was the sign to remove the restriction.

《Notification: Usage restriction of non-elemental magecraft has been removed. Applicable sign: Non-elemental Master Key.》

“Okay. I sure wasn’t expecting it to remove all the restrictions…”

Normally, mages needed to memorize a sign for each spell they wanted to use. By using the sign as a key, they could remove the usage restriction for the spell, which granted them access to higher-level incantations and strength adjustment based on mana input. The Help Function, however, just stamped a master key for all non-elemental magecraft onto his brain, saving him the effort of learning them one by one.

He now had a creeping suspicion that despite all the skills bestowed upon him, the most broken ability he had was probably the Help Function. Nevertheless, it did not seem to do anything bad, and he certainly saw no way of un-stamping the sign from his head, so he put it out of his mind.

The second issue was that he could not move the orbs of light he created. Specifically, he could cast the spell wherever he wanted, but once the orb was made, it was stuck there. This was a discovery he made after his disastrous attempt to try out the unrestricted “I summon thee” incancation, in which he ran out of mana, failed to cast the spell, and blacked out on the spot. Once he recovered, he stuck to using the spell once and then resting until its effect wore off. Ten cycles later, he noticed that he stopped feeling dizzy. Figuring that his mana pool had gotten a little bigger, he tried consecutively casting the spell twice, which brought the dizziness back. While he rested, he tried to move the orb floating in the middle of the room and finally happened upon the realization that he could not.

As he gained the ability to cast the spell multiple times in one go, he learned more about its traits. The orb of light itself produced no heat. It merely glowed with white light. In addition, once it was placed at a fixed point in space, it remained there until it eventually dissipated. This had the harmless but highly unsettling effect of turning his room into an ever-brightening light show. Following a period of trial-and-error, he happened upon some solutions. He could either keep casting the spell in the same place, or he could cast it on an object. In the latter case, moving the object would move the orb along with it.

Armed with this new knowledge, he began settling into a routine in which each onset of dizziness marked the end of a cycle. Like clockwork, he cast the spell over and over. For about three hours, he was a lean, mean, illuminating machine. In the end, he managed to put out eight orbs before getting dizzy.

At this point, the process of reciting the same incantation again and again was really starting to grate on his nerves. He needed a better method. After some thinking, an idea came to him. He had no clue if it would work, but figured there was no harm in trying.

“Quickcast Illuminate applying Simulcast eight times.”

A word flashed in view.

《Confirmed》

He barely caught a glimpse before eight equally-spaced light orbs appeared above his head. It occurred to him that he forgot to assign their positions beforehand, but either way, it worked. That brought a satisfied smile to his face. He’d just demonstrated that it was possible to combine his skills and use them like macros. One problem remained: it would be terribly annoying if he had to repeat that phrase every single time. Falling back into thought, he tweaked the instruction a little bit and gave it another try.

“Quickcast Illuminate applying Simulcast eight times. Repeat until my remaining mana drops below fifty percent. Restart after my mana fully recovers. Repeat until terminated. Assign location to the palm of my right hand.”

He would have preferred to keep it going until he ran out of mana but, unsure of the effects of an empty mana pool on his body, decided to keep things safe with a fifty percent margin. Fainting did not pose much of a problem if he did so in his room, but even so, it seemed unhealthy to go on fainting streaks.

Each light orb he created could last about ten minutes, and last ten minutes they did, because he had no idea how to cancel the spell. The reason he put them all on his palm was because he could hide them in his fist if the need arose.

His newly-implemented macro worked as intended, giving him access to a safe and convenient method of endlessly casting the spell. It also led him to harbor a misconception, albeit unwittingly. The onset of dizziness due to low mana was generally accepted to occur when one’s remainder dipped below ten percent or so, and recovering from such thorough exhaustion required almost a half day’s rest. This was common sense among mages.

Meanwhile, Renya, thanks to his Super Regen, recovered his mana at an absolutely ludicrous rate. What would normally be performed in half-day intervals, he repeated every half-minute. Furthermore, the combination of Simulcast and High-Speed Recharge all but negated any sense of cast time or cool down, allowing him to hurl out eight-shot volleys in rapid fire.

Rounding off the package was Limit Break Leveling. When he first gained this skill, he assumed it removed any restrictions imposed on the effects of his training, allowing him to keep up a steady rate of improvement. In actuality, not only did it remove the limits to his growth, it also removed the limits to his growth rate. To put it simply, Renya’s training regimen consisted of casting his spell an insane number of times at an insane speed and an insane rate of improvement with no hard limit to his stats. And he had no idea this was happening.

Rather, after being told by Caryl that his mana pool was hopelessly small, he felt compelled to push himself harder. From his perspective, the people in this world must have been practicing magecraft since a very young age and they were probably all miles ahead of him. Being a late starter, he had no choice but to train extra hard and extra fast if he wanted to stand a chance against his peers.

Since the only spell he could use was Illuminate, every time he noticed the macro was lasting longer than before, he modified its instructions. His last command was “Quickcast Illuminate at max strength applying Simulcast sixteen times. Repeat until my remaining mana drops below twenty percent. Restart after my mana fully recovers. Repeat until terminated. Assign location to the palm of my right hand.”

Had Caryl witnessed this scene, her eyes would have popped out of their sockets. Even scarier was that Renya thought it still wasn’t enough. Thus did a certain overpowered character, unbeknownst to the world, start using his overpowered skills to grind his soon-to-be-overpowered stats with the person in question being none the wiser.

At the north gate, Renya displayed his guild card to the guard, who asked him where he was going. He replied that he was going for a bit of a long jog as part of his training. The guard sent him off with a wave, telling him to be careful. He kept walking for a while and, after seeing that he was a good ways from the gate, slowly broke into a run.

The landscape past the north gate was just as Shion had described; a vast expanse of nothing stretched off into the distance. He had hoped to run into some weaker monsters, but even those were nowhere to be seen. His view consisted entirely of rough earth and the odd patch of short grass. While it was a good place to practice some swings, he felt like he needed a little more. Instead of simply going on a run, he decided he would keep jogging for as long as he could. It would be a test of his stamina, and there might be some monsters worth fighting farther away from the city.

At first, he went at the speed of a light jog, but gradually he sped up to the pace of a marathon runner, only to find he was not at all out of breath. Impressed by how light his body felt, he tried sprinting for a while. This made him breathe harder, but he felt no need to rest. It was actually a little creepy how well his own body functioned. Creepy, but convenient. There was nothing wrong with convenience, so he gave it no further thought.

After Renya had run for about an hour, alternating between various speeds, the flatlands gave way to stony ground. Rocky mountains overlooked him, hard and lifeless. He did a quick calculation. Shion said that it took several hours to get to these mountains on foot. Accounting for individual variation, the average walking speed was about 4 kilometers per hour. Since the people in this world, adventurers in particular, were in pretty good shape, that average should be closer to 5 kilometers per hour. Supposing several hours meant something like 5 or 6, 5 hours of walking meant this mountain range was at least 25 kilometers away from the city. He ran 25 kilometers in an hour, which was approximately equivalent to finishing the 100-meter dash in 14 seconds. It didn’t seem all that fast to him.

He was wrong. Very wrong. Especially considering that record marathon runners took at least 2 hours to run a bit more than 42 kilometers.

“Well then, let’s get started.”

Renya withdrew his recently-purchased longsword from his inventory and tested its grip. When he mentioned that only an idiot would swing a sword around without knowing how well it cut, he meant it as a metaphor for his capabilities. It was, of course, equally applicable in a more literal sense to his new weapon, of which he was not expecting much. Being mass produced and sold as a commodity on the market, it was not even sharp enough to be called a blade, and was clearly intended to be used for chopping through things with brute force. This irked him to no end. He had held out hope for at least a reasonably sharp cutting edge, but that was dashed by reality. This was how weapons were here, and he would have to deal with it.

Once he found a comfortable grip, he tried a few quick swings. He knew nothing about how swordsmanship was practiced in this world. His memories, faint as they were, suggested to him that he was never taught how to handle such a weapon in his previous world, either. His swings, therefore, followed no form or stance, and he allowed them to flow as they pleased. Nevertheless, he was no beginner to combat, and as he chained together sequence after sequence of slashes and thrusts, it really did look like he knew what he was doing.

Had Renya devoted himself to kendo, he might have been able to fight reasonably well even with the sword he had right now. Unfortunately for him, he spent most of his previous life mastering a very different art — kenjutsu. Practitioners of kenjutsu employed the katana, which was the antithesis of the the longsword he held. Unlike the slam-chop-and-smash style of fighting exemplified by the weapons of this world, a katana must first touch, then be drawn across. Only then did it cut. Even the finest katana would break or bend when swung with the crude technique of a longsword. The different methods of cutting inevitably required the two to be handled differently. Every difference chipped away at his comfort, causing his motions to become stilted and awkward. It was an exercise in frustration.

Back when he was beating down goblins at the settlers’ village, sheer adrenaline kept him swinging without a hitch, but if he had tried to calm down and fight normally, these discrepancies would have been a big problem. After practicing a couple of sequences, he sheathed the longsword and threw it back into his inventory with a sigh.

“Okay, nope. This is not going to work.”

Overall, it felt okay. But Renya was not the kind of person to be satisfied with okay. Shaking his head, he exhaled deeply and lowered himself onto a conveniently chair-sized rock nearby. Suddenly, a voice called to him from behind.

“Is something troubling you?”

He shot to his feet, tension surging through him as he spun toward the direction of the voice. It put him face to face with a sloped cliff of rock. He peered upwards along the side of the cliff until he found a level overhang.

Squatting on the platform with her elbows on her knees was a young girl. She held her face in her hands and looked down at him. Black pigtails sprouted from either side of her head, and her red eyes were only half open, lending her an air of sleepiness. She wore a dull gray mantle over a plain brown shirt and plain brown pants, and a large pouch hung from her right hip. Judging from her appearance, she was traveling somewhere.

“Who are you?”

Renya did not recall having seen her before. The girl made no reply, instead choosing to stand up. Then she hopped down from the platform. Renya turned up the danger dial. He had to crane his neck to see the platform, which meant it must have been a fall of about three meters. Despite that, she landed gracefully before him. She hardly bent her legs, she did not stagger from the impact, and she barely made a sound. She simply landed.

“I’ll remind you that it’s common sense to introduce yourself first when you ask for someone else’s name. Or, I would, if it wasn’t for that fact that I spoke first. Therefore, allow me to introduce myself!”

She gave her mantle a quick flick, put her hands at her hips, stood up straight, and threw her head back. Renya doubted she could have looked more suspicious if she tried. He kept himself at a safe distance and readied himself to run if the need arose as he watched the girl proudly announce her name.

“I am the traveling merchant, Gi— erm, I mean, Kirie!”

“Am I supposed to be impressed?”

His lukewarm response seemed to suck the vigor right out of her, and she visibly wilted.

“I was just trying to build some hype.”

“Forget your hype. What does a traveling merchant want with me?”

He shot her a cautious glance. She had gotten his attention for a reason, and he wanted to know what it was. His overt wariness, however, earned him a resigned shrug.

“You don’t have to act so defensive…” she said with a smile.

“There was nobody around. I checked to make sure. And yet here you are. That’s reason enough for me to be on guard.”

Without the ability to use gracecraft like Rona, he could not say for certain, but he had scrutinized his surroundings and the place had been deserted as far as he could see. He had good reason to, as well. Him fumbling around with a sword was not something he wanted an audience for.

“Hey, you’re not giving us traveling merchants enough credit. We have to avoid being attacked by bandits and monsters as we make our way from town to town peddling our goods. Hiding our presence is a cinch,” announced the girl with another proud puff of her chest.

“Okay,” he continued, still unconvinced, “but for a traveling merchant, you’re sure carrying a whole lot of nothing. Where are these goods that you’re supposedly peddling?”

“I’m special, you see, because not only am I a traveling merchant, I’m a traveling merchant who has a voidbox!”

Renya nodded. That did explain her conspicuous lack of baggage.

“All right, then. What do you sell?”

“Anything sellable. Now, this is quite a place to cross paths, don’t you think? Fate must have conspired to bring us here. Why not treasure this opportunity and take a look at my goods?”

Not even waiting for him to answer, Kirie pulled from her waist pouch a rug far larger than what should have been possible to fit inside and spread it on the ground. Then, she began to produce all sorts of items from the same pouch, neatly arranging them on the rug for display.

It reminded him vaguely of a certain pocket from a certain anime. There were tiny tube-shaped jars filled with colorful liquids, jewelry made from precious metals adorned with gems, black leather-like gloves that exposed the fingers, and a few pairs of boots. As she pulled the final article from her pouch, Renya’s eyes widened.

“That’s…”

“Oh? Has this caught your eye? You certainly have good taste,” she said, offering it to him with both hands for his perusal.

It was a katana.

The hilt was wrapped in matte leather, black and unobtrusive. Similarly unassuming was the guard, made of matte black metal. The blade hid inside a black metallic sheath, decorated by silver tendrils that coiled in arabesque patterns.

“Please, draw the blade and take a look.”

He took the katana in his left hand, holding it by the sheath. With a small motion, he loosened the blade. It slid free of the sheath with a crisp sensation. Drawing the rest of it out, he flipped over the blade and held it up at eye level to be examined. A breath of awe escaped him.

The layered steel, known as jigane, showed fine wood-like ko-itame grains, and the complex interplay of light and shadow across its length was a feature of the irregular scattering of midare-utsuri. The blade pattern, or hamon, consisted of a smooth, rolling pattern of shallow waves that crested into uneven gunome-choji cloves. A rough measurement by eye put the length of the blade at a little longer than two foot four. He would have to take it apart and examine the inscription on the tang to be sure, but judging from the shallow curvature of the blade, it was probably a type of katana known as an uchigatana. He continued to look it over for some time. Eventually, he carefully returned it to its sheath and handed it back to Kirie.

“A fine piece of craftsmanship. It was a privilege to behold.”

“Oh? Are you not going to purchase it?” she asked in surprise.

“Of course not. I can’t possibly afford such a premium item,” he answered with a sigh.

“Well, actually, here’s the deal. Apparently, this weapon originally came from a Wanderer somewhere, and it really isn’t very popular in our world here.” Holding the katana in her right hand, she scratched her head with her left and gave an awkward smile. “It really is beautiful to look at, so I figured I might be able to sell it as a work of art. The problem is, no one can use it properly as a weapon. Even if they like how it looks, they might break it because they don’t know how to handle it. To be perfectly honest, I’m having a lot of trouble finding a taker.”

“Wow, that’s such a waste…”

Renya meant it. Kirie, however, seemed to take his sincerity as interest and dialed up her pitch.

“Right? At the end of the day, I think every tool longs to be used by someone who knows how to handle it. So, let’s cut to the chase. If you know how to use this, I’ll give you a deal. Twenty gold! It’s a steal!”

“I’m pretty sure I know that blade inside out, but I don’t have the money.”

Upon hearing the price, he immediately gave up any further consideration of purchase. Even with all his assets put together, including the money he’d brought with him to this world, his earnings from selling manastones, and the reward for killing goblins, he simply did not have enough cash. He also did not want it enough to go borrow money from somewhere.

The problem with the longsword was that he was trying to use it as a blade. If he just treated it like a hunk of metal, he might be fine in a fight. All he would need to do was bludgeon people.

Meanwhile, Kirie’s expression turned serious. Seeing that he was about to call off the deal, she doubled down on the offer. She seemed very unwilling to let him walk away, possibly because she figured it would be ages before she found another buyer.

“In that case, how about we barter? Item for item. I see that you were training with a weapon here. You’re an adventurer, I assume? If you have anything rare or exotic on you, I’d be happy to trade.”

“Sorry, but I only came to this world recently. I’ve got nothing on me that’s rare or exotic.”

“Hm? This world? Are you, perchance, one of those Wanderer people?” asked a surprised Kirie.

He had let his identity slip with his last remark, but he’d also been told there was no need to hide it, so he nodded.

“For real?” The girl’s eyes lit up. “In that case, did you bring anything from your world? If it doesn’t exist in this world, it’s sure to be valuable.”

“Yeah, but still…”

Normally, Wanderers arrived in another world through a process that can be summed up as tripping and falling, except they fell into a particularly deep and interdimensional hole. This meant they often brought whatever they had on them to their new world. In Renya’s case — assuming that girl was telling the truth — he’d already died. For obvious reasons, he ended up packing light for his trip.

A thought, however, crossed his mind, and he opened up his inventory. One item in there sort of fit the bill as having a foreign origin. Technically, the thing itself did not come from his original world, but other ones like it did. It had a lot of personal value to him, but even he grudgingly admitted that to the untrained eye, it was fairly indistinguishable from a stick. Regardless, having nothing else of worth, he took it out of his inventory.

“What might that be?”

“It’s called a shinai. Back where I’m from, it’s… well, technically a weapon.”

“Most intriguing. Could I… perhaps take a look?”

He handed her the bamboo sword and she took it, scratching her head. For a brief moment, he considered the possibility of her dashing off with it but soon dismissed the notion after remembering the pile of goods that still lay unattended at her feet. With the katana still in her right hand, she held the shinai in her left and gave it a swing.

“It’s rather light.”

“Yeah, in my world, it’s mostly used as a practice weapon.”

She studied it, looking up and down its length. Then, she froze, as though she’d suddenly realized something.

“Hmm, hmm…” she murmured as she studied it with narrowed eyes. Then, she happened upon something that made her pause. “Oh? I see that it’s a class ten item.”

Her remark reminded him that the item did indeed come with a description like that when he first saw it in the inventory, and he found himself impressed by the traveling merchant’s astuteness. He nodded at her, wondering whether her keen eye just came with the job, or if she could use the Appraisal skill. In return, she began lightly striking the katana in her right hand against the shinai in her left, all the while cautiously glancing at him as if she was gauging his response. He had no idea what she meant to do, but after ten strikes, she slowly held out her right hand, katana included.

“What?”

“Let’s trade. I don’t know much about this shinai item, but there are plenty of connoisseurs out there with a thing for item classes, and this one’s a class ten! It’ll definitely sell!”

“Really? I mean, I realize I was the one who put it on the table, but are you sure about this?”

“Absolutely. This katana isn’t worth much to me since I can’t sell it. It’s class seven, too, which is a good deal lower.”

“Well, I’d certainly appreciate it if you’re willing to trade…”

In contrast to the uncertain look on Renya’s face, Kirie was all but beaming. She looked like she just got the bargain of the century.

“And I get to offload dead stock in exchange for fresh new goods. This is great for me, too.”

“I… guess? If you’re really okay with it, then sure.”

“Done! Good doing business with you.”

Renya could not shake the feeling that he just involuntarily scammed a poor merchant girl, but the girl in question happily pressed the katana to him and threw the shinai into her pouch-shaped voidbox.

“Is there anything else you want?” inquired the girl. “If not, I’ll start putting away my goods.”

“Yeah, go ahead. I don’t have much with me, anyway,” he answered, but his mind had already drifted to the katana in his hand, pondering such topics as how he was going to carry it. Being an uchigatana, the correct method was to wear it at the waist, but his current attire was not very katana-friendly.

“By the way,” said Kirie as she carelessly hurled item after item into her pouch, “since we’re here, would you mind indulging my curiosity and showing me what it’s like to use that thing properly?”

“Huh?”

“Here, I’ll give you a target to use.”

After she cleaned up her makeshift storefront, she reached into her pouch and pulled out a different object. It bore an unmistakable resemblance to the scarecrows he had seen in rice fields in his previous world. Made of straw and sticks in the shape of a human, it was wrapped in leather armor and looked fairly durable. A spike took the place of its legs, and she drove it into the ground, firmly planting the scarecrow in front of him. Then, she gestured to him to go ahead and took a few steps back.

Renya hesitated for a second, but something about their prior transaction left him feeling a little guilty. Seeing that she was not asking for much, he ultimately decided that it was only right for him to grant her request. He did, after all, claim to know how to use a katana properly. He owed her a demonstration.

Once he confirmed that she was far enough from the scarecrow, he bent his knees a little, held the katana at his left hip, and slowly wrapped his right hand around its grip. For the briefest moment, he was assaulted by a peculiar feeling of familiarity. It was as if he had been carrying it all his life, despite using it for the first time now. He narrowed his eyes and focused his gaze on the scarecrow.

A space of two meters separated Renya from his target. Kirie tensed, her pulse quickening as she watched from the sidelines. There was an invisible pressure radiating from him that pressed against her chest. Finding it slightly hard to breathe, she gulped. That was when his right hand blurred.

Realizing that he’d drawn the blade, she looked for the swing, only to find that his body had returned to its original position. Slowly, as though savoring the lingering echo of a concluded melody, he slid the blade back into its sheath.

Words failed her. She did not blink once. Nevertheless, her eyes seemed to have failed to capture the moment when he took a step forward and cut through the scarecrow. A chilling sensation gripped her, and she stood transfixed, unable to look away. It was as if she was the scarecrow — as if the blade had sliced through her.

With one final flick, the blade returned fully into its sheath. At the same time, the scarecrow split right down the middle. Then, it broke again, this time across the chest, and fell to the ground in four pieces.

Renya let out a breath.

“Since this was a stationary batto — that is, I drew the sword right where I stood — the correct term for it is probably battojutsu,” he said as he looked over at a stunned Kirie. “It’s a different style of swordsmanship than kenjutsu.”

The girl remained frozen. He smiled.

“Have I satisfied your curiosity?”

In all likelihood, he meant well, but the smile shook Kirie to the core. At the mercy of her nerves, she found she could do little but nod along.