SIAW Vol. 1 Chapter 9
Chapter 9 – Team Ranga’s Training
The day after I spoke to Ranga about training, he started helping out at the well, but passed out in the middle. The day after, Jeet and Zlatan started helping too, and somehow managed to pull it through till the end.
After that, he continued every day, albeit complaining about muscle pain.
Helping out at the well also improved Ranga’s reputation among the villagers and in the family too: Ranga was elated when Sasha started treating him more kindly.
On the other hand, I had finally been freed from the well volunteering work: every morning I spent some time fixing and reinforcing the wooden fence surrounding the village. I would hate it if something happened to the village after I left, so I did what I could.
Ranga focused more on hunting, and brought Jeet or Zlatan with him every day, to train them.
Jeet was good at Sword Arts, so he trained especially in dodging enemy attacks and delivering a fatal strike to the neck. He was a bit of a goof and a slacker, just like Ranga. At first, he trained only because Ranga told him to, but once he realized he could hunt a Horn Rabbit by himself without trouble, he started boasting about his exploits with the villagers.
I made a wooden shield for Zlatan, and a machete to use as a weapon. His training consisted in stopping the Horn rabbits’ attacks with the shield, then chopping them down.
At first he went to the “battlefield” with tears in his eyes, but now he knew that he could safely stop the Horn Rabbits’ advance with the shield, so he became able to fight with more confidence. When the villagers praised his efforts he laughed, embarrassed, as his short tail wagged left and right. Pretty adorable guy.
Ranga assisted them from the rear: sometimes he would lose patience and join in the fray, though. The other day, however, he finally acquired the Presence Detection skill: achieving a result gave him more motivation, so now he patiently watches over the trainees from behind them.
Actually, Appraisal had told me that Ranga would soon learn Presence Detection. Acting more prudently for the sake of his family had been advantageous, after all: the timing was just right.
Lately, more and more villagers went outside, to gather herbs and firewood. Ranga and the others escorted them, so they complained about having less time to train.
Children over 10 took over the role of standing guard at the village gates: there were less Horn rabbits around, so Ranga and the others were liberated from the task.
◇ ◇ ◇ ◇
I went to the village gate, as usual, and found Ranga, Jeet and Zlatan waiting.
Ranga started talking first.
“Since today we’re going to be practicing how to fight as a team, we’re all pumped!”
“Your individual movements aren’t perfect yet, but I heard that the traveling merchant is coming soon, which means that I will leave the village in the near future. I want to help as much as I can, as long as I can.”
After hearing my words, the three men looked all sad. It made me feel kinda happy to be missed like that, to be honest.
“Alright then, I’ll start by explaining about the formation and the role you will have. First Zlatan: you’re going to stand in front. Ranga has acquired the Presence Detection skill, but don’t rely only on him, or you’ll never learn it yourself. Focus especially on the dangers in front; if you find any monsters, stay ahead of the team. Try to attract the monsters’ attention as much as possible. You can use your shield to make noise, or shout, or anything else you come up with. If the monsters attack, first of all you have to block their attacks with the shield. DId you get all that?”
“Y-Yes, leave it to me!!”
“Next, Jeet. You should be behind Zlatan, on the right. Focus on the area on the right and behind the team, most of all. When the fighting starts, and Zlatan holds back the enemies’ attacks, take them down with your sword. Basically, you and Zlatan will be defeating enemies together. Is that clear?”
“Gotcha!”
“Ranga, you’ll be behind Zlatan too, on the left side. Stay slightly behind Jeet too, and focus on the areas on the right and behind you. Always keep them within your field of sight, giving them advice when they need it. Don’t go forward, even if they start fighting. Keep watching the surroundings and intervene only if they make mistakes. If someone ends up getting hurt, know that it’s going to be your fault. Okay?”
“Sure! It’s a bit boring, but I can do it no problem!”
“All right then. I’ll be following you. We’re training, so I’ll give you orders sometimes. Make sure you listen to me, okay?”
“YEAH!!”
Talking to them about such videogame-like tactics was pretty fun. It was like I was playing the game and raising units at the same time. As I repeated to myself, however, this wasn’t a game, but reality.
We greeted the young woman that was in charge of the gate that day and left.
～
We walked along the path for a while and proceeded towards the plains when we reached the forest. Soon enough, we encountered a Horn Rabbit.
The group took the planned formation: Zlatan managed to attract the monster’s attention without problems.
The fighting started as planned and the group defeated the Horn Rabbit, albeit with some awkwardness.
“Zlatan, Jeet, stay aware of your surroundings! Ranga, let the rabbit’s blood out, then put it in Zlatan’s satchel!”
The two front line members had dropped their guard a bit, feeling relieved after defeating the monster, so my instructions made them shudder. Ranga too had lost focus a little, but promptly followed my orders.
During the process, he asked me a question.
“Tenma, shouldn’t I be the one watching the surroundings? Since I have Presence Detection.”
Ranga had finally acquired the skill, so he surely wanted to use it.
“Sure, if we weren’t training, I’d have you do it. But since we have enough leeway at the moment, it’s better for them to build up experience, so they can learn that skill too. Besides, it’s better for you to learn Dismantling quickly, no?”
While observing the surroundings, the other two were listening to us and nodded.
“You sure thought it through. I guess you have to plan that much, if you want to become stronger…”
In response to Ranga’s comment, Zlatan and Jeet nodded even more fiercely.
After letting the blood out of the rabbit’s carcass, Ranga put it in the satchel Zlatan was carrying.
“In the last battle you were a bit too hasty, Jeet. In this formation you are more safe than when you are fighting by yourself, but you still used too much power when you took down the rabbit. Try to deal a cleaner blow next time, so we can extract more parts from the prey. Let’s go!”
I gave such advice after every encounter.
We were still facing Horn Rabbits, so there wasn’t much to worry about.
“After five encounters, we are getting more confident, I see. You’ve got the basic flow down now. I think Zlatan could carry more prey, but let’s go back to the village once. We might encounter other monsters on the way back, so let’s return while we still have energy to spare.”
We thus headed back to the village. We had two more encounters on the way back, and Zlatan’s movements were slowed down by the weight of the prey he was carrying. The three looked at me with admiration, as if I had predicted exactly how the situation evolved.
In reality, I used the Map skill to direct them where there were monsters, to make them accumulate more experience…
～
We arrived at the village, put down the prey and went out again immediately.
In the second battle, I guided them so that monsters would attack while the group was still dealing with the aftermath of the previous encounter: because of that, Zlatan panicked and failed to hold the monster at bay; Jeet was equally useless. Ranga thus had to interrupt the dismantling process and join the fight.
“Did you seriously not expect that other monsters might come when you’re watching the surroundings? If you just follow orders you’ll never grow!”
The three nodded, silently. After that I led them to being attacked from the side, then from two monsters at the same time.
At about noon, when we returned to the village, they were pretty much drained mentally, but discussed the day’s battles among themselves, while eating meat skewers.
They were going to keep growing on their own now.
I had no intention to push them to the limit any more for now, because I didn’t think it was necessary.
I had come up with a new objective, though. There did not seem to be an established method of training in this world. Today’s training made me feel that it might be interesting to formulate my own and teach it.
Besides, I didn’t think I could lose to someone with the same natural talents as me, but if I don’t test the growth of people with better natural talents, I might end up facing opponents that could be a threat to me.
◇ ◇ ◇ ◇
That night, I called Ranga to the barn.
“Are you finally going to teach me the secret plan?”
Ranga was unusually sharp.
“Yes, that’s right. But it will be pretty rough, and it will take time before you get any results, you know?”
“It doesn’t matter how harsh it is, or how long it takes. I can tell that not only me, but Jeet and Zlatan have been growing lately. It’s fun, but I don’t want to lose to them!”
“I see. Anyway,…for you to become stronger in this village, the only way is to learn new skills, or to raise the proficiency of the ones you have.”
Ranga nodded.
“After learning Presence Detection, I could tell. I can’t pick up on far away monsters yet, but while fighting I can tell if there are monsters hidden nearby. I really should have learned it earlier!”
“That’s what I mean. Use the skills you have as much as you can, and raise their proficiency. Also, try not to train your power and stamina only, but add training to improve your speed and dexterity in your daily routine.”
“Sure, I suppose, but is this the secret plan?”
“Of course not. In order to become stronger, you need the Physical Boost skill. It will improve all of your abilities, it’s absolutely necessary for battle!”
Ranga’s expression became clouded. He was apparently disappointed by learning that the secret plan I told him about was just the Physical Boost skill.
“You know that I used to be an adventurer, of course I know about that skill. I tried learning it in the past, but they told me I didn’t have the right aptitude, so I gave up!!”
“It is true that your affinity for magic is low, so it will be hard for you to learn it. But there is no way that you cannot acquire it no matter what. And the method to learn it is the secret plan!!”
“I can? Are you serious!? It’s one of the reasons why I gave up being an adventurer!”
“Yes, you can. But you will need plenty of effort and time. What are you going to do?”
“Please! I have no plans on returning to adventuring, but it will definitely help me protect my family and the village!”
His answer was much more promising than I expected. To be honest, I imagined he might say he would go back to being an adventurer to make his way up in the world, or something.
I thus proceeded to tell Ranga the details about the secret plan.
“In order to learn Physical Boost, you first need to increase your magic power reserves, become able to detect magic power, and learn Magic Power Manipulation.”
“I know that much! And I can’t do any of that, that’s why I gave up. To increase my magic power, I got to level up, and…”
“Listen until the end, will you!? There’s a way to increase your magic power besides leveling up.”
“S-Seriously?”
“Seriously. Every time you use up all of your magic power, it will increase. Little by little.”
Ranga looked at me, wide-eyed.
“Are you crazy? Using up all of your magic power is taboo!! It can kill you, you know!?”
What? Using all of your magic power is considered a taboo? Well, it can be dangerous if you don’t prepare for it, so I can see why they would treat it like that…
“It is true that it can be dangerous. But if you do it properly, you will be fine.”
I then explained in detail what I meant.
You need your adventurer card, to check your remaining magic power. You use Lifestyle Magic, keeping count of how much magic power is consumed, and make sure you only use up exactly the amount of MP you have. I also added that if you don’t have enough magic power, you will lose a great amount of HP.
Even after the explanation, though, Ranga was still doubtful.
“Have I ever lied to you? Trust me and try it!”
Scared of the taboo, Ranga hesitated. With the correct knowledge, however, he was not going to be in trouble.
I then half coerced him into trying.
～
When Ranga’s MP ran out, he dropped to his knees.
He looked in pain, but he stood back up. I immediately used Appraisal, and confirmed that his total MP had grown by 1.
“Use the adventurer card and check your status.”
Ranga still looked weak, but his expression soon turned into one of surprise.
“Luckily, your max MP increased already. It won’t happen every time, but repeat the process a few times and it will increase again soon. You have to let your magic power recover completely and use it all up, so you can only do it a few times a day at most, but if you keep it up you’ll definitely see results. Your magic affinity is a bit low, so you might need at least 350 or 400 MP before you can detect magic power. But once you can, if you practice moving it around inside your body you should be able to learn Magic Power Manipulation. It will take time until you get Physical Boost, though.”
Ranga was still surprised, but listened intently. The guild card showed clear proof that his magic power had increased, so he probably felt that learning Physical Boost had become a realistic goal.
He apparently forgot about all the taboo stuff already. Good thing that he’s a simple guy…
“If you know this method, Tenma, I guess that you too did…”
I just smiled back in response, then told Ranga to go to bed early and pushed him out of the barn.