Chapter 231 – Academy Arc (5) – Hunting 1
232. Academy Arc (5) – Hunting (1)
There are many outdoor activities for the Department of Combat, but the most representative is monster subjugation.
It’s easy to build recognition and produce clear results without being complicated.
In the case of the Department of Swordsmanship, they regularly conducted activities tailored to the difficulty level for each grade to enhance their practical sense.
It seemed remarkable that the still-youthful students of the academy were taking on such life risks, but in fact, this might be a very modern perspective. It’s not unique to this world either. Even on Earth, a few hundred years ago, there were cases where young boys became officers and had command over soldiers.
And in the first place, if you’re careful, it’s a suitable level where there’s no danger to life.
Even if you find yourself in a critical situation, you can fire a magic flare into the sky, and then an academy official from the area will come to rescue you. They also provide a one-time use artifact that creates a dome-shaped shield, which is said to be borrowed from the Department of Magic. If you use it, the department will bill you for it.
The sun was high in the sky.
-Haa, it’s stuffy.
-Is this the place?
The place we arrived at was a farmland, with a dense forest visible along a straight border.
The sixteen male students, who had been traveling for about four hours since dawn, got out of the carriage and enjoyed the fresh air. As you can tell from the number of people, not all the first-year students came; they were divided by region and date.
And these sixteen male students would be paired up in twos and engage in monster subjugation activities for two nights and three days. In short, it was like a kind of survival game. Perhaps it was to emphasize that there’s nothing more important than thinking and acting for oneself.
The instructors from the Department of Swordsmanship, who had arrived earlier, gathered us shortly after and began to explain.
“When you enter the forest, you will see scattered footprints. They belong to the Creeps. As you’ve heard, they’ve been coming out of the forest and causing occasional damage to the farmland. The local guards are doing their best, but they need some help. That’s why we’re here to train and take care of them. If there are any of you who are scared, speak up now.”
The students chuckled at the instructor’s words.
After all, they were just Creeps.
Creeps are similar in form to goblins, with large heads and short statures, typical humanoid monsters. The difference from goblins is that their skin color is darker, and they tend to act in family units rather than forming colonies. Since there’s a difference in their group consciousness, they’re relatively easy to target. Of course, if you excessively provoke them, all the surrounding monsters will swarm, so you have to be careful about that.
‘The leaves still seem damp.’
It rained when I first met Ferris yesterday, and it seems like it poured quite a bit in this area.
Our group entered a nearby supply depot and received recovery potions, flares, and artifacts from the Department of Magic. Then, the instructor pointed to the rows of basic armor and told us to choose what to wear.
There were light ones, heavy ones, and even clunky plate armor.
Were they testing us?
After thinking it over, I told Lewin to wear the same light leather armor as me. Lewin tilted his head at this.
“Raul, is it okay to go so lightly? It’s not that I don’t trust your skills, but real combat is different…”
“Heh heh heh. That’s right, Raul. Don’t be reckless. Everyone else is fully armed.”
A male student scoffed with an annoying tone, echoing Lewin’s words. As he said, even though Creeps were weak, everyone else was reinforcing their armor in preparation for combat. Looking around, everyone was staring at me as if I was being ridiculous, and it seemed like I was being misunderstood as showing off.
In fact, since most of them were novices, it might be right to play it safe.
But I had my reasons for doing this. Besides, that guy is one of those who look at me with disdain even in the academy.
“Don’t worry. This will be much better.”
“Hmm…”
After whispering that to Lewin, I told him to reinforce his elbows and knees with protectors if he was still worried. Lewin hesitated with a rather reluctant face, but when I kept coaxing him with a confident voice, he followed my suggestion. The instructors didn’t say anything about our light attire and just waited quietly until everyone was ready.
And soon, the two-night, three-day Creep hunt began.
…………
-Kee-ruk! Kruk…!
“They’re coming, Lewin!”
“Okay!”
If you keep going through the forest, you’ll come to a field on the other side.
As each group scattered to start searching, we also encountered four Creeps. As we had heard, they were monsters similar in form to goblins, with animal hides around their waists and wielding clubs or stone hammers as weapons.
We threw down our supplies, quickly took our stances, and swung our swords at the Creeps running towards us. Then, following the arc of the blade, the Creep’s blood spurted out and scattered on the ground.
‘Hmm…’
The chilling sensation of cutting something alive.
I felt a strange unease at the thought of taking someone’s life for the first time, but the fact that they were monsters quickly erased that feeling. The last remaining Creep was running towards Lewin with its stone hammer held vertically, and Lewin, sensing that it was about to jump, dodged the downward strike and finished off the last one with a slash.
And only then did he relax his tense face.
It was a smooth start.
I cut off the tip of a Creep’s thumb as proof and put it in my pocket, then casually praised Lewin.
“You were calm and good, Lewin.”
“Whew…! Even though they’re low-level monsters, to deal with three so quickly. Okay, I have to do my best too.”
“Don’t overdo it. How is it? It was good to wear light armor, right?”
“Yeah. It’s definitely about movement, but the ground condition is…”
It had rained until yesterday, so most of the ground was muddy and unstable. If you were heavily armed in these conditions, you would be asking for trouble.
-Hey…! Damn it. Get these guys off me!
-Wait. You bastards. You’re so cocky…! Eat this!
-Krrruk!
They weren’t widely spread out yet, so when I followed the sound, I soon saw another group, and sure enough, they were having a hard time.
They weren’t veterans, and trying to step on the muddy ground as they had learned while wearing thick armor was not going well. With their center of gravity shifted upwards, they were likely to fall over easily, and then the added momentum could easily cause them to twist their bodies. Since they were inexperienced first-year students, their movements tended to become exaggerated as they got excited.
It must be frustrating when your body doesn’t move the way you want it to.
The Creeps were happily pounding on the armor of the two who had fallen, as if they were playing drums. Eventually, they managed to regain their senses and swung their swords, which they had held onto, and somehow managed to take them down. Then, they took off their helmets and were sweating profusely.
It was the guy who was being cocky at the supply depot earlier.
“Hah hah hah. It’s good that they can’t hurt me…! Hah, I’m really going to die. …What, you guys. Did you come to laugh at us?”
“No, we came to cheer you on. You chose that armor. Endure with all your might.”
“Damn it. What are you talking about?”
The grumbling male students seemed exhausted after just one engagement and immediately took a break on the spot.
The hunt proceeded roughly like this. Then, when night fell, we set up small, cozy places to sleep with the provided tents in what we assumed was a safe area. As I stomped the stakes into the ground with my toes, I couldn’t help but think of my time in the military.
Inside the tent, we did our personal maintenance for the next day’s hunt. Lewin and I shook off the mud from our armor and, most importantly, cleaned the blood off our swords before they rusted.
“…………”
Even though he was tired from his first real combat, my eyes sparkled as I looked at Lewin’s delicate and slender neckline. Lewin, who was sitting a little away, must have felt my strange gaze, and he opened his lips slightly.
“…Why are you looking at me like that?”
“It’s a bit out of the blue, Lewin, but have you heard that you’re pretty even though you’re a guy?”
“Pretty…? What are you talking about all of a sudden?”
“Hmm, I just said what I felt. Sorry if it made you feel bad.”
“Well, well. It’s okay if you’re sorry…”
He was desperately trying to maintain a blank face, but his cheeks were slightly flushed. It seemed like he hadn’t completely abandoned his femininity.
“You really don’t have any hobbies?”
“Hobbies? I just practice swordsmanship in my free time…”
“You’re a complete model student. Lewin, don’t you make a girlfriend?”
“Girlfriend… I’m not really thinking about that right now. …What about you?”
Lewin glanced at me.
“Do you have a girlfriend or anything?”
“No… I don’t have a girlfriend either.”
Just a lot of sex partners.
“I see.”
Lewin finished his sentence and started cleaning his sword again. He was a nice guy, but not very sociable. More than that…
‘I want to take him.’
As I continued to restrain myself and focus on training, the desire to pounce on Lewin was bubbling up. It would be nice if I had a good reason, but my skills were improving so quickly that I couldn’t stop. I was bored, so should I play a little trick here? He’s cute whenever he struggles.
“Lewin.”
“Yeah?”
Clap.
I had a shallow thought and clapped my hands towards Lewin.
His eyes went blank in an instant.
“Can you hear me?”
“Yeah…”
“Lewin, every time you smell my scent, your libido rises, and you want to act on your desires.”
“Libido… I want to act on my desires…”
If two swordsmanship students who sweat a lot live together, there will be plenty of opportunities to smell each other’s scent. Let’s see what happens. And since I ended the sentence with ‘want to,’ not ‘act,’ if Lewin actually does something, it will be of his own will. Maybe I’ll get to see him struggle.
Lewin was still muttering softly.
“Every time I smell your scent…?”
“Yeah.”
“Even more here…?”
“What?”
I unknowingly answered Lewin, who was under hypnosis, with a reluctant voice. Hearing that, it seemed like he had already felt a strange feeling while smelling my scent. I didn’t notice anything… When I asked if he had masturbated, he suddenly closed his mouth even in his hypnotized state, but whatever. Since he was full of energy and healthy, his libido would be high.
It wasn’t that strange.
“Oh, um. Yeah.”
“Okay, I understand…”
With that, I clapped my hands once more, and Lewin instantly returned to his normal state.
Lewin was quietly wiping his sword as if nothing had happened.
“Wait. Some new cloth… It’s already dirty.”
“Okay… ………….?”
I approached him to test if the hypnosis had worked well. When I, who had been sweating all afternoon, got close to Lewin, his expression turned strange after a while, and he slowly moved away from me.
“What, all of a sudden? Do I smell that bad?”
“No, it’s… Ah, it’s nothing. It’s just, it’s a bit close…”
“What’s wrong with that? We’re both guys. You’re weird.”
“…………”
I had given him the suggestion that he wanted to act on his desires, but if he broke down here, he would just be an animal. Naturally, Lewin immediately went into defense mode.
Night.
“Ugh…”
“Ugh…!!”
Since the space was cramped, if I pretended to sleepwalk and slowly approached him at night, the suggestion would be triggered, and his body would tremble once. Then, after some thought, Lewin would slowly roll his body in the opposite direction without waking me up. Since it could negatively affect the hunt, I decided to stop at a reasonable level.
I’ll be able to see something interesting soon.
…………
The Creep hunt went smoothly the next day as well. As I was hunting monsters that didn’t fit my standards, I couldn’t help but think that I was taking things too honestly, step by step. I’d probably be at the top of the rankings at this rate. I should adjust the difficulty higher next time.
And so, two days passed in an instant, and the day of the gathering arrived.
Now, we just had to return to the supply depot by the time the sun was high in the sky.
“Haaam. Time to head back…”
-Kee-ruruk!
-Krrruk!!
As I came out of the tent first in the morning and was enjoying the morning air, I strangely saw Creeps running away somewhere in the distance.
‘Where are they going?’
Just as I was about to think about what was going on, I felt gazes on me from the surroundings.
I naturally turned my head to confirm their presence.
The green creatures had a very familiar appearance, just like in many comics.
